Moffitt Board Member Shares Life Lessons in Leadership and Caregiving

Search the internet for Victor Young, and you’ll discover a true Renaissance man. He is a devoted father and husband, the managing partner of a successful auto group, a co-owner of multiple dealerships, a distillery owner, a movie producer, a life coach and even a helicopter pilot.

Beyond his entrepreneurial ventures, Victor is active in his community, inspiring younger generations by working with organizations such as Florida Youth Inc., where he developed and managed a youth entrepreneurship program. His work with young people extends through programs for aviation, artificial intelligence and robotics.

Victor is also known to be an advocate for those without a voice, especially in health care. He is particularly committed to raising awareness about cancers that disproportionately impact the Black community.

At the heart of all his endeavors, Victor is fundamentally dedicated to serving others. Over the years, this has been reflected in one of his most important roles: a caregiver. It is a position he has stepped into many times as he has supported close family through their cancer journeys.

As the newly appointed chair of Moffitt Cancer Center’s Moffitt Medical Group Board of Directors, Victor will expand his role as an advocate and caregiver to a broader scale. Guiding Florida’s largest multidisciplinary medical group dedicated to cancer care, he brings a personal connection to Moffitt’s patient-centered care.

Life Lessons

Victor’s work ethic was instilled in him early in his adolescent years. He began working for his father, Fred, who started a landscaping and irrigation business in Tampa in 1970. By his teenage years, Victor had advanced to the role of estimator for the company, pricing out jobs for potential clients.

Working alongside his father, Victor learned firsthand the value of a day’s work and how to treat people. He watched his father continually invest in the community around them by mentoring, hiring those who had fallen on hard times and inspiring others to be better.

His father would later take pride in seeing those investments come full circle, as people once in need became able to provide for their families.

With age comes perspective, and Victor carried these lessons into his own career and community work in the Tampa Bay area. He launched businesses and embarked on entrepreneurial endeavors that would provide jobs just like his father.

“My father taught me about living life,” Victor said. “And my mother in her passing taught me about death and leaving a legacy.”

When he was 46, Victor lost his mother, Tossie, to ovarian cancer. It was one of the most impactful moments in his life. This was his first time caring for a loved one battling cancer, and he learned more of life’s valuable lessons from it.

“Her death dialed me into my own thoughts of mortality or going through something physically and medically and how to power through it,” Victor said. “She was so courageous and strong through the whole thing. I remember crying like a baby while my mother comforted me on her deathbed, telling me it’s going to be OK.”

The experience also taught him the importance of seizing opportunities and extending kindness in the moment. His mother showed him that by acting on your desires to bless or assist others now, you ensure a sense of fulfillment and comfort when your own time arrives.

The Role of Caregiver

The strength Victor learned from his mother’s cancer diagnosis prepared him for his next role as caregiver. In 2023, his wife, Tia, was diagnosed with colon cancer and began her own journey at Moffitt. The pair also cared for Tia’s mother, Joyce Austin, who battled both breast and kidney cancer.

Victor’s wife, Tia, was diagnosed with colon cancer in early 2023 and began her own journey at Moffitt. In August 2023, she rang the bell and is now in remission.

“Being a caregiver is like a moment of truth, of what direction you and your family are going to go down for the next couple of months or years until that person is healthy again,” Victor explained. “I have made business decisions, personal decisions and every decision you could possibly make around supporting my loved ones.”

Victor notes that supporting a loved one through a cancer diagnosis is a balancing act. It can be a difficult role, with so much information to digest and countless decisions to consider.

“You are just trying to help that person manage their own situation without taking it over. That is very important,” he said.

In his role as a caregiver, Victor learned the importance of respecting his loved ones’ decisions — even when those choices were difficult.

“It’s like the old saying — ride-or-die person. You go with whatever they say we’re doing. You get in the seat next to them, riding with them to whatever destination they’d like to go at the time. Whether it’s to fight, get treatment, try something experimental or go into a clinical trial,” Victor said. “There are all these decisions that require you to minimize yourself and your own thinking and give them as much information as you can, but at the same time supporting whatever decisions they make along the way. And that’s not always easy.”

For Victor, the most difficult moment as a caregiver was standing by his mother’s side as she chose to end her battle with cancer.

“My mother had a successful round of chemotherapy and radiation. And then when the cancer returned, she said she was good and was done,” he said. “Supporting her and her decision, knowing that we could make her better, was very difficult.”

Advocating for Others

Throughout every chapter of his life, Victor has been an advocate, often speaking for the voiceless or standing up for the helpless. This commitment is central to his purpose and a key reason he supports Moffitt.

“After losing both of my parents, it really shed light on how we’re never prepared in life to receive a life-threatening diagnosis. So advocacy is a big thing for me,” he said. “It is crucial to make sure everyone has access to premium care because unfortunately, not all institutions are created equally.”

Victor Young shows his support for Moffitt with Valerie Goddard, chair of the George Edgecomb Society, and B. Lee Green, PhD, whose research focuses on cancer health disparities.

Within Moffitt, Victor felt a deep connection where his passion and beliefs aligned. Victor originally joined the Moffitt Medical Group board in 2018. He later became involved with other Moffitt initiatives such as the George Edgecomb Society and the Health Equity Partners, both of which support work that focuses on eliminating cancer health disparities by ensuring equitable health outcomes among Black patients.

Aligning with his focus on closing the gap on health care disparities, Victor’s passion also led him to work alongside Moffitt’s Foundation, where he plays an active role in raising funds for researchers who study cancers that disproportionately impact the Black/African American community.

Victor says he couldn’t ask for a better organization to dedicate his time and service.

“It’s part of my legacy,” he explained. “We all give our time, talent and treasures to the places that are near and dear to our hearts, and this is something that’s near and dear to mine.”

And just like his father, Victor has seen his own advocacy work come full circle.

“So many people around me have benefited from the work I do to help others” he said. “Then, it’s on your own doorstep or in your own house.”

When Tia was diagnosed with colon cancer in the beginning of 2023, Victor knew Moffitt was the best place for her to be. After successful treatment, Tia rang the bell in August 2023. She is now in remission.

Execution Is Power: A Motto for Success

Peeling back the many layers of Victor Young reveals a multidimensional man, and at the core of it all he lives by a driving motto: “Execution is power.”

In every facet of Victor’s life, whether personal or professional, he believes that being committed enough to get things done fosters trust and respect. And although commitment is essential, the follow-through is what sets someone apart.

This motto is reflected in his advocacy for cancer patients and his leadership at Moffitt. As the chair of the Moffitt Medical Group Board of Directors, Victor now channels his passion and expertise into ensuring access to premium care for all.

His life’s work — rooted in the principles of compassion, advocacy and execution — continues to inspire and impact countless lives, creating a lasting legacy of resilience and generosity.

This article originally appeared in Moffitt’s Momentum magazine.