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Build

A web show where Poornima Vijayashanker, the founder of Femgineer, interviews guests on topics related to startups, entrepreneurship, software engineering, design, product management, and marketing. Sponsored by Pivotal Tracker.
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Now displaying: Category: general
Mar 25, 2019

We began this month exploring the theme of career transitions. In the first Build episode for this month, we talked about why even if we want to transition in our careers, we don’t and get stuck in a role. If you missed the last episode of Build you can check it out here.

If you were wondering how to get unstuck, then today’s episode is for you! We’re continuing our conversation with Amy Sun who is a partner at Sequoia Capital, a venture capital firm. Amy began her career as a product manager, transitioned to a product manager and most recently became a venture capitalist. Having gone through a number of transitions herself, she’s learned to navigate them in a number of contexts.

Even if you aren’t going through a transition yourself, it’s a valuable episode to tune into, because as a teammate, hiring manager, or leader you may find yourself working with someone who is going through it, and you’ll be equipped to help them out!

As you tune into today’s episode you’ll learn:

  • How to avoid being typecast into a role and be your own advocate

  • How to figure out what companies are looking for within a role

  • How long it can really take to go through a transition and how to keep your motivation up

  • Why short trial periods can be helpful, and how to set expectations and criteria for grading performance

  • How to get feedback and build awareness to improve

  • How to transition between companies versus across roles within a company

  • How to fill in skills gaps, build trust with peers, and present to leaders

“The opportunity won’t just present itself one today. Believe that you want it. And then tell people you want it. Sometimes you’ll get push back. Even if you do, you have to continue to fight for it, if you believe that’s the path that you want to go down.” — Amy Sun, Partner at Sequoia Capital

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Build is produced by Femgineer (http://femgineer.com/).

Mar 12, 2019

Career transitions are tough for all of us. Leveling-up or transitioning into a new role or field is challenging because we have to prove that we can do the job, especially when our resume doesn’t reflect relevant or exact experience recruiters or hiring managers are looking for.

 

The countless rejections may cause us to want to stay in our current role and hope that someone will acknowledge our skills, talents, and efforts.

 

However, we cannot build a career on hope alone!

 

In today’s episode of Build, we’re going to share what holds people back from advocating for themselves successfully, and in the next episode, we’ll dig into ways you can make the transition happen.

 

To help us out, I’ve invited Amy Sun who is a partner at Sequoia Capital, a venture capital firm. In case you’re curious, Amy’s firm Sequoia Capital has been investing in companies since 1972. They have invested in 250+ companies, and some notable ones are Apple, Google, Oracle, PayPal, Stripe, YouTube, Instagram, Yahoo! and WhatsApp.

 

Last year at Grace Hopper, Sequoia Capital was the sponsor for a workshop I was co-teaching with Karen Catlin, which gave me the opportunity to meet Amy. After the workshop, Amy and I had the chance to chat, and I learned about her exciting background and thought it would be wonderful to share it with you.

 

What surprised me was that Amy didn’t start her career with the intention of becoming a venture capitalist; her first real job was as a snowboarding instructor!

 

After graduating from college, she began her career in tech as a product marketer, then eventually became a growth marketer and product manager.

 

As you tune into today’s episode, here’s what you’ll learn from Amy:

 

  • How to deal with the inner critic inside each of us who worries about: “What people are going to think” and get your foot in the door in spite of it
  • How to suss out if you are missing experience
  • How to handle roles that are and aren’t clearly defined or vary between companies
  • The value of shadowing people and doing your homework
  • How happenstance and luck play into transitions

 

“If you think about your career as the sum of all the knowledge you have—it’s not like you’re throwing away all the experience you’ve had in the past to start from scratch. Having a diverse set makes you more uniquely qualified for certain roles. So rather than holding yourself back by thinking: ‘Oh I don’t want to start from the ground (zero), and all my experience before is useless,’ think about it as compounding upon each other.” — Amy Sun, Partner at Sequoia Capital

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Build is produced by Femgineer (http://femgineer.com/).

Jan 21, 2019

Do you ever feel like you’re caught between making personal concessions and compromises in order to advance professionally?

 

I felt this way less than six months ago.

 

I was getting ready to transition from maternity leave back to work. Part of my transition plan was to initially work part-time so that I’d have time to rest and take care of my little one. Running my own business would give me the freedom and flexibility I needed to do this.

 

However, during my maternity leave, I became overly concerned with providing for my little one. As I transitioned back to work, I decided I need to think about taking on more clients.

 

A dear friend of mine had advised me to create a document with non-negotiables so that I wouldn’t be tempted to make concessions and compromises for things I needed from a client.

 

But I was concerned about how clients would perceive my non-negotiables.

 

In today’s episode of Build, I’m going to share how I went through this transition last year.

 

Once you’ve listened the episode, I’d like to know what was the last career transition that was spurred by a life event for you? How did you manage to pull through without compromising on what you needed? Feel free to tweet your response to @poornima.

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Build is brought to you by Femgineer (http://femgineer.com/).

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Femgineer's Confident Communicator Course 2019 is coming up! To learn more visit:

https://femgineer.com/confident-communicator-course/

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Enjoyed this episode and want to support the show?

To become a patron of the show visit:

https://www.patreon.com/build

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## Easy to Set Non-Negotiables But Hard To Stick To Them Transcript

 

Career transitions are tough. Especially when they are spurred by life events.

 

They can feel endless, overwhelming, and cause us to shortchange ourselves by making concessions and compromises on what we need.

 

In today’s Build episode I’m going to share a recent transition I went through and how I managed to get through.

 

So stay tuned!

 

Welcome to Build. The show that debunks a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies and your career in tech.

 

I’m your host Poornima Vijayashanker.

 

I had previously mentioned that I’d be experimenting with the format of Build, so today’s show is a solo show with just me.

 

I’m curious to hear your take on it. As always, feel free to leave a comment below. I don’t always have time to respond but I’m always listening, reading, and learning from audience members like you ;)

 

Last year, in the midst of my maternity leave I started to worry, more so than I usually do, and specifically about money.

 

I had previously written some blog posts about how I had gone through a round of interviews at companies, and ultimately decided that running my own business was going to provide me the most flexibility and freedom.

 

Somehow all the logic had seeped out of my postpartum brain and been replaced with a need to provide for my newly born child.

 

Despite being a good saver, and being a part of a dual income household, staring at my medical bill for the delivery made me worry about all the unexpected expenses that would start creeping up.

 

I’m a strong believer that I tight budget isn’t enough. You also have to make money.

 

So I thought about all the things I could do. I could answer all the emails that were piling up from recruiters or I could start working on the course I wanted to offer in the fall.

 

But this was 6 weeks into my maternity leave, I was having a really hard time summoning the energy to do something new.

 

Not to mention having the time to do it.

 

I’d need time and energy to either prepare for interviews or market a new course. Plus I’d have to persuade others that I was credible.

 

I re-read my own advice, and realized I needed to find a way to cash in on credibility that I had already built up without compromising on my non-negotiables.

 

That meant instead of proving myself to someone new, I needed to go back to working with people who knew I was credible.

 

I called up a client that I had worked for back in 2014 and 2015 to see if they needed help. They did and they didn’t need it until I was done with my maternity leave. So the timing was on my side.

 

There were just two catches: I need to commute up to SF and they had reduced their contractor rates.

 

Both of these directly conflicted with 2 of my non-negotiables, which were working commuting only two days a week and my rate.

 

I decided I wasn’t going to budge on how I priced myself, and told my client to check if there was more budget.

 

I reminded my client that I was reliable, and they remembered the quality of work that I had done.

 

I was also fortunate to have others vouch for me.

 

I put the ball in my client’s court and waited patiently for their response.

 

My client came back and asked me if I would accept working 2 days at the rate that fit into their budget.

 

I happily agree to the terms because it was exactly what I needed as I transitioned back to work.

 

What I re-learned is that you can go back to a client or company, especially if you have built up credibility there, and it helps to have more than one person vouch for you.

 

Finally, I re-learned the importance of having set non-negotiables.

 

As I was negotiating on the phone call, I made sure to pull them up and have them stare right at me!

 

Now, if you’re willing to share, I’d like to know what was the last career transition that was spurred by a life event for you? How did you manage to pull through without compromising on what you needed? Please let me know in the comments below!

 

That’s it for this episode of Build. Feel free to share it with your teammates, your friends, and whomever you think might be going through a tough transition.

 

And subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive more episodes.

 

Ciao for now!

Dec 10, 2018

Last week on Build, we shared what allyship is and why it can help build inclusive workplaces. Anytime new approaches like these come out our defenses go up because it can be challenging to change mindsets and best practices. Plus there’s some fear around what the unintended consequences will be.

 

I hear ya!

 

Here’s the thing about allyship, you don’t need to get the green light from someone at the top or put in a ton of effort to make an impact. Turns out there are everyday actions that can benefit your team and workplace and make you a better ally.

 

In today’s episode, we’ll be sharing them with you to help you get started as an ally!

 

To help us out, I’ve invited Karen Catlin, co-author of Present! A Techie’s Guide To Public Speaking, a leadership coach, and an advocate for inclusive tech workplaces. You may recall seeing Karen in a few episodes from last year on mentorship.

 

I invited Karen back on to the show to talk about the work she has been doing coaching allies.

 

Given Karen’s rich career in tech spanning 25 years, she has a lot of experience to draw from, and it has inspired her to help other become better allies and create inclusive workplaces.

 

Here’s what you’ll learn as you watch today’s episode:

 

  • How You Can Get Started Being An Ally
  • How Karen went about testing a number of simple everyday actions people can take to being an ally
  • 3 simple everyday actions you can start to take immediately
  • How Companies Have Benefited From Allies Taking Simple Everyday Actions
  • A Best Practice For Being A Better Ally In Your Community

 

Want to get in touch and learn more from Karen?

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Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

 

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## 3 Simple Everyday Actions You Can Do To Be A Better Ally And Create An Inclusive Workplace Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     In the last episode, we talked about what allyship is, and why it's important for helping with diversity in the workplace today. If you missed that episode, I've included a link to it below this video. In today's episode, we're going to dive into some best practices on how you can become a better ally through simple, everyday actions. So stay tuned.

                                                 

Welcome to *Build* brought to you by PivotalTracker, I'm your host Poornima Vijayashanker, in each episode of *Build*, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech. Now two big misconceptions that a lot of folks have when it comes to being an ally for diversity is thinking that they need to have a green light from some high level executive in order to have their initiative come out, and thinking that the initiative has to make a big impact in order to even pursue it.

                                                 

Well it turns out that there are some everyday actions that you can do that will cause a ripple effect and improve diversity in your workplace, and we're going to share what those are in today's episode. And to help us out, Karen Catlin is back. Karen is my co author for our book Present, she's also a leadership coach and an advocate for diverse and inclusive workplaces. Thanks for coming back on the show.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Thanks so much for having me again.

 

What Allyship Is And Why It’s Important

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah, so let's do a quick recap for people who might be joining us. Tell us what allyship is, and again why it's important today.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Mm-hmm (affirmative), so allyship is simply using your position of privilege to make more inclusive workplace, and help other people be successful if they don't have quite as much privilege as you. And this is so important today, because we have a war on talent, it's hard to hire people so you want to cast a wide net and keep those people once you've hired them, keep them productive and working hard at your company, and stayed, staying there.

                                                 

And, there are all these studies showing the economic benefits, benefits of improved innovation, problem solving, and decision making. So that's why it's important.

 

How You Can Get Started Being An Ally

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah. So let's talk about how people can get started, because I'm sure there's people in our audience who would love to get started as an ally.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Yeah, so it's really not that hard. And I love the way you started out saying you don't have to have a huge initiative, you don't have to be the VP of people at your company, or head of diversity and inclusion to start being an ally. You simply I think need to just start paying attention to what's going on around your workplace, and raising awareness yourself, and if you're not really aware of like what are some of the things I could be doing, it's fine to ask someone who is an underrepresented gender, or minority, just ask them for some feedback of what are some of the challenges you're facing, and what's one thing I could be doing to help you out?

 

How Karen Catlin Went About Testing Simple Everyday Actions People Can Take To Being An Ally

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     So in your upcoming book, you provide a myriad of best practices, but before we dive into some of those, let's talk about how you went about testing these practices.

 

Karen Catlin:                     So I start testing these ideas actually on Twitter.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     OK.

 

Karen Catlin:                     About four years ago, I started a Twitter handle called @betterallies. And it was anonymous, it still is anonymous until this show actually.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                     And I started tweeting simple, everyday actions that someone could take to create a more inclusive workplace. And my whole goal was that I didn't want it to be, you didn't have to feel like you were the head of people at your company, or head of diversity and inclusion to make a difference. It really was something that the normal person could do. So I started tweeting these ideas based on my experience working in tech, based on coaching clients I had, as well as the research that was being published at the time of the challenges that are happening in tech workplaces as well as other workplaces by people who are underrepresented.

                                                 

Based on the reaction, I kind of started realizing, OK that works, that's helpful, that's not so helpful, and where it was helpful it was really helpful, and I started getting again, positive reinforcement that these messages were making a difference to the people who were consuming them. And checking out my Twitter handle too it's like, there's some, you can use Twitter Analytics to find out a little bit about your demographics.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Mm-hmm.

 

Karen Catlin:                     And I have about 50% followers who are men, 50% women, so I know that there are a lot of men who are paying attention to this and appreciating the content.

 

How Companies Have Benefited From Allies Taking Simple Everyday Actions

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Nice. I know you've coached some men, so do you mind sharing maybe one or two examples of how these best practices have helped their team, or their company?

 

Karen Catlin:                     Sure. One that's just so memorable to me is I was coaching a man about, he wanted to hire more diverse talent for his team, and we started talking about just different aspects. I asked him just so how does the team socialize today, like you know, to go out to lunch or after hours? What's social life like for the team? And he looked at me, and he said, oh, you mean I probably should've told those guys going to the strip club for lunch last week that that's not cool? I'm like yeah maybe that wasn't exactly the most inclusive social event.

                                                 

He honestly like, bless him, he just hadn't realized how other people might feel that they couldn't go out to lunch that day with some of the team members, right. Another example is some of the language we use, and I know Pivotal Tracker I was reading a blog post that they now have something in their daily stand up, and in their bill process for the week called the Inclusion Thing of the Week.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Oh, cool.

 

Karen Catlin:                     And they just come up with the idea of something they can be doing to be more inclusive, and they talk about in their daily stand ups and everything, and one of them was simply don't use the word “guys.” Some people may be thinking, “Wait a second Karen, what do you mean? Guys is gender neutral, we use it all the time.” To them, I always like to say well if you were a woman, you need to use a public restroom, and there was a door marked guys, do you go in? Probably not.

                                                 

Or if someone were to ask you, a man, how many guys did you date in high school? They're not thinking women, right there, right? So “guys” is not gender neutral, so that's another thing that as Pivotal Tracker learned is a simple thing they could do. As I've started coaching other people too, examples come up such as, “Well what's your spirit animal?”

                                                 

Well maybe that's not very inclusive because spirit animal is actually an important part of some Native American cultures, and spiritual component of it. So it's really kind of appropriating their culture. So I can't believe this is such a beautiful example of an alternative. Why not use patronas instead from Harry Potter right? So just swap that out, and have everyone feel that they can be included in the conversation.

 

Best Practice #1 For Being A Better Ally And Creating An Inclusive Workplace: Reviewing How We Give Feedback To Women Versus Men

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Got it. OK so let's dive in now and have you share three best practices from your book.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Yeah. So the first one I'll share is all about performance feedback. People who do research into performance feedback have done things like study performance reviews, written performance reviews, thousands of them, and found that there is gendered difference in how we give feedback to women versus men. Some of that gender difference shows up in the form of the feedback that we give to women is more vague.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     OK.

 

Karen Catlin:                     And with men, it's more specific. We're telling men more often that this is how your work has impacted the business, here's how you can keep impacting the business, here's a skill you need to learn to have a bigger impact on the business. And with women less so, it's more vague. And at the same time there have been studies showing that we actually tend to hold back from giving constructive feedback, the hard feedback, to people who are different than us.

                                                 

So whether that's a different gender, different race, or so forth, we hold back from giving the constructive feedback probably because we don't want someone to think that oh he's only giving me that feedback because I'm a woman. So as a man we might think I don't want to give a woman feedback because she's going to think I'm sexist if I criticize her. I don't want to give a person of color feedback if I'm white, because they're going to think I'm racist, right.

                                                 

So we hold back, and we soften the feedback. But that doesn't do anyone any good, right.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                     We really need that feedback, constructive as well as the positive feedback to keep growing our careers. So in the book there's a whole chapter on giving feedback with best practices of doing things like looking at the language you're using, and are you actually tying the feedback that you've giving someone to their performance? And to the impact they're having on a business?

                                                 

Are you providing skill based suggestions about how they can grow their career that way? And, at the end of the day, are you writing reviews of roughly the same length for men and women, for all of your staff? Because that's one indicator that you might be skimping on the feedback, real easy thing to check.

 

Best Practice # For Being A Better Ally And Creating An Inclusive Workplace: Give Credit To An Idea’s Owner Publicly

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Nice. Well that's a very comprehensive best practice, thank you for sharing. Do you have another one?

 

Karen Catlin:                     Sure, pay attention to what happens in meetings. So much of tech and frankly any workplace is driven through meetings. And, in meetings there are a number of dynamics at play that really prevent people who are in the minority from speaking up and fully participating. Perhaps it's that they are interrupted, we've talked about that already.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yep.

 

Karen Catlin:                     And number of reasons why that might happen, but if that is part of your culture, or perhaps there are some repeat offenders who interrupt frequently, that could be something you could be paying attention and stopping. It could be that the ideas are not being credited appropriately when women or people in minority positions are bringing them up.

                                                 

It may be that someone's asking a question, like in a client meeting of what they, they asked the question to the person who they think is in the power position of the meeting. Probably a man, when really it should go to a woman. So redirect that question to well, you say something like, that question would be best answered by Poornima, the founder of Femgineer, like throw that question to the right person. So look for ways that you can create more inclusive meetings by just paying attention to these social cues that are happening.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Got it. So this is great in meetings, but I think sometimes we're not sure if we're doing it the right way. So is there a way we can solicit feedback from our peers, from our boss?

 

Karen Catlin:                     Yeah, why not use the back channel?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     OK, yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                     The back channel that's in any meeting, I mean we all use them right. The DM's or the text messages, private chats to just like touch base with people, like what did you think of that point they just made? Or did I clarify everything I should've clarified? We're constantly using the back channels, why not just ask people in the meeting that you trust, have someone DM you when you could've been a better ally, when you could've stood up for someone who was interrupted or had trouble making a point in the meeting, or whatever it is right. Use the back channel.

 

Best Practice #3 For Being A Better Ally And Creating An Inclusive Workplace: Saying No To Office Housework That Isn’t Your Job

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     OK. Your third best practice that you'd like to share with us.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Yeah, so the third one is I think I'll choose office housework. So office housework is the stuff that needs to happen in any office and it's no ones job really to get it done, and it's important work, but not really leading to business growth, career growth, and so forth. The classic example is taking the minutes at a meeting. When that's not your job.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     OK.

 

Karen Catlin:                     That's your job, that's not office housework, that's your job. But if it's no ones job and you just have called a meeting and someone needs to take the minutes, it often falls on the shoulder of a woman sitting around the table. The problem with that is the person taking the minutes is usually a step behind, so they're not participating in the meeting at full force so to speak, so they're being left out, their voice is counted as much. They're also put in a subservient position to maybe their peers who are sitting around the table, and that's not fair, and that might have longer impact right, well beyond the meeting.

                                                 

So it's much better to set up a rotation.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah. Actually did that at my second startup, yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Excellent, so you were a great ally there. But office housework isn't just meeting minutes, it's also things like maybe it is someone's got to clean up all the comments in the code before we ship it off to our partner, or to make it open source, right. That important work needs to happen, but it doesn't really lead to career growth, right. It could be oh we need someone to mentor the intern again this summer, Susie did it the last five summers and she's awesome at it, right.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Right. Maybe Susie doesn't want to do it again, she wants to do something else, yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Exactly, because the first time yeah maybe there's some career growth area, you learn to mentor, you learn to have that leadership skill, but the fifth time you've probably mastered it and maybe it's time to spread the wealth.

 

A Best Practice For Being A Better Ally In Your Community

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah, that makes sense. So these three are great for inside your company, do you have maybe a couple best practices you would share for the community at large?

 

Karen Catlin:                     Sure, so I think we should think about our networks, the networks we build professionally. Our networks, and there's research on this too, that they become very homogenous, or just like me, because we meet people and hang out with people, and connect with people, and stay in touch with people who we share some common interest with, right. So it's not that that can't cross gender bounds, or racial bounds or anything like that, but we tend to have networks that are primarily just look like us.

                                                 

So the impact of that is that then we only have people who are like us that we connect with opportunities, whether that is to get a new job, or to speak at an event, or some other career growing opportunity, right. We recommend people in our network. So the call to action here is diversify your network. The next time you're out at any kind of professional event, go say hello and introduce yourself to someone who does not look like you.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Whatever that means right. Start a conversation, see if you can't connect them with an opportunity, and reverse might happen to. So diversify our network I'd say is the first one. The second thing is, and this is such an important part of being an ally is, don't just be a bystander, or like I don't do these bad things, right. Be an upstander. When you see something bad happening, don't just like say that's not my problem, like say something, and see something, say something.

                                                 

There is a story that was shared on Twitter just I think a week or two ago of a woman saying that one of the worst things that ever happened to her as a public speaker was that there's a man who asked a question during the Q&A and kind of demanded to know was she single, because he wanted to pursue things with her. And at the time, I mean I wish there had been an upstander in the audience who would just stand up and say basically, hey dude, we don't do that here.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Right.

 

Karen Catlin:                     That's all it takes, defuse it and put the guy in his place, and show some support for the woman.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Yeah. Well you remember when I was in Canada, I fortunately had a team that helped when I had a heckler in the audience, and just kindly took this gentleman outside, and I could kind of move on with my Q&A, so it helps to have those folks in your kind of corner.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Yes, absolutely.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     So be one of those people.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Be one of those people, yes.

 

Better Allies: Everyday Actions For Creating More Inclusive Engaging Workplaces

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     So I know we just scratched the surface. So tell us more about the upcoming book as well as how people in our audience can work with you.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Yeah, so the book is *Better Allies: Everyday Actions for Creating More Inclusive Engaging Workplaces*. And you can get in touch with me at KarenCatlin.com, but I really encourage you to follow @betterallies on Twitter, or other social channels, we're on Instagram, Pinterest, and Medium as well. And there's a newsletter also so if you go to betterallies.com you can get the subscription link to the newsletter.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Wonderful, thank you.

 

Karen Catlin:                     Yeah, thank you.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:                     Well I can't wait to read Karen's book, and that's it for this episode of *Build*. Be sure to share this episode with your teammates, your friends, your boss, anyone who you think may be wanting to be an ally, and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode. Ciao for now.

                                                 

Dec 3, 2018

As the year comes to a close, you’re probably getting ready to attend a holiday party, maybe your company’s. And maybe you’re concerned about what to talk about with your teammates and boss. Diversity and inclusion may be hot buttons to stay clear of, especially with people scrutinizing practices and scoffing at the benefits.

 

But you know it’s important…so what can you talk about? How can you set your team and company up to see a change next year?

 

Allyship.

 

Wondering what it is and how to be a better ally? Well in today’s episode, we’ll cover what allyship is and how it can help you build a more inclusive company.

 

To help us out, I’ve invited Karen Catlin, co-author of Present! A Techie’s Guide To Public Speaking, a leadership coach, and an advocate for inclusive tech workplaces. You may recall seeing Karen in a few episodes from last year on mentorship.

 

I invited Karen back on to the show to talk about the work she has been doing coaching allies.

 

Given Karen’s rich career in tech spanning 25 years, she has a lot of experience to draw from, and it has inspired her to help others become better allies and create inclusive workplaces.

 

As you watch today’s episode, you’ll learn the following:

 

  • What an ally is and what allyship is
  • How people can develop an awareness for allyship
  • Why you don’t need to be a leader to be an ally in your company
  • Why men care about being an ally
  • How to spot or approach an ally to work for

Want to get in touch and learn more from Karen?

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

--

## How Being An Ally Can Help You Create An Inclusive Workplace Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         You've probably read a number of headlines around discrimination in tech. Despite all of the diversity initiatives, it seems like change is pretty slow. So, what can we do to make change faster, both in our teams and our companies? Allyship. If you're not familiar with what allyship is, well, in today's *Build* episode we're gonna talk about it. So stay tuned.

                               

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode of *Build*, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech. As you're well aware of, diversity is a hot topic today. There are a number of practices, but people are scoffing at their benefits and they're wondering if there can really be anything done in the near term.

 

Well, there is a new approach called allyship. In today's episode, we're gonna share how allyship can help you and your company. To help us out, I invited Karen Catlin. Karen is my co-author on our book, Present. Karen is also a leadership coach and an advocate for inclusive tech workplaces. In the episode today, we're gonna be talking about what allyship is, why it's important, and in the next episode, we'll be sharing some of the best practices that you can put in place every day.

 

Karen Catlin:                  Thanks so much for having me on the show again, Poornima.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                  It's great to be here.

 

Why Diversity And Inclusion Have Been On A Decline In Tech For Two More Than Two Decades

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Thanks for coming on. You've had a rich career in tech. Why don't you share with us what you've done, as well as problems you've experienced over that time?

 

Karen Catlin:                  Yeah, so I spent about 25 years working in tech. I started out as a software engineer writing code for a living, and over time moved into management roles, and eventually into executive leadership. Most recently, I was a VP of Engineering at Adobe Systems. During that time, I definitely saw this interesting thing happening where there was a decline happening in the number of women coming into the field. There's a lot of research that backs this up, but there are just fewer women studying computer science. Not that that's the only way you get into tech, but it is definitely a key way, here in Silicon Valley, to get into tech.

                               

So, there's a decline happening with the number of women who are into the field, and at the same time, women leave tech at twice the rate of men at that mid-career point. As a result, over the 25 years that I spent working in tech, I really saw the impact. I saw that there were a lot fewer women around and less diversity in general.

 

Beliefs That Have Held Leaders Back From Creating An Inclusive Workplace

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Were there specific problems that maybe you incurred or you saw happening within the companies?

 

Karen Catlin:                  Yes. And I worked for some really good companies, so I don't wanna throw my companies under the bus that I used to work for at all. But I will say that most of the men I worked with really, firmly believed that their company was a meritocracy, that you got ahead based on your merits, that if you worked hard and did good work you'd be recognized and promoted. But the numbers just really didn't back that up. In any company there are more women in the entry level, and as you get up to the C level, it just declines like a pyramid. So, definitely there was something going on.

                               

Personally, some of the things I witnessed...and I think this will resonate with a lot of women who are watching this, is something called bro-propriation where you say something in a meeting, as a woman, and it's a pretty good idea but it kinda falls on deaf ears, doesn't really go anywhere. And then in the same meeting, a little bit further on, somebody says the same thing, usually a guy because there's mostly men in the meetings. A guy says the same thing in the meeting, and gets all the credit. We call that bro-propriation, because a bro has appropriated your idea, of course. That happened to me so many times.

 

Examples of Unconscious Acts That Contribute To A Lack Diversity And Inclusion In The Workplace

                               

Then there's also this thing, and it still happens to this day, where people give me what is called an unconscious demotion. An unconscious demotion...I bet this has happened to you, too. You meet someone for the first time and you might say, "Oh yeah, I work in tech." And they say, "Do you work in HR or marketing?" That's an unconscious demotion. Nothing wrong with those fields at all, but if you're a woman who's already in a very male dominated field, like engineering, computer science, tech in general, it's like this yet another reinforcement that you don't belong there. That's just not cool.

                               

It happened to me just a couple months ago. I was visiting my husband at his office and I met one of his new colleagues. Sure enough, he said, "What do you do?" I said, "Well, I used to work in tech, was VP at Adobe for a long time." And just told him something like that. And said, "Oh, well at Adobe, were you in marketing or HR?" I mean, literally, he said those words, and I just kind of...I wanted to punch him. But I ended up just sort of smiling and saying, "Actually, I was a VP of Engineering."

                               

So those are just a couple examples of things I've seen. I could share some more, but I think you probably have some more questions you wanna get to.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah, of course. It's unfortunate that you're experiencing this and seeing this happen inside of your companies and other companies. Were there things that you were also seeing in the community at large over the years?

 

Karen Catlin:                  Yes. Definitely started seeing...First of all, in support of women as well as other kinds of diversity, there's a lot of activity going on, a lot of conferences, a lot of discussions, a lot of research. All of that's great. And I'm starting to see men wanting to also really get involved and help with diversity initiatives, help support women in their companies, and so forth. I saw that first hand. I also saw it at places like the Grace Hopper Celebration.

 

The Grace Hopper Celebration...I mean, you and I know. We've been there a number of times—

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         It's the largest technical conference for women.

 

The Origin Story of Better Allies: The Bingo Card At Grace Hopper 2014

 

Karen Catlin:                  Yes, exactly. In 2014, there was something called the Male Allies Panel. It was a panel of men who were leaders at their company, and talking about what they did for women in terms of allyship, to support them, to champion them, and so forth at their workplaces. Unfortunately kinda fell flat. It fell flat because ahead of time, some women were upset that men were taking up valuable stage time at this conference, right?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Sure. Yep.

 

Karen Catlin:                  Some women also were concerned that these men really weren't the best allies.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         OK.

 

Karen Catlin:                  So they created a bingo card. They created a bingo card of phrases they expected those men to be saying that would show exactly how far they still had to go to become real allies. They handed the bingo card out, right? And of course, during that panel, the men were saying different things and falling short, and the women were checking off those bingo squares and started yelling bingo at different points during the panel.

                               

Now, when I heard about this...I wasn't at that panel, I sort of was following it on social media. When I heard about this, I sided with these poor men. These were actually good men, their hearts are in the right place. They wanna do the right thing. They just don't know exactly what women need. They certainly don't know what people of color need, or you put those together, women of color, and so forth. So, I see people wanting to do the right thing but not quite knowing what to do.

 

Why Diversity And Inclusion Initiatives Are Important Now More Than Ever                              

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Got it. Why is this even important, right? There's so many of these diversity initiatives that come out and benefits just are slow-coming or maybe not existent at all in some people's eyes. Why do you think this is important?

 

Karen Catlin:                  Yeah. First of all, especially in the whole me too era right now, you kinda hope that people just wanna do the right thing, and it feels maybe like a moral imperative to support people of all types of backgrounds. So you kinda hope that. But at the same time, there's so much research that shows that diverse companies are more economically profitable and successful, that there's better decision making, there's more innovation, there's better problem solving. It's so many benefits that have been proven in social science and economic research studies coupled with it's the right thing to do. Then you layer on top of all of that, there's a big talent shortfall in tech as well as across the whole United States in terms of we've got the lowest unemployment numbers in...I don't know, in a generation. So, we have a problem finding the talent to fill a position, so why wouldn't you want to cast the widest net possible?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                  One more thing. Women can lean in all they want and all they can, but until we start changing our workplaces so that things that have always been done a certain way change, the women aren't going to be successful. We really need to start looking at our workplaces and changing our workplaces.

 

Why Workplaces Are Slow Or Resistant To Change And Embrace Allyship

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         OK. What do you think is hindering that change?

 

Karen Catlin:                  There are a couple of reasons. I would say one is this is the way we've always done it. Why would we bother changing? An example of that is, well, I've always hired the best people for my network. Why would I go outside of my network? Well, if you don't go outside your network, and your network is your best buds, people who are probably just like you, you're gonna continue hiring people who are just like you and you're gonna have homogenous hiring, right?

                               

So, if we've always done it that way, maybe that's something that's holding us back. Another is that there might be concerns that we are taking away something from men who are in positions of privilege right now, right? If we hire more women or people of color or whatever underrepresented minority you wanna fill in the blank there, if we hire more of those people, there's gonna be less opportunity for me. That's not exactly a growth mindset. If you think about hiring the best people, assembling the best team, the pie and the opportunities are just going to expand and there's gonna be larger slices for everyone as a result. That's another thing that's holding people back.

 

The third, I'll say, is that there's just, at times, a lack of awareness. Unless you're living these situations of being interrupted or having your ideas appropriated and so on, and so on, you just might not be aware it's happened to other people. You might not be aware that...even walking around a trade show floor and seeing maybe a sexy pinup image on a T-shirt or a bumper sticker or something, or a laptop sticker even, you might just think oh, that's sort of funny, not thinking about how a woman might feel is she sees such a sexualized image on a conference swag giveaway. So I think that we need to raise awareness as well.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         What drew you into this?

 

Karen Catlin:                  What drew me into this is this desire, especially after hearing about the bingo card in, at the Grace Hopper panel of all the male allies, that, coupled with just hearing from man after man that I would just be talking to, maybe casually, or coaching, men really being curious of how can I help here, I really do care about diversity. I wanna create a diverse workforce. I wanna work with all kinds of people. I care. I'm a good person. But what am I supposed to do? There really seemed to be this desire without the information.

 

Why Karen Catlin Decided To Become Coach Others Into Becoming Better Allies

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Why did you decide to embark on this mission?

 

Karen Catlin:                  I decided to embark on the mission because I felt like I couldn't not get involved. I really felt like I had a unique perspective. I had been working in tech for 25 years. I understood this industry. I also had this desire to really help make the industry more diverse. I really wanted to have an impact.

 

I started tweeting. After that Grace Hopper conference, I started a Twitter handle called @BetterAllies. I started tweeting answers to this question of what am I supposed to do, and simply talking about here are some simple, everyday actions you can take as an ally to be better for people of all sorts of underrepresented groups in tech.

                               

So I started the Twitter handle. Then I started a newsletter and started getting some really positive feedback from both of those channels. People say Twitter is just a cesspool and everything, but I actually have fan tweets that I get.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Nice.

 

Karen Catlin:                  People like my content. So I got positive reinforcement there. My newsletter is growing like gangbusters, so super happy about that. Again, positive reinforcement. I just decided recently that I had to write a book on the topic, too. I had to take the best of what I learned on Twitter, through what I've been tweeting as well as the reinforcement I was getting there, and the content from my newsletter, and create a book for people to be better allies.

 

What Is An Ally And What Is Allyship

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Let's dig into what allyship is. What is an ally, and then what's allyship after that?

 

Karen Catlin:                  Yeah. So, an ally is someone who uses their position of privilege to help someone who has less privilege. So, in tech, that typically is a white, straight, CIS man who has a lot of privilege. They can use that position of privilege to help others. They can do that by doing things like mentoring, sponsoring, championing, speaking out on behalf of them, looking for opportunities, connecting them to different opportunities, being just somebody who's an all around good person, but not just sitting still, not just not being a bad person, but actually taking action to help promote other people.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Got it. So taking initiative.

 

Karen Catlin:                  Taking initiative, yes.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         You already touched on this, but who can be an ally besides the straight, white male?

 

Why You Don’t Need To Be A Leader To Be An Ally In Your Company

 

Karen Catlin:                  Definitely. So, allyship is not limited at all. That's the beauty, it's anybody can be an ally. You can be a leader at your company. In fact, I'll share a quick story about a leader that was my manager, a senior vice president at one point in my career. I still remember this time. I had just started working for him. I was new to the company, and I was in a very senior meeting with him. I heard him say, "Well, what I learn from Karen is the following." And then he said something.

                               

I thought at the time, first of all, I didn't say those exact words. So he took what I had shared with him in a one-on-one earlier and reframed it in the company speak. So he taught me how to speak the language as a result. But also, what a shout out he gave me. What he, the SVP, learned from me, was the following. So that's a great example of how a leader who has a lot of cred within the organization can be an ally.

                               

But an individual contributor can be an ally, too. An individual contributor sitting in a meeting and noticing someone might keep interrupting another person, might just pull them aside later and say, "Hey, dude, do you know you interrupt a lot?" And just raise awareness. So it's really a job for everybody.

 

Why Men Do Care About Being An Ally

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. I know we're gonna go into more best practices. Thank you for sharing those. I also know that there may be some people in our audience or just wondering are men really interested in this and questioning if they really care. Maybe you can share from your experience.

 

Karen Catlin:                  I'm sure there's some men who don't care, and that's fine. But there are so many men who do care. I get emails from people, they don't even know who I am. They're just emailing to or DM'ing the Better Allies handle, and they're asking for advice. They're asking for advice about...well, with everything that just recently happened around Judge Kavanaugh and the hearings there, how do I actually support women at my workplace who might be feeling upset about the way that Dr. Ford was treated? I'm getting emails, and messages, and questions of things like well, I just got this great job and I'm thinking about taking it, but hiring me is like the opposite of improving diversity, 'cause I'm a white guy and I really care about working at a diverse company that values that, so help me...Should I take the job? And the answer was yes. If you want the job, take it and go in and be an ally and a champion for diversity from your position of privilege.

                               

So, I hear about that. I get questions of just how can I...I want to respect women I work with. Is it cool to invite them out for coffee, for a one-on-one, just to get out of the office. Can I do that? So, there are so many men who are thinking about this very thoughtfully and really want to make sure that they are being supportive and doing the right thing.

 

How People Can Develop An Awareness For Allyship

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         That brings up a good point, that you wanna be well-received should you choose to become an ally. How can people develop an awareness and make sure they're headed in the right direction?

 

Karen Catlin:                  Here's what not to do. What not to do is to assume you're the knight in shining armor riding in to save the underrepresented person from whatever-

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Princess, yeah.

 

Karen Catlin:                  The princess, whatever. Because there are a lot of women who don't need to be saved, frankly, and don't want to be saved and so forth. And so, instead, what I recommend you do to make sure that you're having the right kind of impact, is look for systemic changes as opposed to one off changes where you are maybe just saving the day. What I mean by that is, let's say you notice that someone on your staff is being substantially underpaid for her grade level. You could make just that fix, potentially, if you have the budget and assuming you have control over their salary. You could change the budget for that one person, her compensation.

 

But better is to look more holistically at your department or the company and request that a salary review be done by gender and perhaps by other minority kind of aspects, such as race, or sexual orientation, and so forth. But make a systemic change, not just a one off. So that's something that’s a best practice to follow.

 

How To Spot Or Approach An Ally To Work For

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         For our audience out there who maybe want to work for an ally, how can they approach and spot one.

 

Karen Catlin:                  If you are thinking about in an interview setting, like let's say you're going to a company you wanna be working for, someone who is going to be a good ally for you, perhaps your manager, or perhaps coworkers, during that whole interview process, you can literally just ask them. It's like, so what have you done to support a diverse, inclusive workplace here? Just ask them to give you some examples. And then I think you'll be in a pretty good situation for seeing whether or not they're going to be the kind of allies you want them to be.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Well, thank you for coming on the show, Karen, and sharing what allyship is. I can't wait to read your upcoming book. Maybe you could tell us a little bit about it.

 

Karen Catlin:                  The title of the book is Better Allies: Everyday Actions for Creating Inclusive, Engaging Workplaces. It's coming out early 2019.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Now, Karen and I want to know if you've acted as an ally inside of your company, what did you do and what was the impact that you experienced. Share it with us in the comments below this video.

 

That's it for this week's episode of *Build*. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode where we're gonna be diving into more best practices for becoming an ally. Ciao for now.

Oct 3, 2018

Confession time…

 

A few years ago when someone asked me to explain a technical concept and I couldn’t successfully get through to them or didn’t have time, I would send them this link. ;)

 

And it seemed funny the first couple of times I did it.

 

It wasn’t until someone did it to me that I realized how obnoxious it was. I eventually stopped asking for them for help, because I knew they weren’t very good at explaining things and didn’t have the patience to help me.

 

I also realized that I didn’t want to be like them. I needed to get better at explaining technical concepts. Ever since then, I’ve been on a quest to improve how I communicate technical concepts when I write and speak to people and audiences of varying levels.

 

Part of my discovery led to me Anne Janzer. Anne is a prolific author who has recently written a book called Writing To Be Understood: What Works And Why, and she’s also a cognitive science geek!

 

I sat down with Anne to debunk the misconception that if someone doesn’t understand a technical concept immediately, then it’s their fault. They're too much of a layperson, and they should look it up. But it’s actually the explainer who needs to do a better job of explaining, and in today’s *Build* episode, we’ll explain why!

 

In next week’s episode, we'll provide techniques on how you can get better at explaining technical concepts to a mixed audience or to a layperson.

 

As you listen today’s episode, you’ll learn the following:

 

  • Why people on the receiving end of an explanation find the explainer to be less smart if the explanation cannot be easily understood
  • Why people are bad at explaining technical concepts using simple language
  • Why we assume our audience knows what we’re talking about
  • Why people may not get our explanation
  • The three questions to ask yourself about your audience before you communicate with them
  • Why we have a tendency to overexplain
  • Why overexplaining isn’t helpful either and being brief is better

 

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

--

## Why Doing a Bad Job of Explaining Technical Concepts Hurts Our Credibility Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:  Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies and your career in tech.

 

Now one huge misconception that we all face is that when we're trying to explain a technical concept, if someone doesn't immediately get it, we think, you know what, it's their fault. They're too much of a layperson, and we advise them to just look it up. Turns out, the person who's explaining the technical concept, it's actually their fault for not explaining it.

 

I know that might seem counterintuitive, but in today's episode, we're going to explain why the onus falls on the explainer and in a future episode, we'll give you some techniques on how you can get better at explaining technical concepts to a mixed audience or to a lay person. And to help us out, I've invited Anne Janzer, who is the author of a number of books ranging from writing to marketing and she's kind of a cognitive science geek. Thanks for joining us today, Anne.

 

Anne Janzer:    Thanks for having me Poornima. I'm happy to be here.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   So you've got a new book coming out and it's all about explaining technical concepts and being understood. Maybe you can dive into the origin story for what inspired you to write this book.

 

Anne Janzer:    Sure. So, the title of the book is *Understood*. So it's about writing to be understood and it came from two things in my life. One, is that I spent a lot of my time in the technical industry as a freelance marketing writer working for dozens and dozens of different companies trying to explain these really geeky technologies to a business audience. So that's familiar to most of the viewers.

 

But second, I also, as you said, I'm a bit of cognitive science geek so I love to read all these books about the brain and psychology and behavior and behavioral economics. You notice that some authors are really good at explaining this stuff. And you think, so there's parallels between what they do and what I was doing, which is explaining complicated, abstract topics. So are some people just like born better at this? I don't think so.

 

I took a close look at what these writers do, now I've called up and talked to some of them about what they do which is great. It turns out that there are just methods and techniques and approaches that we can all use to become better at being understood when we're talking about something to people who don't share our knowledge about it.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   So it's great that there all these experts who understand why this is important, but for our audience out there, they're not sure why this is important. We can dive into that in a little more detail.

 

Why people on the receiving end of an explanation find the explainer to be less smart if the explanation cannot be easily understood

 

Anne Janzer:    Yes. So you may not feel like…you may feel, well, I'm the expert. It's not on me to make sure that everybody understands. It's not my problem basically, if I'm explaining it. But it is your problem. It really is and the cognitive science shows that.

 

When you explain something that's complicated and you use words or terms or even writing techniques that they don't understand, you are giving the audience extra cognitive load. You're making them do extra work, not to understand the thing that you're saying, but even to get through to the thing that you're trying to explain to them.

 

Research shows that when people experience cognitive load, certainly while reading, they don't assume that the writer is smarter, they actually assume that the writer is less smart. So when they don't get it, they don't think, gee, I must be stupid, they think, they're not so smart.

 

Anne Janzer:    There's a study by a guy named Daniel Oppenheimer, who's now at Carnegie Mellon, but he did this back when he was at Princeton. I have to read the name of the study because it totally illustrates what it's about. “Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective of Necessity or Problems with Using Long Words Unnecessarily.”

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   Nice. Yeah.

 

Anne Janzer:    Which is great. And in the study they had people look at the same passage written two ways. One in a more straightforward way, one more complex using longer words or one piece sentence construction, let's say. People who read the more complicated ones rated the author as being less intelligent.

 

In one case, even when they knew that the passage was by René Descartes. They were reading translations and they're like, this is René Descartes from his meditations. They're like yeah, he's not that smart. If they read the more complicated one. So if you want to show up as being an expert you have to be understood. And it's on you. It's on you to do that.

 

Why people are bad at explaining technical concepts using simple language

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   So why do you think people get into this habit of being long-winded or maybe using big words?

 

Anne Janzer:    I don't mean to be critical of it, because we all do it. It's a natural thing. If you work in a tech sector for a long time, you're surrounded by people who are all using these abstractions and these terms. You master the complexity of the subject. You're a part of a social group of people who have mastered that complexity. So it's natural to want to speak in a way that people around you understand, use those words.

 

But you need to remember that these abstractions that now come easily to you. Like now you can ride a bike, but a toddler can't ride a bike, looks up at the person riding the bike thinking, yeah, that looks really hard. So that's the situation. That you're really comfortable with these abstract terms, but if you're talking to people outside of your domain, outside of your area, those terms are much more difficult to operate with.

 

Why we assume our audience knows what we’re talking about

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   So it's natural to evolve and get into this in crowd or you're surrounded by people who know. You kind of expect other people to know and then when they don't, you're kind of like, well, just Google it, right. So how can we get over this? This expectation that our audience just knows.

 

Anne Janzer:    Well, we have to remember that we suffer from the curse of knowledge, which is hard for us to remember not knowing the things that we not now know. So some of the times it's not that we're being dismissive of our audience, we're just assuming that they know the things. That these things are familiar to us are familiar to them.

 

So you really have to get outside of your own head for a moment and try to put yourself in the perspective of your audience. That's why the title of my book is Understood. It's not like, explaining, it's understood, because it doesn't matter what the words are coming out of your mouth or your pen. It matters how it sinks into the audience's mind.

 

Why we need to incite curiosity in our audience

Poornima Vijayashanker:   I don't know about you, but I definitely had a few college professors, their names will go unnamed. In their 101 class, kind of expected me to know certain things or to, again, spend the time looking it up. So how can we combat that as well?

 

Anne Janzer:    So that story drives me crazy because the purpose of a 101 class and the job of the professor of that class is to give people enough information but also to incite their curiosity so that they can learn enough to figure out if they want to pursue that field. If they want to learn more or what is useful to them from that class.

 

And in many ways, we all are in that same position as that 101 teacher. When we're talking to people who aren't familiar with our area, our job too, is not to tell them everything I know or expect them to step up to what we want to talk about. Our job is to incite their curiosity about our topic so that they'll pay attention and get something and to give them a little bit more and to lead them into it. That's a whole different way to think about explaining complicated stuff. It's not like I'm going to dump all this stuff on you you need to know. It's I'm going to pull into this topic and bit by bit get you interested in it, tell you how it applies to you and see what goes from there.

 

Why people may not get our explanation

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   So it's good to know that we may suffer from the curse of knowledge and that not everyone is going to have a same level of expertise as us. What are some other things that may get in the way of people understanding when we communicate technical concepts to them?

 

Anne Janzer:    There's a couple things to be aware of and one is that sometimes people think they understand already and you have to work around their existing models of what's happening. People think they understand what's happening, for example, to their data when they go onto a website and use it and then go away. The data stays where they left it. Right?

 

And that's not always the case. So sometimes they think they have an understanding of something. We always talk...if you think about how do you understand using storage. How is stuff stored on your computer? You think, well, I've got a disk, maybe you think you have a directory and then I have a folder and I put files in it. That's nothing like what's really happening underneath. The file may be distributed over many areas of the disk. Some stuff is not on disk, it's in memory.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   It's in the cloud.

 

Anne Janzer:    It's in the cloud. You can't come up to people and say no, you don't know what's going on, you're wrong. So you need to understand what their understanding is and figure out how to work around that.

 

And then there are the topics that people, they want to cling to their understanding of it. They don't want to hear about something that disrupts their understanding of it. That's why, if you search for a swimsuit on a website and then you go to the New York Times and it's serving you an ad for that swimsuit that you just searched for. It can be really distressing, these retargeting ads, because they show us something that we don't want to hear about, which is that we're leaving this huge digital wake of data around that people can use. We find that distressing because we don't want to hear it, but it's there.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   So there's the concept of challenging people's current understanding and then there's a concept of ignorance is bliss.

 

Anne Janzer:    Yes, right, right.

 

3 questions to ask yourself about your audience before you communicate with them

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   So those are both things that we need to be aware of. How can we know...because I know in the next episode we're going to dive into how to get around this. But how can we at least develop an awareness to know which camp our audience may be in?

 

Anne Janzer:    That's the key thing is to think about your audience. I think you need to answer three questions about your audience before you go to speak to them or before you write for them. It's what do they already know about the subject and this requires that you put yourself in their perspective. You may have to talk to people that are like your audience.

 

How do they feel about your subject? Do they have resistance to hearing the message? Is this something that they like talking about? Are they curious or are they showing up for your talk under duress because they have to? That's something you want to know too, right?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   Yeah. My boss is making me come to this.

 

Anne Janzer:    My boss is making me come to this. And the third thing is what makes them curious? What can you use to hook their interest in the topic? What going to make them want to explore more about it?

 

Why over-explaining isn’t helpful either and being brief is better

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   Now one final thing I've noticed, especially with a lot of my students and audience members is they can be on the flip side, where it's not the case that they think they're the expert, but they feel like they really need to go down this path and be very, very long winded about an explanation instead of favoring brevity. So how would you recommend to kind of balance that?

 

Anne Janzer:    So there's two things I want to get at. One is that you need to make a careful distinction between what you want to talk about and what the audience needs to hear. There may be a small overlap and maybe you can widen that by making them more curious, but you need to respect what their needs are. And that's the hardest thing for us as writers to do.

 

When I worked on this draft, I wrote this whole section and I thought, this doesn't serve the book. I had to delete 10,000 words and just put it aside because it wasn't what the audience needed. It wasn't what the readers needed. So that's one thing.

 

Why we have a tendency to over-explain

 

And then second, I would look at the reason why they feel they need to explain everything and often I think it's an attempt to assert some kind of credibility. Credibility is such an important issue, right?

 

It's such a critical issue for speakers, for writers. But the way that we often go about asserting credibility can work against us. If you say, well, I'm going to get up and first I'm going to list off all my accomplishments so they know I'm serious. Or I'm going to just take them through every little experiment, every little process I did to get to this so they see that I worked really hard.

 

These things work against you because the root of the word credibility is believability. That's what it means. Well, to be believed you have to first be understood. So to be credible, you need to be understandable and that means you're going to have to cut out that stuff. People will respect you more, think more of you if they can really understand what you're saying. So if you were meeting their needs rather than asserting your own. So if you come at it from that way, it gives you an understanding for how to be more brief. What to cut and why to cut it.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:   Well thank you so much, Anne, for sharing why our explanations may be convoluted and of course, why we need to do a better job at explaining them. I can't wait until our next episode where we're going to dive into a number of techniques and tactics to help our audience out there when it comes to explaining these.

 

Now Anne and I want to know, when was the last time you had to explain something that was complicated, maybe some technical jargon. Were you misunderstood? And if you were, how did you get over that misunderstanding? What were your techniques? Let us know in the comments below this video. And that's it for this episode of *Build*. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode where Anne and I are going to dive into some techniques to help you be more understood when you're explaining those technical concepts to your audience and to your teammates. Ciao for now.

Jun 18, 2018

All this month we’ve been talking about remote working as it relates to recruiting, training, and retaining remote works. We started out by tackling how to recruit remote workers for people who may be new to it. Then we discussed how to train, hold accountable, and retain remote workers.

 

In the final episode for this month, we’re going to address a BIG concern that often holds people back from recruiting and managing a remote team: the nature of the work that needs to be done.

 

Most hiring managers we talk to are OK with hiring a virtual assistant to handle day-to-day tasks. But when it comes to a mission critical project like launching a startup or handling very important client or customers, going remote seems too risky, and people opt for hiring a team on-site.

 

In today’s episode, we’ll talk about why it boils down changing your process depending on the nature of work your remote workers are doing.

 

Holly Cardew the Founder of Pixc is back to help us out. Holly has grown and scaled her team across Australia and Asia. And has done so in a number of job functions spanning both the business side with roles such as virtual assistants and marketers, to the technical side hiring software developers and designers to build the product.

 

As you listen to today’s episode you’ll learn:

 

  • How to manage a remote team that is working on a mission critical project
  • How customers and clients benefit from a team of remote workers
  • Why facetime is still important for remote teams—especially when kicking off a project
  • How to facilitate facetime amongst remote workers
  • A simple first step for people who are on the fence about hiring remote workers

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

--

## What A Remote Team Needs To Be Successful When Working On A Mission Critical Project Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        In the last two episodes of *Build*, we shared a lot of the benefits of remote working. We also shared some best practices when it comes to recruiting and retaining employees and the processes you want to put in place to keep everybody productive.

                   

In today's episode we're going to share how these processes will change depending on the nature of work so stay tuned.

 

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode of *Build*, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech.

                 

We're continuing our conversation with Holly Cardew who is the CEO and founder of Pixc on remote working. Thanks for joining us Holly.

 

Holly Cardew:       Good to see you again.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Every episode of *Build* is inspired by amazing audience members like you, sharing your experiences and asking insightful questions. Today's episode is also inspired by an audience member, Kai. I want to start by reading an email that Kai sent me because I think it could help many of you who are out there.

 

How to manage a remote team that is working on a mission critical project

                   

Kai wrote, "Hi Poornima, I've been following your show since the pilot episode with Ben Congleton on building a remote team and recently caught the one you did with your team mate Megan as well. Thanks for revisiting this topic of remote working over the years. One thing I've been curious about is how processes change when you're managing a critical project versus a normal day to day? I know for things like startups, or mission critical projects, coordination appears easier when everybody's in the same location. I say "appears" because it can also be a huge distraction. What do you see are the trade offs and how does a remote team dynamic change between a critical project versus normal day to day tasks? Sincerely Kai."

                   

This is a great question Kai, and Holly and I are going to tackle it. So, if you're watching this episode, thank you for writing in. OK Holly, let's start with Kai's first question, which is, what are the trade offs when it comes to these mission critical tasks versus sort of the day to day?

 

Have remote workers be within a few time zones for mission critical projects

 

Holly Cardew:       I think mission critical tasks, you really need to understand what needs to be done and stick to that goal and that time zone. Also, understand that other people, aren't maybe in different time zones and you may need to stay up a bit late or go to bed, you know, I mean may not go to bed till 5 am. Whereas day to day tasks, it doesn't really matter when they happen in the week.

                   

For us, what we've really done is we've kept all our tech and product in Europe. So they're not in the same location, but they are in a similar time zone, so the time difference is really 4-5 hours, five hours max. Which allows everybody to communicate, but I think it can be beneficial, again to have somebody in another location in case there is a customer issue with the technology side.

 

Categorize tasks as asynchronous versus synchronous tasks to help remote workers collaborate

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. So what we did early on was actually break this up into asynchronism, what we like to call sort of those day to day tasks that people can do whenever they have availability, and then synchronism, where it's like you said, something that's customer facing, something that's critical, or something that requires a lot of coordination and figuring out that 3-5 hour time difference where everyone's kind of, be in the same day versus you have a problem, someone's asleep, you don't necessarily want to wake them up, right?

                   

If it's a customer facing issue than it can be a challenge, but I also like what you said about having people in different time zones in case it's a customer issue and then you've got more hands to kind of help out over the various time zones.

 

Holly Cardew:       Definitely.

 

How customers and clients benefit from a team of remote workers

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Do you have any, do you have a specific example you'd like to share with us?

 

Holly Cardew:       So as I mentioned, we definitely have taken product in Europe. We do have a project manager in the Philippines but that's OK because she understands that the rest of them are in that time zone, so she will work with that time zone. For our content and marketing, it's kind of, Europe but Western Europe and then flows over into America. That works absolutely fine.

                   

There's about, maximum there's eight hours difference, with social media included but they don't mind that because they've just set a time, each week to get the tasks done, but as you said, it's tasks that sort of come and flow. You don't need to do it at a certain time, it's not critical that you know, our social media post went up one hour difference, doesn't make that much difference to us as a B to B software company, but I think for customers, so customer service is really important because customers can not wait 12 hours. They can't wait eight, they need a response within 20 minutes.

 

Facetime is still important for remote teams—especially when kicking off a project

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Now I will say that even aside from the time zones, another thing that I've found helpful is when you're kicking off a project, or you do feel like it's something really mission critical, it can be helpful to have people at the start of the project, all working together. Early on I will do either a retreat or maybe coordinate with some subset of the team, do you do anything like that at Pixc?

 

Holly Cardew:       We haven't yet. We've actually, we're talking at the moment about having our first meet up. Somewhere in Asia, so sent out a Google form with potential dates of what would work, but I think it would be really valuable for people. If you are located closely together, what we will do is try to meet up at conferences.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Oh perfect.

 

Holly Cardew:       Or, you know other events, or you know if I'm traveling to Indonesia I'll try and meet up with a team member, but for us we haven't yet done the in person thing yet.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. I think it's also good that you said you meet up with your employees, right. So, even if it's just a one on one or kind of a smaller group getting together that can be really valuable.

 

Holly Cardew:       Yeah, I've also said to them, like give them a budget to travel too. So if there's a lot of them in Asia, it's quite cheap to travel within Asia, so they could meet up for a dinner or lunch.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Oh, great.

 

Holly Cardew:       So it doesn't necessarily mean it's just for the project, it's again, links back to the culture, because if you create a good culture and they have a social gathering together, then when they do go away they sort of understand each other a bit more.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right and it stills helps to kind of elongate that process and they feel like they're part of team and not just somebody working somewhere in some part of the world.

 

Holly Cardew:       Yeah. Definitely.

 

A simple first step for people who are on the fence about hiring remote workers

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Wonderful. Any final words of wisdom for our audience out there when it comes to recruiting remote talent and retaining them?

 

Holly Cardew:       I think when I speak to people and they're like I've never hired someone remote, what should I do? I think the first step is having a virtual assistant for yourself. So those tasks that you do every single day, that you could pass to someone else, just try it. Have someone 10 hours a week, or even five hours a week so it's one day a week, doing some of those tasks and you'll soon build a culture that works for them.

                   

The other thing is I would really think about them as not outsourcing or part of someone else's company. I stick with hiring individuals and not agency's or outsourcing companies. Then I send them birthday cakes and cards just because it makes them feel included in the bigger vision and bigger company and picture rather than just doing a task at hand.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Oh yeah, they're definitely contributing to the overall company so that's good. That's good that you recognize them. Well these are all great tips Holly. Thank you so much for joining us.

 

Holly Cardew:       Thank you.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        That's it for this week's episode of *Build*. Be sure to share this with your friends, your teammates and your boss, if you are thinking about putting in place a remote working culture. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode. Ciao for now!

                   

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor PivotalTracker.

 

Jun 11, 2018

In last week’s episode of Build, we dove into the benefits and best practices around recruiting remote workers. But as you’ve learned from last month’s Build episodes, it’s not enough to hire talent, you also need to onboard new hires by training them!

 

Training someone to be on a remote team might seem like a challenge since they aren’t sitting next to you. Those who are new to setting up a remote team think that training face-to-face is just easier because you can answer questions as they come up. And it may seem easier when it training multiple hires. But rest assured you can train remote workers, and in a way that scales as you hire multiple people at once.

 

In today’s episode, we’re going to share a number of proven strategies that have worked across job roles.

 

Once you’ve trained your remote workers, you might be wondering how to hold them accountable and retain them long term. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered ;)

 

We’ll be share fool-proof techniques for holding remote workers accountable and how to retain them long-term.

 

One last thing to keep in mind—there is a difference between a remote-first versus a remote-friendly company. If you’re not familiar with the difference, we’re going to dive into it and talk about how it can impact long-term retention of your remote workers.

 

Holly Cardew the Founder of Pixc is back to help us out. Holly has grown and scaled her team across Australia and Asia. And has done so in a number of job functions spanning both the business side with roles such as virtual assistants and marketers, to the technical side hiring software developers and designers to build the product.

 

As you listen to today’s episode you’ll learn:

  • Why remote working doesn’t work for some companies and cultures—impacting long-term productivity and retention of remote workers
  • Best practices for training and onboarding remote workers
  • How to hold remote workers accountable
  • Why you need a communication escalation framework to keep your remote workers productive
  • How to coach remote workers to be more resourceful

Check out these additional resources on remote working:

If you have a remote team, how do you train, retain, and hold your employees accountable? Let us know in the comments below.

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

 

## Proven Strategies For Training And Retaining Remote Workers Transcript

Poornima Vijayashanker:        In the previous *Build* episode, we shared a number of strategies for recruiting remote workers. If you missed the episode, I've included the link to it below. Now, it's not enough to just recruit employees. You've also got to train them, hold them accountable, and retain them. In today's episode, we'll dive into how to do this, so stay tuned.

                   

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech. As an employer, once you've recruited remote workers, you need to train them, you need to hold them accountable, and of course figure out ways to retain them. If you're wondering how, Holly Cardew, who's the CEO and Founder of Pixc, is back. Today we're going to be sharing a number of strategies on how to do this. Thanks for coming back, Holly.

 

Holly Cardew:       Thanks for having me again.

 

Remote-first versus remote-friendly

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. OK, Holly, one of the biggest misconceptions around retaining remote workers is this idea of remote-first versus remote-friendly. Maybe you can explain what each of these are and how they impact retention.

 

Holly Cardew:       Sure, so the difference...Well, what remote-first is means that everybody is remote. There is no head office. There is no main office. Everybody can work from home. They could work in a coworking space or a café.

 

Remote-friendly is that there is essentially an office, and then the office allows you to be at home or at the office when you would like. We've never had remote-friendly. We've always been remote-first.

 

Why remote working doesn’t work: communication and collaboration breaks down with remote-friendly

 

But the issue I see with remote-friendly is that there is a lot of miscommunication, because everybody is...You can either choose to be involved in the culture and be at the office, or you can be at home. It's kind of a little bit warped, whereas remote-first, because we were remote-first, we had to build a really strong culture from the beginning. There's no thing that I was at the office, or I was at wherever, a space, with three employees and not the other 20. That's where I think in terms of retaining, it's just really important to build a strong culture either way, but there is a little bit of miscommunication in the remote-friendly one.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Do you think people feel left out maybe?

 

Holly Cardew:       Yes, definitely. Well, they may or they may just not want to get involved, which therefore impacts the team because the team feel like...The team who are in the office feel like they're doing more, and the person at home may not be.

 

What you need in place before you train remote workers

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Got it. OK. We also know that in any company, in order to retain employees, you have to train them, but it can be a challenge to train people when they're not right in front of you. What are some best practices when it comes to training remote workers?

 

Holly Cardew:       It's so important to document. At the beginning, I didn't document. I would get on Skype or Google Hangouts, and I would tell the same person the same thing. I realized that I was repeating myself.

 

Our best practice is really to document, but also make everybody responsible for documenting.

It's not my job to write everybody's roles. I always tell the next person I hire that they're going to be responsible for the next team member that joins. They need to keep their own documentation.

 

We've also started Google Sites, so we have Google Sites which also connects to Google Drive and Google Documents, but that place is like...Google Sites is really the place for us where we can talk about the culture, the values, and the missions of the company, but then have all the documentation in there. It's a one, sort of essential portal.

 

Best practices for training remote workers

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Nice. Then what about when it comes to actually training people?

 

Holly Cardew:       It depends on what team they're in. We usually have an onboarding process with their team lead, whether it's marketing or customer service or engineering. Then we have a weekly team meeting. They'll have an onboarding session, but we have check-ins, more check-ins I would say at the beginning than further on down the track.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Mm-hmm. A couple things that we do at Femgineer are I record all the videos, because like yourself, I got tired of saying the same thing over and over again. The other is I have screencasts, and I also have an employee handbook, and much like yourself, have people update that once a quarter. As we scale my training efforts, do you have any that you recommend?

 

Record training sessions

 

Holly Cardew:       We actually do a lot of what you do. I think that you made a really good point. We do a lot of screencasts as well. I think we try and implement the philosophy that even if you're just doing a quick call...They may have been in the job for six months, but if you're doing a call with somebody via Google Hangouts, record it. It doesn't have to be perfect. Just put it in the folder with that question or showing that person how it's done, so the next person who comes along doesn't have to ask the same question.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. I also do it for our meetings, because sometimes people get sick.

 

Holly Cardew:       Yeah, definitely.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Instead of having one person type up all the notes or play phone tag, it's easier to just say, "Hey, watch the recording. If you want, watch it, double the speed." It's a great way to stay efficient and keep everybody in sync.

 

Holly Cardew:       Do you record every week or every meeting?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yes, we do record all of our all-hands. Then if it's a particularly training meeting, if I'm walking somebody through it, then I'll also do the recording. Zoom has been great for us to do the recordings. It just automatically records it. Then I'll upload it to Google Drive and label it whatever the training was about.

 

Holly Cardew:       Cool. Where do you put all your documentation?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        In Google Drive.

 

Holly Cardew:       OK.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah.

 

Holly Cardew:       Sorry.

 

How to hold remote workers accountable

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Similar. Yeah. On the flip side, there's also accountability. I know a lot of times managers feel like if somebody's just sitting right next to them or in the cubicle farm somewhere, they're a lot more present and they're getting work done. But I've been in environments where people spent that eight hours in their cube surfing the internet. How do you hold people accountable in a remote team when they're not even near you, you can't see them?

 

Holly Cardew:       For us, it's really about the goal and the work that they achieve. We could be counting hours and minutes and what they're doing. Some days, I do get a little slightly frustrated, because I want the person to be...I expect them to be there and they're not, but at the same time, we're flexible with time. It's about getting the work done. If people have never hired online before, I actually suggest for them to use a time tracker. I know that platforms like Upwork have...What they do is they take a screenshot of the screen every 10 minutes, and you can check a work diary of what the person's doing.

                   

How to divvy up tasks and set goals with remote workers

 

For us, it's really about trusting the person at the end of the day. I don't want to sit there and look over their shoulder every single minute on what they're doing online. I just want them to deliver high-quality output of their work and their goals for the month or for the quarter. What we've done is we've set up team goals. Instead of me setting goals for the team, we agree on them. They can say, "Holly, that's not achievable," or, "Yes, that is achievable," or, "That's a push goal," but we both agree before moving forward. Then they can't come back and say, "That was too much work," because they also agreed to it.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, but what about some of those nitty-gritty tasks like, "Oh, I thought so-and-so was going to write this blog post, but then they didn't, so it didn't get it done"?

 

Holly Cardew:       No, we have everything documented in spreadsheets.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Good.

 

Holly Cardew:       Like the task at hand and the person responsible and the due date.

 

Remote working and collaboration

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yup. Yeah, we actually do that as well at the beginning of the week when we do our all-hands. People are supposed to come in with their Trello already filled out—

 

Holly Cardew:       Oh, that's interesting.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:      —on what the tasks are going to be. It's also a great way to then, if somebody can't do a task, to hand it off. The checklists and all the documentation is in there, and that way, if for whatever reason it doesn't get done, someone else can pick it up and run with it. We're still flexible within that. If it's really like, "Oh, this person had five tasks, and it was unreasonable that week," then it's OK, but if you look and see that none of the five tasks were done, then clearly something is up. I feel like the tools have evolved to a point now where it becomes very transparent on who's getting stuff done and who isn't.

 

Holly Cardew:       Definitely. We have all the tasks listed out. We have used Trello depending on what the role is, again, so we're doing some new feature builds. It involves having the UX and the front-end engineer and the back-end, so we want to keep it all on track. We do use JIRA, too. We probably use one too many tools, but I think everything's well-documented, so we know who's doing what and if it's being achieved.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, and then just going back and kind of grooming that periodically to see if things are no longer a priority or aligned to your goals.

 

Holly Cardew:       Yeah, definitely.

 

Why you need a communication escalation framework to keep your remote workers productive

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yes. As your team scales, communication obviously becomes a bottleneck. What would you recommend to keeping people in sync?

 

Holly Cardew:       What we do is we've actually broken up in the teams into mini-teams, so tech and product, and then marketing and customer service, and then internal operations. The reason for that is we don't...The tech don't really need to know some of the details, and I don't want to confuse everybody. We have weekly meetings but in those sort of mini-meetings. Then it means that there's no miscommunication. It's quite easy for a small team of four to get together rather than a team of 23.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Sure, that makes sense. Another best practice that I have kind of discovered over time is communication escalation, because it's very easy for people to think that texting has to happen no matter what. I actually over time came up with a framework where, for example, email was for reference. Using a tool like Slack is great for daily communication, archiving messages, kind of going back and taking a look. You could even have a water cooler. Do you have anything like this in terms of communication escalation?

 

Holly Cardew:       We do. I haven't put in a proper framework, but I think over time it's evolved that people do understand that, yeah, Slack is for daily chat. Email, we still quite like email, because it is a bit like to-do. For me personally, it's like a to-do list. Then if it's an ultimate emergency, WhatsApp. WhatsApp's the place.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah.

 

Holly Cardew:       No matter where you are, it's handy. We actually have our groups on WhatsApp, so we have our tech and product, our marketing and customer service broken down, so when there is an issue, they can go to a different group. It's a little bit like Slack in that way.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, but it's good to have that breakdown. Otherwise, people feel like, "Why are you texting me all the time?"

 

Holly Cardew:       Exactly.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Or, "why are you emailing me all the time?" Having that, I think, is important and figuring out what works for your team versus another team.

 

How to coach remote workers to be more resourceful

 

Holly Cardew:       I think also as the leader, it's important that if somebody does email you something, and there is information out there, rather than giving them the answer, in a nice and polite way point them in the direction to say, "You didn't need to email me this for this question. You could have figured it out."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right. Exactly. This is great advice, Holly. I know our audience out there is going to benefit from all this.

 

Holly Cardew:       Thanks for having me again here.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Holly and I want to know. If you have a remote team, how do you train, retain, and hold your employees accountable? Let us know in the comments below this video. That's it for this week's episode. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode where we're going to talk about how a number of these processes will change depending on the nature of work, whether you've got a high-stakes project or just daily tasks. Ciao for now. This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

 

Jun 6, 2018

Remember our fun live pilot episode back in January 2015? In case you forgot about it or missed it, it was on How To Build A Happy And Productive Remote Team with Ben Congleton the CEO and Co-Founder of Olark. In it, we debunked a number of remote working myths such as:

 

  • Remote employees won’t be as productive and progress will stagnate
  • Communication between remote employees and remote teams will break down
  • A remote team will be devoid of culture

 

It was great for teams, but then we got questions from individuals who wanted to know how they could get started. So last December, we revisited remote working and focused the conversation around How to Succeed In Your First Remote Working Position with Femgineer’s very own Community Manager: Meghan Burgain.

 

And it seems like we have only scratched the surface because we still get a lot of questions and concerns on the topic from startup founders and hiring managers.

 

Most recently, we’ve received questions and concerns are around the hiring process like:

 

  • How do you know someone is a culture fit without a face-to-face meeting?
  • Can you hire a remote worker for any role or only specific ones?
  • How do you test a remote worker’s capabilities and competence?
  • What is the best way to onboard and train a remote worker?

 

So this month we decided to revisit the theme and created three more episodes on the topic, focused on recruiting, training, retaining, and managing remote workers.

 

To help us out, I’ve invited a pro on the topic: Holly Cardew the CEO and Founder of Pixc. Holly has grown and scaled her team across Australia and Asia. And has done so in a number of job functions spanning both the business side with roles such as virtual assistants and marketers, to the technical side hiring software developers and designers to build the product.

 

As you listen to today’s episode you’ll learn:

 

  • The benefits of remote working for employers and employees
  • The criteria you need to set to source candidates
  • Roles that are well-suited to remote work
  • How to suss out culture fit without a face-to-face meeting
  • What to watch out for—red flags to spot early on when hiring remote workers
  • Why it’s good to give people a test or trial project and how to structure it

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

 

## How To Recruit Remote Workers Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        We've covered a number of benefits when it comes to remote working in previous episodes. If you've missed any of them, I've included links below. In today's episode, we're going to talk about how to actually go about recruiting for your remote team, so stay tuned.
                   

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech.
                   

Remote working is becoming the way of the future, and employers who have started embracing it are starting to see the competitive advantages. It's very attractive for employees. In today's episode, we're going to dive into the numerous benefits that employers and employees face when it comes to remote working, and we're going to talk about some of the best practices when it comes to recruiting and retaining employees. And to help us out, I've invited Holly Cardew, who is the CEO and founder of Pixc. Thanks for joining us.

Holly Cardew:       Thanks for having me.

 

Remote working benefits for employers

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, thanks for joining us. You and I have experienced a number of benefits when it comes to running a remote team. For our audience out there, maybe you can share some of the benefits as an employer.

Holly Cardew:       Running a company, a remote company, has been beneficial for us, or beneficial for any employer, because what you can do is, you can scale up and scale down depending on what task you need done. You can also hire from a remote pool...Sorry, global pool of talent, rather than a local one. We can also provide customer support 24/7, and in other languages, which is amazing. It's also great because as a company, we're flexible. If something goes down or something happens on the weekend, the employees or the team members can also jump online. They're not so constricted to a specific time.

 

Remote working benefits for employees

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, and I'm sure there's a number of benefits for the employees, so let's jump into those.

Holly Cardew:       I think, for the employees, they love it because it is flexible. At the end of the day, they can live and travel and be wherever they want to. They can work the hours that they want to work. I don't expect someone to be there 9-5. I didn't want to build a company and be in an office 9-5. The employees don't have to necessarily spend an hour and a half in traffic each way every day. So, they can spend that time really focusing on their task at hand.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Another thing I learned recently was that people who are disabled, or an elderly population, can stay in the workforce longer because of having the ability to work remotely. So, I think that's another great thing, if we can keep maintaining the size of the workforce.

Holly Cardew:       Definitely, fantastic. I've also seen that with mothers. We've hired content writers, proofreaders. They're mothers in middle America, or the Philippines. It doesn't matter where they are, they're now able to be with their children before and after school, be really flexible at home.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, we've got one, Meghan, who's been on an episode before. So, yeah, I think it's great for motherhood as well. These are great benefits. Let's talk about the types of roles that are conducive to remote work.

 

Types of roles for remote workers


Holly Cardew:       I actually think anything can be remote. I mean, there are definitely times when you need to be on the ground with the customer, or you need to build a physical product, if you're in hardware or other industries. But really, we have, I don't like to use the word "outsourced," but we have people doing legal, accounting, bookkeeping, engineering tasks, design tasks, customer service, marketing. You name it, it's been done with us. So, I think you can actually use a remote or distributed team for any job.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        But I'm sure there's some employees who are better suited for remote work versus others, so tell us what somebody should be looking for in an employee.

Holly Cardew:       Yeah, definitely. I find that the people who are most proactive and take initiative are the ones who are better off when they're remote, because they don't need the guidance or the team around them to keep them motivated. I also find that someone who is slightly entrepreneurial, like they may...I had someone who was in the Philippines, and I said, "What do you do in your free time?" And she said, "I import things from America and I sell them at the market on the weekend." And doing that, it makes them think outside the box, as well. You don't have to train them as much.

 

What to watch out for when recruiting remote workers

Poornima Vijayashanker:        That makes sense. And are there signs that you want to watch out for?

Holly Cardew:       The signs I would watch out for are people who do need to be around others, and they do need that guidance and training, and they're waiting for you to tell them the next thing to do.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        So, people who maybe aren't as self-directed, or possess some of the self-leadership qualities.

Holly Cardew:       Definitely.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Which I think is necessary for any employee, but...

Holly Cardew:       Definitely, but there are people who are starting out, and they're not used to taking the initiative to go find something. They're used to turning to the person next to them at the office, or university, or wherever they're starting out, and finding the answer.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, that's a good point. So, being proactive about being resourceful, and getting the answers that you need on your own.

Holly Cardew:       Especially if they're remote, and I'm sleeping, and another team member's not awake, so they can't get help that way.

 

Criteria for sourcing and filtering remote working candidates

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, that's a good point. So, do you have a set of criteria for sourcing candidates that fit?

Holly Cardew:       We have quite a, I wouldn't say strict, but a process that we follow every single time. Essentially, we always hire contractors straight away. The reason for that is that we don't have to onboard them for every single task.

 

So, what we do is, we put out simple things when we put out the job. People, nowadays, they're applying for absolutely everything. They just click the apply button. So, we'll put some sneaky question inside the job, even it's "start your cover letter with a smiley emoji."

 

And then you can clearly filter out the people who have read the job description. Because when you're remote, there's a lot of reading, rather than face-to-face conversation. So, that filters down some people.

 

Interview process for remote workers

                  

And then we make a short list, and we interview, and just have a Skype call, about 10-15 minutes. In 10-15 minutes, you can figure out if you're going to...if they culturally fit with the company. I think that's really important. They may be the most amazing person on paper, but if they don't fit with your remote culture, it won't work. And then we give them a trial task, and then after that, if they're successful, we hire them for approximately two weeks to a month to figure out how it works with the company, and then we scale up from there.

 

How to setup a trial project to test candidates

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. The trial task is one that I do, too. I call it a "task project," and I time box it to about 5-10 hours. I limit it to maybe the two people that I feel have gone through the interview and done a good job, and I actually end up paying them for that trial time.

Holly Cardew:       Yeah, that's exactly what we do. Exactly the same. We also do a trial task, about 5-10, depending on the role. If it's a social media thing, it might be, give me 20 posts that you would post up, or some advice on what you would change on our current social media. But if it's an engineering project, yeah, it would be 5-10 hours, maybe a page, and pay for that task, and then decide from there.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. And how do you communicate that to them? Because I know some people are immediately like, "I'm not doing this," and then some people actually take the effort, and I can tell just based on that, who's going to be a good employee versus, OK, clearly you're not interested. So, do you start to see signals like that?

Holly Cardew:       We've definitely had the same thing.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah? OK.

Why a trial project helps filter candidates

 

Holly Cardew:       It's sort of like a self-filtering mechanism for us. I think most people who have already...If they're local and they haven't had a remote job yet, they're probably a bit standoffish. But most people who are freelance, or have worked remote, they are used to that.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        And then there are some people that think remote working is for them, even though they've never done it before. Like you said, someone who is new to remote working, and they might not know the criteria. Do you have any filters, or ways in which you recruit them?

 

How you can spot signs that a remote worker can be self-directed and resourceful

Holly Cardew:       I think, what we have looked at is that if people are entrepreneurial, they usually have done some small task by themselves. The other one is, I've asked if they've done any side projects, and I ask them to show me their side projects. Like, what do they do in their free time on the weekend? If they don't do something that is slightly work-related...engineers may build something. Marketing people might start their own website to self-promote. So, I look for those things before hiring someone who hasn't had a remote job.
                   

If they have started, it's really about trial and error, and talking to them, talking through. I have friends who are definitely, they say straight up, "I need to be around people." The other option is, you can actually provide them with co-working space.

 

How to provide remote workers opportunities to be around other people
                   

In some situations, I've either provided them with co-working space, or there was another situation where I had someone in Manila, and I knew the people at the Uber office in Manila, so I made a connection for her to go meet with the community manager at Manila, so she could learn from them. And then, it doesn't necessarily mean that they have to have the people in your company around them, they just need inspiration from other people.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Nice. Yeah. And that's a good point, because it does get lonesome, and coffee shops don't always have the best internet. The co-working could be great. Hiring sight unseen can be challenging. I know, when I initially did it, I wasn't as good, but over the years, I've gotten better. How have you managed to get the best candidates out of the pool?

 

What to watch out for—red flags to spot early on when hiring remote workers

Holly Cardew:       I think, going back to my previous answer, is that really it's about the cultural fit of the person. If your values and the culture doesn't fit, it won't work. I had someone who I was interviewing, and they were so good. I really wanted them. They were an early employee at a huge company that's IPOed. They would have been...It would have been really beneficial to the company, but we didn't see eye-to-eye on hiring, growing the team. We discussed how we would grow the team, and how we would go about it, and it did not fit. Even though it wasn't an issue then and there, I could foresee, going forward, that it would be a huge issue when we wanted to expand the team. So, it was really about the values.
                   

The other thing is that you really need to trust your gut. At the beginning, you're early on, you're starry-eyed. You think everything is amazing, and you just want to get these people on board, but deep down, if you know that it's not going to work, don't do it.

 

Crucial conversations to have with candidates

Poornima Vijayashanker:        One nugget in there was having these crucial conversations, right? You said that you had the conversation about how they were going to approach hiring, and you didn't start to see eye-to-eye. So, maybe when it comes to the tasks, or whatever the next milestone is, have those conversations, and that way, you start to uncover what their philosophy is, to see if there's alignment and a good fit.

Holly Cardew:       Yeah, definitely. I think, it's like any relationship. You need to be able to have a hard conversation. And sometimes, you don't...As a CEO, what's really challenging is, you don't actually get along with everyone perfectly. But as long as you can have a hard conversation, and come to a conclusion, then it's OK. But if something really doesn't fit in your values...

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Better to expose that early on.

Holly Cardew:       Yeah, exactly. Move on, rather than try and make it fit at the beginning.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Well, these are great practices, Holly. Thanks for sharing them with us.

Holly Cardew:       Thanks for having me.

Poornima Vijayashanker:        So, now, Holly and I want to know, if you have put a remote team in place, what was your process for recruiting? Let us know in the comments below. And that's it for this week's episode of *Build*. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode, where we'll talk about how to hold employees accountable and retain them. Ciao for now.
                 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

Mar 12, 2018

We’re probably all aware of the famous proverb: “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”

 

I think it’s very apropos when it comes to diversity and inclusion efforts. Too many of us think that having a diversity and inclusion initiative within our company will produce the change we want to see in the world.

 

Yes, it’s a necessary step, but sadly many initiatives and programs have failed to get off the ground and make a mark.

 

Why?

 

The first culprit is stopping at intentions and not really thinking through what is needed in terms of budget, resources, and timing.

 

The second culprit is not being realistic about expectations. Really asking the question what do you expect to see at the end of a year from a program and is that achievable?

 

Just like we build a business case around running an experience when it comes to our product, process, or policies, the same rigor needs to be applied to diversity and inclusion initiatives.

 

In today’s Build episode, Melinda Epler and Wayne Sutton, who are the founders of Change Catalyst and Tech Inclusion are back.

 

We’re going to talk about best practices and what to look for if you are interested in starting a program at your company or participating in one outside.

 

So if you’re thinking about starting an employee resource group or another program, or want to know how you can improve an existing program, you’ll want to watch this episode to learn:

 

  • Why it’s important to start with a business case — just like you would for any product, process or policy change in a company
  • Why you can’t expect immediate results, but it’s OK to celebrate incremental progress
  • What to do when people within your organization say no to your proposal
  • The microchanges you can into practice daily as you lead and work with teams

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer (http://femgineer.com/) and Pivotal Tracker (https://www.pivotaltracker.com/). San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA (http://www.startmotionmedia.com/design/).

-- 

## Diversity and Inclusion: Why You Need To Rethink Your Approach to Diversity And Inclusion Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        In the last episode of *Build*, we talked about how diversity and inclusion initiatives are impacting tech, and how to navigate conversations with teammates and peers. If you missed that episode, I've included a link to it below. In today's episode, we're going to dive a little bit deeper and talk about some of the best practices that you can use to kickstart a diversity and inclusion effort at your company, or if you want to go and contribute somewhere else, what to look out for, so stay tuned.

 

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode of *Build*, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech.

 

We're continuing our conversation with Melinda Epler and Wayne Sutton, who are the founders of Change Catalyst and Tech Inclusion. In today's episode, we're going to dive a little bit deeper into some of the best practices that you can use to kickstart a diversity and inclusion effort in your organization, as well as get others to help you out. Wayne and Melinda, thanks for coming back on the show.

 

Melinda Epler:      Absolutely.

 

How To Measure Success For Diversity And Inclusion Initiatives

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Before we jump into the best practices, I want to just remind our viewers and our listeners out there how can we measure success before we start to pursue any sort of tech practice?

 

Melinda Epler:      It gets to our number one—the most important thing to start with is measuring where you are now, really benchmarking where you are now in terms of diversity and inclusion. That means doing—if it hasn't been done already—looking at the demographics from race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, veterans, people with disabilities, people all across diverse backgrounds, and then also looking at engagement, and inclusion, and really measuring those as well. There are some surveys out there that you can take internally in a company to really gauge where you are. Before you start, you need to know where you are.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Oh, yeah. Of course.

 

Melinda Epler:      That ranges from obviously looking at the demographics, but also looking at how do people feel? Do they belong? Are they supported? Are they able to really thrive in the company? Are they allowed to rise in the company? Are they supported in growing as a leader in the company? All those things you want to know before you really dive in to programs.

 

Under-Resourced Diversity And Inclusion Programs Are Rampant

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Now, I know one issue that I run into, and you've probably experienced the same, I think we touched upon this on the last episode, is people come with a lot of great intentions, and a lot of times when you come into these internal groups though, they haven't really thought beyond those intentions. When I ask them questions like, "Who's going to be working with me?" or, "What are the meetings going to look like on the calendar? Is there a budget?" Just the basic logistics, it's like, "Oh, I guess there's some more work to be done," right? Because they haven't thought through what's budget, what's a roll out, what sort of opposition. How can we get around that initially, and what's the homework you would recommend after doing what you said about the benchmarking?

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah, I think you need...if you're going to start an employee resource group, an ERG, or an affinity group, or something like that in your company, you need to know what are your objectives? What are your goals? What does it look like at the end of the year? What have you accomplished at the end of the year, and how do you design a program that's really going to get to those outcomes, because we see that as well. We see a lot of affinity groups, and it's important to find a safe space for people to get together, and then the next step is how do we go further? How do we do more? How do we start to develop each other as leaders? How do we grow as an organization? How do we help the company change its processes and systems? How do we get to the next level?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah.

 

How To Set Expectations Around Diversity And Inclusion Efforts

 

Wayne Sutton:       Yeah. I believe, also, in setting realistic expectations around what the goals and outcomes could be. Often people come to us like, well, they put resources towards this, they made this type of investment, they hired this person, they did this event, and they expected magic to happen. They expected the doors open where all the other underrepresented categories is gonna come apply to the company. They expect their brand to change. They expect some heat from the press to take off. It's like, "No, you did one thing."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right.

 

Wayne Sutton:       It's like you send one tweet, you don't expect the world to follow you, right?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah.

 

Wayne Sutton:       There's certain expectations around diversity and inclusion, as well.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. I think a lot of the product analogies apply here, as well. Like you said, you don't do one marketing campaign hoping that you're gonna 10x your revenue, so why would it be any different with a lot of these efforts?

 

Wayne Sutton:       Exactly.

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah, and also you need to use agile design, as well, like really think. If it's not working, change it. If something is not effective, do something different.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Let's get onto the first best practice that you would recommend to our audience out there who wants to kickstart an effort.

 

Connect Diversity And Inclusion Programs To A Business Case

 

Wayne Sutton:       Yeah. I'd probably say the first best practice is one where we need to identify who our core audience is, right?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        OK.

 

Wayne Sutton:       If you are someone in HR, or is in a role of heading diversity inclusion, or even in product, it's like Melinda articulated, you do need a measure, right? You need to start with see where we are. See what our numbers look like. Or, it could be, "Let's talk with executive leadership about how creating inclusive culture, having a focus on diversity and inclusion is connected to our core values and our business goals."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, that's great.

 

Wayne Sutton:       Let's start right there.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yep.

 

Wayne Sutton:       Right? Not “let's just run with it, or we're gonna do diversity and inclusion,” because in a day what we've seen, and what has been happening is people say they're working on diversity and inclusion, they put resources behind it, it's not connected to the business goals, and they haven't set the benchmarks around measuring success.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right.

 

Why Diversity And Inclusion Programs Fail

 

Wayne Sutton:       It's like end of year, what do you have to show for it, or at the end of a program, what do you have to show for it?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah, and there's a huge disconnect, and then people feel like, "Oh, nothing's changing."

 

Wayne Sutton:       Exactly.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        "All these programs are useless. Let's just go back to the way things were." Yeah, yeah.

 

Wayne Sutton:       Yeah, exactly.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        I like that you mentioned tying it back to business goals, so do you have an example or a case study you can share of either a company that you worked with that was really good at doing this, or even took a first step?

 

Wayne Sutton:       We have several companies that we worked with, but it goes back to what we were saying earlier. It's like the reason why we pause is because there's not a single company we can point to to say that it's doing it well.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Sure.

 

Wayne Sutton:       In doing this work what Melinda and I have learned is that there's also this opportunity of shaming.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah.

 

Wayne Sutton:       Right? We can say we work with Asana, right? We work with Reddit, also. We work B Corp. That's just in some of the consulting training or workshops. We also worked with Capital One. We did a workshop for their network of startups on how to create inclusive cultures from the start with. That was about 20 startups from the size of five to 200, and we could name...there's some well-known name companies in that area, as well.

                   

At the same time, we can say that some of the impact at those companies, we can give an example saying that we worked with them, they completed X, but that's not necessarily an endorsement that those companies have it all figured out.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        OK.

 

Wayne Sutton:       It's almost I'd like to say a disclaimer on that. We're not saying that, "Oh, here's an example that Asana's doing, or Reddit is doing, and everybody should copy it."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right.

 

Wayne Sutton:       That's not saying that they have everything figured out, not saying that they don't have everything figured out.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        OK.

 

Wayne Sutton:       It's just the state of the narrative around this industry, and around the conversation about diversity and inclusion. It gets emotional fast.

 

Why Immediate Results For Diversity And Inclusion Efforts Are Unlikely

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        OK, so maybe a best practice is to not expect immediate results, but to say, "OK, you did one thing. Let's see if that's replicable, and then maybe in five or ten months, years, whatever your benchmark for time is, then take a look back."

 

Wayne Sutton:       Yes, yeah.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right, so don't call it an early success until you've really seen a number of dots lining up.

 

Wayne Sutton:       Yeah, but we have—

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah. You can celebrate incremental successes, but it's not fundamentally shifting yet.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        OK. OK. Do you have—

 

Wayne Sutton:       But one example is we did work with Asana around their recruitment process. Melinda and I, we held a workshop training on mapping out the entire recruitment flow, and identified areas where they can make some improvement on sourcing differently, and how they can do some of their screening and their in-person interviews better, and they implemented some of those changes, and we're also communicating with their head diversity officer around how did that affect their goals around increasing their numbers around diverse employees or underrepresented employees.

                   

That is one example, but was that a success?

 

Define What Success Looks Like For Your Company

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right.

 

Wayne Sutton:       We know change was made. We know that there was a learning window created. We know that some process was changed, and people grew from that session, but they're still measuring numbers, and there's also these other quantified elements that goes into play when you're talking about success, so yeah. It could've made success from us working with them to help change culture, mindset, and the process, but for the company in itself it is yet to determine in these other variables. Well, if the goal is to hire us to do that to help them increase those numbers, well, what other factors went into play around them increasing their numbers that's outside of our control, and that's where this work we do, we've been doing it now for a long time, and we feel like people need to broaden their mindset, or understand the impact of measuring success on diversity and inclusion. Success could be one thing, or success could be 1% or 2%.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right. What's another best practice, then, if we're thinking a little bit more broader?

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah, I'm thinking a lot of people come to us who aren't necessarily in a position to go to leadership, or they've gone to leadership and leadership has said, "No." What do you do there?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right.

 

Melinda Epler:      Do you just give up, or do you think about other things that you can do outside of that, and I think one of the big things that you can do regardless is lead with empathy, and whether that's leading teams, that's leading products, that's just being a leader in your life and modeling inclusion and empathy, it starts with listening, and really understanding people for who they are and what they bring to the conversation, understanding the perspectives that people bring, and the unique issues that they're dealing with in their work life. It's also listening to your customers. Really, if you don't have a diverse team, you can't change that, listen to your customers, go out and learn from diverse people who are using your product.

                  

If you are leading a team, you can change the way you're leading you team. You can change who you bring on in your team, you can change how inclusive that team is. You can change a lot of things about your team, and really make a difference.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        So there's a lot of those micro changes that you can implement, like we were talking about in the last episode, on a daily, weekly, monthly basis, that are eventually gonna add up. Like you said, start with your team, your customers, your leadership, and then go from there, rather than always wanting to enact change top-down.

 

Wayne Sutton:       Yeah.

 

Melinda Epler:      Right, exactly. Exactly. There are a lot of things that underrepresented...that you can do as an ally, as well. There are a lot of really amazing things that you can do that make a big difference in somebody's life.

 

How To Be An Ally For Diversity And Inclusion

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Let's talk about what an ally is first.

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah, so an ally can really be anyone. It can be you, it can be me, it can be Wayne. Pretty much anybody can be an ally to someone who has less privilege, or someone who has equal privilege, quite frankly, and really looking at the little things you can do to help support others. If you're in a position of greater power or leadership you can bring others up with you that are underrepresented. You can disrupt little biases and microaggressions that come to play in daily meetings. For example, you see somebody who's consistently, their ideas are being shot down, or taken over, or they're never able to get a word out, then you can do something to disrupt that.

                   

You can do something to disrupt...I mean, if you see harassment or something like that, there's definitely something you can do about it. It's really hard for an underrepresented person to come out against their own suppression, and so there are lots of things that allies can do, little things that can make a big difference in somebody's life. There's also mentorship, and sponsorship. Mentoring somebody who is underrepresented and really helping them grow their career, giving them advice about how to take the next step and become a leader. Sponsorship is more around, again, that if you're in a position of power, really helping sponsor somebody else to be there, as well.

                   It also could be, as an ally, maybe you're a part of a dominant group being asked to speak on a panel, and it's the same group of people. It's all white men, or it's all white women on a panel. Part of ally-ship is actually taking a step back and allowing somebody else to speak, and allowing other perspectives.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah. Take a break for a while.

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Rest your voice. Let someone else have a turn.

 

Why It’s Important To Be Proactive When It Comes To Diversity And Inclusion

 

Wayne Sutton:       When I think about the tech industry, and this conversation around diversity and inclusion, and everything that is bundled up in that, there's been a constant theme that most tech companies and individuals have been reactive instead of proactive, and that is disheartening. It's like, "Let's wait for something bad to happen," someone to leave and write a leaving article, a sexual harassment situation, or some shaming to happen online, then let's talk about diversity and inclusion. I would say that if there's an individual on the inside of an organization, and they're working in tech, and they want to create change, don't wait.

                   

Don't wait until something negative happened before looking at creating change. That could be, yes, talk with an executive, talk with a manager, talk with the CEO. Set up a meeting, track it, let them know that, "I'm taking note that I had this conversation."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Right.

 

Wayne Sutton:       Look at the values of the company and speak up. That's kind of more like, "Hey, go straight to the top. Go to the manager," but it also could be just in meetings, right? Just in meetings say, it could be me saying, "I don't feel like my voice, my opinion was heard," or are you thinking about a program or a product and saying, "Well, are you thinking about black women, are you thinking about LGBTQ community, are you thinking about vets? Are we really looking at a targeted customer base from a global and inclusive scale, or a mindset?"

 

Melinda Epler:      And also accessibility, really looking at accessibility from the beginning rather than a reaction to, "Oh, wait. It didn't work. We have to do that now."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        People are dropping off, yeah. Why is that?

 

Wayne Sutton:       If people want to create change, and they want to implement a diversity and inclusion strategy, or just get started, just speak up. Speak up, and there's tons of articles, I mean tons of research. We have a blog, we have plenty of resources online, and some of it is finding the allies Melinda was articulating, and knowing that you're not alone, and speak up.

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah, and take some of those daily steps like taking your vitamins every day, eating your veggies.

 

How You Can Get Involved With Change Catalyst

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Let's end with this note of how can our audience get involved with you two and your company?

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah, a few different ways. One thing is as an organization focused on diversity and inclusion, we need funding. We always do, and so if you have the ability in your company to support us, we have sponsorship. We also can do training and consulting with your company, as well. That's one. Another is we always need volunteers, and we cannot do this work without volunteers. They're amazing. They are part of our team, and they really help make our events, in particular, happen, so volunteer. What are some others?

 

Wayne Sutton:       Yeah. What I say to people who want to get involved is just if you're working on diversity and inclusion, be successful, or often have a conversation with other underrepresented individuals and saying that if you're working in tech, don't forget to open the door for someone else.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah.

 

Wayne Sutton:       The tech industry, we know the numbers. We also know the numbers of our growing global population, how diverse it is, and if you can get in the door, we can do the best of our ability to help consult, train organizations to create inclusive culture, but if you get in the door and you need help, we're here to help.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Yeah.

 

Melinda Epler:      Yeah, and I just want to end with, I firmly believe that if we change tech, we can change the world, because tech is so much a part of the world, and it's increasingly so. Almost every company is becoming a tech company, and we have the power to really make a difference, whether it's in your startup, whether it's in your team, whether it's in your company, whether it's in tech as a whole, the entire industry. If you can affect change in any one of those areas, even if it's you becoming a successful entrepreneur, that in itself, as an underrepresented entrepreneur, that can make a big difference.

                   

You have the power to create change. Do it.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Well, thank you so much for ending on that inspiring note, and to all of you audience out there, thank you for tuning in today. Be sure to share this episode with your teammates and your boss, and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive more great episodes like this one. Ciao for now.

                   

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.


Mar 5, 2018

I’m sure you’re aware of the talk and debate around the topic of diversity and inclusion. Maybe it’s left you feeling frustrated, tired, or downright apathetic…

 

I get it.

 

Much of the emotional rollercoaster stems from the challenges of navigating conversations with your teammates and peers on top of your day-to-day responsibilities.

 

Plus you’re probably wondering: Are these programs actually working?

 

You know how much I love busting myths! So in today’s Build episode, we’re going to talk about the issues specific to tech and provide you with some strategies for navigating those tricky conversations with your teammates and your peers. We’ll also dive into what isn’t working and why.

 

If you're curious about starting a diversity and inclusion initiative at your company or participating in another organization, then keep an eye out for the next episode where we'll do a deeper dive into a number of best practices.

 

To help us out I’ve invited Melinda Epler and Wayne Sutton, who are the founders of Change Catalyst and Tech Inclusion.

 

As you listen to this episode, you’ll learn the following:

 

  • Why we may shy away from talking about diversity and inclusion
  • How shaming people and companies doesn’t help the cause
  • Why awareness isn’t enough — how to shift to being more process oriented
  • Why it’s hard to take action individually and how to get support
  • How to know if diversity and inclusion are worth it

 

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

 

## Diversity and Inclusion: How To Navigate Conversations About Diversity And Inclusion in Tech Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           There's been a lot of talk and debate around the topic of diversity and inclusion. And regardless of what side you are on, in today's episode, we're going to talk about the issues pertaining to tech, as well as how to navigate conversations with your teammates and peers. So stay tuned.

 

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode of *Build*, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech.

 

Now, as you can imagine, there are a lot of myths and misconceptions around diversity and inclusion. Conversations can be really hard to navigate. And that's why in today's episode, we're going to talk about the issues that pertain specifically to tech and help you navigate those conversations with teammates and peers. And if you're curious about starting a diversity and inclusion initiative at your company or participating in another organization, then stick around for the next episode where we'll do a deeper dive into those practices.

 

In today's episode, I invited Melinda Epler and Wayne Sutton, who are the founders of Change Catalyst and Tech Inclusion. Thanks you guys for joining us today.

 

Melinda Epler:            Thanks. Thanks for having us.

 

Wayne Sutton:              Thanks for having us.

 

What does diversity and inclusion mean?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yeah. So, let's start by talking about what exactly is diversity and inclusion?

 

Melinda Epler:            I'd like to say that diversity is about bringing diverse people to the table and inclusion is about inviting them to speak, encouraging them to lead, and supporting them in leadership. Diversity is really about the demographics and inclusion is about how people show up, how people thrive, and how people feel that they belong in their culture.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yeah. And how do you think it pertains to tech?

 

Wayne Sutton:              I like to say diversity includes everything, how it pertains to tech. Tech impacts the world, it impacts everything we do in our daily lives, from the time we wake up to the time we go to sleep. Tech creates wealth. Tech creates innovation. You look at all the products. They got some of the products living on your shelf. We're thinking about the customers. We're thinking about the followers. We're thinking about the equity or the inequity and all the opportunities that is connected to tech. And without diversity, right, you see problems being built by a homogeneous culture. You see solutions not brought to the table because it's being built by one or two mindsets.

 

You see a lot of disparity gaps in terms of access and wealth. So, without diversity, really, the tech industry is not as thriving as it should be or could be. And the impact is having, in a positive and a negative way, is not where it could be as a whole, as well.

 

Why Diversity And Inclusion Are Important

                  

At the same time, if the tech industry were more inclusive, I could imagine more innovative products. I can imagine an industry that is really identifying or being held accountable to its actions as current culture, where we wouldn't have issues that existed in the ‘60s, ‘70s, in terms of not having equal pay, not having women or other representative groups, African Americans in leadership positions, cultural and sexual harassment. If we had inclusion, these negative issues that is in the face of our society right now, in tech, wouldn't exist.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So, let's talk about what drew you to focus on diversity and inclusion, because you both had different backgrounds before you were working on this.

 

Melinda Epler:            Yeah. My background actually started back in cultural anthropology and really looking at how individuals create change in societies, how culture changes. Then, I moved into the documentary filmmaking. I was a documentary filmmaker for about 10 years, became a consultant, and then, actually became an executive at an engineering firm. That experience of being a woman, and the only woman, in leadership in that engineering firm was what made me rethink what needs to change in society. I was not thriving in that culture and it was because it wasn't set up for me, it wasn't set up for my success. And so, I actually left that job as an executive to go into diversity and inclusion. I started Change Catalyst and Tech Inclusion programs, really addressing the inequities in our society. My whole life has been focused on creating social and environmental change.

                  

And I believe, now, that if we don't change leadership, if we don't change who can be a leader and who is leading our countries, who's leading our companies, who's leading our technologies, our stories, then we can't change what's really happening in the world. I am here because I believe that this is the most important thing for me to be working on to create positive social change in the world.

 

Early Attempts To Foster Diversity And Inclusion In Tech

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           What about yourself, Wayne? Your background is also from a different angle.

 

Wayne Sutton:              Yeah, yeah. I started off doing design, graphic design—I'm showing my age some. Then, got into design UI/UX and computer graphic design. I did IT for about 8 years in North Carolina—Research Triangle Park—then became a tech founder. Had a startup back in 2007 or 8, and didn't realize that in North Carolina that I was one of very few unrepresented tech founders, a black tech founder. And then, experienced the challenges of growing and scaling a company. Then, fast-forward to 2011, the data from CB Insights said that 1% of the tech startups, that raise "angel" or VC are founded by African Americans and Latinos. They actually grouped that data together. So it really was less than 1% Black and Latino that received any angel or venture capital in 2011.

 

By that time, I knew various colleagues across the country that was also working on startups. I was basically like address the problem. What can we create a solution around? Some other colleagues and I, we decided to move to Mountain View and create the very first incubator and accelerator, focused on underrepresented tech founders. That led to a whole other window of opportunity. Moved to Silicon Valley, then moved to San Francisco. And then went through a period where, after that, I realized that the tech industry did not want to talk about diversity and inclusion, did not want to talk about the disparities of access and inequality for founders to receive capital. The tech industry was priding itself on being a meritocracy. It was like: Anyone can create a tech company, anyone can create a product, it doesn't matter.

                   

That may be true.

 

How The “Pattern Of Action” Created A Period Where People Didn’t Talk About Diversity And Inclusion

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           But it wasn't happening.

 

Wayne Sutton:              No. It was not happening. And the data already showed that everyone was not raising angel capital. It wasn't because of lack of talent. It was not because the products were not as good. It was because what the VC industry would call "a pattern of action."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Right.

 

Wayne Sutton:              And we went through a period where we’re not talking about diversity or inclusion at all. We're not talking about a lack of funding for underrepresented entrepreneurs. And then the tech industry released a diversity report, that was in 2014. And then email—and I want to say the phone, but more the email and Twitter DMs started come in. It was like, "Hey! We need to talk about diversity. I remember you used to talk about it in the day..." And Dan Blenman and I started collaborating. We met and started collaborating on solutions. We got invited to so many roundtables, kind of private conversations, one-on-one meetings around what can we do to fix this diversity problem.

 

Melinda Epler:            Yeah, those were from the White House, to the Small Business Administration, to the FTC, the FCC. And then local tech companies and local conversations as well all kind of talking about that.

 

Wayne Sutton:              That was at the White House during the Obama Administration.

 

Melinda Epler:            Yes, just so we're clear…

 

Why There Isn’t A Single Solution To Improving Diversity And Inclusion

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yes, yes, of course. Well, we know who was in the Administration in 2014. So you already touched upon some of them in your intro, but what were some of the problems specific to tech that you continue to see in this phase and maybe even today?

 

Wayne Sutton:              I would say that the biggest problem is still that happened then that we see today is still the state of denial that there is an issue. There is also the problem that it's going to be one technology solution or you do one thing that's going to fix everything.

                   

And then—

 

Melinda Epler:            One cheap thing.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yeah.

 

Wayne Sutton:              And then one problem is still thinking that companies and individuals can focus on one demographic or one category. I don't want to say category. But one part of the conversation. And use it saying that it's solving all the problems.

                   

And I would probably say lastly, it's another problem in that I was shocked at how many companies when they started talking about wanting to do work around solutions around diversity and inclusion, they will not even connecting it to their business. Or their customers. Or their direct culture. They were just trying to say, "Hey, we're working on this. Get off our backs! Here's our solution. It's hard." And all those things combined is not really good for the goal we want to achieve.

 

Melinda Epler:            I think there's a few different reasons that this is happening. And this happened in tech differently than in other industries. It started back when Steve Jobs and some of the big, great tech CEOs became "the" story around tech. And the story revolved around that being the kind of...that is the tech founder: the white male CEO is the tech founder.

                   

And when those white male tech founders built their companies, they hired their friends. They just didn't think about it. They hired their friends and their friends hired their friends and the tech companies are still set up for referrals mostly. When you have the same people referring their friends, then you're going to have a homogeneous culture. And so the issue is, now that those companies are so big, it's really hard to create change in them.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yeah.

 

How Success Patterns Have Bred The Current Culture In Tech

 

Wayne Sutton:              That brings up another good point. Because the industry is manipulated by market trends and success patterns, right? So the VCs while they represent the founders, because they hadn't seen any. Or there hadn't been enough for them to say this is a good model, right? But in the culture of the tech industry, you look at your Microsofts, your Intels, your HPs. That's like one era of American business and society, how they grew and scaled companies.

                   

Then the second wave is the Googles, the Facebooks, the Twitter, the Snaps, the Instagrams, the Salesforce. Those companies basically, like Melinda said, they hired their friends when they started. Larry and Sergei were Stanford grads. And then they got funding from Ron Conway and the network. And there was a lot of luck involved, a lot of sweat, a lot of hard work, they built innovative products, but then because those companies made a lot of money, everybody just replicated that same pattern.

                   

I'm old enough to remember where it didn't matter what school we went to. You can code, you can build, you can design—it mattered. Let's get to work! Let's build something! But then because it became a new norm of like, "Let's copy Google, let's copy Facebook, let's copy other companies." Then that became the standard like, "We must do this." And if we look at that demographic data…

 

How to Measure Diversity And Inclusion In Tech

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So, obviously this isn't the first time that people are having this conversation. Like I mentioned in the intro, there have been many, many years that we've been having this. I know even for myself, moving out here in 2004, there were some rumblings, but not a whole lot, to the level it's at today. But obviously people have tried to fix this problem once before, and where have they fallen short? Like, what didn't work?

 

Melinda Epler:            Part of it is not measuring. And that changed in 2014. That was a big shift for everyone, where they really could see these are the diversity...these are the actual demographics of our companies. "Oh! Whoa! Those are really bad! We need to figure out how to solve them."

 

Why Measuring And Building Awareness For Diversity And Inclusion Isn’t Enough

                   

And then, once they said that, they kind of put those numbers out there. It hasn't changed all that much, because the first year was just about measuring. And then starting to hire diversity and inclusion managers and directors, but not putting a lot of money and resources into really...you can't hire one person to change a whole company with very little resources. That's just not possible.

 

So, as those diversity and inclusion managers have gained traction in their own companies, they're starting to get bigger budgets and things are starting to change a little bit faster in the companies. Now that does not discount the fact that people have been working on diversity and inclusion in some of the tech companies for quite some time. One of the issues is that many of the initiatives around diversity and inclusion in the past have focused on employee resource groups, community groups, and really helping support underrepresented people in the companies. And I think, on the other hand, some work has been done on education and awareness building. And this happens in every kind of major culture shift. It happened in the sustainability movement as well. There's an expectation that if you tell somebody there's something wrong, they'll do something about it.

                   

But the problem is, you actually have to help them change their behaviors. And really fundamentally think about how to shift culture. How to shift processes and systems that are ingrained and perpetuating the problem.

 

Why Shaming People And Companies Doesn’t Enact Change

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yeah, talk is cheap.

 

Melinda Epler:            Yeah, and it doesn't really change anything. And the third component is really about shaming. There's also a really deep and disturbing trend around shaming people into changing. That doesn't really change people either! So, there's a new and growing movement and at least an understanding—I wouldn't say movement yet—and understanding that it takes more. It takes a bigger effort to really look at your culture. How do you change your culture? How do you change individual behavior? How do you fundamentally look at your recruiting process? And say, "Oh, wow!" From the very beginning. We need to change the way we're doing things. There are biases in the system, but also there are some mismatched systemic problems in the process.

 

Change Catalyst’s Approach To Helping Companies With Diversity And Inclusion

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So let's talk about Change Catalyst and how do you approach this differently?

 

Melinda Epler:            We have a few different things that we do. We have events, our Tech Inclusion events. And when we were talking earlier about having those roundtable discussions back in 2014, we started getting pretty frustrated that those roundtable discussions kept talking about the same things over and over. We had the same conversations over and over again. And they were really problems focused, which is important…

 

Is A Diversity And Inclusion Program Worth It?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           What's an example of that?

 

Wayne Sutton:              An example would be the question we get asked over and over again. "Who's doing it well?" And the reason why everybody wanted to know...

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Like they're a benchmark.

 

Wayne Sutton:             ...No, no, not that! The reason everybody wanted to know who's...everybody wanted to know what company was having any type of success around diversity and inclusion. Any type of success.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Oh! To see if it was worth it.

 

Wayne Sutton:              They wanted to know if it was worth it, but also wanted to know if they could copy it. They wanted to replicate it. And that was really it. Because everybody wanted one moonshot idea to say, "We're implementing change." That they could say, "We're working on it." And that was a repetitive question across the board.

                   

At times, really, there wasn't a company that had all the answers or all the ideas or...

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           You guys all suck!

 

Melinda Epler:            Exactly!

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Or it's not making an impact.

 

Melinda Epler:            I'd say it's still the case. There's no one company that's doing everything right.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           I'd agree!

 

What Diversity And Inclusion Training Looks Like

 

Melinda Epler:            Largely because the diversity and inclusion programs are under resourced. But there are gems. There are some people that are doing some really great programs that we can point to.

 

I think also, in 2014, there was a lot of talk amongst underrepresented people that were feeling disenfranchised. Feeling like the opportunities weren't there for them. Feeling, hearing over and over again that there are barriers, there are barriers, there are barriers. But less about solutions. How do we break down those barriers? What do we do? How do we solve that problem?

 

So that was one. We really wanted to focus on solutions, and that's what we have done. We've designed it to focus on solutions. The second is we really with our Tech Inclusion Programs...it's a systemic problem across the tech industry. So, it starts in education, and then there's huge problems in terms of entrepreneurship. Lack of investing. Lack of investors who are underrepresented. And then also lack of investing in underrepresented founders.

 

And then of course, the workplace. At the time, it was really focused on recruiting. As we talked about, you also have to change the culture. You can't just change recruiting, because you're bringing underrepresented people into a culture that's not creative for them. And they're going to leave! Like I left my position, right?

 

So workplace, and then policymakers as well. Policy and government agencies, and their power and wealth, and ability to create change in the system. And now we also focus on storytelling, like you do as well, to really help raise the underrepresented voices and perspectives, and have more diverse perspectives out there.

 

So for our events, that what we really focus across the tech ecosystem, bringing everybody together to focus on solutions.

 

For our consulting, training, and toolkits, we're also solutions focused. And focused on behavior and culture change, and really going beyond recruiting—recruiting is a part of that, but all the way through creating a culture of belonging.

 

Change Comes From Multiple Sources

 

Wayne Sutton:              Yeah, for us, it's that how change comes is different. We're not a "come in and look at one problem or one sector of the goal you want to accomplish around diversity and inclusion." We want to really discover and look at your entire company from a culture and a systematic perspective to help identify opportunities to create real change.

                   

What we've seen in the past is that a lot of companies contact us after taking unconscious bias training, and saying "We did that, now what? What do we do now? That has had some effectiveness, but we need more." And it's been an opportunity and a challenge aspect is that smaller companies—and even larger companies—they really have to be committed to put their resources in to explore what real change looks like. Whether you implement a new tool to remove names from resumes—that's just one thing. That's just one task you can do to help affect your recruiting process.

                   

But what about when you have your product team, your design team, your engineering team and there's different negative and positive behaviors in that one team dynamic. A software tool is not necessarily going to fix that. One unconscious bias training is not going to fix that. There needs to be a discovery and a real heart-to-heart conversation around employee behavior with accountability. And we come in and have those harder conversations, put together a report, talk with the executive team, and if they have a head of diversity officer, work with that individual to put together some strategies that can create change.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Nice! So what's the impact that you've seen so far through your programs and your offerings?

 

Wayne Sutton:              We see impact across the board. There's impact from the consulting, has been from a company not having any strategy at all from everybody saying like, "Well, we care about this. We want to do something," to now that there is a board level, and executive-level type solution with a plan in place that they can measure and track results over time with some accountability involved, where there's an individual or team saying that, "This is the team that is working on creating inclusive culture." That's been in some of my trainings. A consultant impact.

                   

The other impact we've seen around our conferences and events that we've done now mostly across the globe. We've been overseas. Across the globe, has been everything from gender-neutral bathrooms to new jobs created.

 

How To Navigate Conversations About Diversity and Inclusion

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           That's a great segue into my next question. I know a lot of people—especially in our audience—care deeply about diversity and inclusion. But they may find it hard to navigate those conversations or to even initiate them with their teams, with their bosses. So how have you kind of facilitated that?

 

Melinda Epler:            We start by asking everyone in the company, at least a broad set of people across the company, what diversity means to them. What inclusion means to them. Start to develop a company-wide definition of diversity and inclusion. And then, literally we talk to people across the company about the ideas that they have, the experiences that they've had, and really develop a strategy that includes all of those voices. I think you have to do that.

                   

So that's what we do at the kind of company-wide level, and including the executives all across the executive teams and the board as well. For an individual wanting to create individual change, who may not be an executive in a company, I think that there are some different resources for understanding the language around diversity and inclusion and there are some courses out there around allyship. And some information around allyship that I think can be really beneficial to really...there are so many different things that you can do.

 

Why It’s Hard To Take Action As An Individual Leading Diversity And Inclusion Initiatives

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Before we dive into that, because I want to talk about that in a future episode, maybe we can talk about why it's been hard for them to take action individually.

 

Wayne Sutton:              We have been contacted about a lot of individuals saying that they care about diversity and inclusion and they want to implement change in their company. They need help, right? And ultimately we go back and have a one-on-one call or face-to-face, and we say, “Well what does this conversation allow with the company values? What has been done? Have they discovered what has been done in the past?” And then question if they don't feel confident to have a conversation with their manager or someone, a colleague or someone in an executive role around diversity and inclusion, they need to see if this is a place they want to work. Because it can be a difficult conversation.

                   

I mean, an article just came out today where an individual, he quit a well-known company because his manager or executive said that, "Stop talking about diversity and inclusion!" Right? So this topic is sensitive to a lot of people. They're afraid of it, they don't want to talk about it. It creates a sense of fear and anger and frustration for others. So whenever people come to us and say, "I want to talk about it," a suggestion is approach it with a business case. That’s one. Approach it with an empathy case. Approach it with an idea versus, "Hey, I want to work on diversity and inclusion at my company."

 

That's how we get asked. It's like “diversity and inclusion” is such a big umbrella word. So for your organization...

 

#1 Reason That Keeps People For Taking Action

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Loaded

 

Wayne Sutton:              Loaded, right? Well a lot of emotions with a lot of history. So if you are an individual and you say you work in product and you want to work on diversity and inclusion at your SaaS company, right? So a suggestion would be to identify that you're going to talk to your manager. “I want to reach this audience that we haven't been talking with or connecting with. With this lens, how can we make that happen?”

 

That's gonna cost them a product. But from a cultural perspective, it could be "Have we measured?" Or "I noticed that I'm the only female or African American, Latino, LGBT. There are some issues to mean that are not being brought up." Or, "How can we have a dialog about it?"

 

Melinda Epler:            I mean, your question was "What keeps people from taking action?" I think, really. And the #1 thing is fear.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yeah. Losing their jobs.

 

Melinda Epler:            Losing their jobs, but also just fear of making a mistake. It can be hard to navigate. There are definitely people who are good at shaming, publicly shaming. And that doesn't make it easier to create change and to take action. So I think that inherent in what Wayne is saying is that just take the first step. Take one step. Try something new. Talk to someone. Understand basic things. Understand what their experience is. Listen. Those can be really powerful first steps.

 

Wayne Sutton:              It seems like the tech industry has forgotten that we are humans. We had a conversation as a team talking about...

 

Melinda Epler:            Human first.

 

Wayne Sutton:             ...Human first. Right? And just because I'm different. Just because I'm a black male from the South doesn't mean I can't have an intellectual conversation around topics that are passionate to me. That could be black man, STEM products, that could be how can we look at different demographics or location. Why can't we have a real conversation?

                   

If we can talk about growth. We can talk about APR. We could talk about growth hack and design thinking. Why can't we talk about working together as humans and expanding your mindset, opportunity, and behaviors for all humans? What's the problem?

 

Why People Are Reluctant To Talk About Diversity And Inclusion

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So maybe you can touch upon that. What's some of the resistance around the conversations?

 

Wayne Sutton:              It goes back to what Melinda says: Fear! It's fear. But it's also fear because the tech industry traditionally has been a Type A, god-like mentality. Where everybody has all the answers and so if you go to someone and say—talking about diversity and inclusion—you want to have all the answers, so there's it can create a sense of fear. And/or the tech industry we know today, right, is in Silicon Valley, it's in San Francisco, it's in the East Bay some, and the data just in terms of population, in terms of African American in San Francisco is like 6 percent. And if we know the numbers that at Google and at tech roles is average 2 percent within the entire organization. So the culture that these companies traditionally haven't been diverse. So now you want to take an individual, who maybe the one only diverse individual—African American, Latino, women, or Latino or on the team—they want to talk about a cultural topic that is relevant to them, to someone who doesn't have the same experiences, it could be sensing like fear and they don’t have all the answers and not understand why. And that right there creates tension.

 

Melinda Epler:            There are also studies that show that if a company is talking about diversity, then people within the company think it's changing. That is another aspect of this. That's just psychology involved in all of this. When you start talking about diversity, people think that it's changing.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Changing for the better? Or like…

 

Diversity And Inclusion Is Not A Zero Sum Game

 

Melinda Epler:            Changing for the better. People think if you're talking about it, it's changing for the positive. And then there's also on the fear side, though, there's also a fear that if other people rise up, you'll fall down.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           A zero-sum game.

 

Melinda Epler:            Exactly. But it's not. This tech industry is growing rapidly. There aren't enough people to fill all the tech jobs. That's absolutely not the case. So we just need to change that perception

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So, in the next episode we're going to talk about best practices, but before we wrap up this one, I want to just address some of the objections that our audience may come across when trying to broach the topic. They might have somebody say, "Oh, we're not going to talk about it all, it's not a priority. Like ship product." Or, "Hey, we had lovely little meetup the other day, with some great female engineers. What's the problem? We're making incremental progress." Or, "Hey, we've got to move really fast and whatever you do, how do I know it's going to be a 10x impact?" Right?

                   

And that can be overwhelming for the person on the receiving end. So how do we deal with some of those objections?

 

Wayne Sutton:              Yeah.

 

First Step Is To Measure Your Diversity And Inclusion Efforts

 

Melinda Epler:            I think one of the things people in tech react really well to is data. So the first thing is measure. And find out that information. Find out the demographics of the company. Find out—if you can—the engagement metrics as well, because you can start to look at engagement metrics as it relates to race and gender and ethnicity. And that can...and people with disabilities. And you can really see something is not right.

 

And once you look at the data, then you can say, "Oh, wait! We have a really high turnover rate among women. That's a big..."

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Well, everyone's making babies!

 

Melinda Epler:            That's a problem! There are lots of data that shows...

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           I know...

 

Melinda Epler:            An important part of society. But that is only one. Most of the women who leave tech just so we’re absolutely clear, most of the women that leave tech go to other industries and become leaders in those industries.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So we're missing out on opportunities.

 

Melinda Epler:            We're missing out on opportunities. The cost of turnover is high in a company. You don't want to lose people. That's a huge cost.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So that's just employment. What about with the product itself? Because you had been touching upon some of that.

 

Wayne Sutton:              Yeah, I want to say that for individuals who want to create change or they've experienced some—they're in a culture they want to make improvements in, you start with the data like Melinda articulated. But it's also starting documenting examples, right? Like we worked with one company where the CEO had heard some stories but it was coming second and third hand.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:            Yeah, that's a challenge.

 

Document And Show Proof Around The Need For Diversity And Inclusion Efforts

 

Wayne Sutton:              So if you're an individual, you work on your product team, your engineering team, or you could be a product manager. And you constantly see these examples, these situations happening. Take note that this happened on this day. This was the experience. And therefore you are able to have proof. The opportunity to create change may come under the window or umbrella of diversity and inclusion, but it could be just how can we conduct an inclusive meeting? Just a better meeting? How could we make sure all the voices are heard?

                 

If you've got a product team, like seven guys, three women, and the women hardly ever speak up or talk, you have a communication and culture problem where the women either don't feel empowered or the men are being assholes. Or both, right?

                   

And so, it's like that is culture. So the change you want to make may not say…”I want to create diversity and inclusion strategies.” Or, “I want to increase #1 my product team.” Or, “I want to make sure the voices are heard.” Or, “I want to talk about how we can conduct a better meeting that benefits the company, and everyone.”

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           So start small. And that makes a big difference compounded over time.

 

Wayne Sutton:              But track it! Because you've got to have real examples that's relative to the change you want to make.

 

Melinda Epler:            Yeah, it affects product design in a huge way. And I don't think we talk about it enough. That if you want to grow your customer base, and if that customer base is diverse, your designers and developers need to reflect that customer base. If you're designing for the wrong customer base, you're not going to have a success. And it has huge implications—I mean some really terrible ones out there. Even when the airbags were designed, for example, they were designed by men. And in the first rollout, several women died, children died, because they didn't test it out on women and children. That's just a really basic example.

                   

Then we see that in the tech industry a lot now, where especially when AI is being developed and things come out on Google search where black people are mislabeled. That is a really dreadful outcome of not having diverse people design your programs.

 

Diversity And Inclusion Doesn’t Just Impact A Single Group Or Criteria

 

Wayne Sutton:              I'll probably say here another problem is that—or opportunity—is that when people are talking about diversity and inclusion. You got to remember that if you're going to focus on inclusion, look at it from the perspective of everyone. Right? Think about diversity is beyond just a color of someone's skin.

                   

We were talking earlier about people who are hidden, invisible disabilities. Think about accessibility. Think about age. Think about class. You have people with different heritage.

 

Melinda Epler:            Veterans.

 

Wayne Sutton:              Veterans. It's not just black and white. It's not just gender. It's literally everyone. But the solution that may pertain to a company can be one thing—and that's OK if you're going to focus on, "OK, we're going to focus on STEM youth, kids' pipeline." That's OK.

                   

But identify, communicate that this is what we're doing as part of a solution, but not "the" solution. Or, “We're going to focus on college students.” That's OK. That's good. We need to do that. But identify and be clear and authentic about where your solution is around college students affects your business and your culture.

                   

Understand that if you're a person in that culture, say my company's all, "We've got a diversity and inclusion plan. We focus on college students." Yay! Great! But if most of your employees want to focus on a different demographic, want to do something around veterans, then as a team, as a company, depending on what size, you've got to understand why. OK, there's an opportunity and a need to focus on these areas as well.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Well, thank you both for joining us today. And now for all of you out there in the audience, let us know in the comments below this video if your organization has put in place any diversity and inclusion initiatives. And what's been the impact?

                   

And be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode, where we'll dive a little bit deeper and share some of the best practices if you're thinking about putting in place a diversity and inclusion initiative at your organization, or want to join another one.

                   

Ciao for now!

                   

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

Jan 30, 2018

All this month we’ve been exploring how startup fundraising is changing and why it’s going to continue to change in 2018.

 

We started off by talking about why you don’t want to reach out to an investor when you just have an idea, how to evaluate if seeking investment make sense for your business, and in the last episode why no matter how great your idea or business is you’re still going to receive a lot of NOs.

 

After what might seem like endless reality checks, I’ve saved the best episode for last, we’re going to be talking about what it’s going to take to get a yes from an investor. Ooshma Garg and Danielle Morrill are back. Ooshma is the CEO and Founder of Gobble, and Danielle is the CEO and Founder of Mattermark. They've both recently become investment partners at XFactor Ventures, an investment firm that's focused on investing in female founders and mixed-gender teams.

 

You’ll learn:

 

  • Some of the uncomfortable activities you’re going to have to do find that first investor
  • How to approach the topic of check size
  • How to leverage that first check and attract additional investors who may have been on the fence
  • What the investment partners at XFactor Ventures are looking for and the types of startups they have already invested in

 

Finally, if you are a female founder or are on a mixed-gender founding team and want to pitch your startup to the partners are XFactor you can check out their website here and follow up with them via email: hello@xfactor.ventures.

 

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

 

## What It’s Going To Take To Get That First Check From An Investor Transcript

 

Poornima:         In the last *Build* episode, we explored all the reasons an investor may say “no” to your big idea. If you missed the episode, I've included a link to it below this video. In today's episode, we're gonna dive into what it's gonna take to get that yes from an investor. So stay tuned.

 

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode, innovators and I debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech. Now, it can be very disheartening to hear no after no from investors, and make you wonder whether you're eventually gonna hear a yes. But it is possible, and in today's episode we'll talk about what it's gonna take to get that yes.

Today we're back with Ooshma Garg, who is the CEO and Founder of Gobble, and Danielle Morrill, who is the CEO and Founder of Mattermark. And they are both investment partners at XFactor, a new investment firm focused on funding female founders and mixed-gender teams.

             

So thanks for coming back, ladies. I know last time we talked about all the many reasons that we've received a no. This time let's turn it around and talk about what it's gonna take to get a yes and let's start by reveling in that moment where we each got our first yes. Danielle, when was the first time you got a yes?



Danielle:            I got my first yes from Dave McClure. We were sitting on the curb in front of their new office they had just opened in Mountain View. It was my birthday and it was the “you can quit your job now” check.

 

Poornima:         Awesome.

 

Danielle:            So it was extremely exciting to kind of put that milestone.

 

Poornima:         Yeah. What about for you, Ooshma?

 

Ooshma:            I got my first yes from Ben Ling and Keith Rabois. I remember going to get a physical check from Ben. He was at Google at the time. Now he's a partner at Khosla Ventures. And so we had been meeting and going back and forth and then I showed up there and he just wrote this check that was more money than I had ever seen in my entire life. He's like, "Here you go." I felt like I was this bodyguard...like I needed an armored truck. I felt like anybody who looked at me could see that I was carrying tens of thousands of dollars in my hand. It was really funny. I remember just being so excited, but also funny enough, just so careful and so nervous carrying that check literally all the way to the bank.

 

Poornima:         Nice. You weren't like Serena Williams, who just hopped into the ATM and tried to put it in the machine or something like that? She did a drive-by with one of her first—

 

Ooshma:            Oh yeah?

 

Poornima:         Yeah. With one of her first grand slam winnings. It was like—

 

Danielle:            I didn't even have a bank account.

 

Poornima:         There you go.

 

Danielle:            That sounds awesome.

 

Poornima:         That's awesome. All right. And then what did you do right after you got that first yes...after you deposited the money in the bank?

 

Danielle:            I don't think I deposited it for a while. There's all this stuff that has to happen actually, so we also incorporated on that day, just luck of timing. But yeah, I think it's really weird. You get this check and it's like this life-changing thing and then you have to go back to your crappy one bedroom apartment with no windows in San Francisco and it's like, "Get back to work."

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Danielle:            Keep coding, so it's bizarre and this thing happens and you wanna shout from the rooftops, like, "Ah!"

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Danielle:            But on some level you feel like, "Oh shit, this is real."

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Danielle:            Does that resonate for you?

 

Ooshma:            Absolutely. I think with every great success there's just great responsibility. And so now you have this amazing check and certainly it's time to crack a bottle of champagne and celebrate for a moment.

 

Danielle:            Yes.

 

Ooshma:            But with that comes everything that you were planning to do when you told the person you would do with it. And not only that. It's just the first check. Typically you're raising some kind of round and it takes 10 to 15 angel investors to get it all together. So it's a huge milestone that I think people can take a sigh of relief, but still have to carry it to the finish line.

 

Poornima:         Now, one of my first investors was somebody who understood my niche market. I know we talked about this in the last episode, but once I found him, actually fundraising became super easy because he went out and kind of rallied the other folks who were kind of on the fence, right? It was, "I believe in this market, I believe in this founder, I believe in this idea, I'm gonna write this check and you all would be stupid to not follow." Have you had that experience as well?

 

Danielle:            Yeah, I think different investors take different approaches. Sometimes they go and create the syndicate and sometimes you do and then they come back you up by adding a voice. But I think they're pretty networked so most investors here talk to each other or they're only one degree of separation away.

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Danielle:            So you almost feel like when you're beginning to fundraise, you can kind of feel the Valley talking about your company. There's no trace of it on the internet, but they definitely are asking each other questions and saying, "Have you looked at the deal? What do you think of the price? What do you think of this person? Do you know anything about them? Have you heard anything negative?" Just all those questions. Because there is no diligence tool, and I'm laughing because Mattermark is part of that story—

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Danielle:            —but when we were really early stage, it's really a reputational thing.

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Danielle:            And so I think part of it is going out and beating the drum for you and part of it is also they're fielding questions. So as soon as you say, as soon as I said, "Hey, Dave invested in us." Then I should expect Dave is gonna get hit up with people saying, "What do you think of Danielle? Why did you invest?" etc., etc.

 

Ooshma:            Yeah.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Ooshma:            But I do think it's important to make sure that when you get some of those first checks that you ask the person who else they would recommend join the round. That would be leaving a lot of value in introductions and referrals on the table if you didn't do that. Because this person has just expressed huge conviction in your vision. And so they'll typically or should be able to bring along at least a handful of introductions.

 

Danielle:            And also, I've gotta add, I did not know to do that when I first started out. And I think it's because you think you're inconveniencing this person who's just written you a check.

 

Ooshma:            Yeah.

 

Danielle:            But actually they just wrote you a check because they wanna make you successful. And so you should ask and ask and ask. They will tell you if you've crossed the line, but you probably never will cross the line. And it's really easy, as an investor now, to just move on to the next thing and get busy. And it's not that I don't want to help, but I kind of assume if you're not asking, you're all right.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Danielle:            So ask. Because I think it's totally true. And I think I did leave a lot of that on the table and probably made it harder on myself than it had to be at first.

 

Ooshma:            Yup.

 

Poornima:         Yeah. They're also protecting their investment by getting their fellow investors to invest, right?

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Poornima:         Yeah. So last time we talked a little bit about the stage that investors are at and oftentimes that makes a difference. And Ooshma, you sort of alluded to this. Now there's a lot of different types of investors out there in the market today. There's VC's, angels, super angels, micro funds, and so on. So let's talk through what makes sense at each stage, and let's start with accelerators because both of you have been involved with YC. So when does it make sense to approach an accelerator before or maybe after funding, and what did it take to get in?

 

Ooshma:            Wow. You know, one secret that a lot of people don't discuss is that many folks that got into something like a YC got in on their third or fourth try. So I did not know that until I started talking to a lot of founders. And YC might've given them feedback, maybe they kept working on their idea and they got to a certain stage. So I think that you might apply but you shouldn't just quit based on getting a no that we talked about. Even getting in to accelerators at an early stage sometimes takes a few tries.

 

Poornima:         And why would you even recommend people apply? Why does it make sense to do that?

 

Danielle:            So I think it really comes down to helping you set up the company for success down the road. So what an accelerator or incubator program is gonna do is help you with your go to market, and that doesn't just mean your product go to market. It's also the marketplace they create for financing your company.

 

So they're gonna help you validate that you've got a venture-backable business and they're gonna help set you up with the relationships and the communication pattern that you need to have in order to be a viable option for those investors. And that's really valuable, especially if you're coming to the Bay Area from somewhere else and you can't really build that network in a few weeks.

 

Poornima:         Sure.

 

Danielle:            You really need to be here. And so you're gonna be able to get a lot of time back. Of course, they take equity for this. But I think it's probably one of the best trades you're gonna make because in the beginning it's just so binary. You're either gonna raise that round or your company's probably not going to exist and so early on that's probably one of the best ways to de-risk financing and then you can focus on the product.

 

Poornima:         So you mentioned that marketplace pulling in intros for you. For the two of you, how did YC facilitate those intros to angels or super angels?

 

Ooshma:            Well, in my case we were very unconventional. I started the company without YC and I just wanted to build this idea and I felt that there was a problem that needed a solution. So I started prototyping it, I asked my friends for introductions. I was luckily already here for three years after college building a network. So I could just start my own process and seed round and ask for introductions, start raising money, and we didn't need Y Combinator for the first couple years of the company.

 

Then, it takes a while. First your company has to get funded so you can explore it, all right? And then you have to find product-market fit and you get to a stage of scale. So it took us a while to find product-market fit and I did YC in the middle of our company's story, at a time when we were changing models. Solving the same problem, but with different solutions, and when the fundraising environment was really tough.

 

So I had to make the decision of, “If it's worth working on, I'm gonna take what I can get.” And at the time that was joining an accelerator. So I think that that's a good example because it shows that you might've been working on something for five years and if YC can help you, or an accelerator can help you, you should still apply and use that as a catalyst for whatever next funding round or whatever growth metric you're—or awareness you're really looking for. But I would also say that you can't let anything like that stop you from building your company.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Ooshma:            So any investor saying “no” or any accelerator saying “no,” you should be building something because you see a way for the world to be better with something. And you have to decide to just do that and do it anyway, regardless of how you get there.

 

Poornima:         So let's talk about the mechanics behind this now. So there's obviously angels, there's super angels, there's micro funds, there's VCs. Walk us through what the check size is or who makes sense at what stage.

 

Danielle:            Right, so, there's a lot of flavors. Generally, if you're talking pre-VC, then there's very few private individuals who are gonna write more than a $50,000 to $100,000 check. Generally, if you think about someone's net worth, they've got some chunk of their net worth set aside for investing, and it's probably like 5% or 10%, so you can kind of begin to understand what's going on there.

 

But the easiest thing for anyone who's not a VC is just to ask them. What's your check size and how much risk do you wanna take? Will you invest pre-product or no, is question one. And then post-product, it's like what do you need to see from me to invest? There's so many investors now in that pre-Series A stage that I think it would be hard to give a blanket answer. But the most important thing is to just ask them, "Tell me about the last two or three deals you did. How big were they and what stage?" And I would try to not worry about getting them to do something exceptional. People kind of have their comfort zone with their personal money. And what they're doing is probably gonna continue to be the same because they're anchored on their last check.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

Danielle:            So if they've been writing a lot of $10K checks, that's probably the check size that they're writing unless they come into a huge amount of money and it changes their world.

 

Ooshma:            Right.

 

Danielle:            And then the other thing is you're gonna have these weird institutional investors who will invest before Series A. I guess this is super common now. When I started fundraising this was a lot less the case. So these are kind of these super angels, micro VCs, I don't really know what they're called today. Pre...what is it, pre-seed?

 

Poornima:         Pre-Series A.

 

Danielle:            They call it all these different things.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            But fundamentally no, those check sizes could be anywhere up to, let's say, $500,000. They're generally not leading or pricing a round. No one has to lead a round if you don't have a equity round, so that's—a big part of it is just, again, what size check are you normally writing, do you need control in some way, do you add a board seat, all those things. The good news is once you get to Series A, it's a lot more standardized in terms of ownership. So there's some rules of thumb and I'm gonna say these and then you tell me if you think they're different because I feel like maybe they're not all the same. One big piece of advice is don't sell more than 25% of your company before your Series A. So fully diluted, when you run your own cap table out. You don't wanna be in a position where you've already sold half your company, because what happens is a Series A investor probably needs to have 20% ownership just for them when they come in. So if you've already sold half your company, on top of that, it starts to be pretty demotivating. That can be a little higher or lower, just depending on what's going on with your business. And then you of course have your other investors that might come in. So maybe you sell 25% to 30% of your company total in that round.

 

And then the B and C and so on. The way to think about it is the better you're doing, the more leverage you have.

 

Poornima:         Sure.

 

Danielle:            People generally sell 15% to 20% of their company in the B. And then at the C, D, and onward, it's kind of a sliding scale downwards from there in terms of ownership percentage. And you might be thinking, "Well, doesn't this add up to more than 100%?" And the thing is that you're diluting everybody else as you go. So you're selling a chunk of the whole company at that moment in time. So these investors, it's generally gonna come down to...fund size will line up with check size. And they're gonna say something like, "We raised $150 million fund, we're planning to write $5 million to $10 million checks, and then we're holding on to $5 million to $10 million per company for follow-on." Something like that, and you can just do the math.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Ooshma:            Or like, in our case with Xfactor, we have a $3 million fund and we're putting $100K in 30 companies. And that's the rubric. So I think to Danielle's point, it's your job to understand everyone's rubrics and appetites so that you are not wasting your time and not wasting their time. And at each stage—and let's take the seed stage for example, because it's one of the only stages where there's so many investors involved—fitting all those puzzle pieces together to get to how much money you need for the next 18 months and a specific material milestone. So I think you start out with calculating that money and you get your friends or blogs or whatever advisors to help you. And then look for people in that stage and then fit those pieces together and ask them to make introductions until you fill the amount.

 

Poornima:         Yeah, so let's talk about that. How do you actually get these intros? If I'm outside of Silicon Valley, I'm coming in, or even if I'm here and I've been an engineer all my life or a designer or something and then I recently made the switch to a founder, I might not have that network. How do I get those intros?

 

Danielle:            So, the truth is you're just gonna have to get out there and talk to people.

 

Ooshma:            Yeah.

 

Danielle:            And I think the thing is you probably know people who can help you that you might not realize. It's pretty rare, if you live here, even if you just moved here, not to know somebody who works at a startup. So you just have to start asking. And the truth is you're gonna have to give away information to get information.

 

Poornima:         Sure.

 

Danielle:            "Hey, I have a startup." OK, everybody has a startup.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            "Hey, we're raising." OK, "It's really hard."

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Danielle:            A lot of people immediately are like, "Oh, OK, interesting." "Do you know anybody who invests in startups?" And the thing is you're gonna have to do this at scale. So you're gonna need to go to events.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Danielle:            You're gonna need to ask the people that you worked with in the past and you're gonna need to do things that you might not enjoy doing, like going on LinkedIn and just doing a ton of research. Nothing is better than a warm intro. So even though this feels really weird and painful to ask, these are gonna generate the introductions that are gonna be the best

possible. The next thing is cold after that.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Danielle:            So anything you can do to get something warm, even if it's many degrees of separation, is gonna help you more. And so that might also mean cold outbounding someone that you wanna then get an intro through.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            So portfolio founders are probably the best people to cold outbound rather than the VC themself or the investor themself. So if someone cold contacts me and says, "Hey, I'd love to get to know you and Mattermark, yadda yadda," and maybe their plan is that they'd like to get introduced to Brad Feld, the reality is if they can tell that we didn't click, they're not gonna ask for that intro. And that sounds really, I dunno.

 

Poornima:         Transactional?

 

Danielle:            Mercenary? Transactional?

 

Poornima:         Yeah, yeah.

 

Danielle:            But it's business, so that's what business networking is.

 

Poornima:         Of course.

 

Danielle:            And I think the truth is I wanna send Brad great companies.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            Yeah.

 

Danielle:            So if you're an interesting company and you pitch me and I get excited, one, I might angel invest in you, which is the absolute best way for me to introduce you to one of my investors.

 

Ooshma:            Yeah.

Danielle:            But the other thing is we all got helped in the same way.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            So it sounds transactional, but it's also just kind of how it works.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            It's the culture of paying it forward.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Ooshma:            Everyone does that. And if they can't...they'll be honest. If they can't give you that introduction and you do click, maybe they'll give you some advice. And then we go back to that whole idea of listening and staying in touch and sending people updates. But I would say leave no stone unturned. If you just landed here, there's Techstars or 500 or Founder Institute or Y Combinator or TechCrunch Disrupt or Golden Seeds or who knows. There's all these things you can apply to. And of course, if you are an island and you don't know anyone, you have to start out cold. But cold will soon become warm.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            And you have to play the numbers game in the beginning.

 

Poornima:         Sure.

 

Ooshma:            And so just go to all the meetups, email everybody, send links and product demos. Just be creative. Oh! One hack that I had which actually led to me meeting you is that I would go to talks and sit in the front and come up with really good questions. And I'd strategically go to talks where I really wanted to meet the person and I knew they'd be a great investor or advisor. I would wait until the very end. They would give a talk and then all these people would be crowding around someone like Reid Hoffman. In this case it was Aaron Patzer from Mint. And so people were talking to him for 30 minutes. And I waited until the very end and he was like, "Oh my gosh. Who's this person waiting?" I said, "Hey, I'll just walk you to your car. I have a quick question." And then he became a very early on startup advisor and advocate for me. So there's all these unconventional things I think that you can do to get out there. And they might be uncomfortable but that's how we all did it.

 

Poornima:         Yeah. It's funny. I actually mentioned this hack to a bunch of people whenever they want my time. I tell them I'm gonna be at this event speaking. Some people take me up, some people don't. Some people have gone so far as to say, "I'll pick you up from the airport." I love those people. Because I'm like, "Great! I don't have to worry about how I'm gonna get from Point A to Point B," right? Or "I'll buy you dinner" or whatever, but yeah, I think it's definitely going out of your way to get that interest and build that network.

So let's talk about what you guys are working on now. You are working on XFactor. So let's dive into that. Why did you even think this was important? Ooshma, you just rattled off 10 seed opportunities. So why XFactor?

 

Ooshma:            Yeah.

 

Poornima:         Why do you want to put another one in there?

 

Ooshma:            You know, there was not one female investor in our seed round. And I think...I firmly believe that diversity creates innovation, diversity of thought. And America in and of itself is this diverse nation and considered to be the best in the world. And it's because of all the different perspectives and kinds of people that we have here.

 

I like to emulate that in the company and I would like that in our investors. I don't think that one perspective is gonna make us this breakout, worldwide innovative company.

 

So, I think that XFactor is unique and necessary because it's brought together a partnership of nine people and it's all women and we are all operators, founders, CEOs, and active companies. We're not retired. We're extremely current. All these things...fundraising, hiring, strategy, growth, it's all on top of mind. We can add so much value to early stage companies. And we're just approaching it in this very kind of operators helping operators, allowing for bad-ass women to help other women in a space where there just aren't as many.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            And really just adding some more diversity to both the founder pool and the investor pool to build more breakout companies.

 

Poornima:         So you mentioned you were able to raise capital without having a woman founder. So why is that...why do you think that's important? Right? You did it, you proved it. You did it, you proved it. And I know I've...in my last company I raised from all men, so why is that important?

 

Danielle:            I think that it's important because it's hard and the reality is we want these products to exist in the world. It's not really that these companies can't get funded. It is harder, but the best ones get funded. And it's just what are we missing?

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            What are we missing out on in the world that could exist tomorrow?

 

Ooshma:            Yup.

Danielle:            There's so many creative, amazing people who are not getting funded for reasons that have nothing to do with what the company is about. And the bad thing is that this kind of poisons the well too, so there's people who aren't even trying.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            And so I think we wanna send this message that, "Look, we shouldn't have to exist." XFactor shouldn't need to exist and if we do a really good job and we make a bunch of money, people are gonna realize that investing in women, investing in men, we wanna invest in the best no matter what. So down the road, hopefully we can't exist.

 

Poornima:         Nice. Yeah.

 

Danielle:            But until that happens I think we need to...the only way to change it is to actually create competition.

 

Ooshma:            Yup.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            So we are in competitive deals and we are sending this deal flow, we're creating market for each of these founders because we're gonna need to see a lot more female role models at the top. Ooshma's company is progressing, Mattermark is progressing, but we're still very early stage and there's not a ton of examples of huge exits run by women.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Danielle:            So I think we're really great examples here, but it's very early days and the best chance we have of seeing those results at the end is to put as much as possible at the top of the funnel. And I wanna say I also think it's just an incredible investment opportunity because it's under-invested so dramatically. Frankly, we should be able to see incredible returns partly because there's just so many opportunities that haven't been taken.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            So I feel like not only is it awesome for founders, and I'm so stoked about them, it's awesome for our LPs and it’s gonna prove to LPs that female fund managers can return awesome results as well. And you know what? There's more asymmetrical opportunities like this to take. There's room to create tons more funds focused on women. You can create the exact approach with any minority group.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

Danielle:            So it's...it shouldn't have to exist, but while it does, we should try to create wealth for all the people involved and then long term, I think create competition in the market.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            And it's so...this is not a not-for-profit.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            It is not a charity. We are looking at people who are the grittiest of entrepreneurs and are in it for the long haul and ready to build multibillion dollar companies, and can answer all the hard questions. And we've got—

 

Poornima:         So what are some of those?

 

Ooshma:            Yeah. Well, first of all, we've gotten hundreds of pitches.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Ooshma:            And we've only made about nine or so investments.

 

Poornima:         OK.

 

Ooshma:            Since July. So in just the last three months we've looked at so many companies, and I think people assume, "Oh my gosh, there's a female investor, she's gonna invest in a woman." But I think it's out of respect to founders that you...that investors ensure that they are looking for and helping you build huge companies and use your time in the best way possible.

 

Poornima:         OK. So what are you guys looking for in your...and what's kind of...you said that your check size is $100K, so we're looking at early deals. And what else are you looking for? What's it gonna take to get a yes?

 

Danielle:            Well, the first thing is that we are definitely looking for a return that's pretty impressive. So even at the early stage if we invest, let's say $100,000 in a $1-million round, I would say the average post-money valuation is $8 million to $10 million.

 

Ooshma:            Yup.

 

Danielle:            So right away, to get to a 10x outcome, we need to see a company with really meaningful revenue. The good news is we don't technically need to find the billion-dollar companies to have a really successful fund, but I think the reality is we wanna find those outliers.

Poornima:         Sure.

 

Danielle:            So we're just like any other venture firm at the early stage looking for the most impressive opportunities to deploy their capital. We've got 30 bullets in the gun. So we're also thinking, "OK, we're gonna invest this money over the next two or three years. Is this the best deal that I can do this year for each partner?" Each partner is thinking about this constantly. So you're looking at the entire field and you're saying, "Of all the possible ways to deploy this money, what do we think can get the best return?"

 

Ooshma:            Right.

 

Danielle:            And that's what we're focused on.

 

Ooshma:            And the partners hold each other to a very high bar. We're all CEOs of our own companies and we hotly debate every deal.

 

Poornima:         OK.

 

Ooshma:            And it's incredibly smart, active people around the table. So it helps us make great investments. And it helps us keep the bar high because we have a lot to prove to each other and I think we have a lot to prove as a fund. And that we want to. Because this is...it's about the great returns, but it's also, like Danielle said, about setting an example and about proving a point and hopefully making ourselves obsolete.

 

Danielle:            So I think we should give some specific things for the viewers in terms of what we wanna see because, people listening, we want you to pitch us. So, you gotta have a product. You pretty much have to have revenue I would say for our group, although we would still talk to you, help you get there, stay in touch. We wanna some amount of revenue or customers. I would like to see high margin businesses. I'm looking for software scale. I don't think that that's true for all of my partners, but I struggle because I think we're looking for companies that take advantage of innovations to get the advantage in the market.

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Danielle:            I'm looking for people who have some special passion. Ooshma talked about being mission driven. It's really hard. I think we really wanna find founders who are in it for the long haul, so if they're just an arbitrage deal, I don't know that we're quite as excited about that.

 

Poornima:         Right.

 

Danielle:            Again, I don't wanna speak for all my partners, but I personally would prefer to talk to somebody who's like, "This is the only thing I wanna do."

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            I'm looking for patents and technology innovation. I'm looking for stuff that solves problems in the enterprise space and software space for developers, just because I actually think there are a lot of women in those fields and I think there's more bias for women pitching those ideas than any other idea, and I think they—I wanna give them that check so they have the confidence to go do all the rest of the pitches.

 

Poornima:         OK.

 

Danielle:            I wanna write the quit-your-job check. That's the number one thing. So if you're watching this video and you're like, "I would have to quit my job and work on this full-time and I need $100,000," we wanna talk to you.

 

Poornima:         Yeah.

 

Danielle:            Because the quit-your-job check for me was life-changing. I think we would like to write that, so, sorry I'll let you tell them what you want.

 

Ooshma:            I mean, man. Yeah, Danielle really covered a lot of it. And I think just the founder DNA and passion and willingness, of course plays a huge role. But the interesting thing is that our partnership is so diverse that we have folks coming at it from retail, from consumer, from enterprise, from hardware. We've assembled this...and from the finance companies and healthcare, finance, SAS, etc., so it's really neat because no matter what your company is doing, there's probably an expert in our partnership that can talk with you, consider the deal, and at least give you feedback, if not invest.

 

So I think that we are looking for breakout companies in all of those industries. But your...yeah, we—

 

Danielle:            Our portfolio already has quite a range.

 

Ooshma:            It has quite a range. I mean, we've invested in fashion, in hardware, in AI—

 

Danielle:            Developer tools and machine learning and ag tech—

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Danielle:            Huge range already.

 

Poornima:         Well I can't wait to hear when they come out.

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Poornima:         So, for our audience out there who's eager to get their idea out in front of you, how can they get in touch with you?

 

Danielle:            An email to hello@xfactorventures is perfect. Xfactor.ventures is the domain.

 

Ooshma:            Yes.

 

Poornima:         OK, what should they send you?

 

Danielle:            You can send us a pitch or you can send us a hello and we can set up a phone call. Either one is great.

 

Poornima:         Cool.

 

Ooshma:            Yup.

 

Poornima:         All right, well, be sure to take them up on their opportunity.

 

Ooshma:            Looking forward to it.

 

Poornima:         That's it for this episode of*Build*. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive many more episodes like today's and great *Build* tips. Ciao for now.

 

Announcer:      This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

Jan 9, 2018

It’s the start of a new year, which is an exciting time all around. You’re probably excited about new opportunities, starting a company, or building product in 2018!

 

While I’m all for optimism, I’ve also gotta stay true to them theme of Build: debunking myths and misconceptions when it comes to building tech product, companies and your career in tech ;)

 

So we’re going to spend the next four episodes of Build debunking themes around fundraising for startups.

 

I know what you’re thinking: “Poornima, is this really necessary?! Can’t we just focus on product and engineering? How about some Build Tips with those friendly product managers, designers, and engineers from Pivotal Labs?”

 

Don’t worry we’ve got plenty of those in store for you! Before we dive back into the fun and friendly banter of Ronan and his team, I thought it was necessary to start 2018 debunking myths around fundraising.

 

Here are my reasons for doing this:

 

Reason #1: If you want to be a founder and start a startup in 2018, you need to know how to control your own destiny.

 

Gone are the days of a quick and easy seed deal. If you don’t believe me, then here are two posts from very active investors Fred Wilson and Jason Calacanis with compelling data spanning the past 5 years. They show you that investment in early-stage companies is indeed slowing down, and why the trend is going to continue. #byebyebubble

 

Reason #2: If you want to be a founder and fundraise, you need to know what it’s really going to take to get the first check that gives you the freedom to quit your day job.

 

I know I previously explored what it takes to raise capital from investors and how investors add value beyond the check. But times are changin’! As I went back and reviewed the episodes I realized that while much of the advice still applies, there are new challenges founders, especially first-time founders face.

 

If you’re going to be one of them, then you need to be aware of them as you build your startup. There are also going to be a lot of sacrifices that you will need to consider making. As you’re faced with them, you might feel like you’re doing things wrong, when others have had an easier time. But you cannot compare when the market is in flux.

 

Reason #3: Don’t want to be a founder? Even if being a founder is the furthest thing from your mind, you might be thinking about joining a startup as an employee at any stage — garage to growth.

 

Well you need to be able to tell fact from fiction. You don’t want to get lured into visions of billion-dollar exits, only to discover that they are going to be cutting health care benefits, won’t be able to make payroll next month, or all that equity won’t help you buy my 2005 Honda Civic!

 

You need to be able to ask tough questions to understand the real health of the company, and market opportunity, so that you can decide if it’s worth taking the risk.

 

Reason #4: As an employee at a startup, every quarter you are going to be tasked with challenging milestones.

 

Metrics matter more and more these days, and every department has a funnel.

 

For engineering, it’s making sure the team is continuing to build and ship a quality product, balancing out features with infrastructure and keeping an eye out for that pesky tech debt to avoid slowdowns.

 

For product, it’s making sure there is a good balance of attracting new customers, while engaging and monetizing existing ones. And holding the engineering team accountable to spending time on paying down product debt.

 

While marketing has to keep growing traffic no matter what!

 

Teams are also staying lean longer, and founders are looking for employees with generalist backgrounds who can #GSD.

 

Everyone’s contribution matters to achieving metrics, which makes you feel wanted as an employee. But it also means that you need to be good at prioritizing, understanding tradeoffs, and a fast learner!

 

At the end of the day, you need to know and understand that what you are doing is actually moving the needle and going to help attract investment and customers.

 

There is no point in building product or marketing just for the sake of it.

 

Hopefully my reasons have convinced you why learning about fundraising is integral to your own success at a startup, and we can move on to the first episode of the year! In it, we’re going to tackle the first misconception a lot of first-time founders fall prey: thinking they need to reach out to investors the moment they have an idea.

 

It turns out you actually don't need to reach out to investors and you can get started by funding your idea on your own. You’ve probably heard this a lot already…

 

Quite frankly, investors won’t even take meetings if you do reach out. I can count on two hands the number of investors who I had successfully raised from in previous years that wouldn’t even return my emails recently! Why? Because it’s getting really competitive out there and they want to make sure startups have substantial progress before they are willing to take time to meet.

 

To help us out, I've invited Erica Brescia, who is the COO and co-founder of Bitnami. Erica has also recently joined XFactor as an investment partner. XFactor is an early-stage investment firm that's looking to fund female founders as well as mix-gendered teams.

 

I choose Erica and her peers to come on the show because they are ALL founders first and investors second. Meaning they have sat on both sides of the table.

 

As you watch today’s episode you’ll learn:

 

  • Why investment may not be applicable to the type of business you are building and alternate approaches to funding your startup
  • The questions investors ask themselves before they will respond to a meeting request or write a startup a check
  • When startups are “too early” to fundraise and why the definition of “too early” is inconsistent — who really gets funded early and why
  • The work that startup founders and teams must do, if they are keen on attracting investment

In future episodes we’ll dive into topics like why raising capital won’t help you outdo competition, how to get over the constant rejection, and what it’s going to take to get that first check.

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

Episode Transcript

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Got an idea for a tech product that you want to scale into a big business? You probably think that you need to go out and raise capital from an investor, right? Well, it turns out that you may not need to. In today's *Build* episode, we're going to explore when it makes sense to reach out to investors.

                   

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each *Build* episode, I invite innovators and together we debunk myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech. One misconception a lot of first-time founders fall prey to is thinking they need to reach out to investors the moment they have an idea. It turns out you actually don't need to reach out to investors and you can get started by funding your idea on your own. In today's episode, we're going to dive in deep to understand some of the mistakes that first-time founders make when it comes to funding their idea. We'll also talk about what investors are looking for and when it makes sense to reach out to them. To help us out, I've invited Erica Brescia, who is the COO and co-founder of Bitnami. Erica has also recently joined XFactor as an investment partner. XFactor is an early-stage investment firm that's looking to fund female founders as well as mix-gendered teens. Thanks for joining us today, Erica.

 

Erica Brescia:              Thanks for having me. It's great to be here.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           This is the first time that you and I are meeting. Thanks for being here. I want to know a little bit more about you. Let's start with your background. What got you interested in tech?

 

Erica Brescia:              I've always been very interested in gadgets. It started out actually with mobile phones way back in the day, but I've always been curious about learning more about technology and gadgets and how things work. I really wanted to understand how mobile phone networks worked back in the day. Don't ask me why. I went on to study investment finance. A different path than a lot of people in Silicon Valley take. My father is an entrepreneur and I always had it in the back of my mind I wanted to start my own company. I got introduced to my co-founder and decided I was just going to help him work out a few kinks in the business and get it off the ground. Here I am now running a software company. It's really a case of being open to new opportunities, but also just having this lifelong interest in understanding how things work and learning new things.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Let's talk about Bitnami, your current company. What exactly does Bitnami do and what inspired you to start it?

 

Erica Brescia:              Bitnami is a catalog of open-source applications that you can deploy on servers. It's primarily like B2B software. Things like maybe Moodle or Druple or WordPress, if you're familiar with that. We also package up a lot of development environments and development tools, things like Jenkins and Get Lab or Anode or Rails or Django Development environment. We have over a million deployments a month of the applications that we package. We publish them both through Bitnami.com as well as on all of the major cloud bender platforms. Users choose Bitnami because they know everything is going to work right out of the box every time, and they get a consistent experience wherever they deploy the software. If I can just add one more thing to that, one thing I'm particularly excited about is up until now we've been bootstrapping through our relationships with cloud vendors, but we're about to launch a new product for the enterprise. We're essentially taking the next step in the company's evolution by productizing all of the automation that we've built to deliver this catalog of applications so that others can take advantage of it, too.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           It sounds like Bitnami has been going strong for a long time. How long have you guys been around?

 

Erica Brescia:              We've been working on the Bitnami part of the business since 2013, but the technology dates back about ten years to when we started Bitrock, which is the predecessor. We do have several years in now.

 

A Day In The Life of a Startup COO

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           That's great. As a COO, what's your day to day like?

 

Erica Brescia:              It was funny, when I thought through that question, there's no day to day. I spent Monday and Tuesday in some really key BD meetings. In Seattle yesterday, I was in LA for an open-source conference. I'm obviously here today. The way that we have our leadership roles between my co-founder and I might be different than a lot of other companies. I run everything except for product and engineering. That means that marketing, sales, BD, legal, finance, everything rolls up to me. That basically keeps things running and make sure that the company is growing and bringing on the right people and has revenue coming in and all those good things. Obviously as a quickly growing startup that's very, very tech heavy, I'm still involved in everything including product and engineering, too. There's never a typical day. It varies a lot and the days are long, but a lot of fun.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Very good. Now you have actually taken on another role. If Bitnami isn't enough, you decided to join XFactor as an investment partner. Tell us a little bit about XFactor and why the decision to go into investment.

 

Erica Brescia:              Absolutely. I'll start with XFactor and tell you about the fund. Then I'll talk about why I joined. XFactor is a $3 million seed fund. We're making $100K investments in 30 companies. Pretty easy math. The genesis was really a woman named Anna and a guy named Chip. Chip is a partner with Fly Bridge. They got together and wanted to find a way to fund more women in technology because they had read some of the statistics about how difficult it can be for women to raise funding. The truth is, it's really an untapped opportunity. There's a ton of brilliant women building some very interesting companies. They were having problems in some cases getting through the traditional VC process because of some of the biases that we've all read about. We probably don't need to go through that. The idea was that they were going to get together a group of operating female founders. I think that's really the key is we're all women who have built and scaled our own businesses across a variety of sectors. I have a lot of experience in B2B and closing very big BD deals.

                   

I've acquired companies and things like that. Some of the other women are very heavy on the consumer side and they're great at branding and rolling out new products. We got a really diverse team of women, but who are actually still on the ground running businesses, very in touch with the problems that founders have in getting new companies off the ground. We think we have a pretty unique perspective and also an edge in terms of what we can offer founders because we're so close to the challenges that they're experiencing. We're very focused obviously with that check size on pretty early-stage companies and helping set those founders up for success. We do expect most of them will go on to raise for their venture capital. We're there to support them in doing that. I actually haven't raised VC for my company, but all the other women have. We have a good diversity of experiences and opinions around that too.

 

Being A Startup Founder And Angel Investor

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Why'd you join?

 

Erica Brescia:              It took a lot of thought. They came to me. At first, I thought they just wanted to run the idea by me back in February. Then I get an email a few days later saying, “We'd love to have you join us.” I really did spend some time thinking about it and talking to my co-founder and my husband about whether or not I'd be able to balance everything, because it is a big commitment. If I make a commitment, I want to come through on it and make sure that I'm not letting the founders and my fellow investment partners down. It really came down to the opportunity both for personal growth for me and to give back. There's a financial opportunity, too, which is fantastic. I really saw that we have a pretty unique angle into both deal flow. Several of us are YC founders as well. We have access to the YC network and obviously just good networks in Silicon Valley and outside as well. I felt like we could do something really interesting. I could meet a lot more women in technology. Also, I really do think there's a huge untapped opportunity there. I think we'll be able to produce above-average returns. It really came down to me asking the question, “Do I have time for this?” I'm going to get less sleep for sure. That's definitely been the case.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Sure. You can make time.

 

Erica Brescia:              It was just too good to pass up. This is one of those things that I just couldn't say “no” to because the opportunity is so big and it's something that I'm enjoying doing so much.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Wonderful. As soon as I saw the news, I wanted to reach out to you guys because I thought it was fabulous and needed to be spread to everyone else. Let's talk about your investments then. I know everyone has probably got different things that they want to invest in. We're going to talk to some of your partners later on. Let's talk about what you like to invest in.

 

Why Angel Investors Focus On Making Investments In Markets and Business Models They Are Familiar With

 

Erica Brescia:              Sure. I right now am very focused on things that I am passionate about. I think about whether or not the company keeps me up at night thinking about it later. I am usually receiving on the deal flow that it's on B2B and enterprise sales in particular because that's where my expertise and experience is. I found myself drawn to some other things, too. One of the investments that'll be announced soon, I wish I could name some of them.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           That's OK.

 

Erica Brescia:              I think we're about to announce that we've made eight investments in the first two months.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Oh, awesome.

 

Erica Brescia:              We've been very busy and we've met some amazing women. One of the investments that I've led so far is very much a technology, cloud-focused company, which is absolutely my bailiwick. The other one is a fin-tech company. I was really drawn. I loved the founder. Was very impressed by her and the team that she's put together. Also, it was just the problem that they were solving, I could see it so clearly. It was palpable and I was staying up at night and I was talking to my husband about what they were doing and why I thought it was exciting. When I start thinking about how they can make the business successful and what they should be thinking about, that's a very good sign to me. I know it's not direct answer. I invest in this list of companies, but that's really not the way that it's worked out so far. I've looked at a variety of med-tech companies, fin-tech companies, more women in technology and sourcing and recruiting companies. Some people doing interesting stuff with NLP. It's really been a very diverse range of companies.

 

Why Women Founded Tech Companies Are Broader Than Gets Portrayed

                   

One of the things that I think you'll see us talking about more, which is very cool, is a lot of these companies are not what you would typically think of as the women-in-tech companies. A lot of people think all we want to work on is beauty. I like makeup and clothes and everything as much as the next person, but I don't know anything about those businesses. A lot of the deal flow that we've had, it's coming from all kinds of very hardcore tech, a lot of VR stuff, too, and AR. We've seen a broad range. Right now we're looking for the next billion-dollar businesses really. Any other VC it's, “Is this something I'm passionate about and can it be huge and can I add value in helping them make it so?”

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Actually, that's a good segue into talking about I think one of the things that confuses some folks in our audience and even first-time founders is, what qualifies as a tech product and then what—let's start there and then we can talk about maybe what a big idea is.

 

Understanding If Your Startup Is A Tech Enabled Business Or A Tech Product

 

Erica Brescia:              Sure. Almost anything these days is tech enabled. If it's not, you might have a scalability problem. I don't think we have very strict definitions as to what is tech or not. If excelling in technology and in the technical underpinnings of the product is going to give people an advantage, that's probably a tech company or something that we would think of as such. Some of the subscription businesses or there's a food device I can't talk too much about, but that we're looking at. A really novel subscription business around it. Another two companies have come through that are working on breast pumps for women. They're hardware companies but there's a lot of technology obviously that goes into the hardware. Obviously a lot of tech powering how they're approaching the businesses. It's really a pretty loose definition of what a tech company is. Even some of them are physical spaces now that we're looking at. It's a pretty broad range. It's not like we're only investing in software or we're only investing in sass or something like that.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           That's good to know. Tech enabled but there's probably some conversation that needs to be had around, “Are you really just selling water online or is there a distribution model that is tech enabled and it's cool if you sell water online.”

 

Erica Brescia:              Exactly.

 

Why Finding An Investor Isn’t Good Enough — You Need To Find THE Investor Who Understand Your Market and Business Model

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Got it. Then let's talk about I think another area, though, which is—you've already started talking about you enjoy the deals that are B2B, more enterprise, and maybe a little bit more saas heavy. I think one of the concerns that a lot of first-time founders have is, “I just need to find an investor.” I just need to find one investor, but they may not necessarily find that right investor. It's interesting because it's not just limited to tech. I was reading Barbara Lynch's memoir, who's a restaurateur, and she talked about going and finding the investors who invested in restaurants for her nine restaurants. Talk to me a little bit about what it means to be vertical focused as an investor.

 

Erica Brescia:              You want investors who understand your business or at least have the capacity and time to learn about it and who are upfront if they don't understand things, too. There's several things that make people good investors. One is, don't be an asshole, if I can say that on your show.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Sure. Of course.

 

Erica Brescia:              I just don't want to work with people who are not good people. To me, some people don't care about...I've actually had people come to me and say, “It doesn't matter. All VCs are going to be assholes, you just need to accept that and move on.” I'm like, “Uh, uh. No. No, I don't. There's a lot of great VCs out there.”

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           That's the normal assumption.

 

Erica Brescia:              There are a lot of good people out there, men and women in venture capital. I do think it's important that you understand somebody who understands your business and the cycles. Before, example, we've had a lot of very hardware-centric businesses come through. Those are difficult to invest in. In particular, if you don't have experience in hardware because you don't have a really good understanding of how long it's going to take and what the development cycle should look like and how capital intensive that you're going to be. It's harder to make good investment decisions. It's harder to be helpful for the founder, because if you have unrealistic expectations for the type of business they're building, nobody wins. It's the same, we've seen a lot of robotics companies doing super cool stuff, but I've told them, “Look, I'm not an expert in robotics. I'm going to have to go out.” We do have an associate who does some work for us, but we have to go out and be willing to invest our time to get up to speed in those industries in order to feel comfortable making an investment.

                   

It's good advice. I think what you're alluding to is, find an investor that actually knows what they're talking about in your space because otherwise they could really do damage by slowing you down, refusing to fund a second round or something like that. A follow on or just inundating you with questions all the time. The last thing you want to be doing is just educating your investors on the market when you have a company to build.

 

The Sacrifices Founders Have To Make To Get Their Startup Off The Ground

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Exactly. No, that's a good point. Let's talk about the other side of this, which is also, it's very tempting, as a first-time founder or somebody who’s green, to have an idea, whether it's hardware or anything that we feel is capital intensive or sometimes we just don't even have the capital as a founder. We haven't quite got to the financial point of our life. It's tempting to immediately say, “Oh my gosh, to get this thing off the ground I need to go and get investment. That might not be the right time.” Let's talk about what time horizon makes sense. I know it's going to be product specific, but I think it would be helpful to just—

 

Erica Brescia:              It really depends on so many different variables. One of them I think is important is to be realistic about where you are in your life and what kind of sacrifices you're willing to make. The reality is, if you have a family and a mortgage, it's a heck of a lot harder to stop taking a salary—particularly if you were to work in Silicon Valley because the salaries are quite high here right now—and go and start something from scratch. If you're 22 and right out of college and have none of those financial responsibilities, you might have more flexibility. My vote is do as much as you can before raising funding. Build as much as you can. First of all, there's so many good investment opportunities right now that I think most investors, they want to see...first they want to see that you're committed. If you just go out with a pitch deck—like I took two weeks of holiday for my job to put together a pitch deck and if you fund me, I'll go do this—you're never going to get funded because we want to see conviction.

 

We want to see that you quit your job, you're committed, you've been working on this with somebody else preferably for six months. You have the personality and the skills and the charm or whatever it may be, the conviction to actually get other people to join you. That's important, too. Unless you absolutely can not do it without raising money up front, I would say get at least to a prototype or as far as you can to be able to go show people and prove to people that you're there for the long haul and that you're willing to make sacrifices to make something happen. I will also plug incubators, like Y Combinator. Obviously I'm biased because we went through the program. That was a great experience for us in terms of helping us just build some momentum and we did rebranding of the company and accomplished a lot during that period. It's not about the funding necessarily, but it can give people who are cash wrapped a bit of cash to fund those first few months. It really helps you to accelerate that initial process and sets you up very well to raise from VCs after the fact.

                   

We've certainly sourced a lot of our deal flow from YC. We try at XFactor to be very broad and we've had people from all over the world, in fact, contacting us. Of course, we're going to look to YC because they've already been through that filter. They've achieved something during the period that they're in Y Combinator. It's a three-month sprint. We've found that looking at people that have at least gotten to the point where you would be if you've gone through a Y Combinator or similar. They've got something to show. That's when it makes sense. I will say, this is really the approach that we've taken with Bitnami is try to find money from customers. Let's not undervalue the fact that people will pay you for what you're building. Hopefully if you're building something valuable, and you're much better off going through that experience, learning what it takes to sell to people and collect their money—there's a lot of details there—and try to build your business that way. You don't need to go for VC right away. There are great examples of companies that have been hugely successful doing that like GitHub and Atlassian.

 

Why It’s OK To Build A Lifestyle Business

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           I'm going to have you hold that thought because we are going to talk about that in a little bit. Now, the other thing I want to point out because you said customers, but I think also bootstrapping with a pay check to get off the ground. A lot of times people are worried about quitting their job and having a source of income, so using that especially for businesses that a little bit more capital intensive early on. Want to throw that out there. I want to dive a little bit deeper into this whole idea of, “I do want to get investment eventually.” Let's say I have gotten to a point, maybe I've gone to an incubator or I've gotten it off the ground, I have some customers. Then there comes that period where you're talking to an investor and they may not really understand how big your idea is. It's oftentimes that thing that people nitpick over and over again that, is this a big idea? Is this a big market? Or sadly people like to say, it's a lifestyle business. There's a stigma here in Silicon Valley against that. Let's talk about what exactly defines a big idea—if we can even define it because I know it's a little amorphous—versus a lifestyle businesses and maybe even break that stigma of that lifestyle business.

 

Erica Brescia:              Sure. First I'll say I don't think there's anything wrong with a “lifestyle” business. There have been a lot of deals that we looked at. There was this one amazing woman, I won't name the company, but she came through my network actually. She developed some really interesting technology. It was my belief after talking to a lot of people that she's going to sell the company for somewhere between $30–50 million within two years. Awesome for her. Not a great VC investment?

 

Why Venture Capitalist Don’t Invest In Lifestyle Businesses

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Why?

 

Erica Brescia:              Because we can't produce the kind of returns that we're looking for. We have LPs just like any other VC fund. We have a responsibility to them to generate returns. I told this woman I want to help her in any way I can. She's incredibly bright. I just couldn't see a path to them building a billion-dollar business. That's really what it needs to be. There needs to be a path that you can understand for how this can be huge. It's going to be very risky. I should say we always know that businesses are going to change and evolve and you're very much betting on the founders. That's absolutely true, but at the same time, if they have conviction around a specific idea and we don't see how it can get to be a huge business, and some of the great hardware companies we're looking at are like that. I think they will have fantastic businesses and fantastic exits. I certainly wouldn't call them lifestyle businesses because they're life changing in terms of the returns that they'll create for the founders. They may not be appropriate for a VC fund. I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

                   

You need to take a dispassionate look about what you're building, how big the market really is, how much of it you have an opportunity to grab, and be realistic about that. Then think about the kind of funding that makes sense. You might be able to find a family office or something or angel investors who are not looking for the same VC-style risk and returns. They'll be totally happy with the company selling for $10, $20, $30 million. In a couple years, they'll double their money and everybody's fine.

 

Where Do Venture Capitalist And Angel Investors Get Money To Fund Startups

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           On that note, let's actually define what an LP is and why VC versus angels that people understand if they're not familiar.

 

Erica Brescia:              Sure. An LP is limited partner and they're the people that put money into the funds. They're often wealthy. They always have some money coming from somewhere. Often wealthy individuals, but depending on the fund, they might also be pension funds or endowments and things like that from universities or different trusts and things like that. Basically the people who put money into the hands of the venture capitalists who are the people who actually invest that money. In the case of angels, angels I think have evolved a lot. Now we have the super angels.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           We'll get into that in a future episode. I keep saying this, but it's gonna happen. It's gonna happen guys.

 

Erica Brescia:              I won't take us to off course then. There are a lot of different kinds of angels. I was an angel investor before joining XFactor. I mean, not at a huge scale, but I'd made a few investments myself.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           What's the scale?

 

Erica Brescia:              I was writing like $10,000 checks.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Perfect.

 

Erica Brescia:              Smaller checks. Then there are people like—I'll take my father, who's one of my closest friends and heroes and has inspired me to do all of this. He built a brick and mortar contracting business that did quite well. He's been making tons of angel investments and all kinds of different things. Some tech, some very, very nontech. You have people like that. Then you have people like Eric Han for example. My company did raise a bit of angel funding primarily to get some really great folks involved with the company. Some of these people were like Eli Gillin, Eric Han. Eric Han was the CTO of Netscape. He went on to be a very early investor in Red Hat. Since then, has been one of the first checks into a ton of companies that have IPO'd. He was on the board of Red Hat after they IPO'd. Eli Gillin is running his own company now, but he started and sold a company to Twitter and ran a bunch of stuff there. These are people who have done well in their career, typically understand tech. They make a lot more investments than somebody like maybe me or my father who might've written a couple of checks a year. These people are doing several key deals a year, usually only investing their own funds. That's one of the big differences. They don't have LPs. It's their own money. They might be doing it more at scale. We call them usually professional angels or super angels.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Business angels.

 

Erica Brescia:              Exactly. Who are making a lot of investments, but they don't have LPs to answer to.

 

When Does It Make Sense To Approach An Investor With Your Startup Idea — First Know What You Are Going To Do With It!

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Great. Let's end with this question. When does it make sense then when you think you have this big idea, to approach an investor? I know you guys said early, but what is maybe too early and what's a reasonable early to get a meeting?

 

Erica Brescia:              It depends on what you need. Let's start with why do you need the money? That's the first question you should be asking yourself. Where is this money going to get you? You better have a good answer before you go talk to VCs. What milestone are you going to hit with this? Then the second question you should ask is, could I get it from anywhere other than VCs? Do I have friends and family who might want to just give me some money? Could I even take out a loan? Sometimes these other things make sense. There are a bunch of diverse opinions on this, but my view is you don't take VC unless you absolutely need it. Until it's holding you back from scaling. In the particular case of Bitnami, for example, we've primarily bootstrapped. We've only taken a million dollars in outside funding in total. I have over 70 employees in 12 countries. We're cash-flow positive. We've built quite a stable and steady business. We are starting to talk about potentially raising venture capital because we're launching this enterprise product that I mentioned before.

                   

That involves building out an entirely new part of the business. I can do that off of cash flow, but I'll probably go a lot slower and we see that there's a limited window of opportunity here. I think it really depends on your specific case and whether you can do it any other way. Or if there's an investor that you can feel or that you feel can add a lot of value. There are certain investors who might have a ton of experience in your space. Maybe they started an earlier company and exited it and are just itching for the chance to do it better now that the technology is evolved or what have you. If you find people like that, I think they can be really helpful to building the business. Otherwise, it's like, you should raise when you need to raise. If you feel like you could run out of money in the near future and not be able to actually execute on your plan.

 

Yes There Is Such A Thing As Being Too Early To Fundraise For Your Startup And Yes It’s Inconsistent!

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Let's admit. There is a time that's too early.

 

Erica Brescia:              Oh yeah. There always is. It's funny. We funded a company that was quite early and quite a high evaluation. That's one of the deals I led actually. I knew the founder and he'd already built a successful company.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           There you go.

 

Erica Brescia:              You're much more willing then, almost eager, to get in because this is a male, female team. I happen to know the male better than the female. I told him I wanted into that deal because I think this guy has a ton of potential. Even though it was early, I would write him a check, but he's proven. That matters.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Exactly. I think that's a big stigma, or rather a big misconception around who's getting a deal, who hasn't built a product yet, or it's not on the market. It's great that you mentioned that. I think for most other folks, they need to see something. They need to see product. They need to see at least a concierge-style minimal bible product or service, some cash flow, some customers. They really want to...those who don't have a track record need to step up their game and show a little bit more credibility.

 

Questions Investors Ask Before They Take A Meeting Or Write A Check To A Startup Founder

 

Erica Brescia:              Yeah. The things I look at is, are they committed is the number one thing. Starting a company is hard and a lot of people underestimate how hard and how many sacrifices you make. You can do a whole episode on what's involved in that. Are they committed? Can they build a team? I look at that a lot. That's one thing where people who want to move to Silicon Valley who have no connections there, that's one of my questions. How are you going to find people and convince them in a highly competitive job market to join your team? If you can do that, it also speaks pretty highly of you and your ability to convince people and help them see the vision. Then can they build the product? Is it something that people will pay for? Those are the checklist items that I have. The more that you can demonstrate, the easier the time you're going to have with fundraising.

                 

If you can't prove that people will pay for your product, if you can't prove that people will use it, especially if you can't prove that you can build it, that's when we're going to have a lot of challenges getting to the next step. That's when I try to give people a clean “yes” or “no.” Sometimes it's like, “You're just not there yet. If you do these things, then I might be interested. I'm sorry. I need to see more before I can make the call.”

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           Yeah. I think that's fair. Thank you so much Erica for sharing all this information with us today.

 

Erica Brescia:              Thank you for having me.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:           That's it for today's episode of *Build*. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode where we'll continue the conversation and talk about when it makes sense to transition from angel investment to seeking investment from venture capitalists and what you need to do in that interim period. Ciao for now.

 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor Pivotal Tracker.

 

Blog Post 2

Subject: When It Does And Doesn’t Make Sense To Fundraise For Your Startup

Title: Startup Funding: When It Does And Doesn’t Make Sense To Fundraise For Your Startup

Subtitle: Interview with Erica Brescia COO and Co-Founder of Bitnami and Investment Partner at XFactor Ventures

 

Ready for more myth busting around startup funding? Let’s get to it then!

 

Last week I shared a number of reasons you should share care fundraising whether you’re a founder or startup employee. Here’s they are again, and in the Build episode we talked about why it’s a bad idea to reach out to investors when you have an idea.

 

This week we’re going to continue our theme and focus on what compels us to think we need to raise capital like competition heating up, the belief that the business will stop growing, or that the idea we’re pursuing isn’t really BIG enough. We’ll also be diving into the mechanics of investment talking about the nuances of an angel versus a venture capitalist, and why it’s important to look for investors that have knowledge of your marketing or industry.

 

Erica Brescia is back to help us out with this episode. Erica the COO and co-founder of Bitnami. Erica has also recently joined XFactor Ventures as an investment partner. XFactor is an early-stage investment firm that's looking to fund female founders as well as mix-gendered teams.

 

Erica is a founder and investor, and having sat on both sides of the table, she knows how to dispel fact from fiction!

 

As you watch today’s episode you’ll learn:

 

  • Why Erica and her partners at XFactor are putting their money where their mouth is and starting a fund to invest in female founders and mix-gendered teams
  • What the XFactor investment partners and other angels look for versus venture capitalists, and how much they are willing to invest
  • Why competitors will come and go, and you cannot let their actions intimidate you or direct your business goals
  • Why only you as a founder, can decide when is the right time to raise for your business

 

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0gwGGGoHLcU" frameborder="0" gesture="media" allow="encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

In the next two episodes we’ll explore handling all the rejections you receive from investors, how to motivate yourself to keep going, and what it’s going to take to get that first check!

 

Listen to the episode on iTunes!

You can listen to this episode of Build on iTunes.

 

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

 

## Startup Funding: When It Does And Doesn’t Make Sense To Fundraise For Your Startup Transcript

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Last time, we talked about how as a first-time founder, you don't necessarily need to immediately rush out and get investment to get your tech product off the ground. We discovered some alternate ways of funding your product development and company growth. If you missed that episode, I've included it in the link below this video.

 

In today's episode, we're going to dive in a little bit deeper, and talk about when it makes sense to go out for that angel investment, and then how do you transition from getting capital from angels to eventually getting it from venture capitalists, and what you need to do in the interim to make sure you're growing your company. So stick around.

 

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode, I invite innovators, and together we debunk a number of myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech.

 

What Compels Startup Founders To Fundraise

 

One myth a lot of founders fall prey to is the need to constantly fundraise. They're worried that if they don't, their competition is going to swoop right in and outpace them. Or their business is just going to stop growing, and even worse than that, people might not think that they are actually onto a big idea.

 

To debunk these myths and more, I've invited Erica Brescia, who is the COO and co-founder of Bitnami. Erica has also recently joined XFactor as an investment partner. For those of you who aren't familiar, XFactor is an early-stage investment firm that's looking to invest in female founders and mixed-gender teams. Thanks again for joining us.

 

Erica Brescia:      Thanks for having me!

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah! I know we talked a little bit in the last segment, but let's just quickly do a refresher, tell us a little bit about your background and what you do at Bitnami.

 

Erica Brescia:      Sure. Bitnami automates the packaging and maintenance process for server software for containerized, cloud, and behind-the-firewall deployments. We're most known right now for the Bitnami Application Catalog, which contains over 150 different pieces of server software, ranging from business schools, like content management systems, more project management systems, to development tools like GitLab and Jenkins for building out your development processes and pipeline, to stacks of things for building applications, like Node, or Rails, or Django. We work with all of the major cloud providers, and have over a million deployments a month of the apps we package across all the platforms that we support.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Awesome. In addition to Bitnami, you recently joined XFactor as an investment partner.

 

Erica Brescia:      I did, yes.

 

The Difference Between Angel Investors And Venture Capitalists

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah! We talked a little bit about that last time, and I want to pick up the conversation from our last time and dive a little bit more into not only what does XFactor do, but this whole position between angels and venture capitalists. How do you guys think of XFactor? Are you considering yourselves as angels or VCs? Would it help to start with defining angels and VCs?

 

Erica Brescia:      Sure. I mean, I tend to think of angels as primarily investing their own capital, and VCs are investing other people's capital. We all actually have our own funds in the fund as well, so we're LPs in addition to being the investment partners.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         What does that mean?

 

Erica Brescia:      That means that we're the people who put money into the fund, as the limited partners, who just put money in the fund, and then they step away, and they entrust, basically, the team of investment partners to invest that capital in companies that will produce ventures that yield returns.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Where is that money coming from? Is that your own hard-earned money, or is that from somewhere else?

 

Erica Brescia:      In the case of the LPs for the XFactor fund, it's from a range of different people. Some of them have just been very successful in business. Some may be managing endowments or trusts, or other investment vehicles, and they invest both in the stock market and in VC and angel funds as part of their diversification strategy.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Got it. I think some of you have also contributed personal funds, right?

 

Erica Brescia:      Yes. We have put our own funds into the plan as well.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         That's important to note. Yeah.

 

Erica Brescia:      You've got to put your money where your mouth is, right?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Great! No, I certainly appreciate you guys doing that.

 

Erica Brescia:      Plus, honestly, I think we're going to make money off of it! So why would you not do that?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Exactly!

 

Erica Brescia:      That is the whole point.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. You guys are operating a little bit like angels, but a little bit like VCs as well, but let's dive into more of a traditional VC model. What does that look like?

 

What Seed Stage Investors Are Really Looking For And The Size Of Check They Write

 

Erica Brescia:      Sure. The distinction there is interesting, because I would say there's seed-stage financing, which a lot of people think of as coming from angels a lot, but VC funds do as well. Those are typically much smaller rounds and much earlier stage. The company probably has something built, probably has some users, probably can show some traction, but they're usually not raising huge amounts of money, at least not by Silicon Valley standards, which are different than the rest of the world.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. Let's get some ranges. Because I know some seeds can get crazy.

 

Erica Brescia:      Huge. Yes.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         So let's do a more middle-of-the-road seed. What would that look like?

 

Erica Brescia:      These days, I would say they're usually between $500K and $2 million. I know that's a wide range, sometimes it's smaller, sometimes it's bigger, but the fundraisings that we're participating in are usually somewhere around there. We have had some companies raise significantly more than that, and we've almost gone in more at like a Series A stage. But typically you're raising $1 million or $2million to get your idea off the ground and show a little bit more traction, before you go and raise at a Series A. Those used to be maybe $2 or $3 million. Now, most of the time, you're looking at maybe $6, $7, even $10 or $15 million as a Series A, which we certainly see in the cloud and container space in particular, which is where I'm focused with Bitnami.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         OK. That makes sense. Now, I'm not going to dive into microfunds and syndicates, and all that stuff. We're going to do that in a later episode. But let's go back to you, and let's talk a little bit about how you initially funded Bitnami.

 

How To Initially Fund Your Startup When You Cannot Attract Investment

 

Erica Brescia:      Customers.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:        Customers!

 

Erica Brescia:     We sold stuff. Yeah.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. When was this, by the way?

 

Erica Brescia:      We started with a company called BitRock over 10 years ago, and BitRock built some really interesting technology around application packaging and deployment, which has become the foundation of Bitnami. We're very unique, I would say, for a Silicon Valley company. We developed a package software product. We sold it to customers, and we generated money that way.

                   

Then we started providing a subscription service to a lot of software companies that needed us to build, we called them "stacks" of software, so their products could be installed and distributed very easily, and we worked with a lot of the biggest names in open source, in those days. So we had that money coming in—

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         If you don't mind sharing, how big were some of those contracts?

 

Erica Brescia:      They were in the tens of thousands of dollars a year. So reasonably sized, but we now, in retrospect, we charged far too little. But that's one of the lessons that you learn as a founder, you're always underpricing yourself in the early days.

 

So we did that, and built up the company that way. Then we decided to evolve into Bitnami. We went through Y Combinator in 2013—

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         So before you did that, you actually had revenue coming in?

 

Erica Brescia:      Yes.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Give us a range of how big you were at that size?

 

Erica Brescia:      We had 12 people, and seven figures in revenue, when we—

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Oh! That's fabulous!

 

Erica Brescia:      —went through Y Combinator.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. OK. So why even bother going to—

 

Erica Brescia:      That's a great question! It was a subject of much debate, but again, interesting story, I suppose. My co-founder's wife had gone through Y Combinator with her own company, and had a great experience with it. And we knew that we wanted to send the company on a different trajectory—

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Which was?

 

Erica Brescia:      Growth.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         OK. OK!

 

Erica Brescia:      We wanted to build a huge business, and the model that we'd had previously was really what we talked in the last episode about, more of a lifestyle business. Right? We built a solid business, but that's not what we were there to do. We wanted to build a huge and very meaningful company. And we felt like Y Combinator was the right way to do that.

                

It gave us a lot of focus, and helped us make some interesting and difficult decisions. It also helped us a lot with hiring in the early days, and bringing more folks to the team. We've been on a pretty healthy  trajectory since then. Over 75 people. I don't give out revenue numbers, but we're profitable and growing, and doing well.

                   

All of that money, except for a million dollars, which we still have sitting in the bank, has come in through customers. And that million dollars we raised after going through Y Combinator. We brought in some angel investors whom we really liked, for different reasons. Some of them have a lot of experience in building companies, specifically in our space, and we felt like they could help us a lot with that.

                   

A couple of them are VCs who invested personally in us, because we didn't want to raise a VC fund, and a few were overseas venture investors, but they make seed stage investments. One from Japan, and one from China. And that was purely because we plan on going into those markets, and we thought it would make sense to have some people over there with a vested interest in our success.

                   

Y Combinator served as a good catalyst to bring that round together-

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         How big was that round?

 

Erica Brescia:      It was just a million dollars?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Oh! OK. But you were already in the seven-figure revenue at that point, when you raised that million.

 

Erica Brescia:      Exactly.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         OK.

 

Erica Brescia:      And that money is still sitting in the bank, and we've added a healthy amount to it, and—

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         That was what year?

 

Erica Brescia:      2013.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Oh! It's been a while. It's been four years.

 

Erica Brescia:      Yep.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Now, interestingly enough, you have that million, you're raising revenue, and you had grown without a lot of outside capital. I mean, you were already growing, so in that span of time, weren't you afraid that some competitor was just going to swoop right in and go out and raise $10 million or $100 million dollars, and put you out of business?

 

Don’t Let Competitors Intimidate You Into Fundraising For Your Startup

 

Erica Brescia:      What's actually funny about that question is we had a bunch of competitors do that, and they all went out of business..

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Oh, OK! Yeah!

 

Erica Brescia:      OK! Some spectacularly so. One raised $40 million, had huge names. One of the people on their board tried to come and intimidate me, and say I could never compete with—it was actually a woman running that company, too. But I won't name her, because that's not good for anyone.

                   

Yeah. We had a lot of companies come and raise money, but the model wasn't there yet. And that's why we didn't raise, either, right? There's a time, and we talked about this in the last episode. It's my belief that in most cases, you're better off raising when you have product-market fit. We had that at small scale, but we hadn't found what was really going to fuel exceptional growth of the company. It took us a while to get there, and a bunch of other companies tried to come in and do that, and they all went bust.

                   

I mean, there is a time and place when I think it does make sense, and when you do have to worry about competitors, because the truth is, once a big name competitor raises a big round, it's really hard to get anyone else to invest in you. I think Docker's a pretty good example of that in my space, right? They have tons of money. Nobody's going to invest in another container startup. Why would you do that? It doesn't make sense for investors.

                   

It is something to consider, but I think a lot of people spend way too much time worrying about their competitors, and not enough time worrying about their own business.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. Or their customers.

 

Erica Brescia:      Yeah! Or their customers. Exactly. So, yeah, that matters, but you need to do what's right for you, and what's right for what you want out of your life and your business. You should ask yourself those questions. Taking on VC is taking on a lot of additional responsibility, too—

 

What Kind Of Return Venture Capitalists Look For

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Like what?

 

Erica Brescia:      Well, they're expecting a certain level of return, right? A $100 million exit is not something a VS wants, where it might be completely life changing for you, if you don't have venture capital in the company. If you're taking venture capital, you're committing to running the company for at least 5–10 years, providing they don't push you out, which happens sometimes, too, if you're not doing things the way they want.

                   

You're committing to managing a board, with outside parties who are going to have sometimes divergent interests from you. It could even be the case that the fund cycles are usually 10 years, and they have to return the capital to their limited partners, which we talked about earlier. They might need to get out, and want to push you to sell when you don't want to. They might want you to sell to somebody you don't want to.

                   

There are a lot of great things that come from venture capital, if you partner with the right people. Obviously, you get the capital you need to fuel the growth of your business, and that can be incredibly important, especially to support go-to-market activities, or SaaS business models, where customer acquisition costs might be high, but the LTV is huge. There are reasons to take money.

                  

I'm not against that. But you also need to understand what you're signing up for, and what it really means, and that there may be an alternative path for you if that's not the path that makes the sense for you. If you don't want to run this company for 5–10 years, and you don't expect to sell it for hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars, don't take venture capital.

Startups That Focused On Growing Their Business First

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. Some folks in our audience might be thinking, "Erica, that's fabulous for you and Bitnami, and all of the success, but I could never do that. I couldn't just sit and wait for my business to grow organically." Are there other examples of companies here in the Valley, that you're familiar with, who have done a similar approach? I know I can think of a couple, but I'm curious—

 

Erica Brescia:      Absolutely! Well, Atlassian, they're in the Valley now, but they came from Australia, and that's a spectacular story. They really couldn't raise, because they were in Australia, and especially back then, the VC climate in Australia was almost nonexistent. They raised very late, and a lot of it was secondary to the employees, and they've done spectacularly well. GitHub's another example. They raised very, very late in the process, in a very big round, and that gave them a lot of flexibility to do other things.

                   

We've seen that happen a lot. It really depends. Again, I think, going back to what I said before about product-market fit. It's my view that the best time to raise is when you just need fuel for the engine. You already know how the engine works, and it's already built, and the machine is there, and you know, "If I put X in, I'm going to get Y out." Right? That's when you can really take advantage of venture capital, and that's when it can really make a difference.

                  

I'm not saying take a long time to build your company like I did. I would certainly do a lot of things differently this time around, but a lot of it just has to do with where the business is, and what the capital's going to be used for.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         It's been a four-year period, right? Where you haven't taken outside investment. You took the initial million. But in that period of time, how has not taking capital, or not thinking about fundraising, how has that helped you and Bitnami?

 

Erica Brescia:      Well, several ways. I think the most important thing is focus. Not having $10 or $20 or $50 million in the bank makes you focus on what's really going to move the business forward. It's really easy, and I have seen this countless times with companies that I will not name. They raise a ton of money, and they go out and hire a ton of people, and everything falls apart.

                   

Because humans are humans, right? These are not just cogs in the machine, especially when you're trying to build a breakthrough or game-changing product. You need incredibly smart people. They're going to have strong personalities. They're going to have past experiences from other companies. And you need to be able to get those people to work well together. So many startups have failed in doing that, and it's led to their own demise, or at least slowed them down a lot, and really burned a lot of bridges with fantastic employees.

 

I'd say it's allowed us to build out the infrastructure to responsibly scale the team, and it's helped us to focus, again, on making the right investments in terms of where we're spending our time. It's also great for negotiating business deals, I will tell you. That doesn't come up a lot—

 

How To Compel Customers To Do Business With Your Startup

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         How so?

 

Erica Brescia:      I was in meetings, even earlier this week, and these are quite big, multimillion-dollar-a-year deals, and they were asking some questions about what the business model looked like, and I could look at these people with a straight face and say like, "Look, we're not VC backed. My company needs to make money. You want me to be around. This needs to make sense for us, financially."

                   

That drives a lot of my decision making. I'm very, very involved in the corporate and business development stuff that we do. I need to do deals that make sense for my business. For some reason, it's a lot easier for people to get their heads around that when you don't have venture capital, which is kind of a funny thing, right?

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Well, people understand where you're coming from, and what resources you have at that level.

 

Erica Brescia:      Yeah! I'm not BSing them. "I have to pay people, and you're going to get a lot of value out of this, and you need to pay me, and I'm not going to do it on a bet that the relationship itself is going to benefit me enough, because that wouldn't be responsible business." That's what I go to all the time. It's not responsible business, you're not doing it. I think being bootstrapped and funding through customers really helps you think through that and make very good business decisions. We say no to all kinds of things, too. And I think that's easier, as a result of that.

                  

The one other aspect I'd say is, we don't have to manage investors. It takes a lot of time to build investor relationships, which I do do that anyway, because we may raise in the future. But also just to raise funding, to go through the diligence process, and then to manage a board of directors that involves VCs, again, who might have competing priorities, or other things going on.

                  

Again, we don't get some of the pixie dust you might get if you're VC funded, and sometimes we have to have interesting conversations with procurement departments, and show them our financials, to prove that we've got a great business, and that they can feel comfortable working with us, but it saves a lot of time and overhead.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah, that's interesting. So you feel, because you're in the B2B space, the enterprise space, some companies may feel like, "Oh, you're not VC backed, so you might go out of business sooner." But what you're saying is, "Actually, we've got customers. We're going to stick around because we've got real revenues coming in, so no need to worry about this."

 

Erica Brescia:      Yeah. And I can point to, we do business with Microsoft, Amazon, Oracle, Google. All these big companies. It's gotten a lot easier, now.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Right. You've got the credibility.

 

Erica Brescia:      Exactly. And we've got a track record. We've not just been around for a year, and we have an established team of senior people, and we've proven that we can execute, and we can deliver. And what often happens is we'll start with a smaller relationship, and it grows over time. After you get your foot in the door, what they care about is do you deliver on your commitments, not whether or not you have a VC in the company.

 

Keeping Your Options Open When It Comes To Investment

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Awesome. Now, I know you said, "Never say never." So you are thinking about capital, and then your future. How are you thinking about attracting that VC capital?

 

Erica Brescia:      Let me be clear: we haven't decided to raise capital, but it's a discussion that we're having currently between my CFO, my co-founder, me, and some of the other people on the executive team, because we're launching this new enterprise business. We're incredibly lean as a company right now.

                   

I told you we have in the mid-70s in terms of employees. Over 50 of those are in engineering and product. So the business team is quite lean, and we have very, very little sales on the sales side. Building on an enterprise business means I need a whole new go-to-market plan that involves field people, inside sales, solutions architects, and support people, and a bunch of other folks. Account executives, all these things.

                  

That's very capital intensive to build. We can do it off of cash flow, actually. We're in that fortunate position, but at the same time, we might grow a little bit more slowly, and especially hire more slowly, than we would if we had, say, $15 or $20 million in the bank. So we're starting to think through the tradeoffs, and what might make sense there.

                   

I've been in the Valley now long enough, I know a lot of VCs. There's several whom I like and respect quite a bit, and I still develop relationships with them, and we talk about the industry in general, and Bitnami, and where we're going. I think it's a little bit different than a company that's just coming out of nowhere. We have people who know us, who know the business, who have said that they're interested. So when the time comes, it's more of a matter of sitting down with people who are already friendly and interested in the company, and talking through what makes the most sense.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         It's a partnership.

 

Erica Brescia:      Mm-hmm, absolutely.

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         Yeah. Wonderful. Well, thank you for sharing your experience with us today, Erica. I know our audience is going to get a lot out of this episode.

 

Erica Brescia:      Thank you so much!

 

Poornima Vijayashanker:         That's it for today's episode of *Build*. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode, where we'll dive in deeper with some of Erica's co-investors and explore more topics around funding your startup. Ciao for now!

 

Voiceover:          This episode of *Build*is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

 

 

Sep 24, 2017

As if preparing and delivering a presentation to your peers isn’t nerve-wracking enough… you also have to worry about the Q&A period at the end of your talk!

 

You’re worried about people asking not one but TWO questions! Having to decipher those questions that are really just comments. Then there is THE dreaded question: the question you don’t know the answer to.

 

You don’t want to appear stupid in front of your audience!

 

Truth is that the Q&A period can leave many first-time public speakers feeling like they need to know everything before they give a talk!

 

But you don’t, and we’re going to debunk this myth and more in today’s Build Tip.

 

I’m joined by Lara Hogan who is the VP of Engineering at Kickstarter and Author of Demystifying Public Speaking. Together we’ll be sharing a number of strategies to help you get ready for ANY question you receive during your next Q&A session after a presentation or team meeting. You’ll also learn some techniques to calm your nerves, engage your audience, and keep them wanting more!

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

--

Episode Transcript

Poornima:  Whether you're new to public speaking or you've been doing it for a very long time, there's gonna come a point at the end of your talk, and right before that Q&A, where your nerves are gonna flare up.

                               

You're gonna be thinking, "What questions are people asking?" Or, "How do you respond to a question that you don't know the answer to?"

                               

Well in today's *Build* Tip, I'm gonna cover answers to these questions and more. Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. And today I'm joined by Lara Hogan, who is the author of *Demystifying Public Speaking*, and a lover of donuts.

 

Lara: Absolutely.

 

Poornima: Yeah. So Lara, you and I have given a lot of technical talks through our careers, and gotten to this point where maybe we're not as nervous giving the talk. But at the end, there's that Q&A period. Right?

 

Lara: Right.

 

Poornima: Where we can't anticipate all the questions. Those wonderful two-parters. People who do comments instead of questions.

 

Lara: Absolutely.

 

Poornima: Or you just don't know what the answer's gonna be.

 

Lara: Totally.

 

Poornima: So, let's kinda walk through each of these. Let’s start with the first where you just don't have a sense of what the questions are gonna be.

 

Lara: Yeah.

 

How To Prepare For A Q&A Session

 

Poornima: Do you have a technique that you use?

 

Lara: Absolutely. So I like to just in general have a feedback crew of three to five people. And hopefully they're people who you know well enough to make sure they're gonna

give you good critical feedback.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: 'Cause it's not worth it to just get feedback from people who you're not sure are gonna help you actually get better.

                               

So at the end of your practice run, maybe with that feedback crew, maybe they've helped give you some feedback about your body language, about your words that you used, etc. Ask them to help you do a practice Q&A.

 

Poornima: OK.

 

Lara: Yeah.

 

Poornima: That's great.

 

Lara: I love to make sure I have a mix of people, maybe people who are new to the topic, maybe people who are really familiar with it, or know the audience really well.

 

Poornima: Mm-hmm.

 

Lara: 'Cause they can help you level up your game, and get some practice to reduce those nerves.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: That when you're finally on stage you're like, "I've done this before."

 

Poornima: Sure. And do you feel like the questions that they ask are usually indicative of what the audience is gonna ask?

 

Lara: I try to ask for two different kinds of questions. One's just like a stereotypical, “If you were in the audience for real, what might you ask”?

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: But if they're your friends, they're gonna be nice, normal questions.

 

Poornima: Right.

 

Lara: I also like to add a version two, which is like, “Let's get weird.”

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: Give me that statement that's not actually a question. Or like totally intentionally

misunderstand the point that I'm trying to make, and ask me that question.

 

Poornima: Mm-hmm.

 

Lara: That way I have some practice in knowing how to handle those really sticky moments.

 

Poornima: So doing this in a practice session and dealing with peers, you're probably gonna feel

pretty good.

 

Lara: Yeah.

 

How To Respond To A Question That Is Really Just A Comment

 

Poornima: But what do you do in that moment where you may get that comment that's a question? How do you respond?

 

Lara: Totally. I think it depends on the situation. I want to remind everybody, your audience is rooting for you. Whenever you get that, "This is more of a statement than a question." I promise it's not just you feeling the weirdness of that, it's the whole of the audience, too. And you're still in a position of power. You still have control over the room.

 

Poornima: Mm-hmm.

 

Lara: And your whole goal is to teach people something new. And make sure that they are leveling them up in whatever the topic is that you're talking about.

                               

You have completely, a complete opportunity to be like, "Thanks for that. Here is how I would either reframe it, turn it into a better question, or answer the question, that you think you really wanted." Provide the information to the audience, too.

 

Poornima: Mm-hmm.

 

Lara: Yeah.

 

What To Do If You Get Asked A Question From Someone Who Is Online

 

Poornima: That's good. Now I also know a lot of times there are questions that come up where the audience isn't present, they might come up from audio, video, somebody might have written one in, Twitter, whatever. How do you facilitate those kind of questions?

 

Lara: Yeah, that's a really good question. I think—I hope—it helps to have a good moderator.

 

Poornima: Uh-huh.

 

Lara: To make sure that someone can actually help you navigate especially as multiple different sources of information giving you those questions.

 

Poornima: Yep.

 

Lara: But by and large, I just try to scan them, and kind of see which ones are the most relevant to my topic.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: Or which ones are gonna help me give an answer that will actually level up the entire audience who's listening in.

 

Poornima: Nice. I like what you said. So you're gonna filtering, but in a way that's gonna benefit the audience.

 

Lara: Yeah.

 

Poornima: Not just filtering for the sake of filtering.

 

Lara: Absolutely. Yeah.

 

What To  Do When You Don’t Know The Answer To A Question

 

Poornima: So let's talk about the last, the dreaded question, that you don't know the answer to.

 

Lara: Oh, those are my favorite. Yeah.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: I found that just in general in my career, not just in conference settings, but as for standing up in front of my team, or my boss.

 

Poornima: Sure, meetings.

 

Lara: Yeah. You have to be able to say, "I don't know."

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: And you can do it gracefully. Just saying, "I don't know," doesn't mean that you're bad at your job. It doesn't mean that you didn't do all the—no one human can possibly know all there is to know about the topic on which you're speaking. So I like to practice also with that feedback crew saying, "I don't know." And in a really graceful and helpful way.

 

Poornima: Mm-hmm.

 

Lara: So maybe like "I don't know. I'll follow up later." And like respond on Twitter when I finally do the research on their answer.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Lara: I might just be like, "I don't know. That's a great question. Come find me at the break and we can talk more about it." And my absolute favorite one is to be like, "You know, I don't know the answer to that question, but does anybody else in the audience know the answer to that question could you raise your hand? You should go talk to that person."

 

Poornima: Yeah. That's great.

 

Lara: Just totally punt on it.

 

Poornima: Yeah. No, that's fair. Awesome. Well thank you so much, Lara, for joining us.

 

Lara: Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

 

Poornima: Yeah. And thanks all of you for tuning in today. And special thanks to our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker, for their help in producing this episode.

                               

If you've enjoyed this episode, then please subscribe to our YouTube channel. And if you have friends out there who are nervous about Q&A, be sure to share this episode with them. Bye for now.

 

Lara: Thanks so much.

 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

Aug 20, 2017

Every product release our goals are the same: we want to show customers we care about meeting their needs and we want to stay ahead of our competition! So how do we get it all done? We cram as many features and bugs as we can think of. Cutting back is for complainers!

 

Is it really?

 

Or… is it hard to estimate how long a feature is going to take to build and a bug to fix? And by not cutting back are we jeopardizing the quality of the product we release and sacrificing the sanity of the team?

 

We get that this is an age old struggle. It’s hard to challenge business goals, and start a conversation within your team about why you aren’t going to do something without being seen as a slacker.

 

If you or your team has struggled to figure out what will produce quick wins, what to ignore because there is no value, and what may be too complex to pursue in a single release then you’ll want to watch today’s episode! In today’s Build Tip you’ll learn:

 

  • Why people choose to cram versus cut back
  • Why it’s hard to estimate how long it will take to build a feature or fix a bug
  • Why it’s important to cut back on features and bugs for each release
  • What happens when you and your team commit to building and fixing everything
  • How to evaluate what to work on and commit to using a simple 2x2 matrix
  • Why it’s OK to have a debate around the product’s strategy and roadmap

 

Be sure to share the episode with your teammates to help them understand the importance of cutting back!

 

 

 

Transcript

 

Poornima: What's the matter? What are you doing?

 

Ronan: I'm getting ready for the next release.

 

Poornima: And this is how you get ready?

 

Ronan: Do you know how many features and bugs we have to get into it? I'm to sure we're going to be able to make the release in time.

 

Poornima: Have you thought about cutting back?

 

Ronan: No way. Have you spoken to the customer recently?

 

Poornima: I think we're going to need to cover how to cut back in today's *Build* tip.

                               

Why People Choose To Cram Versus Cut Back

 

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host Poornima Vijayshanker, and today I've got a new *Build* tip for you. I'm joined by Jay Hum, who is a project manager at Pivotal. Now Jay, we run into this issue over and over again where we commit to a lot of features, a lot of bugs, because we want to meet business goals and we want to make our customers happy. But we can't cram it all in. And I know time and time again we tell people to pare back, but they don't, right?

                               

So let's start by talking about why people don't pare back.

 

Why It’s Hard To Estimate How Long It Will Take To Build A Feature Or Resolve A Bug

 

Jay Hum: So before I answer that question, I think it's important to bring out that software development's always notoriously difficult. And estimating the amount of effort that goes into any type of release feature or functionality, is even more difficult, right?

                               

So, for example, if a developer comes to me and says, "This is going to take two days," then I multiply that two and then add two days to it, so it's actually going to take six days instead of two days.

 

Why It’s Important To Cut Back On Features And Bugs For Each Release

 

Poornima: So why is it even important to pare down a release?

 

Jay Hum: So customers always ask for a lot of features and functionality, and then even the development teams, the product manager, the designers and developers, they always have their own ideas of what should go into a release or feature. But at the end of the day, until that product is out in the market, you're actually never going to know what features or functionality the customers are actually going to use.

                               

There's lots of evidence out there that when you're dealing with customers, they'll say one thing but you go look at the analytics and they're actually doing something else, right? So the danger in creating this big release that has tons of features and functionality, is that you can sort of create something that's sort of an analysis paralysis in terms of what the user's experiencing, right?

                               

So if they get a new release and there's so many new features and functionality they don't know what to do, so what they end up doing is not doing anything and just going back to what they were doing originally. The second part is that you always want to sort of relate it back to web business goals or metrics that you are trying to achieve, right?

                               

Again, you want to focus on some of the top priority task features that will drive the most business value or move a KPI, whether that is to increase engagement or move people further down the funnel.

 

What Happens When You And Your Team Commit To Building And Fixing Everything

 

Poornima: What happens if we commit to everything?

 

Jay Hum: Well, in Ronan's case where he's all stressed out and it's a big release, I mean I've heard this story before, and essentially the short answer is disaster, right? But let me unpack that a little bit.

                               

So, first of all, you've already seen that Ronan's very stressed, right? So if you don't pare down the release you are effectively going to burn out the team. Not just the developers but the product manager, the stakeholders even, the quality engineers, and the designers.

 

Poornima: Is there anyone besides the team they're going to upset?

 

Jay Hum: Yeah, obviously you're going to upset the customer. So generally when the team is overstressed or burned out and really pushing hard and cranking through the night, effectively, they're not going to write good-quality code and they're going to accrue technical debt and it's going to be messy and they're going to cut corners, right? So that means that the product that eventually is going to be shipped is going to be subpar, it's not going to be up to the expectations of the client or customer, and again, they're just going to get turned off and very disappointed.

 

How To Evaluate What To Work On And Commit To Using A Simple 2x2 Matrix

 

Poornima: I know there's been a lot of conversation and debate on how to pare down features, what bugs to include or not include. Do you have a simpler solution you can share with the audience?

 

Jay Hum: Yeah, my go-to solution is a two-by-two matrix. That works very well in helping us prioritize which features should go into a release and which features should fall out. So it's a two-by-two that allows us to rank any features in terms of value to the customer as well as complexity to implement.

                               

And it's great because it actually gives you information on four different things. So it'll give you information on which of the features you should actually be doing or working on, as well as which would we call sort of the quick wins that you can do very quickly and looks like you're making good progress. It'll show you which features that you should ignore because they don't have any value or they're too complex, and other ones that you should debate around in terms of product strategy and roadmap.

 

Poornima: Now Jay and I want to know do you guys have a go-to method for paring down features at your company. Let us know in the comments below.                               

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

Aug 13, 2017

All this month, Joy Dixon and I have been digging into the theme of working on side projects that you’re passionate about. We started out by talking about how to keep your day job and pursue your passion project on the side, and last week we talked about how to keep your passion project moving along when you physically can’t.

 

In today’s final episode, on side projects for this month, we’re going to talk about how to keep your passion project growing despite challenges.

 

When we’re just getting started all the passion we have for our side project makes us feel like we can tackle small challenges that come up every day. But over time we start to uncover bigger challenges like funding, dealing with regulations, lacking experience, and missing self-imposed deadlines and milestones.

 

When we hit one of these challenges we feel stuck. Our side project stops growing, and again we’re tempted to quit.

 

Instead of giving up, it might be time to re-evaluate the direction and purpose of our side project.

 

In today’s episode Joy is going to share how she responded to all the challenges she ran into while setting up and growing her side project Mosaic Presence. You’ll learn:

 

  • How to embrace not being ready
  • Why you need to build a support system for your side project
  • Why Keep Your Side Project Alive Even If It’s Not Growing
  • Why Our Self-Imposed Deadlines Slip And Having A Day Job Helps When They Do
  • How to re-evaluate the direction and purpose of our side project instead of giving up on it

 

Know someone who is starting a side project? Please share this episode with them!

 

 

Transcript

 

Poornima: Previously, Joy and I dug into why it's totally OK to keep your day job and pursue a side project. We also talked about how to manage your time and your energy. If you missed either of those segments, I highly recommend you check them out. I've included the links to both of them below this video.

                               

In today's segment, we're gonna tackle the final topic: how to continue growing your side project, despite the bumps.

                               

Welcome back to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. Each *Build* episode consists of conversations I have with innovators. Together we debunk myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech. Thank you, Joy, for joining us again.

 

Joy Dixon: Hey, great to be here.

 

Poornima: It's been two, two and a half years since you started Mosaic Presence. Surely you've hit some bumps along the way.

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Poornima: In those bumps, as you were experiencing them, how did you respond to them?

 

Joy Dixon: I took them all as learning opportunities. There was a lot I didn't know. I was very clear about being in the classroom. Very clear about teaching code. But a lot of the other parts of it—like creating my business, incorporating all those different I's and T's—I did not know about those. I really just took it in stride. I was like, "OK, cool. Now let me jot it down and I can share this with the next person."

 

Poornima: That's awesome. That kind of answers my next question, which is, what did you learn from that? It sounds like you learned a lot.

 

Joy Dixon: Totally. I learned a lot, how to actually set your business up, how to establish it, how many, where the offices are in the city of Oakland who are like, "Go and file this paperwork." So I really just took it all as a big learning opportunity and it's just really great. It was really great.

 

How To Embrace Not Being Ready

 

Poornima: One of the things we talked early on about was being ready. Since you didn't know all this stuff, it didn't make you feel like you weren't ready to do it?

 

Joy Dixon: No. That thing called Google has really instilled a lot of confidence in me. I would really just go Google. So many people put out so much great material, like yourself.

 

Poornima: Thank you.

 

Joy Dixon: Right?

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: So you can just follow along, learn some things. It's really easy to just keep moving forward.

 

Why You Need To Build A Support System For Your Side Project

 

Poornima: Nice. When you did hit those bumps, in hindsight we're like, "Oh yeah, it was a learning opportunity." But they sting in that moment, right? It's like, this is really difficult. Yeah, I'm sure I'm gonna look back and learn on this. How did you manage that moment when the bump hits you?

 

Joy Dixon: When the bump hit me, I leaned on my loved ones. Honestly. My best friend, my inner circle. Because the bump hit, and it was a really big bump. Yes, without a doubt, on this side of it, it's a learning opportunity. But in the midst of, and I remember the exact moment when there was so many things coming at me, but the exact moment is when my MacBook Pro just went blank. And I was like, "Oh my goodness, this is it right?" That was the moment that I pretty much lost it. 'Cause I was like, everything was rolling and even I hit bumps I could still manage. But I was like, "Everything is on this machine." Thank goodness for the people in my life, really.

 

Poornima: Building a support.

 

Joy Dixon: I would tell people, have that support system. They don't have to be in the same field you are, they just have to support you. That's really so important.

 

Poornima: Nice. Again, because we're in that moment, we think, "OK, we can get through this." But there comes a time where we keep hitting those tough bumps. And it can kind of phase us, right?

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Why Keep Your Side Project Alive Even If It’s Not Growing

 

Poornima: Why did you decide to keep going in spite of?

 

Joy Dixon: Really what I did, was I stopped and I looked at what was really causing a lot of the pain for me. It was really my timeline. It was my timeline. 'Cause I had said, I wanted this completed by this. When I initially opened up Mosaic Presence and started doing it, I was like, "Oh. Four months. I'll be done. It'll be up and running. I'll have 30 students two weeks after that." Right?

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: None of that came to fruition. It was really, "Wow." Sad to learn how to let go and just keep moving forward. Have a direction, but not be attached to the outcome. That was really what made it easier to go through the process, 'cause it was really my struggle and my holding on tight and wanting things to go my way that was really causing all of my extra pain.

 

Poornima: I like what you said about the timeline, 'cause this is something I talk to a lot of founders about. Those who are both technical and nontechnical. It's just, “We anticipate it taking three months, six months,” it ends up taking—heaven forbid—a year.

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Why Our Self-Imposed Deadlines Slip And Having A Day Job Helps When They Do

 

Poornima: Sometimes 18 months. I think going back to the overall theme, that's kind of why it's nice to have that day job, to have a little bit of a footing and continue that side, because you don't know how tumultuous it's going to be. I think that's hard for people to wrap their head around, "Why would it take double the time? Why wouldn't it be done tomorrow? Why can't I just fix this thing with one pixel? Why is this not a five-minute fix? Why is this a five-day or a five-month sort of thing?"

 

Joy Dixon: It really is so true. And that's so good to put that out there for everybody to really understand that. Having a day job made it easier for me to get through those times. Because one of the things I really was concerned about with Mosaic Presence and actually starting it was the energy that I brought to it. I wanted everything to have a certain level of peace and calm. Just to create a great learning environment.

                               

I wanted my students to be my number one. I wanted to serve my students. I didn't want to all of a sudden see them walk through the door, "OK, you're the rent." You know, I didn't want to look at them like that. I really wanted to look at them as, "Well, I'm really trying to expand your opportunities. I really want to be in community with you. That's how I want to see you, and that's how I want you to feel in this classroom." I wanted to talk all that extra pressure off of them and off of myself. That's why I maintain the full-time job.

 

How To Re-evaluate The Direction And Purpose Of Your Side Project Instead Of Giving Up On It

 

Poornima: Let's talk about the learnings, 'cause there is that moment where you can look back and you can say, "I learned something." How has that caused you to change course?

 

Joy Dixon: Really, the timeline is the main thing. The timeline and allowing it to just unfold. Instead as opposed to being super directed about, "I want this to happen, this way, at this time.” Now it's more of an unfolding as I go through Mosaic presence. The amazing parts about this is all these opportunities are coming to me.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: I'm not out there actively seeking. I'm allowing things to just happen and transpire.

 

Poornima: Sure.

 

Joy Dixon: It definitely is challenging. It is really challenging. Like I said, I'm Type A.

 

Poornima: Yeah. I was just gonna say, as a, I shouldn't say recovering, as a present Type A, I think part of the challenge is, and also having been a software engineer, when you see something done and it's shipped, that's when you get this great sense of like, "I accomplished something." But when stuff isn't, then it causes you to, "Oh my God. I gotta do all these other things now to make this thing happen because this deadline has been pushed." There's this level of unease. When you said, learning to sit with it, I think that's the challenge. Learning to let go, that's the challenge. When it doesn't happen, we don't have that nice to-do list checked off. We don't have that thing to show, so we don't have that sense of accomplishment.

 

Joy Dixon: Yes. That was really it. It's about redefining success. Really. 'Cause is it the journey? Or is it the destination?

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: I know people say it all the time, but it really is like, "Oh, with each step. Each step I have a success." Celebrate each and every single step towards your goal. 'Cause otherwise it's gonna be a painful journey. It really is. That has really been the thing that has helped me a lot. It is a big walk of faith.

 

Poornima: There are obviously times where you felt like you were banging your head against the wall. It wasn't working. You needed to change the timeline. You've kind of kept at it because you've been doing this now for two and a half years. Somewhere in that period of time, there must have come a moment where you felt like, "OK, what I'm doing, it's making an impact. It's actually bringing me joy." Right?

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Poornima: How did that feel for you? When was that?

 

Joy Dixon: That felt great. That felt really great. Really it was just encountering...It was actually when I started reaching out to former students for testimonials and to see that, "Oh, they're a director of this part. They're a senior software engineer over here." The words that they sent back about the impact that I had on their lives was like, "Oh my goodness." That was an amazing thing. That reminded me that this is why I do what I do. There is no better feeling in the world than being able to support somebody and assist them on their journey in moving forward.

 

Poornima: How do you continue to keep growing your presence?

 

Joy Dixon: Yeah. Ba-dump-bump. Actually even meeting young people. Young people are really great and they're super inspiring. People who are like me, who are like, let me transition and acquire some new skills and really kind of show them that, "Hey, I do this. You can do this." And when they see that and they get that light in their eye, then that makes all the difference in the world to me.

 

Poornima: Any final recommendations you have for our audience when it comes to growing their side project?

 

Joy Dixon: Yeah. Keep at it. I really do mean that. Keep at it. Every single step counts. Do what you need to do to take care of yourself. That is of the utmost importance. Your self care is number one. Always do something on your project every single day, even if it's some small thing. But just something every single day, that way you'll feel like, "Oh, you're nurturing yourself. You're being and you're nurturing yourself like your project and your baby.” That would be my recommendation.

 

Poornima: Those are wonderful words to end on. Thank you so much.

 

Joy Dixon: Awesome. Hey, thank you, this has been so great.

 

Poornima: For people that want more, how should they get in touch with you?

 

Joy Dixon: They can reach me at mosaicpresence.com and feel free to send me an email at joy@mosaicpresence.com. I'd love to hear from you.                               

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

Aug 6, 2017

In last week’s episode of Build, we began exploring the theme of pursuing a side project while keeping your day job. Jox Dixon and I did some myth busting around the need to go all-in. If you missed the episode you can check it out here.

 

This week we’ve got a pretty meaty episode for you. We’re going to dive deeper into this theme, and talk about what to do when the inevitable happens: you can’t physically work on your side project.

 

We thought it was particularly important to tackle this topic because it’s happened to both Joy and myself more than once, and it’s probably already happened to you or you’re thinking about how to handle it when it does.

 

The common culprits that hold you back from physically working on your side project are burnout and stress. Each is often prompted by teammates at your day job needing you more, you feeling the need to do everything yourself, and not having enough help on your side project or feeling like you can’t ask for help!

 

People often think it’s the quality of the idea that determines the success or failure of a side project. But really it depends on how you respond each of these issues as they arise. Of course, it can be tempting to just give up and move on, because hey it’s a side project! But if you’re really passionate about your side project, it can be hard to let go, and you’ll want to continue to make progress.

 

So in today’s episode, you’ll learn the following:

 

  • Why it’s OK to take periodic breaks from your side project
  • Why it’s important to say NO to things to avoid burning out
  • How to set boundaries with your teammates at your day job, when they want more of your time
  • How to ask others for help
  • How to find people who are interested and motivated to work on your side project
  • Why it’s OK if you don’t have knowledge or experience in some areas and can delegate that work to those who do
  • Why you don’t have to respond to every improvement request immediately

 

 

 

Transcript

 

Poornima: In today's segment, we're going to talk about how to manage your time and energy around a side project. I know there's been a lot of talk around time management and energy management, so I'm going to dive right into some of the tougher topics.

                                                 

Welcome back to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. Each episode of *Build* consists of conversations I have with innovators in tech. Together we debunk myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and advancing your career in tech.

 

Why It’s OK To Take Periodic Breaks From Your Side Project

                                                 

We're continuing our conversation with Joy Dixon, who is a visionary and entrepreneur with 20 years’ of industry experience. In addition to having a day job as a software engineer, she runs a technical training school called Mosaic Presence. I know for myself, Joy, I have recently gone through a tough month, where I had a lot of health issues, and I just couldn't physically be there to nurture all of my side projects. Let's start by talking about how do you keep these projects humming along when you maybe physically can't?

 

Joy Dixon: Yes, that is a great question. That is a really great question, because that actually happened to me a couple of times last year, major health issues. It was really an opportunity to take a break.

 

Poornima: Good.

 

Joy Dixon: I took it as an opportunity to take a break, so I slowed down a little bit. It gave me enough space to refocus and to prioritize. That was something. Instead of trying to do everything, let's actually set up that list where this is number one, this is number two, and if we get those two things done, that's good. We don't need the full 30 done today.

 

Poornima: Nice.

 

Joy Dixon: That was really it.

 

Why It’s Important To Say NO To Things To Avoid Burning Out

 

Poornima: I remember in last segment, you mentioned that lovely word, which we started this year talking about, that N word. Let's hear it. Saying “no” to things. Right?

 

Joy Dixon: Yes, yes.

 

Poornima: What's your magic way of saying “no” to things?

 

Joy Dixon: I do it graciously. Really. I have said “no” to more things in the past two years, and not just like, "Hey, let's go hang out," but no to weddings. No to graduations. No to major birthday milestone parties. Really just having to make a decision and having to...most people have been receptive, because it's you're like, "Oh, I'm doing X, Y, Z. I'm working on Mosaic Presence. It's really important to me. Can we get together at a different date?"

 

Poornima: Right.

 

Joy Dixon: Most people have been more than receptive for that and really super supportive. I think just the practice. It's about practicing and getting comfortable with putting yourself and your dreams and your desires first.

 

How To Ask Others For Help

 

Poornima: In addition to saying “no,” I also have to get comfortable asking for stuff. How have you gone about getting help from other people?

 

Joy Dixon: My network has been really super great. I have really just reached out to them, because I'm very clear about what I know, which means I'm super clear about what I don't know.

 

Poornima: Yeah, yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: With that, I just reach out to people. Most people I have found...people have been so super helpful and want to help. Maybe not on the timeline that I have, but they are—

 

Poornima: That's important.

 

Joy Dixon: That is very important.

 

Poornima: I think you should say it one more time. Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: Yes, people are very receptive. Maybe not on working on my timeline, but they do come around, and they do help. So just really learning to accept the help when it's available has been really, really good for me.

 

Poornima: I'm sorry. I had you repeat that, because I think a lot of times, when we get so passionate about our idea, and we want to put in the effort, we think everyone else is like, "Yeah. I can do this, too. I can quit whatever I was doing," but they need a little bit more lead time, because they also have commitments that they want to keep up. We just have to be respectful about that.

 

Joy Dixon: Really, having my own passion and my own project, really, I have more understanding for people when they have theirs. I'm like, "Oh, OK. We'll do it in two weeks, then."

 

Poornima: There you go. Now, here's the thing. I think a lot of people...because you mentioned before being type A. We get really averse to asking for help, though...

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Poornima: ...because it's our baby. We just have to figure out a way to get over the hump. How have you gotten over the hump of asking for help?

 

Joy Dixon: Yeah. That one's a really great question. I love that question, because I still do that. I'm still in process and learning how to do that. Back to knowing what I know and knowing what I don't know and really everything is an opportunity for me to learn. The teaching, writing code, I know all of that. The accounting? Oh, no. I don't know that. It's really just allowing myself to learn. Another thing along with that is being super clear about what I'm doing. When I'm super clear, then it's easier for me to find people and for people to find me who also want to support my project.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Why It’s OK If You Don’t Have Knowledge Or Experience In Some Areas And Can Delegate That Work To Those Who Do

 

Poornima: You said a couple of things here that were interesting. The first is knowing what you know and knowing what you don't know. That's good. That's the first level. Then the second level you said is getting the help for the things that you don't know. One question I get asked a lot is, "Oh, should I just dive in and learn that accounting?" Especially people in our audience. They might think, "Well, I don't know coding. Should I do that as an entrepreneur instead of hiring somebody?" What's been your response, or how do you handle that? "This is a way for me to learn. Maybe I just want to hire somebody and get it over with?"

 

Joy Dixon: Yeah. That's really good. Disclaimer. Type A. I actually spend time in each of the areas that I don't know, at least so I can have a conversation, a more intelligent conversation with the people. I can also vet people.

 

Poornima: Bingo.

 

Joy Dixon: I don't have to know it all. I'm not looking for a master’s degree in accounting.

 

Poornima: Sure.

 

Joy Dixon: At the same time, what I am looking for is a certain sense of, "Oh." When I have a conversation with somebody, I know the questions to pose, and then when they give me a response, I'm like, ‘Oh, that sounds good.’”

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Poornima: I like to call that the BS detector.

 

Joy Dixon: There we go.

 

Poornima: Yes.

 

Joy Dixon: There we go.

 

Poornima: You know just enough to be a little dangerous, but at the end of the day, you don't want to do the work.

 

Joy Dixon: No.

 

Poornima: Yeah. You want to get somebody else who has deeper subject matter expertise in it.

 

Joy Dixon: Exactly.

 

Poornima: Wonderful.

 

Joy Dixon: That's great. I like that.

 

How Find People Who Are Interested And Motivated To Work On Your Side Project

 

Poornima: Yeah. Of course, there are times where we hire people, and they, for whatever reason, let us down, either because they didn't meet our standards or just things happen. That can cause us to become dispassionate, because you think, "Oh, maybe my idea isn't that great. That's why other people don't want to work on it." How do you stay motivated through those moments where some people just let you down or drop the ball or don't execute quite to the same level?

 

Joy Dixon: You're the great questioner. OK? Really, that one is back to self. Everything comes back to self for me and self-awareness. Am I super excited and I'm super jazzed? It's really my thing. I really can't hold anybody or put them on a hook to have the same passion about my thing as I do.

 

Poornima: OK. That's important. Yeah. I think that's a good takeaway.

 

Joy Dixon: That's really important first and foremost. It's really about just getting super clear about what I'm doing. I call it the lighthouse effect, like shine my message even brighter. For those people who are really attracted to it, it will make them easier to find me. Those people who are kind of like on the fence, then they'll stay away. Then we really won't have too many of these interactions.

 

How To Set Boundaries With Your Teammates At Your Day Job When They Want More Of Your Time

 

Poornima: No, that's good. Yeah. I think another issue I've seen that arises a lot is people want more of your time. Let's say at your day job or your side project, and you've got to figure out how to set those boundaries. How have you done that?

 

Joy Dixon: Yeah, that one is a really challenging one. Really. Like I said before, if you have social events, you have family events, those are really challenging.

 

Poornima: But even within your existing day job or your existing side where they want more of your time.

 

Joy Dixon: Yeah. Really, for what I've done with the boundaries is, “this is the boundary,” because I know any overflow will affect everything else. It will have a ripple effect. You might think, "Oh, I'm just going to spend these extra few hours doing this," but it will really have a ripple effect and take away from the other part. It's super important to get very clear and to just maintain those boundaries.

 

Poornima: What does that look like for you? Let's say somebody at your day job is like, "Hey, Joy. Really could use your help. Could you stay another hour or two to help me out with this thing?"

 

Joy Dixon: Balance of an hour or two?

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Joy Dixon: Sometimes it would be “yes,” and then sometimes it would be “no.” Honestly, it's truly contextual. If I have to teach a class, then the answer is “no.” If I'm available, then I can do it. It really is situation.

 

Poornima: In that moment.

 

Joy Dixon: In that moment, exactly.

 

Poornima: OK, got it. Then same thing for your side project. If someone says, "Hey, Joy. I really need you to help us do X, Y, and Z."

 

Joy Dixon: Yes.

 

Poornima: The same thing.

 

Joy Dixon: Yes, because I'm beholden to both, so I have to keep both at the forefront of my mind.

 

Why You Don’t Have To Respond To Every Improvement Request Immediately

 

Poornima: Now, there's also times where we want to do more. Maybe that project at work, we want to go that extra mile, or in the side project, it's like, "Ooh, wouldn't it be really cool if I could add this and that? That's going to take another couple of days. It's going to take maybe another hour of staying awake or setting up another meeting. Do I have the room? Does it make sense to do that or not?" How do you manage those...I like to call them requests?

 

Joy Dixon: Those requests. Are they from...

 

Poornima: From yourself.

 

Joy Dixon: Did I initiate them?

 

Poornima: Yes, yes.

 

Joy Dixon: OK.

 

Poornima: Yeah, you just feel so compelled. Maybe it's external, like a customer saying or a student saying, "Hey, it would be really great if you guys also provided Y."

 

Joy Dixon: Yes. That would definitely have to go on the lovely big corkboard that I keep in my bedroom full of great ideas. It would be in the parking lot, and then I will revisit it in time. There are so many things I want to do. There's so many things. Every time I teach a class, I'm like, "Oh. Take notes on the curriculum. I want to teach it this way next time. I'll say it this way next time." Then I just have to wait for next time. There are just certain times you can't make those changes each and every time. Having that break. Once again, I know I speak about space a lot, because space has really allowed me to decide. Is it something I really need to do, or it's just something in the moment that just felt like a good idea?

 

Poornima: Ah, that's good. What's your barometer for that?

 

Joy Dixon: Time.

 

Poornima: OK. Letting it sit.

 

Joy Dixon: Time and emotion. Really. There is a part that's like jazzed and this is great, and making it that part, I would move forward with that. If it's like fear or like, "Oh, I need to hurry up and get this to market," then anything that comes from that place is something that I really just sit with for an extended period of time, because if it's supposed to be done, then it will be done.

 

Poornima: Thanks so much, Joy. This has been really helpful.

 

Joy Dixon: My pleasure.

 

Poornima: Yeah. For all of you out there, if you've had a side project that you've been working on for a while, I'm sure you have your go-to for managing your time and energy. Joy and I would love to hear what it is. Please share it with us in the comments below this video.                                                 

 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

Jul 31, 2017

It’s a brand new month, and we’ve got a new theme we’ll be tackling on our show Build! We’re going to be talking about building, managing, and growing a side project you are passionate about while keeping your day job.

I’m sure you’re aware of all the benefits that come with a side project: you get the chance to explore and learn new skills. And if it’s 100% yours, you get full creative freedom.

However, you’ve probably heard that once your side project starts to grow you need to make a decision… You need to decide to go ALL-IN! You need to quit your day job and pursue that side project. Otherwise, you’re not really passionate about your idea, you’re not committed, and chances are you’ll appear less than focused!

But going all-in on a side project can be a real challenge for many of us that don’t have the means, really like our day jobs, and truly want to have something on the side.

Well, it turns out you don’t actually have to go all-in, and in today’s episode we’re going to tackle this myth. In future episodes we’ll talk about how to manage your time + energy when you physically can’t and what to do when your side project is facing a number of challenges.

To help us out I’ve invited Joy Dixon, who is a visionary and an entrepreneur with 20 years’ of industry experience. In addition to having a day job as a software engineer, Joy also runs a technical training school in Oakland, California called Mosaic Presence. So Joy is definitely someone who walks the talk!

In today’s episode you’ll learn:

  • How to pursue a side project while holding down a full-time job, when you don’t have the means to go “all-in”
  • How and why it’s important to share your side project with your current or future employer
  • How to respond to people who think you aren’t “focused”

 

 

 

Transcript

Poornima: I'm sure you've heard that it's a wonderful idea to have a side project. After all, a side project will help you learn a new skill or explore something. But once that side project starts to grow, then you've got to quit your day job and go all in. If you don't, you're just not that passionate about your idea, you're not committed, and you could appear less than focused.

                                                 

Today we're going to tackle this myth, and in future segments we'll dive into how to manage your time and energy and grow your side project.

                                                 

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker, I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. Each episode of *Build* consists of conversations I have with innovators. Together we debunk myths and misconceptions that are relating to building products, companies, and your career in tact.

                                                 

I've invited Joy Dixon, who is a visionary and an entrepreneur with 20 years’ of industry experience. In addition to having a day job as a software engineer, Joy also runs a technical training school called Mosaic Presence.

                                                 

Thanks so much for joining us today, Joy.

 

Joy Dixon: Thank you for having me here, this is great.

 

Poornima: You and I met at a conference recently and I'd love to just get to know you a little bit more. Tell us how did you get introduced into tech?

 

Joy Dixon: Actually in the sixth grade. I actually had a teacher, who said, "Hey, let's do tech." She was doing computers, it was back in the day with dummy terminals. Learned Basic, line number 100, duh, duh, duh, line number 200 duh, duh, duh. That's actually how I started in tech.

 

Poornima: Wow, that's great that you got exposed to it so early and now it's brought you full circle where you're doing, you're teaching. Let's take it a step back, you have a day job right now. What's your day job?

 

Joy Dixon: I have a day job right now. My day job is writing code. I'm a senior software engineer and I write code by day and then I teach people to write code by night.

 

Poornima: That's awesome. Your side project is Mosaic Presence. Tell us a little bit about it.

 

Joy Dixon: Mosaic Presence is my thing. That is the one thing that I do. So there is, it is truly my bliss, it is a software development training school, we have a mobile focus and really it's about expanding opportunities and creating community. That is the main purpose of it all. We take brand new people, if you're a complete beginner, we'd love you there. Then we move on and we do mobile stuff, we teach people how to make SMS apps. As well as your standard apps, either iOS or Android, whatever one's your preferred flavor.

 

Poornima: Nice. What inspired you to start Mosaic Presence?

 

Joy Dixon: Actually I've been teaching for 10 years and I've taught at various companies professionally, as well as various universities, and I just really wanted to do my thing. I wanted to teach things in my way. And then also with, just when I went back to school to get my Master’s, I had to do that at night and on the weekends because I too had to keep my day job. I wanted to create a program that would allow people to also keep their day job as well acquire new skills.

 

Poornima: Nice. You've been doing this for how long now? Mosaic Presence.

 

Joy Dixon: Mosaic Presence? Two and half years. The first half year was a pilot program that I ran and that was really great, there were so many companies who allowed me to use their space. Then actually putting pen to paper and creating a business was in 2015.

 

When To Start A Side Project

 

Poornima: OK, great. How did you know you were ready to start this? I know a lot of people are like, "Oh I want to teach." Or, "I want to do this thing." Or, "I want, want, want." But it's hard to get over that hurdle and then start doing it. You mentioned you'd been teaching before, but when did you decide, “Now I want to make this into my side project and then a business?”

 

Joy Dixon: Into a business. This is actually really great. This is actually my second time at bat. 'Cause before I was just doing software consulting and I was building websites and doing consulting for people, and then that business went down because it did. I was working too much and not working on my business.

                                                 

Actually that was really good because it gave me a foothold this time to make sure, if you're doing Mosaic Presence, you're going to make sure you spend the time doing Mosaic Presence as well as maintaining your day job.

 

Poornima: So you had a little bit of a, let's call it failure.

 

Joy Dixon: Totally.

 

Poornima: It taught you how to do things the second time around.

 

Joy Dixon: I call them learning opportunities.

 

What It’s Like To Hold Down A Full Time Job And Pursue A Side Project

 

Poornima: I like that. Then let's talk about managing the business while you're doing your day job. What's that like?

 

Joy Dixon: A lot. It is really a lot. It is about time slicing, honestly. I pretty much sleep between 12 and 5, those are my hours. Before I go to work, I work on Mosaic Presence and then I teach at night. It's really time management, time management is key, there are a lot of nos to invitations to go places and to socialize because the weekends are really meant for me to spend on my business.

 

Poornima: I want you to hold that thought 'cause we're going to talk about that in the next segment. I want to skip ahead, why even do this on the side and keep your day job? Why not just save up a bunch of money and then say, "Peace." And go and just focus on your side?

 

Joy Dixon: That is a definitely a way to go if that works for some people. For me, this couldn't wait. Mosaic Presence couldn't wait and I wanted to fund it and then just make it happen. I was like, let's just do this. And the way I can do this and keep it in my control is to keep my day job.

 

Why You Should Tell Your Employer About Your Side Project

 

Poornima: The other issue that I know that a lot of our audience is probably thinking about is, what about your employer? How do they feel about it?

 

Joy Dixon: I told them. That was really, really, really important and key. Because when you start to kind of do stuff in the dark then you really don't do it. I was very open and honest with them that this is the thing that I'm doing. I just felt better about that, just being transparent. This is my love. I'm working here and I'm going to do my best and I'm gonna work in excellence as always do but this right here is my love.

 

Poornima: What was their reaction to it? Was there any, "Well, we need you here?"

 

Joy Dixon: They basically were like, "Hey, if you can do your job."

 

Poornima: OK, good.

 

Joy Dixon: So that worked out really well. I really appreciated that.

 

Poornima: So finding that fit.

 

Joy Dixon: Yeah.

 

Poornima: Yeah, I talk to a lot of people who when they know that they need to financially or intellectually have that day job, they negotiate up front with that future employer or the current employer. But they don't leave them in the dark because it gets them into deep water.

 

Joy Dixon: It really does.

 

Poornima: Later on.

 

Joy Dixon: It really does. I would definitely agree with that and recommend that to anybody's who's doing both. It could be a little scary especially if you're already in your current job. And they're like, "Oh, why are you doing this all of a sudden? Are you planning to leave?" At the same time I think it's just better just to have it out there. And it just makes you feel better in general and you put forth your effort.

 

How To Share Your Side Project With Your Employer

 

Poornima: Do you have some techniques you can share with the audience for even how to start that conversation with a current employer?

 

Joy Dixon: I would really find somebody who you feel safe with. If it's not your manger. Even if it's not, just like, "Hey." Have the dialogue and then at that point in time you do need to move it up the chain. But I would check all the lovely documents that they have for you to check. To see if this is even OK.

 

Poornima: That's true.

 

Joy Dixon: Before you even have a conversation. 'Cause that's really the challenge is the conflict piece.

 

Poornima: I do know some places there are very, very strict where you're not even allowed to do things like, "Oh, I took $100 for tutoring this kid on a one-off basis."

 

Joy Dixon: No really?

 

Poornima: Yeah. You're just not allowed to take money. To your point, check the documents first.

 

Joy Dixon: Check the documents first because there's a lot of times when people will think it's something but what's actually written on paper, 'cause that's really going to be what happens.

 

How To Respond To People Who Think You Aren’t “Focused”

 

Poornima: Aside from your employer, you probably told other people that you're working on this and on the side in addition to your day job. They were probably less than supportive. How do you manage those reactions where they're like, "Oh Joy, that's not very focused." Or, "How are you going to manage all of this? Seems like a lot."

 

Joy Dixon: It's really interesting 'cause part of me and the people in my life know I'm type A so they're just like, of course you are. But there are those people definitely who aren't as familiar with me or don't know me as well who do have that response. Really I just take it in and I'm like, “OK.” When you find that thing and Mosaic Presence is my thing, it actually energizes me. It energizes me and sets my energy in a space that makes me more creative, more full of life, more joyful, no pun intended. That's what I respond with that. And when people see that passion and they feel that energy then they're usually are like, "OK, keep going."

 

Poornima: They get it. That's good, wonderful.

                                                 

Well, thank you so much Joy for sharing.

 

Joy Dixon: It's my pleasure. Thank you.

 

Poornima: Now Joy and I want to know, are you worried about going all-in on an idea and would prefer to start something on the side? You've got some concerns? Share those concerns with us in the comments below this video and we'll be sure to take a look at them and respond shortly.

                                                 

That's it for this segment, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next segment where we'll talk about how to manage your time and your energy as it relates to your side project. Ciao for now.

                                                 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

--

Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

 

Jul 16, 2017

All this month, Karen Catlin and I have been digging into the theme of mentoring. We started out by sharing the debut Build episode on why some people are reluctant to seek mentoring, and last week we talked about how to approach mentors, set expectations, and thank them.

In today’s final episode, on mentoring for this month, we’re going to talk about what you can do to become an effective mentor yourself.

We understand that you might be reluctant to be a mentor for a number of reasons: you don’t have the time, you don’t feel qualified, or you feel like your experiences may not relate.

Don’t worry Karen and me have you covered! You’ll learn:

  • How mentoring is a two-way street benefiting both the mentor and mentee
  • Why you don’t need to have same experience or perspective as your mentee
  • Who should be holding the mentee accountable
  • What to do when you just don’t have time, but still want to help someone who approaches you
  • What to do when someone brings you a deeply personal problem

Transcript

Poornima: In the previous two segments, I've been talking to Karen Catlin, who is an advocate for Women in Tech, a leadership coach, and my co-author of our book, *Present! A Techie's Guide to Public Speaking*. Karen and I have been digging into the importance of mentorship. We started out by talking about why you might be reluctant to seeking a mentor. Then, we talked about how you can effectively establish the relationship. If you've missed either of those segments, I highly recommend you check out the links below this video. In this final segment, we're gonna talk about how you can become an effective mentor yourself.

                                                 

Welcome back to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. Each *Build* episode consists of a series of conversations I have with innovators. Together, we debunk myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career. Now, I know at the beginning, Karen, you mentioned how you loved mentoring, because you get to learn a lot. I feel the same way. I think I actually learn more than maybe my mentees do and that's why I love doing it. Let's talk about some of the benefits that you're gonna experience should you choose to mentor.

 

Mentoring is a two-way street that benefits both the mentor and mentee

 

Karen Catlin: Sure, yes. It's definitely a two-way street. You may not know what you're gonna be learning from a mentee, but getting together, hearing about what's going on, the questions they ask, you are going to get insight into how you can benefit your career. You might just get a good, broad perspective of what's going on around your company or your industry. As I mentioned, maybe some great ideas for podcasts that I could listen to, or books I could read, or productivity apps I could use. I don't even know what's it gonna be, but I always pick up something when I talk to a mentee.

 

Poornima: Yeah. I feel like it's a great way to stay relevant. Especially if some of us are a little bit older and maybe we're not as in the know.

 

Karen Catlin: OK. OK. So one time I was talking to someone and they said, "TLDR." This was a few years ago to my credit, but I'm like, "TLDR, what's that mean?" So, I asked and they said, "Oh, just too long, didn't read." I'm like, "Oh, OK." Just now, I am able to just like, weave that into conversations and all of a sudden I seem really relevant.

 

Poornima: Totally. So you can speak the lingo.

 

Karen Catlin: Exactly.

 

Why a mentor doesn’t need to have the exact same experience or perspective as their mentee

 

Poornima: Now, when you were at Adobe, did you just mentor women or do you also mentor men as well?

 

Karen Catlin: Sure. As a senior woman at the company, I definitely was approached by a lot of woman for mentoring. Men approached me, too. I did definitely mentor both genders. I think it's important for a mentee to get advice from people who don't look like them, whether that is because of your gender, or your life experience, your...of other things that you're bringing to the company, bringing to the table. It's important for a mentee to get advice from people who aren't like them, because it's gonna broaden the set of advice that they're going to get, right?

 

Poornima: Sure.

 

Karen Catlin: Likewise, because mentoring is a two-way street, it's good for mentors to mentor people who don't look like them too, because, that is going to allow them to learn, get different perspectives, and all of that. I think everything is ups for grabs.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah.

 

Poornima: What about people who may worry that they don't have the same experience, or perspective, and so, they might not feel credible sharing their life experience with a mentee?

 

Karen Catlin: Oh my gosh. Don't overthink it. That's my advice for mentors here. The mentee has approached you because they respect you and they want to learn from you. You don't have to worry about, am I going to be able to provide just the right piece of experience or advice. Don't worry about it, just have a conversation, share stories, share your experience, it's gonna make a difference to the mentee.

 

What to do when you don’t have time to mentor someone

 

Poornima: I wanna talk about a couple of other issues that I see come up a lot when I recommend people mentor and they're resistant to. The first is time. “I'm just so busy, I have kids, I have a family, I have other obligations, I just don't have the time to be somebody's mentor.”

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah. Yeah. I get that. Because, we are all very busy. That said, if someone

approaches you because they wanna get your advice, and they haven't time-boxed it following my advice from an earlier segment here. Ask them, what are you really asking for here? Can we get together and maybe, you know, if you're busy, you might say, "Can we get together for a 30-minute phone call?" for example. Ask yourself, "Do I have time maybe for a 30-minute phone call?"

                                                 

Chances are, you have some small segment of time that you could offer to a mentee and so, you can be responsible for saying, "Well, this is what I can give you and this is all I've got right now." If you're really too busy, you might just say, "The next two months I am just super busy on this project, can you ping me in three months’ time, and I'll bet I'll have some time for you then."

 

Poornima: Yeah. I think that's good. I think it's good to give people that kinda realistic picture. One thing I like to do—actually, two things I like to do—if somebody comes to me and I know they have that good directive question, like, I got this one recently, "How do you self-publish?" Well, I've already written two posts, like, pretty meaty ones. I tell them, "Read these posts and then, if you have any other questions, shoot me an email, I'm traveling a lot, I'll be sure to respond to you via email."

                                                 

Trying to find a 30-minute time spot across time zones, is just not gonna work for both of us. I think that's great. The other thing I say is, and you do this because you speak at a lot of events, I say, "I'm gonna be at this event, why don't we just meet there and when I'm in between sessions, would be great to come out and have a chat with you." I think finding those opportunities, you can get more flexible.

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah and,doing what you can to just help the person, whether that is with your actual mentoring or making a recommendation for another mentor.

 

Poornima: Yeah. That's a good one.

 

Karen Catlin: I had times, yeah, over my career, where really my mentoring dance card was just full. I really, really couldn't take on anymore mentees. When those things happen and someone approached me for mentoring, I would explain, my mentoring dance card is full. What are you really looking for from a mentor? And then I might recommend that they reach out to someone else at my company. Right?

 

Poornima: Yep.

 

Karen Catlin: Help them, move them forward in some way.

 

Poornima: Definitely. I know another hurdle is relevancy. Again, kind of, oh, you know, the mentee might say, "I'm looking for somebody in data science." I might say, "I don't know anything about data science, I'm just a front-end engineer or I'm a designer, why are you approaching me?" Right? It doesn't seem like my work is exactly relevant. I don't know if this is a good thing.

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah. It's so funny. Just a couple days ago, a mentor, excuse me, a mentee was reaching out to me and asking, "Hey Karen, I am thinking about putting on a women's only hackathon and I'd like to get your advice about how to do this." I had to tell her, "Well actually, I have very little experience with hackathons, even though I'm an advocate for Women in Tech. I think this is a great idea, but I don't have direct relevant experience to share with you. However, I do know about this one tech company who has run a women's only hackathon." I mention the name of the company, she said, "Oh, I know people who work there, I'll reach out to my network there to find out little bit more.” Again, this notion that I pushed her forward, I helped her out without really being able to answer her direct question, whether that was on data science or a hackathon.

 

Poornima: Yeah.

 

Karen Catlin: This notion, I’ve done with so many mentees, this notion of encouraging them to think about their network. Who else could they tap to get that specific experience or advice they're looking for?

 

Poornima: Yeah. Part of your mentorship is also helping them see what they already got, see the resources that they have at their disposal.

 

Karen Catlin: Exactly.

 

Poornima: It's not all about you having to do the work.

 

Karen Catlin: Exactly.

 

Who need to hold a mentee accountable

 

Poornima: Yeah. That's great. What about accountability? A lot of times people say, "How can I hold my mentee accountable? Make sure they're hitting milestones. Make sure that they are successful?"

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah. Gosh. Maybe I should be doing a better job at this. I really feel that as a mentor, my job is not to take any action items from the meeting, you know, it's to provide my experience, my advice, my thoughts. But, really, I'm expecting the mentee to be taking notes, to be figuring out what they're gonna do next, and to be making progress. I don't take any of that on me, but maybe I should be, I don't know how to help them. We all benefit from having accountability partners. It's just that, as a mentor, I'm already giving a lot of my time, I don't feel I need to be doing that as well.

 

Poornima: OK. Maybe that's something more a sponsor would do or even a coach, if you hire them?

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah. A coach would definitely do that for you. Otherwise, maybe it is a buddy, or a friend, or a colleague that you might reach out to, in addition to having the mentor, you have an accountability partner, who helps make sure you're making the progress you want to make.

 

What to do as a mentor when someone brings you a deeply personal problem

 

Poornima: I've had this happen a number of times, where somebody that I mentored, I see very quickly that it is not just about getting that promotion, or improving a particular thing about their career, there's some other stuff going on. It might be a personal issue, and so, how would you recommend answering that as the mentor?

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah. Mentors and coaches, frankly, we're not therapists. We're not trained in helping people through some deep personal issues. I remember a situation where someone had some things going on with, I think it was a teenage child, and, even though I'm a mom of teenagers, I still felt that this was something that I did not feel qualified or really feel right about providing guidance. Happy to share what I've done as a parent in different situations, but that's not getting to the point of providing therapy, so I've really had to sort of redirect the conversation and stay away from it, frankly.

 

Poornima: Yeah. Set some clear boundaries and make sure that they understand that.

 

Karen Catlin: I'm not a therapist.

 

What are male allies and how to become one

 

Poornima: Yeah. That's fair. I wanna go back to one of the earlier things that we had talked

about around coaching people that may not look like you and I know as an advocate for Women Tech, one of things that you do is coach men to become better allies for women. Start by telling me, what exactly is a male ally?

 

Karen Catlin: Yeah. So, an ally is anyone who is in the majority and really has a point of privilege as a result. Maybe a little bit of power that other people don't have, because they're not in the majority. In tech, it's typically white men who have the position of power, they're the majority. So, it's an important thing for them to realize that they have this role to fill as an ally for women or anyone who's underrepresented in tech.

                                                 

They have a role to play to help those people be successful, to feel that they can be...that they're welcome somewhere, that they can be included, that they can grow their career and have an impact there. A male ally, that's what I look to them to do, is to make their environments, their teams, their company culture, more welcoming and inclusive to people who don't look like them.

 

Poornima: How do you help men to become male allies?

 

Karen Catlin: Yes. I believe there are everyday, simple actions that men can take to make their environments more welcoming and inclusive. For example, and this is something that I think that pretty much every woman who's professional, or maybe working—every woman working in tech, I'll go as far as to say that, has had this experience, where they have been talking in a meeting and some man with deeper vocal chords and a louder voice, just interrupts them and sort of steers the conversation in a different direction.

                                                 

There's a phrase for it, “manterrupting.” We've heard that before. What can a male ally do when they witness that behavior when they're sitting across the table and seeing it going on? They can say something with their deep, strong vocal chords, "Hey, I was actually interested to hear what Anna had to say, let's bring the conversation back to her." That's an example of an everyday action a man can take to be an ally for women in that meeting.

 

Poornima: Yes.

 

Karen Catlin: Another example, might be this whole idea-hijacking, I like to call it. Again, I think so many of us have had the experience where we have said something brilliant, awesome, in a meeting, and it kinda fell on deaf ears at the time, and then maybe a couple minutes later in the meeting, someone else says the same brilliant thing—often it's a man, only because there's gonna be so many men in these meetings.

                                                 

What's a male ally to do in that situation when they notice an idea has been hijacked by someone else? They can say something simple, like, "Yeah, I really like that idea, and when Jen said it a few minutes ago, she phrased it this way. I like the way you've built on it," or something like that. Another every day action a man can take to help the women and underrepresented minorities be successful.

 

Poornima: It's great that you are coaching men to have these everyday actions that are important and impactful. You have any others that you would like to share?

 

Karen Catlin: Oh, sure. Here's another space, I'll call it—forget about meetings, let's move on from meetings. We all need to have networks to be successful, to hear about opportunities, to hire from, right? When we're trying to fill roles at our company or to find jobs if we're looking for jobs. If we let our networks grow naturally and organically, chances are, we're gonna have networks of people who are just like us. “Just like me” networks. We enjoy the same hobbies, we went to the same school, we enjoy doing and talking about the same things, right? That's just human nature to reach out to people we enjoy spending time with, that's our network.

                                                 

I think we have a role to play, especially if we're a male ally, but we should really be looking to diversify our network, so that our networks aren't just like us and that they're filled with people who are of different backgrounds, different experiences, just went to different schools, worked at different companies and so forth. For men, specifically, I challenge them, if they go to some networking event, or a Friday afternoon beer bash or something, go introduce yourself to someone who doesn't look like you. You can define that however you want, but someone who doesn't look like you.

 

Poornima: Maybe shorter than you.

 

Karen Catlin: Maybe shorter, yes. Darker skin, gender, whatever it is. Say hello, get to know them a little bit and see if there isn't something that you can either learn from them or that you can do for them as a result. Just getting to know them a little bit. That challenge, I think, is important and I try to embrace it, too. When I go to a networking event, I tend to like to look for the women that I wanna meet and reach out to them. It's easier for me to have those conversations. It's a little bit more intimidating for me to go up to a young man in a hoodie and introduce myself and start a conversation. I try to do that myself, because I think it's important for me to diversify my network. It's good advice for not just male allies, but probably for all of us.

 

Poornima: Yep. Well, thank you so much Karen. This has been a lot of fun and I'm sure the audience is gonna get a lot out of this. Why don't you let us know how we can get in touch with you.

 

Karen Catlin: Sure. You can get in touch with me on my website, there's a contact page and that is karencatlin.com. If you want more everyday actions you can take to support diversity, inclusion, create a welcoming environment at your company, check out the Twitter handle @betterallies.

 

Poornima: Wonderful. Thank you. We'll be sure to share the links below the video. That's it for our episode on mentorship. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode. If you've enjoyed this segment, then please be sure to share it with your friends and your colleagues. And finally, a special thanks to our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker. Ciao for now.

 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

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Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer ((http://femgineer.com/) and Pivotal Tracker (http://www.pivotaltracker.com/). San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA (http://www.startmotionmedia.com/design/).

Jul 9, 2017

Have you already tried mentoring and found that it’s not working for you?

Is it because you’re just not getting what you want out of it, or other people have convinced you it’s just not worth your time?

We get that something may go wrong, which is why in today’s episode we’re going to cover ALL the things that can go wrong with mentoring. But we won’t leave you hanging… Karen Catlin (https://karencatlin.com/) and I will provide concrete tips (including some exact script to use) for:

- Why you might consider finding a mentor inside versus outside your current company
- How you can go about setting clear expectations with your mentor
- How mentoring and coaching are different
- How to decide if it makes sense to pay for coaching
- Why it’s important to thank your mentor and how to do it effectively

In the next video, we’ll conclude our theme of mentoring by sharing how you can get started as a mentor!

Transcript

Poornima: In the last segment, we talked about the importance of mentorship and why some people may be reluctant to seeking out a mentor. If you've missed the segment, I've included a link to it below this video, so don't miss it and be sure to check it out. In today's segment, we're going to focus the conversation around how you can get the most out of mentoring. Welcome back to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. Each *Build* episode consists of a series of conversations I have with innovators in tech, and together we debunk a number of myths around building products, companies, and your career in technology, because I know there's a lot of people out there who may not be aware that they are doing things that are actively acting against them from having a good mentoring relationship.

Karen Catlin: Sure.

What not to talk about during mentoring

Poornima: Let's start by talking about what you should not expect to get out of that relationship.

Karen Catlin: In a word, gossip. I used to have a mentee who would come to my office for our monthly meetings, and would sit down and just say, "So, tell me what you're hearing about. What's going around the company?" Oh my gosh, like I wasn't just going to share all of the, you know, news I had heard to this person, you know?

Poornima: Right.

Karen Catlin: He was just looking for gossip and it basically turned into this mentoring relationship that I hated. I really did not look forward to those meetings because like he was probing me for intelligence. It wasn't cool.

Poornima: Yeah, yeah. It wasn't the purpose of the meeting.

When mentoring goes wrong

Karen Catlin: No. Can I tell you something else I've hated about mentoring? I had another mentee who we were working together, I think, for over a six-month period, once a month we had a meeting, and when we got together each time I would say to her, "So last time, you know, we talked about this. Did my advice help you?" Her response was various forms of, "Oh, you know, I've been too busy" or, "I didn't really think it was going to work so I didn't even try it out," but she was there to get more advice from me. Like, what was that all about, right? I was not fulfilled. I did not think my advice was helping her, and again, I hated those relationships.

Poornima: Yeah, so it didn't sound like it was something that would keep you engaged as the person who was doing the mentoring.

Karen Catlin: No, exactly.

Poornima: Anything else that people want to be doing?

Karen Catlin: I'm so glad you asked.

Poornima: Yeah.

Karen Catlin: The other pet peeve I have around this—and I bet most people in our audience here would be incredibly respectful of anyone's time that they were asking for mentorship—but I definitely have had people that have overstepped the bounds of that. You know, a meeting has been scheduled maybe for an hour and I can't get them to leave the office. It's like the hour is up and they keep talking, and they want me to keep providing advice. I'm just trying to get them out the door because I've got other things to do, so we really need to be respectful of the time and our time commitments there.

How to set expectations for your mentoring relationship

Poornima: OK, so now that we've talked about a number of things not to do, let's switch gears and talk about how to set expectations.

Karen Catlin: Sure. A mentee should really be looking to the mentor for advice, but really in the context of, "Have you ever experienced this situation before?" Or, "Tell me about a time you might have had to do something like this." For example, let's say that you wanted to approach a mentor because you had to learn about a certain market vertical, right? The worst question is to go to that mentor and say, "Tell me everything I need to know about this market vertical." It puts so much burden on the mentor to be like this educator in everything.

Poornima: We don't know where to start.

Karen Catlin: Any way, and we don't even know where to start. It's too big a question. Much better would be to approach the mentor and say, "Hey, I need to come up to speed on this market vertical. Can you tell me how you came up to speed and learned everything you know?"

Poornima: Nice.

Karen Catlin: Something like that. They then can share their experiences and start talking about how they have come up to speed on the market.

Poornima: Yeah. It's a lot more relatable and they have those experiences. They're not kind of fishing for things that may or may not be applicable. It's kind of your job as the mentee to figure out which piece of their experience relates back to you. Any other examples that you have?

Karen Catlin: Sure. I remember mentoring someone who came to me because she wanted to explore a lateral job move and she actually asked a really good question. She didn't come saying, "Hey, I have this opportunity to do this lateral job move. Do you think I should do it?" No. She didn't say that. Instead she said, "Hey, I'm thinking about this lateral job move. Have you ever taken a lateral job move and how did you make the decision to do it?" Then we were able to have a great conversation about it.

When does it make sense to pay for coaching?

Poornima: It's natural to start and have maybe a coffee conversation. There are a lot of mentors, though, who are also coaches that expect to be paid, so how do you know when it's time to hire somebody?

Karen Catlin: Mentors and coaches are similar and yet different as well. A mentor's job is to provide their experience, share their advice, those types of things. A coach probably has more of a discipline around helping a client in a certain way, whether that is a job transition that they're exploring and trying to put frameworks around that, or strengthening leadership skills, which is what I focus on, and every coach is different. I think a very simple way to think about this is, a coach will be—it's a business, and so there is a charge for that, and a mentor is a free thing.

                                                 

One thing I'll say though is every coach has a different style depending on their experiences and their approaches to things, and I am a blend. Chances are I've walked a mile in my client's shoes because I've had such a long history in tech already and all my clients are in tech, so I do provide some mentoring in terms of my coachees might ask me something, my clients will ask me something, and if I have relevant experience, I'll share that story because I think it might help them, but then I'll also be putting more of a framework around helping them achieve their goals overtime and that's why it will end up...you know, there's a payment involved, there's a cost involved.

Poornima: Yeah. You're trying to get somebody to a milestone.

Karen Catlin: Exactly.

Poornima: You're trying to help them improve, and because there's a lot of structure around it, you then want to get paid for that versus like just general kind of coffee conversations.

Karen Catlin: Right. Exactly, exactly.

Poornima: For people who are evaluating when it makes sense to hire somebody, how would you recommend that they think about it?

Karen Catlin: Yes. I would recommend it in terms of, first of all, if you don't have a good mentoring situation or mentoring program at your company or in a community of some sort, then that's a time to explore coaching. I would also say that if you have a situation where you're trying to grow some skills and you're very much, "Here are my goals and here's what I want to get to," and you feel that it would be something you want to do not out in public, like you don't want anyone at your company to know you're working on these skills, again, you want to do it on your own and sort of on the side, you might want to hire a coach. It also might be that you want some professional help in terms of, yeah, you respect a lot of people that you work with, but are they the right people to help you get to this point that you're trying to get to in your career? It might be time to get an external perspective and some professional help.

Poornima: Yeah. I've also found that just having the accountability of meeting with somebody weekly, thinking of it as an investment, is really helpful.

Karen Catlin: Yes.

Poornima: Versus like, "Oh, can we grab coffee 30 minutes here, 30 minutes there?" A lot of times it's valuable, but you miss some of the context, and like you said, some of the framework that people you're paying for have done this over and over again.

How mentoring differs from coaching

Karen Catlin: Yeah. Here's an analogy. Let's say you think about your workouts, just to keep yourself healthy and so forth. You may have a workout buddy or a friend. You're going to go work out, go climbing, go for a walk, whatever. That's great, but if you really are serious about changing things up, you might hire a trainer at your gym to really get things moving in the right direction and get some professional help. That's similar to how you might approach coaching and mentoring. A mentor would be someone like, "Let's go for that walk together. Let's go climbing together." We're going to talk as we go, but it's going to be a little more casual. Then if you really want to get serious, you're going to hire the equivalent of the trainer at the gym. You're going to hire a coach for your career.

How to thank your mentor

Poornima: Last question for you in this segment. How about thanking your mentors, expressing your gratitude so that they know that their time was well spent, and they keep kind of looking out for you and want to work with you?

Karen Catlin: Yeah. Mentors, even if it looks like we are professional and successful, we still enjoy being treated to a cup of coffee or a lunch. You know, it's a nice touch, and of course flowers, wine, gadgets, Teslas. I don't know. Just have some fun there.

Poornima: Yeah. It'd be a toy Tesla.

Karen Catlin: A toy Tesla. There you go, but seriously, gifts are always nice, but I'll tell you the most meaningful thank yous I've gotten from my mentees have been when they have come and thanked me and told me, "This is how your advice has helped me." I remember I mentored someone when I was back at Adobe just over lunch one day. It was just a one-time, casual mentoring kind of thing. A year later, she reached out to me and said, "Hey, Karen. I want to thank you for that lunch we had a year ago. You told me these things and this is what I did, and I just got the promotion I was trying to go for." I remember I went to lunch, but I didn't remember everything I told her. I shared some advice, shared some stories, whatever.

                                                 

For her to come back and say, "This helped me" was so important to me because that meant that I spent my time well, she really was paying attention and in sort of a circle kind of thing, it also helps me become a better mentor because now I know, "Oh, that story or that advice really resonated for her. I'll remember to use that again if someone is in a similar situation." So thank somebody by really telling them, "This is what you've shared with me. This is what you told me. This is what I did. Here's how it helped." That's the best thank you any mentor could ask for.

Poornima: No, that sounds great. Well, thank you for sharing that with all of us.

Karen Catlin: Sure. My pleasure.

Poornima: Karen and I want to know, are there expectations that you're looking to set with your potential mentor and you're wondering how to frame them? Let us know what they are in the comments below and we'll be sure to respond to them shortly. That's it for this segment. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next and final segment on mentoring where Karen and I will be talking about how you can become an effective mentor. Ciao for now.

 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

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Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer ((http://femgineer.com/) and Pivotal Tracker (http://www.pivotaltracker.com/). San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA (http://www.startmotionmedia.com/design/).

Jul 3, 2017

Welcome to Build brought to you by Pivotal Tracker! I’m your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. 

Each Build episode consists of a series of conversations I have with innovators. Together we debunk myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech.

One misconception I fell prey to early on in my career was staying heads down and waiting for someone to acknowledge my accomplishments.

The thought of tooting my own horn seemed too self-promotional. I was worried about what my teammates and boss would think.

It wasn’t until I came across people who helped me find my voice and style that I realized the disservice I had been doing to my career.

Through their guidance and support, I realized how beneficial mentors can be to your career.

While there’s been a lot of talk already about the need for mentors, in today’s segment we’re going to take a slightly different angle and explore:

  • Why many resist seeking mentorship
  • What is a mentor versus a sponsor
  • When is mentoring appropriate
  • What to expect from a mentor
  • Why is it good to have a mentor 

In future segments, we’ll tackle how to effectively get a mentor, and how you can get started as a mentor!

To help us out I’ve invited Karen Catlin who is an Advocate for Women in Tech, a leadership coach, and my co-author on our book: Present! A Techie’s Guide to Public Speaking.

Transcript

Poornima: One misconception I fell prey to early on in my career was staying heads down and not talking about my accomplishments. I felt like it was too self-promotional to toot my own horn, and I worried about what my colleagues and my boss will think. It wasn't until I came across people who helped me find my voice, and told me that it was OK to share the work that I was doing, that I became more comfortable. And it was through their guidance that I realized how valuable that mentorship can be to catapulting your career.                                              

While there's been a lot of talk already around mentorship, we're gonna dive a little bit deeper. In this segment, we'll dive into why you might be resistant to getting a mentor, and in future segments we'll talk about how to effectively approach a mentor, and if you wanna be a mentor, how to go about getting started.                                              

Welcome to *Build*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker. In each episode of *Build*, I'm going to be talking to innovators in tech, and together we're gonna be debunking myths and misconceptions related to building products, companies, and your career in tech. And to help us out, I've invited Karen Catlin, who is an advocate for women in tech, a leadership coach, and my co-author on our book, *Present! A Techie's Guide to Public Speaking*. Thanks so much for joining me, Karen.

Karen Catlin: Oh my gosh, it's my pleasure, Poornima, thanks for having me. 

Poornima: Yeah. This is such an exciting episode for me, 'cause you and I have been working closely for a number of years. Now, for our audience out there, I wanna go back a little bit to your days as a VP at Adobe, and walk us through what you were working on there. 

Karen Catlin: Sure, sure. So I joined Adobe through the acquisition of Macromedia, so I actually worked at those two companies for 17 years, so a big bulk of my career. And while I was the Vice President there, I ran the shared engineering services, which included things like product security, product globalization, our open source, our engineering productivity tools, accessibility work. All sorts of things that we hire deep experts in those areas, and then worked across the product teams to help them with their product releases. 

Poornima: In addition to your role as VP at Adobe, you were also mentoring a lot of people. Walk us through why you decided to do this. 

Karen Catlin: Sure. And I actually started mentoring people much earlier in my career. I remember at one point, at Macromedia, I was a program manager, and in fact I was the only program manager for the company at the time, and I worked on a very early version of Dreamweaver, which you may remember. And as other product teams started hiring program managers, I offered to help hire them and train them, and bring them up to speed. And because of that interaction, a lot of those program managers, by default, kind of started looking to me for ongoing mentorship about how to be successful in their role. So it started out really there. And then, certainly I just kept continuing to do that as I moved up with my career and into the VP level. 

Poornima: That's great that you were doing a lot of corporate mentorship, but as I know it, you also had been mentoring outside of Adobe and other companies that you worked at. Talk to us about the kind of mentorship you did outside of the company. 

Karen Catlin: Sure. So there are quite a few ways to get involved in, formal mentoring programs, I'll call it, and I do that through...for example, my alma mater, where I mentor a senior, an undergraduate, who's about to start her career, and I provide mentoring during her senior year, which is great. And I get matched with someone, and it's a nice way for me to give back to the university, as well as to learn about what a senior is going through right now in her life, and trying to figure out and navigate the career options and so forth.                                                

I also do more informal mentoring, which I like to call micro mentoring, and I do that through The Women's Club of Silicon Valley, where I've been a member of that for a number of years. I've been on their board, and I certainly love helping our members with anything that they might need some advice on, some help on. And I call it more informal because we're not matched, people just reach out to me if they have advice that they want to seek, they wanna get my experience that I've had on something. And they'll just reach out and say, "Can we get a cup of coffee, get together for lunch," something like that. So it's much more informal and kind of organic that way. 

Why is it good to have a mentor 

Poornima: So let's dive into kind of the bigger theme here, right? 'Cause I know a lot of people say that mentoring is important, but why is it even important? Like, why do we need to do this, why can't we just read books, or ask our boss, or ask our colleagues for help when we need it? 

Karen Catlin: Yeah. So first of all, I think that I enjoy mentoring because I wanna pay it forward. I want to share my experience, and help other people who might be going through similar challenges, or similar choices that they need to make, to learn from my experience. And I hate reinventing the wheel, so if I can help other people not have to reinvent the wheel themselves, if they're going through the same type of situation that I'm going through, I'd love to—or, have gone through, excuse me—I would love to share my experience with them.                                                

And this whole notion of paying it forward is one reason I mentor, but it's really a two-way street. Every time I mentor someone, I learn something from them, too—it's just not me providing my advice, I learn from them. I might learn about, you know, good new books or podcasts I should be listening to. I might learn about new productivity tools that are just, you know, a new app to do something that I had never heard off. When I was a VP I also might hear about certain challenges that people are facing, that actually helped me be a better leader, because I got intel and insight into what was going on around the organization that I might not otherwise hear about. 

When is mentoring appropriate 

Poornima: Yup. And for the mentee side, what are the benefits for them? 

Karen Catlin: Oh, sure. So the mentees, they get to have a sounding board. For example, if they are trying to decide something, get some advice, they get to hear someone else's perspective on that. They get to hear stories about a time that that mentor maybe went through something similar, and then they can learn from that. And they just might be able to take a step back from that day to day, I'm working, I'm getting stuff done, let me step back and think about what I should be doing with my career, these choices ahead of me, how I should think about a problem differently, or a situation differently. So, so many benefits to a mentee. 

What is a mentor versus a sponsor 

Poornima: I've also heard of this word, sponsor, and I'm sure some of our audience has as well, so walk us through what's the difference between a mentor versus a sponsor. 

Karen Catlin: Sure. So they're very different, although they may sometimes be the same person. But let me break it down. A mentor is someone that you might meet with to get their advice, and they should share their stories, their life experiences, their perspective on things, so that you get that insight into what they, you know, how they think about things. By contrast, a sponsor is someone who is influential at your company, or in your industry segment, and they are going to be in situations, meetings, different situations where they will find out about opportunities that they might think of you as a good person to fill. So they will open doors for you that you might not even know exist, right? So that's what a sponsor does, they know you well enough to recommend you for opportunities, and to support you that way. 

Poornima: Yeah, a little bit more directed, then. 

Karen Catlin: Yes, exactly. But you might not even know you have a sponsor. They might just be doing this behind the scenes, and opportunities are coming your way and you're not even sure why they happen. So sometimes you don't even know you have a sponsor. 

Why people are resistant to mentoring 

Poornima: Nice. Now, not everyone wants a mentor, why do you think people are resistant to seeking one? 

Karen Catlin: Yeah, so in my current role as an advocate for women who are working the tech industry, I have talked to hundreds of women about mentoring and the importance of mentors, and the two things I hear from many women—there's a theme. The first is, "Ooh, it's so awkward to go up to someone, or send a note, and say 'Hey, would you be my mentor?'" You know, that's awkward and a little intimidating, so they don't wanna do it for that reason. And then the second reason is that they think they're imposing on someone. Everyone's so busy in tech, right? Super busy, and so why would some important person wanna take any time out to help me, right? It's an imposition, and I don't wanna go there. 

Poornima: Yeah. And what would you recommend to kind of getting over those hurdles, if that's what's holding you back? 

Mentoring what to expect 

Karen Catlin: Right, right. So I like to break it down with my coaching clients, as I encourage them to find mentors in their companies, I like to break it down in terms of, be very specific about your ask. For example, let's say your goal is to file your first patent. That's a really clear goal, and there are...then you can look at, who do I respect around the organization who's filed a patent, and send a simple note saying, "Hey, I'd love to file a patent and I would like to have lunch with you to find out about your experience with patent filing." You know, just really simple, concise, direct, this is what I would like to do.                                                 

Sometimes it might be a longer term mentorship, so another example of an ask might be, "I'm very interested in growing my career to the director level. Would you mind meeting with me for three months, once a month, for half an hour or something. I'll bring the questions, you bring the advice." Right? Just be very specific about what you need. You don't even have to say mentoring, like, that feels awkward. Just say, this is my ask, can you help me?                                                 

And you'll notice with both of those, whether it's a one-off or a longer term thing, I time boxed it, right? And I think this notion of time boxing is really critical when you reach out to a mentor. If I were to say to you, "Hey Poornima, would you mentor me?" You'd be like, "What's that mean?" Like, what does that even entail? What are they asking me to do? But if I can say, "Would you meet with me for half an hour, once a month for three months," you know exactly what you're getting into, and it's a whole lot easier for you to say "Yes," or maybe, "Not right now, I'm too busy," if that's the case, right? 

How mentoring relationships evolve

Poornima: Yeah. Or, let's do a couple meetings first, and then if it works out, there's chemistry, you like what I'm saying, then maybe we'll do a full three months, but let's not get— 

Karen Catlin: Exactly. And by the way, at the end of that time box period, let's say that is a three-month, or a six-month engagement, if things are gelling and you still wanna be learning from that mentor, and the mentor wants to continue meeting with the mentee, you can continue it. You can renew it for another period of time, another six months, three months, whatever that is. Yeah. 

Poornima: Thank you so much Karen, I think that's a great place to get started with mentoring. And for all of you out there, if there was a hurdle that Karen and I didn't cover in today's segment, let us know what that is in the comments below, and we'll be sure to answer it shortly.                                                 

That's it for this segment. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get the next segment, where we'll continue the conversation, and talk about how to get the most out of your mentorship. Ciao for now.                                                 

This episode of *Build* is brought to you by our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker.

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Build is produced as a partnership between Femgineer ((http://femgineer.com/) and Pivotal Tracker (http://www.pivotaltracker.com/). San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA (http://www.startmotionmedia.com/design/). 

 

Apr 24, 2017

If your company doesn’t produce a hockey stick graph for growth by the end of the first year, you’ve done something wrong. Don’t expect it to become one of the fastest-growing companies, just shut it down!

Seems drastic, no?

Sadly, that’s what many founders are led to believe.

The truth is, it can take several years to really figure things out. Some of the fastest-growing companies today began really slowly.

To debunk the myths around how long it takes to really see significant growth, I’ve invited Ooshma Garg, the CEO and Founder of Gobble.

Gobble is a weekly dinner-kit delivery service that helps busy people cook dinner in just 10 minutes with one pan. It is growing quickly, doing $100M in sales. But it didn’t happen overnight. It took 3+ years of twists and turns through the trough of sorrow.

This is one of my favorite episodes because Ooshma does a great job of talking openly about issues that many founders struggle with like:

- why you should pursue your idea, even when you don’t have a funding or a technical co-founder

- what to do when your lead engineer leaves right before you launch;

- why finding product/market fit is really about becoming an expert in the field

- transitioning from a bespoke service to a product that scales;

- how to deal with competitors that creep up on you

- how to deal with the criticism of going at your own pace

- why it’s OK to go back to investors that had initially rejected your idea

- how to put aside your ego and do what is best for your company.

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FemgineerTV is produced as a partnership between Femgineer ((http://femgineer.com/) and Pivotal Tracker (http://www.pivotaltracker.com/). San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA (http://www.startmotionmedia.com/design/).

Mar 20, 2017

Two common pieces of startup advice that get doled out are you need to be in Silicon Valley to start your startup, and you need to cater to customers in the US market.

That’s a tall order considering the rising cost of housing, the war on tech talent, and a number of challenges facing immigrant entrepreneurs (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SybHtHG6gcA).

Plus it’s simply not true. There are a number of startups that are starting up and succeeding outside Silicon Valley (http://femgineer.com/2016/05/myths-overcome-idea-to-global-product/).

To help debunk this myth and others, I’ve invited Marina Mogilko (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAQg09FkoobmLquNNoO4ulg) who is the co-founder of LinguaTrip (https://linguatrip.com/en/), an online marketplace that connects language learners around the world to language schools.

What you’ll learn from Marina in this episode:

- How Marina and her co-founder came up with the idea for LinguaTrip, and began it as an offline business.
- How they transitioned from offline to online.
- How they attracted customers outside the US.
- Why they decided to hold off on coming to Silicon Valley, and how it benefited them in building a profitable business that wasn’t beholden to receiving investment.

Listen to the episode on iTunes

You can listen to this episode of FemgineerTV on iTunes (https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/femgineertv/id1032969327?mt=2). Please take a moment to leave us a review. Your positive review will help us get featured in News & Noteworthy and bring more exposure to the work we’re doing, as well as the talented guests we feature!

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FemgineerTV is produced as a partnership between Femgineer ((http://femgineer.com/) and Pivotal Tracker (http://www.pivotaltracker.com/). San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA (http://www.startmotionmedia.com/design/).

Jul 27, 2016

Did you take a risk and then realize, “OMG I am in too deep?”

But by the time you realized it, it was too late.

There was no time for a do-over.

You were stuck and really the only logical thing to do next was to throw in the towel and call it quits.

Or was it?

Well in this episode of FemgineerTV, we’re going to be tackling the topic of how you can rescue yourself from a risky setback.

And to help us out I’ve invited Jessica Mah who is the CEO and Co-Founder of InDinero. She has grown InDinero from zero to multi-million dollar revenues with nearly 200 full-time staff and has been on the cover of Inc Magazine, featured in the Forbes and Inc 30 Under 30 Lists. Jessica studied computer science at U.C. Berkeley.

Jessica went from engineering to entrepreneurship right out of college, but it hasn’t exactly been a bed of roses for her.

She’s had to overcome a number of setbacks along the way, including being on the brink of bankruptcy!

She’s been kind enough to share her story openly with us, and as you watch the episode you’ll learn:

  • Why it’s important to set goals but not too many!
  • Why being direct with teammates and customers can help you work through a risky setback.
  • How partners can be helpful, but those relationships need to be nurtured to withstand setbacks.
  • How you can feel fearless and confident, but it’s like a gas tank and needs to be replenished.

If you’ve agonized over a significant setback, then I highly recommend listening to this episode!

FemgineerTV is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

May 25, 2016

Risk can mean a number a number of things. It could mean speaking up. Or striking out on your own.

But taking a risk is hard.

What’s easier is following a known path.

Creating what we’re told to create. Doing what we’re told to do.

So why not just go for the easy path?

Because it doesn’t always lead to us to feeling fulfilled in our careers and everyday lives.

What does is pushing our creative limits, and that’s where risk comes in.

The reason risk is hard is because it’s surrounded by fear.

Anytime we want to take a risk by sharing ourselves or pursuing a new experience, our inner critic: that little voice inside our heads stops us dead in our tracks. It fills us with fear...

Fear of criticism, rejection, and failure.

It’s hard to put the inner critic in its place because of the way we’ve been educated and conditioned: to not make mistakes.

So what does it take to get over our fears and take a risk?

Creative confidence.

Creative confidence is a mindset, a way of being, that comes from design thinking. Design thinking allows you to be experimental, make mistakes, let go of perception, embrace testing to see what happens, and be detached from outcomes.

In today’s episode of FemgineerTV, we’re going to be talking about how to manage the various fears we come across and gain creative confidence.

To help us out I’ve invited a good friend of mine Maria Molfino who is a women’s leadership coach and helps women gain the creative confidence to lead. With a Masters in Design from Stanford, she has worked with top managers and professionals at companies such as Facebook, Twitter, and IDEO.

Maria says, “If you care about growing and expanding then you have to find out how to relate to your fears.” She continues, “If fear isn’t coming up, you’re not playing at your edge.”

As you watch the episode you’ll learn:

- Why the fear of failure is bigger than actually experiencing failure
- Why we’re sensitive to feedback and how to remove the sting of it
- How to deal with criticism from ourselves, bosses, peers, and loved ones
- Why it’s important to create space between yourself and your creative work
- How to reframe self-promotion

This is a must watch episode if you find want to grow, but feel stuck, and especially if you are looking to help others grow!

In the episode Maria shares her Creative Confidence Playbook to help you overcome obstacles such as perfectionism, comparison, and more. You can download her playbook here: http://www.mariamolfino.com/free-playbook

Maria also recently launched a podcast called Heroine where she interviews creative women leaders in art, business, design, science, and tech. Listen to the podcast here: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/heroine-womens-creative-leadership/id1100949693

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FemgineerTV is produced as a partnership between Femgineer http://femgineer.com/ and Pivotal Tracker: http://www.pivotaltracker.com.

San Francisco video production byStartMotionMEDIA: http://www.startmotionmedia.com/

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