September 26, 2024 • 45 mins
Priceless Conversations With Mastercard: Financial Literacy
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
All right, his way up with Angela. Yee. I'm so excited.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
You know, this is part of our insolidarity initiative, and
Massacard has been partnering with iHeart to produce these priceless
conversations with me and we're bringing together thought leaders, financial experts,
and business owners to sit down and kind of share
your expertise and share your stories. And so we're talking
today about the role that financial literacy plays in building
(00:30):
and maintaining wealth and sustaining legacy in the black community.
So today we have Nicole Turner, who is the Senior
vice president of Technology Hubs at MasterCard.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Welcome, Thank you, so excited to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
I'm so happy to have you. And you know, just
full disclosure.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
She's from Brooklyn, yes, and the house Tanya band Court,
the founder and CEO of Goal Setter.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Hey, thank you for having me, who.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Travel from Brooklyn today straight from best And then you
guys should all know Stacy Tisdale at this point. You
know she's my co She is my co host for
Wealth Wednesdays, but also the CEO of My Money Media.
She's a financial expert, author and broadcast journalist. Hello, Stacy, Angela,
how's everybody feeling today because we always got to start
(01:18):
with that.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
I'm feeling excited, empowered, I'm ready to rock and roll.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah, I mean, the pre conversation was amazing, just talking
about different goals, finances, being patient.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
But Nicole, let's start with you. As we're doing this conversation.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Financial inclusion is one of the key pillars of Mastercard's
social impact strategy and in solidarity efforts. Can you talk
more about Mastercard's commitment to financial inclusion and also we
always talk about the tangibles the programs that you have
that supported sure.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Of course, when I think about MasterCard and the commitment
that we have to try to close the racial equity gap,
tell me it's been something that's been important that we've
been doing for a long time. I love the fact
that not only do we talk it, but we walk it.
We understand that in order for us to be successful
in our business and what we do, closing that gap
is equally important, especially when it comes to financial inclusion
(02:10):
and financial literacy holistically. And so when we think about
the programs that we have and some of the partners,
and we'll talk later with my friend that's here from
Goal Setter, we understand and by supporting and working with
these partners, not only do they help us continue and
improve the digital divide that we need to say how
do we close it? But then also how do we
(02:32):
make inclusive products in order for us to do this
as well?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
And you know, I just want to put this out
there first too, Nicole, just your background and how you
got to Masteracre, because I love for people to know
how everybody got to where they are today as well
in this space.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Yes, so before I join MasterCard, I used to open
up healthcare facilities and long term care facilities in underrepresented
communities in Bushwick, Brooklyn and in the Bronx. And it
was important that the agency that I work with at
the time said, you know what, we're looking to put
three and four hundred jobs in the communities. We realize
that there's a change that's happening. But in order to
(03:07):
do that, use your HR background to hire people from
the community and upskill them. In order when you upskill them,
not only do you help the economic community, but you
also help the real estate. And at that time, they
were doing a lot of programs from a low income
housing perspective. This company I was working with, so not
only were we bringing jobs, we also was giving them
mortgage grants as well.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I think it's important to know all of those things
because we do care about the people who are behind
these programs. And so when we're talking about MasterCard, just
to see how much you care about the community outside
of this and what got you here today. So thank
you for sharing that, Tanya.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Let's move on to you. Let's talk about goal Setter.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
What goal Setter is the need that you saw specifically
in the black community, and how goal Setter is helping
to close the wealth gap as well.
Speaker 4 (03:56):
Absolutely so. Goal Setter is a family find nan and
financial education platform. So for any of your listeners out
there who may have a kid's debit card for their kid,
goal Setter allows your kid to have a debit card,
but to have that debit card with financial education. And
I'll tell you why. My mother was an elementary school teacher.
(04:17):
I did everything in my house that had everything to
do with education, right. You know how it is when
you live in the house with the teacher, right, everything
you do is like accounted, like everything is. So because
of her, I ended up going to Stanford. I got
two degrees in engineering, so on a great track from
(04:37):
an educational perspective. But I came out of Stanford and
there's one thing I didn't know about. I didn't know
about money because my mama didn't teach me about money
because she didn't know about money. So I'm in my
late twenties. I have a job in Silicon Valley. At
that job, they give me a bunch of stock and
stock options, and I don't know about diversification or asset allocation,
so I just leave it there. I picked my head
up one day that stock is worth a million dollars.
(05:00):
That was at the beginning of the day. Because by
the end of the day, the big tech bubble had
burst and my million dollars went down to twenty thousand
dollars in one day.
Speaker 5 (05:07):
That's what I said to my million, to.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
See, I.
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Understand stuff.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
You don't understand options, you don't understand vesting, and that
you could sell them, and that you could diversify. So
in that moment, I thought, Okay, this was stupid, but
I can't turn back the hands of time. All I
can do is make sure this doesn't happen to my
own children. Fast forward, when I actually had my daughter, Gabrielle,
I taught her everything I had since learned about personal
finance from the time she came out of my womb.
(05:37):
And when she was eight, about to turn nine, she said, Mommy,
for my ninth birthday, I really only want two things.
I said, what's that? She said, enough money to say
for an investment account? Wow, and a bike. Thought at
that age, if I could get every child, you say that,
I can change the world. And so that's what Goal
Setter is. We provide, not us a debit card for
(06:01):
your kids, because let's be honest, America teaches kids from
the time that they are born how to send and
spend money. We can go to kids now and say,
how many of you have cashp how many of you
have themo how many of you have sending and spending mechanisms?
And they do and they do. Excuse me, how many
of you know about investment accounts? How many of you
know what a bond is? How many of you know
what a stock is? And they don't. And so that's
(06:22):
what we do at Goal Setter. Our debit card actually
comes with a rule called learn before you burn, so
your kids debit card will automatically freeze on Sunday morning
if they haven't taken their financial literacy queens for the weekend.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Oh I like that for me.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
And while you were talking about all of those things,
I was thinking about, like me not having financial literacy
when I was younger, and when I got my first
bank account. And before we get to you, Stacey, do
you guys all remember when you got your first ever
bank account?
Speaker 4 (06:52):
Absolutely?
Speaker 3 (06:53):
I do. I remember it was I was so proud
at the time. There was a program. I was going
to school in East New York, but my mother had
busted me to a school in Meal Base Shoes PS.
Two thirty six, and what they did was they had
given us they set up bank accounts for us. At
that time, I felt so proud just to have a
couple of five dollars or something that was in it.
It gave me a sense of pride to open up
(07:15):
my first bank account. I remember those days.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
Absolutely, and I remember getting my first bank account because
then I was like, oh, now I can get a job,
so I can put some money in that bank account.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
Right.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
You associate a bank account with wealth and money, and
that gives you the motivation. But you know, a bank
account and investing are two different things, and that is
what our community is lacking right now understanding of how
to build wealth, not just how to make money exactly.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
Well, now, Stacey, let's get to you.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
And you remember your first time opening because that was
my first foray into anything financial, like having a bank account,
and it wasn't until I was in high school. And
so that's why I remember it so well. I think
I was like a junior in high school and I
didn't have much in there. But imagine not even having
that then, how was I going to be able to
invest anything or learn about it? And so that was
(08:05):
quite a journey for me. Yeah, and so Stacy, now
let's get.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Over here to you.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
You know, this is my girl, Stacy, so I can't
assume that everybody knows everything about her. But in your
work you've talked about financial behaviors developing at an early age,
how messages from society impact our financial choices. Can you
share some more insight about this and also some of
the barriers that exist, particularly in the black community, and
also because we like to be you know, just always
(08:32):
think about solution tips on how to overcome them.
Speaker 5 (08:35):
Absolutely, and I think all of the questions you just
answered are in my story. So I'll share my story
just as you ladies have a big AHA moment for
me when it came to money was when I was
in college and a friend of mine's father worked for
a brokerage company called pain Weber. That will really date me,
(08:56):
and we walked into he was going to take us
out to lunch one day, and I'd never been around
Wall Street or anything like that, and we walked into
his office and I saw my first trading floor and
I was like, I have never seen anything like this before,
and it was an incredible experience. I went back. I
changed my major to business right away intern there. Got
(09:18):
a job right out of college at a commodities firm,
and I was a cash manager and invested in the
treasury markets, so I really learned how the economy worked
and how the markets work within economy. Didn't want to
stay on Wall Street. Came out of the womb loving writing,
and I called the Wall Street Journal and I said,
I know finance, I love writing, and they actually bought
(09:38):
that story and they hired me and I started at
their newswire service. Eventually moved to their television department and
I was there for seven years, and it was just
wonderful to see now I've seen the corporate side of money.
So CBS was starting a business news division called market Watch,
(09:59):
and I got hired to be their first on air reporter,
and that was a journalist's dream because I had to
do every single CBS show, from morning news to evening news,
everything in between radio and that really brought me to
Main Street. I was at CBS for many years, and
then I went to CNN Global and I was really
(10:20):
starting to have a lot of conflict about being a
financial journalist, about doing this the information we were putting out,
and from working on Wall Street, because I could see
that knowledge does not translate into behavior, and especially all
the big financial gurus at the time, I'm not going
to name any names, but really kind of making us
(10:42):
feel bad. You're supposed to put this amount into retirement,
You're supposed to do this, and I could see people
can't do that, they don't do that, So why aren't
we doing that? And I thought it was kind of
a failure by the financial services industry and the financial
media the way they were giving financial advice journalists, and
we had to know why why do we do what
(11:04):
we do when it comes with money? And I went
on what I had no idea was going to be
a six year research project into what drives financial behavior.
Because of my career, I had access to the greatest
minds in the world. Psychologists don't remember Clinton Gore's addiction specialists,
because that's financial behavior. Everything for my research problem became
very clear. When we have trouble with money, we go
(11:26):
straight to the numbers. I got to earn more, save more,
invest more. The real causes of our financial behavior have
got absolutely nothing to do with numbers. We make our
choices based on our beliefs, and our beliefs are the
result of things that have nothing to do with money.
How we saw it handled growing up, social messages to
(11:48):
live a certain lifestyle, have certain things, or you're not whatever, gender, culture, race,
all of these former beliefs about ourselves, and that's drives
our financial choices. So the dance becomes teaching people how
to manage those choices, to become aware of what's really
(12:09):
pushing their buttons, so that at that moment they can say, oh,
I can make a different choice. So I wrote a
book about that, and it came out in two thousand
and eight, and I hate to say it was good timing.
But it was a huge recession and a very emotional recession.
And I started my book tour on the Today Show,
and really, I think it just really resonated for people
(12:30):
to hear about money spoken in that way. So that
appearance turned into a three year gig. A lot of
people watch that show. So the White House contacted me
and asked me to create a behavior based financial education
system based on this holistic approach to money. Did that
and then went on to create my own financial education program.
(12:54):
My journalism career continued PBS Black and Enterprise, and one
of my jobs right when I left Black Enterprises start
my own company, a show called The Breakfast Club asked
me to come on and talk about blacks and investing
(13:15):
and what I had seen. And I'll just never forget
this from the first time President Obama ran when it
became clear he was going to win. In the weeks
before his presidency, the number of Blacks going to sign
up for financial literacy courses, going to sign up for
entrepreneurship courses, going to sign up for advice ten thousand tupled.
(13:39):
So I love his saying the audacity of hope. So
the X factor was actually the hope and I remember
my first segment I did with Angela, and I was
talking about the mentality and the Black community that you
need to be rich to invest. Totally understand where that
comes from, and totally understand why we don't trust the
financial markets. Though our story is told wrong and we
(14:01):
are an incredible story of resilience. But now technology fintech
is providing solutions that the government failed to and it
guess what, it takes out that discrimination piece and now
it's micro investing was created and now it's investing is
accessible to everyone. I mentioned one company's name in that interview,
(14:24):
and I'm not saying that company now, but while I
was in that interview, four million people signed up for
that company's app amazing, and then we saw our community
does have an appetite for this type of information and
they're hungry for it. And talk we're always told as
lax and at the bottom. Talk to us from our
(14:46):
position of power, help us make empowered financial decisions. And
that's that's where the work has to go. So a
holistic approach, you know people talk about behavioral finance or
holistic approach, is like there's something different. That's the only
way to learn about money you have to work on
mindset and help people remember how strong they really are.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
And go to trusted companies for companies. Yeah, and also
because you know, it's there's so many people out there
that call themselves gurus and listen, That's why it's so
important to have these platforms here where Mastercard's been doing
this work. And so we're going to get to that
and thank you Stacy in a second. But Tanya, I
(15:29):
want you to talk about your partnership with MasterCard over
the years and more specifically the programming that you are
doing and activating with HBCU students.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
Absolutely.
Speaker 5 (15:39):
Well.
Speaker 4 (15:39):
The thing I love about MasterCard is that MasterCard is
really focused on you know, through their Center for Inclusive Growth,
they are focused on inclusivity. How do you include more
people in the conversation and include more people in wealth
building in ways that meet them where they are. To
the point that Stacy just made right, I know that
(16:00):
that they're folks sitting in classrooms across America where some
banker comes across the street and is teaching them about
the stock market, but that banker is thirty years older
than them, doesn't speak their language, doesn't come from their community,
and all of those kids have their heads down on
their desk and are falling asleep. It's not because they
can't learn, it's because the teacher can't teach.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
And so, you know what they can relate.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
They can't relate absolutely, and sometimes they can't relate to
the stories. They can't relate to the you know, to
the examples of what investing means or what investing will
bring you and your family and your community. So all
of that relatability is really important. All of that is
to say, with MasterCard, we have just recently launched a
financial freedom project with the HBCUs in the Atlanta area
(16:46):
and so Morehouse Spelman Clark Atlanta. We have brought to
them this Financial Freedom boot Camp. So it's ten sessions
where we are for twenty to thirty minutes in every
single session talking about a different financial concept that is
the core of wealth building and that people need to
know in order to build wealth.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Right.
Speaker 4 (17:04):
We just kicked off last week incredibly exciting, had all
these amazing AUC students in the room, and we start
with questions like who knows what the rule of seventy
two is? Nobody's raising their hand and that's okay because
we're now about to share it with you. The rule
of seventy two teaches you how fast your money will
double based on where you invest it. And so now
(17:24):
after that twenty minute session, everyone says, wow, okay, So
I just can't stick my money under a mattress or
in a savings account that's going to yield me zero
point one percent interest. I need to do something better,
So click, I got that right. Then in the second
session we talk about okay, great, now you know you
need to do better. How do you do better? Where
can you put your money where your money will have
(17:45):
an opportunity to grow at seven percent per year for
the next thirty years. Oh well, that's something called the
stock market. But I don't have to be a stock picker.
I can learn about ETFs and mutual funds and index funds.
So then we introduce that language and we tell them
about that language. The reason all of this is so
important is because we all know if you don't know
the language of money, then anybody can sell you anything
(18:08):
because you feel ashamed about not understanding the concepts, and
you just sit there and do what we all do. Right,
You go into the mortgage loan place and you just nod.
They may have a really bad interest rate on that
piece of paper, but you don't know what good is.
And so we're teaching them the language of money, and
we're also giving them the goal setter app. MasterCard is
putting one hundred dollars onto these students' accounts so that
(18:32):
before they graduate they can be savers and investors. We
are turning the next generation of AUC students from senders
and spenders into savers and investors and giving them both
the tools so that they can start investing and the
knowledge to do so.
Speaker 5 (18:47):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
I love that the confidence that comes with being able
to know that you have that information too. I'm just
now flashing back to the first time I had to
do a mortgage and what that process was like for me. Absolutely,
you're confident I did on but I did on my
research ahead of time.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
So it's interesting and I'm glad you said that you
did your research because I didn't. So when you said,
you know, it wasn't until you got older that you realized, Okay,
how do I understand about numbers and financing? We were
talking before. I wish I had this goal than when
I was younger, right, because growing up I wasn't taught that.
That wasn't the behavior in my family for us to
sit down at dinner to have those conversations and say,
(19:24):
let's talk about savings, let's talk about investing.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
We didn't talk about money in my house, no, not
at all.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
It was like, don't open those bills because we can't
do it. It was my mom my dad being like,
your mother spends all the money, and then my mom
hiding packages so that he wouldn't see her going shopping
and bringing them in the house.
Speaker 5 (19:40):
It was all that and then those early impressions that's
I mean, that's what sets how you hand no money.
I remember my mother hiding stuff in the trunk, so
my father and so you.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
Grew up the house.
Speaker 5 (19:56):
And well was interesting for me. I grew up as
a figure skater, I lived away from my parents and
an athlete, and I always had that messaging you just
worry about what you're doing. We'll worry about the money.
You just worry about what you're doing. We'll worry about
the money. And as I got into my work and
I was like, oh, and I said, even in my
adult behavior as far as worrying about the details and
(20:17):
getting into the nitty gritty. It's not natural to me,
but you have to know yourself well enough to know
your tendencies. And that's also a big part of the
about financial literacy, exactly what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
And you know, I'm so glad because we are going
to get into this program more. But even just to
piggyback off of what you said about a mortgage, you know,
I actually got my real estate license, But part of
the reason I did that was because I had been
doing these deals for myself in real estate and I
wanted to make sure I was as educated as possible
on everything on every aspect, so that when I was
(20:50):
going in and meeting with brokers and going to get
my mortgage and mortgage and doing all of that, I
understood it so well that nobody could really try to
get over on me. And it's just so much better
when you can walk in there with the confidence of
knowing that you know, I educated myself. That's why I
love goal Setter and the fact that you're saying, Okay,
you want to access this, so you want to do
this well, first you have to make sure you take
(21:11):
this course and you know it's information I think that
kids will hold on to.
Speaker 5 (21:16):
It's so cliche, but knowledge is power, and it really is.
Speaker 4 (21:19):
I have to tell you this is so funny because
I have kids, right and I see the impact that
it has on them. And my kids are from eight
all the way to nineteen. So my fourteen year old
I picked him up from basketball practice the other day
and his friend got in the back seat with him
and he said, Miss Tanya, did Hendrix tell you that
when we are in the line at Chick fil A,
he's always trying to hurry up and finish his quiz so.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
That I can access so levcard can get a lot
of money.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
He gets to the front of the line.
Speaker 4 (21:48):
So that's on one side, and then on the other side.
I have my nineteen year old daughter. When she turned eighteen,
because she had been taking these quizzes for many years,
she called me up and she said, Mommy, I'm eighteen.
Now I think I need to pull my credit score.
But I probably don't have a credit score yet because
I don't have a credit card. So I'm gonna go
get a credit card so I can build my credit.
I need to go get a roth Ira, and I
(22:09):
need to open up a high Field savings account. Anything
else mommy, and it was because she'd been taking these
weekly financial Yes, but that is the difference. And as
we talk about creating products for our community, right, I'm
one of the very few black women in America who
owns a fintech company and an aed tech company, And
(22:33):
so our company looks very different and acts very different
than a standard debit card that you stick into kid's hands,
because I know I'm not going to do that disservice
to my children, nor to any of the other children
in our community, of just teaching them how to spend
money without the other side, which is learning about building
your credit, learning about investing, learning about saving. So it's
(22:55):
great that they learn how to be responsible spenders, but
we all know that being a responsible.
Speaker 5 (22:59):
Spend is not that is definitely not.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
Check to checheck, right, you cannot do that. And so
you know that having black people and black women who
are bringing a different lens to how we create products
for our community is essential. And that's the other thing
that quite frankly, MasterCard has done by being an investor
and goal setter, right, MasterCard has powered us to do
(23:24):
this work in a way that other people, quite frankly
can't do it because they come with a very different lens.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Well, Nicle, have a question for you now, all right,
we've talked about the MasterCard Start Path program and how
it helps early stage underrepresented founders a bit on previous episodes.
Why is it important to invest in underrepresented startups and
how is this beneficial to Mastercard's overarching financial inclusion strategy.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Of course, love that question, Angela, And first you so
eloquently talked about the work that we do holistically as
one of our start Path Right partners. When we think
about start Path, when we think about connecting with some
of those fintech startups, those education startups, it's helping us
connect with the community and power with the community on
a broader scale. And some of those digital products, although
(24:10):
I call it inclusive products that we have, it's helping
us say how do we touch everyone and have equal
access to everyone? And so I just want to take
us back for a little bit. In two thousand and six,
Right MasterCard Foundation was founded. In twenty fifteen, we made
a commitment to connect five hundred million people to the
digital economy. Since then, we've exceeded that goal. And what
we wanted to do is say, how do we have
(24:32):
one billion people by twenty twenty five. How do we
connect Well, we also said, let's push our goals a
little bit further. We want to connect with fifty million
small business owners, one billion underserved individuals, but also twenty
five million women entrepreneurs. Now, think about this start Path
program and what it can do when you connect these
entrepreneurs and these FinTechs together to create these digital products
(24:54):
that can help our communities. More broadly, we're in the
digital age right now. So I mentioned earlier, how do
we close that gap? And so some of the partners
and the products that we have, we have goals. That is,
we have Wealthy, we have SUMA. Right, there's different fintech
organizations and products that we have that's out there that
not only if you think about can I access it,
(25:14):
but also can I see individuals who look like me
who are teaching me and educating me on these products?
Speaker 5 (25:19):
Holistically, fintech is really the game changer. Yeah, yes, really,
we've been we've been talking about been talking about fintech
for a long time. And it was really wonderful to
see post twenty twenty the black community when everybody was
locked down and we saw how bad things really were
really it was like there was a collective decision. The
traditional economy was not made for us. It does not
(25:41):
work for us, and we migrated to the digital economy
and it was explosive. And then you saw for the
last I think three years in a row, the first
largest number of first time investors to the stock market
are black. It's because of fintech. Yes, and we've been
on Wealth Wednesdays. We've been just raising that tech, bringing
that fintech bell for a year so that this MasterCard
(26:05):
that really applaud you on what you've really been a
pioneer and a leader in this.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
Yeah, we have to walk the talk, right, we can't,
you know, in order for us to be effective in
our business, it's the authenticity around it. But it's the
commitment as well, and it's not for the short term.
It's for the long term gain for us, for our communities.
We were at as an organization where we put our
money at our businesses or our locations, but it's also
important to affect the communities is at large.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Well, let's talk about some of those locations. Let's talk
about MasterCards, tech hubs and all of those things. My
main thing when we started these conversations was for people
to have real tangibles and to see how can I
access this for what I do and where do I
need to be and how can this benefit me? What
are the different programs based on where I'm at in
my business? So can you just give us some insights
(26:51):
into that.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
So when we think about mascoret global Technology hubs, so
there represent almost forty percent of MasterCards employees in these
locations around them. We believe in the locations where we're at.
So we're in New York City Saint Louis and I'll
just talk about those two locations for starters. And also
we have work that we do in Atlanta as well.
When we think about the locations of where our physical
(27:13):
presence is, we also understand the commitment in partnering with
not for profits government agencies on a community basis as well.
So our tech cubs unite diverse talent from software engineers, FinTechs,
you name it. In those tech cubs. All those creative
and innovative products that we're creating or producing and developing,
those inclusive products, they happen and they're develop at the
(27:36):
tech cubs that I manage. And so looking at the
people that we bring on board, but then also what
are some of the programs that run out of these
tech cubs. So we have master your Cards not only
are to run at the tech cups, but they also
in the community because we want to meet people where
they're at. They could be online, they could be virtual.
And we had an activation at clock Atlanta University and
(27:57):
ensuring that how do we reach out only students as well,
but how do we reach adults for them to understand
the inclusivity around financial education and financial literacy and so
the broadened aspect of where we're at and the continuation
isn't yes, it's us. We're also global in nature.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Man.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
I love that because I feel like nowadays kids are
also teaching their parents.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Yes, oh for sure, the big time.
Speaker 4 (28:22):
Okay, I just have to jump in and say to
that point. MasterCard just recently did a research study about
goal Setter users. Let me tell you what they found.
Eighty five percent of parents said their kids are better
savers because they use goal Setter. One out of two
parents said their kids are better investors because they use
(28:42):
goal Setter, but seventy five percent of parents said they
are more financially healthy themselves because their kids use their
goal setter, And thirty percent of parents said they are
using a different financial instrument or investment vehicle that they
learned about on goal Setter.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Oh my gosh, see this is a generational like it.
Speaker 4 (29:03):
So when you said the kids are teaching the parents,
we never got how many of you all got financial education?
Speaker 2 (29:10):
And in college all I did was sign up for
things I shouldn't have.
Speaker 3 (29:15):
I want to say, is we're also doing something like
for the stem right for girls for tech black girls
who code, because again, how do you touch that demographic
those students in that age, and it is diververse mentoring
and educating, cating their parents. That's something that was never
the case for us. Think about the impact that we're
doing right now. So sometimes we say were worried about
(29:35):
the future. I'm not.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
I was when I.
Speaker 5 (29:38):
Told you when I came on the show the first
time and I mentioned that technology company for micro investing.
Who told me about that company?
Speaker 1 (29:47):
He told me what I'm using.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
I want to ask you guys a something because the
other day, my friend's son, he's fourteen years old, and
you know, he wasn't there, and I was with his
son and we were just having a conversation because he
said he's interested in real estate.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
You know, he's in high school.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
And he says to me, my biggest fear is that
one day I could be homeless. And I don't know
why he said that because his family, you know, they're good.
He lives in a house. It's not like there's ever
been that. But I do feel like a lot of
times people have this fear. I know I used to
always have this fear, like what if something happens, What
if I don't have a place to live, what if
(30:26):
I'm not set up properly? And I really did used
to think that when I was living check to check
and not even check to check, you.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Know, until I got myself in a better position.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
But let's say a fourteen year old came to you
today and was like, look, this is my biggest fear
that one day I'll be homeless.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
What would your answer be to that child.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
My answer to that child would be, you can eliminate
that fear by managing your finances appropriately. And we're going
to teach you how to Most of us, because we
don't talk about money in our families. As we all
just talked about, it's scary, and of course that could
be your biggest fear because it's that money is a
(31:05):
black box and it's an unknown. But if somebody sitys
down with you and says, okay, the day you get
your first paycheck, let me tell you what we're gonna do.
We're gonna start putting away at least twenty percent out
of every paycheck until you have an emergency fund. That
emergency fund will be three to six months of your expenses.
So if you get fired from your job, don't worry
about it. You got three to six months that you
can live on right there. And then after you're done
with the emergency fund, the next dollar, we're going to
(31:27):
start investing that. You aren't a stock picker. You don't
need to be a stockpicker like Stacy over here, right.
You want to be a stock for a black station.
You can invest your money in a mutual fund or
an ETF. And here's how you do it, and this
is what it's done for the last thirty years. If
you invest one hundred thousand dollars in thirty years, it'll
be seven hundred and sixty one thousand dollars if you
put it into the stock market. And the stock market
(31:48):
returns what it always has. When they see a path,
then it's like, you know, after I was pregnant, when
my second child, and I was like, oh my goodness,
I got on his weight on me that I need
to get off. All I needed to do was go
to a boot camp and somebody need to show me. Okay,
you jump that rope one hundred times and then you
run around. We have to give them a path so
to get them away from that fear. And if we
give them a path, then they can see what their
(32:11):
lives can look and what's the.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
Gold gold, gold, and what you just said. Your relationship
with money can teach you how to manage fear. Yes,
and it's managed fear. It's not real, that's right. And
we can show you how those fears aren't going to
come true. And that's what's so powerful about all of
it is really unpacking. Your relationship with money can teach
you how to manage fear and how to not let
(32:35):
it run the show.
Speaker 4 (32:36):
Absolutely, absolutely, I agree.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
And it goes back to what you were saying is
you have to show them because sometimes we can have
conversations with those fourteen year olds and if we're talking
at them without having conversations with them to bring them
in and give them relevant examples. You can't see it,
you can't be it right.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
That's right, blinding, Yeah, it's blinding, right.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
And so we goes back to fundamental each one teach one.
If each one is going to teach one, let's make
sure we have that step by step process. And I'm
bringing you along the journey. I'm not trying to kick
you to the side at all.
Speaker 5 (33:06):
And don't you love when they see And that's what
was so eye opening on Wall Street because it was
like Wall Street that I didn't meet a single rocket
scientist on Wall Street. Nor is money rocket science. This
is it's not hard. It's fears. Great about goal setter,
what Mastercard's doing. When they stuck, they're like, oh that's easy,
(33:27):
seventy two, all that stuff's easy.
Speaker 4 (33:29):
Exactly, that's right. And then we need to show them
Angela Yee and her many businesses. So we're going to
reframe his fear. His fear is going to be like,
oh no, I might only have two houses as opposed
to three, and he can see what's start to set
up his goals, and he reframes what his goals are.
My goal is not to not be homeless. My goal
(33:50):
is to have three houses and two businesses and this
and that.
Speaker 5 (33:54):
Right, how are you careful with the e effect? My
son has grown up around her and she's created a
financial nightmare. Why don't we have ten houses?
Speaker 2 (34:02):
No.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
One thing I did.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Show him, though, was I showed him like the first
brownstone that I ever bought, and I showed him what
I paid for it and what it's worth now, and
also that it was a two family so I was like,
this is what my mortgage was. And then I had
a tenant downstairs that was paying this much money, so really,
this is what I was paying every month, And so
I was showing I actually showed him that so he
could see what it is, and the brownstone that I
(34:26):
purchased recently. I was showing him, you know, all of that.
So he's like, now he wants to be an architect.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
He probably wants to be your architect.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
And listen, one of the things that people ask me
all the time, if I could go back to my
younger self and do things differently, what would it be?
Speaker 1 (34:49):
And I always say, I wish.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
I would have started investing earlier, you know, because I
think that when I first was, like I said, living
tech to Chech, I wasn't investing.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
And it wasn't until I was like twenty nine years old.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
That I started a roth Ira and I got a
lot more confident and it didn't have to be a
lot of money that I was putting in it every month,
you know. So that was just something that if I
could have seen exponentially how that could have grown, and
if I would have started at a way younger age
where I would be now, if I could go back
in time and do things differently, I would have.
Speaker 5 (35:20):
I agreed you a good point you made. So many
people think, well, I don't have the money to start one.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
You don't need that much, little fife.
Speaker 5 (35:28):
I want something that we're talking about a lot lately,
is a lot of this is systemic. Like what we
were talking about, people not understanding like their work benefits
and things like that. Companies aren't educating people. Companies have
the power to offer all sorts of benefits. I'm so
glad so many are now focused on financial wellness. Systemic
(35:51):
discrimination put us in this place. It's going to take
systemic solutions to pull us out of this. You know,
really help from company, so.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
Walking Wave and that's what I love about the work
that we do holistically to enhance, rite and educate the
communities across the board, to give access to everyone. There's nothing.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
Yeah, and some of that is on us too, write
to go out and seek this information and this knowledge
because you know there are that like you said, massacred,
you have these programs that are available. And I do
want to ask you, Tanya, how did you end up
even approaching or did they approach you?
Speaker 4 (36:33):
Yeah, so I applied to the start Path program.
Speaker 1 (36:36):
And I want to hear this. I want people to
see how it can happen. It was like you had
it in. I knew this person. It was a hookup.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
We were at a conference one time and I remember
her walking up to me was like, oh you work
in MasterCard. Well, this is my business and this is
what it is that I do. I'm going to partner
and work with you. I want to have give me
some names.
Speaker 4 (36:58):
Right.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
So, the way that she is now, this is a
long time ago. The way that she is now, she's
the same. Meaning I'm driven, I'm focused, I believe in
myself right right, yes, And I believe in my product yes,
and guess what happened and now we're partner.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
Look at that, Wow, and that the same story.
Speaker 4 (37:19):
And it is true. I mean, but what I have
found is God doesn't put you in any place where
you're not supposed to be, But it is up to
us to take advantage of every one of those offices.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
You will that networking.
Speaker 4 (37:32):
Networking is so important, and there are times, you know,
I actually nobody will believe this. I sit on the
line between being an introvert and an extrovert. So there
are some days where I walk into a room of
a thousand people and my introvert side is screaming out like,
oh Lord.
Speaker 5 (37:47):
I just want to be at home. I just want
to go.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Home, right.
Speaker 4 (37:50):
But in those moments, I say to myself, I am
not leaving here until I have talked to five people
who can move this business forward. And the reason is
because I am so committed to transforming our community. And
I know, you know, we've raised thirty million dollars. We've
raised money from MasterCard, but also from Robert F. Smith,
the chairman and philanthropists of Vista Equity, from Kevin Durant,
(38:11):
from Chris Paul, from Carmelo Anthony. We have extraordinary investors
who believe in goal Setter, but they believe in goal
Setter's power to transform the next generation of kids in
our community. And so it is my responsibility every day
when I took one of those investment dollars, it's my
responsibility to go up to folks like Nicole and make
(38:31):
sure that I am getting the kinds of partnerships that
can help goal Setter to get in the hands of
more kids across America. So, yes, I may have been
a little aggressive.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
Because that excitement can translate.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
And let me ask you this, the goal Setter start
off when you first launched it, right, I want to
know also about how it morphed because a lot of
times you have an idea, you start something, but then
you end up kind of having to adapt to what
you see is necessary, is needed absolutely.
Speaker 4 (39:04):
So one of the things that we realized is that
not only did families and kids need our product, but
banks and financial institutions need our product. And so goal
Setter is now white labeling our platform for banks and
credit unions across the country so that they can give
our platform to all of the families that they serve.
(39:24):
So that's been a huge part of our pivot. The
second thing has been that we're actually serving school systems now.
So we have goal se Goal Setter both the APP
and financial education curriculum in ten states across the country
in twenty five school systems throughout the country. We partnered
with Nike and UBS and other financial institutions to help
(39:47):
bring this content in this curriculum into school systems that
need it most. So those are the two of the
things that we have done to make sure that we
are getting out there and really meeting the need.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
And Nicole has to feel great for you to be
doing this work that obviously it's right, Yeah, top talk,
that's it is.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
I mean, when you realize that you work for a
work at MasterCard, I understand that the work that we
do and I'm touching the communities and I can see
that tri factor of education, financial literacy, the community involvement,
community development. When you witness that, and then you also
turn it into what are some of the products that
we're doing and we're touching generations, we're touching communities. For me,
(40:30):
it's something that I will continue to being with pride
and what it is that we what we do in
working with our community partners with our FinTechs with our
startups is key.
Speaker 2 (40:41):
Yeah, all right, well Stacy, you know, Stacy's with me
every single week on Wealth Wednesdays. But honestly, when I
go out and about, people always approach me and talk
about how helpful our platform has been with Wealth Wednesdays.
And then now they're coming up to me and talking
about these priceless conversations with MasterCard also, and so that
means a lot to me just for me to have
this platform, to be able to give people this valuable information,
(41:04):
give people a place that they can go to get
the assistance that they need when they're at that point
that they're like, Okay, I'm ready to bring my business
to the next level. Or I can speak confidently on
what it is that I have going on, or maybe
I need to learn how to speak confidently, because that's
not always something that's a given, either being able to pitch,
being able to.
Speaker 5 (41:25):
To hear you talk about that was a little entrepreneurship
one on one and I hear the you know, the
partnerships and the investors and things that you made. How
did you do that? Wow?
Speaker 1 (41:40):
I'm like, oh, it.
Speaker 4 (41:41):
Was a long journey and truly, how I did It
is meeting good people, telling them what we're doing and
why we're doing it. Right, It is often the why
behind your product, not just the product that you're offering,
that gets people engaged and wants them and makes them
want to help you. So getting good people into our ecosystem,
(42:05):
and truly, I'm not even kidding you asking each person,
can you just introduce me to one person? And then
that next person, can you just introduce me to one person?
I mean, that is what networking is. You don't go
to someone and say, Angela, can you introduce me to
all five of the people who were on your show
last week?
Speaker 5 (42:23):
Right, be like, no, I.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Have other things.
Speaker 5 (42:27):
Take exactly literally.
Speaker 4 (42:36):
But you know, when you are doing the work, and
you're doing the work for the right reasons, and then
you get people engaged in that work, they do want
to help you and they are willing to help you.
And so that's how we were able to get it done,
just one by one by one. But that's why it's
been You know this, this work is not for the
faint of heart being an entrepreneur. It is not for.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
The before you get to yes.
Speaker 4 (42:57):
A whole lot of nose, before you get to a yes.
And the funny thing about me is I didn't come
from the fintech space. I didn't come from the finance space.
I actually was a Nickelodeon. I ran nick Junior dot
com and nogging dot com before I came over into
this space. But I knew that if I could bring
all my skills of making content and making fintech products
(43:18):
fun and engaging, then I could bring that into the
financial services space and transform the space in a way
that no one else had done. And when Angela was
talking about, you know she had a two family brownstone,
I thought about one of our videos. It's called get
a Renter to pay your Mortgage. So those kinds of videos,
they're fun, they're engaging. We have one that's called life Insurance.
(43:38):
Isn't just for dead people?
Speaker 1 (43:42):
Right to the point true.
Speaker 4 (43:45):
So we have all these this great content because I
came from the content space absolutely and brought that over
into the financial services space. Which is why goal Setter
can bring this content to people in a way that
makes y'all have and it's fun and engaging, but it's
still informative.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
About creating a trust.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
Yes, we do have one trust will trust that you
need trust in case you have kids that you need,
that's important as well. First, I want to say just
thank you for the opportunity for MasterCard, for even having
us to have the opportunity to amplify our message and
the work that we do in this space. I think
you heard from some of our partners that join you previously,
(44:23):
you had Troy Dennis, you has a lot of guss
and and definitely for the work that they do holistically,
So I just want to give them a shout out.
But thank you. I think that when you have the
masses that can hear the wealth content what it is
that we can do holistically and with some of the
tools and resources that you can educate right and learn from,
I just think that this is a fantastic platform for
(44:45):
us just to share and amplify a message.
Speaker 1 (44:47):
So thank you, well, thank you.
Speaker 2 (44:48):
This means a lot to me. So I appreciate you
all for being here with us today. I know our
audience on way up appreciates this too. We're gonna get
our investments way up. Yes, yes, and again this is priceless,
this information. So now what are you going to do?
That's the question, you know for everybody listening, what are
you going to do. It's time to take some action.
(45:09):
But thank you so much for joining us. And I
know this is going to be amazing and I cannot
wait to hear some of the success stories and people
who are just listening and are inspired. So thank you
so much.
Speaker 1 (45:19):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
I'm inspired because you know, I'm already like, okay, in solidarity.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
What am I doing?
Speaker 3 (45:24):
Stop path?
Speaker 5 (45:26):
That's right, you car This building did great.
Speaker 4 (45:34):
Thank you.
All right, his way up with Angela. Yee. I'm so excited.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
You know, this is part of our insolidarity initiative, and
Massacard has been partnering with iHeart to produce these priceless
conversations with me and we're bringing together thought leaders, financial experts,
and business owners to sit down and kind of share
your expertise and share your stories. And so we're talking
today about the role that financial literacy plays in building
(00:30):
and maintaining wealth and sustaining legacy in the black community.
So today we have Nicole Turner, who is the Senior
vice president of Technology Hubs at MasterCard.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Welcome, Thank you, so excited to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
I'm so happy to have you. And you know, just
full disclosure.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
She's from Brooklyn, yes, and the house Tanya band Court,
the founder and CEO of Goal Setter.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Hey, thank you for having me, who.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Travel from Brooklyn today straight from best And then you
guys should all know Stacy Tisdale at this point. You
know she's my co She is my co host for
Wealth Wednesdays, but also the CEO of My Money Media.
She's a financial expert, author and broadcast journalist. Hello, Stacy, Angela,
how's everybody feeling today because we always got to start
(01:18):
with that.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
I'm feeling excited, empowered, I'm ready to rock and roll.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah, I mean, the pre conversation was amazing, just talking
about different goals, finances, being patient.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
But Nicole, let's start with you. As we're doing this conversation.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Financial inclusion is one of the key pillars of Mastercard's
social impact strategy and in solidarity efforts. Can you talk
more about Mastercard's commitment to financial inclusion and also we
always talk about the tangibles the programs that you have
that supported sure.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
Of course, when I think about MasterCard and the commitment
that we have to try to close the racial equity gap,
tell me it's been something that's been important that we've
been doing for a long time. I love the fact
that not only do we talk it, but we walk it.
We understand that in order for us to be successful
in our business and what we do, closing that gap
is equally important, especially when it comes to financial inclusion
(02:10):
and financial literacy holistically. And so when we think about
the programs that we have and some of the partners,
and we'll talk later with my friend that's here from
Goal Setter, we understand and by supporting and working with
these partners, not only do they help us continue and
improve the digital divide that we need to say how
do we close it? But then also how do we
(02:32):
make inclusive products in order for us to do this
as well?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
And you know, I just want to put this out
there first too, Nicole, just your background and how you
got to Masteracre, because I love for people to know
how everybody got to where they are today as well
in this space.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Yes, so before I join MasterCard, I used to open
up healthcare facilities and long term care facilities in underrepresented
communities in Bushwick, Brooklyn and in the Bronx. And it
was important that the agency that I work with at
the time said, you know what, we're looking to put
three and four hundred jobs in the communities. We realize
that there's a change that's happening. But in order to
(03:07):
do that, use your HR background to hire people from
the community and upskill them. In order when you upskill them,
not only do you help the economic community, but you
also help the real estate. And at that time, they
were doing a lot of programs from a low income
housing perspective. This company I was working with, so not
only were we bringing jobs, we also was giving them
mortgage grants as well.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I think it's important to know all of those things
because we do care about the people who are behind
these programs. And so when we're talking about MasterCard, just
to see how much you care about the community outside
of this and what got you here today. So thank
you for sharing that, Tanya.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Let's move on to you. Let's talk about goal Setter.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
What goal Setter is the need that you saw specifically
in the black community, and how goal Setter is helping
to close the wealth gap as well.
Speaker 4 (03:56):
Absolutely so. Goal Setter is a family find nan and
financial education platform. So for any of your listeners out
there who may have a kid's debit card for their kid,
goal Setter allows your kid to have a debit card,
but to have that debit card with financial education. And
I'll tell you why. My mother was an elementary school teacher.
(04:17):
I did everything in my house that had everything to
do with education, right. You know how it is when
you live in the house with the teacher, right, everything
you do is like accounted, like everything is. So because
of her, I ended up going to Stanford. I got
two degrees in engineering, so on a great track from
(04:37):
an educational perspective. But I came out of Stanford and
there's one thing I didn't know about. I didn't know
about money because my mama didn't teach me about money
because she didn't know about money. So I'm in my
late twenties. I have a job in Silicon Valley. At
that job, they give me a bunch of stock and
stock options, and I don't know about diversification or asset allocation,
so I just leave it there. I picked my head
up one day that stock is worth a million dollars.
(05:00):
That was at the beginning of the day. Because by
the end of the day, the big tech bubble had
burst and my million dollars went down to twenty thousand
dollars in one day.
Speaker 5 (05:07):
That's what I said to my million, to.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
See, I.
Speaker 5 (05:14):
Understand stuff.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
You don't understand options, you don't understand vesting, and that
you could sell them, and that you could diversify. So
in that moment, I thought, Okay, this was stupid, but
I can't turn back the hands of time. All I
can do is make sure this doesn't happen to my
own children. Fast forward, when I actually had my daughter, Gabrielle,
I taught her everything I had since learned about personal
finance from the time she came out of my womb.
(05:37):
And when she was eight, about to turn nine, she said, Mommy,
for my ninth birthday, I really only want two things.
I said, what's that? She said, enough money to say
for an investment account? Wow, and a bike. Thought at
that age, if I could get every child, you say that,
I can change the world. And so that's what Goal
Setter is. We provide, not us a debit card for
(06:01):
your kids, because let's be honest, America teaches kids from
the time that they are born how to send and
spend money. We can go to kids now and say,
how many of you have cashp how many of you
have themo how many of you have sending and spending mechanisms?
And they do and they do. Excuse me, how many
of you know about investment accounts? How many of you
know what a bond is? How many of you know
what a stock is? And they don't. And so that's
(06:22):
what we do at Goal Setter. Our debit card actually
comes with a rule called learn before you burn, so
your kids debit card will automatically freeze on Sunday morning
if they haven't taken their financial literacy queens for the weekend.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Oh I like that for me.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
And while you were talking about all of those things,
I was thinking about, like me not having financial literacy
when I was younger, and when I got my first
bank account. And before we get to you, Stacey, do
you guys all remember when you got your first ever
bank account?
Speaker 4 (06:52):
Absolutely?
Speaker 3 (06:53):
I do. I remember it was I was so proud
at the time. There was a program. I was going
to school in East New York, but my mother had
busted me to a school in Meal Base Shoes PS.
Two thirty six, and what they did was they had
given us they set up bank accounts for us. At
that time, I felt so proud just to have a
couple of five dollars or something that was in it.
It gave me a sense of pride to open up
(07:15):
my first bank account. I remember those days.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
Absolutely, and I remember getting my first bank account because
then I was like, oh, now I can get a job,
so I can put some money in that bank account.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
Right.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
You associate a bank account with wealth and money, and
that gives you the motivation. But you know, a bank
account and investing are two different things, and that is
what our community is lacking right now understanding of how
to build wealth, not just how to make money exactly.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
Well, now, Stacey, let's get to you.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
And you remember your first time opening because that was
my first foray into anything financial, like having a bank account,
and it wasn't until I was in high school. And
so that's why I remember it so well. I think
I was like a junior in high school and I
didn't have much in there. But imagine not even having
that then, how was I going to be able to
invest anything or learn about it? And so that was
(08:05):
quite a journey for me. Yeah, and so Stacy, now
let's get.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Over here to you.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
You know, this is my girl, Stacy, so I can't
assume that everybody knows everything about her. But in your
work you've talked about financial behaviors developing at an early age,
how messages from society impact our financial choices. Can you
share some more insight about this and also some of
the barriers that exist, particularly in the black community, and
also because we like to be you know, just always
(08:32):
think about solution tips on how to overcome them.
Speaker 5 (08:35):
Absolutely, and I think all of the questions you just
answered are in my story. So I'll share my story
just as you ladies have a big AHA moment for
me when it came to money was when I was
in college and a friend of mine's father worked for
a brokerage company called pain Weber. That will really date me,
(08:56):
and we walked into he was going to take us
out to lunch one day, and I'd never been around
Wall Street or anything like that, and we walked into
his office and I saw my first trading floor and
I was like, I have never seen anything like this before,
and it was an incredible experience. I went back. I
changed my major to business right away intern there. Got
(09:18):
a job right out of college at a commodities firm,
and I was a cash manager and invested in the
treasury markets, so I really learned how the economy worked
and how the markets work within economy. Didn't want to
stay on Wall Street. Came out of the womb loving writing,
and I called the Wall Street Journal and I said,
I know finance, I love writing, and they actually bought
(09:38):
that story and they hired me and I started at
their newswire service. Eventually moved to their television department and
I was there for seven years, and it was just
wonderful to see now I've seen the corporate side of money.
So CBS was starting a business news division called market Watch,
(09:59):
and I got hired to be their first on air reporter,
and that was a journalist's dream because I had to
do every single CBS show, from morning news to evening news,
everything in between radio and that really brought me to
Main Street. I was at CBS for many years, and
then I went to CNN Global and I was really
(10:20):
starting to have a lot of conflict about being a
financial journalist, about doing this the information we were putting out,
and from working on Wall Street, because I could see
that knowledge does not translate into behavior, and especially all
the big financial gurus at the time, I'm not going
to name any names, but really kind of making us
(10:42):
feel bad. You're supposed to put this amount into retirement,
You're supposed to do this, and I could see people
can't do that, they don't do that, So why aren't
we doing that? And I thought it was kind of
a failure by the financial services industry and the financial
media the way they were giving financial advice journalists, and
we had to know why why do we do what
(11:04):
we do when it comes with money? And I went
on what I had no idea was going to be
a six year research project into what drives financial behavior.
Because of my career, I had access to the greatest
minds in the world. Psychologists don't remember Clinton Gore's addiction specialists,
because that's financial behavior. Everything for my research problem became
very clear. When we have trouble with money, we go
(11:26):
straight to the numbers. I got to earn more, save more,
invest more. The real causes of our financial behavior have
got absolutely nothing to do with numbers. We make our
choices based on our beliefs, and our beliefs are the
result of things that have nothing to do with money.
How we saw it handled growing up, social messages to
(11:48):
live a certain lifestyle, have certain things, or you're not whatever, gender, culture, race,
all of these former beliefs about ourselves, and that's drives
our financial choices. So the dance becomes teaching people how
to manage those choices, to become aware of what's really
(12:09):
pushing their buttons, so that at that moment they can say, oh,
I can make a different choice. So I wrote a
book about that, and it came out in two thousand
and eight, and I hate to say it was good timing.
But it was a huge recession and a very emotional recession.
And I started my book tour on the Today Show,
and really, I think it just really resonated for people
(12:30):
to hear about money spoken in that way. So that
appearance turned into a three year gig. A lot of
people watch that show. So the White House contacted me
and asked me to create a behavior based financial education
system based on this holistic approach to money. Did that
and then went on to create my own financial education program.
(12:54):
My journalism career continued PBS Black and Enterprise, and one
of my jobs right when I left Black Enterprises start
my own company, a show called The Breakfast Club asked
me to come on and talk about blacks and investing
(13:15):
and what I had seen. And I'll just never forget
this from the first time President Obama ran when it
became clear he was going to win. In the weeks
before his presidency, the number of Blacks going to sign
up for financial literacy courses, going to sign up for
entrepreneurship courses, going to sign up for advice ten thousand tupled.
(13:39):
So I love his saying the audacity of hope. So
the X factor was actually the hope and I remember
my first segment I did with Angela, and I was
talking about the mentality and the Black community that you
need to be rich to invest. Totally understand where that
comes from, and totally understand why we don't trust the
financial markets. Though our story is told wrong and we
(14:01):
are an incredible story of resilience. But now technology fintech
is providing solutions that the government failed to and it
guess what, it takes out that discrimination piece and now
it's micro investing was created and now it's investing is
accessible to everyone. I mentioned one company's name in that interview,
(14:24):
and I'm not saying that company now, but while I
was in that interview, four million people signed up for
that company's app amazing, and then we saw our community
does have an appetite for this type of information and
they're hungry for it. And talk we're always told as
lax and at the bottom. Talk to us from our
(14:46):
position of power, help us make empowered financial decisions. And
that's that's where the work has to go. So a
holistic approach, you know people talk about behavioral finance or
holistic approach, is like there's something different. That's the only
way to learn about money you have to work on
mindset and help people remember how strong they really are.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
And go to trusted companies for companies. Yeah, and also
because you know, it's there's so many people out there
that call themselves gurus and listen, That's why it's so
important to have these platforms here where Mastercard's been doing
this work. And so we're going to get to that
and thank you Stacy in a second. But Tanya, I
(15:29):
want you to talk about your partnership with MasterCard over
the years and more specifically the programming that you are
doing and activating with HBCU students.
Speaker 4 (15:38):
Absolutely.
Speaker 5 (15:39):
Well.
Speaker 4 (15:39):
The thing I love about MasterCard is that MasterCard is
really focused on you know, through their Center for Inclusive Growth,
they are focused on inclusivity. How do you include more
people in the conversation and include more people in wealth
building in ways that meet them where they are. To
the point that Stacy just made right, I know that
(16:00):
that they're folks sitting in classrooms across America where some
banker comes across the street and is teaching them about
the stock market, but that banker is thirty years older
than them, doesn't speak their language, doesn't come from their community,
and all of those kids have their heads down on
their desk and are falling asleep. It's not because they
can't learn, it's because the teacher can't teach.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
And so, you know what they can relate.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
They can't relate absolutely, and sometimes they can't relate to
the stories. They can't relate to the you know, to
the examples of what investing means or what investing will
bring you and your family and your community. So all
of that relatability is really important. All of that is
to say, with MasterCard, we have just recently launched a
financial freedom project with the HBCUs in the Atlanta area
(16:46):
and so Morehouse Spelman Clark Atlanta. We have brought to
them this Financial Freedom boot Camp. So it's ten sessions
where we are for twenty to thirty minutes in every
single session talking about a different financial concept that is
the core of wealth building and that people need to
know in order to build wealth.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Right.
Speaker 4 (17:04):
We just kicked off last week incredibly exciting, had all
these amazing AUC students in the room, and we start
with questions like who knows what the rule of seventy
two is? Nobody's raising their hand and that's okay because
we're now about to share it with you. The rule
of seventy two teaches you how fast your money will
double based on where you invest it. And so now
(17:24):
after that twenty minute session, everyone says, wow, okay, So
I just can't stick my money under a mattress or
in a savings account that's going to yield me zero
point one percent interest. I need to do something better,
So click, I got that right. Then in the second
session we talk about okay, great, now you know you
need to do better. How do you do better? Where
can you put your money where your money will have
(17:45):
an opportunity to grow at seven percent per year for
the next thirty years. Oh well, that's something called the
stock market. But I don't have to be a stock picker.
I can learn about ETFs and mutual funds and index funds.
So then we introduce that language and we tell them
about that language. The reason all of this is so
important is because we all know if you don't know
the language of money, then anybody can sell you anything
(18:08):
because you feel ashamed about not understanding the concepts, and
you just sit there and do what we all do. Right,
You go into the mortgage loan place and you just nod.
They may have a really bad interest rate on that
piece of paper, but you don't know what good is.
And so we're teaching them the language of money, and
we're also giving them the goal setter app. MasterCard is
putting one hundred dollars onto these students' accounts so that
(18:32):
before they graduate they can be savers and investors. We
are turning the next generation of AUC students from senders
and spenders into savers and investors and giving them both
the tools so that they can start investing and the
knowledge to do so.
Speaker 5 (18:47):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
I love that the confidence that comes with being able
to know that you have that information too. I'm just
now flashing back to the first time I had to
do a mortgage and what that process was like for me. Absolutely,
you're confident I did on but I did on my
research ahead of time.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
So it's interesting and I'm glad you said that you
did your research because I didn't. So when you said,
you know, it wasn't until you got older that you realized, Okay,
how do I understand about numbers and financing? We were
talking before. I wish I had this goal than when
I was younger, right, because growing up I wasn't taught that.
That wasn't the behavior in my family for us to
sit down at dinner to have those conversations and say,
(19:24):
let's talk about savings, let's talk about investing.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
We didn't talk about money in my house, no, not
at all.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
It was like, don't open those bills because we can't
do it. It was my mom my dad being like,
your mother spends all the money, and then my mom
hiding packages so that he wouldn't see her going shopping
and bringing them in the house.
Speaker 5 (19:40):
It was all that and then those early impressions that's
I mean, that's what sets how you hand no money.
I remember my mother hiding stuff in the trunk, so
my father and so you.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
Grew up the house.
Speaker 5 (19:56):
And well was interesting for me. I grew up as
a figure skater, I lived away from my parents and
an athlete, and I always had that messaging you just
worry about what you're doing. We'll worry about the money.
You just worry about what you're doing. We'll worry about
the money. And as I got into my work and
I was like, oh, and I said, even in my
adult behavior as far as worrying about the details and
(20:17):
getting into the nitty gritty. It's not natural to me,
but you have to know yourself well enough to know
your tendencies. And that's also a big part of the
about financial literacy, exactly what you're talking about.
Speaker 2 (20:28):
And you know, I'm so glad because we are going
to get into this program more. But even just to
piggyback off of what you said about a mortgage, you know,
I actually got my real estate license, But part of
the reason I did that was because I had been
doing these deals for myself in real estate and I
wanted to make sure I was as educated as possible
on everything on every aspect, so that when I was
(20:50):
going in and meeting with brokers and going to get
my mortgage and mortgage and doing all of that, I
understood it so well that nobody could really try to
get over on me. And it's just so much better
when you can walk in there with the confidence of
knowing that you know, I educated myself. That's why I
love goal Setter and the fact that you're saying, Okay,
you want to access this, so you want to do
this well, first you have to make sure you take
(21:11):
this course and you know it's information I think that
kids will hold on to.
Speaker 5 (21:16):
It's so cliche, but knowledge is power, and it really is.
Speaker 4 (21:19):
I have to tell you this is so funny because
I have kids, right and I see the impact that
it has on them. And my kids are from eight
all the way to nineteen. So my fourteen year old
I picked him up from basketball practice the other day
and his friend got in the back seat with him
and he said, Miss Tanya, did Hendrix tell you that
when we are in the line at Chick fil A,
he's always trying to hurry up and finish his quiz so.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
That I can access so levcard can get a lot
of money.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
He gets to the front of the line.
Speaker 4 (21:48):
So that's on one side, and then on the other side.
I have my nineteen year old daughter. When she turned eighteen,
because she had been taking these quizzes for many years,
she called me up and she said, Mommy, I'm eighteen.
Now I think I need to pull my credit score.
But I probably don't have a credit score yet because
I don't have a credit card. So I'm gonna go
get a credit card so I can build my credit.
I need to go get a roth Ira, and I
(22:09):
need to open up a high Field savings account. Anything
else mommy, and it was because she'd been taking these
weekly financial Yes, but that is the difference. And as
we talk about creating products for our community, right, I'm
one of the very few black women in America who
owns a fintech company and an aed tech company, And
(22:33):
so our company looks very different and acts very different
than a standard debit card that you stick into kid's hands,
because I know I'm not going to do that disservice
to my children, nor to any of the other children
in our community, of just teaching them how to spend
money without the other side, which is learning about building
your credit, learning about investing, learning about saving. So it's
(22:55):
great that they learn how to be responsible spenders, but
we all know that being a responsible.
Speaker 5 (22:59):
Spend is not that is definitely not.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
Check to checheck, right, you cannot do that. And so
you know that having black people and black women who
are bringing a different lens to how we create products
for our community is essential. And that's the other thing
that quite frankly, MasterCard has done by being an investor
and goal setter, right, MasterCard has powered us to do
(23:24):
this work in a way that other people, quite frankly
can't do it because they come with a very different lens.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Well, Nicle, have a question for you now, all right,
we've talked about the MasterCard Start Path program and how
it helps early stage underrepresented founders a bit on previous episodes.
Why is it important to invest in underrepresented startups and
how is this beneficial to Mastercard's overarching financial inclusion strategy.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Of course, love that question, Angela, And first you so
eloquently talked about the work that we do holistically as
one of our start Path Right partners. When we think
about start Path, when we think about connecting with some
of those fintech startups, those education startups, it's helping us
connect with the community and power with the community on
a broader scale. And some of those digital products, although
(24:10):
I call it inclusive products that we have, it's helping
us say how do we touch everyone and have equal
access to everyone? And so I just want to take
us back for a little bit. In two thousand and six,
Right MasterCard Foundation was founded. In twenty fifteen, we made
a commitment to connect five hundred million people to the
digital economy. Since then, we've exceeded that goal. And what
we wanted to do is say, how do we have
(24:32):
one billion people by twenty twenty five. How do we
connect Well, we also said, let's push our goals a
little bit further. We want to connect with fifty million
small business owners, one billion underserved individuals, but also twenty
five million women entrepreneurs. Now, think about this start Path
program and what it can do when you connect these
entrepreneurs and these FinTechs together to create these digital products
(24:54):
that can help our communities. More broadly, we're in the
digital age right now. So I mentioned earlier, how do
we close that gap? And so some of the partners
and the products that we have, we have goals. That is,
we have Wealthy, we have SUMA. Right, there's different fintech
organizations and products that we have that's out there that
not only if you think about can I access it,
(25:14):
but also can I see individuals who look like me
who are teaching me and educating me on these products?
Speaker 5 (25:19):
Holistically, fintech is really the game changer. Yeah, yes, really,
we've been we've been talking about been talking about fintech
for a long time. And it was really wonderful to
see post twenty twenty the black community when everybody was
locked down and we saw how bad things really were
really it was like there was a collective decision. The
traditional economy was not made for us. It does not
(25:41):
work for us, and we migrated to the digital economy
and it was explosive. And then you saw for the
last I think three years in a row, the first
largest number of first time investors to the stock market
are black. It's because of fintech. Yes, and we've been
on Wealth Wednesdays. We've been just raising that tech, bringing
that fintech bell for a year so that this MasterCard
(26:05):
that really applaud you on what you've really been a
pioneer and a leader in this.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
Yeah, we have to walk the talk, right, we can't,
you know, in order for us to be effective in
our business, it's the authenticity around it. But it's the
commitment as well, and it's not for the short term.
It's for the long term gain for us, for our communities.
We were at as an organization where we put our
money at our businesses or our locations, but it's also
important to affect the communities is at large.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Well, let's talk about some of those locations. Let's talk
about MasterCards, tech hubs and all of those things. My
main thing when we started these conversations was for people
to have real tangibles and to see how can I
access this for what I do and where do I
need to be and how can this benefit me? What
are the different programs based on where I'm at in
my business? So can you just give us some insights
(26:51):
into that.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
So when we think about mascoret global Technology hubs, so
there represent almost forty percent of MasterCards employees in these
locations around them. We believe in the locations where we're at.
So we're in New York City Saint Louis and I'll
just talk about those two locations for starters. And also
we have work that we do in Atlanta as well.
When we think about the locations of where our physical
(27:13):
presence is, we also understand the commitment in partnering with
not for profits government agencies on a community basis as well.
So our tech cubs unite diverse talent from software engineers, FinTechs,
you name it. In those tech cubs. All those creative
and innovative products that we're creating or producing and developing,
those inclusive products, they happen and they're develop at the
(27:36):
tech cubs that I manage. And so looking at the
people that we bring on board, but then also what
are some of the programs that run out of these
tech cubs. So we have master your Cards not only
are to run at the tech cups, but they also
in the community because we want to meet people where
they're at. They could be online, they could be virtual.
And we had an activation at clock Atlanta University and
(27:57):
ensuring that how do we reach out only students as well,
but how do we reach adults for them to understand
the inclusivity around financial education and financial literacy and so
the broadened aspect of where we're at and the continuation
isn't yes, it's us. We're also global in nature.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
Man.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
I love that because I feel like nowadays kids are
also teaching their parents.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Yes, oh for sure, the big time.
Speaker 4 (28:22):
Okay, I just have to jump in and say to
that point. MasterCard just recently did a research study about
goal Setter users. Let me tell you what they found.
Eighty five percent of parents said their kids are better
savers because they use goal Setter. One out of two
parents said their kids are better investors because they use
(28:42):
goal Setter, but seventy five percent of parents said they
are more financially healthy themselves because their kids use their
goal setter, And thirty percent of parents said they are
using a different financial instrument or investment vehicle that they
learned about on goal Setter.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Oh my gosh, see this is a generational like it.
Speaker 4 (29:03):
So when you said the kids are teaching the parents,
we never got how many of you all got financial education?
Speaker 2 (29:10):
And in college all I did was sign up for
things I shouldn't have.
Speaker 3 (29:15):
I want to say, is we're also doing something like
for the stem right for girls for tech black girls
who code, because again, how do you touch that demographic
those students in that age, and it is diververse mentoring
and educating, cating their parents. That's something that was never
the case for us. Think about the impact that we're
doing right now. So sometimes we say were worried about
(29:35):
the future. I'm not.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
I was when I.
Speaker 5 (29:38):
Told you when I came on the show the first
time and I mentioned that technology company for micro investing.
Who told me about that company?
Speaker 1 (29:47):
He told me what I'm using.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
I want to ask you guys a something because the
other day, my friend's son, he's fourteen years old, and
you know, he wasn't there, and I was with his
son and we were just having a conversation because he
said he's interested in real estate.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
You know, he's in high school.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
And he says to me, my biggest fear is that
one day I could be homeless. And I don't know
why he said that because his family, you know, they're good.
He lives in a house. It's not like there's ever
been that. But I do feel like a lot of
times people have this fear. I know I used to
always have this fear, like what if something happens, What
if I don't have a place to live, what if
(30:26):
I'm not set up properly? And I really did used
to think that when I was living check to check
and not even check to check, you.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
Know, until I got myself in a better position.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
But let's say a fourteen year old came to you
today and was like, look, this is my biggest fear
that one day I'll be homeless.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
What would your answer be to that child.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
My answer to that child would be, you can eliminate
that fear by managing your finances appropriately. And we're going
to teach you how to Most of us, because we
don't talk about money in our families. As we all
just talked about, it's scary, and of course that could
be your biggest fear because it's that money is a
(31:05):
black box and it's an unknown. But if somebody sitys
down with you and says, okay, the day you get
your first paycheck, let me tell you what we're gonna do.
We're gonna start putting away at least twenty percent out
of every paycheck until you have an emergency fund. That
emergency fund will be three to six months of your expenses.
So if you get fired from your job, don't worry
about it. You got three to six months that you
can live on right there. And then after you're done
with the emergency fund, the next dollar, we're going to
(31:27):
start investing that. You aren't a stock picker. You don't
need to be a stockpicker like Stacy over here, right.
You want to be a stock for a black station.
You can invest your money in a mutual fund or
an ETF. And here's how you do it, and this
is what it's done for the last thirty years. If
you invest one hundred thousand dollars in thirty years, it'll
be seven hundred and sixty one thousand dollars if you
put it into the stock market. And the stock market
(31:48):
returns what it always has. When they see a path,
then it's like, you know, after I was pregnant, when
my second child, and I was like, oh my goodness,
I got on his weight on me that I need
to get off. All I needed to do was go
to a boot camp and somebody need to show me. Okay,
you jump that rope one hundred times and then you
run around. We have to give them a path so
to get them away from that fear. And if we
give them a path, then they can see what their
(32:11):
lives can look and what's the.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
Gold gold, gold, and what you just said. Your relationship
with money can teach you how to manage fear. Yes,
and it's managed fear. It's not real, that's right. And
we can show you how those fears aren't going to
come true. And that's what's so powerful about all of
it is really unpacking. Your relationship with money can teach
you how to manage fear and how to not let
(32:35):
it run the show.
Speaker 4 (32:36):
Absolutely, absolutely, I agree.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
And it goes back to what you were saying is
you have to show them because sometimes we can have
conversations with those fourteen year olds and if we're talking
at them without having conversations with them to bring them
in and give them relevant examples. You can't see it,
you can't be it right.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
That's right, blinding, Yeah, it's blinding, right.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
And so we goes back to fundamental each one teach one.
If each one is going to teach one, let's make
sure we have that step by step process. And I'm
bringing you along the journey. I'm not trying to kick
you to the side at all.
Speaker 5 (33:06):
And don't you love when they see And that's what
was so eye opening on Wall Street because it was
like Wall Street that I didn't meet a single rocket
scientist on Wall Street. Nor is money rocket science. This
is it's not hard. It's fears. Great about goal setter,
what Mastercard's doing. When they stuck, they're like, oh that's easy,
(33:27):
seventy two, all that stuff's easy.
Speaker 4 (33:29):
Exactly, that's right. And then we need to show them
Angela Yee and her many businesses. So we're going to
reframe his fear. His fear is going to be like,
oh no, I might only have two houses as opposed
to three, and he can see what's start to set
up his goals, and he reframes what his goals are.
My goal is not to not be homeless. My goal
(33:50):
is to have three houses and two businesses and this
and that.
Speaker 5 (33:54):
Right, how are you careful with the e effect? My
son has grown up around her and she's created a
financial nightmare. Why don't we have ten houses?
Speaker 2 (34:02):
No.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
One thing I did.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
Show him, though, was I showed him like the first
brownstone that I ever bought, and I showed him what
I paid for it and what it's worth now, and
also that it was a two family so I was like,
this is what my mortgage was. And then I had
a tenant downstairs that was paying this much money, so really,
this is what I was paying every month, And so
I was showing I actually showed him that so he
could see what it is, and the brownstone that I
(34:26):
purchased recently. I was showing him, you know, all of that.
So he's like, now he wants to be an architect.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
He probably wants to be your architect.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
And listen, one of the things that people ask me
all the time, if I could go back to my
younger self and do things differently, what would it be?
Speaker 1 (34:49):
And I always say, I wish.
Speaker 2 (34:50):
I would have started investing earlier, you know, because I
think that when I first was, like I said, living
tech to Chech, I wasn't investing.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
And it wasn't until I was like twenty nine years old.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
That I started a roth Ira and I got a
lot more confident and it didn't have to be a
lot of money that I was putting in it every month,
you know. So that was just something that if I
could have seen exponentially how that could have grown, and
if I would have started at a way younger age
where I would be now, if I could go back
in time and do things differently, I would have.
Speaker 5 (35:20):
I agreed you a good point you made. So many
people think, well, I don't have the money to start one.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
You don't need that much, little fife.
Speaker 5 (35:28):
I want something that we're talking about a lot lately,
is a lot of this is systemic. Like what we
were talking about, people not understanding like their work benefits
and things like that. Companies aren't educating people. Companies have
the power to offer all sorts of benefits. I'm so
glad so many are now focused on financial wellness. Systemic
(35:51):
discrimination put us in this place. It's going to take
systemic solutions to pull us out of this. You know,
really help from company, so.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
Walking Wave and that's what I love about the work
that we do holistically to enhance, rite and educate the
communities across the board, to give access to everyone. There's nothing.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
Yeah, and some of that is on us too, write
to go out and seek this information and this knowledge
because you know there are that like you said, massacred,
you have these programs that are available. And I do
want to ask you, Tanya, how did you end up
even approaching or did they approach you?
Speaker 4 (36:33):
Yeah, so I applied to the start Path program.
Speaker 1 (36:36):
And I want to hear this. I want people to
see how it can happen. It was like you had
it in. I knew this person. It was a hookup.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
We were at a conference one time and I remember
her walking up to me was like, oh you work
in MasterCard. Well, this is my business and this is
what it is that I do. I'm going to partner
and work with you. I want to have give me
some names.
Speaker 4 (36:58):
Right.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
So, the way that she is now, this is a
long time ago. The way that she is now, she's
the same. Meaning I'm driven, I'm focused, I believe in
myself right right, yes, And I believe in my product yes,
and guess what happened and now we're partner.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
Look at that, Wow, and that the same story.
Speaker 4 (37:19):
And it is true. I mean, but what I have
found is God doesn't put you in any place where
you're not supposed to be, But it is up to
us to take advantage of every one of those offices.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
You will that networking.
Speaker 4 (37:32):
Networking is so important, and there are times, you know,
I actually nobody will believe this. I sit on the
line between being an introvert and an extrovert. So there
are some days where I walk into a room of
a thousand people and my introvert side is screaming out like,
oh Lord.
Speaker 5 (37:47):
I just want to be at home. I just want
to go.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Home, right.
Speaker 4 (37:50):
But in those moments, I say to myself, I am
not leaving here until I have talked to five people
who can move this business forward. And the reason is
because I am so committed to transforming our community. And
I know, you know, we've raised thirty million dollars. We've
raised money from MasterCard, but also from Robert F. Smith,
the chairman and philanthropists of Vista Equity, from Kevin Durant,
(38:11):
from Chris Paul, from Carmelo Anthony. We have extraordinary investors
who believe in goal Setter, but they believe in goal
Setter's power to transform the next generation of kids in
our community. And so it is my responsibility every day
when I took one of those investment dollars, it's my
responsibility to go up to folks like Nicole and make
(38:31):
sure that I am getting the kinds of partnerships that
can help goal Setter to get in the hands of
more kids across America. So, yes, I may have been
a little aggressive.
Speaker 1 (38:44):
Because that excitement can translate.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
And let me ask you this, the goal Setter start
off when you first launched it, right, I want to
know also about how it morphed because a lot of
times you have an idea, you start something, but then
you end up kind of having to adapt to what
you see is necessary, is needed absolutely.
Speaker 4 (39:04):
So one of the things that we realized is that
not only did families and kids need our product, but
banks and financial institutions need our product. And so goal
Setter is now white labeling our platform for banks and
credit unions across the country so that they can give
our platform to all of the families that they serve.
(39:24):
So that's been a huge part of our pivot. The
second thing has been that we're actually serving school systems now.
So we have goal se Goal Setter both the APP
and financial education curriculum in ten states across the country
in twenty five school systems throughout the country. We partnered
with Nike and UBS and other financial institutions to help
(39:47):
bring this content in this curriculum into school systems that
need it most. So those are the two of the
things that we have done to make sure that we
are getting out there and really meeting the need.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
And Nicole has to feel great for you to be
doing this work that obviously it's right, Yeah, top talk,
that's it is.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
I mean, when you realize that you work for a
work at MasterCard, I understand that the work that we
do and I'm touching the communities and I can see
that tri factor of education, financial literacy, the community involvement,
community development. When you witness that, and then you also
turn it into what are some of the products that
we're doing and we're touching generations, we're touching communities. For me,
(40:30):
it's something that I will continue to being with pride
and what it is that we what we do in
working with our community partners with our FinTechs with our
startups is key.
Speaker 2 (40:41):
Yeah, all right, well Stacy, you know, Stacy's with me
every single week on Wealth Wednesdays. But honestly, when I
go out and about, people always approach me and talk
about how helpful our platform has been with Wealth Wednesdays.
And then now they're coming up to me and talking
about these priceless conversations with MasterCard also, and so that
means a lot to me just for me to have
this platform, to be able to give people this valuable information,
(41:04):
give people a place that they can go to get
the assistance that they need when they're at that point
that they're like, Okay, I'm ready to bring my business
to the next level. Or I can speak confidently on
what it is that I have going on, or maybe
I need to learn how to speak confidently, because that's
not always something that's a given, either being able to pitch,
being able to.
Speaker 5 (41:25):
To hear you talk about that was a little entrepreneurship
one on one and I hear the you know, the
partnerships and the investors and things that you made. How
did you do that? Wow?
Speaker 1 (41:40):
I'm like, oh, it.
Speaker 4 (41:41):
Was a long journey and truly, how I did It
is meeting good people, telling them what we're doing and
why we're doing it. Right, It is often the why
behind your product, not just the product that you're offering,
that gets people engaged and wants them and makes them
want to help you. So getting good people into our ecosystem,
(42:05):
and truly, I'm not even kidding you asking each person,
can you just introduce me to one person? And then
that next person, can you just introduce me to one person?
I mean, that is what networking is. You don't go
to someone and say, Angela, can you introduce me to
all five of the people who were on your show
last week?
Speaker 5 (42:23):
Right, be like, no, I.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Have other things.
Speaker 5 (42:27):
Take exactly literally.
Speaker 4 (42:36):
But you know, when you are doing the work, and
you're doing the work for the right reasons, and then
you get people engaged in that work, they do want
to help you and they are willing to help you.
And so that's how we were able to get it done,
just one by one by one. But that's why it's
been You know this, this work is not for the
faint of heart being an entrepreneur. It is not for.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
The before you get to yes.
Speaker 4 (42:57):
A whole lot of nose, before you get to a yes.
And the funny thing about me is I didn't come
from the fintech space. I didn't come from the finance space.
I actually was a Nickelodeon. I ran nick Junior dot
com and nogging dot com before I came over into
this space. But I knew that if I could bring
all my skills of making content and making fintech products
(43:18):
fun and engaging, then I could bring that into the
financial services space and transform the space in a way
that no one else had done. And when Angela was
talking about, you know she had a two family brownstone,
I thought about one of our videos. It's called get
a Renter to pay your Mortgage. So those kinds of videos,
they're fun, they're engaging. We have one that's called life Insurance.
(43:38):
Isn't just for dead people?
Speaker 1 (43:42):
Right to the point true.
Speaker 4 (43:45):
So we have all these this great content because I
came from the content space absolutely and brought that over
into the financial services space. Which is why goal Setter
can bring this content to people in a way that
makes y'all have and it's fun and engaging, but it's
still informative.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
About creating a trust.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
Yes, we do have one trust will trust that you
need trust in case you have kids that you need,
that's important as well. First, I want to say just
thank you for the opportunity for MasterCard, for even having
us to have the opportunity to amplify our message and
the work that we do in this space. I think
you heard from some of our partners that join you previously,
(44:23):
you had Troy Dennis, you has a lot of guss
and and definitely for the work that they do holistically,
So I just want to give them a shout out.
But thank you. I think that when you have the
masses that can hear the wealth content what it is
that we can do holistically and with some of the
tools and resources that you can educate right and learn from,
I just think that this is a fantastic platform for
(44:45):
us just to share and amplify a message.
Speaker 1 (44:47):
So thank you, well, thank you.
Speaker 2 (44:48):
This means a lot to me. So I appreciate you
all for being here with us today. I know our
audience on way up appreciates this too. We're gonna get
our investments way up. Yes, yes, and again this is priceless,
this information. So now what are you going to do?
That's the question, you know for everybody listening, what are
you going to do. It's time to take some action.
(45:09):
But thank you so much for joining us. And I
know this is going to be amazing and I cannot
wait to hear some of the success stories and people
who are just listening and are inspired. So thank you
so much.
Speaker 1 (45:19):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
I'm inspired because you know, I'm already like, okay, in solidarity.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
What am I doing?
Speaker 3 (45:24):
Stop path?
Speaker 5 (45:26):
That's right, you car This building did great.
Speaker 4 (45:34):
Thank you.
Host
Angela Yee
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