On a Mission to Secure Black Women's Future in Tech [Washday Woosah]

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So if we're not taught early how to articulate, it's
not bragging. I know that I'm very intelligent. I know
that I'm very creative. I know that I am a
visionary executive. So I don't feel the need to humble
myself when I'm talking about what my skill set is.
If you're hiring me, you know why you're hiring me.
It's not for any of my past. It's none of

(00:21):
your business.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hey, hey, ba Fam, what's your girl?

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Bandy money?

Speaker 2 (00:29):
And welcome to today's Wash Day WUSAW episode. So this
is the series I've been doing. Maybe I'll have clocked it,
maybe this is a random Thursday and you just really
wanted to listen to this, But it's intentional. I have
been coming out every Sunday with an in depth one
on one interview with an incredible woman of color who
is either doing incredible work that they're excited to talk about,

(00:50):
has a message to share with BAFAM. But the ultimate
goal of the Wash Day WUSAW is I know that
Sundays we want them to be or I'm hoping to
help create more space for this with podcast, but we
want them to be a time where we are pouring
into ourselves, refilling our cups a little bit before we
go into the week ahead. So whether you are doing
your wash and go, you're doing your deep conditioner, walking

(01:12):
around the house with your hair net on, or sometimes
I lose it and I have to use the ran wrap,
don't judge me, or a grocery bag, whatever, whatever will
help you know, to get the penetration of the moisture
into the girls. We gotta do what we gotta do,
whether you are deep cleaning or honestly just laying around
and just being beautiful and resting and just taking a nap,

(01:35):
whatever that may be. I'm hoping that these episodes can
be a part of that routine leave you feeling a
little bit more invigorated and excited and motivated to go
into the week ahead. There is so much up against
us at all times. This is not the time where
we're gonna steep in that negativity. Well, nothing on Brown
Ambitions ever gonna We're not gonna stew in that negativity

(01:55):
so much. But we can acknowledge the strife, We can
acknowledge the struggle. We can acknowledge what happened but in
the week past, and maybe it wore us down, but
we have to keep moving forward. What other choice do
we have? And so I just hope with these Washday
wusaw's episodes that y'all have a little bit of pep
in your step, a little bit more fuel in the
tank to tackle whatever is coming your way the week ahead.

(02:15):
Today's conversation is really special. I had the pleasure to
chat with Christina Mancini, the CEO of Black Girl's Code,
a couple of months ago, maybe a month a couple
months ago, Yeah, and I was really blown away by her, well,
her depth, the level of care that she puts into
her work, and also her ability to still access joy

(02:36):
through the work that she's doing. She's someone who's had
a really incredible storied career. She got her start in
media working for juggernauts, juggernauts like Warner Brothers, twenty first
Century Fox, and then she transitioned into the world of tech.
She was at Salesforce for many years, rising through the ranks,
becoming a senior executive in the C suite, and then

(02:56):
she took on this role about a year ago, maybe
going on two years now, become the CEO of a
nonprofit called Black Girl's Code. They have a simple but
bold goal to get a million Black girls into tech
by the year twenty forty. So we're going to talk
about what a success for Black Girl's Code look like.
How are they going to know when they've reached it.
We're going to talk about the mission. We're going to
talk about how they are expanding outside of just young

(03:18):
women and girls into us, into the mid career professionals,
the senior executive, senior directors, the directors, the want to
be directors, the managers, the mid level workers, people like
you bea faan who have been working in your careers
for a decade and be two decades even three, and
are either feeling stuck or feeling like, what else could

(03:40):
I be doing? What else should I be striving for?
Could potentially there be a path for me in tech?
Or if I'm in tech, how can I create longevity
in my career? How can I start to expand and
get outside of my lane a little bit. We'll talk
about that in this conversation. Christina is going to talk
about as an introvert, and she and I are very
similar because we could be friends, but I doubt we'd

(04:01):
ever talk because we would just be like always recharging,
which is fine, but she's talking about how she's navigated
her career as a deep, deep introvert and how she
has built processes, strategies, tools to overcome that and still
find success. How she looks at the concept of mentorship.
She's a CEO of a nonprofit. She used to be
a higher up in salesforce, so she gets inundated and

(04:24):
has been with requests for mentorship. So she talks about
her approach to it and how she wants to make
space for always lifting up more women of color to
find career paths and to show up in these rooms
where sadly she herself was the first few only different
constantly throughout her career. But she talks about her approach
to it, how she sets boundaries, and how we as

(04:44):
someone who may look to someone like Christina and look
to them for support or advice to our careers, how
we can engage with, you know, these people in our
lives instead of looking at them for just pure mentorship
a different way we can look at that relationship, and
how we can stop judging our so harshly when it
comes to trying to engage with someone with the hope
that they might be able to lead us to our

(05:07):
next opportunity. So we'll talk about that. Oh my goodness,
we talk about Mandy moneymakers and some of the challenges
I know my coaching clients have had in navigating their
careers in tech. So we're going to have a fun,
juicy conversation. If you want to learn more about Black
Girl's Code, head on down to the show notes right now.
You can find out about all their incredible programming, their
summer camps. They're doing family pop ups in Englewood, California,

(05:30):
so if you're on the West Coast you can check
those out. Incredible work. Make sure you follow them on
social media. I'm going to be following if I don't already,
because as I was speaking to Christina, I'm just reminded
how with everything happening in the world and all the
challenges we're all coming up against in our careers, the microaggressions,
the lack of recognition, feeling stuck, feeling like I want

(05:50):
to pivot, but I don't know where to start. Sometimes
looking at what the babies are doing and just like
getting out of our own mess for a minute and
just looking at a seven year old, a seventeen year
old you know, seeing what a twenty year old is
doing and how they are excited about their career paths
and the little activities and the problem solve and that
they're doing, and just the work that BGC has done

(06:11):
to train these girls and to get the tools that
they need to succeed. If we can just like get
out of our own drama and just look at what
they're doing, put ourselves in their shoes for a while,
I find it to be really invigorating, really exciting. It inspires, right,
and I think at the end of the day, if
you're feeling stuck, stale, demotivated, unmotivated in your career path,
getting back in touch with the youths can actually be

(06:33):
the answer sometimes a little meditation in getting out of
our own mess and just looking at what the youth
have going on and what kind of problems they have
and what kind of solutions they're finding, so that we
can find some inspiration for ourselves. All right, va, fam,
I am going to get into the interview now. I
hope you all enjoy it. I hope you're enjoying these

(06:53):
wash Day wou saws. Please leave a comment, leave a review.
Let's feed the algorithm beast as we need so Brown
Ambition can keep growing. I don't know if y'all notice,
but the podcasting space has never been more saturated, more competitive,
and part of me just kind of feels like it's
going over my head a little bit in the best
way possible, because we have such a thriving, strong, loyal

(07:15):
community thanks to y'all. Thanks to everyone who's listened to
Brown Ambition, whether you're a day one, ten year og
or whether you just discovered us last week. I just
really thank you for sharing your time with us, for
spending some time with me, for letting us in letting
some of this light shine on y'all. I can't say
thank you enough, So thank you so much. BAFAM, I

(07:35):
am again Mandy Money. I'm going to get out of
y'all's way and now get out of my own way
and enjoy this conversation with Christina Mancini from Black Girl's Code.
All right via FAM Welcome back. I'm so excited to
introduce you to this week's guest on Washday Woosa. We
have Christina Mancini. She is the CEO of Black Girl's Code.

Speaker 1 (07:55):
Welcome Christina, thank you so much for having me I'm
a huge fan of your podcast.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Oh, thank you. I'm a huge fan of you. I
love that we've gotten to chat a little bit before.
The last time we spoke, you were your jet setting.
I think you had just left Essence Fest. Were you there? No,
I take that up in my head.

Speaker 1 (08:13):
I did not go to Essence Fest. I was at
Jobs for the Future in oh Okay, also in New Orleans.

Speaker 2 (08:20):
Oh, that's what it was.

Speaker 1 (08:21):
That's where I was.

Speaker 2 (08:23):
It should be illegal to have conferences in New Orleans
in July. Truly very hot.

Speaker 1 (08:28):
But it was a great conference.

Speaker 2 (08:31):
That's good. That's good. Well, you're relatively new ish in
this role. You have this incredible career trajectory, and I
want to I want to start there. Can you tell
bea fam a little bit about your decision to leave
corporate You were a big batty in tech at Salesforce,
and now you're running a nonprofit. So talk to me,
talk to us a little bit about that decision and

(08:52):
what brought you to Black Girls Code.

Speaker 1 (08:53):
Absolutely, I did have a wonderful career. I started my
career in media and television. I transitioned into technology. You know.
I was at summer camp last week in Atlanta and
Representative Kim Schofield was speaking to our girls and one
of the girls asked her why did she get into politics,
and she said she wanted to make sure that people

(09:15):
without a always had a voice. And I think that
that really sums up why I wanted to get into technology.
I did not come up through the traditional educator channels
for this line of work. I came through corporate, and
I was in the rooms that I want to get
our participants into, and so I come with that intention,

(09:37):
like what are the things I wish I knew then
that I know now? And what are the things that
I was trying to solve for at one company that
I can now solve for at scale? And so that's
why I'm here. I want to inspire, educate, and launch
these girls into these big jobs at tech so that
they can save us all. I believe, if I'm not mistaken,

(09:58):
that that is why you started podcasts.

Speaker 2 (10:01):
It's pretty similar, yeah, I mean also I was bored.
I was I was bored. No, not bored as in
like I have nothing to do, bored as in surrounded
by people who didn't look like me every day. And
I was also in media covering personal Finance, and I

(10:21):
wanted to I wanted to feel the energy, giddiness, the excitement.
There wasn't a lot of that excitement in like doing
it for a cause. Maybe I was a little bit
of a bleeding heart at the time. And I met
my co host at the time, Tiffany, at a conference,
and we had such We were both so equally passionate
about doing this work and really closing the racial wealth

(10:41):
gap and talking to women of color, and I just
didn't get that where I was working at Yahoo Finance
at the time. So for me, this was an outlet.
It was an outlet and a place to take all
my enthusiasm. And at the same time, now it's been
ten years and I have chosen to keep doing it
again and again, I've left corporate. I left corporate back
in twenty twenty one. And definitely my why now is

(11:02):
because you know, I was going to ask while you
were speaking, I was going to ask you. Sometimes there's
a bit of a pressure on women of color when
we reach these high rankings in corporate America, like stay there,
we need you representation, da da dada. But at the
same time, and I did feel that way because when
I was in corporate. I wasn't as senior level as
you were, but I was making hiring decisions. I was hiring.

(11:24):
I hired a team of forty and you know, I
really wanted to make sure that they were diverse, and
that little bit of power and responsibility. It took it
very seriously and it was a privilege and some power.
That being said, I wanted to get your take on
that and your answer to anyone who may say, but
we need you in corporate.

Speaker 1 (11:44):
I think that we need a whole bunch of us
in corporate, right. And I was doing this work off
the side of my desk for many years. You know,
I launched multiple programs, even when I was in film
and then also when I was at Salesforce. And at Salesforce,
I Lon and start Make Change Series, are leading through
change series, trying to motivate people to think different about

(12:05):
using their platform to affect change and instead of just
going to work every day and thinking like, oh, I
got to tick all these boxes in my playbook, Like
what if you thought about how you could use the
space and influence you have to affect change. And so
there's this incredible pressure when you as you rise through
the ranks in corporate when you get to the spaces

(12:27):
where you are in fact the only one to create
space for others. And it is the right type of pressure.
But for me, I couldn't get enough people at the table.
I wanted to actually encourage us to start building our
own tables. And so, yes, I suffer that pressure. It's
the pressure of wanting to mentor and sponsor everybody while
you still have your regular day job. And I think

(12:49):
that's a really interesting conversation in itself around thinking through
what is mentorship versus sponsorship. Everybody wants mentorship, but it
presents itself in different ways. For me, I'm not super chatty.
I'm going to go straight to action items, and so
I think I am a better sponsor. But in order

(13:11):
to be a good sponsor and find the right sponsors,
you need to really think about what your value proposition
is and you know, start thinking about who's your mentor
that you have coffee with and you want to have
small talk with, and who's your sponsor who's going to
be in the room. I used to say, you know,
fighting for you in rooms where you're not and now
where we are right now, which is an epidemic of

(13:32):
no black women in tech. I would say it is
fighting to make sure that you yourself are in the
room to present your own projects so that you can
accelerate your career.

Speaker 2 (13:42):
Okay, you said you said so much there. I have
a lot of respect for anyone who's clear on what
they what they're able to offer. I've read a group
coaching community called the Mandy money Makers, and one of
my makers last week, she's incredible networking and she'll she'll
send an email, but she'll meet up and she'll meet
up with people in person and then keep their relationship
going via email. And she had said how someone that

(14:03):
she was reaching out to or hoping to get some
advice on breaking into this new field had posted on
LinkedIn this post that was like, we're being inundated by
mentorship and advice emails and virtual one on ones and
we can't do it all. I hope you guys understand
if we don't get back to you, this is why.
And part of me as a coach, I'm just like, oh,
that's kind of a shame, because you hope people will
have the bandwidth. At the same time, I respect a boundary, right,

(14:25):
and I think what you're really vocalizing what a lot
of the few of us that do make it to
the top can feel a bit overwhelmed by the pull
back to look back and bring others forward while trying
to like survive and survive where we are one of
the few only difference. But you know, make sure that
we our asses don't get let go because our margin

(14:46):
of error is like super duper raised or things like this.

Speaker 1 (14:48):
Big magnifying class on you already. You can't make any mistakes, exactly,
it feels, or so it feels.

Speaker 2 (14:55):
Yeah, I just wanted to acknowledge that and just say
that that is completely fair. At the same time, you
do offer this window of saying, here's what I can do. Yes,
I can have a list of batties that I know
I can support, you know, and how does someone get
on your sponsorship list? How we can sponsor.

Speaker 1 (15:13):
Yeah, I like how you position that because I feel
like I'm curating a massive pipeline of batties at Black
Girl's Code. You know, I was at Salesforce. I met
incredible leaders there, and when I came over to Black
Girl's Code, it was October of twenty twenty three, and
I remember being just blown away by the level of

(15:36):
talent that I could see in our participants that were
in these programs, and that was the inspiration to it
was actually part of my interview was that I wanted
to expand the age range. Black Girl's Code was already
participating in colleges and careers as so much as like
how to talk to a recruiter, how to articulate your
value proposition, and they're still crushing it and we're still

(15:56):
doing it and we're building out how to show up
at college campuses. But I really wanted to introduce more
technical training as well, and I wanted to support our
communities beyond college, and that was the workforce development expansion.
You know, it's funny because as you think about women

(16:18):
and women of color in corporate you should assume that
if someone is making it up through the rings, that
they're a total baddie because they are going. But I'm
saying that as I say, you know someone as be
like for some newsletter, like what do I wish people
would understand or think about or consider? And it is,

(16:39):
you know, this sense of as we're talking about this,
I'm not celebrating resilience. What I would actually love is
if when we talk about women of color, that we
don't have that adjective celebrated when it's connected with us.

Speaker 2 (16:52):
Right, I'm strong.

Speaker 1 (16:54):
Wouldn't you rather work at a place where you were
just celebrated for being innovative, brilliant creator, but not resilient.
Work shouldn't be a battleground.

Speaker 2 (17:06):
Yeah, exactly. I talked to us before. When I'm talking
to usually white men in my space, so podcasting, so
this could be like one of my one from my
network for example. So these are corporate spaces. I'm a
podcast so I all talk to white dudes occasionally and
fortunately not always, because I get to do this work
and there's usually a there often is a point when

(17:29):
they try to connect with me on their struggle story,
you know, Like I mean, I could tell you, sure
do I have some do I have some challenges, but
like I grew up with the suburbs of Atlanta, Like
I wasn't starving, I wasn't poor, and like you know
all that, and but that does get to be a
little bit tiresome that you feel like people want they

(17:52):
want to feel better about themselves for somehow rescuing you,
for giving you a chance. Yeah, no, you still I
would have been in the streets.

Speaker 1 (18:01):
If hate that, man, I hate that so much. I
hate especially in tech. It was my biggest back, Like this,
this tiresome trope of rags to riches. I did not
come from rags. I had a great background and that's
my story. And if it's not your story, you don't
owe anyone that story. I hate. There's this book What

(18:23):
We Build with Power that I love, and in it
he talks about this concept of feeling the need to
sell trauma for access. It starts around high school when
you're doing your scholarships. Like, yeah, yes.

Speaker 2 (18:38):
I really struggle with my college essay. I was like,
I have.

Speaker 1 (18:43):
A good family. I don't know what to tell you,
but if you don't, it's still not their business. I
was speaking at Princeton and I had a mom like,
we had some Jack and Jill students come and listen,
and some of our BGC community, which always makes me happy,

(19:04):
came up from the city to listen to me speak.
And one of the moms of the high school kids said, well,
if I don't talk about her resilience, how does she
differentiate herself?

Speaker 2 (19:19):
So her excellence.

Speaker 1 (19:21):
So if we're not taught early how to articulate. It's
not bragging. Not bragging. I know that I'm very intelligent.
I know that I'm very creative. I know that I
am a visionary executive. So I don't feel the need
to humble myself when I'm talking about what my skill
set is. If you're hiring me, you know why you're

(19:43):
hiring me. It's not for any of my past. It's
none of your business, honestly, and so I want our
girls to learn that it's none of our business. You
choose who deserves to hear your story, not the other
way around. I've seen it. I've been at keynotes where
the sad story comes on. Someone reaches out to the
person who is featured and they're like, tear, You're so strong,

(20:12):
and you get like a little check for your charity,
and that's it. That's not what we're talking about. I'm
talking about, how do we set you up for success
and advance you in your career or set yourself up
so that you can be an entrepreneur and people are
buying the things that you create, not your past, not
your trauma. That's why I love this work. Going back
to like my first camp that I went to when

(20:33):
I saw these little girls coding and making something new,
move that didn't move before. Watch the light bulb turn on,
and the joy. That's what we sell, that's what we
talk about. That's you know, in this AI moment where
everybody's talking about AI and this great hype cycle, the

(20:55):
very things that make us different and differentiate it from
machines is our imagination, our creativity, our critical thinking. Those
are the things we need to nurture. Those are the
things we need to talk about, just like everybody else.

Speaker 2 (21:09):
Yeah, and I think too, just seeing the girls see
each other in that context, like I just imagine I
want to go to one of these camps and.

Speaker 1 (21:16):
Just personally, we just just that the camps in Atlanta,
and I just was like man, being around each other
in a safe space. That's we This centers that we're
building out in Inglewood, California are for that. I think
what we're missing is a town square. We're missing these

(21:36):
third spaces where we can gather and learn together. It
gives me infinite joy to participate in it. I spend
a lot of time on the road speaking and meeting
with partners, but I reserve the right when I feel
depleted of energy to go spend time with our learners.
It is incredible, and you have to come with me

(21:57):
to one of them, I insist.

Speaker 2 (21:59):
I you know, as you're speaking, I'm thinking about the
way that I look at my children. I have two
little boys, they're five and two, and I look at
them as a reprieve from all the stuff, Like I'll
get on the floor build some legos, and it's it's
a sort of meditation. It's like it takes you out
of this even this morning, you know. And I know
you must feel this way, or maybe you don't because

(22:20):
you've been You're much more, you know, so much more
wisdom and time, you know, in a high but truly,
like you know, I consider you to you have more
experience coping with all the things. But some mornings I
wake up and it's just it's it's suffocating. How many
different feelings and emotions and things to do and like
that are tugging you in all these different directions. And

(22:40):
my kids are at camp in school right now, so
I don't have them. I can't. I could build a
lego by myself, I guess, But anyway, I did a
little meditation instead that having the kids there is so nice,
and I love that you are staying grounded in the girls.
You know that y'all are working with that. So talk
to me about for those who may not know. And
BA Fan, we've heard of Black Girl's Code. We know that.

(23:03):
You know you're on this mission to get a million
girls in tech, black girls in Tech by year twenty forty.
Such a huge, amazing goal. And I know that you're
planning new things and expansions, but can you break down
what exactly the structure of Black Girl's Code is today?
If someone wants to learn more, get their girls involved,
get themselves involved as a parent, to help you get

(23:24):
to that million, that million number.

Speaker 1 (23:27):
It's a great honor to lead this organization. The organization
was founded in twenty and eleven, truly visionary at the time.
You know, at the time there was not a lot
of these programs out there, and so when I came
in twenty twenty three, my focus was again to launch.
So there's always been this access, inspiration, education, but I

(23:53):
wanted to connect it to results. A quick way to
get grounded in what we are doing right now is
we are EGC dot Org is our website and parents
can sign their kids up for upcoming programs. We are
in the last quarter of thirteen summer camps that we've
been running all summer. Shout out to my BGC team.

(24:14):
They have been literally nationwide all over the place, including
in Puerto Rico. We have our summer camp coming up
right now next week in Los Angeles.

Speaker 2 (24:23):
These like week long, couple weeks long.

Speaker 1 (24:26):
It depends like they We've been testing different lengths, so
some are one week, two week, and some are four weeks.
I think we're landing somewhere around the two week is
the optimum length, and we stay connected through the year
with additional pop ups and immersion programming that is again nationwide.

(24:47):
We have ongoing free YouTube programming with a series called Codolong,
and the streamer Kailani Jules just won the Young Artist
for Host of a streaming Series for our Code Long Juniors,
so we're really proud of her. That YouTube series has

(25:09):
reached over eight million views and it is a great
introduction to CODE if you cannot get to one of
our live experiences. But we try to get around the
nation as much as possible to inspire and engage with
as many potential students and bring them into the BGC family.
We've also been working really hard to activate our alumni

(25:31):
and bring them back into the full A lot of
them are now teachers assistants. They've been supporting us in
our summer camps and also with our virtual programs. So
we have quite a bit going on, but I think
we need to do even more. The way that there's
this mass exodus of people of color from tech is
really worrisome for me, and.

Speaker 2 (25:53):
Oh talk about that. Is there has there been What
am I missing? Is it an exodus like we're taking
charge or we're just going to let go?

Speaker 1 (26:00):
I think it's a combination. I honestly, I think it's
a combination. I was looking at something it said three
hundred thousand women have left the workforce just in the
past year. If I'm accurate, if I'm speaking for.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
Women of color, Yes, yes, right, and largely a lot
of that is from tech.

Speaker 1 (26:18):
Correct, Okay, And I worry because the narrative around technology
is not very welcoming right now. But that does not
mean that we should give up and just accept the
fact that we are not in the rooms where these
technologies are being developed, legislated, funded, or even marketed. And
so that is why these inter generational hubs that were

(26:42):
standing up are important. When I was speaking at Web
Summit Vancouver, someone asked me what would I do if
I was made queen for a day?

Speaker 2 (26:52):
Aren't you already but okay?

Speaker 1 (26:55):
My answer was, it's a lot of questions, but I
so really and I mean this is that every parent
would have the conversation about AI with their child, right.
I mean. I have a very senior technologist on my
team and she was like, you know what. After I
heard that, I was like, you know, I've here talked
to my eleven year old about it. She's like, download chat, GPT,

(27:18):
let me show you what it is. He's like, oh,
I've had it. And so that's her. But I also
think about how many people come up to me when
I speak after panels to tell me that they don't
use it, or private meetings and can I teach them?
And it makes me think, well, how are they going
to have the conversation about this technology with their kids

(27:40):
if they don't understand it themselves. And that's why we
have this first pop up in Inglewood, California. Is AI
for families. I truly believe that you not just coders.
It doesn't matter what you do if you're a board member,
if you're an investor, if you're a teacher, if you're
a parent, if you manage technology and are not a

(28:01):
technologist yourself, you still need to have a baseline understanding
of what these technologies are, what they can do, and
where the deficits are and the harm that occurs from
not having us in the rooms where they are developed,
so that we can be thoughtful about how we roll
them out and how we use them. And we're being
thoughtful about how we can bring this training also to teachers,

(28:24):
because that is the other person who's talking to kids,
not trying to a teachers. Already, big scope, but we
have to think about how we talk about these technologies
with our children.

Speaker 2 (28:38):
Yeah, well, talk to me a little bit about that.
As a parent myself. My five year old is he's
he knows a lot already, and I do try to
keep tabs on everything that he is consuming. But I'm
wondering what types of conversations are you hoping parents have
with children or educators, or even if you're a you're
an auntie who's listening, or a godparents or whatever, like,

(29:01):
what types of conversations are you hoping that we have
and then what's the what's the ideal outcome from those conversations?
Is it raising their awareness or straight up like teaching
them how to use it to accomplish things and they
want to accomplish.

Speaker 1 (29:14):
First of all, I think you know, you see you
see conversations about I think it was in China where
they're starting in at six, and I just I worry
about that we have brought on doctor Avriel Epps. She
actually wrote this book.

Speaker 2 (29:37):
Oh wow, okay, let me get that. I think it's
book for those who can't see a kid's book about
AI bias.

Speaker 1 (29:43):
Yes, by doctor Avriel Epps. It is an introduction to
how to think about artificial intelligence for children, but I
really think it's for anybody, especially in these conversations. One
of my worries, and one of the things that we
consider when we're building our own curriculum is how to
ensure that our participants and really any of us, don't

(30:09):
lose our ability to continue to develop critical thinking, because
when we turn over all of our questions to a
technology platform like write me this email. Oh, I'm having
a conflict with Mandy. What should I say to her?
You know, hey, what is a great new idea? For
this thing that I want to do. You are surrendering

(30:30):
your ability to think for yourself. Two things pop in
my head. One is I already always had was challenged
with navigation. I'm one of those people that gets lost
going around the corner, and now I get lost as
soon as I go out my door because my brain
is like, exactly, I knew we didn't need this Google Maps.

Speaker 2 (30:51):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (30:52):
Do you remember any phone numbers that he wore? I'm
old enough that I still remember phone numbers. But how
many phone numbers do you member? Because your brain at
this point was like, yeah, right, just type in the
person's name and it comes up. There's a time when
you would know like ten twenty phone numbers.

Speaker 2 (31:09):
I remember that, Okay, those days. I have three phone
numbers by heart, my mom, my husband, and my brother
for some reason.

Speaker 1 (31:18):
And and you know what are those? Your brain has
decided that it doesn't need to use energy to remember
these things. So what are we teaching our brain that
we don't need to understand anymore? I had a terrifying
conversation with a friend of mine when I was in
Los Angeles. The last time she sits next to this

(31:40):
guy and their cubicles are next to each other, and
he uses it for dating.

Speaker 2 (31:47):
So God exactly which would be the most obvious use
of it for a dude? You know, like, oh, you're.

Speaker 1 (31:57):
Already meeting the representative, but now you're meeting the GPT
version of him that he fancies himself to be what
it does, So luck on your.

Speaker 2 (32:04):
First date, dude, Good luck.

Speaker 1 (32:07):
And this is why I do believe that we need
some more in person time together, Like what is happening
to our social skills?

Speaker 2 (32:16):
So you you're in these you know, you know what
it's like to be rising to the ranks in corporate.
You know, you're giving presentations, you're speaking live to people,
even if it's on zoom, you're not. Maybe you can
use these tools to prep or to troubleshoot or whatever,
like to prepare yourself, but to be in the room
and be able to come up with ideas on the

(32:36):
fly and think on your feet. That type of training
is invaluable. And the more that we can get, especially
young women who are pursuing these paths and career, it's
so soft skills. It's like the how do you how
do you address people? How do you leave an impression?
How do you how do you come across you know,
your energy that you're bringing into the room, and how

(32:58):
do you trust yourself to go off track, even off
of your scripted whether the presentation or a keynote or whatever, like,
how do you trust yourself to go off script? And
if people are losing that or never even building that
muscle in the first place, I'm scarred, very shitty.

Speaker 1 (33:15):
It's funny when I don't enjoy presenting with slides for
this very reason. I once was in a meeting and
I was the customer and I told this executive he
was presenting, and I could see there was like twenty
more slides to go, and I was already bored. But
I asked a question and he said, oh, let me

(33:35):
just finish this deck and then I'll answer your question.
And it was like at that point, I was already
doing my email. And you know, over reliance on what
you think is important, and now what chat GPT thinks
you should think is important is a surefire way to
disconnect yourself from a human experience with someone, which is

(33:55):
the whole point of engaging and having a conversation and
a presentation, because otherwise, couldn't it just be an email.

Speaker 2 (34:02):
Amen's sister friend. Also, people who present decks and you
have your whole slide gallery on the side, you like,
don't do that, so annoying anxiety.

Speaker 1 (34:11):
Immediately, I'm like, oh my god, there's so many No,
can you fix this one thing for me?

Speaker 2 (34:18):
Because you got to you gotta go through, you gotta
go through. Okay. So, so you're you're said you're wanting
to expand the the audience that y'all are targeting. So
traditionally it's been what ages seventeen to twenty five with
Black Girl's.

Speaker 1 (34:33):
Code seven to.

Speaker 2 (34:36):
Seventeen, oh seven to seventeen, expanded to.

Speaker 1 (34:40):
Through college, and now with these centers, it's really to
ninety five, right, it is we want to solve for
the whole community, and I don't want anyone to get
left behind in this conversation. We need to think about
how we prepare our commune unities for this technology. You

(35:02):
speak to anyone in tech and you will know that
we are in an incredible hype cycle around some of
these new technologies and they cannot quite deliver exactly what
they're promising, and so just saying it's not worth opting
in is the wrong answer. I think coding is still

(35:23):
an important skill when you think about how to build
critical thinking problem solving. You know, some of the issues
that I see around. You know, people's favorite vibe coding
is that could just learn.

Speaker 2 (35:36):
This expression yesterday.

Speaker 1 (35:38):
It's like where you know, just because it can make
something quicker doesn't mean that it's more efficient and that
it is secure. And we all know that these systems
still hallucinate and they don't tell you when they're hallucinating.
They think it's great, and you will find out the

(35:58):
hard way when something is wrong. And it worries me
when we think about agents that are not built with
inclusivity in mind, especially as it relates to healthcare, finance,
and education and recruiting. You know these How do you
know when someone develops a technology that decides whether you

(36:21):
get advanced to the next round of interviews, if you
get a higher interest rate, if you deserve to go
to the next level of medical care, what is the
algorithm that decide It's based on which input? Who's the
person in putting it. That's why I say it's I'm
beating a dead horse here. I hate that term. Sorry,
But if you're in a board, if you're a parent,

(36:43):
if you work, if you're manager, if you work in marketing,
anybody anywhere needs to understand if you're using these technologies,
how do they work. I'm not saying that you need
to code one or build one or vibe code one,
but you should understand, like, what are the securities? We
heard about someone you know vibe coding and it erased
an entire database. You know what?

Speaker 2 (37:06):
Wait so for BA family doesn't know vibe coding. I
thought it was just your play coding on your own
personal computer for fun, like you're trying to build.

Speaker 1 (37:14):
People make things. People actually make things, but the securities
are not in place always. And just because AI can
write code does not mean that it is perfect. And
that is why I still believe that there needs to
be a human that is involved in all of these technologies.

(37:35):
I also wanted to because I was looking at who
your audience is, ooh, what do.

Speaker 2 (37:41):
You find younger twenty five to forty five, younger.

Speaker 1 (37:47):
Who are focused on accelerating their wealth and their careers?
And I just wanted to say It's funny because I
was talking to a recruiter yesterday and they were like,
I know, if this person fits in your box for
what you're looking for, and you know as a habitual
line stepper by self, You remember that Dave Chappelle as

(38:10):
a habitual line stepper myself. I don't believe that in
this current climate, staying in your lane is always the
best thing to do. I think that you should make
it your business. And we're talking about this exact thing
right now as it relates to technology. To understand, and
I hate to use this term has been overused, but
be a lifelong learner and understand what is going on

(38:33):
around you, not just your specific lane that you're focused
on in your career currently. What's the future looking like?
What is the opportunity space where you could affect change
Instead of just seeing problems and agreeing that this is problematic,

(38:54):
what if you came up with a solution. And especially
in this time, we're so many people need help. It's
discouraging to see people say I can't fix everyone and
therefore not opt in to fix the one person that
they can help.

Speaker 2 (39:08):
Today, say more about that last part, fix everyone in
what context?

Speaker 1 (39:13):
So this is not related to my current work, But
I was talking to somebody about current opportunities with what
I was doing, and she was talking about She was
emotional because she was frustrated because she could not help
a kid who needed help. The system wasn't working for her,
and she just felt stuck. I was like, well, what

(39:34):
can we do to help this girl? We have her name,
what can we do to help her? It would be
easy to say like the system is broken and the
parents are challenging, and the daughter won't leave because she
doesn't want to leave her brother, but like, what can
we do to help? Doesn't mean that we don't care
about everybody, but it also means that we have a

(39:56):
name of somebody, like what can you do to help?
And I just think that if we did more, that
we would be a better society. I think we are
overburdened with you touched on this, overstimulated with too much
bad news. And it's funny because I was talking to
somebody the other day, you know, I always like, write

(40:16):
a book, write a book. I'm like that, I think
a memoir to I don't like looking backwards. I want
to look forward to where the opportunity is. If you
get stuck in the now all this bad, you look
back and it's like overwhelming, how'd you get here? You're exhausted,
You know, there's the depression comes from ruminating on the past,
and anxiety is thinking about the future and the present

(40:40):
is and the present. So I just when I talk
about using your platform for change, I think about not
just work. What can you do today to make someone's
life better? Is a worthy exercise for all of us
to consider.

Speaker 2 (40:57):
Yeah, and I think that's a very very true statement.
I completely agree. I think it's a and you it's
you're right, it's a practice. It is. It's almost a mantra.

Speaker 1 (41:07):
Yes, no one feels bad from helping someone else. That
is a fact.

Speaker 2 (41:12):
You got to get to know your neighbors. Like if
you get to know your neighbors, eventually you're going to
be in a position where you have someone that you
asking to borrow or asking to help or you know,
and vice versa. It's it's such a as much as
I think we're in this like virtual hellscape and like
it's like we have too much. We're like overly inundated
with voices and everything day to day on our on

(41:33):
our devices. But and to the point where people are
like I'm too exhausted to even leave my house, leave.

Speaker 1 (41:38):
Your house, leave your house.

Speaker 2 (41:41):
Bump up against some people Yeah.

Speaker 1 (41:44):
That's like my dog makes me leave, you know, like
go yeah, go for a walk, leave your phone, look around,
enjoy nature, use skills that are getting dull, like listen
to the birds. I'm not trying to be you know, pollyannious.
I know that we have like huge problems that we're
all solving and that we're all dealing with every day
in our life. However, we have a limited amount of

(42:06):
time on this earth. Make the most of it. Don't
lay in bed doom scrolling and thinking about all the
things that you can't solve. Solve the one thing that
you can today.

Speaker 2 (42:15):
Yeah again, my kids help. Not say any other cure
for everything, but someone that you take care of, something
that relies on you, it just pulls you out of it.
I want to talk about you know, when you were
talking about approaching your career and not staying in your lane,
I couldn't agree with you more. As a coach, I'm
like a broken record when it comes to tech. Like
a lot of my time I spend as a coach

(42:36):
is working with really accomplished women who just need someone
to tell them to talk about themselves and their work
and to get out of like get out of their
current social circle and to expand it. Can you talk
to me over your career how those two things have
helped you, if at all, I'm going to assume, because
you're so successful, you know how to do these two things.

Speaker 1 (42:57):
I do.

Speaker 2 (42:58):
You do know how to talk about yourself, and you
do know how to expand your network.

Speaker 1 (43:02):
I do know how to talk about myself. And if
you've heard me something before, we know that I'm an
introvert and I can be a bit socially awkward. That's
just who I am. Pop I cut straight to the facts.
I still get nervous every time I have to get
up and speak, and it is an overthinking of like

(43:23):
making sure that whatever I'm saying is like worth people
spending their time to listen to me. As someone who
came up in media, you know, attention is a huge currency,
and so thinking about how to make sure that every
conversation is meaningful is exhausting. One of the ways that
I started getting better at networking for someone who used
to dread. The networking piece was look at who's going

(43:46):
to the event that you're going to look them up
and who are they and what do they care about?
If they have a LinkedIn. They probably post what they
care about, have they written an article? Do you share
a chair of philanthropy and ask them about themselves. People
love to talk about themselves. People get overwhelmed when you

(44:06):
come immediately to them and like be my mentor. It's
like whoa, yeah I am Christina. But also think about
what the conversation is. I was really I had somebody
once who wanted to meet with me and was really
aggressively wanting to meet with me. And I finally met
with her, and her first question was what is my sign?
And I was like okay, and then her phone kept

(44:26):
going off. She kept looking at it.

Speaker 2 (44:27):
It's just like, you know, like, what's your astrological sign? Yes,
well now I got to know what's your sign?

Speaker 1 (44:35):
Well, it's a scorpio. So when I say all these
things at all.

Speaker 2 (44:38):
Tracks, I'm a Leo, So I don't really know much
about the people's signs, so about.

Speaker 1 (44:44):
Your's sign because Leo sees the baby.

Speaker 2 (44:48):
I could talk all day about it. It's really hard
being introverted Leo. It's it's the Dike. It's weird. Yeah,
that's a world of contradictions over here.

Speaker 1 (44:56):
Yo, totally makes sense. I'm all dark and stormy and
think about things a lot. So yeah, I can only
imagine who's your time because you don't know when you're
going to engage with people, which you would ideally like,
You're probably not going to walk away with exactly what
you want in that first interaction. The win is getting
someone to interact with you again, that's the win, and people.

Speaker 2 (45:20):
Want to put too much more? Do you put too
much pressure on that one interaction?

Speaker 1 (45:24):
It's like a man if you don't. This happened to
me when I was twenty five. When I was twenty five,
I drove from I worked at Warner Brothers. I drove
to Newline and I was twenty five again like maybe
I've been this way a long time, and Michelle Bell
was We're still very good friends. She was at the
time like VP of Creative Services at Newline and Warner

(45:45):
Brothers had just acquired them, and so I had just
been promoted to manager. I drove down to Newline and
met with from the Valley to LA and met with
Michelle Bell to tell her that in order to be
successful she needed to hire me, and she didn't. I
was devastated. I remember I drove home with the window down.
I used to have long hair, wind blowing through my

(46:07):
hair and was like, I can't believe it. Devastation. And
a week later she did call me. She was like,
you know, come back for another meeting. Tell me boy.
She did end up hiring me. We are still really
good friends. There you go, and she's She was the
first person that I saw that made me understand that
you could be your self. She I worked at Warner Brothers,
which was very corporate. Michelle at the time wore her

(46:29):
hair natural like, wore these giant boots, was loud and
herself and I loved it. And even though I didn't
work for her long because I ended up going to
work at twentieth Century Fox, where I spent the bulk
of my career, she made a very lasting impression on me.
So I do think as you, As I say all
the things, the pressure is not just on the person

(46:51):
who wants the engagement. It is still on us to
be thoughtful about how we show up for the next generation,
current generation who's coming through the ranks, to show what
the art of the possible, what success looks like. I
am not a traditional executive. I don't walk around all
buttoned up, all the time with saying perfect things and
perfect clothes with perfect hair, because I'm a person and

(47:13):
those things do not equal what is brilliant about me,
which is my brain.

Speaker 2 (47:19):
So if I could just echo some of that back.
Your example when you were twenty five with Michelle Bell
is like you were putting a lot of pressure on
that one interaction. You were devastated, but clearly you made
an impression. I did because a week later and.

Speaker 1 (47:34):
She would just already she could call me and so
but again, like I did leave her with So there's
two parts to unpact. Thank you for pulling it back.
Two parts to unpack, which is devastation, did not get
outcome I wanted right away added value. She thought about
it and was like, maybe some of these things could
be great. No, she's not ready to be a director,
but come and do this work with me instead. And

(47:58):
so I didn't just go and tell her be my mentor.
I didn't want her to be my mentor. I wanted
her to hire me because I saw an opportunity because
I worked at Warner Brothers and I knew what they
were saying about Newline when they acquired it. So just again,
do your homework add your value proposition, but like, don't
be hurt if it doesn't click the first time, and
be patient when you're reaching out to people. People don't

(48:21):
always answer right away.

Speaker 2 (48:22):
Because work also just bandwidth. Like you may have a
question that I can't answer, and the two minutes I
have between this talk and the next one, or I
have to go to the bath, I gotta pee real bad.
But let's connect and then I can, you know, more
thoughtfully think about this later. And there's a sense of
I've seen women get when you're quota. You think you're
turned down. I had a coaching client tell me up

(48:43):
and down. She's like, Nvidia rejected me. I didn't get
through the first round. I got this automated email and
this had become like a story that we talked about
for the past six weeks. We've been working with each other.
Tell me why yesterday she went back to the original email.
It wasn't a rejection. It was like, we're passing on
your resume to the next step. We'll reach out if

(49:03):
we're interested. It wasn't a rejection. I mean, did she
hear back no.

Speaker 1 (49:07):
The next round, which is really successful in these days.

Speaker 2 (49:12):
I mean, but they yes, it wasn't like one of
those automated but she had told herself and I'm like,
we gotta. It's like we it's that negative like uh
track that sometimes we can be on. Or if someone
doesn't answer your question, Like you run into someone in
the bathroom at a conference and you're like a huge
fan or the worker you want it, You're just you
try to chat and they're like it feels like you're
getting rejected or brushed off because they really have to

(49:35):
use the bathroom where they're late for something else. And
then you start to feel embarrassed or ashamed and like
shy about doing it again.

Speaker 1 (49:42):
I'm like, please stop attacking. I get attacked a lot
in the bathroom. It's really.

Speaker 2 (49:48):
Wait really because that's one of my favorite places to like.

Speaker 3 (49:50):
Have I got just catch me on the outside, like okay,
wash my hands and like walk outside and catch my
breath because sometimes this room just to breathe.

Speaker 1 (50:01):
For a second. Because with the work that you do
to your point, when you talk about these things you
get off the panel. People want to tell you their story. Men, women,
Everyone wants to tell you their specific story. And I
love everybody's story, but sometimes, like I have a lot
of pressure on myself before I get up, and then
I want to just go and pause for a second

(50:23):
to think, and then I can recharge five seconds, come out,
start all over again, and then go hide in my
room later so I can complete like reboot.

Speaker 2 (50:32):
Like yourself in exactly exactly those room bus God, no,
did you get back to the docking station. No, they
just had a thing that roombas had some breathing they
recalled or something.

Speaker 1 (50:44):
Pictures that aren't authorized.

Speaker 2 (50:47):
And room boss have a camera, yeah they do.

Speaker 1 (50:50):
That's how they know where to go.

Speaker 2 (50:52):
So which, Okay, that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (50:53):
Another great job of the future, by the way, is cybersecurity. Girls.

Speaker 2 (50:58):
My husband's in that past.

Speaker 1 (51:00):
Okay, security is a great great track.

Speaker 2 (51:06):
Scurity, right, everything is watching us. I don't actually have
a roomba.

Speaker 1 (51:11):
It's real point comfortable with just surrendering our data. Like
you remember back in the day when there was like
a breach and everybody's like, oh my god, breach. Now
it's like everyone's information has been hacked and people are
like whatever I mean they're talking about like aliens arriving
in November and people are like, okay, aliens, yeah, like

(51:32):
just random you.

Speaker 2 (51:34):
Know, just like Martians or something whatever. Like like you said,
we try to stay in the present sometimes, like we
don't want to get in an anxiety cycle. Oh lord, great,
I want to be respectful of your time. I work
with women, like I said, women of color who are
They are typically like mid career thirties, getting into their

(51:56):
late thirties, and they are either they're really frustrated. Sometimes
they're not feeling like they're making any traction. They're not
getting the opportunities to advance that they want. They're also tired,
which I really understand, tired of being the only tired
of being mistaken for cleanup crew or the intern or
whoever else happens to have some melanin and curly hair,
and they are wanting a new opportunity. But it's so challenging.

(52:21):
I've got clients who have incredible resumes and are sending
out applications even with a referral, sometimes.

Speaker 1 (52:28):
Talking about their achievements anywhere.

Speaker 2 (52:30):
Great question. So I'm I mean, yes, I'm gonna I
love that. That's what your head went. Okay, they're really
frustrated and it's taken I don't know, like say, it's
been a couple of months and you know, You've been
making these efforts, but you're not hearing back.

Speaker 1 (52:47):
Your question is are you talking about your achievements? Like,
are you coming through a non traditional route where you
cut through the clutter and someone pays attention to the
work that you're doing that is not what everyone else
is doing. People do not get promoted anymore for time
served that's gone. So what are you doing that's different
that makes you stand out that someone would go like,

(53:09):
I want to learn more about what they are doing.
You know, I don't know LinkedIn's weird now, but I
still think it's a great platform to talk about things
that you care about, your achievements, connect with the people
that you care about. I personally have reached out to
multiple people to connect because I was curious about what
they were talking about. Someone reached out to me the
other day, which was pretty funny. It was a cold
sales call, but it was a hey, I see you

(53:31):
speak Italian, and like, I love speaking Italian and also
have you thought about this SaaS platform?

Speaker 2 (53:37):
Ha, that's like people on Brown front again on Brown addition, Yeah, like,
that's not I guarantee you I'm going to get an
email subject line. Loved your interview with Christina Mancini from
Black Girl's Code. By the way, like, okay.

Speaker 1 (53:50):
Non secretary, but think about like do think about these
platform People are on them and paying attention. But if
you reach out to someone in a cold call, like hey,
that's interesting, blah blah blah, you should have something that
they can go look at your profile and go like,
oh yeah, this person is interesting to talk to more.

Speaker 2 (54:10):
Thank you so much. I'm just gonna So basically, what
you're saying is you endorse all of my career coaching
philosophies and you think I'm the best and everyone should
listen to me.

Speaker 1 (54:21):
As I said, I'm a fan.

Speaker 2 (54:22):
It's really hard. No, but it's really challenging, and it
doesn't matter how many years I've been doing it, I
still run up against this. It's the sense of like,
I've done incredible work, yes, and I'm like, and if
a tree falls in the forest, what does it like
does it matter? Then it's like then you have to
go through the same excuses like oh, link LinkedIn, it's
like icky, it's grow it's cringe, or I don't want

(54:45):
to seem boastful. I don't know, or like there's a
sense of talking about what you're doing, like they're almost
too good for that, Like, no Ah.

Speaker 1 (54:56):
I'm still talking about what I'm doing.

Speaker 2 (54:58):
Christina man Cheiney's on a p podcast to talk about
what she's doing to get attention and a new eyeball,
so that like you're talking about yourself even now, you
have to you.

Speaker 1 (55:07):
Have to stay current. You have to stay current. And
when I tell my friends, like update your LinkedIn, it's
like I don't have time to do that.

Speaker 2 (55:16):
Well, okay, then stay stuck.

Speaker 1 (55:18):
And the problem is is that it's no different than
when you're building technology. You know, if there's like more
than three clicks, someone's probably not going to do it right.
So if it's too hard for me to learn about you,
I'm probably not going to do it. People say like, well,
I sent you, my I sent you, I sent you
an email, I sent you, but I'm looking at you
on LinkedIn. You can't be mad at the person for
like optimizing the time that they have where they are

(55:40):
where they are, like email is a nightmare, nightmare, like
inboxes are overflowing, but on LinkedIn, there's like this great
opportunity to talk about yourself, what you care about, what
you want to do, and I don't see any harm
in talking about that. I think it's helpful. It's really helpful.
And to that end, you should really think about what

(56:00):
you do say when you're on LinkedIn and on Instagram.

Speaker 2 (56:04):
And make it on brand and make it on message.

Speaker 1 (56:07):
Don't be angry, be thoughtful about what you want to achieve.
Be thoughtful about what you want to achieve, and focus
on that. So this is your sadly necessary other job,
but it's worth it if you get to where you
want to be instead of just complaining that you haven't
made it there.

Speaker 2 (56:26):
Amen. And if you can master those two things, like
putting yourself in rooms where there's people that you can
connect with, even if it's I always give myself a
goal to have one conversation because introvert, I'm like, I'm
just going to single out one person that's my person.
We're going to have one chat and then you know.
But if you make that, if you focus on putting
yourself in rooms where you can bump up against people

(56:47):
and chat to people, and then the second piece is
actually talk about yourself and share what you're doing, and
not just talk about yourself, but actually demonstrate the work
that you're doing. Demonstrate the way that you think about things.
Demonstrate that, yeah, the critical thinking, Like I'm working with
a UX designer right now. And I'm so proud of
her because she started to blog about other platforms and

(57:08):
like she would run against run up against apps and
technology in the wild on vacation at the airport, and
she would have a bunch of thoughts about how this
could be better or how she loved the way that
this worked. And I was like, put that on lived in.

Speaker 1 (57:20):
Will you share her information with me?

Speaker 2 (57:23):
Oh? I would love to. She's just I love her
so much. And she's part of a discord for black
women developers in Tampa, Florida, and she's involved in FIGMA
and I'm trying to get her to come out to
to go to this. There's this great conference called Batty's Con.
Have you heard of this?

Speaker 1 (57:37):
I have? I have heard of it.

Speaker 2 (57:39):
And she was like, she was like, I want some advice.
I'm submitting my resume for Batty's Con. Of like looking
at the conference and I said, girl, why aren't you
on a flight? Like why are you not? So I
think she's going to come out here.

Speaker 1 (57:48):
Please she's a Please connect those because I would love
to talk to her myself. B Yeah, that's what we're
talking about. And see being able to when she's there,
have her elevator pitch.

Speaker 2 (57:59):
Elevator pitch, Okay, what's it? An ideal elevator pitch for
someone like you? If the goal is I'm open to
new opportunities, I'd love to be considered for an open role.
Should they I always like to go in if you're
to know who you're talking to and to already have
a sense of if there's open roles at their company
or whatever.

Speaker 1 (58:16):
So sometimes there's like roles you haven't thought of, Like
what you just said. I was like, huh, that's an
interesting way of I'm everybody's different, and for me, the
way that people think is really interesting. So people who
think different, especially in this time as we need to
think about how to prepare our youth and ourselves for
quickly changing times. What she's doing is exactly what I

(58:37):
was talking about. She's like looking at things and going like, huh,
this makes no sense. This is how it would be better.
I love that. That to me, I'm like, I want
to know her and maybe we can do something together.

Speaker 2 (58:50):
Oh, I love you for that, And see told you
should talk about yourself because then I can talk about
you exactly.

Speaker 1 (58:57):
You're like a sponsor times one hundred.

Speaker 2 (59:01):
I go hard for my Mandy money makers. It's just
like I'm ana. They call me a loving bully. I
lovingly bully them because if I'm like, you need to
post this on LinkedIn, I'll be like, Okay, cool, what
date are we saying? And then I'm gonna tell Siri
to remind me and I will bother you.

Speaker 1 (59:15):
You need to you, you need to. I have to
be reminded. You can get buried in your work and
forget to talk about the work. But to your point,
if a tree falls in the forest, and I think
it's a muscle that you have to build and start
being comfortable talking about yourself because you're not bragging about yourself,
You're talking about the work that you're doing. I had

(59:36):
an executive when I was at Salesforce, and I wanted
to give her a bigger role. She said, I don't know.
Do you think I'm ready for that? I don't, I
don't know. I said, you tell me.

Speaker 2 (59:48):
Well, I did until you asked me if I thought
you were ready.

Speaker 1 (59:51):
I asked her the next question, and I said, if
you were a man, would you have asked me that question?
She thought about it and she was like, no, I'm
ready to take it. And she was excellent and she
continues to thrive. What we're talking a little bit about
is imposter syndrome. And I talk about this a lot.
I don't like to give credence to imposter syndrome. I
don't like to give energy to it because it's a
fake voice in your head that does not exist. It's

(01:00:13):
not a real person, it's not based on anything real.
That tells you to not expend any energy trying something
new because you're just going to get your feelings sirt.
Turn that off, don't listen to it. Talk about yourself,
feel comfortable. I'm not saying brag about yourself. I'm saying
talk about your achievements. You did it, You deserve the flowers.

Speaker 2 (01:00:31):
You absolutely do. And it also to be a what
did you call it, A forever learner or a lifetime learner,
wrong learner. Say things without fear of critique, look at
critique or any additional con because people are afraid that
people are going to point out a mistake or that
they're going to criticize what they've done, Like if you
just go into this, if you open up your mind

(01:00:53):
and your like your heart too, people may have feedback
and you post with the intention of getting that feedback.
That's engagement. That's that's great for the algorithm. You know,
it's good for you.

Speaker 1 (01:01:05):
It's one hundred percent. And I have a lot of
ideas and they are not all great ideas, and sometimes
the best ideas come from a bad idea. But you
need to be open to feedback. So when people have
ideas and they've curated them for so long and don't
want to release them into the wild, they are like

(01:01:28):
very protective of it. Yeah, they get into the habit
of thinking about things, sharing your thoughts, getting feedback and evolving.

Speaker 2 (01:01:36):
Fail fact, you I.

Speaker 1 (01:01:38):
Really no wonder I knew I was going to enjoy
talking to you. Andy.

Speaker 2 (01:01:41):
Oh yeah. Every time I see all thirty how many
teeth do we have? I see all your teeth. That's
all I want to see. That's all I want to see.
That's all we're here to do.

Speaker 1 (01:01:52):
This has been a great conversation.

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
Well, thank you so much for sharing with me and
for sharing with BA fam. Christina Mincheini from Black Girl
Code everyone, we will post the show in the show notes,
you'll have a link to why do I keep one
to say, bcg BGC the website how you can get involved?
When is this?

Speaker 1 (01:02:12):
Channels too so you can see what the girls are
up to Black Girl's Code. We're on TikTok, Instagram, LinkedIn.
I'm also on LinkedIn at Krispy Mancini. I just get involved, opt.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
In, yeah, and get excited. Check out what the youths
are doing to inspire you. I love that you're expanding
it to women you know and more advanced in their careers.
But also just like and at whatever point you are
in your career, like, check out what the kids are doing.
Give them some advice. It'll make you, it'll overnew your energy,
give you a little bit of joy, and just whatever
way you can support the work that Black Girl's Code

(01:02:45):
is doing. And Christina again, thank you very much, Brand Ambition.
I will see y'all next time. Take care all right,
va fam, thank you so much for listening. Don't forget
to rate the podcast, leave us a review. Let's feed
the algorithm, all right. Just do what we got to
do to make sure that Brown Ambition can still continue
to grow and find even more ears that need to

(01:03:07):
find us again. I'm your host, Mandy Wedriff Santo's aka
Mandy Money. I want to thank my editor, Courtney D
for holding it down. I want to thank our summer intern,
Gabrielle Barnett for working so hard this summer and helping
with those edits, helping book guests, helping publish video for
our YouTube channel. Thank you again, Gabrielle. Good luck and

(01:03:27):
your fall semester. I'm taking applications now for our fall intern.
If you want to help out editing, if you want
to learn how to produce content for social media on YouTube,
go ahead and head to my LinkedIn page. I have
the job posting there for the Brown Ambition Producer intern
for Fall twenty twenty five. Tell a friend to tell
a friend, and while I'm at it, don't forget to

(01:03:48):
join our patreon. You can join for free, but when
you do you'll get access to additional bonus content from
the show. If you become a paid member, you can
actually get a free access to become a virtual backstage
audience member for our live Brown Table recordings, but anyone.
Even if you join on the free plan, you also
get access to the Brown Ambition book Club. I am

(01:04:09):
in the middle of reading our August book club pick,
The Ghost of Gwendolen Montgomery and ooh, she got a
spicy one. She's a spicy I don't know what to say.
I've leaned a little hot under the just thinking about it.
But really good, really intriguing book to read, and I
can't wait to discuss it with y'all. But I can't
discuss it unless you're in the book club, so please

(01:04:30):
go to our patreon Patreon dot com slash brown Ambition.
I also have the link in the show notes so
you can join. And until next time, Iba fam

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