Meghan, Duchess of Sussex
Appearances
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Confessions of a Female Founder (Official Trailer)
These are very friendly. These are very friendly waters. It's all going to be good.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Confessions of a Female Founder (Official Trailer)
I'm Megan, and this is Confessions of a Female Founder, a show where I chat with female entrepreneurs and friends about the sleepless nights, the lessons learned, and the laser focus that got them to where they are today. We're diving into the highs.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Confessions of a Female Founder (Official Trailer)
And no one's calling me. Oh, no. And the kind of advice that turns small ideas into billion-dollar businesses.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Confessions of a Female Founder (Official Trailer)
Okay.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Confessions of a Female Founder (Official Trailer)
And through it all, I'm building a business of my own and getting all sorts of practical advice along the way that I'm very excited to share with you. So join me for Confessions of a Female Founder from Lemonada Media, which by the way, is also female founded. Launching April 8th, wherever you get your podcasts. Let's do this, ladies. This is not Shark Tank. Think of this as Dolphin Tank. Yes.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
It's interesting because you started your company first as a blog, which I didn't know. Yeah. So then it was really a means to connect in a way that was virtual, but to create community and then the evolution of brick and mortar. But how did you and Micah decide to do that first?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I used to work at BB with that sparkly BB shirt. It was that time.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I'm Megan, and this is Confessions of a Female Founder, a show where I chat with female entrepreneurs and friends about the sleepless nights, the lessons learned, and the laser focus that got them to where they are today. Okay, real talk. Running a business is a lot.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Well, especially because you were doing hair at 11 is when you realize in Connecticut, there weren't a lot of people there that could do your hair, your texture of hair. So you started experimenting on your own. I can't imagine what that was like. It kind of reminds me of when I was at Northwestern and I moved into Kappa, our sorority there. I don't even think they made plug-in
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Flat irons at the time, they couldn't, if they did, I didn't know where they were because I had the little stove with the flat iron that would go in, have a paper towel on the side. I mean, there's probably half the people listening to this going, what is she talking about? Or you'd pull it out, it would have the little scorch marks. And I remember most of the girls in the sorority...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Who were not black. I said, what's that smell? Is hair burning? And it was just what you would do to figure out how to grapple with this texture of hair. Were you using things like that back then or is that what you were doing in college?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
But also, this is before, I mean, U11 in Connecticut, this is before the World Wide Web. Yeah. It's not like you were Googling different ways to do your hair and your hair texture. Where were you finding inspiration for that?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Is there an immigrant community there at all?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
What did you think you were going to end up doing professionally?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Oh, wow. Wow.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Did you ever think that you would start your own business? Did you think you would have a chair at a salon? Was that the ultimate goal? Or did you always feel entrepreneurial in what you were really sort of striving for?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Building something new is a long road of making decisions in the dark and then holding this vision in your head when no one else can even see it yet. It can be slow. It can be scrappy. It can be exhausting. It It's a process. And there's no roadmap. There's no manual. And if you knew how hard it would get, you might hesitate to start at all.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
This doesn't work for me anymore. Yeah. So you go to the L.A. salon. You obviously start working up in the ranks. And a lot of that, I think, feels like it's part of your journey as a colorist. But then at what point does it shift that you say, okay. I am going to have my own brick and mortar.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I am going to open a salon and a space because I find it really interesting to go from... You've had two entrepreneurial journeys, from that to then creating the brand and how different those experiences have been for you.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
That's such a beautiful compliment. That's so sweet.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
In what way? Yeah.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
But that initial bravado, that initial going in like, I've got this.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And for today's guest, brick by brick is literal. Katie Lee is the co-owner of the hair salon Highbrow Hippie in Venice, California. She's also a go-to colorist for a lot of names you'd be familiar with. And she's recently launched a product line that sold out not once, but twice. Look, it's clear that Highbrow Hippie is on a serious roll.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
The name Highbrow Hippie, which I love, we love. I know the origin, but for people who don't, can you share that?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
We just knew. And also the alliteration is so good and it's a perfect barefoot, chic, all the things that you are. So I love that. And also to be working on something different
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
quietly yeah you know i had secured as ever as a name in 2022 and then as everything started to evolve last year and bringing in a partner the size that it was and it was just so interesting because you remember i said i like american revere as an umbrella yeah and then to be able to have verticals beneath it yeah maybe have the orchard really small
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
But when that's not feasible, suddenly it became this word salad. I didn't love that so much. I said, okay, well, let's go back to the thing that I've always loved. Let's use the name that I had protected for a reason that had been sort of under wraps. And then we were able to focus in the quiet and put our heads down and build on something that no one was sniffing around to even see about.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
It was just really, really helpful to have that quiet period, which you would know after spending so many years working on something, building it. And the pivots that you have to take with it, look at you now. I mean, the name Highbrow Hippie is no longer just a blog and a hair salon. It's a product line, too.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
You have a hair supplement and a hair serum that you just launched late last year, and it's already been named Best Hair Serum Best. by Oprah Daily.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
How on earth did you go from getting your financing together, creating the business, having this incredible clientele, the most loyal people who've been with you from the beginning, from high profile to everything in between, to then saying in the midst of still being a startup in those first five years, we're going to start something else too.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And I wanted to talk to Katie, who's also a dear friend, about what it's like to continually iterate and build on your brand. Her business started as a blog. Then she opened a brick and mortar. And now she's selling products that people can't get enough of. Let's get into her story. There she is. Hi. Disregard the state of my hair right now. I'm so excited I'm seeing you next week.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Yeah, she did. I wish her a happy birthday. I will. And Julia, who's like championed you for so long, Julia Roberts.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
For years. Because I remember for years. Because to go from what would be the natural and... perhaps more obvious choice is people would say, great, you have a hair salon, so you're going to make shampoo and conditioner. And that's what it's going to start with.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And that's what it will evolve into, which I would also guess from an investor standpoint, it might feel like a safer bet, even if it's really saturated in the market. So what was it like for you when you guys were really sort of creating this business plan and ideating on the idea of something that is not
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
perhaps most typical, but based on your own focus group from your clientele, you were able to really have a proof point and say, we know that there is a hole in the market for this. We can fulfill it in this way holistically. But that still feels like a gamble.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I don't know if it's shifted since last year, but 2% for just women from venture capital raise, and what is it, 0.34%, 0.3%. 3-5% for women of color. You're right. It is abysmal. It is a shockingly low number of investment that goes into Black female-owned companies and trade. Yeah.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I should have a baseball cap on, really. I mean, there's a lot going on, my friend. A lot indeed, but all good stuff. And even more of the reason that it's exciting to talk to other female founders right now about their journey, their experience, their All the twists and turns that come with the choice to be a female entrepreneur and especially one of color and what that means.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I know. I mean, you were here, what was that, a week or two afterwards you were here. And it was just, you were glowing. You won.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Yeah. And so much of that raise came from the fact that people feel so confident in their belief about you and your work ethic. And I think that's a piece that is such a common thread through how you show up in the salon, how you show up in those chats that you created. It's all about really just your ethos and, of course, having a really strong business partner as well.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
What has it been like to have a friend that's your business partner?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
So let's start when we first met. What year was that?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And to be really aligned in that. I mean, it's great that you know, well, one of our other really good friends, Vicky Tsai, I think has been a mentor for both of us, certainly in what she created with Tatcha from her parents' garage to also selling to Unilever for...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
quite a hefty sum but the level of dedication work ethic and her thoughtfulness and her approach is what I think is so key but I remember very early on when I was talking about starting a business she had said to me okay well Meg you need a reverse engineer who do you want to sell to and
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
As opposed to just thinking, I'm going to create this thing and then we're going to see what's going to happen. And then, oh, I think they might be interested. No, let's reverse engineer five, 10 years from now. Who's going to buy this? And everything you do starts at the intention of what the ultimate goal is. So you're not task oriented, you're goal oriented.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And when you have that level of business savvy right out of the gate. You're looking at it through such a different lens. So let's imagine and assume when you sell.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Because you will. Yes. And it will be a great day of celebration. What would you do in your next chapter?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
It's their favorite when they run out in their cars like, Katie!
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
It was very much 2020.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I know. That's okay. We're the kids. We're the kids.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I can't with you. That's so unfair because we have nine minutes and all I want to do is ask about – is it the – yes? It is, isn't it? It is! Okay. Okay. Okay. Well, this is very exciting.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
He's very handsome. Okay. So, yeah, a different chapter where – You would have gone through all of this adventure. Yeah. All of these twists and turns. We haven't even touched on what was the one hurdle that you didn't see coming? What was the one mistake that you made that, my gosh, if you could say to someone who was doing their own grind and building their own business, do not do that.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
That is a no trespassing. Don't go there.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Oh, does it ever. Serge Normand, leading hairstylist in the industry. And you know him because you worked at his salon in LA way back when. Yeah. And man, he and I became friends after he did my hair for my wedding. Yeah. So my family had just moved to California. We were staying in our friend's home. And because it was the pandemic, I kept ordering boxed hair dye.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Right. So by instilling confidence in the people that were going to invest in you, it gave you freedom, which I think as an entrepreneur, part of it too, is you've always kept a really tight team.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And even when you have a cap table and you have investors, I think all the investors that you've brought on, they are so emotionally invested in you as well as financially invested in you. So you don't have people breathing down your neck, which I think can happen quite a bit, certainly in private equity.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
But you have people that either have big businesses or big voices or platforms that in whatever way they can help you. support you in this growth and in this chapter.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
We show up for you.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
What does that mean to you?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Thanks, Meg. what is unwavering is your commitment to excellence and your value system and your value system right so that that appears in any of these iterations of what you did to now continue to build while you're still building i know that sounds odd but again like most people go i built a salon not i built the salon then the brand and then still thinking about what could come next
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I mean, I'm doing the podcast right now, the show and the brand. And I went, that's three launches at the same time.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
It's a lot of moving pieces, but it's also energizing.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Katie, I love you. You're the best. Thank you so much. Thank you. Next week, we're talking to a founder who never let no get in her way.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And I thought, I'm going to look just like she does on the box. And instead, it was this very inky, almost Elvira-esque black hair. And I had texted Serge. And he said, you need to see Katie. Yeah. And you came over. I mean, we were masked and all the thing. I mean, it was such an interesting time, but I remember that day so well.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
And if you don't know, next week you'll know. See you then.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Well, because for people who don't remember, this is at the height of George Floyd and just so much unrest. And that's when we met. And I also hadn't realized until I was doing my research. I had known you had your salon, but I didn't know that you had just opened it, what, eight or nine months before that that we had met.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
I mean, what was that experience like to have opened it, to feel like you've finally gotten there and then things really come to a full stop?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
But also what's incredible about that is it speaks to everything that I think is the ethos of what you've built the salon and the brand off of, which is community.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Right? So for you, you had already invested so much in the relationships that... People were going to show up for you in the same way that you've showed up for them. And I remember as well, you saying when the salon was going to reopen, how were you going to address these big conversations and topics?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Wow. Yeah, I guess. How did that make you feel? I mean... What was coming up for you? Every day must have felt different.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
a lot of feelings.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Okay.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Well, you just said it. I was like, oh, my God. Okay. Perhaps. Stay on track. Perhaps. We'll save this for a glass of wine on Sunday after all this.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
Building Your Brand Brick by Brick with Highbrow Hippie’s Kadi Lee
Okay. Well, so you've always been fearless and just getting right to the point, my Leo sister. Yeah. Okay. So how did those go?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Why STEM? What made you realize how big of a deal it was?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Oh, no. No one's calling me. I'm Megan, and this is Confessions of a Female Founder, a show where I chat with female entrepreneurs and friends about the sleepless nights, the lessons learned, and the laser focus that got them to where they are today. Behind the scenes, there are so many struggles that female founders don't post about.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And you don't really think of coding as the person who's on the stage giving the speeches. You think of it as the person who's behind the keyboard.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Well, and the creation for access in such a different way, right? For that next step that they may have otherwise not even had a window to peer in through to know that that was a room that was worth going into.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Completely. And now as we look at all the different modality, AI and everything else to really get ahead of how they can be integral. In the creation of those next phases of tech. So, but what was the big break with Girls Who Code? When did people start paying attention and you went, oh, I'm actually onto something here?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But we all also know that fundraising for nonprofits can be really hard. I mean, maybe not as hard with unicorns and rainbows there, but it can be hard. Yeah. What do you think one tip is for people who are starting specifically a nonprofit?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Oh, wow. I didn't realize that. I'm glad that I could be additive in any way. I think one of the pieces of advice I was given early on was, maybe not even advice, but insight was when you're looking at funding for a nonprofit or even in business building, but specifically in the nonprofit sector. Yes, you want to get one hook because it makes other people feel confident coming in.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But in those conversations, if you go to someone and you ask for money, they're likely going to give you advice. And if you go to someone and you ask for advice, they're much more likely to give you money.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Just go for advice because otherwise people aren't immediately feeling pressurized. You're just going for advice. And then if it makes sense for them, they'll offer up what they think you might need as opposed to going in with an ask. So different. Small distinction, but it makes a big difference, I think. I really like that. You have this quote that I love.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
It was, leaders cannot or should not stay in organizations forever. You can't stay innovative if you have the same person leading the movement forever.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Such an interesting insight because a lot of people, I think in that same pursuit of success as we're talking about, especially as female founders, stepping away could feel like failure as opposed to the choice, the active choice you make to say, no, I'm not just doing this for myself. I'm doing this for this organization.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
They don't even talk about the moments when you feel broken, when things don't go as planned, when simply showing up feels like a huge feat. And yet we do it. We push through. We keep smiling. We keep going out there. You get on the panel. You do the thing.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
That is a lot of, I'm not going to say work. I'm talking about self-work. That is a lot of growth that takes people...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
tremendous amount of time to settle into the confidence to be able to do that and to not feel rattled when the phone's not ringing to not feel rattled when you've stepped out of the light so to speak but as you step out of the light you're actually stepping into your own light in a different way and creating space for someone else to be in the light which is probably the larger purpose of all of us being here that's so beautiful so true
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And I'll bring this up if you're comfortable talking about it because I know you've spoken publicly about as you were doing Girls Who Code, all the interpersonal things that are happening for you at that time and the miscarriages that you've experienced. I've spoken about the miscarriage that we experienced. Yeah. And I think in some parallel way...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
When you have to learn to detach from the thing that you have so much promise and hope for and to be able to be okay at a certain point to let something go, something go that you plan to love for a long time.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And at a certain point, though, it does raise the question, how do we redefine what it means to be a female founder without just running ourselves into the ground?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yes. But that in the journey, how many layers come up and then you can start to recognize those patterns. In your business, in your life, in, you know, I was, what is that book? I actually think I have it here. My friend just sent me this passage yesterday. It's called The Boy, the Mole, the Fox, and the Horse. It's a children's book that came out of the UK a couple of years ago.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But at any rate, beautiful illustrations. I have to get it for you. But the quote is, what is the bravest thing you've ever said? Ask the boy. Help, said the horse. Mm-hmm. And at a certain point, you go, the courage that it takes for a female founder, the courage that it takes for a woman when you're on this path, you're on this grind, you've set expectations.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
The courage that it takes to say, I need help or I need to pause is tremendous. And there is no way to continue to show up and role model for these young women all the things that you aspire for them to have that you wanted to have when you were a young girl if you are not doing it with complete authenticity because you are so close to being burned out.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Fighting for what you believe in and all the highs and the lows that come with it. And that's precisely why I wanted to talk to Reshma Saujani. She founded not one, but two incredible nonprofits that help close the gender gap for women. First, with Girls Who Code. And now, with Moms First. She's lived the pressures of building a business both behind the scenes and in the spotlight.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Not allowed to break. You have to keep smiling. All of these constructs that I think we've all been prey to and have projected. And at a certain point, I mean, I often find too, even in the advocacy work or showing up and wanting to that you go, Am I saying the thing, but I'm not doing the thing? Yeah. And when can we start taking our own advice? What do you think that pivot point will be?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
When will the inflection point happen where women, especially the ones who are leading in these movements and leading in this messaging? To actually integrate that advice and not just know it or intellectualize it, to integrate it for you to say, yeah, you know, honey, I am going to clear the rest of my schedule after this appointment. Please, can you drive me and come with me? Yeah.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And her candid take on leading a movement, it's going to make you rethink how to fight for what you believe in. Let's get into it. Welcome. Thank you. I'm so happy you're here. It's been a while.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
So you mentioned before the break that a lot of these young female entrepreneurs that have that desire to build something are looking at their mentors and saying... No, thank you. Yeah. Based on the burnout they're seeing. And so I guess the question is, how do we turn that around? Yeah. How do we show that perfect doesn't exist?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And maybe that's part of the messaging, but also what does it look like now when you can find balance?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yes. Now you have the title of mom, just like me. Favorite title.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I love being a mom. Oh, my gosh. I love being a mom so much. It's my favorite thing. It is the thing where you're like, oh, my gosh, I just need a break. I just need a minute. I just need a minute. And the second you step into the room, you go, oh, but I... Where are they? Let me just pop, let me just, let me scroll through pictures of them endlessly on my phone.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And then you just, my husband's like, my love, can you just give yourself a minute? Why don't you go work out? Why don't you go take a bath? I'm like, I know, but I just want to cuddle for, it's the parenting paradigm where it is so full on and I wouldn't trade it for anything.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But I think what's really key about what you said, and the pandemic may have been the thing that shifted this when working from home and parenting from home where they are, completely converged can feel incredibly overwhelming how do you feel about that
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yes. Life was difficult. Well, I mean, we had met 2018, I guess. You were very pregnant. Oh, my gosh. Yes, it would have been 2018, pregnant with Archie at Kensington Palace. Yes. How did you end up at that meeting with me?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And also with that comes the woman who is juggling it all and doing it all from home, being confident enough to tell the truth about what's going on. Because you can't give grace to someone in the same way if you just have no sense of it.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
You don't know if they, my kids, for example, right now, one has RSV, the other has influenza A. I hear a little pitter-patter of feet upstairs from school, you know, cough syrup all night and rubbing the back and this and you go, and we still find a way to show up for both.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But being able to be comfortable enough, and maybe that's to your earlier point, how we teach this generation who might not feel as inspired to do some of the change making that we know has been so fundamental, say, no, just be honest in the journey of it.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And say, yeah, today I'm going to show up for you, but I'm showing up for you in my sweatshirt today because I've been up all night with my babies. But I'm still going to be able to show up for both because both matter and both are what keep my cup full.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
It's true. It's true. And that's the shift that has to come. And I think, look, as you continue to grow out I don't know what your next chapter looks like for you, especially when you say eight years and then maybe time for a change. Now you've already forecasted that in some way because we know your proof points of how that works. What do you feel like your next chapter will be?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Oh, that's kind to say generous. I was thrilled to learn more at the time. I would say even the idea of coding and STEM, do you remember? That's when things were transitioning from STEM to STEAM. It was so new and it was definitely new for me, but I remember you came in, we sat in the audience room and I just said, tell me all about it. But
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And sometimes just when you think you're about to win, oh, man, did that hurt because that feels like quite a loss. But you just keep going. And I think my understanding, especially in having this time to be able to hear your story and talk with you and see the commonality in some of these other – equally successful women that I'm speaking with.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
We're going to talk about what's behind every successful woman. What's behind every successful woman is self-awareness. There comes a point where each of these women on their journeys has such a tremendous sense of self-awareness and the desire to dig deeper.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yes. And everything has some expense, right? But when you're looking, what's the ROI? What is your return on the investment of everything you're pouring into that? And at the end of the day, what you're doing is creating legacy that will, whether you see those changes in your lifetime or our kids' lifetime, it still steps in the right direction of what legacy is all about.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And that I think is one of the most fascinating, probably most powerful things about the journey of creation as a female founder. You're creating something with lasting impact.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And thank you for joining me today. I appreciate it. How far we've come and yet here we are. Here we are. Wherever we go, here we are. I really appreciate it. Next week, we are talking to an iconic founder in the beauty industry. She is a hair colorist. She's a stylist too, but my goodness, can this girl do some color? And she has turned her passion into products that people crave.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Can you guess who it is? I'll see you then.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But it was such a great sit down because it was an eye opener for me of so many other ways in which women were showing up for young girls. And I'm curious to get into how that became your focal point. But can we just start well before that? Can we go way, way back? Take us back to the beginning.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Which is beautiful and also completely confounding when you know more about your upbringing, how you were bullied, how you were mistreated, how you were beaten up. For a lot of people, that would... No, no, I'm not showing up in the spirit of love anymore. I've been too bruised and beaten. So can you talk a little bit about that? Because you grew up in Chicago and what was it like?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Oh, the sparkly BB shirt that said BB in sequins across the front. I saved up for that.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
It's quite the acronym. But it's definitely high impact for a 12 or 13-year-old girl to come up with that. It says a lot.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I turned to hope. I mean, honestly, it just says so much about your character to look yourself in the mirror and really see who you are. But even from that moment, you're still at a crossroads where you could have chosen, you know what, I am going to be an entrepreneur and I'm going to build a business and I'm going to be so successful. But instead, your activist spirit is what came through, right?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Didn't you make a plea to the dean? Didn't you just really go in? I did. I did.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Oh, wow.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Right. That it will break you as opposed to break you open for the possibility of more.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yeah. And when it breaks open, it leaves space and room for so much more love, growth, resilience to all pour in. Yeah.