Reshma Saujani
Appearances
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I mean, I always say, like, if I had applied to be the CEO of Girls Who Code, I wouldn't have gotten the job. I didn't code. I'd never coded before. Yeah. Right? Like, I majored in polyscience speech communications. And the only thing I'd ever built was a failed campaign.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, those coding jobs, they paid a lot, like $120,000 a year. And when I saw that girls and girls of color, poor girls, were not going into these fields, in my mind, like they weren't going into the fields that would help them like march up into the middle class and change their entire trajectory for them and their families. And that's what like drove me crazy.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
to coding and technology.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yeah, and you're working on this now. Also, like the things that they're going to create, like bullying, right? Like what are they doing on these problems that they experience, right? Whether it's bullying, whether it's health, whether it's sexual harassment, right? Like if they know how to code, they can build tools that are going to help solve problems that are faced by women and girls.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
So, okay. I thought nonprofits are slow. They don't get anything done. Like nothing happens. Like it's just, it's not for me. Right. Like I want to be where the action is. I want to be where the real change is. So I ran Girls Who Code and now Moms First like a tech company. Oh, interesting.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Big scale, big numbers, hard driving, big change, KPIs, destination where we want to go with like essentially like a nonprofit lens. So it was always kind of like unicorns and rainbows. I'll be honest. Right. Like sometimes you have an idea and the world just changes. collides to make that happen. And so Girls Who Code was a little like that, right?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
From the beginning, people like, oh, yeah, this needs to exist.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
How do you get funders? So here's the thing. I very early on at Girls Who Code got Jack Dorsey to support it. And back then, everybody was like, oh, Jack's doing it? Great. And I'll say with Moms First, it was you. Like very early on, you were like, oh, paid leave? This movement? Moms? Yes. And I think the thing is for people and entrepreneurs, it does help to get an early adopter. Hmm.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
especially one that people admire and that people want to follow and see as a guidepost. And so, yeah, for Girls Who Code, it was really Jack. And for Moms First, it was you and Melinda.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
That's a good tip. All right. I'm taking that one to the bank.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
So, you know, I... knew it was time to step away from Girls Who Code. One, because I actually don't think anyone should run anything for more than eight years. And then two, this energy I was feeling around motherhood and Moms First and this need to fight for childcare and paid leave, like there was something I knew that I wanted to do.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
So I had this amazing CEO who's now our CEO, Dr. Tarika Barrett, and I'd always wanted her to run the organization. And so it's like middle of COVID. I know it's time. And one, I know if I tell anybody that I want to step down, including my husband, he's going to talk me out of it. So I don't tell anybody. I get on a train. I like basically say, Tariq, I need to meet with you.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And I'm like, I'm ready. And I think you're ready. And she said, all right, let's go. So one, I think it was so important for me to pick a successor, especially a woman of color, and give her the opportunity of like the fruits of my labor, right? Because building Girls Who Code almost killed me, Megan. You know, I was always on a plane. I was always just hustling.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But I had built something that I knew was sustainable because I had rebuilt it during the pandemic. I had money in the bank, right? So like oftentimes if you're a new person, CEO taking over an organization, you're terrified, like fundraising is hard. So I knew I could give her something that like had legs.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But it was such an interesting lesson because the day we were transitioning, my assistant said to me, okay, I'm going to get you a conference room and you're going to get so many emails, so many people are going to call you that we just, we got to block out three hours. So Tariq and I send the email, she's in one room, I'm in one room, press send, crickets. Oh, no. Crickets.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Tarika calls me a couple hours later. She's like, oh, my God. It's been so amazing, the amount of emails and the phone calls. She's like, how's it been for you? And I didn't want to tell her, right, that no one had called me. But it was such an important lesson on like, this is why people don't give up power, because when you don't have power— You're not important anymore, right?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
So it's so easy to hold on to it because your identity is so caught up in it. But that to me was part of the work, right? From an ego perspective, being able to let it go, give somebody else that light, knowing that like it was going to actually diminish my power, right? My resources, my access. But that was the point. I mean, that is...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
That's, that's really, yeah, I was going to say, I feel like you're like reading my diaries. Like that's really, it's really insightful because I don't think anyone's seen it that way, like said it that way for me. But, but that's right because, you know, here I was for so many years, like trying to get pregnant, having miscarriages because I had autoimmune issues. And I got into this really like
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
kind of scary habit where I would be at a doctor's office and they'd be like, you have no heartbeat. And I should have just gone home and gone to sleep and curled up with my husband. But I would just take a breath and I would just show up in a living room, in a stage and just perform. And oftentimes I was like performing in front of these children that I desperately wanted.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And I just got really good at that. But it was eating me up inside. And it wasn't until my second where I was again on this path of serial miscarriages. And I remember just one day it was like I was in California. I had to get on a plane and go to Utah to speak to like – I don't know, like a thousand girls and like the governor.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And like that morning, I get a call from the doctor and they're like, okay, your HCG levels are not going up. You're going to miscarry. And I just got on a plane and I was sitting there in front of these girls and my heart was just breaking. And I remember saying, this is it. I'm not doing it again. And I went to my team and I said, guys, and I'd never told them I was going through this.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I mean, they kind of knew because they would see these doctor's appointments on my schedule, but I never... Like just said, I need, and I said, I can't do this anymore. I need you to take over. I need you to run this organization. I just need, I need a month. I need a couple months just to just breathe. Mm-hmm. That takes so much courage to say it. It did. It did.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But it's right because I had to detach because I felt like I was letting the girls down. I mean, how ironic is that, right? In my quest to become a mother, you have this beautiful line that I quote all the time. The most important title I have is mom. And I so desperately wanted that title. Oh. Yeah. You know? I do. And I just, it was the irony of it all, you know, was a lot.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And if that happens, we're going to lose a generation of social entrepreneurs that we desperately need to continue these fights. And so we got to show them a different way. We got to do it a different way.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yeah. Yeah. And it's funny. I don't know how to learn this lesson. I'm going to be honest. Like a couple weeks ago, you know, I had a breast exam and they thought they saw something and then I had to get a biopsy. And I had never gotten a biopsy before, so I didn't know what to expect. But they're like, you know what? It's just a pinch. You'll be fine. And I had a panel that night.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And I know now from DNCs and C-sections and, like, IUDs that it's not a pitch. So, like, I keep my schedule, right? I keep it all. I tell my husband, like, let me come with you. I'm like, no, no, no, no. I'm good. I got it. I'm fine. No. And it hurt, like— Hell, right? And I go and I do the panel and I'm sitting there and I'm like, what is wrong with you? Like, you know better than this.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
What is wrong with you? And I think it's so hard to unlearn that. what this is really about. Because I think, one, it's personal, but two, like, the sense of, like, I'm strong, I'm resilient, I can take it, I got it, right? Because all these things have served me. It's why I've been able to do the things that I do. And then I think we live... in the society that encourages women to do that.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And the sense that like we don't break and we're not allowed to break.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Well, it's interesting. I'm seeing, you know, a lot of the women, I just went to Cecile Richards' funeral. So you're seeing a lot of these women who've given themselves to the movement. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that the body holds the score. Exactly. Exactly.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And especially for women of color, right, who are always like, oh, but you should go fight and you should go fight and you should go save us, that we can't continue to operate that way. And so I think we have to just – because one of the things I'm seeing – I don't have as many young girls or young women reaching out to me on LinkedIn being like, Mr. Johnny, I also want to start a nonprofit.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
How do I do that? I think that they're looking at us and seeing how exhausted we are, how tired we are, how much you have to sacrifice and saying, yeah, no, thank you. Oh, wow. And if that happens, we're going to lose a generation of social entrepreneurs that we desperately need to continue these fights. Yeah. And so we got to show them a different way. We got to do it a different way.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And it's not one or the other. You know, one of the things I'm seeing in the motherhood movement is people think you have to pick being a girl boss or a tribe wife. that it's black or white, right? That either you're in the workforce and you can't focus on your kids and you don't get to see them or you're just at home.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And I think the point is, is that we're just presenting these like polar opposite choices when really what we all want is something in the middle. I want to be able to pick my kids up, you know, at school every so often, give them a little hug and a kiss, have some flexibility, not be on the plane all the time. But I want to be able to crush it in the things that I care about.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Love it.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I feel like the way that we've built workplaces, we've set women up to fail, period. You know, and the thing I always think about, Megan, is like, look, we have the most educated workforce of women. Like, 75% of the high school valedictorians are girls, right? Most of those getting their PhDs are girls.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And we have to ask ourselves, why do we have the most educated population of women that have the lowest amount of participation in the labor force? And the reason is, is because when we become moms...
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
It's been a long time. I saw you. Different circumstances. Long time.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Because of the cost of childcare, because of the lack of availability of childcare, because we just don't make it possible for you to do both, oftentimes women are having to downshift or make choices. And the way we've tried to solve this problem is say, well, the problem is women, right? Like you got to get more confidence. You got to power pose, you know, your way before a meeting.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
You got to get a mentor, right? It's all about you're wrong. You're broken. When really it's just structural, right? And what was so amazing about this and the pandemic is I think it gave us a window of what's possible. So, like, if you do have flexibility, if you can take care of your kid when they're sick and still get it on a meeting, right?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
If you still can not be set up to fail because the school day is 830 and the work day is 9 to 5, right? If we can actually give people grace and flexibility and give women ownership over their time, right? you will actually see a shift.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. We breastfed in closets. We didn't put our kids' picture on there. We're like, oh, my God, I'm sorry. Completely. Like, I always say, like, you know, Girls Who Code, mostly women work for me. They get pregnant all the time. And we kill it, right? I have built like two of the most fastest growing nonprofits and we live our values.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And so the sense of that, well, you know, you're not going to be productive or you're like, you know, watching Netflix while you're at work. It's just not true. And so we just have to. But there's so much resistance. to change. And I do think that part of that is about having women ask for what they need and are male allies.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
You know, one of the things that you've seen really shift in this remote work conversation is a lot of men are saying, okay, great, you want me to come back to work? Dads are saying, you need to support me in my childcare. You need to change your paid leave policies, right? You need to allow me to be a parent and just thrive. Right. But I think that is just absolutely right.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
It's like, how do we ask and demand what we need? I mean, you see it even in promotions. Men will not, if they leave the workforce, they will go back and they will not compromise on their salary. Whereas women are like, all right, you want to pay me 20% less? Okay, fine. Thank you. Right.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Because you're an amazing human. It's true. And we were bringing Girls Who Code to England, and we were looking to expand, and you... generously met with me.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Well, listen, I love exposing cons. And I think one of the things with all of these things that are in common is one, what do you mean girls can't code? Yes, they can. And they can build incredible things. And what do you mean we can't redesign workplaces for women? Yes, we can. We need to pass child care and paid leave.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And, you know, the work I'm doing on my podcast right now, My So-Called Midlife, was like, I was in that inflection point between Girls Who Code and Moms First. There was no third baby, right? I was seeing wrinkles on my face that I hadn't seen before. My body was changing because of perimenopause. And I was just feeling like my best years are behind me.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And I started working with my monk, Razanath. And that's when I started reading the Bhagavad Gita because I realized like all the things that were holding me back and the things that I were holding on to. And it just opened up such this incredible moment of one, rethinking midlife for women. Because I think the view about midlife is so different for women and men.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And we need to change it because we are living longer than we ever expected. Ever expected. And I don't know if you knew this, but the largest gender pay gap is for women above 50. I have so many friends now who are approaching 50 and who are like, I can't get that promotion. I can't become a partner at that venture fund. I can't start that business.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
The way we perceive women, their potential and their opportunity, and I call it the midlife penalty for women, really changes. And so... To me, I think I will continue to do this work, right? I will continue to do this work about women. I have made the realization, though, Megan, we may not win in our lifetimes. Meaning what?
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Meaning that I might die with women having less rights than they had when I was born. That we may not see a female president in my lifetime. That your daughters, my nieces, may still be fighting the same fights that we're fighting.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And for me, that was a really hard reality to face in midlife because we went through all the things we sacrificed to our health, our family, and we have to say, God, is it worth it? Like, what is the point? What is the point if we keep dismantling progress? And I think I've realized that probably me, you, were put on this earth just like those suffragettes to just keep hope alive. Keep fighting.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Keep pushing. Because, yeah, that's the point. You lose, you lose, you lose, and then you win. Yes. Right? You lose, you lose, you lose, and then you win.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
That is unflappable. I think that's right. And I think you realize, like, I don't care what other people think about me. Like, I'm not doing this. I just, to me, I want to die knowing that I lived my fullest potential. And then I gave back to like, I keep going back to my parents' story, like about the people that sheltered them, that took them in, that fed them.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Like, I will continue to fight for our children to make sure that this world is good, that they learn and see goodness. And I think that we have a role to play in that. But I think the lesson is, is that you got to do it with joy. Yes. And it can't come at an expense, right, to your health or to your happiness or to your children. Right.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Well, thank you so much for all your... Seriously, Megan, there's so much gratitude and love towards you. I just hope... I hope you know that. Thank you.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
So, you know, for me, my parents came here as refugees. My mother was actually several months pregnant with my sister when they came. They had no money. And the Catholic Church took them in, fed them, sheltered them, clothed them. So I've always had this, like, deep love.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
like love for this country and for that spirit, right, of empathy that we shelter and that we love and then we care for those who have been displaced. So that was always in my blood, that I wanted to give back to the country. I wanted to do public service and I wanted to, you know, fight for those who didn't have a voice.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
You know, no one's ever asked me that before because you're right. I could have turned to anger and hate, given what I was going through. And I went the opposite way. You know, my parents came here in the 70s, grew up in like a working class town, you know, outside of Chicago, Illinois. There were no brown people.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And, you know, my mom was still wearing her sari and her bindi on her head, going to the Kmart, right? Still eating Indian food. And, you know, back then it was all about assimilation. You know, my father went to Toastmasters to get rid of his... accent. He literally changed his name from Mukun to Mike. He still signs my birthday cards like love Mike.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
But that is like, if you wanted to fit in, you had to just change. And that's kind of how we felt too. I remember being so mad, Megan, that my mom named me Reshma. I'm like, why didn't you just name me Rita or Rachel? Because everyone would be like, how do I say it? Right.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And, you know, we didn't have a lot of money, so we were wearing the Kmart shoes and the wrong jeans and, like, the wrong shirt. And I remember it was all, like, you know, Forenza sweatshirts and, like, feathers and, like, you know, the 90s.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yes. Totally. And we had none of the—we had, like, the knockoff version. Yeah. You know what I mean? Of all of that. But so I really tried to be white. Like, I tried to be those other girls and deny my culture and all of it. And, you know, every day I would get made fun of and bullied. And one day, I don't know, there was nothing special about that day, Megan.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I just, when challenged to go to the back of the school, you know, for a fight, I was like, okay, instead of just getting on the bus. And that day changed my life, right? I got beat up pretty bad. But I also realized I'm not white and I'm never going to be. And I have a responsibility to actually teach people about difference.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Like literally, I went to freshman year of high school and started a club called PRISM, like the Prejudice Reduction Interested Students Movement. Horrible name. I got better at that.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Yeah, I guess it does. So, yeah, I think I turned to hope.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Always wanting to affect change. Yeah. I realized early on what my gift was. So I started going to Model UN and debate, and I realized, ooh, I can give a speech. I can communicate, and I actually feel at home. on stage. And I'm thinking the way to make a difference is to run for office. I'm in love with Dr. King, Mahatma Gandhi, John F. Kennedy.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Like back then, I thought politics, politics, and you can, you know how to communicate, like that's where you go. And so I, you know, volunteer on my first campaign, the 92 Clinton campaign, fell in love with politics and Washington and Hillary Clinton and the whole thing. And I'm looking at all these people like a Hillary, like
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
You know, and they all got a degree from Harvard and they're all lawyers. And so maybe that's my path, right? I'm going to Yale Law School. That's where I'm going. I apply three times. Don't get in. You know what I mean? Finally get in. But not just finally get in.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
What did you say? Well, so I had this mentor, Leon Higginbotham Jr. He was like the first federal Black jurist on the Third Circuit Court. And he becomes my mentor. Every Sunday, I am at him and Evelyn's house listening to like the heroes of the civil rights movement. And it is just, I love Leon. And Leon's like, oh, girl, you're getting in.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Like when you go to your law school, when you walk in, there's my photo. Like, I got you. And he dies. And he doesn't write my recommendation letter. Oh, I didn't. Okay. Before he dies. Okay. So I'm devastated. And I don't have a recommendation letter. And it's like, it's his funeral. Everybody is there. And at the funeral, I meet the assistants of the dean of Yale Law School. Wow.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And kind of like, she feels sorry for me. And she was like, I'll get an appointment for you. And she kind of squeezes me and Dean Kraman's schedule. And I go to New Haven and make my pitch. And Dean Kraman's like, listen, I'll make you a deal. Like, you've gotten into all these other schools. Like, I got into Penn and Northwest. I mean, like, right? Like, really good schools.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And he's like, I'll make you a deal. Like, just go at any of those schools. And if you get into the top 10%, I'll let you come to Yale.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
So I go to Georgetown. I don't make one friend. I study every single day. I am just super focused, right? Like getting straight A's so I can go to Yale. But it was such a lesson, Megan, in like, I was just so narrowly focused that I had to have that Yale law degree so I could go do the things that I wanted to do, not understanding that I was just letting life and its experiences just pass me by.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
What happens then is that Bush v. Gore happens, and I'm thinking I'm going into public interest, right? I'm going to go work at the NLAACP, right? Like, civil rights, that's what I want to do. Bush wins. No one's going to D.C., you know? And I'm like, oh, and I'm $300,000 in student loan debt. I guess I'm going to go work for the man in New York at a law firm, which I hate.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And that's when I run for office. take this crazy chance, right, in running in a primary. I was 33 years old. My name was Reshma Sajjani. There had never been a South Asian woman to ever run before. I run for United States Congress. I lose, like, spectacularly. I mean, it's, like, not even close. But I had, like, convinced John Legend to do, like, two concerts for me, like, Jack Dorsey.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Like, I had, like, hustled. the whole world, right, into thinking that, like, I'm winning this upstart race. And it is not even close. Like, I'm crushed. And the biggest kind of aha for me was I'm sitting there the next day. I'm in my, like, 400 square foot Lower East Side apartment, and I've pissed off everybody in the Democratic establishment because I didn't wake my turn.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I ran against another Democrat. I'm broke because I spent a year running for office instead of working. And no one's calling me. Oh, no. No one's calling me. But the biggest kind of, I think, moment that changes my life is I realized, like, oh, my God, like, this was the thing that I thought that I was supposed to do. Run for office. Be a politician. Be a public servant.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
The very thing that I had been driving towards, Yale, all of that was about this destination. It doesn't happen for me. But when I wake up the next morning, I'm like, oh, like— I'm not broken. Yeah, this sucks. But like, I'm not broken. Huh. I think we think as women that when we try something, especially something we want so bad.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
And it doesn't work out that it will break us and we won't be able to like wake up the next day. We won't be able to continue on. Forget about like the humiliation and the judgment and all that. I think there's a sense that like failure will cripple you.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
Exactly. And so now the thing doesn't happen and I'm like, huh, there's a lot of things that I should maybe fail at and try and learn. And that's the path.
Confessions of a Female Founder with Meghan
The Long Game with Girls Who Code’s Reshma Saujani
I'm sitting there the next day. I've pissed off everybody. I'm broke. And no one's calling me.