Tania Boler Founder and CEO Elvie Interview

We know how daunting it can be to start a new business, especially if you’re disrupting an industry or creating an entirely new one. When there is no path to follow, the biggest question is, where do I start? There is so much to do, but before you get ahead of yourself, let’s start at the beginning. To kick-start the process, and ease some of those first-time founder nerves, we’re asking successful entrepreneurs to share their stories in our new series, From Scratch. But this isn’t your typical day in the life profile. We’re getting into the nitty-gritty details—from writing a business plan (or not) to sourcing manufacturers and how much they pay themselves—we’re not holding back.

Photo: Courtesy of Tania Boler

Tania Boler founder and CEO of Elvie

Can you tell us a bit about your background and what you were doing professionally before launching Elvie?

I’ve always been passionate about women’s health, and I studied the topic extensively during my time at Oxford and Stanford University earning a Ph.D. in sexual reproductive health. As a sexual health researcher, I spent most of my early professional life in roles that worked to provide women safe, quality care and access to health education. 

While working for the U.N., I was stationed in Africa and launched the first-ever curriculum on sexual education. During this time, I began to recognize technology’s potential to disrupt the way we think about health—and even quicken the pace at which change can occur. 

Before starting Elvie, I served as the global director of research and innovation at Marie Stopes International where I worked to improve sexual health among developing countries. Working directly with women across the world inspired me to advocate for women while understanding their unique health needs. 

What was your “lightbulb moment” for Elvie? What inspired you to start your business and pursue this path?

Despite having extensive academic and professional experience in women’s health, when I was pregnant, I discovered that there was much I didn’t know about my body. It felt like the changes I was experiencing should have been something I knew would happen. This was particularly true about my pelvic floor health. In my studies, training, or personal life, no one described pelvic floor health’s importance. 

At the time, I was spending lots of time in France with my husband’s family and learned that the women there were much more open to discussing their intimate health. In fact, pelvic floor exercise was part of their usual postnatal routine. After experiencing first-hand how pregnancy impacted this core muscle group, I was stunned that this cultural practice wasn’t more common in other countries. I began to do extensive research to understand better the intimate health challenges women face daily. 

The “lightbulb moment” came from this exploratory phase. As I learned more about how women currently care for their pelvic floors, I began to think about how few products were available to promote women’s intimate health. This is especially true when you think about how many generations of iPhones have been developed in the past ten years. Astonishingly, there have been limited modern innovations to address women’s basic needs in the past few decades! I was determined to do something about this, starting by tackling pelvic floor health’s taboo status while creating a design that made caring for this muscle group easy, efficient, and fun. That’s where Elvie Trainer came in. 

Since launching Elvie in 2013, you’ve raised over $50 million in funding from investors, garnering some of the biggest investments in femtech to date. What advice can you share for entrepreneurs on partnering with the right investors? What do investors need to bring to the table other than just money?

My best advice is to be your best advocate, never wavering from your mission or values. When I first started pitching Elvie Trainer to investors, most of whom were men and didn’t understand the need for the product, I would worry about making them feel uncomfortable when talking about the product’s purpose. After leading many meetings like this, where I put the investors first, I realized that I needed to prioritize Elvie. I didn’t want to work with the investors who just stared at the sample Elvie Trainers I’d leave out on the table, but those who’d immediately pick them up to better understand them. That’s why I’d recommend looking for investors who can not only offer capital but also provide partnership as your company grows. Suppose we at Elvie are going to realize our vision of revolutionizing women’s healthcare. In that case, we need investors who share our mission and values and will be open to putting more than just dollars behind it.  

You’re not only the founder and CEO of a technology company that’s revolutionizing women’s health, but you’re also a mother. How has being a mom changed your priorities and your focus in terms of your career and business? Do you think motherhood has made you a better business person?  

As many women know, being a mom completely changes everything. In the beginning, I struggled with how I would juggle my independent, career-driven life while caring for a baby. But after a while, balance comes—and at some point, you start to realize that hey, it’s okay to drop a few balls now and then. 

Once I started Elvie, I did have the advantage of knowing the unique challenges that moms face. I’d say, get used to multitasking and improving how you prioritize aspects of your life. And definitely, get more efficient with your time! 

Elvie’s mission is built around the need to support women, starting with moms. Unlike many other brands, we’ve created an internal culture that reflects these values. I enjoy being a champion for all the mothers and women who are a part of the team.

Did you write a business plan? If so, was it helpful? If not, what did you use to guide your business instead and why did you take this approach?

Writing a business plan was a crucial step for us to outline the opportunities in the category and ensure we stayed true to our promise to women to deliver the most innovative technology to improve their everyday health as we scaled the business. Once we designed the product and realized how many women we could help by bringing the device to market, we quickly launched it via an e-commerce site. 

How did you come up with the name Elvie? What are some of the things you considered during the naming process?

Our name is the first definition of our brand. The word “Elvie” actually derives from the abbreviation for the levator muscles (“LVs”), the key muscle group on either side of the pelvis. We bandied some names around, but Elvie felt right. It simultaneously evokes strength and unabashed femininity. We also loved the name because it felt familiar yet unique. 

What were the immediate things you had to take care of to set up the business?

My business partner, Alexander Asseily, recommended that the first step was to hire the best designers to bring our vision to life. From there, the business took off. What was once trying to convince naysayers that this tool wasn’t “too niche,” we were suddenly being endorsed by celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow and even included in the swag bag for nominees at The Academy Awards. 

For us, digital and social are essential channels. Both are a means of getting our brand to a wider audience and as a platform to start conversations around taboo topics and intimate issues. From a strategic standpoint, it was important for us to have a presence that women can connect with online from the word “go.” 

What research did you do for the business beforehand? Why would you recommend it?

While I had a background in women’s health and had worked with women across the globe, I realized how much more I had to learn about women’s health when I became pregnant and experienced changes in my own body. I did extensive research to better understand women’s intimate health, the healthcare industry, and the technology already available to address these needs. To bring something to market that was truly innovative and could change women’s lives, I had to understand their health challenges and the products that failed them. 

Research is a crucial step for any entrepreneur. However, it’s also important to recognize that you won’t have all of the answers you need before starting your business. The hard part is finding the confidence to take the leap and go from the research phase to market. If you feel strongly about your idea, commit yourself to it and sell your passion for it to your team, investors, and consumers. You’ll never know until you try. 

Photo: Courtesy of Tania Boler

How did you find and identify the manufacturers that you work with? What was important to you during this process? Are there any mistakes you made and learned from along the way?

In the initial stages, we didn’t have any experience in manufacturing. Alex, my business partner, had plenty of advice, including adding a few names to the list of recommendations. But essentially, it’s all a case of setting out your manufacturing objectives; how many you need to make, the capabilities required to make it, and understanding your budget to get it done. 

From there, it’s lots of heavy research to create a shortlist of companies you’d like to speak with, making approaches and discussing your goals while gauging if there are synergies between the two companies. It’s important not to underestimate the people side of things—they may be able to demonstrate capabilities, but you need to be sure that you can work together as a team. After all, you’ll be spending a lot of time working together to refine your design and troubleshooting manufacturing challenges. There will always be tough times, so you need to be able to detach from the work and have fun together. 

Do you pay yourself, and if so, how did you know what to pay yourself? 

Like many new entrepreneurs, I accepted that during the early days of Elvie, it wouldn’t be like a normal salary. That said, I recommend being as open and frank as possible with your investors, because it shouldn’t mean that you sacrifice essential things you need to pay for, like child care. It’s all about striking a balance between company needs and making sure you’re able to focus on building the business—not about whether you can pay your own bills! For me, I initially took 40% of my previous salary. 

How big is your team now, and what has the hiring process been like?

Finding the right people to build our brilliant team has been vital to Elvie’s success and crucial from the beginning. This includes everyone from the talented engineers and designers who helped bring our ideas to life or the advisors who navigated the tech sector while Elvie was still a growing startup. Giving women leadership positions and hiring so many talented people with like-minded values has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my career. 

In 2020, we had 114 new starters, which represents a +80.5% growth. When any company is scaling this rapidly, there’s a significant risk of the cultural DNA getting diluted or lost. With COVID and remote working, this is exacerbated even further. So as we (hopefully) emerge from the stresses of the pandemic, our big re-focus will be on people and culture in 2021. As soon as it’s feasible and safe, we’ll be investing in making up for lost time—encouraging quality collaboration between team members and socializing in real life! 

Did you hire an accountant? Who helped you with the financial decisions and setup? Are there any tools or programs you recommend for bookkeeping?

Quite early on, we were set on hiring an accounting firm, specifically one which had a record of working with early-stage companies in London’s tech ecosystem. That being said, we also relied quite heavily on the readily available internal expertise, who helped with financial decision-making on several things, from the selection of banking partners to the management of company share schemes and the like. We also handled the bookkeeping internally and used Xero. It’s really great and user-friendly accounting software that is well-suited for early-stage businesses. It’s simple to set up and even simpler to use, which meant that we could maintain internal control of essential aspects of our day-to-day financial operations instead of outsourcing.

What has been the biggest learning curve during the process of establishing your business?

Elvie was born out of a passion for women’s health, and it was not very cut-and-dry to carve out space in a very male-dominated tech and investor community. It poses unique challenges to female entrepreneurs trying to design with women in mind. And as a non-tech founder, one of my biggest pieces of advice is to surround yourself with people who can capture that passion with innovative products that meet a need. I mean, when I first started, the term “femtech” didn’t even exist—so it was a great leap into the unknown. If you’re looking to launch something new, the startup ecosystem is vibrant and friendly, with plenty of experienced individuals who are willing to offer practical help and support. There are always lots of meet-ups which can help short-cut problems as you go along and learn from others who have done it before. 

For Elvie Pump, our greatest challenge was building the technology that could solve the breastfeeding problems women had been enduring for far too long. We also knew that we would have to convince investors that it was time to create a better solution for women than what’s been available to them so far. We did this by hiring world-class female designers who understood women’s needs and created a beautiful product that then spoke for itself.

How did you promote your company? How did you get people to know who you are and create buzz?

Given the number of taboos surrounding women’s bodies and health, the Elvie team is driven by our overarching mission of changing perceptions while pioneering life-changing health solutions for women. Our work encourages us to engage in these discussions, shift people’s views, and educate both women and men on important—often intimate—topics. We see this as an excellent opportunity to drive real change in the culture at large while addressing the often-ignored needs of 50% of the population. 

With that in mind, we’ve always known we would need to be disruptive to grab women’s attention on a global scale. These moments opened the door to more significant conversations and helped to begin eliminating taboos on the topic.

One of the larger stunts we created was our massive vaginal blimp at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival to raise awareness on pelvic floor weakness and incontinence. Our campaign was actually banned by the local council, which highlighted how taboos around women’s health and anatomy still run deep in our society. But happily, this led to the viral #LetFannyFly movement on social media—and it was empowering to see so many women get on our side and almost become activists for Elvie. 

A few other buzzworthy moments for us included our #FreeTheFeed campaign when we placed five giant inflatable breasts across London’s skyline. We aimed to fight the stigma around breastfeeding and pumping in public. We knew it would raise a few eyebrows – but in so doing, no one could overlook this taboo that’s been used to repress women for so long. 

Our stunt at London Fashion Week was another disruptive event that made headlines. To amplify our Elvie Pump launch in 2018, we partnered with London-based designer Marta Jakubowski to feature a model (and new mother) wearing our breast pump on the catwalk during her show. If it was talked about at all, pumping was considered a grind, an unpleasant necessity, or a punch line. By crashing London Fashion Week, we wanted to prove that women who happen to be mothers are still women: they can still be fashionable, walk the catwalk, lead businesses, run the world… and ultimately, they shouldn’t feel restricted or held back by anything (including pumping!). 

Do you have a business coach or mentor? How has this person helped you, and would you recommend one? What advice can you share on how do you get one?

I’ve been involved in women’s health for my entire career, and along the way, I’ve been introduced to so many individuals who’ve both inspired me and helped me find my way to creating Elvie. 

Carving out space in a male-centric world is never easy, and it can be intimidating to jump into something when you haven’t seen many examples set by other female friends or leaders. However, there is a growing network of extraordinary, like-minded female entrepreneurs out there who are willing to support you and help you to make essential connections. For anyone looking for a mentor, start by evaluating who you admire in your own circle and ask them for advice and guidance. 

For advice and information around startups, “The Lean Startup” and “The Hard Thing About Hard Things” were great resources for me. Phil Knight’s “Shoe Dog” was also incredibly inspiring at the early stages. 

There are a wealth of exciting podcasts out there, some personal favorites of mine include; “The Future of Everything” from the Wall Street Journal, “Masters of Scale,” and the “WIRED UK Podcast” to keep me up to speed on all the latest trends and stories.

I am constantly impressed by people who are challenging the status quo and introducing new ways of doing things. Tortoise is doing this by encouraging readers to consume information more slowly and with more purpose.  

What is one thing you didn’t do during the setup process that ended up being crucial to the business and would advise others to do asap?

I would advise others to never skirt around topics or words that you feel might make potential investors uncomfortable. Take Elvie Trainer as an example. It took me a few fundraising meetings to realize that I needed to be upfront about women's issues and not shy away from words like "vagina" or other intimate topics. But, how can we create and sell in products that make women’s lives easier if we aren’t open and honest? Now, when meeting with prospective investors, I like to see their reaction once I say the "V" word. I call this the "vagina test!” It's a fun and easy way to gauge whether we'll be a good fit for one another. 

What is your number one piece of financial advice for any new business owner, and why?

Beyond attracting investors, our most significant obstacles at the start of our business came with building our technology. For example, designing one solution that could truly solve breastfeeding problems that women have been enduring for far too long! My business partner, Alexander, encouraged hiring top engineers from the word “go.” As you scale, this is extremely important. You need to surround yourself with people who believe in the mission as much as you do and are the best at doing the jobs you need. So, we set out to hire world-class designers who understood women's needs, placed them in the heart of the design process, and created beautiful products that offered women the best solution out there.

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Ariana Sokolov co-founder trill project interview

Op-ed Overview

The pandemic has been a lonely time for LGBTQ+ youth for those who do not live in supportive households, making the need for inclusive spaces outside of the home even more important. With the pandemic, connecting with people outside of the home has been particularly difficult and we’re seeing youth turn to safe digital spaces as an alternative. I’m reaching out on behalf of Apple to introduce you to Trill Project, an app created by a talented, up-and-coming teenage developer, Ariana Sokolov. The young, LGBTQ+ ally created the app to ensure her best friend, who came out as bisexual, had a safe space online to express herself. 

After hearing how hard it was for her friend to come out, Sokolov developed Trill – a combination of the words true and real – as an anonymous social network with no usernames (it uses various colors instead!) where everyone can freely and safely express themselves. Created by teenagers passionate about coding, the app provides a supportive community to make new connections and have authentic conversations. 

Timed to April’s Sexual Assault Awareness Month, Ari can draft an op-ed that speaks to:

• How the Trill Project creates a safe space for the LGBTQ+ community and why that is so important for this community specifically during April’s Sexual Assault Awareness Month

• Her allyship to the LGBTQ+ community and inspiration for creating the Trill Project

• How she came to become an advanced coder at such a young age

• How her experience at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference and Apple’s Entrepreneur Camp built her coding skills

 photos: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1x-SR7fAL5TWniGQ5NXtI_NnMpXAPTEeo

Can you tell us a bit about your background and what you were doing professionally before launching Trill Project?

I started coding when I accidentally walked into a computer science class at a summer camp when I was eight years old. I loved getting to combine my interest in math and design to create something from scratch, and this is what drew me to app development. Growing up, I used the coding resources Apple provides online to teach Swift classes to myself. 

Eventually, I was awarded a student scholarship to the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). And my love for developing apps only grew stronger. Through this, I was able to unlock a community of fellow app developers that loved to create apps that impacted the lives of others. I was privileged to have the support of Apple engineers in labs and attend talks at WWDC that were instrumental in allowing me to become the app developer I am today. 

I launched my business when I was 16 years old. Before that, I founded my own app development company and was working on projects for a variety of clients with my work being recognized by Apple, South by Southwest, and the U.S. Congress. 

What was the “lightbulb moment” for Trill Project? What inspired you to start your business and pursue this path?

After hearing about my friend’s struggle coming out as a bisexual teen, I rallied together my Girls Who Code Club, and we sent out an anonymous survey to LGBTQ+ teens across Tumblr. We asked users, “What would you say if nobody knew you were saying it?” Through grassroots marketing strategies, we received hundreds and then thousands of responses to this survey. Responses trickled in around stories of feeling unheard, isolated, and alone. 

We were stunned to see that many LGBTQ+ teens felt this way, especially in toxic digital spaces, so we decided to address the mental health issues affecting the LGBTQ+ community. After interviewing LGBTQ+ teens in our high school and learning from our friends how difficult their coming out experiences were, these early connections in customer discovery, who believed in my team and me enough to share their stories with us, became our first beta testers. Trill was designed collaboratively with 10,000 beta testers, and our users have trusted us from day one to listen without judgment and build this community for them, with them.

After working on Trill for a bit, we were accepted into Apple Entrepreneurship Camp. Here we were able to get tremendous feedback on the design and structure of our app to make it more meaningful to our users. We also learned how to integrate Machine Learning technology that would direct users to relevant crisis resources. These improvements that we made over the course of the program were very important to improving Trill.

An entrepreneurial career path is so special because it allows you to identify real problems in your life, like my friend’s struggles with her identity, and take action. I didn’t set out to be a founder necessarily, but I did seek out to solve a problem for my friend. And now I’m able to create technology that is used every day by my classmates, the online communities I belong to, and my generation as a whole.

Did you write a business plan? If so, was it helpful, and if not, what did you use to guide your business instead? Why did you take that approach?

My team and I participated in the Technovation Challenge, a global competition encouraging female-identifying high schoolers to build an app to solve a social problem. Through this, we were able to write our first business plan. 

In the words of Former President Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.” With regard to Trill, we actually have pivoted and evolved our business tons since participating in Technovation. That said, the process and exercise of taking time in the early days of our launch to consider moderation at scale, paid marketing campaigns, revenue strategies, and company culture was incredibly useful. If anything, writing a business plan gave us an opportunity to start thinking about some of the tough questions around building a business like how you make money and how you will grow community. Even if we didn't have all the answers when we first made our business plan, it gave us a solid foundation.

The primary guiding force we’ve always used when building our business (more than any business plan) is real-time user feedback. We are strong advocates for practicing collaborative and inclusive design processes that are user-centric. We’ve maintained a robust beta tester community with regular surveying, interviews, and focus groups to make sure we are building a product that users actually need, want, and are finding value in. 

How did you come up with the name Trill Project, and what are some of the things you considered during the naming process?

Trill is a combination of the words true and real. And Trill Project is an anonymous social network for mental health peer support. 

While it may seem counterintuitive, our experiences with Trill have given us the unique empathy and insight that anonymity and stepping away from whatever identities constrain you in the real world can actually allow you to more fully discover your true and real self. On Trill, we turn social media on its head. We replace followers with friends, emojis with True feelings, and selfies with Real people. 

We allow users to unlock their most authentic selves in a digital world, and it doesn’t happen overnight. The movement to make the internet a safer and more kind space for people from all walks of life is an ongoing process and project. It’s Trill Project. 

What were the immediate things you had to take care of to set up the business? 

Immediately after coming up with the idea for Trill, my first action item was to build out a team. My team and I believe in capitalizing on our strengths and hiring for our weaknesses. Personally, I am a technically minded individual and enjoy software development, graphic design, and product management. So I brought on a co-founder who was more inclined towards the world of operations and could handle marketing, external relations, and sales down the line. 

We worked right away to build team culture, setting expectations around responsibilities, commitments, and values. We did this by establishing workflow tools (GSuite, Trello, and Slack), setting up anonymous surveys for internal feedback, and identifying goals or OKRs for a given work sprint. We also collaboratively wrote community guidelines and strategized together on brand identity and company vision documents. With regard to logistics, we also had to set up our website, our social media channels, officially incorporate, and bring on an accountant and lawyer to advise us. 

What research did you do for the business beforehand? 

We were lucky to participate in an accelerator program in the early days of Trill. This gave us an excellent community right away to tap into for answers to questions around our business. We would recommend accelerators and incubators for first-time founders because it provides a valuable sense of structure, accountability, and routine. Additionally, you will be able to connect with other founders who can empathize in your journey and mentors and experts who are motivated to work with you.

How did you fund Trill Project? What were the challenges and what would you change? Would you recommend your funding route to other entrepreneurs today? 

We have been bootstrapped and only raised capital from equity-free sources such as pitch competitions and incubator programs. For us, this was the right decision and we wouldn't have changed anything around our fundraising journey. Given that we weren’t ready to work full-time on Trill and wanted to finish our college degrees, bootstrapping gave us the flexibility to run the business on our own terms and not feel pressured to grow in ways that weren’t authentic to our mission. 

I would recommend that founders take a critical look at what their ultimate goal is for their business. Do you want to grow very quickly? Is this a side hustle? Are you mission-oriented? Do you need capital to hit these goals? And then make educated decisions around fundraising from there. 

Do you pay yourself, and if so, how did you know what to pay yourself?

At this time, no one on Trill’s team takes a salary as we are all also still full-time students. 

How big is your team now, and what has the hiring process been like? Did you have any hiring experience before this venture? If not, how did you learn and what have you learned about it along the way?

Our team is now over 30 high school and college students from around the world all working as volunteers at Trill. Neither of us had any formal hiring experience since we started this venture so young, and for us the hiring process is something we put a lot of thought and care into. 

We recruit for our “trillternship” every new semester in the school year and during the summer. To do this we tap into women in tech groups we are a part of, personal connections, and outreach on campuses. We have a written component and interview process for all interested candidates. We evaluate possible hires not only based on their skill set but also their knowledge of Trill, support of our mission, and fit within our company culture and values. 

We’ve learned that it is critical to interview not just for skills but also for this mission alignment. Trill is a remote-first team, and most of us have never even met in person. Everyone is a volunteer. And so it’s important that we all like each other and the work that we’re doing. We conduct regular team satisfaction surveys and host a variety of team bonding socials such as movie nights, game nights, and showcases of our work. Our team is like a family, and we all support each other not only with our endeavors with Trill but also with our other academic and professional commitments and our own mental health and wellbeing. 

We are proud that our team is Gen-Z powered, BIPOC-owned, and majority female engineers. 

Did you hire an accountant? Who helped you with the financial decisions and setup?

We do have a bookkeeper who we are so grateful for! We would recommend finding and investing in a bookkeeper early on to keep all your expenses, taxes, etc. organized and in order. 

What has been the biggest learning curve during the process of establishing your business?

Learning how to manage running a business with also being a full-time student can be a challenge. We’ve discovered the importance of prioritization and sacrifice. As long as you and your team are on the same page around time commitments, goals, and accountability structures, then it is totally possible to be both a student and a business owner. In fact, college can actually be a great opportunity to take courses that make you a better entrepreneur, tap into professors as potential mentors, and network with classmates who may be future co-founders, hires, advisors, customers, or investors. 

How did you promote your company? How did you get people to know who you are and create buzz?

We first launched through a grassroots marketing campaign on Tumblr. From there, we have been growing our community organically mostly through socials. We have an active presence on all major platforms, and we work with influencers through our Trill Talks interview series who in turn promote our community to their audiences. We also have been able to achieve some wonderful press through various incubators and programs we’ve participated in, and we partner with other organizations as well for collaborative campaigns to mutually drive traction for each other’s products and missions. 

Do you have a business coach or mentor, and would you recommend one? 

Yes, we have a vibrant advisory board, and we definitely recommend building one out. Our business mentors give us tangible advice around our paid marketing campaigns, analytics tracking, moderation curriculum, and more. Additionally, our business mentors also offer less tangible advice sometimes, which can be just as useful. Such advice includes strategic input on time management, company vision, growth, and more. 

What is one thing you didn’t do during the setup process that ended up being crucial to the business and would advise others to do asap?

We only recently have started formally setting and sticking to company-wide OKRs. We would recommend that all business owners get into an early habit of goal setting collaboratively with team members. This allows for transparency around milestones, organization around prioritization and delegation, and accountability to hit your business goals.  

What is your number one piece of financial advice for any new business owner and why?

Protect your cap table with care. You will put so much time, energy, and love into your business, and you deserve to be an owner of the results of those efforts. Make sure you are building alongside teammates and investors who have been vetted and who share in your vision. 

Anything else to add?

Download Trill Project, and follow us on socials. Trill has a full schedule of upcoming Pride Month events, including social mixers, panels, and moderator orientations specific to LGBTQ+ issues. We're collaborating on these events with a variety of mental health and emotional wellness experts, including Blue Fever, a pocket-sized support group app centered around anonymous, judgment-free journaling for every chapter of life. Interested individuals can RSVP for our fireside chat on Mental Health for the LGBTQ+ Community here and for our “Ask Me Anything” Panel here.

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How Lesbians Who Tech & Allies Founder Leanne Pittsford Is Increasing LGBTQ Representation in Tech

Photo: Courtesy of Leanne Pittsford

Welcome to our monthly editorial series A Day in the Life where we ask successful women we admire to share the daily minutiae of their professional lives, from the rituals that set them up for success to their evening wind-down routines. This month, we caught up with Leanne Pittsford, founder of Lesbians Who Tech & Allies and Include.io, to talk about making the tech industry more inclusive, bringing LGBTQ women and non-binary tech folks together, and being included in Fast Company’s Queer 50.

Tell us a bit about Lesbians Who Tech & Allies and what inspired you to launch your business. What whitespace did you see in the market? What need did you want to fill?

Ha, such a big question. Basically, when I started my tech company back in the day, I struggled to find LGBTQ women as role models and peers. Every event I went to, I noticed LGBTQ women were missing from the conversation. I wanted to make sure our voices were represented and I knew if I struggled finding a community then maybe there were others who were looking for the same thing. Turns out, there were so many more than I originally anticipated. Since the start of Lesbians Who Tech & Allies, I’ve seen more communities coming together creating organizations to make tech more representative and it’s really impactful.

You’re also the founder of Include.io, a platform that connects diverse tech job seekers with great companies. What compelled you to launch this platform? 

I’ve always been involved in LGBTQ organizations and have made an active effort to continue creating conversations around representation and inclusion in workplaces, tech specifically. I was the senior director of equality in California, which led the fight against Prop 8 (which aimed to make same-sex marriage illegal). I kind of fell in love with tech after being so in the trenches with this campaign. The data, the community, and the passion is really what led to my career moves. Through shared experiences and talking with others, I realized that a lot of other queer tech folks experienced the same issues within the tech space.

Now, let’s talk about your workday routine! First, are you a night owl or a morning person? When do you do your most important work and why?

In my old life, I was a night owl. Now, post two babies, I am a whenever-the-coffee-hits-my-bloodstream person.  

What time does your alarm go off, and what’s the first thing you do upon waking?

What alarm? I am just breastfeeding all night right now. I typically just set a mental alarm. I take too much advantage of the snooze button when I use them. 

What does your morning, pre-work routine look like?

Feeding all the children and pups, and making my Moka pot coffee with beans from one of my favorite coffee shops.

Mark Twain said, “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.” What’s the first thing you do when you get to your desk?

I usually send a few voice notes to a few teammates to check-in for the day’s to-do list! 

What are you working on this week?

Pride Summit! We just launched the agenda today! 

What’s been the most rewarding part of running your business? 

My favorite part is being in the Castro Theatre with all of my people, and feeling the energy that only comes from thousands of LGBTQ women and non-binary folks getting together in one room. I never would’ve thought that something I started would end up being the largest LGBTQ professional event and the largest event for women in tech globally (last year, anyway). Not to mention this year’s Fast Company’s Queer 50. Knowing we are responsible for making the invisible, visible is everything. 

Do you ever reach inbox zero? How do you handle the constant influx of inquiries and communication founders are so familiar with?

Twice a year, usually two to three weeks after Summit. 

What is your go-to work lunch?

Cheez-Its.

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Tech Entrepreneur and Author Ali Kriegsman Shares Her WFH Secrets

Photo: Eva Zar Courtesy of Ali Kriegsman

Welcome to our monthly editorial series A Day in the Life where we ask successful women we admire to share the daily minutiae of their professional lives, from the rituals that set them up for success to their evening wind-down routines. This month we sat down with Ali Kriegsman, co-founder and chief operating officer of the venture-backed retail technology startup Bulletin and author of the forthcoming book “How to Build a Goddamn Empire,” which hits shelves on April 6th. Below, Kriegsman shares her unconventional definition of success, her go-to apps for staying organized, and her favorite WFH lunch.

Tell us a bit about your business. What whitespace did you see in the market that led you to found Bulletin? What need did you want to fill?

Bulletin is a premium wholesale marketplace where retailers go to discover and shop the best brands on the planet. Behind your favorite spas, wellness centers, cafes, boutiques, and gift shops is a whole hidden $300-billion wholesale economy you, the shopper, can’t see! Those stores—whether they’re physical retailers or online retailers—rely on various tools and services to discover brands and products their customers will love! Bulletin helps some of your favorite stores find the inventory they then sell to their end customers. We’re a business-to-business platform, meaning we don’t service individual consumers, but instead, we serve and support over 7,000 buyers and store owners who run these shops, and we have around 1,300 brands on our platform selling to these retail businesses. Our community is growing really quickly—and organically—so we’ll likely triple or quadruple those numbers by year’s end. 

We launched Bulletin’s wholesale marketplace because we actually used to be retailers ourselves! We were trying to solve our own pain point, while creating a more affordable way for the brands we loved to grow and scale, too. As a retailer running three stores in New York, we used so many different tools and platforms to find great brands and inventory—Instagram, Etsy, Joor—the list goes on. We felt like there wasn’t one cohesive place for us to discover, connect with, and source inventory from quality brands. So we built the solution we wanted to see in the world. Bulletin began as an e-commerce newsletter and pop-up concept in late 2014, early 2015—we did that for about two years before we ever opened our stores. And through that experience and those connections, we learned how insanely expensive it is for brands to get into retail.

Brands typically have to pay upwards of $30,00 (!!!) to showcase at a physical trade show to try and meet buyers. The operative word being “try;” there is literally no guarantee that if these brands pay that price tag, they’ll connect with or do business with retailers who attend. We also learned that vetting and paying for showrooms and wholesale reps was just as cumbersome and expensive for these brands. So with Bulletin’s wholesale marketplace solution, we kind of found a double whammy. 

We’d be able to help retailers like us find and source incredible inventory, and help level the playing field for independent brands all at the same time. We take a 15% cut on sales processed through our platform, so we literally only make money if we bring brands business. It is a wildly different format than the tradeshow, showroom, or wholesale rep route, and especially with COVID threatening those traditional retail channels, Bulletin has become a really attractive solution for brands and retailers alike.

Not only are you the co-founder and COO of Bulletin, but you’re also an author. Your first book, "How to Build a Goddamn Empire," hits shelves on April 6th. What compelled you to write this book and what do you hope people will take away from it?

When I was approached to write a book proposal, I actually knew exactly what I wanted the book to be about and the story I wanted to tell. As a first-time and inexperienced founder, I felt like I couldn’t relate to the glossy, glamorous entrepreneurs crowding my Instagram feed. I was 24 and I was seeing a lot of founders, especially female founders, posting incessantly about their wins whether it was press hits, awesome brand partnerships, rounds of funding. And honestly, I was doing the exact same thing! 

I think women entrepreneurs feel this pressure to be perfect. We’re fighting to hire great employees, maybe get some funding, secure those press hits and grow our businesses. Making everything seem rosy and easy can build that trust with your audience, and your customers, and I think women fear that being candid and vulnerable about the harder and more taxing psychological parts of entrepreneurship might put that growth or your reputation at risk. At least, that’s how I felt. And a few investors even told me that. Once I started getting more candid about my fear of failure, anxiety, depressive episodes, and struggles with our pivot from running stores to running a full-blown tech company, a female investor actually asked me to be a bit less “candid” lest I make the wrong impression or lead people to think I don’t know what I’m doing. She actually went so far as to tell me to “be more like X founder, be more like Y founder” and I found it really disheartening. 

But I didn’t listen. I decided to do the opposite.

I knew first-hand that building something from nothing is a confusing and emotional challenge you sign up for every single day. It's unglamorous, taxing, and endlessly stressful. It's a constant, dirty fight with your imposter syndrome and the intense fear that if things don’t work out, you've failed miserably. And publicly. I wanted to tell that story, so that if other business owners were suffering or worrying they’d fail, or that they were too incompetent to make their dreams happen, they could read my book and feel seen and supported. I wanted to create a counter-narrative to Instagram entrepreneurship and this glamorized hustle we’ve all come to know all too well.

So, while in the thick of scaling my business and a stressful pivot, I decided to write about my experience in real-time. I started writing the book in 2017 and finished it at the end of 2020. I was running retail stores in 2017 and 2018, a tech company by late 2019, and obviously had to stay alive and scale despite the pandemic in 2020. For that reason, the book really reads like both a relatable "how-to" guide and a candid personal diary (deep breaths), because it was written directly from the trenches and from the heart.

The book also features stories from over 30 other female founders who have built companies of radically different stages and sizes, too. By using the questions I'm most frequently asked as my guideposts, I offer candid insights into the nuts and bolts of building a brand from scratch—discussing early failures, picking the right co-founder, securing press, finding funding —to give entrepreneurs the tools that will help take their ideas to the next level. I feature interviews with incredible founders like Meena Harris of Phenomenal Woman, Trinity Mouzon Wofford of Golde, and Polly Rodriguez of Unbound. I’m so inspired by all of the women who are featured.

Most importantly, though, I am really trying to help founders, and especially women, redefine the word "success" with every single chapter. There is intrinsic and long-term value to building something of your own, whether you sell your company, crash and burn, or forever teeter on the precipice. My book argues that "success" has many faces, and sometimes learning, growing, and building something on your own terms makes you successful enough. You don’t need to get caught up in your impostor syndrome, compare yourself to other founders, or worry you’re not going to “make it.” I want more women business owners to love and appreciate the journey, rather than being so hard on themselves and thinking they don’t have what it takes to climb to the top. 

“Building something from nothing is a confusing and emotional challenge you sign up for every single day. It's unglamorous, taxing, and endlessly stressful.”

—Ali Kriegsman, Co-Founder and COO of Bulletin and Author of “How to Build a Goddamn Empire”

Are you a night owl or a morning person? When do you do your most important work and why?

I’m a total night owl. Sometimes I get wild bursts of energy at 11 PM and have to force myself to relax and get ready for bed. I wake up every morning at around 7:45 AM or 8 AM and relish cuddling with my dog and being lazy in the sheets for a while. The mornings are so precious to me. I use them to get my head straight rather than get work done. Candidly, though, sometimes if I’ve been working like crazy at night I sleep in until 9:30 AM and just own it. I used to have a nagging voice guilting me for sleeping in on a workday, but I’ve moved past that now.

I do my most important work after 7:30 PM or so when my entire team logs off. I find Slack to be extremely helpful but also very distracting, and I’ve always been someone with a limited attention span, so Slack culture really messes with me.

I love using Sundays to write. It was really tricky to juggle building a tech platform and pivoting Bulletin while writing this book. I found that Sunday mornings were the best times to write or get more “heady” and strategic work done. I’m using Sunday morning to answer questions for this interview as we speak!

What time do you get up? What’s the first thing you do upon waking?

I usually get up at around 8:00 AM. I’ll either roll around and cuddle with my dog, Winnie, if my boyfriend has taken her out already. If not, I’ll lazily throw on my shoes and a light jacket and take her for a nice walk. When I get back, I’ll feed the pup and get some coffee brewing.

I try to squeeze in a workout before my team logs on at 10 AM. I’ll do Chloe Ting or 305 Fitness, or just blast BLACKPINK and dance and lunge around my apartment. Now that it’s getting nice out, I’ll swap that for a beautiful run in Fort Greene park!

What does your morning, pre-work routine look like?

I’ll brew some coffee or make some iced coffee with Grady's (the best) and oat milk, decide what type of workout I want to do, and make a to-do list for the day. I always make a to-do list before my team logs on in the morning so I have my priorities straight and know what I need to cover or check-in with each of my direct reports. I use a platform called Notion to manage all my personal lists, thoughts, and priorities.

I always put on a podcast while I shower after my workout, usually “The Daily” by The New York Times or NPR’s “Up First,” so I can catch up on the news. My shower time in the morning is super relaxing and I love taking my time.

I’ve just started meditating, too, which has been a nice addition to my morning routine. I’m not doing anything crazy quite yet, but I’ve found a few great meditation videos on YouTube that I’ll queue up. It definitely helps calm and center my mind before the hectic workday, where I’m usually in back-to-back meetings and fighting for a quick break!

Mark Twain said, “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.” What’s the first thing you do when you get to your desk?

I clean out my inbox. I am obsessed with maintaining my inbox and keeping everything tagged and organized. I need a visual anchor for what’s going on, what’s urgent, and who needs what.  If I don’t clean out my inbox (I mean, honestly that literally never happens because I’ve been doing it for years now) but if I didn’t, I’d be a HOT MESS. My brain has to get it done before I can move on and focus on anything else!

What are you working on this week?

I’m launching my book in less than a week and also hiring about ten people to the Bulletin team. So my main focus this week is building out our hiring pipeline for all of our open roles, moving interviewees and candidates we love through the funnel and continuing to finesse our new org structure and role guidelines. As for the book, I’m prepping influencer book mailers, writing dozens and dozens of thank-you cards for those mailers, coordinating press with my publicist, creating assets for all the panels we’re hosting for the digital book tour, and just trying to keep the launch train on track. I actually love hiring and recruiting and I’m loving all of the work associated with the book launch, so even though it’s a lot, I’m in a great place and groovin’ along.

What’s been the most rewarding part of running your business? The most challenging?

The most rewarding part of running my business is managing our incredible team, and building a technology product together. We work with so many employees, particularly women, that have been with us for nearly three years and who have just grown and blossomed into such remarkable assets for the company. And they’ve become amazing role models and influences to the more junior employees on the team. I actually went into Bulletin thinking I’d despise management. I’m somewhat of a lone wolf and have always been that way. I was the girl who took over group projects and has always loved juggling various roles and responsibilities solo. But helping these women evolve, learn new skills, and come into their own as leaders and managers has been such a blessing.

The most challenging part of running my business is honestly just keeping my head up. This stuff is really hard. Building a tech company and running a tech platform that thousands of people are using every day is a new journey, for sure. I am on the front-lines with our customers because I run our Growth Team, and my team is in charge of growing our revenue month over month and hitting our targets. I get impatient when we can’t develop or fix the product fast enough. I get anxious when we get negative customer feedback. The pressure to keep growing and to deliver excellence to our customers is something I take really seriously. Sometimes I wear the pressure well and sometimes I just don’t. I’m working on it, but yes, I think the most challenging part of building a technology company and growing this platform is staying positive, light, and optimistic when things go wrong.

Do you ever reach inbox zero? How do you handle the constant influx of inquiries and communication entrepreneurs are so familiar with?

I never reach inbox zero. I try to set boundaries with myself and with my team. My team now knows what to email me about versus what to Slack me about. We try to use other tools like Monday and Coschedule for project management so we aren’t bombarded with Slacks or emails left and right.

I have gotten really good about blocking off time on my calendar when I need a strategy session or a break from the Slack craziness. In those blocks, my team knows I’m head down working on a project or chatting and planning with Alana, my co-founder, so they don’t ping me or communicate with me during those times. 

I’ve gotten comfortable with the fact that I’ll never be at inbox zero, especially during COVID. People, myself included, are juggling a lot and just trying to stay above water. Maybe pre-COVID I wouldn’t let certain emails sit in my inbox for days on end, but now, I’m all about prioritizing who I get back to first and why, but I’m also good at prioritizing myself and choosing to shut my laptop off at 8 PM instead of feeling the pressure to get back to everybody so urgently.

“There is intrinsic and long-term value to building something of your own, whether you sell your company, crash and burn, or forever teeter on the precipice.”

—Ali Kriegsman, Co-Founder and COO of Bulletin and Author of “How to Build a Goddamn Empire”

Photo: Eva Zar Courtesy of Ali Kriegsman

What is your go-to work lunch?

I typically microwave some frozen brown rice, make a Beyond Meat breakfast sausage patty (it's SO good), and throw it on top of the rice with half an avocado and a runny egg!

I also make salmon a LOT because it’s so insanely easy. It’s a great thing to have in the fridge if you have a busy schedule but want to eat healthy and avoid spending too much cash on delivery. I buy a ton of frozen salmon fillets and keep them in the freezer, so I can easily defrost them and bake them for 30 min on 300 degrees for dinner. Sometimes, for lunch, I’ll do that leftover salmon mixed with some lemon and mayo, and slap it on some multigrain toast. Tuna salad, watch your back - there’s a new fishy salad in town.

Okay, last one. I also always have Tyson crispy chicken in the freezer. I am a total sucker for chicken tenders, crispy chicken fingers, and pretty much crunchy crispy oily chicken in any form. I’ll pop a Tyson tender in the oven for 20 minutes, and then put it in a whole wheat wrap with avocado, my favorite Kensington garlic sauce, some arugula, and some melted cheese. It’s absolutely delicious, pretty healthy, and satisfies all my cravings. 

What advice do you have for balancing the minutiae of day-to-day tasks with big-picture planning?

I am honestly somewhat bad at this and am trying to get better. Because we’re growing so quickly and hiring and building, I get pulled a zillion different ways and have so many tasks that pile up throughout the day. It is a big goal of mine to continue to delegate more, build in time for myself to think and strategize, and get myself out of the minutiae as much as I can.

What are some work habits that help you stay healthy, productive, and on track to reach your goals?

I have been making to-do lists and priority lists for as long as I can remember. I keep different to-do lists in Notion for my book, my personal life, Bulletin, and even keep a real-time log of my thoughts as they come up, whether it about my career, my team, work, or whatever. I find that my mind tends to race a lot so I’m able to stay productive by translating all my thoughts to paper and getting them out of the ether of my mind.

I’m also good about making time for myself, even if I can only squeeze in two or three hours to myself a day. I make time to work out, I make time to go outside and on walks in the park with my boyfriend and my dog. I make time to cook, which I find super relaxing. I make time to listen to music I love and watch compelling documentaries or movies or TV shows. I don’t believe in the endless hamster wheel and have had a full breakdown before when I work too hard and don’t make that time for myself. Rest is important. Scheduling time to relax and process your life is important. And doing it consistently is key! Don’t just make time for yourself when you feel you’re about to erupt. Do it on the daily so you prevent those breakdowns from boiling over. 

Any favorite apps you use regularly?

I use a new platform called Norby to organize all of my link-in-bio information and also manage and promote all the digital events I have coming up for my book. It is so insanely easy to use and it is such a flexible and intuitive platform that I’m able to run so much of my life on it. It’s great.

I obviously use Instagram a lot because I’m running a business and launching a book, but I’m trying to be a bit more mindful of how often I end up aimlessly scrolling and comparing myself to other people. Trying to pivot to use IG for business-only, and really reclaim my free time and headspace! For business, though, I use Canva and Planoly to design and plan my content. I am obsessed with both and find them both really easy to use.

I use Hotel Tonight if I need to get away. I use it once every two months or so and book myself an affordable hotel room in NYC or Brooklyn. I love my boyfriend and my pup and our life in Fort Greene is delightful, but with COVID, I find myself getting this urge to break away and get a change of scenery. Hotel Tonight makes it super easy and I’m usually able to find a hotel for around $100 bucks for the night. I’ll order Seamless to my room and totally indulge and bring a bottle of wine and just chill. It is a miracle app and it has been such a source of self-care for me.

What are you reading, watching, or listening to right now to help you wind down at the end of the day?

I am obsessed with: “The Great British Bake Off,” “Law and Order SVU,” “Ted Lasso” (SO GOOD), “Criminal Minds,” and cheesy true crime Lifetime movies. Honestly, throw me a true-crime documentary, an upbeat buddy comedy, a melodramatic movie about a cult, or a dark psychological thriller and I’m good to go. I’m also a total sucker for WW2 in Color documentaries or mini-series. I watch a LOT of history shows. Sometimes I like watching TV shows and movies that are super mindless and really let my brain release. Other times I like learning and digesting information. It varies.

As for what I’m listening to, I just finished a crazy podcast called “Mommy Doomsday” from Dateline. It’s true crime. Absolutely wild. I also listen to a lot of political podcasts like “Pod Save America,” “Pod Save the World,” and just started “Us&Them” and “Sway!”

As for what I’m reading, I have a rotating list! I just finished Leigh Stein’s “Self Care” and am in the middle of Jenny Odell’s “How to Do Nothing” which I’ll dip into during the week, usually with a bath and a glass of wine. I am reading “Caste” by Isabel Wilkerson on Sundays when I want more time to read. I’m about to dig into “More than Enough” by Elaine Welteroth and if I’m feeling spooky I’ll pick up “The Perfect Nanny” by Leïla Slimani. It is so, so scary but so captivating. 

When do you go to bed? What’s your “optimal” number of sleep hours?

I need at least 7 1/2 hours. My body doesn't function the same with less than 7 1/2 hours. I get cranky, I’m more sluggish and lazy and my whole energy is off. My boyfriend can sleep like 5 hours and be fine which *blows my mind.*

Lately, because I have a book launch coming up and Bulletin’s been crazy, I’ve been working from 9 AM to 10 PM or so. I need about two hours of me-time every day at least, so I usually end up going to sleep at 12:45 AM or 1 AM. I wish I could go to bed earlier, and under normal circumstances, I would, but as a night owl, I get my best book and Bulletin work done from 7 PM to 10 PM, so I need that 10-to-midnight window to do my thing and chill before passing out.

What’s the most rewarding part of your day?

Ending a long, bustling day with my boyfriend and my dog, turning my phone on silent, and cozying up to a book or dinner and a documentary. I cherish my free time so insanely much because as I’ve advanced in my career, that “me” time window gets smaller and smaller. I’ve learned and accepted that sometimes, you go through massive “sprints” in your life where you’re lacking the right balance of work, play, and chill. Right now, I’m in one of those sprints. I feel so extremely fortunate to be launching a book and running a company, and I know there’s a light at the end of the tunnel once this book is out the door and Bulletin has settled into this new growth phase. But for now, I have mini “lights” at the end of every day’s tunnel because I have a partner and a pup who embrace me at night, hold me, shower me in love, and make the day’s stresses disappear.

“How to Build a Goddamn Empire” by Ali Kriegsman

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Meet the Woman Whose Job Affects the Way 2.5 Billion People Communicate on a Daily Basis

How many times have you peered voyeuristically into the lives of people you admire via social media and wondered what it must be like to do their job? We’ve all been down that research rabbit hole on our quest to create and cultivate the career of our dreams, but often we’re still left pondering the realities of their day-to-day—so, what is it really like? In our editorial series I Want Your Job, we uncover the truth by getting into the nitty-gritty details about what it’s actually like to work in your quote-unquote “dream job” and if the reality stacks up to the expectation. 

Photo: Courtesy of Jennifer Daniel

To say Jennifer Daniel’s work affects a lot of people is an understatement. As the creative director for Android and Google emoji, she designs the emoji anyone who uses an Android device can choose from to express themselves—which is over 2.5 billion people. (Yes, that’s billion with a “b.”) And she doesn’t take that influencer lightly. “I see my responsibility working on emoji to have a lot of parallels with how dictionaries operate,” says Daniel. “Like lexicographers, we’re not looking to invent or create new concepts. Instead, we look at the world—both forward and backward and observe how people communicate,” she explains. “Language is fluid, but if we see patterns or trends that aren’t transient and seem to have stuck, we formally recognize it by emojifying it.”

Recently, Create & Cultivate caught up with Daniel to talk about her impressive career, including what a typical workday looks like for the creative director, which (spoiler alert) doesn’t exist. (“Before this chat, I just got off the phone with a doctor in Cambridge to vet the heart and lung emoji to make sure they’re anatomically correct,” she tells us.) And though her days may not be “typical,” Daniel wouldn’t have it any other way. “I need a job that keeps me on my toes,” she says. “If I’ve gotten to the point where I'm not learning new things, it might be time to find a new job.” Ahead, she also fills us in on getting her start, working her way up from entry-level designer to graphics editor at The New York Times, and why her peers are her greatest professional influences.

How did you get your foot in the door in the tech industry and land where you are today as the creative director for Google's emoji program?

In high school, I was torn between going to a big university to become a lawyer and going to art school. In the end, I ended up at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) which was basically four years of summer camp. It was there that I learned that graphic design was something other than adding lens flares to compositions in Photoshop. After graduation, I spent ten years on and off at The New York Times, originally starting as a designer and working my way up to a graphics editor. I never ever thought I would leave New York but when my partner got a job offer on the West Coast, I suddenly found myself in ‘Frisco. After a rant about the design scene in San Francisco went viral, I heard from Google. 

What did you study in school? How has that prepared you for your job now? 

I ended up studying graphic design, which was something I wasn’t familiar with before MICA. In middle school, they pass out these occupational surveys, I’m not sure how common they are now, but when I turned it in, the recommendation was to become a parole officer. It wasn’t until I was in college that I was introduced to the notion of specialties beyond what is described in Busy Town. My sophomore year at MICA I met Nicholas Blechman (the current creative director of The New Yorker, and previously an art director at The New York Times) who was a guest teacher. He taught a class called “Polemic Image” and lectured about the history of political art and illustration and I was like, “Ohhhhhhh, you can do graphic design and illustration at the same time?" And, you could make it newsy? That’s a job?” At our midterm review, he looked at my portfolio and took out a poster, and asked if he could have it. And I sassily replied something like he could have it if I could follow him to New York and be his intern. One of the best summers of my life living in my grandmother’s attic in Flushing and commuting to Chinatown every day.

Did you intern before landing your first “real” job? If so, where, and how did that prepare you? Would you recommend it to others coming up behind you?

I interned with Christoph Nieman and Nicholas Blechman for a number of years. After I graduated, Nicholas took a job at The New York Times and asked if I would join him as his assistant. This ultimately turned into my career as I know it. 

"In the industries I work in, there’s a lack of women in what my friends and I call the 'just-ahead-of-me group.' So, I’d say my peers are the strongest influences in my life."

—Jennifer Daniel, Creative Director for Android and Google Emoji

What does your day-to-day look like as the creative director for Google's emoji program? Does the reality of the job stack up to your expectations?

The process of creating emoji—from idea to when they land on your phone—takes a couple of years so there’s no day-to-day routine. My days change depending on where we are in the process. Are we in the strategy phase? The proposal reviews? The design? The research? I guess one thing every day has in common is how I am routinely surprised. This is something really important to me. Perhaps because I worked in a newsroom and every day was truly different, but I need a job that keeps me on my toes. I hope everyone has some equivalent of learning something new in their occupation. If I’ve gotten to the point where I'm not learning new things, it might be time to find a new job. 

When I first started working on emoji, I thought, “Are any of these adding anything of value to how we communicate digitally?” And as I got more involved in the emoji sub-committee and started reading proposals, I realized that each proposal is coming from someone who looked at their keyboard and couldn’t find a way to articulate something that normally comes naturally to them. That is deeply primal—the desire to be seen and heard and recognized and understood—and that has changed my perspective. The more I learn how people use emoji has also changed what I prioritize and how I look at things. 

You have what many would consider a dream job. What are some of the common misconceptions people get wrong about your role? Why?

People may assume Google gets to choose the emoji that are encoded, but in truth, that’s up to an independent non-profit standards body called the Unicode Consortium. As a member, I’m on the sub-committee that is responsible for emoji. It’s truly collaborative. Another part of my job that surprises most folks is how much time I spend talking to experts to make sure that the emoji are authentic. Before this chat, I just got off the phone with a doctor in Cambridge to vet the heart and lung emoji to make sure it’s anatomically correct. 

Your job affects the way people on over 2.5 billion devices communicate on a daily basis. That’s a staggering number—How do you view the responsibility that comes with Google’s wide reach? What initiative/project within Google’s emoji program are you most proud of?

I see my responsibility working on emoji to have a lot of parallels with how dictionaries operate. Like lexicographers, we’re not looking to invent or create new concepts. Instead, we look at the world—both forward and backward and observe how people communicate. Language is fluid, but if we see patterns or trends that aren’t transient and seem to have stuck, we formally recognize it by emojifying it.

What advice would you give to young professionals trying to break into your industry? How hard is it? What key traits and characteristics does it take to work in your industry?

Just be you. As women, we’re told over and over again to lean in, but that frequently puts us in positions that are structurally unsuited and hostile. This touches on every part of the job, even seemingly trivial things like tone in emails. Research has shown that women don’t use emoji professionally or aren’t friendly in emails, because they’re taken less seriously if they do. I understand and also reject it. Our humanity is essential to effective communication. Don't use enough emoji and you're seen as hostile. Use too many and you're seen as unprofessional. It's a lose-lose. So, forget it. Just be yourself.

Photo: Courtesy of Jennifer Daniel

Can you share one woman who paved the way for you to be where you are today? How are you paying it forward and helping other women who are coming up behind you? 

In the industries I work in, there’s a lack of women in what my friends and I call the “just-ahead-of-me group.” So, I’d say my peers are the strongest influences in my life. The artists, writers, and designers I’ve met along the way are incredibly motivating and inspiring. And, for those moments where things feel highly discouraging, well, I hope everyone has friends who pump them up like mine do because it rules.

What’s the hardest decision you’ve ever had to make? And how did you turn it into an opportunity?

For me, that was moving to San Francisco. I thought that I was going to stay in New York and I still miss it. I left a place I truly never thought I would leave. But, I guess that’s the point. Just when I think I know the answer to something, I probably don’t. Trying new things isn’t scary to me. Nothing is permanent. And, if ‘Frisco doesn’t work out I can always move back. 

What books do you recommend people read to get a foot in the door in your industry?

Throw out all your UX books. For me, I gravitated towards linguistics and science and social sciences. Those are the sections of bookstores that I go to. If you really want one book recommendation, go pick up “Because Internet” by Gretchen McCulloch is a must-read if you are interested in internet linguistics. 

What podcasts do you recommend people listen to?

I listen to about a hundred podcasts. I am the kind of person who listens and absorbs as much as possible. A few of my favorites: “Infinite Monkey Cage,” “Getting Curious,” and “The Daily.” 

What’s one thing you wish you’d known when you were first starting out? 

That I know nothing. I am a completely different person than I was ten years ago, and ten years before that. We are constantly reinventing ourselves and learning.

What is your best work hack or productivity tip? How do you get it all done?

I create clear boundaries. When I go home, I don’t open my computer unless I’m watching a movie. I do think about work. I might listen to a podcast as I go to sleep and think about how that applies to what I’m working on. But generally, I don’t work at home. I wake up very early, around 5 am, walk the dog, and ok I admit I do respond to emails but I’m a morning person so I like to get a lot done in the morning. Setting boundaries between my work and personal life helps me be my best self in both places and is something I would recommend trying. 

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These Women Keep Us Smiling on a Daily Basis

A catalyst for happiness.

Naomi Hirabayshi and Marah Lidey co-founders and co-CEOs of Shine met while working at DoSomething.Org. Spurned perhaps by the company name as well as a mutual desire to “provide an accessible solution to wellbeing," the duo developed a daily text messaging service to address our shadowy negative thoughts. Instead of letting them lurk in the dark corners, Naomi and Marah wanted to normalize the struggle, the day-to-day hustle of life. 

With a background in advertising, where she “built an understanding of the value of an impression” and “how much people will pay for exposure,” Naomi was able to convert that information while at DoSomething. Calling it “the most formative step” in her career, prior to starting Shine, Naomi built “an expertise in the power of messaging to reach people around issues they care about.” As the Director of Mobile Products & Messaging at the company, Marah likewise lead a team to create engaging digital experiences to encourage young people to make an impact on their community. She also oversaw and lead the creation of the organization’s mobile apps. 

Naomi says, “In our friendship we were able to process work and life goals together because of the shared trust, admiration, and accessibility. What’s amazing is that our dynamic was both the catalyst for the product, and our dynamic was also the perfect breeding ground to become co-founders.” 

Shine became the way for the the co-founders to scale the support they offered each other through a product. It also became a way to provide an accessible solution for wellbeing services. 

At the beginning of this year Marah and Naomi launched a new campaign, called #ResolutionRealTalk. In celebration of the New Year, #ResolutionRealTalk works to remind people to practice self-compassion around 2017 goals. The co-CEOs explain that 80% of New Year resolutions fail by the second week of February. Self-compassion is one of the primary ways to stay on track. “Our goals often aren’t sustainable,” explains Marah. “Change is hard overnight, and when we set unrealistic, binary milestones for ourselves and subsequently struggle to reach them in a short timeframe, we crash and burn.” With a record number of millennial women leaving their jobs, Naomi and Marah want to prevent the work-and-burn crisis that is affecting their generation. 

“The things that are the hardest are hard, because they’re worth it.”

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Along this journey Naomi says her kindness was often perceived as weakness, but knows that often “the things that are the hardest are hard, because they’re worth it.” Acknowledging that Mindy Kaling's message of ‘Why not me?', really resonated with her, "as a woman, a woman of color, and an entrepreneur.” 

In their personal lives most everything is currently taking a backseat to Shine. With the goal of making their messaging service “the largest platform for millennials and well-being,” they admit to being “all in on Shine.” 

With 93% of users reporting that they are more confident and have seen an uptick in daily happiness and mental health, the future looks brights (and female) with Shine. 

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