Soledad O'Brien & Ian Freeman | Bridging the Equality Gap

My very first live shot ever, three days in, I was sent to a bar, I'm in there drinking, and so I started talking and one of the people standing behind me pinched me on the behind in my first live shot ever, where you literally lose control of your body, where you're like with that happened. Please welcome Solidad O'Brien, everybody! Solidad is a former anchor of CNN, MSNBC. She started her own production company, where she now produces matter of fact with Solidad O'Brien. Attacking the issue's head on, making it right, is it as simple as money? Yes, we need more funding. Standing by is no longer an option. It's fun for me to hear you say that because I know the real size for it. One thing that has helped make me successful, I would pick flexibility. It's a really good skill in being a reporter where you go out and you think, all right, I'm going to go do a story on next, I remember, heading to do a story after the Haiti earthquake. And all of a sudden, we saw a big truck pull-up cut across the highway, basically. Four guys get out with a battering ram in front of a bank, and they ram their way into a bay where like, I guess we've got a different story today. When I first started this business, I understood that the failure rate in our business was 90%. What do you mean by that? How do you fail 90% of the time? People who start in our business got 9 out of 10, they don't make it live years. Why is that? It's hard. People think if you sell something, that's the end of your job. Your job doesn't start until there's a claim. That's when you know if you did your job correctly. So to me, it was always about great frame rate running a year ago from someone. He said, nobody ever learned nothing when they were talking. Welcome to Success Story. I'm your host, Scott Clary. The Success Story podcast is part of the HubSpot podcast network. 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I think like most people have been around a minute. I've had a lot of inflection points, but if I had to pick kind of the first important one, it would be in college deciding that I wasn't going to go to med school. Because my entire life, probably, well, I was only 20, so 10 of the 20 years that I've been around, I had really sort of planned to go to med school. One, I grew up in Long Island, middle-class family, and it was definitely like a big stamp of approval by your community, doctor being a doctor. It was a big deal. That's what I want to do. So I'd worked in a nursing home, I worked as a candy striper, I'd worked in a pharmacy. I actually had my certified nursing AIDS documents. I was an official CNA, and so all those things, by the way, make you're getting paid as a real healthcare worker pretty early on. And that was my path, and I did it. I would love to say I did it for the greater good, but I really did it to build a resume that would look good as I was applying to medical school. But then when I started taking classes, some of them, biology, I was always pretty strong, and I took organic chemistry with my sister, who is a surgeon, actually right now, so you could see it worked for one of us and did not work for the other one of us. And I remember her telling me, she's a really brilliant, brilliant scientist, and she said, like, I don't understand why you memorize all this stuff. You should be able to deduce the formula of a line, let's say, you know, Y equals Mx plus B. And I remember thinking, like, I just didn't even understand what she was talking about. I genuinely had no concept of, like, understanding the science so well that you were adding value just because you got it versus, like, I'm a good student, I can memorize and regurgitate it. And I think having someone sort of point out, like, I can see that you are not actually passionate about this thing. You're good at it, you can applaud your way through it, you can make it happen, but you actually don't want to fully understand it. And I thought that was really, really helpful to me. And so that really probably was my very first inflection point. I left school, I didn't really know what I was going to do, and I started working at a TV station. And it was there, kind of in the middle of not knowing, like, oh my gosh, last 10 years I've been focused on going to med school, not knowing what I wanted to do that helped me realize, like, oh, this other thing, working in a TV station, not, you know, being very low on the totem pole. So I was, I was removing staples, I was answering phones, I was getting people, I literally was a person who said, do you want fries with that kind of thing? You know, so all those things, and I love the environment. And I sort of got what it meant to be passionate about a thing, even when you're in the lowest crappiest job. And so I think that for me, probably was my very first and probably most important turning point. I love that. And Ian, where, you know, where did you come from? Were you always looking for a career in finance, a life in finance, when you're growing up? That's, go ahead. Hardly, from the, well, the interesting perspective there is finance wasn't part of growing up because we didn't have any. So it was always an interesting thing that, you know, when you don't, and you're not around it, you don't understand it. And I'll never forget this. So I actually went on scholarship to a private junior high school. And then seventh grade, I was going to a party at one of the kids' houses, my mother drove me. And I literally asked her, how many families live in this house? Because I had never seen house that size. And all I saw was apartments in New York, and the 800 square feet that five of us lived in. So I didn't understand yet. So the interesting part of that is when I went to college, I think the inflecture point is interesting because I had an interdisciplinary major of government history economics and philosophy. So of course, your first job out of school would be a banker, right? I mean, I had no, I went, the job that I took was the first one that offered me a job. Now it was a job that I took. And it was in New York. It was a commercial lender in the Garmin Center in New York City. Okay. And this was, yeah, I'm dating myself here, but it was 1980 when the primary got in 1981 to 21.5%. People think interest rates are high today. Okay. I think they're high today. And so you learn, I learned a lot. And I enjoyed it to a point. And then I had one of my clients basically say, why don't you come work with us? And what do you know at that point, if somebody offers you a dollar more, you go, you know, that's at that point in your life. And then I did that for a little bit. And then one of my clients in Wall Street offered me a job. And I did that. And it just was not fulfilling. So the inflection point really is the fact that I went back to banking in Connecticut. My parents had gotten divorced. I wanted to live near my mom to help her. And I got a job at banking in Connecticut. I was there for a year realizing there's just nothing in this that's giving me any gratitude, gratification, anything. And I just said, I don't want to go through the rest of my life like that. So that point says, okay, let's see we can start this. And fortunately, we're still here. You know, you both operate at the, at the highest levels of your industries. And I'm very curious if you were going to just give advice because we have two very different industries. And you're both our friends, you know, the close friends for a long time. And you have, you know, one of you has a background of median television and broadcasting, the other one in finance. But there's obviously these mindset shifts that have allowed you to get to where you are today. And I find that, you know, even when there's two wildly different industries as somebody is successful in, you know, those mindset shifts, those are industry agnostic. So for both of you, just to pass over some lessons to people that are listening, what are those mindset shifts that have allowed you to get you to where you are? If I had to pick one thing that has helped make me successful, I would, I would pick a flexibility. It's a really good skill in being a reporter where you go out and you think, all right, I'm going to go do a story on X. I remember getting to Haiti and heading to do a story on an orphanage. This was after the Haiti earthquake in 2005. And I think it was 2005. And all of a sudden, we saw a big truck pull-up cut across the highway, basically. Four guys get out with a battering ram in front of a bank. And with the battering ram, they ram their way into a paper like, oh, I guess we've got a different story today. But you know, it's very typical in journalism, especially you're coming a lot of live news that, you know, what you think you're going out to cover is going to change, whether your boss is on the assignment desk, you just tell you, whether you see something more interesting, or you're in the middle of the interview that you had planned to do, and you're hearing someone reframe the issue so dramatically, you think, oh my gosh, I'm completely wrong. Like my thoughts on this were just off. So I think that's helped me both in just being a journalist, but also in life, I'm very much a, there's a plan A that doesn't work, we turn to plan B, plan B doesn't work, you turn to plan C. When I was a kid, my mom used to say, you know, everybody gets the same 24 hours. And, you know, what you need to do, if something goes wrong, somebody breaks up with you, you have a little heart break, you have something sad happens to you, take your 24 hours, like boohoo, all you want. But then hour 25, you know, start making lists and figuring out pros and cons, and what do I want to do next? So I'm a big list maker, I'm a big believer in like focus and wallow and be miserable for 24 hours, and then come out the other side a bit. Pretty fast, you got to start working on, okay, plan A is not going to happen. It is just not going to happen. What's plan B? And how can I leverage everything out of plan B to make it the most successful thing that it could be? And I think I've just naturally always been very good at, nope, that's not happening. We turn this way. And those would probably be the real keys to, for me, being successful because you don't get stuck in something that's not going well and you don't blame yourself and you don't suck every, I do actually for 24 hours straight. I drag everyone 25 hours. Everyone around me comes down and I'm and bed eating the hog and dogs and crying like a baby. But then, you know, but then I literally just start saying, okay, like what does this look like next? And that's a really, really helpful skill and a very learnable skill, you know, it is a learnable skill to say, okay, start making a list. And you know, how about yourself? What was one of those mindset things that helped you get to where you are today? So you'll see where we're friends, by the way, and just at the risk of embarrassing my friend, as consummated professional, as so that she's an even better person by light years. So you have to understand that it's fun for me to hear, say that because I know the real side of her as, and she knows the real side of you. Yeah, you got to, you got both, by the way, you have to call each other out. So somebody is like saying, oh, this is what I do. Like, this is my routine. This is, you know, like, this is what I do when I wake up in the morning. If that's not true, I want to know it. I never have a cocktail. I work every morning. Hold on. Go for five mile runs. Like, if that's not, that's me. Yes. You'll never worry about so that is calling me out if you need to. That will not be important to you. So, but for me, it actually was really when I kind of changed the jobs. And, you know, you're starting, this is more a career than a job. And when you start to realize, kind of quickly, and there's, there's certain things that happen in this, I don't know, the tele quick story, but you start to realize that there's something out there bigger than you when you're doing this work. So if someone's my client, what's important to them is much more than important than what's important to me. And you have to think like that. And that mindset shift carries through to everything that you do because that's where your belief and your passion comes on to make sure that's right. Because in my line of work, if something goes wrong and we haven't done it correctly, it's a serious problem. You have to be on every day with that belief and passion. And for me, one of the things that made that, I would say solidified that is probably the best way to put it, is having a death claim very, very early on in my career when you're not prepared for it. When you don't know. What's that mean? I'm sorry, I know you guys know, but I don't know. When you say, just, I mean, someone dies and they claim, they want to claim their insurance. It means you have to pay it out. Somebody bought our insurance and they died. And that means you're paying it out. And the story that I had with someone who was 49 years old, three kids, five, three, 18 months, walks into McDonald's on a Saturday morning to order breakfast for his kids, cradling the 18 month old and drops to the floor, gone. And this was in like the second year of my career. We are not prepared for that. You know, today, after all these years, I think I've got a PhD in psychology not by a choice and just kind of happen. And so when you're dealing with those kind of things and you realize what that does to the family and the story was, I got a call Monday morning from the brother-in-law who said, you know, some day I was supposed to get referred to. Hi, how are you? He goes, well, it's not why I'm calling and he tells me the story. You know, you're emotionally shot. He's, well, I just want to let you know his wife is going to be calling you shortly. And you hang on the phone and go, what am I going to say? What am I going to do? And the phone rings and my hand was literally shaking picking up the phone and I said, hello and she said, I just want to say thank you. We're not going to be okay, but just because of what you've done for us financially, we don't have to worry. Thank you. And she hung up. So what did I do? Fall apart, you know, cried all up. Of course, yeah. You never, ever, ever going to go into a meeting, not thinking that I can't help. That's a mindset shift and it wasn't by choice. Both of your careers, both of you, you, you do what you do because it's much more meaningful than just your own success. So I mean, when you're telling a story that could, that could bring to light something that is a horrible thing or if you're literally consoling somebody and you're setting up a policy that would allow an individual, it doesn't have the money to afford a funeral and to afford to live their life after a loved one or a spouse that passed away and they lose their job. The similar thread between those two is that you've, you've focused your entire career on doing things for a cause much bigger than yours. And I think that that's actually why you're so successful at what you do because you, you operate at this level that, okay, I need to, I need to perform because there's much more on the line than my own personal satisfaction, my own personal paycheck. Does that make sense? Is that, is that accurate? Yes, but I mean, that sounds really amazing, but that's not how I started. I started making X and I needed to make more. I'm well, yeah, yeah. Don't we grow? We grow over time. And I think you also begin to, because I literally was like, I'm making $11,000 a year and the writer job pays 25. So if I could get that, that would be amazing. It would, honestly, I would love to say, you know, I thought of my fellow man at every turn, but I didn't. I thought if I can make 25, I actually could start paying my bills. And so I really thought like, I just need the next level of expertise because it bumps you up. And in TV news, you need areas of what's the right word where you're, you differentiate yourself. So if you become a writer, trainee, and you're a writer, that's a whole different category than being a production assistant of which anybody can kind of, it's a very, very low bar of entry. So I really started off just kind of like chip my way up and up and up salary-wise because that's what was important to me. And I think it really took a little bit of time before I recognized it. When you had a platform, you also had a responsibility, right? And I think it's a process of growth just by age. You begin to look around a room and think, oh my god, I'm the only woman of color in this room. So when people start to say things or maybe leave people out, like, ugh, I got to raise my hand. But I would sit in meetings sometimes like, oh gosh, don't do it. Don't raise your hand. Don't raise your hand. I'm like, here I am. I got to raise my hand. So, um, so I think as you grow and also you get more expertise and you become more solid in your job and your hierarchy, hierarchically at the top, all those things make it easier to start saying, it's not just about me and now I'm making enough money that I can pay my bills. It really is, what do I get to do with this? How do I figure out even who I am in this job in the world and what are my responsibilities here? And so I think when those things come together for people, and I think it really does come together for everybody at some point you begin to think about, like, well, what is the whole point of this job and this life? Like, what am I doing here? Then you begin to think about how to best leverage all the things that you have to hopefully make the world a little bit of a better place. And Ian, did you feel that way when, when you, I mean, this kind of slapped you in the face very, very early on? Yeah. Because two years in, you have a death claim and you're dealing with this. So it's like, you go from zero to 100 real quick. But as you, as you should have progressed in your career, how, how has your like mindset shifted? Now you, you understood the responsibility year two, but I mean nothing's changed since then. It's still more responsibility, more burden. Very still, he said, you got a, you got a cycle, a psychology degree while doing this job. Yeah, it's, it's really interesting because what you tend to find out is that it's really an odd thing in our world because we talk about the fact that if you don't have what we do and you need it, you can't get it. So I, we're kind of funny about it, but it's you either too old, too sick or too dead, none of the above are good. And so we, that to me is an enormous responsibility that we have to do it right the first time. We can't afford to have an off day from that perspective with whoever we're dealing with. And having unfortunately, or fortunately dealt with many situations in different types of times where people needed us so much of it is in our world that people think of you sell something. That's the end of your job. Your job doesn't start until there's a claim. That's when you know if you did your job correctly. So to me, it was always about, can we make a difference? And if we make a difference, we can make money. It was never the other way around. Now part of that, if I'm going to be perfectly direct, is when I first started this business, I understood that the failure rate in our business was 90%. What do you mean by that? How do you fail 90% of the time? People who start in our business nine out of ten and don't make it five years. Nine out of ten. Don't make it five. Why is that? It's hard. It's really hard. You don't have to do the way I describe it. So that'll smile at this. But the way I describe it is, arrows have to be out. It's not about you. It's always about them. And that's not always easy, especially if you're going to a meeting, if it's your agenda, not their agenda, it doesn't work very well. And a lot of people in the finance world do that. And we've tried not to do that. So if you're hours of pointing out, you're there for them. And the heart, the very difficult conversation sometimes in your own head is that depending on what happens, we may be the most important people someone ever meets. If something happens and we did our job correctly, that responsibility is sold, that's it, is enormous. And if you have that responsibility, do we do it right all the time? Hardly. Make lots of mistakes. But the reality is we try never to make a mistake on that side. And in starting a business that had a 90% failure rate, you know, part of it was maybe I was in my own sense trying to fail. That's a psychology story for another day. We could do a whole hour on my mental process. But I think those shifts continue constantly, but they are reinforced by your belief. One more lesson. I'd love to pull out of you, and then we're going to switch gears and go and talk about some of the work that you've done over your career with diversity, equity, and inclusion, and serving different communities. But last career lesson, I want you both to tell me a story of the biggest failure that you've had. How did you overcome that? The shit hit the fan moment. Well, let's see. Should I start with being fired on live TV? Because that's hard, or should I do the one my very first live shot where I was literally groped by a guy, because I didn't realize you shouldn't let people stand behind you in a live shot. I'd never done a live shot. How much time do we have exactly? You pick one story. You pick both of those are horrifying. You know, actually, my very first live shot ever, I had just become a local reporter in San Francisco. I'd never been on air before, but I got the job because I had been a producer at NBC News. And so I was sent out to our affiliate in San Francisco, which is a very big market. And they sort of swore because I'd never been on live TV. And back in the day, everybody now, everybody's live all the time, but back then there were only certain people who went live. And so they said, you know, don't worry about it because you're not going to have to do anything for the first couple of weeks. We're going to let you get your feet wet. Three days in, I'm out doing a story on the San Francisco Giants had actually made it into the playoffs. And Dusty Baker was the coach and I was sent to a bar, not to the game, to a bar, to go interview people who are also not at the game, watching the game at a bar. And so I get there, I'd be drinking and I'm interviewing them and they're drinking and I'm editing my story and they're drinking, you know, this is going nowhere good. You know, but I didn't know my first live shot ever that I was doing. We set up our lights. And just as they start coming to me, like, so little Brian is standing by live, I realized like, wow, everybody's really drunk because the bar, they're all now, they're, you know, we call these like TV lights, you know, magnets for crazy people sometimes. And so I started talking and one of the people standing behind me reached out and pinched me on the behind in my first live shot ever. And I had never experienced that deer in the headlights where you literally lose control of your body where you're like, what that happened. So embarrassed. It is my third day on the job. And they had, they had, had a big work stoppage. They just started rehiring people. So I was the lowest paid reporter because I was brand new. Everybody then was making $90,000 a year. And I was a reporter making $30,000 a year. So just bad every which way. I get back to the office. My boss, a guy named Al, he's the news director calls me into his office to talk about Santa Barbara would be a much better market for me, maybe than San Francisco. I've been there three days. I've moved all my stuff in two duffel bags across the country. And I remember calling back to my boss from NBC News where I'd been a producer and he said to me, whatever you do don't quit, make them fire you if they have to. But do not quit. These jobs are hard to come by. And I think having someone sort of say, it's actually the easier route to throw in the towel, like stick it out and figure it out, learn, you know, take the small window of time that you have to learn the skill. Because at the end of the day, it doesn't matter what you are promised. It doesn't matter what people told you, you know, like you, you have to be able to do this. And so I did. I mean, it's not brain surgery, right? You just kind of figure it out. Take some time. Within about three months, I was the, I figured out life shots. And I became the bureau chief for the East Bay, which is in San Francisco, the Oakland and the East Bay, which, you know, he just gave a look like he is proud of me. But I was the only person in the East Bay. So I made myself the bureau chief. Listen, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how you got there. Technically, I was the bureau chief and I'm gonna stick with it. But, you know, like you realize that, you know, you just have to put your head down and live through, like surviving the horribly embarrassing derailing thing sometimes is the hardest part. And then you actually have to like take a moment, come up with those steps to figure out how to solve it. So that was the start. But I literally have 999 other versions of other times when things, you know, just don't go well. And you really learn it's less about what happens and more about how you respond to what happens. Does that make sense? I think the answer that the key is in the response. What about yourself, Ian? So I mean, the list of failures, you don't have enough time on this, it may be in 10 podcasts or the things that I screwed up in my life. But I'll give you a professional one, which is actually a serious one and certainly a personal one, which I'll give you two quick ones. But the professional one was very early on. First year, Michael, when I was actually talking to someone who was referred to me by a friend and a wonderful guy, I even remember his name, where he was from, he was a general counsel of one of the United Technologies of all places. But anyway, he had survived cancer. And he was a five year survivor of cancer. And we had gotten to talking, and I was new in the career. And he said, I like what you're saying, like what you're doing. But I just got this policy through my association. And I think that's going to be fine for now. But feel free to call me back in six months. And I didn't press it at all or go into what it was. It didn't even know to go into what it was that he had. Six months later, I called him, I said, how are you? He said, not good because the cancer would come back and it would come back, unfortunately, seriously. And three months later, he was gone. And what nobody knew was that that policy that he got from the association had an exclusion because he had cancer prior. Family got nothing. Did I know what to ask at that time? Not really. Should I have asked someone to know what to ask yet? So you know, it's almost 37 years later, and I still think about that. But the good news is I never did it again. Ever did it again. So those are painful lessons. You know, on the personal side, it's always funny being the finance guy. And back in the day, many years ago, having enough debt for five people and say, how did that? How did you get there? Well, there's a long story about that, which psychologists would enjoy, by the way. But I make a lot of psychologists really happy. They wouldn't need pension plans. It would just be me. And so the fun part would be that, you know, you have to look at that and say, I failed at that in that time in my life. But I got out of it. I did it on my own. I didn't ask for help. I didn't go back. I've been doing that. I just worked harder and did it and learned a lot from that too. But I think those failures, just like Zelda said, there are things that you look at and go, what kind of learn from that? I was going to say, I think that's the key, right? Which is if you have something terrible happen and you don't walk away with the gift of a lesson and it just is the terrible thing, like you really failed then. You know, to me, it's like, if this is going to be miserable, like at least we should walk away with something we learned and got out of it. And that's kind of how I've tried to frame it for my, my kids and even for myself, when I'm in a situation where you're like, oh, I'm in the middle of something and I'm not enjoying this process. You know, what do I learn so that we just don't do this again? And I meant to, or I tend to say, Scott, the people that I think it's the Michael Jordan line that says, I never lose, I either win or I learn. And with people who think? No, that's really it. That's really what you try to do and say, you know, they look at you and say, well, that happened to you. I said, well, of course, it happened to me more times than I hope it ever happens to you. Let's talk about, let's talk about some of the work that you've done both of you in different ways with underrepresented groups in my backgrounds. And I come from a startup entrepreneurship background. So I've seen, I mean, over the course of the past three years, I've seen funding for underrepresented groups massively increase and then decline, which is very really messed up. There's a whole bunch of stats around startups and seed funding for black entrepreneurs and other underrepresented groups. But I think that, out of all the people that I've spoken to about this issue, the one thing that can help move the needle is wealth and access. And I think that a lot of, a lot of underrepresented groups don't have those two things. And you've both tackled this problem from different angles. I mean, like, so that you actually did, I think a special, if I'm not mistaken, disrupting dismantle on systemic racism. And I mean, you've worked with a variety of underrepresented individuals helping them learn what they have to do to become wealthy to protect their families. So let's, let's talk about some of the work that you've done. Let's talk about some of the problems that still exist. Because again, my perspective is startup found like funding. And that was, you know, it was great for like a minute, a flash in the pan for like three to six months. And all of a sudden, everybody forgets about it again. And people don't fund black founders the way they did at, you know, the end of 2021 or early 2022 if my dates are right. So what are the problems that we still see? What are some of the things that you've discovered in your work, Soledad, when you've actually done the research and you've done the investigation? And also, Ian, just from some of the clients that you work with. You know, you name, I think, exactly the problem, right? I think the number that gets thrown around a lot is that black founders, and sometimes we're talking about Silicon Valley specifically, get something like access to one percent of all the dollars that are out there. And some people have actually said it's lower than that. And if you start doing subgroups, right? Look at, well, black and women or black and, you know, immigrate, you know, whatever. So it's bad is kind of the takeaway. And of course, it's a problem on a lot of fronts. I think you just have built in biases. People like to fund those people who they look like them, who remind them of them, like, oh, you remind me of you. That's exactly what I was like. And we did actually a documentary on this thing called the Silicon, about Silicon Valley, where we had a professor, a guy from Duke University, Professor Wadwa, who had done very well as a tech founder, advising a group of young black startup founders who were at an accelerator. And he said to them, listen, here's what I did. I came as an Indian coming to America. I hired a six-foot-to-white guy. And I had him front everything for me. And it was a really, and the people in the accelerator, the young black, I'm going to say kids, but they were really in their 20s, were shocked, like appalled, right? And his thing was, this is a solution. Get someone to be the face of your audience. He was trying to play the city game that exists. And I think they were like, well, this is a city game that exists. And I think for these young founders, part of their thing was, but it matters that I exist, right? I also have to be inspiring other people and say, I exist, and if I exist, then you can exist. And of course, you also have the added problems of often founders of color. Can't just turn to mom and dad to fund some of their stuff. Founders of color, often face bigger obstacles. Founders of color, frankly, don't always have the same access to, here's what my dad did for 20 years. So I have been in, what we run, my husband, I run. Because the seed around is always family. It's usually family. So rich uncle, rich parents, rich, rich somebody in the community. And no one had to ask, right? When we started our little foundation, we send girls off to college. We had so many young women whose parents hadn't had an office job. They had not a clue. I mean, we used to do seminars on this is what you wear. This is literally, you know, how would you know if you didn't know? And I think we often don't recognize the value in that, right? There is a value and a benefit to knowing how to walk into an office and behave, knowing that this is the job of the receptionist. I mean, imagine if you didn't have a parent, one of the young scholars we had who was a student at Stanford University of brilliant young woman, her mother was living in a homeless shelter. And she was crashing in my apartment to do her internship at an investment bank. I mean, it was just craziness. And she remember she said to me the first day, because most of the people who were her colleagues at this bank were the kids whose dads either, you know, were clients of the bank or dads worked at the bank. And she was dressed like you'd be dressed to go work at the gap. Like a perfectly nice outfit, but not a I'm on Wall Street outfit. And I remember she said to me, she said, I'm just dressed completely wrong, right? It's smart enough to know, like it's not you don't. Which is probably the worst feeling. I mean, well, this is a girl who's brilliant. She was a top-ranked chess. She was like this close to being a chess master, like brilliant, brilliant young woman, but very well aware. Like I am struggling because I don't have it. And so I think this plays out in every which way. I mean, certainly for founders who are looking for funding, people look at you and say, oh, not you, you, you are not part of this regardless of how good your idea is or how smart you are or, you know, what you've been through and what kind of resilience you have. So it's not, it's not unusual. I don't think. I think the hard part is really getting people to recognize that it exists. And then, you know, as you know, in the wake of George Floyd, all those dollars came in because people wanted to do something. But they also dried up very quickly when they recognize that they wouldn't really be asked to show their work, show where they'd spent the money, and show a commitment. That's one of the things I like about journalists. We get to like knock on the door and say, no, no, we're here. We're still counting it. But yeah, it's a, it's obviously a really challenging problem. And I think for me, just highlighting the challenge is really a very important first step. And Ian, and the work that you do, I mean, we're tackling this. So this is, the solution to this problem is not, is not just one solution. It's not just, oh, we got to fund black founders or it's not just we got to give underrepresented groups and minorities access to more. It's everything. It's everything all at once. So in your particular case, I mean, if you work with groups to understand how to set their lives up, set their families up so that God forbid when somebody passes away, their kids will have access to wealth and they're not, they're not trying to figure out how to pay rent next month or their mortgage next month. This is another key in this very, very complex problem. But, but speak to me about some of the, some of the things that you realize when you work with underrepresented groups and some of the people that you've worked with, that we have to do better. God, I could do that for an hour, but the reality is let's start with this with the profession. The profession was a white guy profession forever. And so in the multicultural communities, the trust of people that do what we do was really low because they didn't see in general people that look like them doing what we do. And that's, that's shifting. The great news is that's tremendously shifting. And our company, specifically in, in my particular agency, Scott, you would think, if you came to an agency meeting, you think you're at the United Nations. And that's an attachment to the leadership of this agency, the, the, the college is phenomenal. And he's been like that forever. Nobody had to tell him to do that. But he was like that long before the George Floyd murder and anything like that. And it was, and, but I think you have to look at those things and go, how are we going to make a difference without any of those preconceptions? Part of that is in our world to change the wealth gap is to have people who do it, what I do, look like the communities they're in. It's so important. So that the, in addition to having my clients are from everywhere. But in addition to that, that's not as important to me as the mentoring we can do to bring people into the business and keep them in the business. More importantly, just bringing them in. So one of the things I, if you don't mind the story, because I tend to tell stories, I love stories, stories, tell as many stories as you want to. So I got heavily involved in, in the African-American community here at Northwestern Mutual, my primary company. And what happened was there were a lot study groups going on to make sure that as we got more diverse, which we've done an incredible, in fact, the majority of the growth at this particular company is from multicultural markets, which is really cool. But when I first got involved in this, I would go to these study groups, and I went on my own dime, and I would go to the study groups, and I would have some time there, because the people at the company knew me, and I would have some time. And they would, I would start my talk, and within the first five minutes, and I, kids, I how many of you as I did, but the same question happened every time. And the same question was, why are you here? But in most case, it was more, why are you here? Like, what are you doing here? Okay? What box are you trying to check or whatever? And the beauty was, I got to say the same answer every time. And that's what's propelled a lot of what's happened, because the answer, I always said it was three things. Number one was last I checked. The multicultural markets, especially the African American market, which is where I was at the time, had billions and billions and billions of dollars in it. I'm a business person. I want some of it. Now what tended to happen was that kind of everybody says, oh, okay, this is part, this is the business thing, which it is, of course, to some extent, because there are markets for everybody that make money and do things. The second was, I'm a great believer that to be stupid and pardon me for saying it that way, that's learned behavior. I didn't learn that behavior. I still haven't learned that behavior. And so if you don't understand the behavior, you don't act like that. So it never occurred to me not to be in all markets and to help all people. Just treat people kindly. And the third thing, which I think was very important, and this was many years ago, people, by the way, it's kind of to ask me, why didn't you tell people you were doing this 20 years ago? And I said, it didn't do it to tell people. It didn't. That's another issue. The signaling over the actual act is a big issue. I did it because it was right. So the third thing was I looked around and said, you know, I was fortunate. I had done okay at this. And I went back and I said, the company doesn't look like the world. What can I do to help? Somebody's got to step up. And at some point, you got to look in the mirror and say, you got to step up. And so I've been doing it for a long time. And to me, it's just part of life. But you know, that's what you're doing. And then when the company starts to look like the rest of the world, then you start to succeed and do better. And we're in the process of doing that. And that makes me really happy. I've really enjoyed too that the conversation generally in business has moved away from diversity, kumbaya. I'm a good person. So I want to do good things to being like, I'd like to win. And I'd like to make money. And I know if I can get into more markets where there are people and those markets are growing, then I will win. Why would I see this area off to somebody else when I'm good at my job? And I think that conversation has happened out a lot of fronts, certainly in newsrooms too, right? This idea of if you cannot communicate with people, they're just going to leave. And they're going to go to now the many, many options that exist, especially with social media. They're not guaranteed to stay with you. And if you don't represent them or at least give them a sense that you cover their community and you care about their community, they'll be like, great, no problem. We don't need, we don't need you. We don't need to support you. So I see that happening a lot in business as well, generally. As you all know, success story is part of the HubSpot podcast network. The HubSpot network has incredible podcasts like the Goldigar podcast. If you are looking for a new podcast, you have to check it out. It's hosted by Jenna Kutcher. The Goldigar podcast helps you discover your dream career with productivity tips, social strategies, business hacks, inspirational stories, and so much more. I tune into them every single week. They just did an episode on a four day work week experiment that they actually conducted in their own office. A few other recent episodes I enjoyed were on how to hire A players in your organization in 14 days or less. Jenna Kutcher is an OG in the podcast and game. You got to go check out the Goldigar podcast at the HubSpot podcast network or wherever you get your podcast. And I'm so interesting. Well, I was going to just say that I've noticed that too. I've noticed that if you look at an executive team, a C suite aboard, when it's a diverse group, that is that is a much stronger organization because they have all these different world views and different ideas and different backgrounds that not only can you tap into different markets now effectively, you also have people thinking in different ways, which always just makes an organization or company stronger. There was an interesting, I'm sorry, I was just going to add something if I made to that point you just made. There was an interesting study that was done and what they found was that when you had people who were very different as opposed to all of the same homogeneous group that they had less of a sense that everybody was just going to rubber stamp what they were saying. So you ended up having to defend much more and people were much more challenging to you. You look at something like, and actually I would use as maybe the leadership team at GE when they started going through all their troubles right where you had this homogeneous group of folks who played golf together and all were the say you know there's not a person who's going to stand up and say you know what boss, I think this is a bad idea. You end up creating this yes-man kind of philosophy and they have found there's a great study I should send it to you where because you don't know people very well you're not in the all in the in group together but you're forced to be working together that you they describe it as more challenging work environment but the results are better right because you don't feel comfortable like everybody's going to have your back no matter what you say you have to bring your A game you have to defend your A game and then you have to expect to be challenged which of course is always a little bit more uncomfortable. Ian what were you saying before I cut you off I'm sorry. Well to me so much of we talk about the wealth gap in all which is crucial but in the protection world and I'm in the protection world if that protection isn't there and something happens the wealth gap gets worse so as much as we could talk about wealth and investing and all the other stuff if the protection isn't in place it doesn't matter if something happens so that's part of what we're trying to do in these communities too is say that if we can create that and create that kind of and the word I want to use is leverage because we it is leverage I if we can create that then all of a sudden a lot of the mistrust and people who say they don't as an example so they don't believe in life insurance as an example and my response is always the same that it's got which is it's not a religion it's not something to believe in or not believe in it's a tool that can basically bridge some of these gaps especially in communities that meet at the most um I want to talk about some blind spots it still exists because there's a lot of them one of the ones that I've heard of and maybe maybe both of you have some insider commentary on this but it will talk about some other systems as well I've heard and I've looked into corporate boards and you see the corporate boards that are based in North America they're very diverse but then you go overseas and the corporate boards for the same company in a different part of the world is not diverse at all so you see that there's still these blind spots and and where companies feel like they have to do something but it seems disingenuous it seems like they're not really taking it seriously so that's a huge issue and I don't really have a fix for it I'm just sort of bringing up one thing that I've seen that is not it doesn't feel good it's not a feel good thing so what are some other sort of blind spots or systemic barriers that are still so obvious that we have to fix that really haven't gotten better at all since George Floyd since since like this whole this whole change and shift and in us paying attention to this certainly in TV news you know the real decisions are not made in the anchor desk they matter but they're they're made in the editorial meetings and they're framed in editorial meetings so when people say but look at our diverse team and you've seen all the promos for every single TV station right you're like yeah no no no show me the the people making the decisions that's actually what I want to see because those are the folks who well before as an anchor of a show before I even you know start thinking about what's gonna be in my show a entire team has already sent crews to go and cover a thing so you know if I can want to cover something but if someone hasn't sent a crew off to cover it then and also how we would think about covering it so I think there are lots of blind spots I think there's still lots of blind spots in corporate boards because sometimes it's not only the the global board that is not particularly diverse sometimes there's an organization that'll talk a lot about how important diversity is to them and then you're like well you know let me just let me just google like the board you're like oh my gods you know to the to the point of actual embarrassment right you're like you literally should just not talk about diversity you know spare yourself just don't mention it because this is embarrassing and what you you know I've I've had this conversation sometimes telling people you realize that when you're looking for employees and those kinds of employees who can go anywhere they're so good at their jobs they can ask for what they want the first thing they do right is like let me google who's moved up in this company let me see what it looks like do I want to do I somebody who wants to go who can go to ten different places do I want to work here and I I'll say to them like you realize that the for the first thing they do is google the board and who's in the company in leadership positions the second thing they do is call the three black people who work in the company and ask them so if you really want to have access to the best people you might want to you know fix that you know those particular blind spots I would say yeah and Scott I it's interesting to me because I've seen people in many companies who you know who mean it they care they want to do it at the higher levels but it doesn't come down to the levels of the local people so if you go to a local office in my world somewhere in in you know in Iowa or does I'm just picking that as a place it doesn't matter and listen sometimes the pool of people is not as diverse as you'd like it but if you're in a Chicago or in Atlanta or in New York or something like that and the leader of the local office doesn't get it and I'm being polite by saying doesn't get it yeah I'm just trying to be you know gentile here for the moment it doesn't matter what the people at the top say and I think that it's so important to have that filter down to leaders and like you said where I am where it's it's not even up for discussion that's just the way it is and nobody even considers it being another way and has it for years it's about good people smart people working hard taking care of others our business is an hour's out business and that's that has nothing to do with with you know who you are what you are it's an hour's out business and when you have an office full of people from everywhere everybody tends to work well together and that so the local leadership matters too it has to filter down so so if we're going to talk about not just in a corporate setting but now on a very individual in a community and an individual basis in a community what are what are some very tactical things that say I could do as an individual I'm listening to this podcast right now I know that there's lack of access to information I know that I know that there are probably massive amounts of economic inequality in certain disadvantaged communities I'm listening to this podcast I'm thinking I don't know how to solve for this I'm not in a position where I can actually action any change so what do I actually do yeah I would say you you can because a lot of a lot of the things that have to happen are with people making connections so I would say you tell me what your job is I get calls a lot where someone will say there is just a pipeline I'm like really because I did a project for HBO where I had four women of color as my directors and the next day someone will tell me oh we cannot find a single woman of color director but really because I just had four and my company is this big so you know so number one if you're trying to fill a position and you keep going back to the same places over and over again which often if you're talking about finance it's Harvard yeah blah blah right you're you're just you're not going to be exposed to all of the best students of color it's just not a fact so I would say change how you're looking then the other thing that gets annoying and I know because I've been on these these groups before where they need to have a diverse slate so you end up getting tapped to be put in on the slate knowing full well but no one's gonna hire you so I've known lots of people who've said I don't want to be part of your slate I'm not playing this game anymore because I know you have you're gonna hire your friend you're just you need to prove that you had a diverse slate push back against the diverse slate diverse slate is not a thing judge people on the you know what they actually accomplish and then I think you have to say okay so I wanted if you want to find black female directors again this is my industry go find one right go find a couple of black female directors and maybe they are already booked on projects for forever but guess what I guarantee you they know five other black female directors because they're all in the same circle and they'll say well you know what here are five other people that maybe they're not available but you should call them what I've actually had to do this a few times in places where I've said listen I'm I'm not going to keep doing this project if this team is not diverse it's embarrassing for me right I talk a lot about this I see you put your hand up and you and you I say you have to solve this problem and if you don't solve this problem and I'm happy to help you solve the problem of our team not being particularly diverse I will help you but in six more months I'm out like I can't be here and be part of this so and you know and it takes a lot of time it took us a number of times of going back to the well going back to the well of me like no no I'm serious so I think it's a combination of just being very persistent and especially you white guys know if you're the white guys on the team saying that it carries so much more weight than the women of color on the team who are saying it if you say you know and this my husband who's white often will say this in meetings and I'm like it is so amazing because every no one expects it from you guys when you say you know diversity is very important to me and it makes me uncomfortable that I'm looking at this and it's not diverse I am sure you guys are gonna solve this problem let me know if you need me to help make some connections for you you do that which is not actually a very heavy lift and you have gone so far in pushing people like holy cow diversity matters to these guys these are not the guys we thought divert we're used to the whiny solid adobe Ryan raising her hand but like it really is a huge deal to do that and so I would argue anybody who's listening to your podcast who is not they're necessarily advocating for more diversity and they're diverse that's hugely powerful so I'm gonna add to that not much because I couldn't say it better but put your damn hand up you said it's got put your hand up it's not that hard and by the way are you going to do it well and understand everything initially no you're not but the fact that you put your hand up and say I care and I want to make a difference maybe people aren't gonna believe you at first that's okay you gotta keep going because that then your credibility gets higher and and sold out to 100% right if I'm saying it in a room it's gonna carry some weight because the other part of the weight that it carries Scott is I've been doing it long enough that nobody's gonna just argue with me whether or not I've paid my dues in that air and continue to and it's not paying dues I'm saying that just from a time perspective it's it's it's what should be done and the reality of it is if you put your hand up people want your help people want your help and it's if you get involved it's actually so enormously rewarding and gratifying you'll want to do it I think finally oh forgive me and I didn't mean to cut you out I was just gonna add one more thing that I thought of I think these conversations are often framed as I'm a good person right I assume everybody's a good person like it has nothing to do with that it really is about who do you have access to in terms of hiring you know I'm not a good person I don't have any bias when it comes to blah blah blah well all of us do we are all you know full of bias so forget the good person part and literally sort of solve the problem I asked this one's of an executive and I said to him you know their company had a lot of people of color departing and I and I said why don't you track it and his you know thing was like well you know just we don't track it I'm like but if it were a refrigerator and you just kept like it kept failing at some point right it was good for 18 months then the whole thing you know you would literally you would say okay how is it possible that this thing that we put all this money and time into after 18 months just fails and if it happened again and again I guarantee you if it were a refrigerator and not a person you would have a team assigned to figure out what the hell is going on but because it's a person yeah you don't seem to care so if you you know so again as we all people have said this a million times you measure what matters and when you are in a position to encourage people to measure because it does matter to you and you're coming back in two months to get those numbers from them you know then you start really holding people I think accountable and again and when you're you're not the typical person talking about diversity I think that really helps move it along I think a lot of of everything that you just mentioned the cause of that is because there's a lot of ignorance towards how can this actually benefit the business so people take action to a degree but if you don't see the diversity benefiting the business psychologically there's only going to be so much action you're going to take you have to tie it back to KPIs you have to tie it back to success and I think that what you just mentioned about when you have a diverse board or a diverse workforce and everybody has to level up and upscale themselves and how that actually impacts the bottom line of a business that is very powerful because now it's not just about we tried so hard and we hired you know we hired all these you know underrepresented individuals and they left but like we tried now it's like shit our business is not going to evolve at the same rate that it could because we're losing all of this diverse talent that could actually add so much to how we operate and how we push each other and how we force uncomfortable conversations that can actually end up disrupting ourselves so we don't get disrupted by a competitor so I think that that is the piece that has to be communicated a lot more it is no longer come by y'all we're good people and we just think diversity is good to do which is how it started when I started in tv news in 1987 you know this is just good to do and we're good people you're good I'm good let's just do this good thing and now it's I would like to win and that means I need to build an audience that is absolutely dedicated to me and cares about me and that means I need stories that reflect the stories and that means I need reporters who that means decisions have to be made that get to those stories it's literally about winning and always has been for me yeah Ian what are what are some assumptions that have to be challenged to make financial advice more inclusive and accessible um first of all I think that we have to get get more people in our business Scott yeah you might go to people and say let me show you why this is so important that there has to be a building in my opinion building up of trust it's a huge thing in our line of work and in different you know cultural places people like us are not looked at well for many many reasons and we have to start breaking that down part of that breaking down is to have people who look like you in the business and I think that's a huge part of it and you have to in my opinion you have to start asking questions what I see most times in the financial world at least that I do with this people will go ahead and say this is the way I want you to think now step back for a minute tell me your story because you don't know that story how that story is framed by the person you're talking to is going to allow you to help them better and you have to learn and and talk to people about different things that happen in something say I don't understand that explain you know help me understand that so it's it's a lot more about questions than it is answers because there are financial things we could talk for you know two days about financial things and specific financial products and other things but much more important is what are you trying to accomplish what do you want for your family what are your dreams what are your hopes what are your aspirations just like anyone else and once you find those out then you could start to talk about hey here's how we can make that difference I'm going to give you one quick because I'm a storyteller one quick story what there's it uh one of the people I mentor in our business who's just a wonderful person and a great representative of what we do and he asked me to mentor I mean I remember we were doing the zoom and I'm looking behind him and he has this picture with a very elderly woman above where he was sitting and when I see she look really old and I said you know okay I wonder what that picture is about and what I do with all the people I mentor is he look if we're going to do this together I need you why if you're why if I understand you why then I can help you and if it doesn't match mine like sometimes I get a why is I want to make money and that's the only why it's like yeah I'm not the guy for you it's okay so I want to hear the why so I said so let's do this next week but I want you why he goes okay and you're sitting in the same spot the next week and said okay I want to give you my why he says you see that picture behind me and then my brain I'm going now we're getting somewhere and it was his grandmother who died and that picture was her I think he said at 99 or 100 and she died like 104 she lived in the deepest health okay pick cotton her whole life never got the vote till she was 65 you know his mother ended up living in Arkansas in the town you know I guess the size of my desk you know experience stuff that none of us have ever experienced and he said I want to basically make them proud and I want to do the things that I can do to make sure that I'm helping generations my communities and other stuff and I said well first of all the answer is yes I'll be thrilled to mentor you but I said I have one question I said who are you telling the story to when you're talking to your clients and prospects and it was silent for a minute I said you gave me my answer you're not telling the story I said starting today I need you to tell the story you are standing on the shoulders of giants and you're not telling the story and it's interesting to watch what has happened to him since then because he starts to tell the story so that those stories do matter in terms of how we go out and help people and that we can also you taking you taking the human first approach you taking the human centric approach and pulling that story out of somebody is actually how you deal with a community that isn't exactly your community it's like stop talking and just listen is usually the best way to solve most problems I couldn't have said it better and you know it was really interesting one other quick story when the in the George Floyd situation right after that man that was during COVID nobody was seeing anybody right and it was we were all at our homes and zooms but I remember calling 20 of my African American friends and clients and saying I need if you don't mind I need to know how you feel I need you to explain to me how you're feeling because I don't understand it and I need to understand it and the conversations were phenomenal because it helped me frame where they were coming from better than I would have without asking was it comfortable to listen to no was it important to listen to did it help me and everything else it did not only personally but in business it absolutely did it's incredible what a little empathy can do we go a very very long way so the Dodd you have any I mean I asked I asked Ian what assumptions need to be challenged for for financial equality but any any other some it could be financial equality or inequality rather but what assumptions need to be challenged in your mind you know I think there's a sense that certain people don't exist or they don't care about the same things people would ask me often when I'd come back from covering stories Haiti or Hurricane Katrina or whatever disaster I was covering and they'd sort of say you know what do those people want and you're like everybody wants the same thing literally everybody wants right they want their their kids to be more secure than they were they want to live in safe a safe place I don't care where you are and who you are and how you're brought up these are the things that you want you want some kind of livelihood that gives you joy and security and so this idea that like all those people over there I just don't understand them they're so so different I think we make assumptions about people that are just often inaccurate I think people all want the same thing the other thing that I think assumptions that are made are that people of color don't want to talk about the issues that are bothering them and this has happened a lot I was able to moderate a discussion once really interesting conversation with the black employees of this big company and and one of the guys was a very highly what they call them highly compensated employee executive really the guy handsome guy who very well dressed and very well with this company and he he was telling he told his colleagues I said well you can talk about anything you want because I'm going to tell a story he told his colleagues that the night before he had heard a noise in his basement and so he went downstairs and the door to the basement was open and he said I stood there for a minute and I thought should I call the police maybe someone's in my house or should I close the door and go to bed because it was not a clock and he said I close the door and went to bed because I was afraid of bringing the police to my house at 9 p.m. what might happen to me and I think it was the first time that his colleagues who looked at him is like yeah but you're not that guy you're not the black guy who's going to get shot or get in trouble you are this executive I think it was the first time people like actually understood it was such a I mean you could have heard a pin drop kind of story and and so I think we make assumptions like that all the time you know these people are this but they're not those people and often we're just we're just wrong in our assumptions and I don't know that you as you say right if you just sit there and you're quiet and you kind of ask people what they're thinking what their why is why they exist why do they need this what's going through their minds you you learn so much more and you're usually embarrassed to find out like wow that's exactly the opposite of what I thought you were gonna say you know so yeah keeping your mouth closed and just asking you know asking a question and listening I think is a really good strategy I'm going to go ahead yeah no no stress from someone he said nobody ever learned nothing when they were talking good quote I like that smart simple but very very smart I want to I want to just give you both the the floor to just give me any last thoughts you have on on diversity equity and inclusion in in the corporate world how we address financial inequality because then I want to ask some questions to close it out but just the floor is yours anything that we didn't go into today that you think is just very important to to highlight well we're here yeah listen diversity equity and inclusion is literally under attack and I I realize as the words are coming out of a mouth it almost sounds crazy but as you know in the state of Florida where I live and other states similar thing like this idea that we should be trying to make the country fair an opportunity accessible to all which seems very much part for me at least of the American dream there are people who are pushing very hard back on that who do not want that and that that both disappoints me and scares me a little bit so I do hope that people who who agree and just sort of feel like yeah well it's not really my it's not really my fight right I'm not really in this you know I'm a middle-aged white guy and you know like I'm I'm it's not my fight I think I hope that that those are the folks who say actually I do think this is important and I think it's important that for for everybody and that I'm gonna stick my neck out and stand up and and and push for the things for the kind of world that I would like to see not because it's necessarily gonna benefit me or not but because it's important to what I believe are the values of this country so you know that would be Mike sort of final thought on that I mean it's just simple for me you know sold that says it eloquently do it's right it's not that hard do it's right treat people the right way be you know be smart about it it's gonna be better for you in the long run just do it's right it's not that hard um I want to I want to give you both a chance just to to drop your socials and your website so people can go connect with you reach out find out more about what you're doing then I have a couple more questions to close it out um but where do you want to send people so I mean both of you are doing very different things so what's what do you want to point people in direction of what are you excited about now what are you working on now so if the audience wants to connect let them know where to go sure I run a production company so we always have a project that we're working on our latest project just one a P body award which if you're not in TV you have no idea what that means but it's a big deal in my business every so often my husband's like do I need to go to this award ceremony or do I not need to go I'm like yeah don't need to go up do need to go to this one uh so that's pretty exciting for us and I was just uh inducted into the a broadcasting cable hall of fame I saw that in graduation yeah I did sort of my speech was like this is usually what happens toward the end of your life so so hopefully you're ahead of the career mid career um uh so um anybody who wants to reach out to me and folks do all the time on on Twitter and Instagram which I always appreciate and I'm just at Soledad O'Brien kind of basic no apostrophe as we all know in the digital world no one has actually consistently figured out what to do with apostrophes so leave it out um you know I'm just a boring life insurance guy sky you know I mean that's uh that's kind of many but uh actually what I'd love to do and Soledad knows this too I I'd love to do some like the public speaking that I do about the industry and why it's important and about uh you know how we can make a difference I just have a great belief in passion and in uh that we can make a difference and really change communities and change lives so I just continue to try to do that and certainly you know hopefully my clients feel that way and um you know I'm on LinkedIn you can find me on LinkedIn but I also just I'm just uh easy to find if you go on so you know just generally on the internet and just uh my e-mails in that free minute and m.com and um pretty easy to find and by the way Ian there's nothing there's nothing boring about about the work that you're doing it's there's a lot of there's a lot of people that work in finance but I mean you're putting yourself out there you're mentoring people you're you're helping under under representing communities so don't ever ever sell yourself short um two two questions I want to ask to close this out um and and they're for both of you uh so the first question is what would be one lesson that you would tell your 20 year old self well uh I was a woman of color in an all white community so my lessons would all be around my hair and not to let certain people touch my hair because we had some jobs but I'm sure that's now what you're asking um but it would be uh yes do not cut your hair because it will be a giant triangle on your head for a long time um I think I think the main thing is to always um it's actually a lesson I really did learn around that age right which is like figure out what's your passion I know so many people especially now at my age you know you see the folks who just powered through to become the lawyer or become the doctor and you realize like yeah they're not necessarily all that happy with those decisions because like I was doing right I just figured it out a little bit earlier um it seemed like a really good thing to do it was a good box to check and um and you know I sometimes talk to people and it's and they would say oh you know I always wanted to do this I always really thought about doing that and you don't necessarily have to do it for a living you could just do it on the side in some capacity but I do think you know you only really get one sort of opportunity to live the life you want to live and and I think you should take advantage of that as much as you as much as you can so when that would be probably my my first piece of advice like if I were 20 I'd say you know just figure out what you're passionate about maybe it's gonna take you a little bit of time and then go chase that and then you know same thing I think not on a work front but on a kind of the front of just things that I'd like to do as I mentioned you know I broke my foot horseback riding and even with my stupid broken foot I've been riding still my PT guys like just be careful getting on and don't fall off you'll be fine but you know like life is short and you know it go for those things that you want to accomplish and and that bring you joy being a martyr and slogging through is you know that's that's not necessary and it's certainly not fun so I'd say you know find your passion and then go and and and and live it so obviously I echo that completely if if you could find something that 20 years old that you're passionate about and you believe in why not follow it because it's going to be you know fine life is hard enough and I remember quoting from from a movie said you know of course it's hard but the hard is what makes it great because that's part of what it is right it's just this endless series of storms that we all tend to try to weather right and a lot of times you come out of the storm differently then you went in but that's kind of what the storm is about and so you tend to make sure if I was going back like a that person I'd say you're going to go through that and try to believe in yourself before other people believe in you which isn't always easy when you're 20. Good advice. Last question after your careers and and where you've gotten to today I'm sure the definition of success has changed dramatically from when you started to to now so I ask this of every single person that comes on the show at this point in your life what is success mean to you. You know what I started out success was like oh I'm making $11,000 a year if I could just get to 25 you know and then you're like well you know really what I need to do is is get to 50 and then you think well you know what I want to have X amount of dollars in the bank and if I could just you know and and I think at some point probably about 15 or 20 years ago it began to dawn on me that success was actually about the freedom to work with the people you like and to work on the projects that you like you know it's less about the numbers and I'd really just about like who do I want to be surrounded with and what kind of work do I want to be doing every day because for my work it's really I remember I started my production company and one of the very first projects I was working with some very miserable people and I just thought oh my god like the only fun you have when you launch as an entrepreneur right it's so hard like and then also be working with people are not nice it's terrible so I was like you know from now on it's gonna be hard but I'm gonna make sure that everybody who I'm working with is somebody that I've always wanted to be on a project with and you know as we have to slog through this tough project it'll be challenging but not because the people are difficult so for me the success is ultimately about you know are you getting a chance to live the life that you you want to live and and that might be getting a lot of exercise or sleeping in every day that might be you know learning how to bake which I've given up on long ago or you know might be getting a chance to see your kids all the time because you're willing to you know go and camp out and hang out with them as you know so I think it really is you get older you move away from the stuff and you move away from the money and you move into the top the value of time and the value of relationships success is not about money right because if your only goal is money there's never enough money there's never enough money you're always chasing something you'll never quite get there and you're always comparing yourself to something or someone that it's just really not even relevant so success for me really is the relationships that sell that said which is really the most important thing but success really is trying to make a difference in living more a life of significance than it is of things and if I could do that you know I'm trying to get there we're not there yet and we're a long way from there we got to get better but if we could do that yeah hopefully you wind up on the right side of the ledger