Tech Forward

Hello, listeners! Welcome back to the Tech Forward podcast. This week, I'm sharing my conversation with Dr. Herman Pryor, Jr. He currently serves as a District Lead within the Career Services Division for Coding Dojo's Washington, DC campus. There, he enjoys the process of developing others through solution-focused coaching methods.

Having personally attended Coding Dojo over the summer, I was struck by the diversity within my cohort. Of the 12 students, 6 were women, and 7 (including myself) were students of color. Was this unique to the DC campus, I wondered, or is that level of diversity present on all the Coding Dojo campuses across the country? What is it about the bootcamp model in general — and Coding Dojo in particular — that succeeds in attracting and retaining a diverse student population?

At Coding Dojo, Herman explains, you have diversity at the team and employee level, as well as the student level. In that way, the success of Coding Dojo has been a word-of-mouth phenomenon. When students from diverse cohorts share their bootcamp experience within their communities, it means a wide range of people hear about the supportive environment of Coding Dojo organically.

Coding bootcamps have been popping up all over the country to fill the gap in the increasing demand in tech talent. Over the past few years, however, many have closed their doors, or shut down individual locations. Coding Dojo, on the other hand, has continued to expand — they recently launched a new location in Tulsa, OK. Why has Coding Dojo been able to remain strong and successful as other, similar businesses falter?

According to Herman, "the model is simple. We aim to provide an environment where students become self empowered. We provide a platform for adult learners to see themselves where they want to be in their lives, professionally, from admissions until graduation — and even after. [The Coding Dojo model] supports and empowers the students' ability and will to be something and someone they thought they probably never could be."

Herman and I covered a lot more ground in our conversation, including possible barriers to entry, and hurdles that minority students might face along the way. If you've been considering a coding bootcamp, Coding Dojo has campuses all over the country, and also offers online and international options. Thanks so much to Herman for sharing his insights, and thank you to all of you out there listening.

Welcome back once more, listeners! Finishing out launch week of the Tech Forward podcast, I spoke with Lisa Cuesta, a Principal at NextGen Venture Partners. An early-stage venture capital firm, NextGen's goal is to bring a service mentality to venture. NextGen is made up of a core group of seasoned VCs along with a network of hundreds of part-time Venture Partners that drive the growth of portfolio companies. Prior to her work with NextGen, Lisa worked in strategy and product roles at Google as well as the ecommerce team at Pepsico.

Our conversation focused on the barriers that female and minority founders face when fundraising, as well as different methods to make VC funding more widely accessible. Lisa had a lot of great insights to share about how to open the doors to more diverse groups of founders.

So how does NextGen differ from other venture funds? Typical venture funds usually meet companies and entrepreneurs through the general partners network. This means they're exposed to a relatively small pool of potential clients: either those they have invested with previously, or friends of those they've invested with previously. Not only that, but general partners tend to be a small subset of people from similar industries, with similar backgrounds. As a result, there's a degree of blindness to diversity of experiences and perspectives.

With the NextGen model, however, the investment committee process is open to venture partners. Their venture partner network features a wide diversity of backgrounds and perspectives, which gives NextGen a unique approach to investing.

One small example of NextGen's advantage can be seen in their unique positioning to address the issue of geographic diversity in funding. Previously, Lisa worked on a project addressing how to get venture capital off the coasts. "Given the venture partner model, NextGen is very well suited to addressing this issue. They have eyes and ears on the ground all over the country and can meet entrepreneurs in very early stages. It's really a great way to get exposure to markets beyond just the coasts."

I'd like to thank all of my guests as well as my listeners for joining me for the Tech Forward launch week. From now on, I'll be posting new episodes with new guests every Wednesday. As always, if you have ideas for potential guests, topics, and issues you'd like us to address on the show, let us know on Twitter. See you next week!

Hello listeners! On this episode of the Tech Forward podcast, I spoke with madeBOS founder and CEO, Martha Hernandez. Martha has served in several Talent Acquisition and Talent Management and Sales leadership roles for organizations such as Coro, Give Something Back, Mi Pueblo Food Centers, and Inner City Advisors' Talent Management Initiative. Most recently, she was Save Mart Supermarkets' Director of Talent Acquisition.

Martha has a successful track record of strategizing and delivering critical human capital initiatives, technical implementations and integrations. She's passionate about adding transparency in the talent selection and promotion process, access to opportunity, diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace.

MadeBOS grew from Martha's passion for shaping people's professional growth and development, no matter their starting point or current trajectory. "Seeing people develop, starting in one place and seeing their growth into more influential roles, [...] gave me a personal satisfaction. I wanted more of that." To that end, madeBOS is an AI driven, career pathing platform that creates economic mobility for entry level workers in retail. "MadeBOS was simply a way for me to replicate that feeling, and be able to implement it globally."

From a lightning bolt of inspiration, to a series of 52 handwritten note cards (really!), to the full-fledged AI platform that it is today, Martha's journey to implement madeBOS has been a fascinating one. Despite lacking the "typical pedigree" that VC investors look for, Martha's passion and enthusiasm never flagged. In this way, she has truly lived the process that madeBOS strives to deliver to its users. "Sometimes, we feel stuck. An opportunity might look so big that we quit."

"I think we all have our moments. [...] It's important to get angry, because that's a fuel to keep going, passionately. This persistence is also because we haven't given the world — meaning people in general — an opportunity to do things differently. [...] I'm not making excuses for people who haven't invested in people like me. It's just that [Latinx people] arrived to the party late, in terms of resources and access and social capital."

In this episode, we discuss the barriers that Latina and other women of color entrepreneurs face in getting access to funding and other support for their businesses. What specific challenges and fears did Martha face along the way, and how did she overcome them? Listen along and find out!

Thank you so much for joining me for day two of the Tech Forward launch week.

Hello listeners, and welcome to the inaugural episode of the Tech Forward podcast! For my first episode, I spoke with Courtney Bass, a HR Business Partner at Google, who coaches and advises leaders on team management and motivation. As an advocate for diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace, Courtney has spent her career developing and implementing strategies that both individuals and teams can leverage for meaningful collaboration and growth.

Courtney and I covered a lot of ground during our conversation, beginning with examining why diversity progress has been so slow at many of the larger tech companies. At Google, diversity numbers are still well below representative, though they have improved over the years. Why has it been challenging for Google and other tech giants to establish a more diverse employee base?

In recent years, Google has made a sincere effort to broaden their recruitment efforts to be better able to get in front of great talent of color, and make a compelling case for what Google can offer. Courtney notes that, moving forwards, one way for Google and other tech giants to increase their diversity would be to increase their presence in places other than the Bay, such as the South and the Midwest. In Courtney's own words, "We are a very West-Coast-centric company. [...] If you're not from this area, or don't want to relocate here, it just may not be an option you're willing to consider."

The reluctance is understandable. Life in the Bay area is not only cost prohibitive (average apartment rent is well over $3000 per month), but can feel isolating to people of color. Courtney notes that during her time living in the Bay area, she has gone days without seeing another Black person. "It can feel very lonely. For some people of color, moving out to the Bay is a non-starter."

Courtney had a lot of insights to share, and I hope you find our conversation as engaging and informative as I did. Thank you so much for listening!

I'm excited to announce my upcoming podcast, Tech Forward. The discussion about diversity and unequal opportunity in the tech world has been going on for a long time now. But, clearly, this conversation needs to continue. That's why I decided to start the Tech Forward podcast.

Every week, I'm going to interview entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, media and tech leaders, and diversity advocates. What can you expect from the Tech Forward podcast?

You'll hear honest conversation about difficult topics.

You won't hear attacks on anyone's point of view. All guests deserve to have their voices heard, and not diminished. Full stop.

You'll hear diverse perspectives as well, from people with a wide range of backgrounds, experiences, and professions.

I hope you'll save the date and subscribe to the podcast when we launch on March 14th.

For more, visit: goodbyteventures.com