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Black Rise
Welcome to Black Rise podcast, your gateway to inspiring conversations with the crème de la crème of Black talent, leaders of 7-figure and above businesses across a spectrum of industries. Your host is Flavilla Fongang, an award-winning serial entrepreneur and she will be your guide on this journey.
Black Rise isn't just a podcast; it's an extension of the first business platform dedicated to connecting the business world to talented, skilled and experienced Black talent. Our aim is to create connections, foster collaboration, and fuel growth by bringing together Black professionals, visionary entrepreneurs, and groundbreaking businesses. We're here to bridge the networking gap, facilitating collaborative growth not only within the Black community but also far-reaching into the broader world.
In each episode, we dive deep into the stories and experiences of our remarkable guests. They share their insights, challenges, and strategies that have propelled them to the pinnacle of success. Whether you're an aspiring entrepreneur, a seasoned professional, or simply hungry for knowledge and inspiration, Black Rise provides you with the tools and motivation you need to reach your own pinnacles of achievement.
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Join us on this journey of elevation, motivation, and empowerment. Let's rise together, break barriers, and create lasting change. Subscribe now to stay updated with our latest episodes and visit www.theblackrise.com to connect, collaborate, and embark on a transformative path to success.
This is Black Rise, where excellence and impact converge to redefine the future.
Black Rise
How to build a 7 figure Brand Early In Your Career - Ashleigh Ainsley, Co-founder of Colorintech
When Ashleigh, the co-founder of Colorintech, joined me on the podcast, we embarked on an illuminating journey through his life and work. We traverse his academic excellence as a child to his fervent efforts in advocating for a more inclusive tech industry. His story captivates, illustrating the impact of diversity in tech and the need for broader representation. Ashley's personal anecdotes, from his Google internship to the startup world, underscore the transformative power of hands-on learning and the right opportunities in shaping a professional trajectory.
This episode peels back the layers on how career choices, particularly within the tech sphere, can transcend the allure of immediate financial gratification. Ashley's transition from KPMG to Founders Intelligence unpacks the essence of staying relevant and the dangers of professional stagnation. The entrepreneurial spirit shines through our discussion, with a spotlight on the importance of building a robust network that sustains not just job seekers but also those daring to launch their own businesses. Our conversation is a testament to the evolving priorities of life and career, urging listeners to consider the long game in their professional endeavours.
As we wrap up, Ashley reflects on the delicate balance of time and financial investment in the non-profit domain, delving into the challenges and triumphs of diversity initiatives in tech. Through the lens of Black Day Fair, we examine the complexities of managing people, decisive leadership, and the art of maintaining relationships post-employment. For anyone seeking wisdom on diversity, entrepreneurship, or career advancement in the tech universe, this episode with Ashley is a trove of insights and strategies for navigating the ever-changing landscape.
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Don't just think about the job that you're doing now. Think about the job that you want to do after this job. Think about what lines you're going to write on your resume at the end of it and how that's going to enable you to get into that next position. That's really what career development and planning is. It's like okay, this is where I want to be. So I need to optimize for getting myself to do these things that I need to do in order to do that.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Black rice podcast. You get a way to inspiring conversation with Black Rème de la Crème of Black talent, who are leaders of seven figure and above businesses across a spectrum of industries. I'm your host, flavilla Fongang, and a world-winning serial entrepreneur, who will guide you on this journey. Black rice isn't just a podcast. It's an extension of our business platform, allowing the business world to connect with skilled, talented and experienced Black talent. Our mission is to serve as a bridge, connecting businesses with vast opportunities that lie in working with Black professionals, entrepreneurs and enterprise. We strive to showcase the value, creativity and innovation that Black talent brings to the table, fostering partnerships that drive economic growth, diversity and mutual success. Visit theblackricecom to find out more. Welcome to the Black rice podcast, where we dive into the stories and journeys of remarkable Black individuals making waves across industries. In today's episode, I am honored to have Ashley, the co-founder of Colen Tech, a trailblazing non-profit dedicated to breaking barriers for ethnic minorities in tech. He ran Europe's largest event for Black technologists and beyond, black Tech Fest, and works with a number of the world's leading tech companies to run programs to enable students and working professionals to access career opportunities. Ashley has been celebrated in prestigious forums, named in Forbes 30 and 40, featured in esteemed publications such as Financial Times and acknowledged as one of the most influential figures in the UK by Politico in 2023. His dedication has earned recognition on BBC One Extra Rising Star, solidifying his position as a key voice in a tech landscape. He continues as we delve into Ashley's journey, exploring his insight, challenges and vision.
Speaker 2:Welcome to another episode of Black rice. I am so excited to present to you another guest on this podcast, and I'm with Ashley Inslee. If you don't know who Ashley Inslee is, where have you been hiding? If you've never been to Black Tech Fest, if you've never heard of Colen Tech, where have you been? It's about Black. It's about making Black our business, but also creating more opportunities for us, because there's enough food for everybody. So let me tell you very briefly about Ashley, because we're going to go into a full-on conversation. We get to know him. How did he get where he is right now? And also his love for traveling and so much more. So he's a co-founder of Colen Tech and non-profit aiming to improve access, awareness and opportunities for ethnic minorities to enter the tech industry. So there's a lot more he does, but I'd rather hear your voice, ashley, than just meet with you. How are you first of all?
Speaker 1:Thank you. So, for those who know what I normally sound like, I've got a little bit of a cold so I sound like I'm pinching my nose.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I'm not this nasally normally, but it's fine, I'm still here, I'm good, generally in good health. So yeah, thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Yes, and I'm glad that you didn't cancel because of that, did you are committed to do this with me, because we need to hear your story. So, ashley, yeah, ashley, we're going to start from the beginning and I always like to know a bringing story. So tell me, what type of child was your childhood like? How was your family vibe? But also, was it anyone or people that really influenced you when you were young?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I was, frankly, quite a good child, if I'm honest. I was good at school. I was more behaved, yeah, like you know, my teachers were you know, quote like pleasure to teach a lot of the time. So I enjoyed parents' evening. You know, like some of those kids they were parents' evening they all looked like they're really scared because, like, their parents are going to find out really how bad they've been or like how bad the grades are. I was always looking forward to it. I was like it's a good opportunity for, like my parents to like see, like how good I am. So, yeah, like I was, yeah, I was good at school. I mean, part of the rationale for it was literally just like, look, I didn't go to like a private school. I didn't.
Speaker 1:You know, I wasn't particularly wealthy, you know, I was actually quite poor when we were growing up and for me it was like, okay, well, if I've got to go do this school thing, I might as well do it well, like, if I'm going to sit there, I could be with the naughty kids. And they didn't seem to you know, they'll get punished. They didn't seem to be doing well, I was just like this isn't, this isn't me and I didn't. You know, I didn't want to be like them. I didn't see them and be like oh, that's funny, I want to like, do that. I was like, look, if I'm going to be here, I might as well learn and like, if I learn and do like good stuff, like that will work out well for me like my life in the future. So I was like, look, if I'm going to sit there, I might as well be good. So that's what I did. You know I tried to be good at like most stuff. You know I wasn't great at everything, but, you know, pretty decent at other subjects.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Wow, Good that you know, because I was, you know, my mom when I was young. My mom always told me that your first husband is your education. So again, like a bit of obsess here, I had to be the best. I hope I'm actually planning to get the role.
Speaker 1:It's going to be your first husband being in your loft as well.
Speaker 2:You see, I'm loving for myself. Protect me if something happens. I can count on my education to open doors for me. So, yeah, so, um, and therefore I've really again like his world. I knew that where it took pleasure was, you know, studying and learning. Even now, I'm still really much learning, always learning. I probably spend a lot of money on just learning new stuff just because I'm a curious person. But then, yeah, so I'm curious in terms of anybody who probably influenced you when you were young in a good way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean that's, that's a really good question. I like I had a little bit of a think about it but I'm honestly going to say no, I'm just going to again, this could be like some of my, you know, some people are like like, oh, you know, barack Obama or Wolf Smith or whoever I know he I'm just thinking about the black man right now. But, like you know, from my perspective, like I don't know, I didn't really see and this is kind of a sad thing when I was growing up. You know, I'm, I'm 30 now but I didn't really see a lot of successful black people in media or culture. The only time I really saw that was on the sporting pitch. So the only person I had in my room is like Patrick Vieira.
Speaker 1:You know, obviously I was a massive fan of Thierry, you know, no, no, no surprises. But also found part of the reason for that was because the only time I basically saw successful black man anywhere, I mean travel with Donald. He has on TV as a news presenter, but you know he was, you know, at that time probably in his 50s, 60s, you know, so wasn't wasn't particularly relatable to me. So yeah, like I mean, in a way it was like a sad thing. I didn't really see many people who, who you know, had a similar background to me or were like you know, anybody that I saw like I could like model my, my success or life or experience of. So I was very much like, well, you know, I'm not going to kind of take that adage of like, oh well, if I can't see it, I can't do it. It was kind of just like well, yeah, just be the best you then, because you know you're capable.
Speaker 2:So there wasn't, there wasn't that kind of experience, interestingly, it's interesting, what's very interesting and I hear that a lot that people who are successful sometimes don't question their blackness. They just do what they feel like doing, whether they see it or not. Sometimes they, you know, they, they they don't sit and say, oh, I'm going to be the first person, but I think there's a deep down, a natural ambition, and the ambition you don't see any hurdles, you just want to do it and therefore you don't need inspiration, you are your own inspiration and you just want to achieve something great for maybe your vision of the future, for yourself and I know, for me, you know, I people say, oh, I'm from Paris. Oh, my gosh, you're so lucky.
Speaker 2:Sorry, I grew up in the ghetto of Paris, where you know one bit of shoes, and I wanted something else. I wanted to do a different outcome. So I didn't question my blackness as a reason to stop me from getting to where I want to be, and I wanted people to see the talent I had and so on. So it seems like it's something that you did for yourself. You were just hungry, yeah.
Speaker 1:Like, again, the stuff that I would see is like you know, black kids from my school kind of get told off or being excluded or you know, just not really being like you know successful at kind of what they were doing or what they were trying to do in life. So like that wasn't that, wasn't it. Like you know, again, like the most time I saw a black person in the workplace was like the bus drivers If I was on it. It's the like you know I, you know I didn't, I didn't like necessarily resonate like that. Actually, anyone who really knows me from the kid I love buses. I actually wanted to be a bus driver back in the day. Like I loved engineering. I loved, but yeah, then I wanted to be a pilot. I just love big like engineering things. So like, yeah, it was.
Speaker 1:I never really saw it as a context of me being black. I think partly that because of where I grew up like I grew up in a part of town where there were white people, there were black people there were, like Asian people there were, you know, just like South American, latin American, like it was. Just I didn't really I thought the world was as multicultural as where I grew up, kind of the laivity. It wasn't being black wasn't an exception, it was just like well, lots of people are black.
Speaker 2:So why?
Speaker 1:would being black be a problem Like?
Speaker 2:that.
Speaker 1:And I never. I suppose I never really saw anything in a different social class to even be like oh, blackness might actually be a problem. I hope we back or for some people might be an issue.
Speaker 2:And you know what's interesting. I'm going to bounce back to what you just said, because we don't know what we don't know, and part of that is something like here you know my friends at United Benetton, so we are all Arabs, indian and so on, so I never questioned my blackness because that's how the world looked to me, that diversity and that diverse. And then when you go and hit the, we're not here talking about the. You know the professional world, but you don't know what you don't also. Therefore, sometimes people don't realize that they are maybe boxed into possibilities, opportunities that are not there for them, because you don't see those limitations, but maybe the environment that you've chose to enter it I've created them for you and you're not even aware of it. I don't know what I'm saying makes sense, but in my head that's makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, you know you, you don't see limitations because you're not necessarily aware of, like some of the broader structural things in society that might, that, might you know, go for against you in that.
Speaker 2:Exactly Because you know, I basically explained it to that for me before leaving London. I was happy to aspire to be assistant manager for me, that if I made it to that I was happy. But I didn't realize that you know that my limitations were also projected by the me of society as giving me in terms of people who look like me. So therefore there was that, but I'm just, it's not about me. This is your podcast, so I'm going to talk about you. So tell me about you. What did you study and how did you enter into the business? Real care, you know, real world began.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I suppose my school kind of came through through university. So I was good at school. As I mentioned, I managed to be really good at school and get myself into Oxford University. While I studied geography and through the privilege that I had about going there, I met some folks who kind of opened me up to, like, yeah, what consulting was or kind of you know, the world of commerce and business. It wasn't anything like I particularly knew about beyond kind of the theory of studying like business or economics. So, yeah, I met some great people there through an organization that I still do some work with called rare, and they introduced me to the fact that Google had internships in the UK.
Speaker 1:And you know, again, when I think about Google, I was like you know big American tech company like you know what, what? Like you know, why is that relevant to me? Like, do you know what I mean they were? You know it didn't, it didn't seem you know anything relevant or attainable or anything I could do. But you know, I heard about that. And then there's concept of even getting an internship. I didn't know about that until I got into university. Oh, people do, so I have to go and get one.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, I met a really great guy through through a bit of networking, called Oliver, who worked for Google and, yeah, he basically encouraged me to apply. So, you know, they asked me about, like, what was my favorite Google product? And, yeah, for me that was pretty straightforward because I studied geography degree, so I was always going to be able to talk about Google Maps and Google Earth. I actually did my dissertation on it at an undergrad level and I got a job. So, you know, I got rocketed into working for one of the most, you know, prestigious, coolest, innovative, exciting companies, at a time which is still was many of those things back in kind of you know, 2013 or so, yeah, the age of like 20, basically and I was like whoa, what was going on there? And through that I understood more about the technology industry. I was like this is a really cool industry that I want to work in. You know the benefits, the innovation, the people. I was just like I don't want to go and work in finance or law or, like you know, this is my industry, this is what I want to do. This is where the exciting stuff in society is happening.
Speaker 1:So, you know, from that point I was really set on like working in the tech industry, and then it was just a case about what was I going to do, whether, you know, I'd stay at Google or, you know, maybe go and immigrate somewhere and go work abroad or, and you know, that was never really an option, like it was an option theoretically but it's never something I really considered. To be honest, I can come on to that, it's interesting, but, yeah, it was like tech's the place to be. So I learned a lot about, you know, international business, obviously working for a company like Google. And then I decided, you know, not to actually stay there after my internship, but I actually went to go and work for a tech startup founded by some Google called Cubic. Again, that was odd.
Speaker 1:Like you know, a boy for a loo ship going to work for a tech startup. Like, even today, most of that won't happen and it's so. Like you know, it's my life, it's my career, but obviously it's a bit different. That was the best job I've ever had. You know I learned more in that job than I. You know I learned, you know, the other five, 10 years of doing other things.
Speaker 2:Basically, Is it because of you know, when we start up, it's messy and there's a lot of things to do, so you take on different roles. Is that why you feel that you learn a lot?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know people talk about evangelize this concept of CEO and start up. You are chief everything officer. You know, if there's not a guide, you need to write it. If this thing is broken, you need to fix it. If that person doesn't know how to do this, you need to show them. If this person doesn't get that, you need to do it. If this marketing material isn't there, why don't you make it Like there was nothing, that there was nothing done for you, so you had to do it all.
Speaker 1:Compared to an MBA, compared to all these other things, you will learn so much more just being in a scrappy environment. And I was fortunate. I walked in the date, got a Series B funding and it was a growth journey. I thought about hiring. You know I was running a team of seven managing about two million pounds of money at the age of 23. Wow, loads of people. Just you know some people still do that at 33. And the reality was when it's like well, you're the most experienced person, you know how you're doing this, these are your accounts, so that's why you're doing it Like there wasn't like the.
Speaker 1:Obviously there's a hierarchy, so to speak, but it's like that was the benefit of being on that startup journey. You are doing it, you are in charge and, yeah, you like live and die by the thought and I always say it's the best job because, like, I made a lot of mistakes. Like you know, if you had to talk to like my old, like managers or teammates, yeah, there are definitely things I didn't do. Well, you know, I did get a promotion one time and I was a bit upset about that. Like you know, I didn't I didn't necessarily say manage, like some of my clients as well, as I would have done. In like hindsight, you know, there's definitely things that I could have learned and I did learn and that's why it was really great. But I would have even had the opportunity to learn, like, if I look back at my career, I then went and worked for KPMG after that and one of the projects I was on as a strategy consultant there and I was actually helping them evaluate and design and develop the, the, the grad scheme, and you know we're talking about like, okay, what was what the grad is going to do in their first year, the second year, the third year?
Speaker 1:What sort of things are they going to learn and get exposure to? And there's a few people doing three, four, five years in at KPMG. I was doing three, four, five weeks in at QB. It was just yeah. And again why? Well, you know, this is your client management. I love to chat to some of them about it now, cause it's like this literally I didn't even have facial hair this 21 year old. What I got to the business, just kind of like talking to them, literally coming up with rubbish, cause you don't know what you're doing and like, but having to learn that. You know I'm going to call it the art of like. You know some people might call it like BS, some people might call it something else, but the art of improvising, shall we say, and learning how to do things and running with it, like that was that was so fundamental to part of the journey and the learning experience and that that job was the best job of my life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it does sound amazing and I also do it, doing it when you just 23, it's, it's not something that you hear all the time, ashley, and I think the fact that you don't even, you just go for it, people, because a lot of people think, oh my gosh, I'm 23. I'm not really afraid. Then they put all sorts of hurdles into their mind. How do people can learn from you and your ability to just be I'm 23 and so what? I'm just good at what I do and I'm going to do what the job requires to do. And also, I'm presuming that you probably also managing people are older than you, right? Because if you're, 23,.
Speaker 1:yeah, for sure, but I think part of it was like I think part of it's having an inner confidence, and I don't know how much of that is like nature or nurture. I can't A B test myself, but I think you've got to back yourself Like I always thought, like, well, you know, I am, I am capable, I am good, even if I'm not necessarily showing the potential I haven't done it. Like there's no reason I couldn't do this or I couldn't learn that, or I couldn't be this. I don't look at anybody's success, particularly apart from, maybe, the sporting arena, because, you know, age catches up with all of us. I now can accept I've never got to run as fast as you said, but you know what I mean. But like I don't really look at anybody and like the corporate arena, I think I couldn't do what they're doing. I just think they've chosen different decisions or they've made different paths to me. So from my perspective, it was like, yeah, well, I can do this, or I couldn't be good at that. So like, why wouldn't I? So I think it's.
Speaker 1:I think it's about backing yourself because ultimately, if you have self doubt and self, yeah, self doubt in yourself, then why have someone else got to. You know why someone else got to take that pun. And you know you've got to be good at telling stories and convincing other people to go with you on that journey. But yeah, you've got, you've got. You've got the potential to talent. So you know it's not like it's not arrogant, it's. You know it's confident, that it's like well, you know, just back yourself. I think that's that's what it comes down to.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you have to back yourself, and I think one thing that you I want to just add up on what you just said about sometime working with corporate brands and you are people with big titles and one thing I've learned about this I'd never let any someone with big titles and intimate intimidate me, because I really define that they are better than me. They just chose a different path that give them to where they are and I chose another one right. So don't let the titles or the names of the companies devalue yourself. But you're talking about something that is important. The certain skills that keep especially you know whether you're young or you are older is communication communication skills, but also relationship skills, adaptability skills, anything else that really helped you that you think that you master from a very at the early stage of your career.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just on that. I mean so many people get caught up in this, like I call it like job title, like evangelism. You know you talk to those people and like they can't tell you who they are, they just tell you what their job title is. It's like, aren't you bloody boring? Like do you know what I mean? It's like the first thing that you want me to know about you is like your LinkedIn profile. Like, really, like you know, people are people.
Speaker 1:I just think like let's just humanize people, let's think about everyone on a human level. And you know, people want to laugh, people want to do something interesting in their lives. Like what a nice story to go home and tell their loved ones. And you know, regardless of whether you're, you know, ceo of X or or you know, in turn of Y, you're still a person, you're still, you can still connect on that human level. And I think you know it's always weird when I go into like some organizations and they're like, oh, you know, that person's like senior director level, four or 10, or I'm just like Dave, do you know what I mean? Like you know they're just this person. Okay, yeah, they might be 10 years, 20 years, whatever, but like you know, and I think if they, if they go around with that kind of like that ego as well, I mean best to avoid in some instances, you know you don't want to get caught up in people who are just like quite egotistical, because you know there's a
Speaker 1:fancy job title and again, I think there's confidence. Now as an entrepreneur, like you know, yeah, you might run a business as turning as a 50 billion. I don't care what the number is. Do you know what I mean? Like I, I run my own thing and that's as important to me as you getting your money, and it's important to you and your family and all that other stuff. So let's bring ourselves down to that, that common human level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, stay humble, and I think that, as a programmer as well, that society only judged success by the key measures, which is money, where you can make great impact. You know I love. You know something the conversation with some of the previous leaders on the podcast is that you can make a great impact, but the impact is also great success even if money is not there yet and you have to be patient in that game not to think that why are you trying to achieve with it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think, like you know, whether I, whether I depart from this planet. You know, I think I've got to care far more about the, the, the time that I had, the stuff that I enjoyed, the, the impact I made on other people's lives, the things that people say about me rather than you know. Oh, I wish I saved an extra hundred pounds to save the pay off my mortgage to Bob Sernia.
Speaker 1:Did you get what I mean. Like I'm not, I'm not. Money obsessed Like money is a means to doing the things that you want to do, not the reason.
Speaker 2:So true, so true, so do you think that that also help you Is actually, I don't know if Coler Tech is your first voucher, your first venture. Is this your first venture, coler Tech?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it is, it is. I never thought about myself as like a business leader or anything like that. It was kind of, I say, semi accidental. It wasn't like a big grand plan. You know, you need some entrepreneurs that are like I'm going to, you know, set my own business and I'm going to go and do this. Or you know again, I think a lot of people do it for the job title thing. It's like oh, I love this concept of being a founder. Or like I want to be self-employed, I want to be my own boss, and it's like that's not necessarily the right reason to do it, like the reason to do it is because you've got a good business and you're the best person to do it.
Speaker 2:Very true, very true. And sometimes it's just the idea of you see, you're frustrated with something and you just want to solve it. So tell us about that journey. To you say KPMG. So what happened after KPMG?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so basically, I got to the end of my learning curve at QB. It meant went to KPMG and, like, the idea from that was that I was meant to go and be yeah, a tech consultant. I was meant to welcome tech and strategy and do interesting things on that front. Basically, a bit of serendipity happened and it didn't really turn out like that. The pipeline wasn't there for me to do the work that I wanted to do. So after about six months I had to make a decision Do you persist and go with things?
Speaker 1:And I think a lot of people might just be like, oh you know, got a fancy suit, you're in a nice super-dual company, your pay's decent, like you know. Maybe just write it out, maybe just wait a year or two. You know, like you're Yaru, and I was like, no, after six months I'm not doing the work I want to do. Yeah, if you can't take your shoes off. Canon Canon are fica resser and Godnelink is gay, the other is gay, okay, hm. And for me it's like, especially in the technology industry, the longer you're out of it. So I was doing healthcare projects, I was doing, you know, thin tech projects. But you know, basically the longer you're out of an industry, the harder it is to get back in, because you just lose the knowledge, you lose the skills, you lose the connections, you're not relevant, frankly. So for me it was like I've got to get out, I've got to go back to doing something I wanted to do. So there are kind of two things going on in parallel. One was the business, and I can come onto that. But the part of the career journey after that was like I need to go and do some consulting in an organization where I can basically do what I want to do. I work with businesses that are tech enabled, doing interesting things, whether it be startups or corporate strategy etc. Etc. And I was really lucky. I'm a recruiter, to be honest, and he told me about the founders form group and you know I knew about Brent Holman as the entrepreneur from working in tech, but you know I kind of came across it while back but I didn't really realize that he had a whole consultancy on the founders intelligence. A long story short, I ended up leaving Cape and G and going to work for the team there. And what I loved about the FY team, you know lots of things I loved about it, but they're all very entrepreneurial.
Speaker 1:A lot of people have basically been entrepreneurs come out and that was all very professional. It was like a tool of duty. You know it wasn't the idea that you're going to be there for the rest of your career. Whatever it's like. We're going to take really smart entrepreneurial, divergent thinkers, put them in a scenario to problem solve, do that really well for a few you know projects, years, however long it is, and then at some point it's probably inevitable that I'll go off and do something else. But that's fine because they've contributed to the value of the journey. And that really worked for me Because I was like yeah, I don't know where it's going to end, but I'm going to do interesting work. And that's what I'd say to anyone optimize for doing the stuff that you're going to learn.
Speaker 1:Earn in your career rather than earning. You know, I look at like some of my friends. I see some of the people that I know and it's like you know some of them may optimize for earning, like they're like okay, I'm just going to try and get the biggest you know ex salary that I can do in their early career. And you know they try to drive to that and that you know they get to kind of where we are at 30. And then they're like you know, go for coffee, go for lunch, and it's like, yeah, but you know kind of want to family.
Speaker 1:Or you know, like I, it's not there. Or like you know, there's just other things that are coming to priority and it's like, yeah, you all that money, but did it really serve you? You know, do you have that banter when we're all talking about that trip to Ibiza that we had? Or you know, just just you know, do you position where you have the skill set or the network that you can actually go and do something interesting or create a job opportunity for yourself, while then just seeing on a job board? And that comes from learning, not earning, but learning. That comes from building a network, building community. Knowing that you know, if my business doesn't work out, I'll be fine because I know great people and I can probably get myself a good opportunity.
Speaker 1:Like, yeah, I'm not scared as an entrepreneur because I know that, like you know where a lot of people don't have those foundations, so they optimize, I think, sometimes for the wrong things. And who am I today? Where would have to live their lives? But you know, I think if you learn the right things, you also earn money. You earn in a lot. It doesn't necessarily mean you're learning a lot and that will eventually inhibit your earning potential. Yeah, because, especially as an entrepreneur, one of your businesses, ultimately the real wealth engine yeah, like being the entrepreneur is is is capitalism. Yeah, if we live in a capitalist society, being the entrepreneur is how you unlock the material wealth, not really working for somebody, but you can be well off, you can be okay, but you know those disproportionate things and the only way you're going to be a really good entrepreneur is if you learn the right lessons.
Speaker 2:No, absolutely. And you know there's a few things that you say that really I want to echo back into this. I remember a few years ago I did something called the life broke and really talk about success beyond just money, how you optimize your personal life. You know relationship, friendship, family and so on. So, again, if you focus too much on one area of your life and neglect the rest, your life is not a success. You might be successful on, you know, on in your bank account, but nothing else has happened with the rest of what you, what makes a life a fulfilling life Right. So that's super important and I think that you say is so right that people who are successful are have been able to establish skills that whether as I say, is that that, whether business fail, they know that they can get somewhere else. And, karen, do some. You know and do something completely different. And if you are unable to consciously learn I think that's one thing that I say is this is a podcast for our black community and I'm being super honest with you as well we need to invest. We need to invest in learning. So, instead of buying a new pair of trainers or a new iPhone, when the last time you invested in, for example, a coach, having a coach with you, or maybe having a, if you are an entrepreneur, having a CEO training. This is what some of the people on this podcast are doing investing time and make sure that they.
Speaker 2:Knowledge is always relevant. And if you're not doing that, what's going on? When you are left at the mercy of someone else, you know you're unable to catch up. I'm sorry you're going to have to let you go, but even as a person who could just be learning, I love someone say that to me, say like I'm preparing myself for the next world. When I'm in the current, I am. So when I'm at life of this position, I've always been like, oh, this is so good, you know, but I don't think about that. Just think about okay, I'm doing my job nine to five.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, my gosh, you're speaking it, you. It's always a game. It's a game of chess. I always say to people about, this is a career building. It's like don't just think about the job that you're doing now. Think about the job that you want to do after this job. Like, think about two few jobs ahead. I always think about it as like think about, like, what lines you're going to write on your resume at the end of it and how that's going to enable you to get to that next position. That's really what career development and planning is. It's like okay, this is where I want to be, so I need to optimize getting myself to do these things that I need to do in order to do that.
Speaker 1:So, like, when I came and gee, that's one of the reasons I left, because I was like I really need to be writing certain things on my TV that I'm not going to be writing here and that's, you know, that's not going to get me to that thing.
Speaker 1:One of the reasons I was, you know, I say it's kind of one of the reasons I left, but one of the reasons I was super keen to do certain things at Qubit as well was because I wanted, you know, by the age of 23,. You know I was managing people, so I wanted to make sure that I had the opportunity to write on my TV. Yeah, I was like managing people, that was important to me because I didn't want to go back in my career and then go back to like being an individual contributor, like that was a skill set that I was good at, is something I enjoyed doing. So it's like why would I want someone to kind of take that from me, like I need to be able to do that so that I can be, you know, going into my next role, in a position where I manage in projects, not just a contributor to them?
Speaker 2:Correct. I love that. As we continue this engaging conversation, remember that Black Rise is more than just a podcast. We're a dynamic platform where businesses can connect, collaborate and prosper with black professionals, entrepreneurs and black owned companies. Our commitment to diversity, inclusion and empowerment reshapes industries and builds a future where black excellence thrives globally. So don't forget to subscribe and give us a five star review on iTunes. So tell us what happened, because I want to know how Color and Tech started.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I thought that call for career journey was happening in one thing, but I think this is another thing I always talk to entrepreneurs about You've always got to do as much as you can do until you almost can't do anymore. In the absence of having material capital, which a lot of especially entrepreneurs, who are the represented backgrounds that have you've got to work on your human capital and therefore you know time time is almost the most precious commodity, more than money. You know it isn't like people if you give them more time, they'll make more money than if you just gave them money. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1:It's like that conversation. It's like what do you want to do? Have, like you know, an hour long lunch with Jay-Z or you know half a million pounds? I wouldn't say this. And it's like, well, to be honest, the people have no value to add, will take the half a million and to a certain extent, that's fine, because not everybody will have value to add. The entrepreneur people will take the lunch because they know that in that time they can make more money. Do you get what I'm saying? Like you know, if you had that half an hour, you had that hour, you would make more money than the money that someone was offering you.
Speaker 2:I think yes, I know it depends who at the meeting. I know we don't have the conversation about that, but I think it depends who is in front of Jay-Z, because some people will not know how to utilize and maximize the opportunity of an hour with Jay-Z and you might have a completely wrong conversation. Do you see what I mean? So some people would say take the money because you really know how to handle this conversation. But if you are ready and you know exactly how to build relationship and know how to put that person in your pockets, so naturally they will want to help you then definitely have this lunch with Jay-Z.
Speaker 1:And that's the difference between entrepreneurs and not. Ultimately, an entrepreneur would back himself to do that and not wouldn't. And that's fine. If you're not one, don't be one. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1:There's a lot of people who try and be one-lations and like maybe that's controversial, maybe that's harsh, but it's just the truth. Do you get what I'm saying? Like no one's going to be good at some things. I'm not good at a lot of things. Like you know, I'm not trying to be a professional footballer, because I'm not. I'm not good enough, I won't be good enough, I never will be good enough. So I'm not trying. Do you get what I'm saying? Like that's okay. Like so yeah, so anyway, the story of Color and Tech so well, color and Tech for those who don't know is it's a not-for-profit, it's focused on trying to get more people from underrepresented backgrounds into tech.
Speaker 1:And when I was at Qubit so the startup I met Dion, which is my co-founder, and he was another black guy in tech. He'd been basically he was doing some angel vestings, he'd been like an executive tech company. I was basically looking at a few startups and I think Qubit came because he's radar. So you know, we just basically met at an event, I think it was, and we started talking and he was just you know, we literally just talked about being black in tech. It's like, wow, there's another one. Like you know, you're the best thing you know. Sometimes you walk into certain spaces You're like, wow, I actually need to stop and have a conversation, because it's so rare that we are in these same spaces. I need to chat.
Speaker 2:So many times, so many times. You know what actually, at the same time, you have people. When you see another black person, I'm literally drawn to them. It's like I'm going to have to go. I speak to you Because I want to forget how come there's only two of us in the room.
Speaker 1:Yeah, how did you get here too? Because I know my journey, but, like, I need to learn from that journey, so, anyway, so we were just talking about the concept of like, why aren't there many? And it goes back to even when I was, like, at Google. You know, it took me a few weeks to see another black person in the company. I love Google. Yeah, like, I've got an Android phone. Like you know, I work with them. They're one of our backers, you know all of that. Yeah, I love them. But, like you know, like every company, they still got work to do. But you know, the reality was obviously there were people there, but it was rare and it still is rare, like you know, for the hundreds of thousands of people there. And yeah, so we were just talking to me and dealing with about this, like phenomena, basically, and we're just like, but why?
Speaker 1:Because when I was back at like the Google's and stuff like that, even the start up, like, I had people what's happening me? I remember there's this guy that I went to school with what's happening me, being like, oh, can you help me get a job there? But we were the same class, we had the same teachers. You got better grades than me, and some things I got better grades than others, but we were both capable. So why is it that I am now the gatekeeper to your opportunity? Like, why is it that if you know me, you are more likely to be successful than if you didn't? And that didn't sit right with me, because I was just like this isn't really meritocracy. Who am I? Do you know what I mean? And I don't want to be a gatekeeper to anything. I'm in there to say yes or no. I don't Do you know what I mean? My natural inclination is to try and help everybody, but obviously it's not possible. I can't just like say here's my phone number, what's that Me? And just put that on LinkedIn. Do you get what I mean?
Speaker 1:So, from that perspective, I really was just like okay, I didn't like and I couldn't refer anybody and it wasn't possible. So I was like there must be a better way, because all these people are, like, seemingly on paper, just as well qualified as me, so why won't they get an interview to access the same opportunity? I was like well, okay, yeah, I'm a tortsman, so that's one of the reasons. But that's a bit unfair because obviously not everyone can go. Even in that sense, it's got all of its own problems as well. So you don't go to a tortsman, it doesn't mean you're not great, it's just because you guys don't know who you are. So, yeah, so from my perspective, we were like we're a child about this and we're like, well, look, we want to do something about it. Don't know what it is.
Speaker 1:Anyway, long story short, dio gets talked to by Demonsford University in Leicester and they're basically like to him can you help get some of our students into tech? They're bright, they do computer science, they're getting first and they're not getting like the graduate outcomes. And we were like that's a real shame, because why? Like? On paper they're good. We're here with all this tech industry constantly telling us that they're trying to hire people. Their skills, their skills, it's the best jobs that people can get and we can't find them.
Speaker 1:So we were like, look, let's basically take those students to these companies, literally take the horse to water and get a drink. So we used the university travel grant and literally flew the students, most of them included myself. It was actually the first time I ever went to Silicon Valley. We went to Silicon Valley, we took them to Google. I do some of my colleagues who were there who helped us. We took them to some of these companies, but we took them to a range of different ones and we're basically like, yeah, look, we're taking them to these companies. Surely they'll get jobs.
Speaker 2:That's amazing.
Speaker 1:But we were naive because it's not just that easy, like you know what I mean. Again, it goes back to the whole Jay-Z conversation. Like you know, if you put me in front of a recruiter in Silicon Valley, I can get a job. Or if you ask a load of 18 year olds that never use a metter recruiter to do that, most of them can't. You know what I mean Because that's a skill. There's building connection. You're talking to people. They're setting yourself. There's a story, there's getting that person to be interested enough to introduce you to that emir or equivalent who's hiring to find the role. Do you know what I mean? There's a skill in it. Yeah, and like, these students didn't have that. So we were naive, we just thought, oh, they'll get jobs. And they didn't. But they had a good time, they learned.
Speaker 1:And you know, the university came back to us and were like well, you know, can you still help them? And we're like look, we tried. Like, we tried, like we literally took them there. What more do you want? Like, do you get what I'm saying? What more can we do? And they're like well, you know, there's a bit more, you can maybe help the CVs and various bits. And we're like oh, but you know not being funny, I've got a full time job, you know. I was like I'm a G and I, you know I don't have time to do some of this stuff. I don't have to leave to go Like, do you get what I'm saying? Like, you know, and it was. You know deals do stuff too. And they're like please, please, please. And they're like you know what, if he pays you, we were like it's not about the money, I'm earning more money than, like, you know, no, the room. But you know I mean I got enough money, I'm okay.
Speaker 1:I'm like. You know like I wasn't doing it for the money. Do you get what I mean? That was more, yeah, money's nice, but I wasn't. You know, like it wasn't sustainable for me to just do that for money. Do you get what I mean?
Speaker 2:Can I ask you when was it? What year was this?
Speaker 1:2016.
Speaker 2:2016. Okay, wow.
Speaker 1:No, what was it? 20. Gosh, you're really pushing me back. It must be 2017.
Speaker 2:2017. When are the closer to that time?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, 2017. Yeah, yeah, I think it's the same thing.
Speaker 2:I was talking to the city of London the other day and it said to me that basically you have a lot of students that graduate and they fail to get into a graduate position and they wait and end up going working at Sainsbury or Starbucks and whatsoever. If you only try to get back into a work every time an employee look at the CVS, you got the wrong skills survey, they can't right. So there's an issue and around simply that you seem like, okay, you got your new seat, you got good grades, boom, you can get a job. And people don't know. But I struggled to find a job. I had two BA's. I had a BA in Economics and a BA in Marketing Communication and I had a MA in International Business and I ended up doing do-to-do sales.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Imagine I have all these degrees at the do-to-do sales because people say to me oh Flavilla, your accent is too strong, your French accent is too strong, it's still very strong, no really.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I had these horrible things. Maybe it's time to go back to France because, with the eyes of me, yes, recruiters One recruiters, not all recruiters one recruiters said that to me. I always remember Wow, I said. And that woman sometimes when you have this rage, it's kind of like you know what I'm going to prove. You got them wrong, girl, that I can do that and that's my French accent. I'm mad, right.
Speaker 1:Wow. But go back to what you said about the skills for it and it's hard. Yeah, I think there's a few things like taking the politics out of it. The economy is not functioned in a total, optimal way. Yeah, the tech industry requires certain skills and I think our education system in particular hasn't really been good at equipping people to come out with what the industry needs.
Speaker 1:So there are lots of students who come out with a computer science degree but don't have the standards or the levels of programming or portfolio of stuff to show to help them get that first role. And then they go, as you said, they go work for safes or starbucks. And then there's another cohort the next year and then, oh, you're out of industry and you haven't been doing it and you maybe haven't contributed to your portfolio or been huffling in the same way. And then there's another 100-fazard students who are in that pool and, before you know it, may not fall out of the industry. They're not getting the opportunity.
Speaker 1:A part of that is because they're not learning the right things or they're not being taught the right things in the education system. Also because our employees probably aren't doing enough to, yeah, I suppose, train, support, upskill and close those gaps and effectively it's been subsidized through immigration. And I'm not saying, as you said, your story is again an interesting one, but that's what the industry has been doing. It's like, well, london's a great place and we'll just find someone from the Ukraine or France or Holland or Scandinavia, wherever it is, wherever it is, and there's to be someone there who has the right skill.
Speaker 1:Absolutely I would say that there's no value judgment on that.
Speaker 1:This is just the fact of what has been happening, so to speak. But what I'd say from an education perspective is that we need to be providing our young people with better skills so that those are willing and able and capable, do get themselves into positions, which one means that the degrees that they do are actually useful to them and work what they do in the future. And I think there's a massive shortage. And that's where tech came from, because the stuff that we need to do is not necessarily teach them how to program, but how to pass an interview with someone assessing your program. I'm not going to teach you how to do Python better than someone else, but I can probably teach you how to explain yourself, and that can be the difference between you getting them all or not.
Speaker 1:So that's what the tech started to do. It's like, actually, let's just support these students on some of these and I hate the word soft skills because it kind of makes it sound like they're not tangible or worthwhile but those skills, basically, that they don't teach you, are that, unless you have family or friends or you know somebody who used to work for IBM or whatever it is that you might not have an advantage on, and especially if you're from an underrepresented background and you grew up in a poor family and you have to have a part-time job in order to pay the household bills as well and, as a result of that, you don't have time to be working on your GitHub portfolio the same way that Alex from Cheshire does Like. As a result of that, you have some structural disadvantages.
Speaker 2:Yes, and can I add another one to it? I think it's another one called cultural differences. Because if, for example, you are a foreign student and your culture is very different from Western culture and sometimes you don't realize your culture, can be a challenge to your lack of awareness of how to adapt to it and you might not know that the way you do things might upset someone.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and especially in some cultures, especially if you've got first generation parents, there's a big thing in the black community about like, oh, you know, just be thankful for having a job or be thankful for it. That's a bit like, you know, that contributes to pay gaps to this debt. Because there's not an attitude which is actually like are they paying me fairly or equitably or actually I'm worth or deserve or require or need more? So a lot of people they just say, okay, well, I'm going to accept that I'm not going to negotiate. Yes, because it's kind of in our culture not to. But some people it's very much trading to like, well, that's their first offer. Do you know what I mean? And it's like building those skills and those capabilities Like they don't come naturally to some communities or some cultures, as you said, and as a result, we perpetuate some of the challenges that we have in our society 100%, 100%.
Speaker 2:So so Kola and Tech started with helping students. How did that evolve?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so effectively, we we started to do some of that skills training and some students started to get jobs basically, and as a result of that, we we got more support from, like, the universities started doing more of that work and we well, long story short, we basically ended up hiring somebody to do that because it wasn't a sustainable for me and Dior to be doing that.
Speaker 1:Now, what happened to kind of in parallel to that is that as we were doing some of this work, we we knew an organization out in California that was doing something similar. So when we went over there on our trips, but you know, we inspired by them, we learned from them and actually they introduced us to one of their, I suppose, philanthropic donors. Well, at the time, they're Google all Google, all. Well, and this is why I say I love Google, because, you know, a lot of big tech gets a lot of criticism, but they were doing philanthropic stuff for years, long before other people were addressing some of these challenges in ways that other people work. You know they get a lot of stick, but they're still doing more than, like you know, 35% of the tech industry. I can point to companies that even more wealthy than them are doing less.
Speaker 2:Yeah, nothing at all. So some of them don't even do anything. They just say big words and nothing at all. So I am I'm a big fan of Google as well, in terms of they've been the first to support us. So, yes, so I definitely agree.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:They do it.
Speaker 1:Exactly so. So, yeah, they basically saw some of the work that we were doing and the team there really really liked some of us and the work that we were doing. It basically offered us a grant and that was a quarter of a million dollars back in 2018. It basically helped us scale and expand some of the work we're doing. That is, the ability to really change the number of lines in a meaningful manner and actually build stuff that's scalable out of it, and that's exactly what we did. We hired our first person. We built a number of programs, not only just to help students, but like, actually, how do we help entrepreneurs? Like I don't want to just tell people to go work for Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg or whoever it was.
Speaker 2:What about? What about? Bill is the next one.
Speaker 1:Yes, do you know what I'm saying? Like great, if you want to go work for them, that's amazing, that's fantastic. Good on you. We have a couple of people there, as we know, who don't get capital or have ideas and have lots of barriers to build in the next one. So part of that was like let's come up with some programming to use our network to introduce people to venture capitalists or customers effectively to try to help them. That was one of the things that we did as well. And then, yeah, I suppose the final chance of that was actually like there were loads of people who were ready in industry or who were already working professionals, who wanted support too, and why were we just doing stuff for students? So they were like, oh well, actually, you know, we've probably we've got capacity to think about how do we divide, develop programming or, frankly, just bring people together. Yeah, as you'll know what your work is like before you started doing it, what communities were there for Black women in tech?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I know right, but I like how as well, the old communities and the love, what you do and the love, how we can offer and ways to collaborate, which is so, so, so beautiful, because I love your work and love. You know whatever you guys are doing is most beautiful and beyond that, you know this is so important that we operate, understand that the problem is so big. Not only our organization, our organization can save it, so we have to come as a whole. I can't do this. Go to color in tech and I'm always like that. I don't do this.
Speaker 2:Go to coding Black female, I can't do this Best to speak to to Raphael Black Business Show and really forget that I've. If it's not for me, it's not for everybody, and I think if we have that mindset, if you have that, you will never lack of anything in your life. I'm curious if you can tell us more about Grants, because I think people don't think about the option, about how you can. Also because everybody think, oh, vc money is the only way for me to secure a fund, or maybe tapping to my saving. How do you think about Grants? Or did it come to you? Or and also, was it easy to get it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, just on the first bit, you said 100%, like I generally believe and always like the pie. The pie is big enough for lots of people to eat, yeah, and people who try and convince you otherwise like that's not. It's just not the case, to be honest. Like there is enough opportunity out there and there are enough people who need opportunity out there and there's enough opportunity, capital and all the things that you know to create an ecosystem is not just a one market you know you need an ecosystem.
Speaker 1:So if other people doing good things, that's good for us, frankly, because the pie grows Right. So you know that's one thing. So you know just a glance. So yeah, like I think there's a couple of things, as I said, we have a structure where not for profit, so we're able to take grants in a way that other people, you know aren't necessarily even in the first place, and you know that's one thing, but you know that's not necessarily for a hippie. I mean, there are lots of what's going on about like the time as well. But you know, one thing I'd say is you never want to build your business based on God's, because they come and go and go. But it's the best example of this. You know 2020, everyone had money Jack and Harry Jill. You know the government will literally give it away, give away so much money they don't even know where somebody went, like not so much, but now like there isn't. So you don't want to build your business based on this. You know people give him money but not for value, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Value is the thing that you bought a business around. Are you devising and giving and producing value for people? That's what they want to pay for. Grant. They thank you for the value that you've created, but they're not necessarily compensating you for the process of creating the value.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And basically as a result, yeah, when the grant funding dries up, you don't want your business to fail, so you need to have customers as well. You need to be able to do that. So there are grants that innovate you can. There's people that still do grant funding and that's really important, because some businesses can see it as an opportunity to to get money for things that other people weren't necessarily investing. From a commercial return perspective, it can fund things that are needed in society that otherwise you know won't necessarily make money. So you know they are required and I would encourage people to still look. There are a number of like foundations or government things that you know will will will help people out that people don't necessarily explore.
Speaker 2:And I just saw something to use. As you know, it's funny I have two of us, two of us GTA Black analytics, also a non-profit, and something I actually never thought about because I've I've run businesses before. I think it's a figure in terms of how can I always provide commercial value and in the exact exactly what you say. If you count on this, you are dependent on how the mood goes and what the market wants. And I said to people type on the George Floyd as long as you can. At some point this will be gone. There will be something else that will be relevant to them, whatever it is, and it's gone, it's not there.
Speaker 1:It's gone. It's gone, you know, even to what you're saying. I think it's definitely saying and like I think it's a bit of a murky world. It's like, obviously, professional grant writing. So people basically made an industry about being able to unlock and write into this capital. Especially, you know, governments basically, and maybe the only few people now give an answer to grants. There's less in the private sector just because of the economy. But yeah, there's definitely a skill and an expertise in it and if you can unlock some you know significant ones as well then you know they can, they can definitely help. But what they should do is they should help you with that initial kind of growth capital.
Speaker 1:I help you do something which you need almost from a cash flow perspective, like, get you know, maybe it's hiring that person who will then make you money, Like. Or maybe it's like investing in that machinery or whatever it is to help you make your products more quickly or whatever it is. But don't don't see it as like sustainable, because there's no guarantee you get it. There's no guarantee that it will be there once the funding runs out and you know you don't want to build a business hiring and having to let people go, because you know it's just the money's not there at the end of the day. So that's definitely one thing to think about. But, yeah, like I wish I could point people to say, oh, you know, these people are, you know, doing grants and stuff like that. But yeah, the sad reality is that you know, a lot of that funding has dried up and the economy has kind of yeah, gone into.
Speaker 2:Can I tell you something as well, ashley? I think that this is why building relationship is important, because not all grants are advertised. To be honest, sometimes there's part of money that sits there and if you know the right person to tell you like, listen, there's about this part of money sitting there. If you put together a good proposal, I can try to get it to you, and that I'm being truly transparent. That happens to me a few times where people trust me, say I love what you're doing, I love your vision, I love what you're trying to achieve, I'm going to help you, my company, I can get this for my company, because if I can do that level, god knows what other and this is also don't be ashamed, because I know other people are doing it, whether it is in the government and I'm not going to make it.
Speaker 2:You know accusation and give names or what's, because that's not my position. But you have to be against something you know luck is only defined by the consistency of your actions and if the actions don't include your ability to, as you say, actually building great relationship, communicating and so on, you will never have people who advocate for you and be your ally within the business Say I need to work with Ashley, I need you to work with Lavela. She's the one that will do that. Those people are more powerful sometime than you and your voice. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And like business isn't like a shop. You know, like I think sometimes people think, like you know, unless the money's like, they're like like an apple on a shelf. Yeah, it's like, of course, maybe that's it. It's there. Like sometimes you've got to hunt for it. Like you know, especially if you're doing something innovative like often people haven't spent money on this stuff or they haven't bought it before. All right, they haven't done that before. No one's no one's got a budget for this. Do you know what I'm saying? Like you've got to go and unlock it. And yeah, sometimes that means that you know you got to talk to the person who's got the key. Like you don't want to say so, like you really need to think about how you use those connections and build relationships. So it's not about transactional. I think a lot of people think about it as like transactional. Basically, it's not about that.
Speaker 1:It's like you know, I want to help people, other people want to help other people, just generally human nature, to be honest. Sometimes we think it's not, but most people actually do want to help people. Yeah, so you know I think that's like one thing. So from that perspective, people just have to think about you know how can I help others? And then by doing good work that like creates value because we're helping each other, there'll probably be other good value created as well.
Speaker 2:Hmm, love that All right. Black Tech Fest is a monster. How do we create a monster, a great monster, though, wow. I mean I mean?
Speaker 1:where do you begin? How do you create a monster? Do you know? Look at, look at this.
Speaker 2:People have never been to Black Tech Fest. Probably they don't understand, but I would say that, as you listen to this person, listen to this podcast, do a research and look at Black Tech Fest. I don't want to show you the video. Do as much justice as being inside the room, yeah.
Speaker 1:We need to do that better as well. We need to. We need to be better at like, finding ways to show people the magic.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. And also you know, like we've I don't know for you, but you know you go for your entire career. I think that there's always one or two people who are in your space. And then you go to this, to Black Tech Fest, and like, oh my God, what is going on? And I'm probably just feeling like there's so many of us that haven't met. That was my feeling is like, oh my God, there's so many of us having met. Where are you coming from? And you know what.
Speaker 1:That's why I love that, because that's kind of why we started it. We started it because people were gaslighting us and basically being like Black people with tech don't exist.
Speaker 2:Oh, wow.
Speaker 1:I mean, that was basically the narrative. It's like we're fine, people aren't applying, and maybe they're not applying because they don't exist.
Speaker 1:Oh good, and that was literally it and there was very little data to basically go and say to people no, you're wrong Because, like you know, people were tracking data Like, even now, how many people are like what's the definitive source for how many Black people are in tech? And, as a result, it's very easy for people to be like, oh well, people don't exist. So parts of rationale was literally just to be like oh yeah, by the way, we do it this, how about we bring everybody together to show you that we're here and that we exist and actually we'll create some connections as a result.
Speaker 2:When did Black Day Fair start? I can't remember.
Speaker 1:So we started it. So we actually had the idea before George Floyd and all of that. Like you know, tragedy happened. We actually it kind of came out of a couple of events that we used to do so actually back in the founding journey. Like some of the stuff that we did actually was like this concept called color code, which was kind of like how do we get the best school chip going? Like, how do we let people know about early career opportunities in tech? I think we did a few events which were a bit more experienced, got around belonging and the concept of like yeah, let's, let's create a sense of belonging for people. So, yeah, 2020 was basically the first year, and then obviously, everything around George Floyd happened and COVID, which meant we weren't able to do it in person.
Speaker 1:So we're like we've got to do it virtually. We had to do it virtually for two years Now. Actually, the virtual business is like well, the virtual web business at the time was like the most profitable thing you could ever do. I mean like you basically have to pay for a platform and like that was the only cost. You don't have a venue, you don't have to pay for production crew you have to pay for, like musician or anything like that it was. It was like the highest margin business. People see it was great time if you're in that business.
Speaker 1:But we always wanted to do in person, like even if it makes less money as a result from a margin perspective. Like you know, the industry's changed. People don't want to sit down and listen to a whole conference on a laptop anymore. Like, people want to connect. That's what people always wanted to do. So, yeah, the first year that we did it in person was 22. We just started this year. Well, I said last year now 23. I like, yeah, the objective. Yes, you go bigger and better. You know, as we go out, grow, grow every year. Really, like, why not with what we started?
Speaker 2:Yeah, do not stop. I think that you are. I still feel like you are the beginning, because there's awakening where, against the thing that is a there's a mindset shift that you do with this, and it's a mindset shift I'm doing with Black rice, which is we've been operating in silo in this space where we do not believe there's enough of us ourselves and therefore have accepted it. And when you go into places like this, like wow, there's a lot of us and therefore people come back to where they come from and I'm sure people like you travel from many places around the world. They take you, they take you with them to talk about what you're doing. It means that this number will just continue to grow and the impact you know, of what we, what you do, is amazing because this thing that happens now there's also, you know, 10 year impact, five year impact.
Speaker 2:I came to this one hour was two years ago and I was just thinking about taking a fair, comfortable and these other Black people and I signed up to do this and this software engineering and so on, and I'm doing this now this person is able to be in this great position and able to say now we want the company to sponsor, have a space, coloring tech, because I don't want to be the only one, and they understand having a simple, that as a Black person, especially if you are numbered, you have even more power because that company is so scared to lose it, because they're never going to affect their diversity number.
Speaker 2:They will do and listen to you, especially if you're in a position of power to even if not a position of power, but best when you're a position of power to say, hey, listen to me, this is what we do if we want to increase our diversity number, go and harvest and that coloring tech and so on. And that's what's beautiful. You know, if you only focus on the money, you miss out that beautiful, not the effect of the impact that one person has coming to a room like this and utilizing their voices and full time, what they then capable of doing, and that's a beautiful thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's also about is this is you know, I just want to normalize. You know this as a great tech. I mean fundamentally, like you know, loads of organizations go to a number of different events across the year and show up, like so, just because these are black people in the room, why is it any less worthy that they show up? I love it Just fundamentally, like okay, so there's room for the black people, but they're all in tech. You know, some of them are really senior, some of them are junior. You know, some of them are entrepreneurs, like that. You know, take out the color of the skin. This is just like any other tech event.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So why are we spending less? Why are we not showing up in the same way? Because they're black, Like why? So, you know, I want to change that. So part of the issue was initially it's like, well, there wasn't an opportunity for people to show up because there weren't people doing it. Well, now there are. So, like I can't accept any excuses. It's like, well, you know, you can't say to me that things don't you know, you can't find people, you don't exist or whatever. It's like well, got 30, 35 different partners who will seem to understand it, so why don't you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, now you can kind of. I like that because now you can use pressure. Why are you telling me? Because you've been there, you've seen it as results. So if you are really about it, then put the money where your mouth is, and I think this is something that now you know there's a power, no matter recession, what's over technology, we know there's not enough of us. So if you want to invest, do so. I think one thing I don't know for you, but I feel sometimes I wish there was more. I see, most of the time, when it comes to diversity, is driven by American companies and I want to see, you know, I want to see more European companies were to have the same drive, but I feel that there's many dominant, obviously, because the tech space is is dominated by American tech companies. But I want to see more, you know, local, obviously local, but European companies to also take the same drive and understand the power of it but also the commercial value. But it doesn't feel like it's there as much as it is with American companies.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I think there are like cultural challenges across, like even how we talk about diversity across Europe and and you know that disparate nature means that leadership budgets, all these sorts of things aren't necessarily centralized in the same way that one central American market might operate, for example. So you know there will be challenges, but Europe is still a big development market. There are good brands, opportunities, every company has a global presence is still here. So you know, I think I think it's it's for us to make the case about. You know why they should be doing something can make it easy for them to do business. You know they're right about. You know we should exist or someone should do something. So you know we've got to make it easy for them to say yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love that. You have to make it easy If you only remember something. Make it easy for whoever you want to convince to say yes, and for that you need to understand what they want to hear and what information we need to validate to understand that you are relevant to them. I think that's the way we need to make it easy for them to say yes. If you get that mindset, you get a lot of yes in your life. If you just like to talk, you know you can probably struggle a bit more.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Is anything that you think you would have done differently for your career? I never, just you know, separate failures from success, because I think failures is part of success. Is anything that you think you wish you would have done differently?
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I mean that's a really good question and I kind of think that, yeah, that's. You know it's kind of a hard one to say because you know the journey is not done. You know they're still obviously more to see, more to learn. You know time will maybe tell if you've got some of the stuff right. I think one of the lessons that I've learned around like managing people is when it's not working, it can really be a real like pull back and drain on energy and time and successful, and I think you've. I don't know if I'd say I'd do things differently, but one thing I've definitely learned is to be more decisive in terms of like people decisions whether that's you know, hiring or letting people go or whatever it be, because, you know again, the right person can really transform so many things.
Speaker 1:You know, likewise, getting the wrong person can really stall so many things.
Speaker 1:And again, a lot of people might not necessarily have that experience because if they've not, like, managed people or managed teams, or they've gone into this and they've never actually done that before, then you know they learn in this kind of the hard way, really, if you think about it. Like you know they've not had that experience of doing that. But you know, if you've always been in a high performing business, you know you've always been a high performer. You know managing underperformance, like you know I mean that's, you know that's a new thing Like a lot of people haven't had that. You know having to do that and, as I said, you know the best job I had is when I could learn some of these things on other people's type of money. Like you know you get it wrong and it costs you. So so yeah, like I definitely think you know some of the people decisions are some of the most valuable.
Speaker 2:I don't know, when it comes to people and I agree with this it's really hard. I think people I'm very wonder was like can I myself have to deal with people? Because it can be quite exhausting when you are, you know, ceo, founder of running a business and having to manage people. We have been doing it for a long time now and but doesn't mean that I, I, that's my, that's my favorite thing, I do it because I have to do it.
Speaker 1:That's part of scaling. I don't think it's really. If you are serious about being like an entrepreneur and growing a scaling business, I don't think it's just something you cannot tell of and say, oh, I just don't want to manage Like buy it. You can hire people to do some of those things, but part of the job.
Speaker 2:Yeah, 100%, 100%. And you know you talk about hiring on, you know managing low performance, but I think also it can be quite difficult to hire to manage high performer, because high performer can also have those demanded and you know, if you know the company was able to give them that growth, then you also have that fear. But you know there's also this burden of you, know they're going to do the.
Speaker 1:I always say it's a bit easier because the high performers will make it easy. They'll leave, it's true, really great people. If they're not getting it, they won't hang around, like you know, that's that. That's what will happen. You know, if you're not giving them what they need, or they're not happy, or they're not fiving or learning or whatever, they'll take the decision out of your hand. So in a sense, it's a bit easier because, yeah, okay, you have to push them, you have to do it, but they'll manage you, they'll let you know, they'll communicate, they will, they'll make it really clear if they're not getting what they need from you. So in that sense, I think it's easier to manage them because, you know, by them being high performers, they're kind of doing the stuff like it's for you to, it's for you to be a high performer, to match up and to keep up with them and to offer them stuff and sometimes, especially in a bit it's going business you're not able to offer some.
Speaker 1:Sometimes people's personal growth is higher than your business growth. You know, you might want to give someone a promotion but you might not be able to afford them. Like you know, I love foods. You know I love to. You know give them as much money as they want. But, like you know, if I'm making it, where's it coming from. You know you want to be able to. You know help somebody out, like go to people management or whatever. But you know, if you don't have the budget to hire a team of people, like, how are you going to? You know help someone people manage.
Speaker 2:Yes, and you know what I also say, that you know part of also being a great you know great manager and I love that. I love that from Accenture and the other thing where if people leave, they keep them on their alumni and they understand that sometimes they're not able to give them what they're after, so we let them leave, but they maintain that relationship with them, so let them do whatever they're doing in other companies and then try to get them back at some point or leave the good ones that have, you know, chosen the other, other path of their career. But I thought it was just a great approach as well to maintain, especially when good employees have left, you maintain as you alumni.
Speaker 1:You know what a bit of bad terms. You know it's a bit like. You know, even if your favorite manager or colleague leaves the business, you want to stay charged 100%.
Speaker 2:My last question actually, you've been such a pleasure Listen, I can speak to you all day and you know that. But my last question is my favorite question is what is your vision? I know that you still have so much to accomplish. You still, you know I would say baby, but you're still a young man, fits will travel the world and live his best life. What is the vision of your future?
Speaker 1:So me personally rather than the business, yeah, yes, you, oh, interesting, um, yeah, I mean, you know it sounds very cliche, oh, be happy. But yeah, like it is that like the decisions I'm making in my life are to optimize for me, doing things that like make me happy rather than kind of, you know, certain sort of wider, wider deity or goal or whatever it be. And yeah, so, like you know, if I think about that in the work context, it's like I don't want to just do what we've done next year, the set this year or last year, like how do we innovate, how do we do something that's mentally stimulating, like I saw, I saw a tweet today, you know, someone was like, oh, it's the first day back in the office and they're already sort of pressed. I want to wake up, getting there. How do I use whatever privilege I have to try and make that not the case? And that's not me that I, you know, I love every single minute of everything I'm doing, but, like, more of what you do, like less of what you don't like.
Speaker 1:That's the thing. So you know, yeah, like, do things which optimize for, you know, short and medium term happiness. Long term is a long way away. You don't necessarily know, but, yeah, can I do things? You know, can I? Can I do stuff which is, which is contributing to me? You know, not waking up with that, oh my gosh, I can't. You know, I don't want to go to work, I don't want to do this, I don't want to have that call, I don't want to. You know how do I do? Less of the stuff I don't want to do and more stuff I do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, love that and you know happiness. I think if you keep in mind what is best for you, you will always achieve that. But I think, as you say yourself, if you love Mondays I didn't say that, but I'm saying that if you love Mondays, then you know that you know right job. If you, if you just looking forward to Friday, you know that you know wrong job. But sometimes everybody just want a Friday.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, that's fine. As I said, you don't have to love every single bloody second, but, like you know, I think there is a, there's a general, like you know, are you happy with what you're doing? You know, I think anybody who's, you know, been at a job and you know they want to leave. You know, you know, when you get to a point where it's like it's time in it, you know you don't, you don't want that to be your own business.
Speaker 2:So, actually, as we are wrapping up, tell us how, how we can learn more about color and tech, or if you want to get involved in Black Tech first, either as an attendee, a conference exhibitor, or whatever. What's the best way to find out more about everything that you do?
Speaker 1:Amazing. So so, yeah, there's two handles there's color and tech and there's Black Tech first. So Black Tech Fest is the event. You know, whether you're Black, asian, white, whatever it is, you are welcome. I want you to be there. I want you just to see it.
Speaker 1:So you know, if you, if you, you know you've got a new year's resolution, be there is my, you know my one thing, and obviously you've got the privilege and the ability to to bring more people with you or your organization, then please do that. So, yeah, you can find Black Tech Fest on you know all the all the major channels, by literally typing in that same way with you know kind of tech, what I said, a search engine will come up at the top, hopefully. And yeah, and if you want to connect with me, linkedin is the best platform for that. Ashley Ainsley, but not any Y, any E-I-G-H. Ashley, yeah, that's that's my name and you know you'll find me. You know, got a few few further followers, so hopefully I'll pop up if you search me. And then there we go. I try to be like Flavola.
Speaker 2:Stop Listen, ashley. I've been a big fan of you, I've been a big fan of your work and I'm so happy you came to this podcast. My dear listeners, it's been a pleasure to have someone such as him, so talented, so young, so amazing, so bubbly, so just great positive energy. And it's one thing that you want to remember about this episode If, if you don't try, you will never figure out how far life takes you. So live your best life and do what makes sense to you and not anybody else. Bye, everybody. Thank you for joining us on this episode of Black Rise. We hope that you found this conversation as inspiring as we did. Share your takeaways on social media and tag us as we wrap up. Remember that you can always stay connected with us. Join us on this journey of elevation, motivation and empowerment. Let's rise together, break barriers and create lasting change. Subscribe now to stay updated with our latest episodes and visit the BlackRisecom to find out more. This is Black Rise, where excellence and impact converge to redefine the future. Until next time, keep rising, you, you.