My family is mostly a chosen one. I've managed to invite some really amazing people into my life and they become family. Brothers, sisters, siblings, mentors, role models. And I like to live that way, where your family bleeds out into the larger community.
I never had a strategy about my life. I didn't have enough information to have a strategy. I'm the first person in my family to go to college. I had no family mentors.
I have been lucky enough to work with the world's best designers and top stylists - who have been my mentors.
I think I will never stop having mentors.
Mentors of mine were under a big pressure to minimize their femininity to make it. I'm not going to do that. That takes away my power. I'm not going to compromise who I am.
I loved Mia Hamm, and I really looked up to Julie Foudy as well, who is one of my mentors.
At Camfed, we have focused on transforming the vicious cycle of poverty in many rural African communities into a cycle of opportunity. Alumnae of Camfed's programs go on to become role models and mentors for future generations of young students. We call this the 'virtuous circle,' and we know this is a model that works.
Simply stated, girls want role models and mentors.
When I started my company in the U.S. I was always told by my mentors, 'If you want to start a tech company, you need a technical co-founder,' because outsourcing just doesn't work. It is too slow, it is too expensive, and the product is going to change a lot.
I was blessed to have the guys at Bear Stearns as mentors. They taught me a lot, but most of all, they taught me that there's nothing wrong with selling if you're selling the right product to the right person.
