Latest / The Breakfast Club / The Blavity CEO on Leaving LA, Losing the Mask & Choosing Herself

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The Blavity CEO on Leaving LA, Losing the Mask & Choosing Herself · The Breakfast Club

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  Speaker 1: I'm the homegirl that knows a little bit about everything
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  Speaker 2: With me in Vegas.
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  Speaker 1: For the days that I'm there, I'll also be bringing
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  Speaker 1: the latest news, but it's also the latest scene that
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  Speaker 2: Let's get on into the latest. Now, speaking of conversations, wow,
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  Speaker 2: this one, this is a good one, y'all. We have. Hey, y'all,
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  Speaker 2: it's Morgan. I'm here on The Latest with Lauren LaRosa.
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  Speaker 1: So when Morgan talks about Afrotech, y'all, let me because
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  Speaker 1: she being a little humble.
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  Speaker 2: OK, let me just tell y'all.
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  Speaker 1: Afrotech is the leading platform for Black professionals in tech.
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  Speaker 1: They help a network of over 45,000 professionals communicate, collaborate,
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  Speaker 1: and unleash their creative within the tech space. Morgan, as
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  Speaker 1: a venture capitalist, she's raised millions and millions of dollars
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  Speaker 1: in the tech space. I mean, she, just across her Instagram,
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  Speaker 1: talks so much across various platforms, from Blavity to Afrotech
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  Speaker 1: to Travel Noir to her personal Instagram page. Just about
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  Speaker 1: how to sustain a business, how to raise money in
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  Speaker 1: your business, in your field, in the tech arena. But
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  Speaker 1: also some of the things that are going on with
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  Speaker 1: black media, some of the things that we are facing,
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  Speaker 1: some of the things that we are scared to call out.
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  Speaker 2: And she's doing it from the CEO seat. OK, I
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  Speaker 2: give it up to my girl.
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  Speaker 1: Let's get on into the conversation. Now, y'all know whenever
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  Speaker 1: I have a special guest pull up on the podcast,
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  Speaker 1: we love to get a little message for all the
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  Speaker 1: people listening. And today I have an inspiration to us
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  Speaker 1: all in the building space. I'm going to let her
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  Speaker 1: introduce herself because can't nobody say it like she do.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, everybody. It's Morgan DeBond, founder, CEO of Blabbing and Afrotech.
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  Speaker 2: Happy to be here. Hey, Lauren. Hey.
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  Speaker 1: So you have a video, not even a video series,
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  Speaker 1: I would call it on your Instagram, where you post content, right?
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  Speaker 2: And you're very honest. You're very to the point.
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  Speaker 1: You hold the people accountable, but you say how you
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  Speaker 1: feel and you are the head of your businesses and
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  Speaker 1: of your world. For me, watching you, that's inspiring as
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  Speaker 1: a black woman. My first thing I thought, and every
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  Speaker 1: time I see your videos, I'm like, she's not ever
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  Speaker 1: afraid of like what that will trickle down into for
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  Speaker 1: her business because she's a black woman and they make
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  Speaker 1: it seem like it's so scarce for us to do
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  Speaker 1: what you're doing. Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: I think one of the benefits of being a CEO
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  Speaker 3: is that you are your own boss.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: So when it's a rough day, it's my rough day.
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  Speaker 3: When it's a great day, it's my great day. When
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  Speaker 3: you start working for other people, somebody else can ruin
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  Speaker 3: your day. I can't really ruin my own day because
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  Speaker 3: I have chosen this life. And I think for anyone
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  Speaker 3: who's considering being an entrepreneur or is currently employed, you
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  Speaker 3: got to get to the mental model where you feel
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  Speaker 3: confident in who you are and you feel at peace
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  Speaker 3: of who you are because at the end of the day,
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  Speaker 3: entrepreneurship is a journey. So there's going to be ups
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  Speaker 3: and downs. That's guaranteed.
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  Speaker 2: Mental model. I love that phrasing.
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  Speaker 1: Another thing that I've seen and heard you talk about
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  Speaker 1: is As black women, us choosing to work for ourselves
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  Speaker 1: and on ourselves before doing it for other people and
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  Speaker 1: how you grow up typically.
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  Speaker 2: And that is not how you were taught to lead
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  Speaker 2: in the world.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, 100 percent. You know, I was raised in a
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  Speaker 3: traditional black household. My mom stayed home. My dad was
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  Speaker 3: a doctor and we were very much taught to, you know,
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  Speaker 3: put your head down, do the work, get good grades,
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  Speaker 3: get good scores, go to college, get a job, do that,
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  Speaker 3: you know. And so the idea that I was going
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  Speaker 3: to take myself out of a pretty much guaranteed route
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  Speaker 3: for what my parents and the generations.
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  Speaker 2: Before us actually really worked for them, that was pretty risky.
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  Speaker 3: And I think that actually now when you look at
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  Speaker 3: the economy and you look at the outcomes that are
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  Speaker 3: happening to black women in the workplace, being self-employed and
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  Speaker 3: having a portfolio of career where you have multiple things
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  Speaker 3: going on, even if you have that day job, making
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  Speaker 3: sure you have a side hustle where you're bringing income in.
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  Speaker 3: that is going to actually give you more financial stability
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  Speaker 3: in the long run.
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  Speaker 2: It's also a safe space now, too.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, mentally it's a safe space, too, because you're able
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  Speaker 3: to have a little bit more control over your own
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  Speaker 3: environment and what you're working on and maybe work on
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  Speaker 3: things that you're passionate about, not just things that are profitable.
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  Speaker 2: That autonomy over your own life, you said, like, you know,
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  Speaker 2: growing up in your household, you have siblings? I have
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  Speaker 2: a brother, yeah. Brother, older? Older brother. Older brother, okay.
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  Speaker 1: Growing up in your household, like, that not being something
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  Speaker 1: that is at the forefront of your conversation... At what
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  Speaker 1: part of your life were you like, I'm going to
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  Speaker 1: stop over explaining and y'all here or y'all not?
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  Speaker 2: Oh, that took me a while.
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  Speaker 3: That was probably maybe year three or four of Blavity.
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  Speaker 3: Even when I started my own company, I was still
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  Speaker 3: indoctrinated into the system because I moved from a career into,
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  Speaker 3: from a corporate career into a Silicon Valley career where
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  Speaker 3: I was raising venture capital. And there was a certain
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  Speaker 3: way that you do it. They have this thing called
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  Speaker 3: pattern matching where you basically do You need to look
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  Speaker 3: and sound and talk like how the white boys talk, like,
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  Speaker 3: because that's what's going to make them comfortable.
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  Speaker 2: Issa Rae had that episode on Insecure.
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  Speaker 1: I think it was called like Tom or something like that,
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  Speaker 1: where it was like that, where you had to like
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  Speaker 1: he walked through the world in her workplace doing whatever
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  Speaker 1: and she just could not. Right.
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  Speaker 2: So I would wear black combat boots, a black T-shirt
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  Speaker 2: like I was. But it wasn't me.
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  Speaker 3: You know, I wasn't leaning into my feminine. I was
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  Speaker 3: very aggressive. I was very like just trying to fit
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  Speaker 3: into this mold. But there's literally no way. that black
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  Speaker 3: women can fit into their mold. So the more you try,
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  Speaker 3: the more you deplete yourself.
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  Speaker 2: And here's the thing.
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  Speaker 3: When you do that, you are no longer operating at
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  Speaker 3: your highest self because you're spending so much energy and
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  Speaker 3: mental capital trying to conform. That's the same energy that
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  Speaker 3: could be put into innovation. Yes. And the moment you
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  Speaker 3: stop doing that is the moment you're going to be
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  Speaker 3: able to grow faster, whether that's financially, whether that's personally,
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  Speaker 3: whether that's spiritually.
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  Speaker 2: And I truly believe that.
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  Speaker 1: That's why your content like sticks with me. Like I'm
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  Speaker 1: not like the big I mean, I guess I naturally
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  Speaker 1: have to kind of be in tech being the media.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: But I'm not like a techie girl. Right.
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  Speaker 1: But with you and following your journey, your brand, what
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  Speaker 1: I love about you, you and you give yourself the
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  Speaker 1: permission to do that over and over and over and
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  Speaker 1: over again.
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  Speaker 2: Like and it seems like. unwavered.
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  Speaker 1: I was going to say it's a brave thing to do,
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  Speaker 1: but I feel like it's such a necessary thing to
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  Speaker 1: do today.
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  Speaker 2: I'm at peace. That's the other thing. I left LA.
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  Speaker 2: I lived in LA.
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  Speaker 3: I built my company from San Francisco to LA. But
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  Speaker 3: you're here in New York, which is the same level
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  Speaker 3: of intensity, in my opinion.
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  Speaker 1: It is, but I think I've never been in Silicon Valley,
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  Speaker 1: but I have friends, black women, that are in tech.
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  Speaker 1: My old business partner was in tech in Every day,
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  Speaker 1: there's so many challenges because she's a mom and there's
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  Speaker 1: different things she wishes she could remove herself from. But
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  Speaker 1: the type of job she has and being in that,
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  Speaker 1: it's a world of it, doesn't allow her. If she
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  Speaker 1: literally takes a step away or doesn't take the ride
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  Speaker 1: in that they give her so she can start working
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  Speaker 1: in the car, she may lose everything. And that is
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  Speaker 1: so hard for her to function in as a mother
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  Speaker 1: and as a woman who's just navigating life in the world.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: And I think at some point you have to decide,
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  Speaker 3: especially after you've made some level of success, How much
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  Speaker 3: more are you willing to personally sacrifice? And so for me,
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  Speaker 3: leaving L.A. and moving to Nashville, Tennessee, which for someone
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  Speaker 3: of my level moving to Nashville, Tennessee, there's not like
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  Speaker 3: it was slow.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: You know, I'm like, but it was beautiful for me
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  Speaker 3: because it gave me the space to focus on my
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  Speaker 3: personal life and focus on my health and to focus
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  Speaker 3: on my mental. And that opened up. an even brighter
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: life than I could have ever imagined for myself. So
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  Speaker 3: sometimes you have to take yourself off the rat race
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  Speaker 3: and relocate physically if you must.
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  Speaker 2: Were you scared?
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  Speaker 3: No, I don't think I was scared. I think I
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  Speaker 3: was fed up. I was over it. So I was
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  Speaker 3: looking for a hard reset. I call it my control
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  Speaker 3: alt delete moment, like control alt delete.
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  Speaker 1: I'm out.
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  Speaker 2: I need something else entirely.
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  Speaker 1: That's crazy because most most, you know, people that are
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: building anything, whatever your color is, but especially black people
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: and black women in the space. You feel so out
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  Speaker 1: of sight, out of mind. Like if I remove myself
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  Speaker 1: right now, will this even ever happen again? I want
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: it to be out of mind. Please don't invite me.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: I'm not interested.
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: I'm not interested in going to the red carpet for
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: the whatever the hell video movie.
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  Speaker 2: I don't care. I don't care.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: I think you can get caught up in caring about
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: things that don't matter. And then when you look at
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: your life, the things that do matter, love, relationships, family, God,
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  Speaker 3: where are they?
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: Where are they?
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: You didn't leave any room for them because you were
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: so busy.
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  Speaker 2: Working every moment of every day. Right. I'm trying to
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  Speaker 2: figure it out.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Well, we appreciate you at the latest with Lorna Rosa.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. You could do like a
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: sign off line now. Like, I mean, if it's like
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: one thing you want our audience to remember about you,
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: about your company, about your journey.
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: I'd say the one thing I want anyone who's listening
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: to this to remember is that it's okay for you
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: to put yourself first. You can do anything for a season.
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: So it doesn't always have to be forever. If you're
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: making a decision to step out of the rat race
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: and to rebalance yourself. Do it for three months. Do
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: it for six months. Do it for a weekend if
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: that's all you can take. But building that muscle and
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: that habit of knowing when to opt out and finding
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: a space that can be your piece is going to
• 11:38
  Speaker 3: revolutionize your ability to continue to grow and succeed in business.
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: I'm Lauren LaRosa.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: This has been another episode of The Latest with Lauren LaRosa.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: I tell you guys all the time, y'all could be
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: anywhere with any old body, having all of these conversations,
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: but you guys choose to be right here with me,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: my lowriders. I appreciate you, and I'll catch you in
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: my next one.