101. The Badass Boss with Bozoma Saint John (replay)

Explicit content warning

07/29/20 • 62 min

At the beginning of her career, Bozoma Saint John turned down a job at Goldman Sachs and, shortly afterwards, found herself temping for Spike Lee. Since then, she’s worked in C-level roles for the likes of Apple and Uber (being tasked with repairing their reputation after mistreatment of drivers and reports of sexual harassment surfaced) and is now Chief Marketing Officer at William Morris Endeavor. In this episode, she joins us to talk about being a Black woman in corporate America, the strange mixture of arrogance and diplomacy she’s sometimes been forced to employ to get her point across, and the benefits of choosing joy in the face of immense grief.

Bozoma Saint John talks about...

How her parents are her superheroes, dating back to her childhood when her family escaped a violent coup d'etat in Ghana
Her career path and how she chooses next steps-- it’s rarely about the money or about the title, but about what she will learn
Her experience of being a Black woman in a junior role, and the challenges she faced in being taken seriously
The work she has done to become her own cheerleader--take a page here!
The struggle to turn Uber into a lovable brand in the same year all their dirty laundry was revealed
Life’s unpredictability. Boz and her husband were living their best lives when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer
The art of resilience in the face of grief and loss

Resources:

Highway To Well is a production of Crate Media

Bozoma Saint John talks about...

How her parents are her superheroes, dating back to her childhood when her family escaped a violent coup d'etat in Ghana
Her career path and how she chooses next steps-- it’s rarely about the money or about the title, but about what she will learn
Her experience of being a Black woman in a junior role, and the challenges she faced in being taken seriously
The work she has done to become her own cheerleader--take a page here!
The struggle to turn Uber into a lovable brand in the same year all their dirty laundry was revealed
Life’s unpredictability. Boz and her husband were living their best lives when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer
The art of resilience in the face of grief and loss

Resources:

Highway To Well is a production of Crate Media

Previous Episode

100. How Microbes Can Create Better-For-You Foods with Kingdom Supercultures

Kendall Dabaghi has spent the last ten years working at different tech startups, but it was the variety of health issues he faced his whole life that led him to his best work yet. After developing acute digestive issues traveling abroad, and seeing a range of specialists, nothing seemed to work. He started reading up on the gut biome and after adding a variety of fermented foods to his diet, the pain disappeared completely. No big surprise- he knew his next business would be focused on the microbiome. He went back to school, and together with his co-founder Ravi Sheth developed systems for isolating and the individual strains of microbial communities. They looked at what they had built, and realized they could apply what they had learned to creating new kinds of foods. We’re super impressed and excited to see where they take this exciting new technology- as we like to say, let’s all keep the fun in fungi.

Kendall Dabaghi talks about...

Creating different kinds of fermented foods
Leveraging the latest in microbiology
Why he’s focusing on koji
The flavor possibilities of fungi
What bacteria does to food
Trying koji in your cooking

Resources:

kingdomsupercultures.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/kendalldabaghi
Twitter: twitter.com/kendalldabaghi

Highway To Well is a production of Crate Media

Next Episode

102. MINISODE! Summertime Sadness with Erica Huss and Zoë Sakoutis

This episode is a little bit of catharsis for us as we talk about the struggles we’re facing when it comes to finding a sense of normalcy. We’re all still dealing with the isolation that comes with COVID, as well as wading through the poo that comes with building a startup, and maybe it’s getting to us a little bit. It’s a strange experience to feel lonely in your own home, even when you’re not the only person in the room. We hope you either can relate to us and feel a little less alone, or otherwise feel relieved that you’re much better off!

We talk about...