Tell us a bit about yourself and what you do? I’m the co-founder of two businesses, KeepUp and Black Women Talk Tech. I started KeepUp, which automates social media listening for consumers and small businesses, in 2014 and shortly after won the largest business plan competition in the world, 43North competition. A few years in, I founded Black Women Talk Tech with two other tech founders to help provide resources, support and funding to help black women create the next billion dollar companies. Our main event, a two day conference
Tell us a bit about yourself and what you do? I’m Joshua Kissi I’m from New York City specifically. The Bronx but I have also spent time living in Brooklyn. I’m a 28-year-old photographer, creative director, and entrepreneur. My dream is to empower creatives to continue to tell stories that challenge the world we live in today; Resulting in a better tomorrow by any medium necessary. What’s the story behind TONL. What made you start it? TONL was started by myself and partner Karen Okonkwo, I knew as a photographer
Just because someone has a higher position, doesn’t mean they have a better perspective Over the weekend I was fortunate enough to help black founders focus on avoiding the death zone and getting to traction. I didn’t want to spend my free time advising white men and graduates from top schools where they were already grossly overrepresented within tech — I didn’t need my left brain to tell me that it wouldn’t be me adding value (talk less of my heart). When I read CB Insights report that less than
Tell us a bit about yourself and what you do. I’m the founder of a company called Girls’ Night In. We make things that help women celebrate self-care and build better connections with one another. For example have a weekly newsletter that reaches over 20,000 women across the globe that provides smart reads and recommendations on what to watch, listen to, or do during your night in. We also host monthly book club meetups in cities across the U.S., which has been such a lovely way for women to connect
How did you get started with Indie Hackers? August of last year, I was looking for something new to work on. I had just quit my job as a freelance developer, and I was burned out on startups. I had taken a few years off to freelance, but I got an itch to come back to start-ups. So, I figured why don’t I sit down for a few days and try to come up with an idea. I knew that I had a few criteria in mind, I wanted something
I have been speaking to Coworking spaces, Incubators and Accelerators across London and it has become apparent that there is a common problem arising from non-technical startup founders. This transcends the culture; this impacts more than just female or minority-led startups. I have worked as a Product Manager at software companies for a few years as well as experienced starting a tech startup myself. One of the harshest lessons I learned was that to succeed at building a tech company; you need technical talent in-house. Put simply; we had to
As a founder, I’m sure you’ve heard ‘build for the long term,’ ‘focus on the long-term’ or some variation of this? As an advisor, you’ve probably given this advice to a founder, haven’t you? ‘Well, stop it!’ ‘Focus on the long-term’ is a trope that advisors, investors and successful founders tend to throw about. What these advisors don’t know is that when a founder is told this, she thinks You, the advisor, aren’t being empathetic know nothing about the founder’s context. You, the investor, are just repeating something you’ve either
Tell us about yourself and what you do? My name is Chandra Arthur, and I’m the founder and Chief Friending Officer at Friendish. The app is designed to eliminate the bias in friend finding that hopes to dismantle the shallow dating app dynamic for Millennials and Gen Z. How was your experience on Planet of the Apps. Planet of the Apps was crazy amazing! The show was my first experience of doing anything of that magnitude, and I honestly felt superly blessed to be selected. There were so many great
During an entrepreneurship talk, in Prof Darragh’s class while at Booth School of Business, I listened to Andrew Mason talk about ‘The Point.’ This was 2009 and Andrew talked about signing people up to collectively fight for or contribute to causes and initiatives that they cared about. Sort of a mass protest platform for the digital age. Andrew had amassed a list of do-gooders and would unleash it on all the necessary causes. It was similar to Change.org and had been started around the same time. Even if it was
12–18 months after raising some money from friends & family or a seed round, many of the founders I talk to shift from product/market fit questions to fundraising concerns. After trying to dissuade them from going this route (and failing most of the time) I point out the self-sabotaging actions that reduce their chances of raising venture capital. Why do I try to dissuade these founders? Because they lack the understanding that a venture backed firm serves several masters and the growth expectations (that help the VC determine return multiples) can
