On this episode of Found Live, Chief co-founder and CEO, Carolyn Childers, joins us to talk about leading a company that is focused on good leadership. After a transformative experience with another woman business leader who is now her co-founder, Carolyn wanted to create a product that would connect women at the VP and c-suite level with the kind of excellent mentorship she experienced while providing virtual and in-person spaces to develop community.
On this episode of Found Live, Chief co-founder and CEO, Carolyn Childers, joins us to talk about leading a company that is focused on good leadership. AftAfter a transformative experience with another woman business leader who is now her co-founder, Carolyn wanted to create a product that would connect women at the VP and c-suite level with the kind of excellent mentorship she experienced while providing virtual and in-person spaces to develop community.
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Darrell Etherington 0:00
found live in 321. Hey, and welcome to found live. I'm Darrell Etherington, your host and I'm joined by Jordan crook, who is the chief executive to my management trainee. Thanks, Jordan, for joining us here.
Jordan Crook 0:16
Smooth, super smooth intro landed the plane or off. Yeah, I'm Jordan crook. Thanks everyone for joining us are found live found is the TechCrunch podcast where we talk to founders about the stories behind the startups. We go live every other Thursday. So next Thursday, our sister podcast equity will be going live. Make sure you don't miss it.
Darrell Etherington 0:38
Yeah. And one more announcement before we get going. We've got TC sessions robotics coming up on July 22. This is a one day free virtual event so totally free. You can register now. And you get panels and interviews with the world's leading founders, technologists, engineers, researchers, investors and more in robotics and AI, you can RSVP for that at techcrunch.com/events.
Jordan Crook 1:00
Nice. There's so many different people going to robotics. So when will you be going through?
Darrell Etherington 1:04
Of course I will. I wouldn't miss it. That's my birthday. I'm actually on my birthday present to myself.
Jordan Crook 1:10
I probably won't be there but good. Happy Birthday and exciting for robotics. Okay, now that that's out of the way, let's bring in our guests really, really excited today because we are joined by Carolyn Childers, who is the co founder and CEO of Chief. What's up, Carolyn?
Carolyn Childers 1:23
Hi. Thanks for having me.
Darrell Etherington 1:24
Yeah. Thanks for joining us. All right, Carolyn. So normally, we just start out with a quick explanation of what your company is just in case some of our listeners haven't heard of it. I'm sure many of them have. Do you want to give us a breakdown?
Carolyn Childers 1:36
Yeah, absolutely. So Carolyn Childers. I'm the co founder. So yes. All right, everybody dies or does.
Jordan Crook 1:45
It looks like it should be a soft
Carolyn Childers 1:47
dies. It's a problem. Everybody gets it wrong. I am the co founder and CEO of a company named chief, which is a vetted network focused on senior executive women. And it's a great community that comes together to really support each other, as we're all navigating the challenges that come with senior leadership, and kind of our core service that we do is actually named core. It's a kind of peer coaching format, where all of our community comes together, we're now 16,000, strong across the US, and they meet on a monthly basis. There's an executive coach in the room, and it's just a wonderful community that really supports women with the mission of driving more women into positions of senior leadership and keeping them there. Alright,
Jordan Crook 2:32
so one of the questions I have about chief because we've talked a bunch of times, Carolyn, yeah. And I've still got your name that shows how I've got it.
Carolyn Childers 2:41
I don't know that you ever heard of him until Yeah, I never
Jordan Crook 2:45
got on the phone was like Hello, Miss children are always first name in it. I know, Stupid me, I'm gonna be upset about it. But like, we've talked a bunch, and I obviously like understand on a surface level and on to write an article level, like, okay, Chief has this big network, right. And the whole idea is like taking women in positions of senior leadership or trying to be in positions of senior leadership and like giving them other women to be around to understand those things, as well as executive coaches. But I think the thing that I've always wondered about is like, what do you guys do that is super defensible? Obviously, you were like, early, and you have this big network and this big brand. But like if a Google or you know, whatever were to come in, like, is there tech? Is there an algorithm? Is there something there that's really sticky and mowed it off? Yeah.
Carolyn Childers 3:36
Well, I think that this type of business model, the biggest kind of moat is who is in that network, I think at the end of the day, it's a type of organization and a type of community that it would be actually very hard to dedicate the amount of time that is needed to multiple different communities like this. So I think for us, the biggest thing that we look at and have tremendous amount of pride over is the amazing women that are a part of this community. And so when you join chief, you truly are being able to get access to and learn together and with some of the most powerful women across the US. And yes, we have some amazing technology behind it that really allows for great connections to happen for you to find the right people to be in core groups with we have a whole like machine learning algorithm behind the scenes of which groups should actually come together for the sessions. We definitely are investing in our own content for the facilitation of some of these sessions. But at the end of the day, by far, the biggest most that we have are the amazing women that are a part of this network.
Darrell Etherington 4:49
Cool. And how did you build that network to start with like, is it something you spend a lot of time on and how much of the company is devoted to kind of growing and maintaining that number?
Carolyn Childers 4:58
Yeah, I mean, I think what has been pretty amazing is we had as we were kind of launching our first foray into starting to talk about chief was trying to raise some capital. And we had just the hardest time in raising our initial seed round and a lot of skepticism, which obviously puts you into this place of doubt of your you're now dedicating your life to this, what are you doing, and instantly, as soon as we actually started to message out to potential consumers or members of it, it was like night and day, because we were actually just blown away, we had one press hit of announcing our seed round and just had 1000s of women join the waitlist. And it just kind of spoke to how much of a universal need and how much of a alignment to a mission like this existed out there. So it was all word of mouth at first. And we did some cold emailing, which just blew us away of literally, our first customer, our first member was a C level executive of fortune 500 company off of a cold email, and she paid within the day. And so it just kind of blew us away of how much there was a really clear product market need here. So I do think that there was a very distinct first mover advantage of building something like this focused on senior executives, because I think there's many women networks out there, they are often open for everyone, which means that this particular woman is the speaker and she is the mentor and there's actually not a community specifically for her. And that was a very distinct difference of what we were creating, that people really gravitated towards. I will also say that I think we very intentionally tried to build a very aspirational brand around this. Unfortunately, when you think about a women's professional network, you often think about like warm white wine and name tags and pant suits and like nothing that you
Jordan Crook 6:53
have pantsuit Yeah, always come to mind. Every single time I think of sheep, I can't. I'm like there's so many pants. Oh, no. That was oh, no, I know. But it's just the truth. But you can't help it. When you say like a woman in a senior executive role. I just think of pantsuit. I can't help it.
Darrell Etherington 7:11
Okay, so it supersedes even the chief brand. Yeah.
Jordan Crook 7:16
I mean, chief is just associated with those high powered women, like high power women to me are always in pant suits.
Darrell Etherington 7:21
So Carolyn, you're doing everything right, you just can't fight against
Carolyn Childers 7:26
wave daily. We're going to disrupt the the mental image that happens with a professional doesn't work like though. Well, I think that is actually why when we launched, we launched with space with a clubhouse down in Tribeca, in New York. And a big part of that was for the brand to be able to come to life to be able to show that this is more of a aspirational brand that we were trying to create and not be kind of more corporate stuffy feeling that you might just instinctively feel with a women's professional network,
Darrell Etherington 8:00
or any professional work associated with like, oh, that's like a box I have to tick off because yeah, like take it personal. But like, yeah, who management has said you have to fill out this form or whatever do this course. You know, it feels like a series of requirements. Yeah. That arrive in my like, you know, corporate management tool inbox thing, and then nothing else beyond that.
Carolyn Childers 8:25
But yeah. And I think what was really important to us, too, I mean, there was definitely very different like, how do you actually go to market ideas of Do you go to the companies directly and work with companies to say, this is something that you should sponsor you're leading women within your organization into or do you go directly to her. And I think it was really important for us to go and build that relationship directly with her have that aspirational branding have just this amazing first founding members that really set the stage of the level of seniority we were talking about, that pulled it more into a consumer brand than the company mandated being that you have to do
Jordan Crook 9:06
so important. Like I you know, it's probably like harder, because then you're like, Okay, I'm investing in myself, do I want to do this extra thing? It's gonna cost me money. My job and my life are hard enough, right? But like, it's so so much better. Because I mean, Darrell, and I've talked about this a billion times, we're both in the same random program at Yahoo. And then like, god bless Yahoo, whatever. But then, we also that was the right disclaimer backed away from that in the right way. And then, you know, we've talked to a bunch of people, you know, we've talked a medley and we've talked to some other founders who are working on stuff like this and it does feel like anytime you come through the corporation itself or the business itself, I think one of the sticking points is not only that it's like a box to tick or a form to fill out or whatever this like mandatory thing, but it also So doesn't ever feel like specific enough. And like I said, they're all I've talked about this a bunch, but I'm curious how chief solves the issue of like, yeah, it's for me, but I'm still in this big group. And like, we could talk about self advocacy, or we could talk about, like, you know, taking initiative, or we could talk about like building your network. But at the end of the day, like, it doesn't solve this very specific problem, I have this very specific employee or this very specific situation or challenge. Like, I need to talk about that. Yeah. Like that specifically, and hear what other people think about it. And so like, how do you make space and room while still keeping like the structure of, of the system in place? Yeah,
Carolyn Childers 10:35
well, I will answer that, I'm going to just say one thing before I go into it, which is what we have found, which is the sweet spot of a Betta seed a B type of business. So like the relationship is with her, but she still can go and get it sponsored. And so the vast majority actually do, but she still owns the relationship, which is really important. So I think one of the things that has made the experience so impactful at chief is the way that these groups run, we never use the word curriculum, because at this level of seniority, like you don't need to be sitting through like a very prescriptive, these are the topics we're going to talk about month over month over month that like may have zero relevance to what is going on in your life in that month that you guys are coming together and having these conversations. So it's very much an emergent structure that we create, where you actually could walk into that meeting and say, like I am having such a hard time working with Darrell, like it's just it's a struggle, it's always
Darrell Etherington 11:40
a struggle. Yeah, this comes up a lot.
Carolyn Childers 11:43
And you will talk specifically about that. And the executive coach that is in the room will help facilitate that discussion. But it's really like the group of peers that are working through these situations, because every single person has either been through that context themselves or will in the near future. And so work with
Darrell Etherington 12:02
me, and they've asked us to just do as
Carolyn Childers 12:06
Darrell everywhere. But I think that there's that commonality of and most of the challenges that people are talking about are people challenges. So there's just tremendous learning of being able to go through those specific examples together and actually take more somatic learnings from that then lead with the theme and force it into a prescribed curriculum.
Jordan Crook 12:32
So how long is a meeting? Because it feels like for everyone to get through there? There's, you know, we spend an hour on Darrell.
Carolyn Childers 12:40
Yeah, it's, it's two to two and a half hours. Some of the earlier sessions are about two and a half hours, and then it goes down to two hours. And I think that is why it was really important for us. There's other types of models like this, that don't have the very trained facilitator in the room. But for us, that was very important. And so we have just some of the most experienced executive coaches and facilitators that are in that room to make sure that we are not just talking about the same issues each session and actually really coming to some takeaways and resolution.
Darrell Etherington 13:13
And how do you source those folks? Like, are you just taking recommendations? are you recruiting? And yeah, and are there contractors? Or how does that work?
Carolyn Childers 13:20
Yeah, it's 1099. So it's, again, some of the best executive coaches that are out there. So the majority of them have a full book of business of other clients that they're working on one on one, you're actually as a chief member able to extend the relationship into one on one coaching, if you would like it at some discounted pricing. So they are independent contractors that are working with us, but just really deeply aligned to the mission that we are building at chief and making better leaders. And so that has honestly also been very word of mouth as one executive coach joins, she'll introduce us to another that she knows would just be an amazing part of the community. And it's been great. We now actually have close to 400 executive coaches that are working with us.
Darrell Etherington 14:05
And follow up question, can Jordan be one of those two? I know she's looking for some side gigs. Yeah, Coach. Yeah. I think you
Jordan Crook 14:14
coach or member Yeah, you think I should be a coach? Here's what you do. You just joke it on and off.
Just close that computer and get around. That's how you do it. No, go well, I'm, I've got a steep rate, but I'm sure you can handle it. Um, so I was wondering if you could take us back because you mentioned early fundraising. Because like I can imagine, I haven't tried to fundraise for like, women in leadership network before but I can just imagine based on the personalities I know. And we see how that went. But Can you talk to us a little bit about like, what the sticking point seemed to be with those conversations and kind of like, after getting that early traction? Yeah. And going back and being like, Hey, by the way, the
Carolyn Childers 15:10
fun part,
Jordan Crook 15:12
you know, like, what? How just I would love to hear a little bit more the storytelling of that. Yeah,
Carolyn Childers 15:17
I mean, I think our struggles actually started even before we started to go out and fundraise. So as I was incorporating the company and wanting to go and build this, I remember even just trying to get a lawyer to represent us who would like I would literally be paying this person not trying to get money from but I wouldn't be paying this person. And the first two conversations I had with like potential lawyers, they were like, I think this is a really great lifestyle business. I don't think this is a VC business. So I don't think I'm the right lawyer for you. And I was like, oh, man, I can't even pace Yeah, you know? Yeah. Like that kind of started things off. But yeah, I mean, I think I was probably pretty naive going into the process, because I had been, and my co founder had been in startups for a long time, we had really great networks in the VC community. And so for us, we thought, okay, you know, the for the first check is supposed to be about the founders, right? Like, it's supposed to be like, do I bet on this person? And we had a lot of those relationships and thought that we would have therefore not like, nothing is easy, like it never would have felt like, yeah, at least maybe level. Yeah, you know, exactly. And that just wasn't the case. Like we were just no, after No, after No. And I think for Lindsay and I like I can actually remember this distinct moment when we were out in San Francisco, had had a bunch of conversations, and we went back to the hotel, and we're just like, do we just need to like, completely change this, and we had our next like, VC meeting and, like, 30 minutes, I think, and we're like, we don't have enough time to like, pivot in 30 minutes, based off of everything that we've seen. And thank God, we didn't, because it meant that we just like kept at it and found people who ultimately just believed in us and believed in what we were building. And I think the biggest questions that people had was, well, don't women already have like other women they talk to all the time. Like, why do you need this? Like, everybody's got their friends and their colleagues or like, whatever, you don't actually need this. And, and I think,
Jordan Crook 17:21
and those were, those were females that were saying that right? From experience.
Darrell Etherington 17:29
But I have the skull and bones.
Jordan Crook 17:31
Yeah, as a father of a daughter.
Carolyn Childers 17:35
My wife said
Jordan Crook 17:40
she just called me from the hand.
Carolyn Childers 17:44
She has access to opportunities all the time. I don't know. Oh, god.
Yeah. I mean, I think there was a lot of skepticism of like, I don't see what the need is. But I think the other skepticism, which I think is a much more valid question is, you know, we were focused on women, which automatically makes people think like you're cutting an opportunity size in half, and then you're focused on senior executive women. Is that actually a tam? Big enough? Tam? Like that was the big question. But there's 5.5 million women in the US who are VP and above. So at our price point, that's a $30 billion Tam. And I think that has to be going up every month. And that's assuming that the Network helps. Pandemic didn't help as like a lot of women dropped out of the workforce. But our mission should be to grow our tam as we drive more people into those positions. And that's just in the US. So I think it was ultimately that first piece of like, really not understanding the pain point that we were trying to solve. And they was amazing to then see the juxtaposition of that when we launched a few months later, and immediately had a weightless that was like, I think there's a pain point here that we are actually solving for. And that became really clear. So then fast forward to our Series A where there's a lot of players who obviously are both seed investors and series A investors and so we were talking to a lot of those same people again, and we were oversubscribed, you know, had lots of people interested and it was very fun in that moment to go back to some of those early you know, seed investors and be like, I'm sorry, we're not gonna be able to do Oh,
Jordan Crook 19:28
the Julia Roberts. Big mistake. Huge.
Carolyn Childers 19:31
I should have I really should have oh, you
Jordan Crook 19:33
should have so far was shopping bags or something or whatever the like VC equivalent of shopping bags are term sheets. Yeah, ah, yeah. Such a vibe. Ride the way the high of it totally turned around my Childers moment. Perfect. Perfect.
Darrell Etherington 19:54
So I had a question just about like the order because I bet a lot of our listeners have this too. So did you go there even have an MVP when you were going out asking for the first check, or you just had kind of the idea and the concept and you're basing it on that. And then you built that with the money and from your seat.
Carolyn Childers 20:09
So we had some of our services that we were testing. But I wouldn't say that we had our fully complete MVP as we were racing. So when you join chief, you get access to just a suite of services. One is core, which I was talking about before, it's that peer group model, we also have a whole events and programming that you can participate in as many or as few as you would like. And so we have speakers like Michelle Obama, who came earlier this year to some of the best professors at business school, so that we didn't have anything happening on that front pre lunch, there's a whole community product. So yes, you're in your group of 10, for core, but you can also access the 16,000 other women that are a part of this network through our community app. And that was not launched prior to getting our seed round. No. And then we actually had physical space, as we, as we launched, we still do now we have three clubhouses throughout the US that that you can access as part of your membership. And so the last three have kind of that content and programming, the community platform and the clubhouses, those weeks still had to build post the see. But we were doing tests groups of core, because that was really the most important part. And we you know, had a initial list of, you know, interested members. So it was off of that, that we were fundraising, it was the idea of it and what the need was, and it's a big opportunity. It was some early learnings from those core groups. It was some early traction with some early members. And it was Lindsay and I that was really what the backbone of our initial conversations were during the seed round.
Darrell Etherington 21:45
Yeah. Because I think a lot of people are curious, like what they should have in hand before going out. And like I think you mentioned you had some relationships existing because of the your work and startup industry and in the tech industry, right. So that probably informed how much you want it to have in hand before going out. But I was also curious, as you're going through that list, like when you were talking about those other additional products, did you have those scope where you're like, This is what we're going to do? Or did those like come out of your earlier experiences? Like how to find where are they in the early days? And how much were they like built later?
Carolyn Childers 22:15
Yeah, I would say the one that was probably the least and again, given the tech orientation of so much of the VCs, the community product was the one that was probably the most undefined and we were still testing. So like we were early days, just using slack of like, what is the community product before we went and built our own? And I think that that was actually important for us to like, continue to get the learnings of like, what types of conversations are happening here? How are people connecting? So that one was probably the most undefined for us.
Darrell Etherington 22:44
Gotcha. Yeah, that makes sense. Sorry. Yeah. No worries, Jordan, nobody even noticed.
Jordan Crook 22:47
No, but here's the thing. Yeah, maybe they didn't. But I didn't know what you guys were talking about was weird, because I couldn't hear you. But I am a lip reader. And I was curious, I don't think you're gonna share this with me. But I want to ask, which is like, what's next? Right? Like, obviously, growth and scale, you just like, keep going and going. And you can keep capturing these giant swaths of the market. But like, nobody can sit still. Right? Like, that can't be enough. So like, what what does that look like in a couple years? Like, is there a chief Junior network? Or is there how do you kind of expand from that?
Carolyn Childers 23:24
Yeah, well, I would say that, you know, we just raised our series B earlier this year, which was an exciting milestone for us. But honestly, the number one thing that we are most focused on is continuing to invest in the experience of our members. I think that a lot has happened over the last few years, we started at chief we had a very in person experience, we then had to be virtual, and really build into our technology over the pandemic. And there's still a lot more that we want to continue to do there. But we also kind of have to navigate the you know, what is the right balance of in person and tech driven. So there's a ton that we want to continue to invest in our experience. And that is first and foremost. But our mission is to change the face of leadership, which is kind of twofold it is to drive more representation from underrepresented communities in leadership. And so literally changing the face. But it's also making sure that every leader once they become a leader is the best leader that they can be. And, you know, we want to be the most powerful network of women, which isn't just the US. So I think there's an opportunity for us to think more broadly beyond, you know, these United States of America and an opportunity to think across more demographics. But that is all very future. For us. It all very much aligns with our mission. I think right now, we just launched nationally at the beginning of this year. We're now in every city across the US and so there's just a lot of work that we want to do to be investing in those experiences.
Jordan Crook 24:52
About you like yourself as a leader you and Lindsey Right. Like I mean, I talked to like, I do the same thing when we talked to climate and sustainability people and like how sustainable aren't, you know? Like, like, Do you know what I mean? Like, do you feel like you are held to or you hold yourself to a particularly high standard as a female leader or a leader in general, even and, you know, also, particularly in the tech space where I feel like any female CEO gets bullshit that no man would ever write. Like, it's just the truth. Yeah, that's just like stupid. So like, how do you think about stuff like that? Well,
Carolyn Childers 25:29
I mean, I think there's, there's two folds. I don't know that I hold myself to a higher standard. But I definitely know that society does. Yeah, and so I do think there's that component. But I also just think we are a mission oriented company that is based around, you know, good leadership. And so I think that inherently, whether it was a man or woman sitting in the seat of a company that is focused on, you know, driving and making better leaders, that I myself need to do that work. So it is something that like we take very seriously. And as we think about the culture that we want to build a chief and the type of environment that we want to build that Chief, it's really important for us that we kind of start with us first and make sure that we have an environment where people have access to opportunities, access to learning. And I think that is actually one of the biggest misnomers in many ways is that like, the only way that I can show that I'm successful is by getting that promotion or getting that something, but like, there's a ton of just opportunity through learning as well. And I think that's something that we've really tried to embed in the culture of chief is a learning culture and a feedback culture, it's definitely something that I know that I, as a woman am held to higher standards. And I know that I, as a CEO of a mission based company will be held to higher standards. But I also know that I'm not perfect, and nobody on our leadership team is perfect. And I know that we're going to mess up sometime, if we haven't already. And that like that we need to make sure that we give each other in our team, the grace of that of not having to be perfect, because we're never going to be or think
Darrell Etherington 27:04
this is kind of I don't know, if journaling you're going in this way directionally. But like we've talked to other guests about this too, but I'm curious your take on it specifically because the business the chief is in but we've seen like over the past year, year and a half women see as an executives, I think like being kind of like you targeted I guess by the media for for behavior that probably wouldn't cause anyone to bat an eye. No. Male executive do it. Yeah, right. Like bad behavior in Slack, for instance, is one of the things
Jordan Crook 27:34
are being like being like demanding, but like a male boss, who's demanding and says, like, hey, this needs to be done at this time, or I want to do this, like, let's get it done. No one gives a right I feel this all the time. I'm like one of the only women in senior leadership at TechCrunch. And we have a really diverse team. And they're all great. We've worked together for years and years. There's tons of trust, but I do often feel like I'm the one who has to have the empathetic conversation with someone. Right? Like, I'm the one who has to be like, Oh, I totally understand. You know what I mean, which is great. Like, I'm fine to do that. And that's kind of my personality anyway, but like, it's bullsh, that it happens. I'm sorry, I cut you off, Darrell. But like no media do try to like target women for doing what men do. And it feels really unfair, particularly in tech. Yeah.
Darrell Etherington 28:21
Yeah. I was just curious, like, your perspective on that? And how much like, does it does it come up among your community? topic that is, like, often discussed? And do you have kind of, like, suggestions or solutions for people? Yeah,
Carolyn Childers 28:33
I mean, I think that it is definitely a topic of conversation, that community is definitely something that is a topic amongst my peers is CEOs, founders in the tech world that are women. And, you know, I look at, you know, one of the pieces recently, Emily Weiss that yeah, like she tried something, it didn't work, she shut it down. That actually sounds like really good management to me of like taking risks acting fast. It's not working, but it gets put sometimes in a different light. And and I think there's like the double edged sword of you know, as a woman founder in tech, you often get extra media attention, because there's so few of us, but then you also get extra media attention, because there's so few. When it's good, it's good. And when it's bad, it's bad. And so I definitely think that there's and I think it's actually beyond just like the the media attention, I think in the actual operations of a company, you also have the extra burden as a woman of needing to be likable, and that that is actually a criteria of success that actually doesn't exist for many men that are executives, managers, independent contributors, but you've had Darryl
Jordan Crook 29:50
is not even remotely
Darrell Etherington 29:53
actually that's my only attribute. That's why I like all other skills.
Carolyn Childers 29:59
It's Definitely that like, it's that double bind of like, you have to, like, show some power and authority. Otherwise you're not viewed as you know, somebody who should be in a position of leadership, but you can't do it too much, because then you're not likeable. And it's a really hard thing to balance.
Darrell Etherington 30:18
Yeah, it's interesting you bring up that it's like, an operational problem as well, because you're totally right, that when it like expresses itself in the media, and the media does a bad job of story selection as well. And like focusing may choose to focus the Oculus, where they focus it right. But part of that is, Oh, where do I tips come from? My tips come from irate employees who are incensed that a woman leader would do this thing that we're, you know, famous male tech leader, XYZ to do that same thing. Like who cares, right? Like, that's great. Oh, I deserve? I'm not gonna be like, yes, yeah,
Carolyn Childers 30:52
yeah, there's definitely, there's definitely an element of that. But I also think that a belief that a lot of people will have as they join a company, and it's like, oh, it's amazing. I'm working for like a women, a woman CEO. And there's just this different expectation that comes with that of like, the top type of culture that's going to be built. And you know, it, I just say that, like, nobody is perfect man or woman. And so I think everybody's learning and their leadership journeys. And but that, you know, need to find that perfect balance as a woman is just so much greater right from the beginning.
Darrell Etherington 31:25
Yeah, you have a much thinner margin, in which shop. We don't have too much time yet. But I want to dig into your origin story, because really, I'm talking about that at all. But you have such an interesting history, you've worked across a variety of industries. But how did you go from that to wanting to be a startup founder and entrepreneur? Yeah,
Carolyn Childers 31:45
I actually think this is I'm glad you ask this question, because I feel like every time I have heard another founder talk about their origin story, it always starts with the like, I was an entrepreneur since I was young. And I had this newspaper says, you always have that, and I actually am the opposite. And therefore I feel like it's a good story to be out there that like, that doesn't have to be your origin story to go into an entrepreneurial place, if anything was actually the opposite for me, because I grew up where my mom's family had a, they were business owners, they were in the travel agency business. So you know, play that story out, you know, how that all worked out for us perfectly?
Unknown Speaker 32:29
up into the Yeah.
Carolyn Childers 32:31
And so like running a family business was just it was really hard. And that's what I grew up around. Like, there was that entrepreneurial spirit. But it also was like, oh, man, this is tough. And so as I originally started my career, I was like, I'm going that big company route where like, there's, you know, the stability and the opportunities and, and that's how I started my career. And it wasn't until after business school that I actually went into startups and realize this is actually where I should be. I am somebody who has always operated in the like scrappy at 20. Like, how do we just make incremental improvements day after day after day without worrying about the 20 that nobody actually cares about, except for big corporations. And so I fell in love with it. And so my first foray was actually at Quincy, which was in New York, it was the parent company of diapers. So I launched and ran soap.com got acquired by Amazon and was like, This is amazing as a first foray into startups is like, this is how it always goes, it sounds sounds wonderful. And then I worked at a company out in South Korea actually called coupon who went public this year, they are now the Amazon of South Korea, which is a huge kudos to them. And then most recently was at Handi, which is a marketplace for home services and ran all of operations there. So I had done like a bunch of different startup experiences a few different, you know, e commerce marketplaces, I felt like I had a really good base understanding of how to build businesses. But as soon as I actually made the decision to go and launch chief myself, I immediately sent an email to like, every single one of my past founders that I worked for, and was like, I am so sorry. So much harder that I ever like, you think as a senior executive, like you feel that pressure, you're in it with them. There's just something really inherently different about being a founder of a company and the just pressure that you feel of you know, all of these people that are joining you on this journey, like their livelihoods and their careers are in your hands and it's just such a different place. But I knew for myself that I wouldn't be happy unless I had gone on that true like founder journey myself.
Darrell Etherington 34:41
Yeah, yeah, that is it's a an amazing revelation for people. I've heard from a lot of people who worked in in around startups, but then never word they like the actual founder, Chief Executive person directly responsible. And their experience is all similar to that although there are a few examples of the opposite where I've heard come were stationed with like a very longtime chief executive founder where, you know, I said, just like, well, how come I have to be the face of the brand? I'm like, What are you talking about? Brand is you you are the brand. They're inseparable. They always have been. And he his face kind of felt like how can I? How can I escape? I won't name most German guests, but
Jordan Crook 35:23
remember the conversation and not the person? Yeah.
Darrell Etherington 35:26
Well, it rhymes with Spotify. I know you're talking about
Jordan Crook 35:35
Darrell used to work at Shopify.
Darrell Etherington 35:41
But it's like, it's amazing that you have that early. Right. So that kind of responsibility, though, how was it not? Was it empowering for you? Or was it it? Was it daunting? In that same way? Did you extrapolate it out and think like, oh, boy, like, once we've employed a bunch of people and stuff, like, that's all still gonna be on my shoulders? Or how do you feel about it?
Carolyn Childers 35:58
I think it gets a little easier each day is the business. You know, I think those early early days, those first employees that are coming to work with you where you're like that, is this thing gonna be a thing that's like, where it's most stressful? And now, it's more about like, how do you make sure that the culture that we built in those early days is sustaining and this is a great place for everybody to work. But I think there's a really big difference of like, the pressures internally and externally of like, I now feel, and I'm kind of an operator by heart. So like, I've always been much more comfortable in the like, how do I be the CEO to my team? Versus how do I be the CEO, publicly, which I think is a probably what you were referencing of the like, oh, man, I have to do what and I think one of the, like, great parts of being the CEO of something like chief is that we have 16,000, just badass members. And like, we actually try to showcase them a lot to you know, like, you know, Lindsay, and I were really proud of what we've built. But like, there's some people in our membership that like, are a lot more impressive than us. And so like, we actually can for now, now, so we actually can, like create a little bit more ballots instead of us always having to be needing to be that face, because we are a community at the end of the day. Yeah,
Darrell Etherington 37:13
this is a sticky one for just a few minutes left. But when you building a community product, how much do you think about when like other community products that are like open membership or whatever, like, sort of like Reddit or whatever, they have the big thing with reputation, right? And reputation is always inherently tied into community. Does that come up? In your thinking about it? Do you worry about community moderation that much? Or is it less of a concern because of the nature of the product and the nature of your members who are paying to be there? And you know, our professionals?
Carolyn Childers 37:42
Yeah, I mean, I think that there's a few things that are inherently different about our community that we haven't had to, I need to knock on wood, worry about as many of those things. And I think one of them is like, the underlying thread that is bringing this community together is this mission. And I think because of the mission, you just have people that are attracted to the community that come from a position of support and not from a position of negativity and ugliness that I think you can start to see on other in other communities, I'd say the other very important part of this is that you're not anonymous at Chico. Like there's no bots that are coming in and like creating some type of experience and environment that like you Bitcoin scam or stuff that like you have to you have to stand behind the words that are that are there. And so I think both of those things have made it really clear to people like the type of place that the type of community that cheep is, and it's actually like, we as we launched, we didn't, we are on LinkedIn, but we're not in any of the other social media channels, actually, largely because like, they're horrible environments for women. And so it was very important for us as we were building our community to make sure that we put in the right guardrails, the right community guidelines, the right product features to ensure that that didn't happen from day one.
Darrell Etherington 39:02
I feel like Microsoft is gonna take that run with it be like LinkedIn is the only good social network for women. Don't do that Microsoft. It's not what you said.
Carolyn Childers 39:12
Not what I said.
Darrell Etherington 39:17
Well, thanks very much, Carol. I think we're we are at a time but it's been great talking to you. I really, really enjoyed it. And I really appreciate your child. Carolyn Childers. Yes.
Jordan Crook 39:27
For joining us a disrupt, right. We are Yeah. Sneak preview. See it? I don't think so. There you go.
Darrell Etherington 39:36
You heard it here first. Fabulous. Yeah. Well,
Carolyn Childers 39:40
I've loved being here. Thank you for a really fun conversation. Yeah. Talk to you soon. Awesome. Thanks.
Jordan Crook 39:46
And for folks at home equity is next Thursday. Check it out equity. We'll see you the week after
Darrell Etherington 39:53
round is hosted by myself TechCrunch news editor Darrell Etherington and TechCrunch Managing Editor Jordan crook. You shouted McCarney is Our executive producer. We are produced by Maggie Stamets and edited by Cal Keller TechCrunch. His audio products are managed by Henry pick of it. You can find us on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast and on twitter@twitter.com slash Ben, you can also email us at found@techcrunch.com and you can call us and leave a voicemail at 510-936-1618. Also, we'd love if you could spare a few minutes to fill out our listener survey at bit.li/bound listener survey. Thanks for listening and we'll be back next week.
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