11 storytellers inspiring my 2020
2019 was a year of change. Some of this change was personal, like starting my job at WeWork Labs. Some of this change, like the mere 0.9% increase in women who received VC funding year over year, was covered by media as a “record high” but in reality is incremental and nowhere near good enough. The stories we tell about change (or lack thereof) is critical. Thankfully, newer, truer leaders are building scalable businesses and tackling some of our world’s greatest challenges, like fintech for underbanked millennials and a makeup stick that can do it all, including usher in an age of inclusion for the beauty industry. And they’re doing so as storytellers with unmatched authenticity. This is the change that fuels me as I head into this new decade.
Here’s a list the storytellers, business owners, and changemakers that are inspiring my 2020. After initial inspiration I often get stuck wondering: How do they do it? With every person below, you’ll see some of the tools they use to tell their stories, grow their businesses, and change things. Hope it provides a glimpse towards how you can, too. It’s by no means comprehensive — each of these leaders rocks strategy and creativity I could never capture in full.
In no particular order…
1. Sheena Allen, Founder and CEO, CapWay (she/her)
Sheena Allen is a myth-buster. The myths she’s tackling? Underbanked = poor, bad credit = the fault of an individual, and building wealth = big banks and the usual tools. She can debunk these myths with such authority because she knows what’s real: growing up in a Mississippi town where there were more payday loaners and predatory financial services than there were banks, she saw her grandma save money outside of the banking system. She’s also a millennial, and recognized that she is among the growing millions living in a cashless society. As she put it in her TEDxSan Francisco talk, “You can’t pay for Netflix in cash.” Immediacy is important. But so is emotion — the full picture. Today’s system of credit checks and balances doesn’t accurately reflect the human behind every financial decision. Allen knows that unbanked and underbanked people are some of the most creative, resilient, and strategic people out there, and it was a 2015 trip back home that showed her an opportunity.
And so Allen is building CapWay, a new way of finding and building capital, with a goal to foster financial literacy and generational wealth. What’s bolder is that one of CapWay’s core tactics is social content told for and by its community, which very few other finance players do. One look at recent CapWay blogs, and you’ll see that this company speaks the language of financially stressed millennials like no big bank could, including 16 Side Hustles You Can Start Today (complete with the perfect gif for each). CapWay also has a glossary of essential financial terms in everyday language.
I love how she put it in a recent AfroTech interview:
“Even though we have so many financial institutions trying to penetrate the market, what I realized was that an advantage I had as a founder was I understood the people of the market. Everyone else only really understood that there is a problem in the market. I grew up taking my grandmother to a check cashing place, so I really understood the psyche of the person.”
So few people in this country can say they’ve learned about and found access to money on their own terms, in their own words. But Allen is paving the way with #realtalk, and with her iOS and Android app, she’s doing so at scale. Yet on the path to scale, she doesn’t leave her story behind. You can often find her tweeting like the fintech CEO bestie you’ve always been looking for, who recognizes and honors her roots, challenges the system, and takes time to laugh and smile (all while giving you tools to #SecureTheBag). 2020, let’s do more of all.
Tools for stories, biz, and change: SaaS, speaking engagements, Twitter, Instagram, research, direct community experience and engagement
2. Lindsay Peoples Wagner, Editor-in-Chief, Teen Vogue
“When I started this job a year ago, I made it a point that we would use Teen Vogue as a platform to be unequivocally unapologetic.”
I will always remember the December 2019 Teen Vogue cover story on Designer Kerby Jean-Raymond and Rapper Chika. It is by Teen Vogue Editor-in-Chief Lindsay Peoples Wagner (she/her), and in it, she shows the power of design in fashion…not just those of textiles, but those of society, wealth, and organizational culture. She frames Jean-Raymond and Chika’s interview by sharing, “…the industry is overflowing with people who are jumping on the ‘woke’ bandwagon rather than actually working to create equal representation,” speaking on Jean-Raymond’s contributions to but ultimate erasure from the Business of Fashion 500 list. What follows is a powerful conversation on cancel culture — and why cancelling doesn’t necessarily deliver the change we need.
Throughout, everything delivers on Peoples Wagner’s goals to be “unequivocally unapologetic.” Sharing the cover on Instagram, she wrote: “Too often Black voices are silenced, & told to be grateful, so this was an opportunity to bring a small part of reparations to the business of fashion situation and the industry’s lack of equal representation. I come in peace but I mean business.” Black artists abound in this story: from outfits by Kerby Jean-Raymond of Pyer Moss to the hair by Lacy Redway to the styling by Eric McNeal to the makeup by Porsche Cooper.
So, the answer to the question “What can we learn?” is another question: “What can I affect or change?” Besides scoring a Teen Vogue cover, there are other ways storytellers can act on Peoples Wagner’s brilliance.
Be a microphone that makes new voices louder. Who can leaders (that’s you!) make visible in their communications? Can we flip the script on who interviews — who asks — who answers the questions of our time? It could be a CEO. It could also be a customer. A loved one. A creator on the come up. Any storyteller can do the work to pass the mic.
Be a ladder that elevates new and underestimated talent. Representation happens through many channels. We can take a Peoples Wagner approach to everything from who we hire as collaborators, to who we highlight on Stories, to our daily wardrobe.
Tools for stories, biz, and change: Op-eds (read her “Everywhere and Nowhere: What it’s really like to be black and work in fashion”), authoring books (Becoming a Fashion Designer, Simon & Schuster, 2019), Instagram, every aspect of a story (from who photographs, to who interviews, dresses, writes, and publishes)
3. Deepica Mutyala, Founder and CEO, Live Tinted
“To me, Live Tinted is a movement first.”
Deepica Mutyala (she/her) is #goals for many reasons. As a vlogger, her 2015 lipstick hack went viral (10.7M+ views viral), but she didn’t treat that as a “successful social media post” and call it a day. She used this as business case validation for #LiveTinted, an online community and now a roaring business sharing beauty tips and products for skin tones underrepresented in media (over 101K followers today, and counting!). One bestselling Huestick and a few industry-legends-as-mentors later, she has garnered over $500K in seed funding. (How many companies have investors who you’d also want to be best friends with? Live Tinted has Create & Cultivate’s Jaclyn Johnson, the Bobbi Brown, and Birchbox’s Hayley Barna on its cap table…!) And through it all, she’s shared the highs, lows, and family milestones that make her, her.
Mutyala says she she launched Live Tinted “community first” to help her think through the first beauty product. Informed by thousands of conversations at the speed of hashtag, the #LiveTinted community can truly say Huestick is by them, for them.
Influencer-turned-business-owner is nothing new. Greats like Emily Weiss of Glossier know: your online community is the best form of customer research and product testing you can get. But Mutyala executes this to perfection. And the result isn’t just an incredibly crafted, targeted, and received product line; it’s a company culture with the recipe for inclusion at scale baked in. I love what she recently shared with Supermaker:
“Inclusivity is built into the fabric of Live Tinted. It is our mission, and every decision we make — from the social media content we create to the product development, and everything beyond and in between — is with that in mind. Some of the things we do to live this mission every day include 1) Starting conversations and asking our community to share their experiences and opinions. This ensures that everyone has a voice. 2) Celebrating campaigns, products, and people who embrace inclusivity in ways that surpass the superficial. 3) Crowdsourcing feedback on our Huesticks and what our community wants to see in our next products. 4) Challenging brands and products as well as current issues that go against our mission. 5) Providing a platform to people from all walks of life who are doing things that align with our mission.”
I could quote pretty much everything Mutyala says because it is GOLD. She is writing the manual for powerful and empowering business, showing the world and, most importantly, her community, that you can grow from overlooked to empire.
So yes, we’re ending with one more Mutyala quote:
The one thing that I hope everyone takes away from Live Tinted is that beauty is not meant to be confined within society’s boxes, and so our company has made it our business to change that. We encourage everyone who finds purpose in our mission to come join us in our efforts to change the status quo.
You heard her — let’s do it!
Tools for stories, biz, and change: YouTube and vlogging, Instagram, Twitter, interviews, e-commerce
4. Arlan Hamilton, Founder and Managing Partner, Backstage Capital
Arlan Hamilton (she/her) takes the verb of our social era — “amplify” — to task. Often her amplification is twofold:
Shining a light on greatness. She amplifies success, insights, and questions from people of color, LGBTQ+, women and other underestimated founders funding and scaling their businesses. The result: a living, documented history of entrepreneurs and reasons why to invest in underestimated founders.
Sharing reflections and resources on entrepreneurial journeys. Her Twitter feed is better than any MasterClass on modern venture capital. This June, she launched the Your First Million podcast, which is addicting. Each episode “goes behind-the-scenes and teaches you how to make your first million dollars, get your first million downloads, or find your first million customers,” with the likes of Jameela Jamil (!!!), Ellen Pompeo, and more. Some of these are transformation stories, others are negotiation stories, and still others are beat-the-odds stories. No matter how varied the stories are, every millionaire on this show dives deep on tactics. Once an episode wraps and you unplug those headphones, you’ve got goal-getter advice to apply irl.
She offers both inspiration and implementation. This is magic — the wow and how.
But let’s take a step back. If you don’t yet know Hamilton, you should — Arlan Hamilton is America’s hottest VC and the founder and managing partner of Backstage Capital, has raised more than $10M, and has invested in 100+ companies with underestimated founders, spanning femtech, retail, and distributed energy management. (And more! Meet the Backstage “Headliners” here.) She delivers the strategy and results many assume only come from MBAs, but this learn-it-all watched YouTube and took online classes to become the best in the game.
At a Microsoft-hosted conversation on inclusion, Hamilton said, “Privilege isn’t a bad word; entitlement is.” We all have a story, we’re all complex, we’ve all experienced privilege in some way; it’s what people do with privilege that matters and shapes the systems that define our world. I can’t wait to see and support what Hamilton and Backstage Capital do, 2020 and…every year from here on out. 🤗
Tools for stories, biz, and change: Podcasts, interviews, authoring books (you can preorder her book It’s About Damn Time today!), speaking engagements, Twitter, Instagram, Medium, hiring, fundraising and investing
P.S. I just have to include Hamilton’s Bloomberg Studio 1.0 interview with Emily Chang because it is (you guessed it) INSPIRING.
5. Lizzo, Bop Star™️ and Entertainer of the Year, Entertainment Weekly and TIME (and everywhere)
The TL;DR of my Lizzo (she/her) love is: (1) Instant success is a myth, and (2) Lizzo is a genius.
You could say she breaks many things: the internet, the glass ceiling, society’s pressure on women — especially women of color — to fit certain molds, lift us all up, have the answers. It’s an almost impossible ask: Change the world and go viral. What’s amazing is that she’s done both but refuses to let the public off the hook. Therein lies her genius: She uses her story and the importance of memory to provide our own tools for the taking — where we can all see where we’ve been and where we can be. That’s a stronger future.
I love what she shared in ESSENCE with Sylvia Obell: “I made a decision to be myself because I knew I had no choice … I’m trying to shake up the narrative about how we’re supposed to act.”
So she tells her story in lyrics we can make our own. (A branding superpower every business wishes they had.) She tells it through brilliantly selected accessories, like her tiny Valentino purse that almost literally screamed “how many f*#!s I give in 2020.” Or, as The Cut put it, “What Lizzo perhaps didn’t realize is that her tiny bag also contained humanity. As with her music, Lizzo’s many fans inserted themselves into her purse.”
Memory is extremely important to the story. When Lizzo shares her memories of the road it took to get to TIME’s “Entertainer of the Year” or that epic SNL performance, she dissolves assumptions that she was an overnight success. She urges us to see her success not as miracle, but a mirror.
Anything but trendy. With #BodyPositivity now a commercialized movement, Lizzo feels the pressure to embody self love and all its surrounding buzzwords. But what makes Lizzo such a powerful storyteller is that she simply believes in no other option than being her whole self. The headlines capture some of it: Don’t call Lizzo “brave” for being confident, but her IGTV “I Weigh” episode with Jameela Jamil really hit home. She spoke about Lizzo haters — and how oftentimes that even includes herself — and how important learning and unlearning is. Learn to love yourself, full stop. And unlearn what our world tells us about who and what and how beauty is.
It’s what Samantha Irby captures in her TIME feature: “At a time when Instagrammers are shilling flat-tummy tea or pretending to eat a giant cheeseburger, Lizzo sells something more radical: the idea that you are already enough.” Brb — sobbing, dancing, and jumping on a cart screaming bye, bitch! … all in gratitude to this genius.
Tools for stories, biz, and change: her flute, Twitter, Instagram (watch her classical flute Highlight), sponsorships, live events, interviews, brilliant music
6. Rana el Kaliouby, Co-Founder and CEO, Affectiva
Rana el Kaliouby (she/her) is on a mission “to humanize technology before it dehumanizes us.” As CEO of Affectiva, she is showing the world that emotion and AI are a power couple. How? Through deep learning and diverse data repositories, if you want to get technical about it. But if you read the headlines on her and her company, something becomes clear: knowing, owning, and sharing your personal story can be the most valuable thing you do for the world. El Kaliouby’s recent Inc. op-ed, “How I moved from doubt to empowerment while starting a company as a single mom 5,000 miles from home” is a fantastic example. Her own words speak volumes:
“Here’s my path.”
She then does just that, mapping her journey from Egyptian family to single mom and CEO simultaneously raising amazing humans and an amazing tech startup (Affectiva recently raised its $26M Series B funding round). I’ve learned two storytelling pillars through el Kaliouby’s work:
Create an honest dialogue and define your own narrative. AI is everywhere, but it’s hard to break through the clutter. El Kalioby sets the tone and shares her personal anecdotes, which work like a doorway into complex topics like AI. This is because her personal stories get nitty, gritty detailed and then turn to company vision and capabilities at key moments. Her “3 lessons every AI leader can learn from kids” article is another perfect example, where she moves from a quick reflection on visiting her son’s classroom to the very concrete things she wants technology leaders to do. By the time she delivers the clincher — “The future is in good hands, but we need to take action today to address these concerns that impact not just the next generation, but all of us … tech leaders, take note” — it’s not coming from a talking head or a CEO in a castle. It’s coming from el Kaliouby, the gutsy woman you know like that friend you can count on for real talk. Any storyteller can adapt their personal stories into blogs or videos that support product or market launches and campaigns, etc. (Scrappy is great! Glossy ≠ authentic.) For example, you could write about your most-asked questions or the thing that gets people’s heads nodding as you talk about your job.
Deliver tactics. Affectiva and el Kaliouby’s story is inherently a “how to.” Vision is always backed by tactics to change and challenge the system. You trust el Kaliouby because she’s been through it herself, and when she gives broader industry how-to’s — like her 2020 AI resolutions — you support. You amplify. Thinking about this for yourself, sometimes it can be as simple as putting a number to your idea (for example, el Kaliouby’s recent op-eds include 3 Ways to Empower Women at Work: On International Women’s Day and Beyond and 4 Things I’ve Learned From Running a Startup for 10 Years). Any storyteller can find ways to share “toolkits” for the solutions your brand puts forth.
Best of all, she does this consistently. With a regular thought leadership and #realtalk rhythm, it’s no wonder Fast Company, the World Economic Forum, PBS NOVA, and Fortune all want her perspective on their platforms.
Tools for stories, biz, and change: Op-eds, authoring books (you can preorder her memoir Girl Decoded today!), speaking engagements, video, Twitter, Instagram
7. Brittany Chavez, Founder and CEO, Shop Latinx
In 2016, Brittany Chavez (she/her) posted on Facebook: “Hire me.” She was working multiple jobs, including driving Uber, which she used to pitch something she couldn’t find at the time: a place that showcased Latinx products online. So she made a new Instagram account under the handle @ShopLatinx, “just a really cool community page where we showcased Latinx makers,” she wrote in a recent Instagram post.
By December 2019, she had hired herself and Shop Latinx has become the world’s first curated marketplace for Latinx products, 41.K+ strong on Instagram, with 900+ Latinx-owned businesses indexed, 11 brands on its e-commerce site, and growing. Gaining momentum, too, with BuzzFeed features (via their Pero Like vertical) and a profitable first month. Through it all, we see the best of modern storytelling:
Authentically crowdsourced, beautifully curated. Visual-first, featuring stunning photography for and by her community. Memes, but amazing memes (Rihanna memes, to be exact). Color scheme on point. Micro-blogging from Chavez herself (a fabulous practice of making Insta captions long enough to tell an end-to-end story without losing your reader on another page, ad, or myriad other distractions).
Compassion > passion. She leads with empathy which turns a passion for e-commerce into so much more: financial wellness, podcasts, small-business-owner workshops, and more. Alongside Julissa Prado of Rizos Curls and Patty Delgado of Hija de tu Madre, she founded Las Jefas Crew, an entrepreneurship resource hub founded for and by women of color founders. Chavez shared with HOLA!:
“Each of us have respectively self-funded our own brands that have generated impact in the Latinx community … We want to teach underrepresented founders that with the right tools, they can too.”
That’s the power of community, culture, and commerce.
Tools for stories, biz and change: e-commerce, influencers, partners, memes, workshops, Instagram, Twitter
8. Laura Clise, Founder and CEO, Intentionalist
Intentional spending like Shop Latinx is the f̶u̶t̶u̶r̶e̶ present. And yet, Amazon is everywhere. But so are small businesses. Laura Clise (she/her) is bringing visibility to the small businesses and diverse small-business owners at the heart of our communities with Intentionalist, which is exactly that…an intentional list that helps you #SpendLikeItMatters. It’s like Yelp or Google Maps with a conscience, soul, and spirit that no other search tool provides. This biz is protecting the diversity of the local economy and I am here for it. You can easily add or search for your locally owned, diverse businesses, and Intentionalist regularly shares lists curated by influencers, featuring favorite spots to grab a bite, get a workout, or buy some home goods (to name a few!). Today Intentionalist includes nearly 2,000 (mostly Seattle) brick-and-mortar small businesses and will soon have the ability to share your recommendations with friends.
Clise has centered the narratives of the business owners since day one. As she recently put it on Twitter, “We believe that where we spend our money matters, and that small businesses are more than the products and services they sell.” They’re the people, the journeys, the networks created as a family, and individual, or an entire neighborhood breathe life into a business. And Clise herself as breathed life into this brand. How?
Make your hashtag spark action. The Intentionalist mantra #SpendLikeItMatters is powerful because it captures both purpose and a command. Buy stuff, but be intentional. It’s an active sentence that works with you, me, we I, so all anyone needs to do is attach your story to it, and you’re in on the movement: I #SpendLikeItMatters because…
Turn a moment into a memory, and a memory into a habit. The Intentionalist blog features lists for many occasions, identities, and more, like The Beyond Seattle In-TEN-tionalist Guide to Filipinx American History Month. By giving her community a guide, Clise is creating easier pathways to that new favorite dinner or coffee shop, and hopefully, a new shopping habit. Story is critical here: we care, so we go, and we love, so we return. A virtuous cycle.
I use Intentionalist for WeWork Labs catering and can testify — the businesses on here are always delicious, always caring, always present (something I could never say about massive chains).
Tools for story, biz, change: Blogging, interviews, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, search platforms, local partnerships
9. Sema Graham, Co-Owner, Time Being Tattoo
Our bodies are the most honest stories we tell. We carry them with us everywhere. Each of us are sole owners of these stories, despite what the world tries to tell us about the shape, size, and colors our bodies must be.
Tattoos are some of the most permanent stories we tell, then, and Chicago-based tattoo artist Sema Graham (they/them) is redefining and remembering what this craft can mean for self-taught artists and a more inclusive community in Chicago.
Yesterday + tomorrow = today. Graham is defining their own version of innovation. They’re committed to providing exceptional tattooing to queer and trans people of color, who are often told they can’t get tattooed in certain ways (based entirely off of misinformation). They told Bustle, “As queer tattooers, we often want to reject a lot of what came before us, and just do something completely new and different … what I’m trying to do is more to build on what came before.”
And building they are. 2019 marked the one-year anniversary of Time Being Tattoo, the studio they co-own with fellow artists Emily Kempf and Keara McGraw (yes, my twin sis!).
Building in values from the ground up, literally. This space was built intentionally. All artists at Time Being are self taught, something seldom found in an industry riddled with apprenticeships (in their Bustle interview, Graham speaks on what makes traditional tattoo apprenticeships so exclusionary). It’s wheelchair accessible — located in Chicago’s Humboldt Park neighborhood on the ground floor. It’s queer owned. Graham, Kempf, and McGraw’s styles span both traditional (Graham) and modern (Kempf and McGraw). The stories at Time Being are rooted in community, research, and education. By providing space and artists that are open to every body — again, literally — the misinformation that much of today’s popular tattoo industry is rooted in slips away. Graham reflected on this with Bustle:
You’re 100% in control of the process. I just want to be a tool that helps the client get to the point where they feel extremely empowered during the whole process. I want someone to walk away from a tattoo thinking, “Whoa. Tattooing is magical. I feel incredibly empowered. This is my body, and I’ll do what I want with it.”
“Bring your whole self to the table” is corporate HR’s new promise in the future of work, but Graham has reached and exceeded this ideal for quite some time, quite literally.
Their visual stories inspire me in a way words can’t quite capture. But the body does. So, my lesson and commitment 2020: Consider the physical in my stories. We are so much more than words on a page.
Tools for story, biz, and change: Tattoos, space, travel, community events (like a queer prom this NYE!), Instagram
10. Sage Ke’alohilani Quiamno, Co-Founder, Future For Us
Sage Ke’alohilani Quiamno (she/her) is an award-winning entrepreneur, speaker and changemaker. As co-founder of Future For Us, a platform dedicated to advancing of womxn of color through community, culture, and career development, Quiamno has galvanized a nationwide movement to build a future of work reaching new levels of growth through diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Quiamno has gathered a groundswell of support and recognition — a clear signal that our cities, companies, and economy are ready and already fighting for equity at work. Her recent accolades are many (Rising Star Award from Seattle’s National Organization for Women and the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, KUOW Radio’s Boss Tactician Award, University of Washington’s Community Leadership Award, and a nomination for Forbes 30 Under 30 Class of 2019), but many of us know her because she lets us into her journey in real-time through blogs, Instagram Stories, and, if we’re lucky, real talk over some wine. This is the kind of leadership and growth I’m most excited about. People always say “A rising tide lifts all boats,” and I agree, but Quiamno doesn’t ask us to wait for a moment of lift.
We’re there with her, digitally and in person. We’re creating the calls to action together and holding each other accountable. It’s never, “wait and see,” or “I’ll get back to you;” it’s “we’re going together — what tools can we create together to get there, stay there, and change there?” Take Quiamno’s work to #ProtectMaunaKea for example. Digitally, she shared “Six Days on Mauna Kea Taught Me Lessons in Resiliency, Diplomacy, & Sustainability — World, Take Notes,” a powerful reflection that looks at protection of sacred land with an indigenous lens:
If we could all look at systems, processes, and people with an indigenous lens and put into effect policies that support indigenous peoples and their rights, I think we would all leave a better world for generations to come.
In-person, she brought the Seattle community together to raise funds for the protectors of Mauna Kea. Here, people did more than donate. It was an evening of learning, education, and a showcase of cultural practices. And through Quiamno, her community always had a chance to act, no matter the distance. It’s the magic and the power of digital-physical fusion in the stories we share.
#RealTalk on risk taking. Quiamno is very open about the risks she’s taken to pursue full-time entrepreneurship. We’re there brainstorming alongside her via Instagram Stories, and ultimately, every post or blog or speaking engagement is a drumbeat that both prepares and encourages us: The road ahead is difficult, but there’s room for more. There must be. And we can make it so. Not to mention, if you need salary negotiation advice, now is the perfect time to contribute to the Future For Us iFundWomen crowdfunding campaign, where $150 can get you a 1:1 private salary negotiation coaching session with Quiamno (and yes, she has helped over 4,0000 women negotiate $500K in salary increases and secure 150 promotions).
Tools for stories, biz, and change: LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, and Medium; roadshows; speaking engagements; personal board of advisors; her startup, Future For Us; crowdfunding
11. Tori Dunlap, Founder, Her First $100K
Tori Dunlap (she/her) is the founder of Her First $100K, a money and career platform for millennial women. It started out as a side gig, but this October, she quit her corporate job to fight the patriarchy because she believes having funds means freedom. She also saved $100K by the time she was 25. Through it all, she’s shared the wins, the hot messes, and the hard decisions along her journey. She’s shared millennial financial guidance on CNBC, Good Morning America, The Cut, and more, but what makes Dunlap most inspiring is that she’s one of a growing number of “financial feminists” who center womxn living paycheck to paycheck in her work. We’re not all on the same salary trajectory, and Dunlap ensures that her guidance can apply whether you’ve got $10 to invest, or that $100K. To do so, she has mastered two areas of storytelling:
Turn your story into a toolkit. Like so many of the leaders on this list, Dunlap open sources her knowledge in a very real way. Whether you need ideas to increase your credit score or are looking for 5 Ways to Save on Groceries and Household Items, Dunlap has you covered. Every time I’m like, “I need a money app THAT GETS ME!” I think of Her First $100K and CapWay, and know that we’re entering an era of democratized money buffs. Their knowledge is for everyone, served up with memes that give us life, and unscripted and useful (Dunlap regularly does AMAs in her Instagram Stories). With this much knowledge in hand, I know what’s next is up to me. Empowering is an understatement. *chef’s kiss*
Bless the stress. Authenticity is everything — people are not here for the fluff. Dunlap gets that and refuses to paint the perfect, pretty picture. And her work is rising in an age of “better than ever before” access to money guidance. From Ellevest to the growing number of female-focused accelerators and investment firms, women are more encouraged than ever to put their money to work, and invest in themselves and their future. And I’m here for that! But for those whose paychecks and savings are put towards supporting family or preparing to aid parents as they age (especially when traditional retirement is not an option), this encouragement can feel out of reach, if not out of touch. Dunlap understands that our fears and feelings can carry just as much weight as the dollars and cents. It’s a money thing. But it’s a mind thing, too. That’s why this November she hosted #IAmMyParents401K, a roundtable serving up actionable advice for and by women with dual savings pressure (supporting both their parents/fam and saving/investing in their future). That’s also why she partnered with positive psychology coach Alexis Rockley to create Master Your Money, an 8-week, all-you-can-eat online course taught by Dunlap and Rockley. Think of it as a personal finance therapy session with your two best friends, NOT two strangers reading your dad’s personal finance book. 😬They describe it as “a signature blend of science, memes and actionable advice.”
So let’s fight the patriarchy and make our money work for us while doing so.
Tools for stories, biz, and change: blogging, private coaching, all-you-can-eat online courses (seriously, check out her upcoming Master Your Money course!), Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, corporate workshops, brand partnerships
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I hope you walk away confident that stories are business. Stories are change. This list, like all, is incomplete. If you’re out there building your biz or changing the world, you’re on here, too. Keep doing it!
2020, I can’t wait to build and change with you.
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Aileen McGraw uses storytelling and marketing to grow communities, businesses, and brands that are solving some of today’s greatest challenges. She leads WeWork Labs Seattle, an incubator that empowers early-stage startups to put their vision in motion through a tailored approach to mentorship, programming, community building, and innovation. Her words to live by? “There’s no such thing as too spicy.”
