Challenges of the C-Suite with Kenn Walker, Episode 17w

Hello everybody, welcome to Thursday. You know, Thursday it's CB Bowman Live Workplace Equity and Equality. And today we have a— I was going to say it again, a special guest, but you know, I have to tell you, all my guests are very special people. So, uh, I'm gonna think about a secret to tell you today. Give me some time to think about it. Oh, you notice my hair is back, right? That's kind of a secret too. So you know what? Our guest has so much to tell us today that I want to get right to it, and I'm going to have him introduce himself. You know what? His background is so rich. I was going to read it, but then I thought, I don't know if I could pronounce all these technical terms.

So.

So I'll just have him tell you about it. Oh, I know what my secret is. My secret is our guest Ken Walker is actually on my Board of Advisors for Workplace Equity and Equality. It's called WE for short. Isn't that fancy? Wait, I have to learn how to wink my eye. Did I do it? Okay. So, and he is a powerhouse of Brain matter, right? In addition to being a really great guy and a fantastic father of 2 brilliant young babies. So without further ado— and these girls are so cute. Oh my God, you should see them. You just want to grab them up. And smart and precocious and Everything you would want your child to be. So with that, without further ado— by the way, pay attention to the bottom about the ACEC conference. You know, the special deal is about to expire on the 25th. Uh, without further ado, let's welcome Ken Walker. Ken, welcome.

Hello, CB. Thank you so much for your, your kind words about me and my family. So thank you.

Yes, Ken, tell us about you. Tell people why I'm so impressed with you.

Well, you know, I, um, have lived an interesting, uh, career that's sent me all over the state of California, up and down, uh, mostly in technology, but not, not in any sort of linear, simple career path. I I came to California from Georgia, where I was, I was raised and went to school, high school and college. I got a couple of degrees from Georgia Tech. My bachelor's was, uh, in computer science, uh, on an academic scholarship. And then I actually had an athletic scholarship for my master's degree. Uh, and, and how do you do that? Well, I was a football coach, so I coached football, uh, as an— as a graduate assistant coach, and they, uh, they paid for school. Came out to California to work for Georgia— not for Georgia Tech.

Wait, you paid for school yourself? Your parents didn't pay for you?

I had scholarships, right? So, and it was a state school. So even if, you know, my parents would have been able to help, Georgia Tech is a wonderful institution in the state of Georgia. And as a citizen of that state, we were able to get a much reduced price to, to go. So Georgia Tech at the time I went was actually—

Hold on, guys, I forgot to turn off my phone. How did I do that? Talk about technology.

Okay. Tech was cheaper than some of the, the private high schools in the Atlanta area, so you could really— you get a great education at a good price. Um, came out to work for Apple. Which, you know, was my dream job coming out. I'd had, you know, exposure to Apple in high school. My mom used them. She was a teacher, so she used the Apple II. And I thought that that company was the end-all be-all and got to come out here and had 6 great years at the start of my career at Apple, made lifelong friends and learned so much about How you put the user at the center of your thought process when you're, you're building things, right?

Okay, so let's slow down a minute. How, from, from school, how did you get a foot in the door at Apple? I mean, that's like a dream job. Apple and Google. Yeah, it's just not a job, it's a statement, right?

Yeah, and, and, and that was a unique time at Apple. Uh, it was in between the years that Steve Jobs was there. So this was, uh, John Sculley was, was the head of the company at the time. Um, I got, uh, I got that job in part, um, because I had great recommendations from faculty and administration at, at Georgia Tech who knew people at NeXT and Apple and, and the like. But also the tech titans wandered their way through, through tech to interview folks. So I had great, great opportunities at IBM, at Procter Gamble, at HP. But Apple came through and I was like, whoop, sorry, that's where I'm going.

Wow. What a roster for you to select from.

The opportunities exist when you are, you know, when you have the chance to take advantage of them. And, you know, people will talk about how luck is important in life. But, you know, for many of us in many situations, luck is really about being prepared to take advantage of the opportunity when it appears. Right.

So let's just go back a little bit. I always like to talk about the foundation of the life of successful people. Tell me about your parents, your siblings. How did you get to Georgia Tech? You just didn't fly in on a bird, right?

No.

Some foundation, some hard talks with your parents about the importance of education, it sounds like. What did your parents do?

Okay, so my mom was an educator and she came from a line of educators. So she was a primary school teacher, is retired now, still living in Atlanta with Dad. And, you know, my grandfather, her father, was also an educator.

Wow.

He taught at Tuskegee, was a colleague of some of the greats there. And her brother was an educator, right? So strong belief in the power of pulling yourself up with education on that side. My father was— became an educator later in life, but for the majority of his career was a civil servant. So he worked at the Social Security Administration. We bounced around a lot in my early years because in order to move up, you had to be willing to move somewhere else, right? Wherever the job was, there was an opportunity to move up. We would go. So I was born in D.C., but, you know, before kindergarten, I had lived in D.C., Dayton, Detroit, San Francisco, Right. And then moved to Columbia, Maryland, and there was kindergarten, right? So, uh, we stayed there until 5th grade, then we moved down to Atlanta because, uh, Dad was looking for that one last move, one last opportunity. So he went to regional office down there, uh, did, you know, had a fantastic career, was eventually the regional administrator for Supplemental Security Income, right? What we think of as Social Security in general, right? There's a lot of things in, in the Social Security Administration, um, for the, for the, the, the southeastern region. So, you know, the whole southeast. And it was, you know, that one of those high— the highest level you could be without being a political appointee.

Wow.

Wow.

So did your parents— and this is going to sound stupid— but did your parents sit you down and say You don't have a choice about education.

They didn't set me down, but it's just sort of an expectation, I think, growing up that, you know, that you will go to school, you will work hard, and you will go to college, right? That this is what you will do, and you will take— you will learn to take care of yourself. Dad was the first in his family to go to college, but he had also worked then very hard to sort of help bootstrap his siblings and then later his nieces and nephews and the kids of his cousins. So we always had a stream of relatives that would stay with us for a year to get on their feet, to figure out who they were and go on into the world. So there was always that sense of family and bringing people through and you take care of your own and you help them and you move them along. And that was just sort of who he was. And by the way, he had benefited from that himself. One of his aunts had lived in New York City and, you know, Dad came from this small coal mining town in West Virginia called Beckley. And he was actually born in a town called Hot Coal, if you can believe that. There's a town called Hot Coal, West Virginia, and that's where he was born.

Wow.

His father had been a coal miner, died of black lung, um, you know, had had that tough life where, um, you know, Dad would talk about, um, there were days where he would, you know, he remembered watching his father sitting at the end of the table watching all the kids eat, and then, and then his father ate whatever, if anything, was left, right? So this is just what, what it's like growing up poor. Uh, my wife accuses me of being the— uh, that I'm sometimes the, the baby who grew up in the Depression because of the lessons learned, right? You know, my grandmother would not let a single piece of meat live on a chicken bone, right?

Yes.

It was gone. It was clean, right? That's just, you know, how she was raised and what I saw as uh, as behavior, right? This is what you do. This is how you are. You take care of your family. Uh, you trust in the Lord. You go on, right? This is, this is the, the upbringing, um, that happens. Um, but you also have to, you know, learn to take care of yourself. And you— education is important. Um, being well-spoken is important. That was another thing my parents very aggressively worked on with me. They would not allow me to really develop a Southern accent, right? Because it's easy to slide into, and, and I can with a few drinks, right?

Let's hear some of that, Ken.

But, um, they were, you know, they were adamant that you, you know, that You need to sound educated. You need to be educated. You need to have those tools available so that you will always be taken seriously, right? And then the other lessons that you sort of learn along the way is to make sure that you acknowledge the lowest person that you, you know, the lowest person on the totem pole that you would come across in life because other people don't see them. Right? And you need to make sure that everyone knows that they're seen and they're acknowledged and, and, uh, that they're people, right? That's one of those, those, uh, parental lessons. Um, and that, um, you know, coming up as, as a, a Black boy going into situations where I may be one of the first or, or, you know, Early on in terms of people's experience with people of color that you have to in many ways be better, right? You can't say, you know, but, but, you know, person A around the corner here is only doing this much, so I'm only going to do that much. You have to do more, right?

Yes.

And you, you have to to do more because otherwise they're not going to see you, first of all. And then secondly, because if you fail, if you are not good enough, if you're not outstanding, you're only going to make it harder for the guy that follows you.

Let me ask you a question. So you spoke about— and I'm smiling because I had a very similar experience with my family. It was, you will go to college. Not, well, don't I have a choice? Did, did I present that as though you had a choice? No, Mom. No, Dad. Oh, well then I guess you don't have a choice. Like, okay. But did you feel with the pressure from your mom and dad, and I mean that in a positive way, To learn how to speak well. Did you have problems when you met other Black folks who did not speak or sound like you did? Did you have to slip back into— well, not slip back, but try to compensate?

I don't know that I ever did. I mean, I— because I grew up with all of these various relatives from, um, the panoply of the Southeast, right? You know, my mom's family being from Alabama, so I have cousins in Alabama, cousins in North Carolina, cousins in Georgia, uh, cousins in Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, West Virginia. Um, as a matter of just dealing with family, you dealt with folks of various Patterns of speech, accents, etc. I just was me, right? I didn't try to, you know, sound more, uh, you know, pick, pick your, your code word— street, urban, whatever, right? I wasn't trying to, to do that. I was just me, you know. I know I probably got hit a time or two for, for sounding too uppity. Um, but I am who I am, and, um, I also, you know, was raised to not shirk or hide back, you know, not to pull back from who I am, you know. So, uh, it's more— I think I, I came at it with an understanding that I, you know, I You know, I had a cousin named Mookie, right? That's not your average kind of name, right? And name and nom de jour, right? It's not, it's not how that goes. But he's— it was a wonderful, great man, uh, you know, good, good guy. And, uh, we got along great. Um, but this is just, you know, it's our community. Right. So, um, you don't, you know, you don't pick the names of your, your cousins, your family. You don't, you know, you don't have a way of, of, of saying how they should or shouldn't speak. You help them where you can. You love them always. And, you know, you move on, right?

And I can understand that in relationship to family, but What about being outside and in the public and on the street and, you know, just general communication with people of color, with Blacks, other Blacks, to be very specific?

I, you know, I don't, I don't remember there being a challenge there. I just don't remember it. There may have been, right? Again, as I said, I'm, I I know as a little kid, I remember, you know, an incident where, where, um, another, another young man was, was, you know, he had a beef with me for some reason or another. And I, I didn't understand what the beef was. And he started to talk to me about, don't you give me no lip. And I'm like, what do you, what do you mean? What's, what does that mean to give someone lip? And eventually, you know, I had a fat one.

But yeah, you found out the hard way.

I found out the hard way. But again, you know, I didn't change. I did, you know, I, I worked to be more understanding of what it is and, and, and what people are trying to communicate.

But did you feel left out because this was a lingo that you didn't— you weren't raised with and you didn't know the definitions of it?

I, you know, I've always been a, a curious kind of person who wants to learn stuff, so it just became a new learning opportunity. Um, not something that I allowed to, you know, sort of define a, a missing— a hole that then I, you know, I had to fill some way. It's just, oh, okay, I, I need to understand more about how, how people talk, right? It's, um, understanding perspective is very important. It was— it's important as, uh, you know, as a preteen. It's important as a teenager. It's super important as an adult. Um, And how we learn that perspective, right, hopefully doesn't require that you get smacked in the face, but sometimes it does, right?

Mm-hmm. So, okay, so now let's go back to— and I asked that question because, you know, there's so many times when I hear and I watch sports people, and I watch— and this is not to say the world is like this, But I sometimes wonder, when is the time to change the accent on the language? And how does that affect you when you go home to where you may have been raised versus where you went to school? And I hear so many different perspectives on that. And my perspective has always been, it's like learning a different language. You know, nobody chastises you for knowing 5 different languages. So why not have that curiosity and that ability to speak more than one language, if nothing, to make the person you're communicating with feel more comfortable, right?

Right.

where they are.

Yeah, I was— so I, I probably do slide into different idioms, right? You know, it's, you know, and, and not necessarily want to talk about the Southern accent, but Southernisms when I go home. The use of y'all more than I, I ever do anywhere else. Words like I'm fixing to, right? Those sorts of phrases. Um, that slide in. Um, and, you know, over there, I'm sure it gets, gets used in, you know, when I'm other places and, and the like. But I, you know, I think it's subcon— it's subconscious. I, I don't, I don't think I'm— I'm not consciously making a decision to adopt a linguistic characteristic as I move from place to place, whether or not—

You know, actually, I think what I'm saying is it's okay to do that, even if you're not conscious about it, because it's all about seeing the other person and welcoming the other person that you're speaking to. You know, I do not speak another language. I wish I did. It's part of my dyslexia. I'm lucky if I could speak English, right? My dyslexia just takes over. But when I'm in France, all of a sudden I'm hearing a little French tinge and I'm like, where's that coming from? You don't even speak French. But it's— and I remember one time I was in Paris and I was crossing the Champs-Élysées. And the police stopped me. Policeman stopped me. And I thought, oh my God, I'm going to be arrested in France. And I took out my little dictionary and I'm trying to figure out what he's saying. And he's actually helping me find what I was saying.

Mm-hmm.

And so what he was saying, and I'm trying to pronounce the words and he's laughing. And he said to me, I am saying you are a beautiful woman. Thank God. And he said, thank you for trying to find it in your dictionary. So, yeah, that's, that's—

there are always those fun stories about, about different cultures and the like, right? And, yeah, and the expectations that we build up about them, right? Everyone talks about how rude Parisians are. Um, but I've, I, you know, the few times I went there for work, I found if you even remotely attempted to speak French, they became incredibly warm and gracious and, um, helpful, right?

Oh yes, I love France. I, I remember there's another short story. I was on a boat crossing Calais, and I was in second class. And because I was a student, right, and couldn't afford first class. And they ran out of sandwiches in my class, and I was hungry. And I thought, forget this class business. So I marched myself— young and dumb, right? I marched myself into first class, sat at the bar, and waited my turn to get a sandwich. And there was this woman who was sitting next to me and a guy was sitting on the other side of me. And she had these big cat's-eye glasses that were famous at the time. And she demanded that the bartender give her lunch in English. And he just went— he like, he just didn't understand, right? And I thought, oh my God, I don't speak French. I'm never going to get a sandwich. I'm going to starve to death. And I looked at him, and I had looked at my little dictionary, and I said, "Qu'est-ce que c'est, someone, Jean-François?" And he looked at me, and he said, "Madame, for you, I will speak English." Okay. So the guy sitting next to me was Belgian, turned out to be. We became really good friends. And I said, "I thought he didn't speak English." And he looked at me, and he smiled, and he said, The stewards are required to speak 5 languages on this crossing. So yes, he does speak English. But he didn't help her. And he said to me, she didn't try. And so she lost.

Wow.

So it all goes to really trying to meet people, as I said, where they are, making them feel comfortable, you know. But I want to go back to— let's now talk about your entry into Apple. What was that like as a Black person at the time that you entered?

So, you know, that in part you have to understand it was tempered by so much excitement, right? That's— you're going there and it's thrilling. And I was supposed to work originally, I was hired to work in Atlanta. So I was going to work in the office in Atlanta, but They said, hey, could you come to California for orientation? You'll get a chance to meet people at corporate, understand a little bit more about how corporate works and the like. And I came out for 2 weeks, which became 3 weeks, which became 6 weeks. And then they said, you know what? You're not going back to Atlanta. We need you to stay here. So, there was— that was more the shock than some of the— racial stuff. But that, that said, you know, there weren't a lot of Black people at, at Apple at the time. There aren't a huge number, right? We're not a large percentage of, of the people in the South Bay area in general.

And because— At that time, was there— and I don't think there is now— was there a large percentage of Black people in technology?

No, probably not. Probably not in general. But I had a cousin who worked at Apple in the user experience department. And we would joke at lunch that it was the local meeting of the NAACP whenever we got together.

And so what was your experience like? Were you well received? What happened?

So the interesting thing I think about the Valley at that time and in general about Apple is that, um, it was much more the meritocracy that we, I think, always hoped for. Um, and the, the Valley in general was a, was a bit that way. Uh, there's, you know, one of those urban legends about Steve Wozniak, one of the, the founders of Apple, about how after the, the company had IPO'd he went into the local Ferrari dealership to— because I'm gonna get myself a Ferrari, um, and, uh, was wearing, you know, a t-shirt and shorts.

Yes.

And couldn't get the time of day from anyone there, even though he could have bought the entire dealership, right? Um, and that was sort of told— and again, it could be urban legend, I shouldn't try and ask Steve one of these days. Um, as an example of why you couldn't judge a book by its cover, right? The people who wandered around the Valley and had money didn't engage in those trappings of the East Coast, right? It wasn't the Brooks Brothers suits. It wasn't, um, you know, the Rolex watches.

It—

what— there weren't those things that were, you know, sort of those obvious signs of money that, that permeate traditional Philadelphia, New York, etc., certainly at the time, as to who was able to buy and sell your business and who wasn't. And so you had to take everybody at, at, at that value and give them a chance. because you didn't know who they really were or what they were. So I, I think that that was in many ways, um, very liberating, uh, especially as a young person coming into the environment, because you weren't judged by whether or not you were wearing the latest whatever, right?

Yeah.

I think over time that has unfortunately changed because the trappings of money are different for, for us today and are things that maybe technology people care about more, right? I don't know that a tech person cared as much about having a Rolex watch in the '80s, right, as they need to have the latest, you know, I gotta have the latest Apple Watch, I gotta drive a Tesla. I don't drive a Tesla, I have a Volkswagen.

Well, wait, that's just as snooty these days.

I don't know that it is. I've driven Volkswagens my entire life. So, you know, there are different signs that someone has made it that are more tech-friendly today than I think show up. But at the time, that wasn't the case. And my managers were always the kind of, of, you know, the kind of folks who were excited about results, right? And when you were able to deliver results, um, that meant that they, they were driving forward. So, and, and our team, um, the first team I joined, which was focused on trying to make Macintosh an integral technology for large, large businesses, right? To be something more than the latest, best desktop processing machine. We were incredibly diverse, you know, incredible women managers, incredible Latino coders, incredible, right? Just if there was a stereotype about who should and shouldn't be successful in technology, our team was an exact opposite of that. Right? And that was another part of that wonderful experience. But then you learn a lot about people and business and trying to build things that people care about. And, you know, a little bit about where you see the differences of office politics, right? You start to learn your office politics. And, you know, it's been interesting is Over time, seeing how different companies have incredibly different political cultures and, you know, where people are incredibly trusting. You know, at Apple folks were incredibly trusting to the point that you could sort of go to someone and go, do you see that he's building a howitzer in the cube over there? Yeah, it's really incredible. It's an amazing thing he's building. You know, he's pointing it at you. What? No, that's an incredible— no, really, it's pointed at you. You should either find a way to help him build the howitzer and point it somewhere else, or—

Well, you know, it's very interesting what you talk about, um, the trappings of wealth and how things change. I, I was in a conversation with a gentleman this And somehow we started by talking about Apple. And he said to me— and it was— he was an older, elder gentleman, and he was in Russia, and he was wearing a suit and a tie. And he said to me, you know, I never really supported the casual look when you get on a stage to talk to an audience. And I think he was a TED speaker. And I said, well, now you have to meet people where they are.

Right.

And he said, oh, I understand that. And I try to dress down. But, you know, Steve Jobs wearing a casual turtleneck. And I said, but that was part of the brand statement. You know, Apple's market were the turtlenecks and the t-shirts and the jeans. And so it became part of the brand logo. I said, in fact, if you look at photographs of Steve Jobs now, the most famous photograph is everything is black and you just see his face, right?

Yeah.

You think about Apple, originally it was all black and white, right? And so it's interesting now, Apple with their— first of all, the expense of an Apple, right?

Mm-hmm.

Is almost contradictory to the casual look of the employees and Steve Jobs and the whole framing. And I was laughing because I'd registered for Apple Park and I— You know, it just got really busy and I couldn't go. And so I went online to see what was new at Apple because I'm a real Apple— don't talk to me about anything but Apple, right? And I noticed that Apple has this new tracker out, right?

The AirTags.

What is it called? An iTag? AirTag. AirTag. And I'm looking at— I'm like, wow, this is really inexpensive for Apple. What is going on? And then I turned the page and it's like in an Hermès leather case. And the Hermès leather is like $326. And I'm like, damn, leave it to Apple. They're going to raise the number on this product as they do all their products.

Well, that is for a particular segment of the market. It's just like when they had the watch and it was solid gold.

Right?

It's for a particular segment of the market.

Exactly.

I do think, you know, that one of the things that this highlights is a challenge in the Valley, which is, right, we're trained to solve user problems. We're encouraged to say, well, what pains you? And then what can you solve to make that better? I think the biggest mistake I've seen out of the Valley is that we keep solving first-world problems, right?

Hmm.

We have better ways to hail cabs, right? To ride in someone's private car, ways to not have to go to the grocery store and shop, right? Ways, you know, not to bag on Instacart because it was a lifesaver during the pandemic, but if you think about You know, there are people who are trying to just get food. And, you know, there's how much money was poured into finding a way for you to get food without having to go to the grocery store to get it, right? Or not have to call a cab and wait for it, or— right? So, you know, if you're only solving first-world problems, then you're going to have first-world customers. And maybe that ends up saying that your pricing isn't for the masses. That said, you know, Apple, I think, does a better job than people give them credit for, for fairly pricing the product that they produce. If you look at a MacBook, for example, and try to put those things together elsewhere, um, you'd have a hard time. doing it right at the cost you do. We— that was— and that happens across the industry. When I was at Gateway, we made— we had a brand of products called the eMachine. And, uh, our eMachines were low-end Windows desktops. But one of the things we thought was a hallmark of that was that if you went out and bought the parts yourself, you could not build a computer that did what ours did for less money. In fact, it might cost you $50 more to build it yourself before we even figure in your time and your effort and the times your knuckles got scraped trying to fit some piece into a small cubbyhole, right? Because we were driving value that way for the consumer, right?

Well, I remember when I bought my first Mac, uh, I was always a PC person. I was, I was trained in DOS. And I finally got so tired of calling the Geek Squad and trying to find people to fix the viruses. I am— excuse me, it's dry here in Colorado. I thought, I can't tolerate this anymore. It's not— it's fixed for a minute, and then it goes bad again. And I finally said, I added up how much it was costing me to have my computer fixed, right, in a very short period of time for its life, versus buying an Apple computer.

Right, and being able to support it yourself.

Exactly. So much more expensive that I saved my little pennies. And I went and bought my first Apple computer. That computer lasted 10 years, right, without it being touched by a mechanic to fix it.

So again, when I say that they— they're— for what you get, the, the value is honestly there in the Apple products, right?

Absolutely. So unequivocally. And I just bought my new one. And I'm a little sorry I bought it because the new one that's coming out has new ones, uh, switches and things and power cords. And I'm like, darn it, you know.

But still, you know, rumored, rumored, rumored.

But, but you know what, this lasts me another 10 years, I'm good with that. I'm good with that. So now I want to go back now, Ken, And talk about your experience because several times you were voted as, correct me if I'm wrong, uh, one of the top Blacks in technology, right?

Yep.

How did you get that? That is so exciting. And were you excited about it?

It was, it was, uh, you know, it's a fascinating process, right? You submit something. Well, first of all, they find you, right? They, well, they found me, Right. And, uh, Black Engineer magazine, uh, found me. And, um—

Wait, which magazine?

Black Engineer.

Okay.

Right. And, uh, and you talk to them, and the next thing you know is they, they figured out where you fit on the range, right? They give you a number. By the way, I don't know what my numbers were. I just know I was there. Um, and that was when I was at Gateway. Um, that, that time there, which was just fascinating, period. Um, I just had— I had a great time. That was— being a chief technologist is one of the best jobs in the world. I got to— I got to— I got to play with everything as, as a part of my job, right? You know, um, I still play with everything, but now I have to do that on my own time, right? When it's a part of your job, it's like, oh, this is I wish I knew you when I had a Gateway computer.

That was an experience. Okay.

Well, you know, we worked hard on improving that experience for people. Again, at that, at that time, Gateway had— was in the process of selling off those stores that they'd had and had bought the eMachines company. And, uh, most of the management from eMachines came in to help drive the future of Gateway. And that's when I, I went in. I went in to build televisions. I'd been at Philips, uh, working in, in the components division, so working on LCDs. And, um, you know, I built the very first LCD TV prototype at Philips, my team. and, and really driving a lot of things with LCDs. And so the Gateway guys called me and said, hey, we need someone to run our television business. And, and I went down to do that, but within 6 months, the CEO decided he didn't want to be in the television business anymore. And I'm like, well, good thing I didn't sell the house, right? In Northern California, they were down in Orange County. It's a good thing I didn't sell a house. And he said, oh no, I'm getting rid of the the business. I'm not getting rid of you.

Wow.

And so I, I transitioned into a couple different, different things, eventually settling into that, that role of Chief Technologist. And, and then I started to run the software team for, for Gateway. And, um, with that, with that team, right, at that time, we were really focused on, again, the user, right? And that end-to-end Experience, right? And for us, we define that end-to-end experience as from the sourcing of the very first component to when the person decided they were done with the machine, right? So that's that end-to-end experience. And what does that mean for the consumer? And how do you make sure that that experience is as clean and successful as possible? Because at the low end, to be honest, the low end of the PC market, we would make like $10 a unit.

Really?

Yeah, right. So yeah, the Windows, Windows PC business can be brutal. We'd make like $10 a unit and a call to the 800 number cost us $12. So if we did anything that caused people enough pain that they had to call in, we immediately were losing money on that. Computer. So we really focused on that experience to make sure that you didn't need to call us, right, that you could find a better way to solve your problems, and ended up having some of the highest customer satisfaction in the industry. Because of that, we were one of the first companies to get rid of that shovelware, right? You know, if you bought a competitor's product at the time and you booted it up, half of your screen would be filled with icons on offers. and things. And we really pared all that down to an absolute minimum. Um, no competing offers, everything had to make sense, nothing could negatively affect the experience of the consumer, drive a, a call or any of those sorts of things. And it, it was a great laser-focused sort of experience to help drive, you know, our view on things, that helped drive my learning. And I think this was really apparent for us, how important it was when Windows 8 came out. And I don't know if you remember the debacle that was the Windows 8 rollout. But there were a ton of challenges with that experience, and we ended up being the sort of the poster child for what to do in terms of building an image for Windows 8, to the point that Microsoft came down, spent a lot of time studying our process, and rolled it out later for what the best practice was for the industry. So I felt really good about that, right, that we had gone through this and we had You know, my slowest machine would start from zero to fully usable in less than a third of the time that Sony's fastest would.

Wow. So Ken, I want to get back to talking about you as a Black man in technology and in the world, right? You have 2 drop-dead gorgeous daughters.

Thank you.

Incredibly smart and, um, have Daddy in the palm of their hands. Um, what is it that you're teaching them about living in the world as 2 Black women?

Well, we're really first focused on teaching them about living in the world as women, right? It's— I think it's hard enough unfortunately, to be a woman in this world, right?

Yeah.

And so we really want to make sure that they are fully empowered, that they have the, the tools necessary to get the most out of the world they can, but also socially to understand important concepts like no meaning no, right? And, and we want to teach them that at an early age so that when they're older—

What does that mean? Well, how does that affect them?

Well, if you think about kids, kids want to play and wrestle and do whatever. And it's like, look, if someone tells you no, you need to respect that no means no. And furthermore, when you say no, people need to respect that you mean it. Don't say no unless you mean it. And when you say no, mean it in a way that it, it needs to be respected, right? Because this is going to be important for them later on in life, right? Um, both physically, mentally, professionally, right? They need to be able to stand up for themselves and understand, right, no is a complete sentence.

Right. I never thought about it that way.

Right. No is a complete sentence, and it says everything it should say in a lot of cases. So the first thing is really teaching them to be in control of who they are, right? And then we spend time discussing the, the nature of the social world, right?

Right?

My wife is white, so there, there, I'm light as light enough as it is that I get the benefit of the doubt sometimes with people. So you know, I have to acknowledge that you know there are folks who at first glance don't realize that I'm an African American, and and it gives me a leg up, unfortunately, as it were. They you know my eldest is. got blonde hair and blue eyes. So, you know, despite the fact that her racial percentage would mean that she could, you know, be president of the NAACP, she's not going to quite be viewed the same way, right?

Mm-hmm.

And so we need to make sure that they're aware of our racial heritage and history That it's not just something in books, that it's something to celebrate. They are both Black and white. They are wonderful and empowered, and they need to celebrate both sides of who they are, right? And that's, that's what I hope we're able to do and teach them. I think that that will give them better ownership. of, of their being, uh, going forward.

Would you do something different if they were boys?

Um, I think you still have to teach them certain things, right? They— boys need to learn that no means no too, right? Um, for some of this same reasons, but also because they need to know and respect no when they hear it from other people. Um, I would probably still want to raise them the same way around being culturally aware, being, uh, you know, celebrate everything that's a part of, of who you are, not try and— you shouldn't have to pick one or the other, right? Um, it's, you know, I, you know, it's like asking someone who is first generation from another country, well, pick your country. Are you an American or are you something else? Well, I, I am A plus B, and why do I need to pick? Why can't I celebrate both being an American and being from Europe or Asia or India or Africa? Why can't I celebrate all those I think if we allow for that culturally, right, then we are doing more that will help for things like our goals in WE, right? Right? That's how we get to equality and equity because it's not— it no longer is us versus them. If you say you have to be one or the other, you're already setting up a conflict inside of the person, right, of an us-them. And if we enable people to be accepting and, um, you know, adopting of all of their cultural heritage, then you eliminate that first core conflict and maybe hopefully allow them to understand and embrace others.

What you mentioned, we.

I did. We, we Workplace Equity Equality Initiative that you so kindly and presciently, um, started the forum. So, um, for those of you who are watching who haven't figured it out, right, CB is very passionate about workplace equality and invited me, along with some other incredibly talented members, to be a part of her advisory board to really help her get this organization up and running. It's been a fascinating year, a gazillion Zoom meetings, lots of opportunity to learn, right, from members who are in Africa, in Europe, and across America, the different perspectives necessary to really drive this problem home. And I'm looking forward to seeing how people respond to the upcoming conference. And I think that you and the team CB have really come up with an interesting concept around the notion of a collaboratory, right? So for those of you in the, in the audience, rather than just be a conference with talking heads, right, what we really asked the, the people to, to consider and drive and, and find a way to make, um, just sort of integral to the, to the message in the program is a way to help the attendees drive their own agendas, right, within their own companies, and by doing so in a collaborative environment. And so rather than just say, hey, we have collaboration sessions, right, it's collaboratory. I love that term, right, so that we can Have people, you know, bring in what they know in a safe space, right? No judgment, no bullshit, right? And really sort of say, hey, here are my challenges. Here's what's going on. Here's what we think is going to work. And, you know, hear from world-class coaches, but also world-class peers. Right, on thoughts about how to make their programs be the best that they can be for their companies and their systems. So I think that it's going to be an exciting event. I think it's an interesting approach for a first-year event where you've got to really sort of not just dip your toe in the water, but, you know, we've got to jump in. And to do so in a world with COVID is not easy, but the fissures that were exposed with the events of the last year are fissures that needed to be exposed and needed to— and need to be addressed and need to be addressed, not to touch on it downward, but The, the thing that struck me most about the Floyd trial— not the Floyd, the Chauvin trial, right— is, is not that, you know, people are like, oh look, the police are accountable, right? That's not what struck me. What struck me was the amazing thoroughness of the prosecution, right? So the, the game changer here wasn't that a jury found a police officer guilty of murder.

Right.

The game changer for me was that the prosecutor took it seriously and did their job and presented a case that showed exactly what happened and why the jury needed to come to the conclusion that they did. Um, and that, I think, is the inflection point, right? Is if you can get the machinery to say, we're going to hold people accountable, we're going to put together the, the, the, the case, we're going to have other members of the police community say, yeah, that was excessive, right? Um, and then you'll get the results. But this was not— this was not something that was driven by fear of a mob or people just saying, oh, enough is enough. This was, this was a well-thought-out, well-presented, well-argued case on the part of the DA. And if more prosecutors engage that way, we will see that accountability, right? And then, you know, along with changes to qualified immunity, I think we can move to an era where the accountability that all citizens feel will extend truly to all citizens, right? No one is above the law, whether you're president or police, and that is a foundational element of our nation. And As long as we respect that wholly, then everyone will be in a better place.

Do you feel— we only have 2 minutes left.

I'm sorry?

8, 9, 10, 2 minutes. Yes. You just opened the door to a massive conversation. And so you're just going to have to come back. Very simple, right? Because I wanted to end with what advice do you have for young, mid-age, whatever the age is, Blacks to move towards professional success in their lives? What's the single or double piece of advice?

Well, the first piece of advice, and I And I think that it probably echoes a lot of the things that you and the coaches love to say, which is that you've got to find your superpower, right? You've got to find that thing that separates you, right? And then related to that, you need to be able to position for a company why it is that you and your superpower are the right answer for whatever their problem is. Right? And because, look, if you want to be successful in a company, if you want to be the, the star, all-star for a boss, if you want to be the go-to guy, right, being the GOAT means that when the chips are down, people can count on you to make important things happen, right? Because you're fulfilling a need for the team, you're fulfilling a need for the company, you're fulfilling a need for the manager. And the way to do that is if you can align your superpower to a job, uh, or a description or whatever that, that shows where you're going to make a difference for that company or that team or that manager, you'll be immediately embraced and more importantly, indispensable. Right.

And what advice do you have for those that are discouraged?

Well, discouragement is easy, right? And, you know, there, there are plenty of platitudes out there that people are going to tell you, right? Fear— false evidence appearing real, right? All those sorts of things that get splattered about. Um, you probably need to spend a little more time thinking about yourself to get your superpower in line, right? To understand what it is that You have to offer, right? And and that can be as simple as I am the the person people gravitate to in the room. Maybe you need to be in sales, right? If you're if you're not in sales, maybe that's that's the best thing for you to to do. Or you know, there are lots of examples, and I don't want to just just sort of start babbling. But really, if you're discouraged. Maybe you need to rethink what what you want and why. Maybe just spend some time breathing. To be honest with you, I know that sounds strange, but focus, clear your mind, breathe a little bit, and and recognize that look, everybody goes through tough times. It's not all you know bread and circuses, right? It's we. We all have tough times. We will all struggle. Life isn't easy, right?

But regardless of your color, shape, size, yeah, everybody goes through that.

And so what you got to do is, first of all, don't let yourself slide into a victim mentality, right? Yeah, you may be discriminated against. Whether it's because you're old— I feel that— or, uh, you're Black— I felt that, right? It doesn't, it doesn't matter. Because you're a woman, because you're Latino, whatever. Yeah, you— bias exists in the world, and, and you're going to be on the wrong end of bias at some point. Everyone will be at the wrong end of bias at some point in their life, in their career. Okay, you still gotta— you still gotta eat, you still gotta work, you still gotta whatever. So it's, you know, it's, it's not the end of the world. It's just yet another struggle you've got to go through. And, you know, if I think about the struggles my father went through, right, you know, we didn't even get to talk about sitting at lunch counters.

Oh, You know what, we have to talk about that. Audience, just stay, stay, stay with us for another 5 minutes. Yes, please.

Right, you know, uh, my dad was, you know, if you think about his struggles, you think about my grandfather's struggles, um, my struggles are nothing, right? I did not have to sit in at lunch counters for the right to have lunch wherever I want to. Right. When my dad started his career in Baltimore, uh, at Social Security, um, I believe he said that there were 3 places in the entire downtown of Baltimore where he, as a Black man, was allowed to get lunch. Right? So you think about an entire downtown area, and there are 3 places you can go. Um, and it doesn't mean you're not going to get looked at. askance or spat on along the way, right? And, um, it, you know, it affects you. It affects your friendships. He, you know, he had a friendship with, with a woman in the office who's like, let's get lunch. And he's like, I can't get lunch with you. You're white. You're a white woman. I cannot go to lunch with you. I will get strung up, right? Um, now, he didn't say that to her, but that certainly was going in his head. Right? Um, and she was just, you know, being kind, right? And so, uh, if, if you think about those, those struggles that were a generation behind, then, you know, my, my pain isn't, isn't all that great, right? I, I have, um, a wonderful house. I have wonderful kids. I have a lovely wife who I adore, and, you know, we just celebrated 15 years yesterday.

Congratulations.

Thank you. And it's been bread and circuses, mostly.

Well, I also felt great empathy when you told the story about your grandfather who worked in the coal mines and who passed Black Lung and how when you— when he and the family sat down to eat, he would wait for the children to eat first, right?

Wait for the children to eat, and then whatever was left, that was his meal. Now here's— I mean, here's a man who's working hard, manual labor for a living, and he's living on the scraps of the table. So he makes sure that his kids have more and better than he did, right? And, and that is, you know, in many ways the American way, right? We always want our children to do better than we did, and he did it in a very visible way. My father noticed it, right? My dad's one of those people that notices everything. Uh, Dad noticed it and it struck him, and it was a lesson he, he carried forward and made sure I was aware of. And, uh, paid attention to, right? Um, you know, but that— it was a hard, hard world. He had siblings that, you know, didn't make it past 2, right, for various reasons and, and the like. And it's just— that was a— you know, my struggles are nothing compared to those struggles, right? So I, I can get depressed about how I don't have that You know the X, the Y, or the Z. But that's window dressing compared to the fact that you know I I have pretty good health, right? My family's doing okay. My kids are wonderful and loving, right? It's not it's not as it says not all bread and circuses. We have challenges. We have right the challenges of smart kids who you know and then. The, the why questioning at some point, you're just like, just because I said so. And then you're like, oh, and there it is, I'm my dad, right?

Oh gosh, I remember my parents saying that to me on more than one occasion.

But, you know, it's, it's, it's tough. You, you sometimes you just need somebody to listen to you, to, to do what you're saying. And yet I don't ever want to, um, discourage the questioning of authority, the, um, the wondering why, right? Any of those sorts of things that my kids have. So that's, that's the delicate dance there.

Well, you're raising 2 incredibly strong women. And that's the bottom line. That's the parent punishment for raising very strong young children. It's like, okay.

Yeah.

Ken, it's been such a pleasure. I can't thank you enough for coming on. And you came in at the last minute on the wing of a prayer to fill in today. And I couldn't have asked for a better guest, a better friend, a better business colleague. You're just an amazing person.

Thank you, CBA. I'll throw some compliments back your way.

Oh, don't. I'll turn as red as this shirt. So listen, everybody, be sure to text me Or reach out to me on LinkedIn and find out about the conferences I'm involved with, the businesses I'm involved with. You know, just talk to me and listen, follow me on Clubhouse. I'm on Clubhouse on Wednesdays in the evening, 5 o'clock Mountain Time, and Saturday, 9 o'clock Mountain Time. On Wednesday, we talk about the challenges of leadership with the lens of current events. We had such a great discussion last week about the Floyd case. It was incredible. And then on Saturdays, we talk about the challenges in the coaching world and the executive coaching world. So please follow me, your favorite person on Clubhouse. And Ken, thank you again. Audience, thank you for being there. I can't wait to see you next week. No, oh, I forgot my new show is on right after this. You've, you've got to stay for that. That's Social Media Influences with CB Bowman Live. You definitely want to stay for that. So Ken, love you. Thank you.

All right.

We appreciate you.

All right, bye.

Bye everybody. Oh, see you in a little bit. That show comes on from 1 to 2 Mountain Time, I think. But you know, if you connected with me on LinkedIn, you'll now see it in the back of my profile. You can now see the shows actually airing on time. And if you miss it, it's on YouTube and Facebook and Apple Podcasts and and iHeartRadio. I've got it covered. Bye now.

Bye.