Shellye Archambeau: Tech Entrepreneur and Fortune 500 board member

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I'm Guy Kawasaki and this is Remarkable people. I joked with this episode's guest and told her that she is perhaps Wharton's second most famous graduate. Her name is Shelly Archambault. She is a powerhouse, a woman with a plan. She is unapologetically ambitious. She worked for IBM while in college and then took a sales job there after graduating. She's well versed in leading tech companies because she was the President of Blockbuster, CMO of Loudcloud, CEO of Zaplet, and CEO of MetricStream. She is currently on the Board of Directors of Verizon and Nordstrom. She has written two books, co author of Marketing that How Entrepreneurial Marketing Can Add Sustainable Profits to any Size Company and author of Unapologetically Take risk, Break barriers, and create success on your own terms. This episode starts with a discussion of her relative's manumission. You will learn what this shocking document is. You will also hear some great career advice, including why ambition is a good thing, what the imposter syndrome is, and how to get over it and how sometimes you just have to fake it until you make it. This episode of Remarkable People is brought to you by Remarkable the Paper Tablet company. Yes, you got that right. Remarkable is sponsored by Remarkable. I have version two in my hot little hands and it's so good. A very impressive upgrade. Here's how I use it. 1. Taking notes while I'm interviewing a podcast guest.

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Taking notes while being briefed about a speaking gig. 3. Drafting the structure of keynote speeches. 4. Storing manuals for all the gizmos that I buy. 5. Roughing out drawings for things like surfboards, surfboard sheds. 6. Wrapping my head around complex ideas with diagrams and flowcharts. This is a remarkably well thought out production. It doesn't try to be all things to all people, but it takes notes better than anything I've used. Check out the recent reviews of the latest version. I'm Guy Kawasaki. This is remarkable people. And now, here's Shelly Archambault. I would like you to explain what a manumission is. When I read the draft of your book. I learned about a document called a manumission. I had never heard of such a thing. Please explain what a manumission is.

So a manumission was the document that slave owners wrote and signed. That indicated for whoever saw that piece of paper. That this particular person who had been a slave. Is now a free person. And it literally was a piece of paper. And if anything happened to that piece of paper. Then freedom was gone. Because there was no proof that somebody was actually a free person. So it was extremely, obviously valuable once you had it. And tenuous at the same time.

And that's all that separates a person from, really, incarceration. Right. That piece of paper.

That's right.

Do you have it?

I do. As a matter of fact. We have a manumission for one of my relatives. My aunt Dolores. My aunt Dede is the keeper of the family papers on the moundsey side. My mother's side of the family. And it is. I can't even explain, in terms of reading it. The chills that it sends down. Because at this point, it's really yellowed and brown. The ink has gone brown. Right. It's not black. I don't even know if it was black or blue. You can't tell. And it's literally just scratched out. And when you read it, there's no reason to even know. You're reading about a human being. You're reading about something that was living. But the way it describes. And anyway, it's just a. Yeah, it's a very, very painful piece of paper.

What is the impact of that upon your psyche and your perspective? In a sense, something that made you strive to achieve. Or is this something that brings out anger? Or all of the above? What does this mean to you?

What it means to me is it is an example of just how far my family has come. It shows the strength of everything. Character, physical, mental. Right. All of it. That has enabled my family to survive all the way through the generations. And each step of the way, we keep taking one more step into that. Think of it. The ladder to freedom. The ability to actually live and have the life that we want. And so I actually see it as a position of strength, frankly. Now, when you say, does it make you angry? You know, it's interesting. When I first saw it and read it. For me. It wasn't so much anger as it was great sadness. It was just great sadness. Because you're looking at this and you're trying to imagine the life we had. One of my ancestors, he bought himself out of slavery and then worked to buy his mother out of slavery. And you think about what. I can't even imagine what that had to have been like. So I'm more empathetic in thinking about that time and what transpired. So it's not anger. It is much more just a great sadness with hindsight.

And now that you're successful and shall I say, mature, do you think life is fair?

Oh, no, absolutely not. My parents made that very clear when I was a little girl that life is not fair. You come home from school and something's happened. Somebody hasn't treated you right. It's pushed you as you haven't. You didn't get something that you felt you should have based upon what you understood was their criteria, you know, whatever it was. So you come home and you do what kids do.

Mom.

It's not fair, right? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And instead of basically coming and saying, oh, Shelly, you know, it's okay. Da, da, da. No. My mom was like, you're right. It's not fair. Life isn't fair. And you're like, what? But it was literally drilled into me, life is not fair. So don't go looking for it. Don't expect it. It's just not. So what are you going to do about it? And honestly.

And what's the answer?

And the answer is you. You have to decide what it is that you want, and then you have to figure out how to go get it in a world that is not fair. So it really meant for me that I learned to be extremely intentional. I knew that if I did what everybody else did, I wasn't going to get anything. All I do is to look up people didn't look like me that were doing great things. And so I said, all right, I have to figure out, how do I prove my odds? What can I do to improve my odds? Because life isn't fair, and that's just the way it is.

And what did you decide was necessary for you to make it happen?

I became very goal oriented. I'd set a goal or a target, and then I would just work toward it. And I've found that that actually improved my odds of making things happen. Guy. And so I've done that my entire career. I had a fortuitous conversation with a guidance counselor in high school. So roll the clock back. We all remember, kind of junior year, you have the conversation with the guidance counselor. Well, what do you want to do with your life? Are you going to college, going to trade? You know what's happening? And I said, I want to go to college, and I want to get a job. And she goes, what do you want to do? I said, I don't know. I just want a job where I can keep the thermostat at 72 degrees. I can eat out and travel. Cause those were all things that I couldn't do growing up. And she laughed. And I was serious, but she laughed and she said, what do you like to do? And I honestly give her huge credit for this. And I said, what I'd like to do is participate in organizations. I love to run them. I'm in everything. The American Field Service and the French Club, National Honor Society. I'm a Girl Scout. And whatever I get engaged in, ultimately I find that I'm running or leading, and I enjoy that. And she said to me, business is just like a club. Running a business is like running a club. Pull people together to common objective and go make things happen. And I said, done. I'm gonna go run a business. And when I looked up, right, the people that ran businesses were called CEOs. And I said, great, I'm gonna be a CEO. So it's literally that naive at 16.

Let me get this straight. So at 16, you decided you were gonna be a CE. That was it.

That was it.

Basically, you had this goal, and going to Wharton, all that. That was just the plan.

It was. I mean, literally, I was like, okay, so the way I've always done it is all right, if what's my goal, what needs to be true for me to achieve my goal, and how do I make it true? And that's literally how I've lived my whole life. So I want to be CEO. All right? What has to be true? And I'm like, I obviously need credentials because there aren't people who look like me. So I've got to have the top credential. And I looked it up, and the top undergraduate business school was Wharton. And I said, great. It was the only school I applied to. I literally, at the bottom of my application, I wrote, this is the only school I'm applying to. It's the only place I want to go. It fits in with my plan. Take me. I don't want to go anywhere else. I literally wrote it in there. Now, fortunately, I was a good student. The key is you always want to create an environment that you have as many options as possible. So I was a good student. So it gave me that option and, and they took me. So first step accomplished.

You may be the second most famous graduate.

Oh gosh, you're not going to bring that up, are you Guy?

No, I just making an observation, people often ask me what was your motivation? And I think they fully expect kind of a Sandra Bullock response about world peace or ending climate change or creating a better democracy or something like that. And I'll tell you, the honest answer is that twice in my high school days I was robbed and once someone gave me a ride in a Porsche 911. And those three things made me study and work hard. So I'm glad that it was the thermostat, eating out and travel, which is probably better than my motivation. But in the broad spectrum, we're pretty close together.

We are.

So do you think that maybe we're the norm and the people who say I wanted to, you know, make the world a better place are lying?

Oh, I don't think they're lying. I, I just think that by the time they get asked the question, that's what they remember. But you know, I do, I do believe that when we're younger, it's some very basic things that, that drive us.

And who were your heroes at 16? Thomas Watson.

I mean, oh gosh, it's funny, I didn't find out about him until I was doing research and actually in college to say, all right, what' what company do I want to work at, what industry and who are the CEOs, that kind of stuff. But at 16, in all honesty, when I looked around, my heroes were people that I saw leading things. I was always inspired by leaders. In the 60s I went to, I was in elementary school and Martin Luther King played obviously big role. Even though I was very young, he continued to way beyond right. His life and his life plan. And you had people who were able. What I really admired were people who were able to do what they wanted to do or appear. They were able to do what they wanted to do and at the same time impact others. You know, that to me that was just the win, win because I grew up in a family, in an environment that listen, you don't get anything by yourself. There are a lot of people, a lot of people helping and you make sure you help all along the way. And those are the people that I found to be the most inspiring.

Do you have a modern day hero or source of inspiration?

Oh, you know, like right, right this second, if you look so many, I will say so many people. One of my heroes is the late Bill Campbell. I love Bill Campbell Bill was somebody who was really trying to make an impact, really trying to support people, but he wasn't something who needed to be in light. He wasn't a. Look at me, look at me. He was just out there doing things, helping, supporting, making an impact. And yes, he's definitely one of my modern day heroes.

I love the part of your book where you discuss the impact of two teachers. And I would like you to discuss how teachers affected your life.

Oh, big time. So my family moved to an area outside of Los Angeles, a suburb kind of, at the time was far outside of la. And we were moving Philadelphia. I was in the first grade and we literally moved over Christmas. So imagine you're starting a new school and you're not starting when everybody else starts, but you are just plopped in there. Now, that's hard enough. But then I'm the only black girl, not just in my class, in the entire grade. And honestly, I think the school. Okay, but it's the 1960s, so it's racially charged. For as many people that want civil rights, you have as many that don't. And here I am. So it was not an easy time for me at all. And frankly, I kind of went into a shell after a number of things that happened to me. So it's now third grade. And my mother. My mother used to make us go to summer school. She had four. My parents had four children in less than five years. So summer school was not. Because we didn't do well in school. Summer school was, you have to be out of the house. So we all had to go to summer school. We got to pick what classes we took, but we had to go. So summer school, they had a sewing class, So I took a sewing class, and here I am. We laid out our patterns. Well, I was too tall, so they had to cut. She had to cut the pattern, spread it out to give extra space, right. And pin it. So we did all this, and then we went for lunch break and we came back and it's time to cut out our patterns. So I'm cutting away, cutting, cutting, cutting. And I forgot about the separation. So I'm cutting around the pattern, and I literally cut the dress that I was supposed to be making in half. Okay. So the kids around me start giggling and laughing. I ruined my dress, the whole bit. And because I am at this point, I'm shy and I'm kind of inward, and I'm just feeling mortified, right? Here's yet another reason why I don't fit in and why I'm just not good. And my teacher after that, I mean, she helped me fix it. And. And then after that, she actually approached my mom and offered to have me take continue taking sewing lessons at her place. She had a ranch kind of place. And I honestly think it had nothing to do with sewing because when I got there, she actually had horses. And she asked me what I'd like to ride and I said yes. I mean, imagine right a kid. And I will tell you, guy, that whole experience of riding a horse, sitting on top, it's just me, you know, it's her, we're doing things. I. For the first time I started to feel like, I don't know, I'm on top of the world. Like maybe I can actually do something. Maybe I can actually control something. And I honestly think she just saw something in this little shy girl and made an extra effort to really help me. And it did. It helped me come out of my shell. So Mrs. Lutzinger was her name, and to this day I credit her. And then the other one that really helped was fifth grade and a math teacher named Mrs. Mizrahi. And I liked math and I was good at math. So she told me, because I also liked helping people, that if I finished my math first, I could help other students with their math. That was all I needed. I was always first one done and then I would go around and help other people. And so suddenly I started to be seen differently, right? As someone who's actually smart, who kind of knows what she's doing and then she's helpful. So it all fit into this image of what I ultimately wanted to be and do anyway. So those two teachers really made an impact in helping me to build some self esteem in an environment that was not very support.

Is it not so ironic, if not just plain stupid, that teachers are paid so little? I can't even wrap my mind. There's like an inverse relationship. The less you do for society, it seems, the more you make. And I think that is just a crime. And we should take all the money being spent on building a wall and give it to educators. But we don't want to go down that hole.

I was going to say that's a much bigger, broader decision. Guy, I don't think we have enough time.

You had a great discussion about how to make your own luck. So please. How to make your own luck?

Yes. You know, I felt I have found that by setting goals and being intentional that you absolutely can make your luck. Because while many people will set goals, some people put plans in Place. Very few people make decisions every day consistent with their plans. And let me just give some examples. I just assumed that what my plan was, that it was going to happen. So therefore, I made decisions today consistent with what I planned for in the future. And now what would happen is when things actually happened, I was actually ready and I was prepared. A really simple example is wedding. So my parents said, we will help you with college or we'll help you with the wedding cost. You have to pick one. So, of course, I picked college, which means I knew the wedding I had to pay for. In my plan, I wanted to get married younger versus older, meaning I'd love to get married ideally in my early 20s. I wanted to have kids younger. And so that's why I wanted to do that. So that meant that while I'm going to school and I'm paying for part of school, too, I need to start also making money and saving it for a wedding because we had a big family and I wanted a big wedding. So I actually started working. I mean, I worked 20 hours a week. I worked. I catered on weekends. I did all kinds of things while I was going to school. And I didn't spend it. I spent so, so little. Even though I had enough, I spent so, so little. I used to volunteer for receptions on campus because the faculty's always having something. And I would volunteer to help serve and clean up. Why? Because all that leftovers, I got to take leftovers home. I lived on macaroni and cheese and salami and ham and. All right, whatever. Olives. I mean, whatever. They literally. I lived on that stuff, right? Because now it saved me food, bill. And I have more money to save, okay? So fast forward. I had no. I had no boyfriend that was serious at the time. I had no engagement. But I'm saving for this wedding because that's when I want to get married. Fast forward. I got married at 22, and I paid for my wedding, and we had just about 300 people there. So I got lucky, right? I got lucky that I was able to pay for it. I didn't have to take a loan. Absolutely right. I got lucky.

But I would not call that luck. It was not. Luck is you win the lotto. Luck is you find $5,000 in a sack on a bench. I mean, that's lucky. That's not luck, what you did.

But here's the thing, guy. Luck is in the eye of the pol. Okay? So luck is when things seem to work out, you got lucky. And so I have been lucky often in My life, if you look from the outside, right, I've absolutely been lucky. And that's really my point. My point is you can, by being intentional, by setting some things in place, you can actually have what you need when an opportunity comes forward. The skills, the experience, right. The knowledge, who knows, the flexibility, something. And then for you, make yourself lucky.

I read your book, actually, twice now, and I will say that of the factors that helped you achieve success, I would not say that, quote, unquote, luck was very important.

Grit, maybe.

Work your ass off, maybe. Discipline, maybe, but not luck. Luck is that you just had the right name and, you know, whatever I know.

But guy, right?

Skin color, Right, Whatever the guy.

I can't tell you the number of people that have told me, oh, Shelley, you are so lucky. Something happens. Oh, you are so lucky. All I'm saying is luck is in the eye of beholder, and that's how you improve your luck.

But they're clueless if they think it's luck. But anyway, how do you define ambition? Because the word ambition is in your title, and it can be taken, not your title. I mean, but the word ambition has both positive and negative connotations. So how do you define it? And what's the right level?

Absolutely. So I. I believe that. And all ambition means is that you have objectives, goals that you are trying to accomplish. And to me, that's what ambition is. So whether that is in business, that you're trying to aspire to a role or a job or a company or something, or you're trying to aspire to make an impact and what have you. So ambition, honestly, has a broad definition. I can be ambitious, and my full ambition is trying to help my church. Right. It might be. Right. Increase their overall membership. To me, that's an ambitious objective. That is absolutely ambition. It can be becoming a CEO, it can be. My ambition is to ensure that my kids do. Do. Ambition shows up in so many different ways. And honestly, when the negative connotation comes in, I just think it's misinterpreted. Because when they say, oh, ambition is bad, how can ambition be bad? When ambition just means that you are striving, working and trying to. To make an impact, to achieve, to inspire. I mean, a lot of different ways in which it comes across. My mother is one of the most ambitious people I know. Mom never worked outside of the home when she got married. Right. But she. Did she impact things? Absolutely. Pta, church. I mean, you look at it, she was always making an impact and had objectives and things. She was Working towards that is what ambition is. And the reason it's in my title is because I'm tired of ambition being used as a negative. And I've heard that people use ambition and it's not meant to be a compliment necessarily. And I'm thinking, what are you talking about? I mean, would you think about it? Would you actually raise a child and say, now, listen, we want you to work hard and study, right? And do all these things, but, you know, don't be too ambitious. Right? Don't be. We would never do that. So why do we want to tell anybody not to be ambitious anyway? So the whole unapologetic thing is just everyone has a right to be ambitious. Everyone. And you should not have to apologize for it, figure out what impact you want to make, and go make it.

Do you think society judges ambitious women more harshly and more negatively?

Oh, for sure, for sure. I have yet to have a man tell me that someone told them they were ambitious and it was actually a negative versus a positive. And I've. With women, we have absolutely heard it in terms of. As a negative. So yes, yes, it does.

And what can we, as society do about that?

Think, Just think about it. Go back to the analogy I gave. Why would we ever see that as a negative? If I'm running a company, I want employees who are working hard and striving and trying to accomplish something. Right? You want to take and foster that ambition, Right. Not harness, not, oh, don't work too hard. What. So I think we're just not thinking about it. We have these expectations, honestly, that are just left over from the roles that we expect people to play. And honestly, women, we are supposed to be supporters. We are supposed to support. We're supposed to help, right? We're supposed to be that great. Number two.

Says who?

I don't know, says a lot of people who feel that we're too ambitious. Right? And I think that's ridiculous. And I think it's also guy. I think it's subconscious. I don't think people are sitting there in their mind thinking, I don't want ambitious women. But somehow, when it comes right down to it and something happens, it's almost like this reaction, this knee jerk. But I'm very hopeful. I think it's actually declining.

This is potentially also going down another rat hole. But this weekend I had a discussion. My wife and I had a discussion with two of our close friends, and it got to the point of the analysis of why Hillary lost. And my analysis is that if there were a man with the identical resume. Everything else is the same, just gender were different, that man would be president today. There's no doubt in my mind. And shame on America.

Listen, studies show that time and time again, guy. Time and time again, right? The famous Harvard Business case on Heidi Roizen versus Howard Roizen. There are so many studies that just show that we absolutely do have this subconscious fear view that deep down we believe men make better leaders. Deep down we believe that women don't. And we have to work hard to change the paradigm. And I think the more of us that actually step into leadership and demonstrate and show, people will start getting used to the fact that women do this as well, if not better at times.

And do you think women believe that too? Have they been conditioned to believe it?

Oh yeah, I do. And again, I'm not talking everybody. I'm not talking when I say men, I'm not talking about every man. And when I say women, I'm not talking about every woman by any, any degree. But studies have actually shown that indeed some women do believe again, deep down that men make better leaders. And again, a lot of it's been how we've been acculturized. Who do we see as our leaders? Who know who's who shows up? What are the visions and the pictures that we see from the time we're really small. And all of that plays into it. It's the same thing that plays into race. It's the same thing, it's the same concepts. So it's unfortunate, but time will improve this.

Imagine if there was a Supreme Court justice who was brought up believing that men have the sole leadership position. That's another hole we could go down anyway.

Okay.

So kind of the flip side of leadership and luck and grit and all that is the imposter syndrome. So tell us about the imposter syndrome.

Absolutely. Actually, it runs, I talk about it in depth on a few pages, but it runs all the way through. Because imposter syndrome is something that I have suffered from my entire life. Studies show that most people suffer from it at some point or another. Women more than men, and then women of color the most. So what is it? For those of you that may not have heard the term, Basically it means that you get to a point where you get an opportunity, get invited into a room or a new job or new project, something, and you suddenly feel, oh my God, right? Do I know enough? Do they know that I don't know everything? Can I really do this? I'm not sure I can do this. I'm not. It's all that self doubt that kind of eats away in your minds and in your head that tells you that you're just not good enough. And one day they're going to figure it out and you're going to be found to be a fraud. Right? So that's the whole concept of imposter syndrome. And I'll tell you, it's hard. I'm not over it. I would love to say, am I over it? There's still some times when you get that little needling, you know, if you will, of doubt. But what I have learned is how to deal with it. Because if you don't deal with it, then it can stop you because you don't take the opportunity or you don't take the job or you don't walk into the room or take the project or speak up because you're afraid. So here are my quick steps. And there's more covered, obviously in the book. But number one is realize everybody has it. So I, you know, as I used to tell my kids when they watch TV and crazy things happened, I'm like, guys, remember, this is television. This isn't real. This is all make believe. Well, this whole imposter syndrome, it's make believe. It's not real. Everybody has it. It's not you. It's not personal. That's 1. 2. When people offer you a job, when they invite you into a room, when they ask you to participate, they're doing it because they believe that you are capable and that you have that potential and that capability. So believe them. Believe them. Right. 3. If you can't, those two things still don't get you, Then fake it. Fake it until you make it is honestly the strategy that I deployed a lot, which is okay, I mean, even 50 years old, and I'm walking into my first Verizon board meeting, and I've now been CEO. I've served on public boards for, gosh, eight years already. I've done all these things. And just as I'm getting ready to walk in, I'm thinking, oh, God, oh, my God, am I really? Am I ready? Do they know? Da, da. All that. It all kind of comes back. And so shoulders back, deep breath. I'm like, all right, I'm walking in as the Verizon board director, and I'm going to act like I know exactly what I'm doing, because eventually I will. Eventually we all do. So just remember that. And then if that still doesn't work, then get a cheerleader. Get somebody to remind you of how good you are somebody who will literally say, shelly, go, guy, go. I mean. I mean, a real cheerleader, Somebody who pumps you up, gets you ready for the game.

Campbell.

Exactly right.

Bill Campbell.

That's right. That's right.

Couldn't I make the case that at least some imposter syndrome is a sign of intelligence and maybe even humility? Like if you have no imposter syndrome, like if you truly believe you deserve it, everything and it's all merit and you've done it, and blah, blah, blah, Aren't you a little delusional? I mean, I don't know what's worse, delusional or imposter syndrome.

Now you're giving. I'll call it. You're giving two ends of the spectrum, all right?

Yes.

So the middle, right? The middle is, hey, somebody offers you the job and you think, oh, wow, right? That's great. They think, I'm ready. Okay, Right now, that's having humility that's coming in. But that's not really imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is something that actually will stop you if you lean into it. That will actually stop you from moving forward, stop you from accepting a job, stop you from raising your hand, taking the lead. It will actually stop you. So there's two ends of the spectrum, but there's definitely a middle.

No one has ever called you on. It's immoral. It's not transparent. It's a lie when you fake it until you make it.

Oh, no, because honestly, it's just a concept that you're. You're trying to psych yourself up. It's not so much that I'm faking what I know as it is. I'm just telling myself, okay, act like you're confident. Act like you know it's that. But no, I've never had anybody call me on it because I don't. I don't actually pretend. I mean, I don't talk about things I don't know about. I don't. I don't jump into those things. It's really more of a mental psyche. It's not much different than this concept of teams. Football players get ready to go into the huddle, they talk about the strategy, then it's, one, two, three, go. Well, why do they do that? One, two, three, go. It's okay. We're going to get all our energy. Get ready. We're ready to go to battle. It's getting that mindset, right? That's what. That's what I'm talking about.

What is a CEO today in A pandemic. What's the role?

I will tell you that CEOs today are expected to be more of a, what I'll call it, a statesman than ever we have. When, unfortunately, when leadership is not as strong as people need it to be in government, then they tend to look towards their corporate leaders. And right now, I think that's what's happening. So I believe that CEOs are having to play a much broader role of not just running the company and delivering returns to shareholders, but much more of the statesman. Just look at what the Business Roundtable decided, which is the role of the company is not just optimize returns to shareholders, but also to make sure that employees are taken care of, the overall suppliers, the community. It's a much broader definition of the role. So. And we're, we're seeing it.

And who do you think personifies this?

Oh, gosh, I think there are a lot of good, what I would call people who are out there trying to do what's right for their company as well as what's right for the community, et cetera. I put Hans Vestberg, the CEO of Verizon, I would totally put him in that category. I put, in many ways, I put Jamie Dimon in that category. You know, he was leading the Business Roundtable when they decided right on this new definition, et cetera. But we have, the good news is we have executives all over the place. Even the CEO of Alaska Airlines, Brad Tilden, I put into that category. There's a number of them that are out there that are trying to actually do the right thing by business, but also by overall community.

Let's say in this current political situation, what is the role of, let's say that you are a CEO and you don't support racism, misogynism, anti immigrant, all the bad stuff. And do you say to yourself, if I have to play ball with the current government, if I have to go to the business luncheon at the White House, if I have to show that I'm giving tours of our factory with the leaders of this political party is my responsibility to the shareholders? Because that may mean that maybe our product won't be on the list in this trade war with China. Or do you say my greater responsibility is to society to not endorse someone who has these negative connotations, like where do you draw the line between shareholders, employees and society?

I'll be very honest. I think the situation that we've gotten in, the polarization of where we've ended up in terms of you're with Us or you're against us and there's nothing in between is ludicrous. Absolutely ludicrous. So when you ask me, well, what should we do in terms of our company and leadership and the whole bit, bottom line is I don't have to agree with you to be able to talk to you. I don't have to agree with you to be able to discuss and negotiate and determine what things should happen. I don't. I mean, believing that we can't even have conversations or dialogues or compromise or whatever, just because people have different views, I think is ridiculous. So, you know, it, to me, for a leader of a company or an organization, it doesn't matter who the country elects, right? We still have to work within the framework of business, government, laws, all those things. So I need to talk to who I need to talk to, right? And I need to have discussions and compromise. So I don't see it as a line of, okay, you know what I.

Think many people don't understand what is it like and what are your responsibilities to be on the board of directors of a company like Verizon or Nordstrom?

You're right. A lot of people don't know. It's like, what goes on anyway in that room. So I'll tell you. Our jobs are to represent the shareholders. We need to ensure that the companies have the right strategy, then the right management, so that's the CEO, and are following the right rules, regulations, policies, procedures, et cetera, to be able to execute and deliver consistent returns to shareholders while being a good corporate citizen, need to ensure they've created an environment in which people are safe and able to work and to thrive, and that we have good relationships and working business practices with our suppliers all over the world. So think of us as representing each of the different shareholders in the room to ensure that the company's operating the way we want it to operate. But we don't actually make operational decisions. We are there to provide oversight, advice, counsel, support and review, but not to actually make operating decisions. That's the management's job.

And I think people have this impression that, let's say there's nine people on the board and Verizon decides to do something and they think, oh, yeah, it was at least a 5, 4 vote that doing that was approved. Or on the other hand, is it always a rubber stamp for the management? How does it work at that? Kind of Fortune 500 board, certainly.

So back to operational decisions. Typically, most boards have policies and procedures about what decisions or level of investment, what have you actually have to have board review or don't back to management actually operates. But at the end of the day, the board has a voice. But management decides. And can management actually make decisions that the board doesn't agree with? They absolutely can. It's just that over time have to the board, it's the board's decision as to whether or not that management stays in place. So that is the, that's the ying, the yang with regards to this board provides oversight, input, you know, perspective. Management ultimately decides what to do, and then the board decides if management's doing a good job.

Shifting gears. Talk about planning for life. Now you bought a coat at the age of 19.

Yeah.

With the plan that this coat had to work when you were 25 or 26 and pregnant. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around someone who could plan that far and who'd even think, like, in six years I'm gonna get pregnant, I'm gonna need a bigger coat. So I'm gonna buy that now. Just help me understand how. Like, what, do you have a different kind of brain?

Speechless. Like, what? Yeah. Well, this goes back to the people point that I was making earlier about. Once I made my plan, I just assumed the plan was going to happen and therefore I made decisions consistent with that. So I told you already I was saving for the wedding. All right, well, I said I wanted to get. Ideally I got married early, and ideally, therefore, I had kids early. And I didn't have a lot of money because I'm doing school and I'm saving for a wedding. So I didn't have a lot of money to spend. And I am super practical. That's also the household I grew up in. And so I thought, okay, I need a new coat. I'm 19, needed a winter coat. And how long should a good winter coat last? I'm not on fashion. I'm just, how long should it really last? And in my family, I was like, okay, well, you know what? That should be like, I don't know, six, seven years. At least the coat should last. So I said, well, if everything works out the way I want it to, in six or seven years, I should be pregnant. So when I was trying on styles, the whole style that was in, what should I say that was cool and fashionable was the double breasted kind of pea coat, real fitted coat. And I thought, well, that's not going to work. And so I bought a swing coat. It still kept me warm. I used it all the way through. And yeah, I did wear it when I was pregnant with my kids. But, you know, that was just being a practical as well as thing. But. But I also have to tell you, here's what this does, and I know it sounds super, super crazy, but here's what it does when you actually make those decisions. Every time I put on the coat, every time I brought the leftover cheese and salami and whatever, home, right, Every time all those little things are happening, it is just reinforcing in my brain, my goal, my plan and my focus. So. And then things happen. I found the man that was my lifelong partner. I sure did. I got married at 22. I had two kids. Still, I'm in my 20s, which is what I wanted to do. I mean, all that ended up happening, but I was visioning that every step of the way with all these little decisions. But I know I'm. I'm really over the top.

Have you seen a generational drift in the sense that your two kids are buying clothes, figuring out what they need in six years?

Well, I'll tell you, it's. It's in some ways.

Is it genetic?

No, it's definitely not genetic. So I would tell you my daughter's probably closest to me. I like to tell people my daughter wants to conquer the world and my son just wants to impact it. And so she. But she told me in no uncertain terms that she goes, mom, I'm not making a list. And let me explain what that meant. I actually had a list of what I thought I needed in a life partner. And that way, when I was dating, right, I could make figure out, all right, is this life partner material or just fun? And if it was fun, then that was nice, but I need to buy my life partner. And she told me, she goes, mom, I am not making a list. She goes, I know you had a list for daddy. I am not making a list. And I said, fine, you don't have to make a list. But you know what? I bet you if you ask her now, she did not write down a list. She had a list in her head and she picked a great man.

But when she was 19, did she buy a minivan?

Figuring out what she. No, she didn't do any of that.

Okay, really, tactically, a young person listening to this, how do you make a life plan? Do you literally. Do you sketch it out for the next 60 years? I mean, how do you.

No, okay. No, I didn't sketch out like all the details over a 60 year period. Literally, it was the overall goal, which when I first started out, it was CEO and then it was breaking that down into, okay, so if I want to be CEO, then what has to be true and looking at what kinds of roles people took. But I didn't have it all mapped. I just had the first step. When I started working, I wanted to pick the right industry, which is a growing industry. Because you pick a growing industry, you tend to get more responsibility faster because they never have enough resource. And then I picked the first P and L role. I knew I had to have profit and loss responsibility. So my goals became chunked, if you will, just five or six years out as I worked each way to get to that ultimal step. So, no, I didn't have everything mapped out, but I usually had a pretty good plan that was a five, six year in detail. And then the rest was just chunks as I kept moving up.

Isn't your advice contrary to what many people tell young people, which is pursue your passions? You didn't have a passion for technology. You just decided, that's a growth industry. And that's where I'm going.

Right? Yeah. You're touching on something that gets close to one of my pet peeves. We tell young people, people getting ready to go to college and whatever we say, follow your dreams, right? Follow your dreams. Do what you're passionate about. Let me tell you why I have a challenge with that advice. At 19, 20, even 21, you actually have not had that much experience, not as a quasi adult. And I say quasi adult. So I'll give you 16 on. All right, so let's say 16 on. So for 16 on, you've had three to six years of experience. How can you possibly know what dreams you have for the world, for your life? You haven't had a broad enough experience. I think it's terrible advice. I think we actually cause a lot of kids to like, oh, my God, I have to figure out what my dream is and what my passion is right now. And I don't have it. And so something's wrong. And so you people get all stuck. They get stuck trying to figure all this out. Like, no, just pick something. I mean, the CEO was not that. I said, oh, my passion and my dream. And it's to be, no, I just pick something. Now you may pick something and then figure out, nope, this isn't it. But you know what? That's okay, because by picking something, you've at least moved forward. You've gained some skills, you've gained some experience, and you can build on that when you need to move to the next thing. So I'm a big believer in not so much. Follow your dreams. If you don't know what you want to do, then it really doesn't matter. So then why don't you pick something that's in demand, Build some skills that are actually in demand. You might find that you like it. You know, there's been books written. Grit is a great book. But one of the things that is true is that you tend to like things that you're good at. Give yourself a chance to get good at some things, right. To see you might like. And if you pick things in demand, you'll always have lots of choices and opportunities. And no matter what industry you end up choosing or that you fall in love with or like, et cetera. So yeah, I don't like the advice to follow your dreams to somebody who is. Has very little experience yet.

What happens if your kids come home one day and they say, so my dream is to be a professional accordion player. I love the accordion.

Yeah, I think that's great. Then take accordion lessons, right? Absolutely. But I would tell you, hey, the best example I can give you, I'll talk about a niece of mine. All right, so I have a niece and she is passionate about acting and she's good at it. Okay, she's good at it. And so. But I've also had an influence in her life and I've talked about having options. And so she ended up going to University of Pennsylvania and becoming an engineer. Now she acted all the way through school. She was leads in place, she did the whole bit. And then as she's getting ready to graduate, one of her advisors tells her because she's still interested in acting. And one of her advisors tells her, oh, now's a perfect time. Why don't you try? You love acting. Follow your passion, do the acting. You're only young once. She's got, she's graduating summa cum laude from University of Pennsylvania with an engineering degree. All right, I just want to say. And she's being told, follow your dreams to be an actor. I couldn't get to that phone fast enough when my sister told me that. I'm like Sierra right now. Here's what I told her though. I said, listen, acting, what do people do when they start acting? You have to go find jobs. That's why people have all these part time jobs waiting tables, right? Doing, et cetera. I said, go work, even if it's only for a year or two. Leverage your degree, get the value your degree will build. And then if you literally decide that what you really want to do is acting, Great. But now that part time job you do, you can make like 50 to 75 bucks an hour because you can do programming stuff on the side, not waitressing for 19 bucks. All right, so let's talk about practical here. Definitely. So I'm not telling people don't ever follow your dreams, but I am saying let's be practical right about it. Set yourself up so it'd be fabulous. She wants to become an actress and she's great, wonderful. But she at least now has skills that she can leverage in ways to help support her.

Why do you think sales is a good place to start in your career?

Ah, there is so much you learn in sales that can help you throughout the rest of your career. The number one thing is you learn that no does not mean no. No means not now. It means something is not right either. If you're selling something, the price may not be right, the terms and conditions are not right, timing's not right, the support's not right, something's not right. And therefore you learn that it's actually great to get a no. It is so much better to ask and get a no than to hint around, guess around because then you never know what you're dealing with. In business, that is phenomenal. It opens you up. Because most people don't want to get no's, right? They're afraid they're going to be told no. And I'm like no. If you don't get no's then you're not asking for enough. So you absolutely want to get no's and learning. And you learn that in sales and you learn it's not the end of the world and it's all good. You also learn how to qualify, qualify, qualify, qualify. And that also helps you in business because it helps you understand opportunities. Right? Is it real? What's the opportunity? Not just for yourself and career, but frankly, whatever business you're running, organization, what you're trying to do, the resiliency, right? The realization that you have to ask a whole bunch of times before you get a yes. All of that I think is very helpful for building your overall career and being successful running operations.

Perfect. Okay. What should one look for in a first job?

Honestly, the key to the first job is just to get the first job. So I mean, when you say what should you look for? Ideally you look forward in the field that you're looking for. You want to look for a boss or etc that you like. But a lot of times even in your first job, you never even interview with your actual boss. Companies Hire people right, right off, right off on campus and then decide what they're going to do with you. So the big thing to look for is the company. Is it a company whose values, whose strategy, whose role in their industry is one in which you want to be a part of? You're really choosing company more so than people. Only because they'll put you wherever they need you when you first get on board. But the key to the first job is just get a first job. Because once you have a job, it's so much easier than to figure out what you want to do next.

Perfect. I so totally agree. Next question. Is college necessary anymore?

It depends upon what you want to do and also who you are. For my children, I think college is necessary no matter what they want to do. I think it's harder for people who are minorities to actually get, what should I say? To actually get the validation and the respect for what it is that they bring. And I do think credentials help. Now that said, I think there are therefore some people and some jobs that you don't need degrees for at all. I think we have just overinflated that you need degrees. You can learn a number of skills, you can learn a number of technical skills that you can learn and you don't need a whole four year degree to be able to enable, to enable you to actually be good at doing that. So I do think companies should go through and actually look at their jobs and reclassify them, but for options. I still encourage people to get a degree that can get a degree because it will give you more options later.

Let's say magically tomorrow you wake up and you're President of the United States. What are the top things you would do?

I would try to bring the country together. Honestly, the same thing I would do if I was entering a company where there was huge divisions. It'd be the same thing. It's all right. We've got to repair and bring people back together because if we're not operating as a team, we can't be successful. And if we're not operating as a team in the country, it's going to be really hard for our country to be as successful as it can be. So I would be all about how do we unite? And then once we're bringing people together now we can start to solve real problems. And what are real problems? Focusing on what I would call some of the basics. Basics being health care, education, opportunity. That's where I would put my focus.

And how would you bring the country together?

It starts with listening. It really does start with listening. At the end of the day, I don't believe that we are really that different in what we want. So I would treat it the same way I treat it in business when you have conflict, which is peel the onion. When I say peel the onion. All right, we disagree on this. Okay, fine, let's peel the onion until we find what we do agree on. Because you can typically find that if you're in the company at the end of the day, you're trying to achieve the same strategy, goal and or objective, you might have different ways in which you think it should be achieved. So you peel the onion back until you find the point at which you do agree. And then once you find that, then you build it back up again together through conversation and compromise. Right. And discussion. But you got to find that common ground first. And the good news is the common ground exists. We just have to dig a little bit to find it.

What what is your advice to a young black woman in America today?

Be ambitious. Set big goals and go after them wholeheartedly. Buy my book and read some steps and ways to make that happen. That's what I would tell them as.

You look back on your life and your success and your determination and you threaded the needle many times. You achieved your goals. It was grit. It wasn't luck. What's the lesson or the meaning of your life?

I have been very fortunate that a lot of people have helped and supported me along the way. And my whole reason for being is I want people that I come in contact with, whether it's for a short moment or for a long relationship, to feel that somehow I have made a positive impact on them and their life. That's my whole reason for being.

Bear with me everybody as I read you a few reviews. Supra Tentorial TNT I'm a relative newcomer to the Remarkable People podcast, having discovered them after learning about Guy from an IDO Creative Conference webcast. And he had me at hello. I started with Jane Goodall and Margaret Atwood, my comfort zone before venturing into the business and tech interviews with each one gained a valuable nugget or several a party favor that I could use later, presented in a way that tech semi literate such as myself can comprehend. Now listening to this latest podcast with Sin and Aral, Guy has created a treasure trove and just like his, my head was exploding throughout the hour long conversation packed with insights into the pitfalls of social media, how it plays on the human herd mentality and the potential for drivers of this essential human currency to cause harm as well as enrich us. This episode is so dense that I had to to listen to it twice. All I can say is this is going to be a tough act to follow and can't wait to hear who else is on Guy's roster. Another one from Philly Cheese Remarkable People is by far my favorite podcast. I get excited when I open the app and there's a new episode. Guy always has the coolest guests. On another note, the production quality is top notch. It really bothers me when I have to struggle to hear a guest speak on a podcast to the point that I'll just skip it and move on. I don't have that problem with Remarkable People. The audio is always clear, the mark of a true professional. Thank you Guy and keep up the good work. Last one, Bittersweet one by interested bystander. Guy is very interested in Guy and it often shows he is now letting his guests carry the show. Whatever makes you happy. Go to the Apple Podcast app and leave a review. Maybe I'll read it next time. Thank you. Back to Shelly Archambeau. I hope you appreciated the strength and power of Shelly Archambeau. I hope you learned about ambition and why it's a great thing. The imposter syndrome, how to get over it and sometimes how you just have to fake it until you make it. Truly, she is a woman with a plan. Speaking of plans, Jeff C. And Peg Fitzpatrick are always planning how to make this podcast better. My thanks to both of them. I'm Guy Kawasaki and this is Remarkable People. Remember, please wash your hands, don't go into crowded places, and wear a damn mask. One more piece of advice, just listen to Tony Fauci and Vivek Murthy. Mahalo and aloha. This episode of Remarkable People is brought to you by Remarkable, the Paper Tablet company. This is remarkable people.