Prowess Project Founder Ashley Connell LIVE on Global Startup Report (15 July 2022)

What's happening, everybody? Happy Friday. Happy Friday in FI land to all of you watching throughout the interwebs. As you all know, this is the Global Startup Report. Hosted by Founder Institute. My name is Martin, entrepreneur in residence for FIHQ. Also serve as our executive director for the Texas programs, calling in from Austin, Texas. Our guest also is an Austin native, or Texas native, but also lives here in Austin with me. Good friend, amazing founder, brilliant mission, Ashley Connell, Prowse Project. We got a lot today. We got some news. We do have some updates for the weeks ahead, but let's get into the news first. Let me bring up Dustin. That's our producer, man behind the scenes. Actually visiting his alma mater this week. We got a different scene for you this week. How's the time back home?

Different backdrop. It's been nice. Yeah, yeah. So I'm up for visiting for an arts festival, not in my— I'm in a friend's apartment instead of my usual backdrop. So yeah. Pleased to be here. Don't want to take up too much time because as you said, yeah, you and our special guest today, Proudest Project founder Ashley Connell, are gonna, are gonna really kick it off. But so just to get started, 3 quick stories from across the FI global network here. The first one in the news, and we'll drop these links to these stories in the comments if you're watching on LinkedIn, but this— so this is an FI Eastern Europe company. And they were awarded a $125,000 investment from Startup Investor Accelerator. So I think they usually go by SIA, this group. But so they won this first ever Transatlantic Demo Day program. And basically what the company Bluana Foods does, I don't know if I said the name before, Bluana Foods, FI Eastern Europe grad, they make plant-based sashimi substitutes for flexitarians and eco-conscious consumers. And so kind of this is like a really big big trend if you follow food tech, just with more and more plant-based stuff. So this is a plant-based sashimi substitute. And yeah, the founder's name, Florin, if I mispronounce his name, which I'm going to, Florin Irimescu. Yeah. But anyway, really cool company. Look at the website, bluana.me. I personally love like agtech and this kind of cellular sort of— so yeah, really cool to see Bluana Foods getting this money.

Sorry, I had to just Google what's flexitarian. That just sounds like a new word to me. I am looking at it. Oh yeah. The simplest definition. This is from the Cleveland Clinic. This is the first thing that pops up on Google. Simplest definition of flexitarian diet is a combination of the words flexible and vegetarian. Obviously. Thank you, Cleveland Clinic. But they focus on fruits, vegetables, plant proteins, whole grains, plant-based milk, although dairy is okay in moderation, eggs, and dairy or other dairy alternatives. All right. So, yeah, you're kind of waiting to know. You're not— you're not slaughtering any animals. You are taking animal byproducts. I get it. I get it. I should probably do that too.

And sometimes, like, flexitarian, my definition at least, it's like they're usually vegetarian or like they try to—

mostly vegetarian. Yeah, mostly vegetarian diet. Occasionally, occasionally meat and fish. Sounds like one of our founders here in town, Riley Knox. Our special guest knows Riley. Riley's vegetarian for the most part. Hey, you know, if there's some good brisket in town, he's not going to stop. He's not going to stop.

Riley, if you live in Texas—

yeah, sorry for calling you out, Riley, on that.

Sorry.

All right, all right, enough of the flexitarian talk. Uh, Pathloom, the next news. Pathloom out of SFI Silicon Valley, we had them on a recent showcase this year. Uh, they just got selected. Congrats to Pathloom, uh, for the fourth cohort of the Long Beach Accelerator Program, local Accelerate out in Southern California, um, also receiving $100K in funding. That's great news. I love seeing that. Um, founder Anki Jain, um, it's an all-in-one, uh, you know, outdoor planning app. I actually got to meet him, hang out with him last year. We were doing the camping thing as well. Uh, I got to see some people out in Palo Alto, see some of the FIHQ fam. So I'm really excited. Congrats, Anki. You've been, you've been working really hard on this. It's nice to see it starting to be recognized, and this is just the first step of many things. I'm certainly— again, we all know we've been talking about Founder X ad nauseam for the last few months now. We're a few weeks out. Uh, we are going, uh, I'm gonna take some time and do some camping myself and get off-grid for probably that last week of August. But yeah, check out the Pathloom app.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah, I'm gonna use Pathloom, man. I'm gonna use Pathloom. It's already in my phone. All right, let's close it out.

Okay.

Yeah. Final, final news story here, and then we'll get to our special guest. So this is the company, I believe it's pronounced Jam Com Marais. So this is an FI São Paulo company and they were featured in Forbes Brazil. So basically the founder's name is Danila Moura. And yeah, she, she was featured in this Forbes. We actually can share the, again, I'll drop this in the comments on LinkedIn. You can flip through the pages of this entire Forbes like article, but it's a hub for female entrepreneurship in Brazil's cannabis industry. So I don't actually, uh, you, if you can only really read it, if you can, because it's a PDF, if you can read Portuguese. So I'm not 100% sure, like everything that's there, how big Brazil's cannabis industry is, but at any rate, uh, the founder had a nice feature in there and yeah, we'll share that, uh, in the comments as well. So, uh, congrats to founder Danella Mora. And, um, uh, that's, that's it for the opening news segment. I will, uh, let you introduce our guest.

Thank you, amigo. We'll see you here towards the end of the show. Everybody give it up for Dustin, as always putting in some hard work, especially when he's got a little time off. So I'm glad you got to join us here this afternoon. So it's been a busy week. We've had a lot of events here in Texas, online. We did a first event on stocks yesterday, and we're closing it out today with a very special guest. Known this person for a very long time. We'll talk about that a little bit more. But she is working on some amazing things, really getting and helping with the future of work and getting people back into the workforce, especially specifically women. So please, ladies and gentlemen, throughout FI land, whether you're watching us on YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, drop some stuff in the comments. I'm really excited to bring up to the Global Startup Report stage Ashley Connell, founder and CEO of Prowse Project. What's going on, Ashley? How you doing?

Hey, hey, so pumped to be here. Hello, everyone. Yes, Martina already said this, But let's make this a two-way conversation. Bring on the questions.

Yeah, bring on the questions. So yeah, we use Restream back here, y'all, if you're watching in FI land somewhere. So if you drop a comment wherever you're at in the world, I'm going to see it. We get a lot of y'all watching on LinkedIn. I've been seeing a few of you keep coming back for more. So let us know. Tell us where you're coming from too. It's always helpful on that. But we do have a lot of lurkers. We always get a lot of lurkers on this show. So Ashley, how's everything going? How's your summer been? It's hot. It's hot out here, down here in Texas. Yeah, you staying cool?

Yes, super hot, um, and trying to keep a 7-month-old baby cool too.

So, uh, 7 months now?

Yep, feels like just yesterday and 10 years all at the same time.

I can only imagine. Uh, we've got, uh, yeah, our CEO Jonathan just had a newborn too, um, and it's kind of been like that for him as well. I don't know how he's—

yeah, I talked to him about it. Little Georgia.

Yeah, yeah, yes, that's right. Yeah, so he's, he's actually off. He's, he's got a birthday coming up next week, so he's off-grid for the rest of the weekend with the family. Happy early birthday to you, John, from the family. Happy birthday. But we also have, um, like our head of ops, Ryan Micheletti, who's got another baby on the way any, like, any week now actually. He's like, the due date's actually coming up too. So a lot of babies in the family, there's an FI family coming out into the world.

Yeah, that means, um, a lot of tired people you have in your FI fam too, I'll tell you that right now.

Oh yeah, well, like, yeah, they're Having this, uh, putting on this Founder X event, first one we've had in 5 years, feels like I'm having one too. I'm pretty tired already. Oh yeah. But, uh, but yeah, all right, before we dive into all that, again, you can already see Ashley and I know each other for a long time, a little bit more comfortable in the conversations that we've had, maybe a guest in the past. But, uh, we love, we love founders, Founder Institute, Global Startup Report. So Ashley, tell us about yourself. Tell us about, you know, who are you, where are you coming from? Obviously here in Austin, but, you know, Texas through and through, and, um, and everything that's come up to this point, you know. No, no pressure at all.

Yeah, um, so a bit about me. I've lived in Austin now for 17 years-ish, um, Background, I went to UT, then, um, was in tech marketing for 15 years in Austin and then over to London for 2 years. And do you want me to get into the whole story of how Prouse came to be?

Absolutely.

Okay. So yes, like I said, was in tech marketing for 15 years and I looked up at all the leaders in the companies that I was at and realized that they were all men, and if there was one token female, she didn't have kids. And I was like, well, shit, like, being a mom was always on my to-do or what I saw in my life, but actually, was it possible? Was it possible to have both kids and a career? So hopped onto the Google machine, found the Harvard Business Review statistic that if a woman is out of the workforce for just 3 years, she loses a total of 37% of her compensation power forever. Cannot get it back. That's almost 40% of her compensation power for 3 years for raising kids.

The numbers always stuck with me. I know.

And then she, um, this happens to 43% of women. And that was, and that was before COVID and all the craziness there where 5.4 million women were pushed out of the workforce. So again, These are huge, huge numbers that aren't really being talked about, and it's a huge reason why there's not as much money in women's pockets. So with that, I was like, I need to solve this problem. I became obsessed with these statistics, obsessed, and went out and talked to all the women I possibly could who were in this scenario. So we're talking women with 10, 15 years of work experience, some of them all the way up to PhDs, and asked, Okay, you're telling me you want to get back into the workforce, but why are you not? Why are you having such a hard time? And they all said, Ashley, I have been trying for 2 years and all I can get is an internship. And when I dug down deep into what it was, the reason why they were not returning to the workforce first and foremost was confidence. They didn't have the confidence to get back in. And when you dove into why that was, why didn't they have the confidence? It's because there was not a clear path for them from home to hired, and I couldn't find a solution for it. They couldn't either. And so that's what Prowess Project is. That's what we built. It is an integrated platform that helps women with upskilling so they can be ready to get back to work, networking so they have a network of women to help them. And then while they're going through that journey, we're gathering hundreds of data points on their skills, their expertise, communication style, behavior style, work style, create a profile for them. So then when employers come on, come to us looking for talent, we match them based on those profiles. And for employers, we give them the top 3 candidates, each with a compatibility score, so they know who to go hire and why, saving them weeks of time to hire because you have the most compatible person front and center.

Yeah, that's fantastic. You know, like, I And I know I've been seeing this journey since the beginning. I still remember, again, I remember the conversation we had again almost 4 years ago. It was you and me. We were sitting in Elizabeth Street Cafe in South Austin. I remember that conversation. We were just catching up because, you know, again, every year we'd run into each other randomly, like one night during a South by Southwest party, right? Every year it would be like clockwork. And then finally that year it was just like, you know what, let's connect outside of the madness of March and kind of catch up and see how we're doing. And you were just, yeah, it was kind of that crossroads moment. And I'm really glad that at that point, this was our third cohort of Founder Institute just here in Texas. You kind of just took the leap and said, we're going to do this. I need to do this. There's nothing else I want to do or willing to put myself through the work because you had come already. You had already had your own business. You're working on that. So you already kind of knew what those pains are, but it was services-based. Right. So what was, what was probably the biggest transition knowing that coming from that services-based business and then just like, oh, I'm building something that, you know, it's not— so I'm not just, I'm not going to be just, you know, pulling levers and spinning behind a hamster wheel for the rest of my life. I'm automating something. This is something different. What was kind of the biggest shock as you were transitioning as over the last couple years?

Yeah, you know, I've been thinking about this a lot and the one thing that is coming that comes to mind over and over again is there's not a playbook. There's not a playbook for when you're building technology. There's not a playbook when you're building something that doesn't already exist. When you're building— I had a marketing agency before. There are tons of books and resources and gurus and all of that that tell you exactly how to create a marketing agency. But when you're building tech, when you're building a business that nothing like this exists, Yes, there's a playbook of how to start a business, how to build technology, but not how to do exactly what you're trying to do. Not how to take soft skills that people have and put it into an algorithm so that people can use it for hiring. That doesn't exist. And so that's what's been the hardest part is, is balancing building something out of nothing, out of pure imagination, while making money and while bringing home money so that I can live. That has been the hardest part, but also most rewarding.

Yeah, absolutely. You've had some pretty loyal teammates at this point too. People that you've met on day one, they're still riding this and taking this journey with you and building. Okay, so obviously, again, you were coming in, you came in at FI. I won't talk too much about, again, all the nuts and bolts of the program. We have different events for that. But, you know, what was, what did you appreciate at least about that experience, at least? And how did it prepare you in a good way to help you become this leader that you are now?

What I loved about FI from the very beginning is the diversity that I saw. I loved that I walked into a room where everyone had a completely completely different experience, way of life, reason for being there, idea, business plan. That really gave me such a rich perspective and the network from FI and who I can call up and just be like, holy shit, this is amazing, or holy shit, this sucked, is incredible. And I'm so incredibly grateful for that. I will forever be incredibly grateful for that.

That was great. So I guess what's changed? I mean, again, obviously, as you're building this product, you know, and you can tell, you can dive a little bit more about how it's operating and kind of, you know, how it's evolved. But, you know, it was still very much kind of that hamster wheel in the beginning, you know, just like all, you know, kind of MVP, concierge MVPs where you're behind the scenes making it happen. Really connecting. You just recently, just this year, you got the new SaaS offering out. So what's freed up some of your time on that? And how is it— and this is something you've been building. Tell us a little more about kind of what this offering is now doing that it's freed you up to really think about the bigger picture.

You know what's interesting about that? So we built out, so like any company, we started off where we were manually making it happen behind the curtain. We build out the technology to help us really speed up. And, and what that meant for us was match quicker, match based on data. Whereas a lot of times in recruiting, your people are matched based on hunch. And based on, oh, this person went to my same school, I'm going to keep them versus, or I'm going to interview them versus based on behavior science and hey, this is going to be a good addition to my team based on how our team already runs. So having that technology allowed us to make those matches a lot quicker and provide more data on both sides. Sides of the aisle, the talent and the employers, on why this person was a good fit or why this role would be a good fit for you. So essentially de-risking and being able to give people that hardcore data on why this opportunity is less risky is not seen as much in the hiring space. And I would like to see more of it. So that's why we're building it. As far as— go ahead.

No, please.

Oh, as far as what it's allowed me to do more of, and this is something that I absolutely encourage all founders to do out there, is while we were building the technology, while we were growing, while I was thinking about scale, scale, scale, I lost sight of something that's extremely important. And it will never happen again. I stopped talking to our customers. I had too many layers between our customers on both sides of the spectrum, from our talent, the women who are returning, or the women who want flexible work, and also our employers. I was, I was too in the weeds in the technology. I was, I was thinking too far out. I was, I wasn't Putting in the face time. And I think a lot of times when you're building a tech company, you see it almost as what is the product? Like product, the tech, the, the, how do I scale? How do I sell this someday? You have got to remember, you have got to come back to earth and remember you are talking to people. You are selling to people. They have to like you. This is not how many TikTok followers you have. This is not how many people on LinkedIn you have. This is how many individual conversations and how many of your customers and people on both sides of the aisle you can call up and you know when their birthday is, when their anniversary is, how old their children are. That's what matters at the end of the day.

You've pulled up a few good points, so I'm going to try and hit on all of them. First one, and I want to double back on something you pointed out in the very beginning, was again, finding that community and finding those customers. So thinking about, you know, again, you have the MVP product, you're just kind of spinning on the hamster wheel and you're looking for people that you need on the front end. These mothers that are trying to get back into work, trying to get, you know, get their jobs or get new jobs. And at the levels that they left the workforce at, not these little admin things that are way beneath their pay grade. So where were you looking for them? Where were you looking and discovering them and where you were getting also the best feedback to help you continue and refine? The product that you were building?

Yes. So I talked to anyone who would listen about Prowess Project, and because there was such a mission behind it of helping these moms go back to work and helping these moms make money, oftentimes it's because of a divorce or death in the family and they haven't worked for years and now need to get back in. It was something that almost everyone can relate to. Everyone has a mom, everyone. So everyone gets like, oh, I want, I want to help these people. And so when I mentioned it, they would say, okay, I need you to talk to this person and then this person, this person, this person, this person. And I had to kiss a lot of frogs to figure out like who were our niche of, of moms who are going to, who need what we have. So I say that in the sense of the way to find them first is talk to everyone and ask a very pointed, specific question of who you want to talk to. But also what was a huge help for us were Facebook groups. So getting in there and not necessarily even posting like, hey, I'm Ashley, I'm, you know, CEO of Prowess Project, this is what we do, more of lurking. And then when I see someone who could potentially use what we have, replying to that or messaging her. Um, and again, creating that one-on-one relationship. And no, it's not scalable, but no, it doesn't matter at the beginning. It doesn't matter. You just need those champions at first, right?

Right. And so yeah, Facebook groups, it's wild in terms of just— you found— so these are just like mom support networks, or was there some kind of random reasons, or is it just kind of catch-all kind of family? Kind of like advice?

It would, I mean, what I'm realizing is there's a group for everything in Facebook. So a lot of them were like working moms groups. Some of them were just, were just groups about jobs. And some moms would post in there, hey, I have, haven't been in the workforce for 5 years. Can, how do I get back in? And then, you know, I can go in and help. But then also a ton of women come to us who aren't moms yet, but want that flexibility that we can offer or want to be moms someday. And are thinking, hey, I want to set up my life like that. And so we're getting more and more people in our talent pool who aren't moms but want to be someday. And so that's really expanded as well.

Interesting, because I mean, that was effectively the whole thing that kind of drove you to the point of wanting to build something like this because you hadn't had a baby yet.

Exactly.

It was just that innate fear. Of what would happen.

And yeah, absolutely. I mean, think about it, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so to keep on the community piece, you know, you, you started to build your own, you know. What are some lessons that you've taken, at least from what you've been watching out of these other communities, that you might have just been kind of either lurking or passively kind of engaging with from time to time, you know, reaching out to people that seem relevant to want to use Prowess Project Have you translated those learnings into the communities that you're looking now to build out yourself and nurture? You got something going up too. We can get— we can promote that a little later once we start closing out. But yeah, you know, how's that going?

So if I'm understanding your question, your question is what have I seen in the other communities and how am I using it within Prowess Project?

Yeah, some of the communities that you're building, because I know you have— you're starting to really build just like these big champions of Prowess that have gotten jobs, that are helping bring other moms to the platform so they can get jobs? Like, what's the best of the best? How you squeezing that lemon?

So it goes back to what I was saying before— get to know them as people, not numbers. And I think a lot of the time, especially when you're on this route to raise money, users can be exactly that— users and a number. And you have to remember that all of these people have the same desires, dreams, fears that you do. They're just different. And I think that really diving deep and taking that time to understand who they are, having conversations about not just how do you get back to work, but also, you know, oh, your kid's birthday party is coming up. Like, what's the theme? You know, stuff like that. That is so important. Then also, taking down the, the, like, any sort of armor you have and showing your vulnerability too. Like, this is not easy. This is like— building a business is not easy. It's just as hard as finding a job. This is the fears that I have. This is what I do when I feel stuck. I am imagining you feel stuck too, and here are some ideas to get unstuck. And Showing up when I'm not having a good day, showing up when I'm having a great day, and just in sharing with them and asking them questions and making it a two-way street has been absolutely critical. Absolutely critical.

I love that. I love that a lot. Well, let's— I'm going to pull back all the way to the beginning. What you were telling me earlier when you were talking about, you know, how recruitment in the traditional sense is inherently biased just to be real. You know, again, it's like, oh, this person looks like me, this person, you know, lives in the same neighborhood as me, went to the same school together. You know, what's, what's been the biggest challenge in this space to, uh, that you've seen? Maybe not just directly with what you're trying to solve specifically with, with mothers getting into workforce, but just recruitment at large, you know, because you see, you're seeing this Space. So, you know, what's— you know, why is bias— for maybe those of you, those people in the audience that don't, don't really see much on the HR side of the recruitment side— why is bias such a big deal in the workforce right now? And then also, you know, what are, what are some product or things just like Prowess, or what are you seeing in technology that's trying to eliminate some of that bias?

Oh, where do I start? So first and foremost, let's, let's put a pin in the bias thing, because I'll get to that. But I first want to talk about what in the recruiting world, um, is mind-boggling to me. So arguably you're with your coworkers more than you're with your family or your spouse, your partner, your girlfriend, boyfriend, what have you. Um, imagine if you went to find a partner by just the skills that they had. "Oh, he can mumble on." "Oh, she can take out the trash." "Oh, she can make dinner." If that's all you were looking for in your spouse, then can you imagine what kind of relationships we'd have? No wonder, like, the divorce rate would be through the roof, right? Because you have to have that spark. You have to have that compatibility when you're looking for a spouse or a partner. It is the same thing in hiring. It is the exact same thing. Just because he can code does not mean that he's going to be the right fit for your business. You need to make sure that yes, he or she can code, but he or she also has a compatible, a compatible communication skill style to yours. Not the same, compatible. Because without that, you are not going to be able to create a, a workplace that people want to be in and thrive, and you're going to be having the same turnover over and over and over again. So it's mind-boggling to me how in the recruiting and hiring space, all we're looking at are resumes that say, skills. They say where you went to school, if you went to school, and possibly some people that you know based on LinkedIn.

Hmm. Yeah. And yeah, it's wild to think about on that. And she's— yeah, you give me enough to think about on that. And so, so I mean, we're just looking at that, right? Oh, she knows Photoshop, hire, right? But then, but then it also— maybe not, not to play devil's advocate, but to, you know, just to see what your thoughts are there too, is You know, people talk about culture fit. You know, there's some organizations where cultural fit is just a euphemism for, oh, you don't look like us. Y'all don't go to the same school as us. You know what? You know, how do you navigate that when people are like, oh yeah, you know, you can check off all the boxes, but are you a culture fit? You know, what do you mean? Add culture.

Culture fit is no longer— it's like a no-no word. I didn't know that either. I was, I was educated. So I'm not— this is no shade. That I'm throwing here. It's culture add, because you're exactly right. A lot of the times you don't want someone who is a fit. You don't want someone who is just like you. You don't want someone who is just like you and your co-founder. You want someone who's going to bring something amazing into the company and add to the greatness, not fit within it. And so again, I think that's really important and why we built the technology inside Prowess Project is to look from a behavior science standpoint of how do you make everything compatible? How do you round out that team? How do you round out that relationship? How do you have two puzzle pieces, not like two, two bricks? Because realistically, if you have two bricks together, unless you have the glue in between it, which doesn't exist, you have to have the puzzle piece, you have to have tongue and groove. And so I think that that is so incredibly important that a lot of times people don't think about. And what we have found going into the bias piece, it takes employers a long time to get away from, well, I went to this school, she went to this school, I'm gonna pick her, because that feels safe. So how do you de-risk that? How do you de-risk that so that, so that that employer takes a chance on someone who maybe did not go to that school or who maybe did not have that exact experience but has transferable skills? The only way you can do that is through data.

Yeah. So, so what's the, what's the data telling you right now?

What is the data? The, the data is specific for you. I wouldn't be able to tell you. I would have to analyze a couple things for your team, for you, how you be, how you, what your work style is, what your communication style is. And then I could even come up with a full-on, um, profile and, uh, oh, what's the word I'm looking for? Um, like a, not a profile, not a stereotype, but a avatar.

Avatar.

No, no, like an avatar of exactly the type of person that you should hire for that role.

Yeah. So you're using any other psychometric kind of like data or any other kind of stuff? You're integrating a lot of those things into the platform?

Yes.

Oh, that's fantastic.

So some that we've created and then some that are out that everyone, or not everyone, but a lot of people have used and known.

Yeah, I got it. All right, let's, I guess let's talk more about that bias piece. I can maybe close that, put a pin on that. And then, and then I have another couple of questions. I know we're going a little over, so I appreciate you sticking around a little bit for me.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. As far as the bias piece, I think that, and we've touched on it a bit, but I think that we need to remember that exactly what I was saying, the reason why I loved FI so much is because it brought such a diversity of thought. That's exactly what someone will bring to your organization who does not look like you or act like you or have a background like you do. That is the exact same. We know that more, the more women in leadership, if you have 30% of women in leadership, that will increase your profit by 15%. 15%. Profit, not revenue. You can have a ton of revenue, but your expenses can be through the roof, and so you're taking nothing home. This is profit. That's huge. Gender diversity is huge, and it's such an underused lever for so many companies. And that's something that we're trying to change. And quite frankly, it— I'm trying— I, I love to talk to the women who are in our community who are looking for jobs about this to pump them up. They are money drivers. They're profit drivers. Just by being themselves. It's amazing.

Yeah, that's awesome. So what are some of the jobs like right now? Say I'm like, let's say I'm a mom is trying to get back into the workforce and polishing on my LinkedIn. I stumbled into this show right now, Globe Startup Report, and you know, what kind of jobs might be available that I, that I should be looking at? And pursuing jobs that I'm— that I didn't even realize were there for me.

Absolutely. So top job that we see— two top jobs that we see are needed all the time right now that are perfect for moms: project manager. What are moms doing all day, every day? Managing timelines, managing budgets, managing people, managing communications. Top one that I see, it's just really huge. Second one that I'm seeing everywhere, customer success. What do customer success people do? They make people happy. They manage conflict. They keep in communication. That's exactly what moms do. Now, don't get me wrong. You can't not have been in the workforce for 10 years and then immediately go get a customer success job. You need to do your own work, your own brushing up on technology skills, your own brushing up on what does it mean to be a customer success person and What kind of resources, people should I follow, conversations that I should have, mentors that I should go get in order to do that. But these are two really great jobs that just fit naturally all of those skills that women who have been out of the workforce have been honing the time that they've been out.

Oh, that's fantastic. Seems like easily translatable skills.

And exactly.

So, so say again, so if you're joining, if you're looking at Prouse Project right now today for the first time, you know, those, those might be some roles available. What are some things, what are the Any other kind of roles that you see that are very common that tend to be listed on the Prowess Project boards?

Yes, absolutely. So if you are an employer, CEO, hiring manager, mainly you come to Prowess Project for any sort of operations talent. So that could be, hey, I am the visionary, I am the idea person. I need an integrator. I need a fractional COO. I need an operations specialist. I need an exec admin. I need a project manager. I need an account manager. Those are typically who comes to us and the talent that we are super successful in delivering to employers and hiring managers as quickly as possible. So again, that's operations talent is when you would come to Prowess Project. And I do say, if you are a CEO, you need an integrator. You need someone who is— you are the visionary. You need someone who is building Like, you can make the plan, you need someone who's building it underneath you. You just do.

Yeah, helping you connect those dots.

Exactly. Making it happen. Cannot do both.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, every, every day, every day in this world. That's fantastic. So, yeah, no, we're getting a little running up on time. But I certainly want to make sure that you have a chance to share some of the stuff that you're working on. So you got, you got some things coming up. For a lot of people to come out. What are you working on right now with tying in with the PRIDE Project mission that people who are interested want to get involved? You know, how can they get involved?

Yes. So on the employer side, we have a ton of talent who is reentering the workforce after COVID. Like I said at the beginning, 5.4 million women were pushed out of the workforce because of COVID and lack of childcare. So now they're all returning. So if you're looking for, like I said, that operations talent or an integrator for your team, please head our way. We have some fantastic candidates. If you are someone who is looking to reenter to the, in the workforce or looking for a freelance gig as you're getting your business started or are unsure how you can make money on the side, we have a free masterclass happening starting August 1st. That's all about creating a plan to do that. So we will not only say, hey, what does your dream life look like? And so you future cast what that is. Then we take it a step deeper and say, okay, what are the different plans to get there? What does it look like to be a business owner, a freelancer, or full-time job as you have all these other things that you want in your life? Then we do a live assessment so you can understand exactly which one of those you are. And then you'll hear all the different failures that I have had and that I can master for you. And we'll bring in other women who have done all three of those things. To. So that starts August 1st, absolutely free.

I will make sure to share that in the comments thread for all this too. So yeah, I'm pulling that kind of stuff up on LinkedIn right now because I know I've been seeing it. I've been seeing on my feed. So I always see when you're pushing out, you're doing a lot of content these days. I know that was something that we talked about, you know, way, way back in the day. I, again, I'm on camera these days as much, but I'm—

I know you're Content queen over here.

Yeah, but yeah, it's like, yeah, you only have like a proper Twitter, but yeah, you, you, you rock out, uh, on for the prowess stuff. So I mean, I think maybe also, again, you're cranking out a lot of video stuff, you know, what are you seeing on the platforms? And maybe also for those of us that might be like ambiverts, we're not fully introvert, we're not fully extrovert, We got to turn it on when we need to. Any tips and tricks for people that are just like, I'm not cranking out as much content, content like Gary Vee tells me I need to?

Yeah, I mean, look, some days it's gonna suck. Some days you're gonna be like, I don't want to do this, and, and, and do it anyway. I know that y'all don't want to hear this, and it doesn't— for the ladies out there, this is what I hear: oh, I don't want to, you know, put on makeup, and I don't want to Who cares? Absolutely, who cares? And then what I also hear is, um, what I also hear is, I don't know what to say. What I do is, I will— you'll probably see tomorrow or Monday, I will have content that was a conversation that spurred from this conversation, and then I just reuse it on Monday. So if I have a conversation with a potential client I say something about that. Not obviously not about the client, but I say something about that the next day. If I have one with talent, a woman who wants to go back into the workforce, I talk about that in a general sense on the next day. So you're constantly— your own day is feeding you content. You just have to go out there and say it. And guess what? There will be days, weeks, months where you will get zero interaction on your content, and it doesn't matter. Who cares? Yeah, but on the one day it does hit and you make money from it, Hell yeah.

Oh, I like that.

I like that. Yeah, I just got a lead today from something that I put on about the CEO and an integrator.

Oh, really? Yeah, that was like most recent post. We'll make sure that where people are getting you follow— you're getting some tons of followers these days too, uh, on the LinkedIn. Just again, you're pushing this stuff out, you're pushing yourself out there, uh, and I, again, I love watching that journey with you and being a part of it, at least Being like a spectator now.

Are you kidding me? No, you're part of the team. You always will be.

Yeah. And well, last things before I get into one of my final questions, but you know, you and me were having a conversation towards the end of last year. I was just checking. I hadn't heard from you, so I checked on you and just seeing how everything was going. And then you sent me a photo of your beautiful daughter. And again, I just— it kind of teared me up on this too. But there was something that's always— that's going to resonate with me just from that very first conversation we had. Way back when, nearly 4 years ago now. And, you know, just the text message that we had, you know, the end of last year. But, you know, maybe for the audience too, there's a big reason why. And, uh, now she's here. She's here. She's in the flesh now for it. But, you know, all those, all those, all those big things with Prowess Project came because of that, you know, whether you knew it or not.

So, oh, you're gonna make me tear up. But yes, Um, I'll cry with you. Yeah, Prowess Project is, is for her. It always has been and always will be. Before she existed, I want to build a world where she has choice in everything and she has the ability to do whatever she wants, and I'm going to be a part of creating that.

Amazing. That's amazing. Yeah, and I know your mother too has been an entrepreneur her whole life as well, so it definitely runs runs in the blood. It definitely runs.

It does, it does. She's fantastic. And watching her go from single mom with nothing to, um, multi-million dollar business awards internationally— insane.

Yeah, at some point bring the whole—

that's what I'm talking about. All the generations. You should meet my grandma.

We'll bring grandma and we'll make it happen. We will make it happen. All right. Final, final question. And of course, thank you for joining us for today. This is definitely one of the most meaningful shows I've had so far. And it's always good having you. It's always good to see you. One thing, and we may, we may spend the next 10 minutes just talking about this one thing. But if there was anybody in this audience right now, you know, maybe it's a, maybe it's a mom who's finally got the kids out the nest and is like, I want to look and build something for the next chapter of my life. Maybe it's a woman who is yet to have kids but is getting bit by the entrepreneur bug. Maybe it's just somebody else. And if there was just one piece of advice you'd give them before they start anything, what would it be?

Can I do two?

Go for it.

Okay. First and foremost, whatever you're building, you have to be obsessed with it. Be obsessed with the mission. Be obsessed with the why, because this is fucking hard. It is so hard. You're gonna sacrifice your family and your friends and your free time and all of that. And you have to just be obsessed with whatever you're doing. You have to feel it in your blood. You have to make sure, you have to know that there's nothing else you can be doing or could be doing in your life other than this. That is absolutely critical. That's number one. Number 2, people have very different opinions on this, but this is mine. Make sure whatever you're building, even if this is not the way you are going to make money with the business forever, make sure that it is turning a profit. A lot of the times we rely on raising money, and raising money is fantastic, and it is the way for a lot of businesses, and it, and for people who can do it, amazing. But then look at what's happening now with the, the R word, the recession. Oh, VCs, angels, etc. are pulling back their purse strings, supposedly. There's still a ton of money out. I'm not discouraging people, but the easiest way to raise money is through your customers. So create your MVP. It may be shitty, it may not work perfectly, but create it and start charging people for it. And if that means you need a great marketer alongside you, make sure you have that person. So that would be my two pieces of advice. And again, I know that second one may be a little controversial, but that's what I've seen.

Well, I mean, you see it from a different, you see it from a different lens. I mean, the numbers were trending in the right direction, all the way up until the pandemic with respect to women-led companies being funded. And now it's going in the opposite direction. It's just, yeah, 2%.

Yeah.

Yeah. And I think the numbers just out of 2021, at least PitchBook just came out, you know, this, this past week and the numbers are going down again.

Oh really? I didn't even see that.

Yeah. Though there is a, there's an increase in terms of women co-founded companies. So again, there's still, that's something. Yeah. So there's still, there's still, we're seeing more diversity, at least on the founders and the cap tables in the beginning with, with more gender balanced teams on the funding side, but still women led.

Well, and I will say I absolutely love FI because half of the cohort were women. Again, a huge reason why I was there. Like, I felt like I, like, And, and I think half of the women who have the women who graduated, or have the people who graduated were women. And so y'all are really changing the game and giving the 2% of people who get VC funding, you're, you're helping more than y'all know. So thank you.

Well, thank you. Thank you for building the future. That we all want and need to see. Any final things you want to share with the audience while we still have you? Or I'll let you go and have some time with, with the little one this weekend.

Go hug your mom. That's first. Or if she's not around you, send her a good vibe. And second is when you are hiring, look beyond the resume. Have a conversation. Look at their soft skills. Do, do more deeper about what you actually need in an employee.

Good stuff all around. Lastly, how can we, how can we follow the journey? Fun stuff. Yeah, how do we follow some of these tips?

All the things, all this content, content, content, prowessproject.com. That's our website. Site. I am Ashley Connell on LinkedIn. And for women who are returning or want something flexible, we have a Facebook private Facebook group that you can see from our Facebook page. And we are @ProwessProject on all social channels.

Awesome. Yeah, we'll put that stuff in the threads for all of our, all of our attendees to go and jump in if they fit the bill to join.

Awesome. Awesome.

Thank you again, Ashley. This is such a joy. I hope I get to see you in person soon. I know we had a run-in a couple months ago and we need— we were overdue another lunch to catch back up.

Absolutely.

All right, well, you enjoy the rest of your day. And so lovely to have you on this.

Thank you for having me. This was fun.

One of my favorite shows so far, favorite episodes so far. Hope I'll bring it back. We'll bring it back again soon. We definitely are.

Yes, yes, yes, yes. I can't wait. All right. Bye, y'all.

Dustin, we'll bring you back up. We'll close things out for this Friday, July 15th, peak summer, especially here in Texas. How you doing, man? That's a whole bag of tears. Really good. Emotional.

That was a, yeah, really insightful interview. I mean, I loved a couple of different things that you guys talked about, but I had also never heard of the cultural ad versus cultural fit. Like, I think that that really resonated with me a lot. But yeah, very awesome. So yeah, folks, go check out Prowess Project. Yeah, well, We'll put a link to the masterclass starting August 1st in the LinkedIn comments as well in just a minute. But yeah, super cool. So closing announcements here. So things, things coming up for those in FI land or those just joining us, basically next Wednesday we have a cool event that we want to share about. So it's about how to leverage a financial model to supercharge your business. And this is going to be a webinar with Forecaster, the COO there. And so, you know, financial modeling, people always think about it when they think about fundraising, but the gist of this is that like a financial model does a lot more. It provides a lot more value than just when you're ready to fundraise, that you can really get a quantitative and objective look at different parts of your business. It's very easy to kind of silo as a founder, have your headspace in one specific area, but by building a robust financial model, you know, you can really kind of understand your business even better. And so that's what this event coming up on Wednesday is about. So please join us if you're interested in learning more about financial modeling. And then the final announcements, the one that we've been sharing the last couple of weeks, and that is that Founder X is approaching closer and closer with each week. And so, so this is our 3-day conference for all of everybody from across the Founder Institute global network, whether you're an alumni, you want a mentor, a leader, and you want to join us. Yeah, look out for the details, go over to founderx.com. You should probably already be receiving emails from us about this. But yeah, we're just starting to announce the key keynotes, and, uh, we're really excited for this conference that's coming up for, yeah, August 2nd to the 4th, uh, 3 days, and we're looking forward to it.

Yeah, yeah, I'm actually excited. We, we announced just recently again one of our first of many keynotes throughout. I'm sure you're gonna— we're gonna get obviously the F5 co-founder leadership is going to be coming in with some great remarks, fireside chats, but one of them I'm really excited about, Esther Dyson, very well-known luminary investor in the space, has put money in before anybody else in some of the biggest companies you know and use daily these days that might be on your phone right now on the front screen. I'm really excited to learn more about her story. We'll be rolling out some more things about her background and everything, but if you look her up, she's just incredible. So first of many. We got a whole bunch more rolling out in the weeks ahead as well. Some amazing partners that are going to be helping to support that, not just for the virtual event and the programs, but of course in person. So many cities we're going to be hosting in-person closing events. So if there's an FI in your community that's been pretty established, been around for a number of years, more than likely they're going to be hosting a little event just to wrap things up. So definitely keep in touch. We might even give out some free passes to those outside of the FI community on here. I'll see. I might know a guy that's putting this together.

Yeah, I was going to say, you're that guy.

It might be. I might know a guy on that end. But more to come, more to come. We're 2 weeks out. It's a hot, long summer. We're going to close it out well with this amazing Founder X event, and hopefully we might be able to do this in person next year. I think, I think we can get there. I think we can get there. Anything, anything else, Dustin, for our audience before we give them a bit of dues? Been a big week of events we've had in FI land, man. Had—

it has been with these—

the Ramy event, we had the Stonks event yesterday, just Stonks event was incredible. Um, we're looking forward to many, many more of those. We got a lot of interesting commitments. We had a few founders that raised hundreds of thousands of dollars on the platform in an hour. It was incredible. The investment interest was palpable. So we're going to be using that a lot more. You're going to see more.

Very exciting.

And we're using Restream on the back end, whether they know it or not. Uh, so they— Stonks at least shows me like fruit basket or something for that recommendation.

They do, they do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, we're very excited about the demo day on Stonks and the commitments that came out of it. So I guess the only other thing I would say is our host for next Friday. So if you're tuning in now or you catch this replay, same time next week on Friday, we're going to have Steve from Betastore. So this is a Lagos portfolio company. And yeah, we're excited to have Steve come on. And tell us all about it. So that's our guest next week. And, or if you can join us again, this is the link, I'll flash it one more time if you want to join us on Wednesday for learning about financial modeling. But those are some things coming up next week. And yeah, we reached another Friday though. So—

Well, go hang out with your buddies, go enjoy that weekend, getting back to the alma mater and doing the good thing, good stuff over there, man. Thank you again for another Friday. And for all of you watching us in FI land, be safe, be well, build the future that we all want to see. We'll see you next week.

See ya. Bye everyone.