>>Yeah, yeah. Welcome to the Cubes Presentation. Women in Global event Celebrating International Women's Day It's amazing showcase of great people and entrepreneurs, executives, really serious women in the industry, in the countries all around the world sharing their stories on International Women's Day. I'm your host of the great story here, an entrepreneur founder and C e 03 riders. Tanya A. I from New Zealand from all the way down under. Thanks for coming on. Appreciate it. >>Thanks for having me. >>I love your story. Let's stop. Let's start by. Just sit at the table about your story. Where your background from How you got into the business. Take us through quickly. That origination story. >>Sure. Um, look, I come from a low socio economic area. I grew up a new Plymouth. Um, and we didn't really have a lot of money. My mother did struggle to put food and milk on the table. And so, uh, what we did do, though. Although we didn't have money, we have the ability to drink. And so we would every day I remember as a child dream about what it would be like to one day have enough milk and bread, have enough money to be able to buy a car or even catch the bus. And so what we did was we dream about how I could achieve that. Um And so what I did was I got educated because we knew that if I got educated, then that would enable me to get a job and become financially independent. Um, but one of the key things she also made me promise Was that not only what I get educated and have enough money, um, to support myself. But then once I did that that I would give back their knowledge and understanding so that I could strength and others. >>I love this. I love the story again. Entrepreneurship is a lot like picking yourself up. Failure is part of the process. You got a grind. You got to do the hard work. And the idea is to make it happen. You've done that? You've got a building. The business is hard. Never mind for doing it as a woman as well. And you're conditions. What a dream. You found your dream. What's it like? Right now? >>It's hard work I'm not gonna do. I know that around the world of runs excited and they said, I'm going to leave my job and you know, I've had enough. And now I'm gonna stand up my own business. We've been working on my eye for almost three years now. Running standing up a business and then running it successfully once you've started up is actually a lot harder than what people think, especially being a woman as well. And a Maori, which is essentially an indigenous person of New Zealand. Um, it is a little bit harder to do that, especially when when you choose the industry to do that and which is technology, you don't have a lot of other woman. Um, there are some women coming through from indigenous background, uh, paved the way for us, but there's not a lot of us around, and so it does make it a lot more tricky. But I had a dream, and I had a vision that I was going to be able to give back what I had learned about business and about money to help others. So uh, was where it was going to be. >>Well, it certainly inspiration for many. I love the success story and entrepreneurship hard enough as it is, like I said. But being a woman and even harder, what are some examples can you give when you were coming through? Because you've got a really kind of push through and break down walls to get things done in any startup and with the corporate world with his biases. And there's also, um, people's preconceived mindset of who's who should be in a position, what founders are what entrepreneurship is. What was it like? Can you give some examples of situations that you broke through? >>Um, look, I think that immediately people underestimate you when you're a woman, especially in indigenous woman. And so, um, what I was So basically what I would do is I didn't think about what they thought. Um, what I focused on was actually where I needed to go. And so all those people didn't believe that I could get it done. They thought I was dreaming. I know people said, um, at one point they said, Are this company looks like they're doing something similar to that. Just waste $2 million. What makes you think that you're going to be even come close to being successful like they are, um, and And my response to them was that that they aren't me. They don't have money in their organization. And I think that's something really critical. Um, that woman has to understand when they're standing up an organization, especially one of the technology. We, as a woman are unique. We bring to the table a different set of values and different principles that potentially others don't also bring to the table. We have a different level of work ethic, and so I actually think that through those experiences, I was able to be more resilient and follow through in terms of what I believe it was possible. So it doesn't matter what people thought. It doesn't matter if someone was richer or had more money than we did. Well, they had more. Exactly. I remember the other thing was with They've got all these, you know, really high high performing executives from love organizations in New Zealand. Who do you have again? My response was, Well, they don't have me right, And so that makes a significant difference. Um, it's not that I'm a unicorn, but it's that I have a very strong belief system, and I have a have a dream that I've been following for almost 40 years and trying to make come through. So those two things are things that you can't underestimate. And sometimes they are actually a lot more productive and valuable than money or positional executives within your organisation. >>Yeah, that's a great, great insight. And then again, congratulations again. Great inspiration. People worry about what everyone else is doing. Like what they got. They don't focus on what they're doing, But I love the confidence, the conviction, um, preparation, education. These are all themes that are coming out of this international Women's Day around how to be successful, how to raise your hand, how to drive through how to drive, control your career, control your own destiny. This is the theme. Education plays a big part of it. And obviously you're building a company. Amazon. You're involved with Amazon. You've got education now at your fingertips on the internet. Education is out there now. You can get it instantly, and you could level up with cloud and and really factor and compete >>at any time. Yeah, absolutely. I think if you look at a W s, they gave us the opportunity to be global instantly. I mean, without that, you know, without their infrastructure and they're back in and for us to turn that on in any country that we wanted, um, we wouldn't have been able to go global. And so, you know, I really do appreciate all of the different platforms and the technologies that we can access as a c e o of attack organization so that it actually enables us to be a global and have a global footprint. >>You know, you're a great example of what I always say about cloud computing and these platforms Is there agnostic when it comes to talent? If you can write good code and you're talented, yeah, the world is yours. There's no real degree you can get from a pedigree college or university. If you have what it takes, just plug it into the cloud and your instantly global. This is this is new. This wasn't like this years ago. >>Look. And to be honest, when I first started, I I chose voice Alexa voice as one of our channels to through which I I would provide financial updates to organizations. Now I didn't know what no one in New Zealand or Australia even knew what it was three years ago. And so, essentially, you know, the the ability to have access to people around the world to build your team, um, and to have infrastructure like Amazon, it just enables us to achieve great things. It enables us to give back more than we ever thought possible. So I think it's being able to know where you need to play the gap and then plugging that with infrastructure, which is strong and enables you to continue to grow and can really help you go forward. >>So talk to me about your current situation as a leader, as a woman in tech. Now, you have a company you're giving back, fulfilling your dream. You have a life, you gotta live your life and your life, and you're doing it all. What's it like being a leader and being a high-performance entrepreneur? >>Yeah, I love being able to give back and give back and industry, um, where it's just growing every day. The the environment is changing. We have to keep up to the play with all the new technologies that are coming through all the new capability. So that we don't get left behind. Technology enables you to become more efficient and effective and what we're working on three years ago, that's now changed significantly in terms of what it looks like now, how fast you can go, how much reach we can achieve when we're going out to our other customers and, uh, from across the globe. Also, I think that, um when you look at a woman in both of professional and a personal standpoint, I'm also a mother of four Children, and I'm also a wife. And so what I have to do is be able to balance running a typical organization as well as running the house. Unfortunately, even though I'm a C e o of a technology company, it's certainly doesn't enabled me to turn off the the mother light at the end of the night or at the beginning of the morning, when the kids at school I might be sitting in a meeting and doing a full negotiation for a for a high-value contract and in the back of my head, I'm thinking I have to take out the months later or I have to make sure that my daughter and members to take. It talks to school tomorrow. So we're quite lucky. Woman. We essentially running two parts of our brains, one of those being able to continue to nurture and and be the supporter of their husbands and our families and our Children at home as well as run these tech companies. So we're we're very lucky. I also think it's interesting that the majority of funding that that's made available by J Visas is not to women. I don't know why that is. But if you imagine having a woman who can literally, what run two worlds at the same time and be successful at both, then I think that that's high productivity that you want to be a part of. >>Yeah, that's that's injectable and more women leaders again having role models like you out there. And the story is really compelling and super inspirational. I love the 22 worlds just having to start at the same time. Yeah, talented, Um, but I love your comment also about the underdog, and I know a lot of entrepreneurs and being one myself and even people who are ultra successful, they still have the chip on the shoulder they still have the underdog mindset. So, um, is that true for you? Do you still feel like you're underdog? You always kind of. Is that something you'll never give up even when you're super successful? >>Yeah. Thanks. So, um and it's not an underdog from a really vicious, uncomfortable standpoint where I'm trying to, um, where I'm trying to get back at anybody. What it does do is as an indigenous person coming from low poverty, um, you know, the expectation of where I would end up was really low. If I if I wasn't pregnant or I wasn't in jail by 16, I was successful, and I had one. And so the bar has always been set really low for me. Even when I went and did a degree, Um, the first one was, Well, you should go and do Maori or a bachelor of arts at at University. And I said, Well, why can I go and do that thing over there? There's no Maoris or there's not a lot of women sitting in the finance, um, elections. Why don't I don't go and do a degree in finance. And so, as I've worked through my education and also my career. The expectation that achieved great things just wasn't there. And so that that drive does have to come from you internally. Um, sometimes you're not always surrounded by people who understand your value and what you can contribute to the world. And so what you do have to do is you have to have a personal belief system that enables you to actually leverage that underdog position. And so rather than letting that get you down like oh, they don't believe in me or they don't think I can do this so I can achieve that. Basically, what you do is you use it is like a little stepping stone. You're like, Thanks for that. I'll just put that over here and all it does is just enables you to prepare yourself forward. >>It's motivational. It's also curiosity. So, Steve Steve Jobs once said, Stay curious, you know, and, uh, stay foolish, actually. Say foolish, Amazon says. Be curious. That's the kind of slogan, >>but they >>will be foolish and stay curious. Whatever it is. That's kind of the mindset. And again what I love about the story, and I think this is a trend that we're seeing is that if you are underrepresented or you are the underdog now more than ever, the ability to level up is better than ever before. Anyone can start a company, you can get a cloud computing, and Amazon gives the education for free. If everyone someone stuck, you can just go online courses. So there's now plate paths to go from here to here quickly. Um, this is amazing. >>Yeah, but it is hard work, so right, so it doesn't come easy. Um And so that is one thing I think that people underestimate about the ability to stand up for business. And then it becomes this, you know, apple or Amazon or Google. And so, yes, my vision is that we're on the road trip back. We're focussed on being able to list in the last five years time with a billion dollar valuation and use that as a vision. But being able to be open-minded about what it's going to take to actually get there is really important, and so you can have conviction, but you need to follow through and have action. Um, you need to be open-minded about changing the way you thought it was going to look. I mean, every day, I probably three or four times since we've gone live last year. Um, and that was because she wasn't where she needed to be. We needed to private her so that we can continue to ensure that we ended up with the product market fit that enabled us to meet our vision, but also to achieved financial and strategic >>goals. That's a great point. You've got to do the work. You've got to grind it out. Sometimes you gotta be sensitive to the customers and the market. This is the secret final question for you. What a great conversation. Um, as an entrepreneur, we all know it's the trials. Tribulated the roller coaster. A lot of emotion. Like raising a family. You don't know what you're gonna get. You know, anything is possible. How do you maintain the balance? Emotionally as you go in and continue to build out your business, you gotta take the highs and the lows. >>Oh, look, in the early days of standing out today, I was very naive. Not because I was a woman just because I was new to the game. Um, I had always worked for global organizations that already established that had big bits of money that had resources that I could call on. And so I'd say that first 6 to 12 months was really hard. There was a time there where I had to rebuild i-i. They changed the back end infrastructure. Um, I've spoken to zero and Amazon. Alexa and I had to achieve a certain I had to go through a number of different gates. And what that means is that I had to rebuild build here. Um, I think I cried initially for the first couple of days, but then it was actually, it took me about a month to get over myself. And what I mean by that is I had this vision and this dream about how it was going to be. I was going to do this and then all these steps we're going to follow, and everything was going to turn out how I expected. Um, and then it hurt me within the first three months of trying to get accreditation That it wasn't It wasn't going to turn out how I wanted. I didn't have the resources or the money to execute it. How I wanted. And therefore what I had to do was understand why. Why? Because what happened was I was able to use my why It is the basis for why I was making decisions going forward. So rather than it being just this vision about where I was going to land, it ended up being It doesn't matter the how the pathway we get there. Obviously, we want to do it with integrity, but I don't necessarily know all the steps of how that's going to happen. But I need to be open to the fact that it won't. Now when I get disappointed and things don't happen, how I expect them now, I basically just perfect. Initially I cried and I sit there and complain to my husband, and I feel like, Oh, my God, let me do this. So it was like, I've turned me down and I'm not gonna do it this way. And, you know, I just complain and wind, Um, but three years on, basically, whenever I had a wall or I had a roadblock, I'm just I just step back and go right. I can't go that way. Let's find another way. And so I think you have to be really resilient around accepting that things won't always go away. But there is always another way. >>Don't worry. Great conversation. Building a business and text from your dreams. Getting educated, going out in the arena, being successful again. Once you're successful, you can write your original story The victory. The victor writes the narrative, as they say, so is it can be disappointing. Sometimes when you're learning to grow like that, businesses like that's a great story. And congratulations. And thank you so much for taking the time to to share on the Cube as part of our celebration of International Women's Day. Thank you so much. >>Okay, thanks so much. >>Okay, that's the presentation of women in Tech Global Event celebrating International Women's Day. I'm John for most of the Cube. Thanks for watching. Yeah, Yeah, yeah. Hm. Yeah, yeah,