We welcome Gayle Jennings-O’Byrne, Pennsylvania, a Tri Delta Woman of Achievement, Foundation Board trustee and trailblazer dedicated to empowering women as the CEO of Wocstar Capital. Gayle is also a co-founder of the Wocstar Fund and is involved with Wocstar Media. Hear Gayle’s incredible accomplishments, including her recent recognition on the 2024 Forbes 50 Over 50 list, as well as how she is making the world a better place, one investment at a time.
It’s no surprise that Gayle has received numerous awards and accolades throughout her career. She inherited the spirit, energy and deep-rooted desire to create positive change from her parents—strong role models for this high-achieving woman. Discover why she accepted the invitation to serve on Tri Delta’s Foundation Board of Trustees while simultaneously building Wocstar Capital, Wocstar Fund and Wocstar Media. Through these endeavors, Gayle remains dedicated to investing in women, especially women entrepreneurs of color, and helping them share their stories. Hear about the broader impact of Gayle’s work and what’s next for her as she continues to shine brightly and inspire us all.
Gayle welcomes all emails! Reach out to her for guidance, for advice or to discuss funding your next project at Gayle@wocstar.com.
This transcript was created using automated technologies and may contain errors.
Welcome to the Let's Talk Tri Delta podcast. I'm Mindy Tucker, Tri Delta's interim CEO
and your host for today's podcast. I am so excited to introduce you today to
Tri Delta’s Foundation Board Trustee, Gayle Jennings-O’Byrne. Gayle joined Tri Delta at our
Pennsylvania chapter, and she is a trailblazer of committing to empowering women.
She is the CEO of Wocstar Capital, co -founder of the Wocstar Fund,
which focuses on early stage investments and female innovators, particularly women of
color tech entrepreneurs whom she calls her "woc stars." And most recently, Wocstar
Media, where she is an associate producer of the Broadway play, Thoughts of a
Colored Man, and she's also an investor in For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf, which earned a Tony award nomination. Seven.
Seven Tony. Oh my gosh. Okay. The list, here's the list of some of her
accolades, recognition, all much deserved, and really the tip of the iceberg. First
of all, she's a tried out a woman of achievement. She was named one of the 10
women changing the landscape of leadership by the New York Times in 2021. She is a
top woman of influence in venture capital by venture capital journal that was in
2022. In 2024, she was named one of business insiders top black venture capitalists.
She's also Forbes 50 over 50 honoree. And if that wasn't enough, she also received
the US Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award in 2022. All so much,
so well deserved, and you are so much more than impressive. There's just so much I
can say about this woman. So I'm so excited we're going to get to talk to her
today and learn more about what she's up to, which is a lot. Her companies, how
she supports women, also can't wait to ask her about her tri -Delta experience. So,
Gayle, welcome to the podcast. Oh my goodness. Thank you so much for having me.
This is like the highlight of my, I don't know, week, day, month, you name it, but
it's a highlight. I'm so excited to be here. I love it. So I want to start with
Tri Delta and how you came about joining Tri Delta at Penn. Yeah.
In some ways, it was a happy, unexpected occurrence. I hail from a family,
a Greek family, in that I have five uncles that are in fraternities. I have four
aunts and a mother who are AKAs, so they're all in historically black organizations.
And yet when I got to Penn's campus, I was just in this exploratory wanting to
just spread my wings, and I had a roommate who was a little shy and wanted to not
go to Rush alone. And so I said, I'm happy to go with you. And I think because I
didn't come with expectations and I was just approaching with a really curious mind
of wanting to just meet people and learn about other people and their experiences
and their communities, that this beautiful thing happened where I was embraced by
Tridelt and Tridelt's women were my jam and I thought yeah I want to be part of
that sisterhood that community. I love that so you weren't even intentional you
weren't even going into it intending to to find a place but you did. What um what
did Tri Delta to teach you? Oh gosh I learned so much from out that carries with me
today, how I act, how I show up in relationships, how I show up for friends. But
I think the first and probably the most sustaining thing that I learned was how to
just express myself and not get caught up in trying to twist myself into what I
thought people wanted me to be or expected of me to Um, that I could be that
kooky girl sitting on the couch after an evening out watching Saturday Night Live,
um, and at that time they had like a little parody that they would do about our
sorority, and, uh, that was my time too, I remember, right? And so,
you know, I could be that kooky girl just sitting on the couch with a couple of
sorority sisters laughing, you know, at this parody, the skit, and, you know, not
not take ourselves too seriously. And then it also taught me about sisterhood.
I was an only child till I was 10. And so I didn't have sisters that I,
you know, shared lipstick with or, you know, well, I wouldn't share boys, but, you
know, I didn't have a sister I could really talk about, you know, boys with. And
so I would share clothes, things like that. And so I learned what sisterhood looked
like and how to you know how to ask for you know friendship and sisterhood and
receive it in return and you know and give it as well and I remember one time
this boy who shall not be named Steven broke up and I didn't say the last name
I'm not you know I can get anyone in trouble had broken up with me on Valentine's
Day, and he called-- - On Valentine's Day. - Yeah, or maybe the day before,
maybe the day before. And he called to say that the Valentine's gift was still on
its way. So it might've been Valentine's Day or the day before, but that it was
still on its way. It was this big cookie from Mrs. Fields, this big chocolate chip
cookie in the shape of a heart and said, "You know, I love you. "It'd be my
Valentine or something." From Steven, no last name, no last name. And it arrived and
so of course I'm in tears and I'm just a mess on the floor. I was living in the
house at the time, the Tridelt house. And so I have a mess crying on the floor.
The big cookie arrives, a couple sorority sisters bring it up to my room. And we
just sat and ate this cookie and I cried, and I vented,
and tears turned to laughter, and it was just this moment of like,
I get it, I get how powerful having sisters and girlfriends that can just sit with
you, even if we're not really talking, and what's an I don't think, you know, I
don't know that there was any like, magic words of wisdom that were shared, but it
was just, they were sitting with me and letting me have an ugly cry, a happy more
crazy laugh, more chocolate chip cookie, yeah. - That,
so many people that I get to talk to on the podcast talk about moments when Tridel
just showed up for them. And I think in those moments, you realize how special this
thing is that we're all a part of. And sometimes when you need it most and expect
at the least, here we all are holding each other up. So, - And I'm sure Steven
should, Steven does not know what he missed out on. Let's just say that. - He
doesn't, he doesn't.
- Poor Steven. - I know, poor Steven. Well, Tri Delta knows how amazing you are.
You are on our foundation board and I'd love-- - Thank you. - Thank you for allowing
me to serve. - Yeah, no, we're just so lucky to have you. How did you get
reconnected with Tri Delta? And it was sort of after you went out and built your
career and then sort of came back in into this role. How did you get reconnected
with Tri Delta? - Yeah, so I, you know, it's funny. I should say that connection can
look different for different people. So I wasn't connected with the larger
organization or formal activities. But if I look at my life,
I've had Tri Delta to my life ever since, you know, pledging since Rush.
I'm on a WhatsApp group with four or five Tri Delta from Penn.
And so one of those sisters, Leanne Huebner, she was involved with Tridelt and had
put my name forward for Woman of Achievement. And when I got the call that I was
being considered, and I had to really think about, like, well,
what does this mean? It's not enough to simply accept awards and then go off into
the sunset with this lovely award. But I thought, If I'm going to accept this,
then I need to recommit myself to the organization, the organization.
And so I sat with that for a minute and I didn't know what that would look like,
but I had made a personal commitment to myself that I would do that. And so that
was really the start of it. And so when the invitation came to get involved at the
board level, it was easy to say yes. It was really easy to say yes.
You say that so effortlessly, but I don't think everybody looks at receiving awards
that way. I think that's a really impactful way for you to look at recognition
that's given to you and what do you give back. I think that's unique and valuable.
Thanks for saying that. I mean, I do believe that With all that's given to us,
we have to think about how we can leverage that for good. And so awards are in
that same category. If an award comes, can I use that as a moment to do more, do
better, do good? Does it lift up something or someone or something?
Yeah. So let's jump into this very successful and just so interesting career that
you've had. Tell us about your path through Silicon Valley and New York. - Yeah,
happy to. So I am really the product of a couple of trailblazers.
My father and my mother grew up in the South,
agriculture South and farming communities in which their parents were farmers and They
both through education Went on to do fabulous things in their career and help,
you know set me on this path in particular My mom was similar to the women you
would have seen in the movie hidden figures So those women in that movie worked on
the space shuttle at NASA and they were using IBM Mainframe computers and for Tran
computer software And my mom was doing similar using the same computer and software.
But she was helping design two planes, two very significant planes for the United
States. One was the F -15 fighter plane that really helped with America's air
superiority. We had a lot of other military superiority, but that plane was a huge
contributor for air, in particular. And then she helped in the design of the DC -10,
which is the grandfather or grandmother, as we like to think, of all the jumbo jets
and big planes that we're all flying to get across the country and the world.
And so that brought us to Silicon Valley. And so I grew up seeing women and men,
diverse people, diverse cultures in STEM and science and technology.
And so I didn't know any other path. My dad worked at a biochemical company and
she was in Silicon Valley and at tech companies. And so in my mind,
that's what people did. And so no surprise when I graduated from Wharton and came
back to came home because I didn't get a job on Wall Street when I first tried
out of undergrad. I too went to Silicon Valley. And it was a great time because
the companies were not mature,
but they weren't fledgling startups. And so there was this neat kind of space of
new companies. There was still that startup feel, but there was still grownups in
the room as well and so I got to see a lot of and have a lot of great
experiences and then I finally figured that you know at its time now after having
some really great experiences there that I would get my MBA and I went to
University of Michigan and I did so because I had already gone Ivy League, I'd been
on the West Coast and I thought you know where is another part of the world that
I may not live in, but could have some great experiences. And so I decided that
the Midwest and Michigan was a great school. And I turned down, by the way, I
turned down a full ride to the University of Texas at Austin. Really? Well,
right. Yeah. And someone had said to me, Hey, if you think if you truly believe
you're going to be successful in the way you think you are? Why the hell do you
care about the student debt? Don't you think you're going to be able to pay that
off? And I thought, Hmm, you're right.
You're right. If I truly believe I'm going to be successful. Don't let that hold me
back. I don't know that I would I don't have kids, but I don't know if I would
say that to any of the people I mentor the young people. That's a big challenge
question. Yeah, it's a very big one. I think I might answer I might answer
differently fast today. But I answered it with walking away from that full
scholarship and I went to Michigan and carried that debt for a while had a debt
free party that when I paid off the what I made that last debt or payment.
And that took me to Wall Street. And that started my career and I started actually
in Asia during the currency crisis. So as a poor student and I was working in
investment banking and I've just, I never looked back, never looked back. But in all
of that, there's been a lot of reinvention. So I started out as an investment
banker doing mergers and acquisitions. And then I was an international lobbyist and
my last role was in global philanthropy,
which I did for 10 years. And it was from there that I decided I was gonna start
my own business. So I'm, we can have another podcast about how to reinvent.
- It's funny, we were just talking about this. I have another Tridel to who I've
been talking to, who's now, she and I have this conversation about So you kind of
have these like, at least three big reinventions in your life as a woman. You have
this opportunity to yourself at least three times. So it's interesting to hear you
talk about it because I do, I think sometimes that scares us, but also look at
what, I mean, look at what you've been able to do in the times that you've
reinvented yourself. I mean, these are not, you sort of downplay this, but these are
not small companies you've worked for. People
And, and you've risen to, you know, high levels in places that women and in
particular women of color probably have not been in, in these business arenas and
have great success. So, I love that you were, you weren't too scared to step out
there and just do something different. Go to the University of Michigan and get your
MBA and go back to New York and do something different. So yeah, yeah, thank you
for for seeing that and and you're right. I mean, many of these, and I'm sure
others have experienced this, but in many places, you know, being the only woman,
being the only, you know, woman of color, being the only person of color, like it
just happens over and over again.
Yeah, I love your, I love your ability to dream big big and go after things.
One of the things you've talked about is this concept of dual citizenship and I
think you've talked about now a couple of different places you've been and lived and
how valuable it is to see yourself and exist in these different communities and
different places. Can you talk a little bit about that? Yeah, I call it dual
citizenship and what I mean by that is this ability and we all have it in some
some ways I I know for me I I use it I pull out different passports to pay a
lot a lot but it's this concept of sometimes having to show up differently depending
on the room that you're in and the situation that you're in and It can either be
freeing, it can be a superpower, it can be the thing that propels you and helps
you excel. I worry when people don't activate it in the positive and that they let
it sort of Crush them. So what I mean by that is You know, okay, let's stop all
the diplomatic talk and get real here. What I mean by that is how I show up and
White dominated circles looks very different Then maybe how I may show up when I'm
just kekeying with my girlfriends I don't know on a girls trip or Friday night when
I'm bitching about
And so yeah, there's going to be times where I'm going to be one of one in a
room.
And instead of letting it kind of crush me or chip away at my self -confidence,
instead it's about this idea of embracing who I am and just knowing I'm going in
and my passport looks different than your passport when we walk in. And so that's
what I mean by dual citizenship. And that too, I think I've learned from Tridelt,
'cause when I joined Tridelt, I wasn't joining a historically black sorority.
And Tridelt wasn't the most diverse. It was very diverse, but it wasn't the most
diverse room that I would walk into on campus. But it was a room that taught me
to be okay
and like, you know, having my passport looks different than yours. My life
experiences look different than yours. My, you know, my hairdresser looks different
than yours, right? My size, clothing and where I shop can look very different than
where you shop and what your size is you wear. It could be the same Levi's, you
know, or is it just width and length, but it looks very different on the two of
us. I love how you're marrying the concept of knowing how to show up with a
particular audience successfully, but also how to do so being yourself. That sort of
like, being able to sort of not blend in, but being able to sort of join in that
conversation with your individualization present. Yeah,
yeah, No, you have you have to otherwise it's it's soul sucking and it's just can
drain you You know, listen, I wear hats now and big earrings.
I didn't do that my first few years on Wall Street I probably didn't do it my
first 10 years on Wall Street, right? It was Navy suits pearls You know one inch
little heels like, you know and pantyhose. Do you remember pantyhose? Oh my gosh So,
So, you know, but they have no idea how good they have. Yeah. So listen, I didn't
pop out of the womb with fedoras and, you know, big chunky earrings. But throughout
all of that, I throughout my whole journey, my career, my, you know, my
professional, my personal, I've always been in search of or attuned to like the real
me, like, am I being my authentic self. But am I truly the me that is happy with
me and loves me and is okay with me is going to give grace to me. Right. And and
that's a journey, right? I don't want to make it sound like I wake up every day.
I did hear once that one of the most freeing things that we could do as women is
is is take the Supergirl pose. And like your hands on your hips,
kind of Wonder Woman, like, you know, if you're going out to give a speech, if
you're behind the curtain, just like, give yourself that pose for a minute. And then
just like, it's just this freeing thing.
Yeah, everyone try that everyone who's listening, try that and come back and tell me
if it works for you. But you know, I don't wake up every day with a Supergirl
pose, there's days where I crawl back in bed, where I don't want to go to that
conference, because I don't know anybody. And it feels like, You know, the first day
of school and heading into the cafeteria where you don't know anyone, you're not
sure where to sit. But gosh, when you can get to a place where you love yourself
and kind of know yourself, you can show up real fabulous.
Well, that's a great entree to your fabulousness, which is Wocstar Capital,
Wocstar Fund, star media. Can you talk a little bit about this Woc star concept?
How all of this came about and what these companies are doing? Yeah, happy to. So
I'd been on Wall Street about two years, two decades.
And towards the end, I had been diagnosed with cancer in my eye.
and my eyelid and we just didn't know where it was and it was going to impact my
sight or any of that so a I was scared shitless of dying I
Was mad at myself because I thought there were so many more things that I had on
my to -do list You know my master life to -do list that I hadn't gotten done and I
made a pack with God And I asked her, he,
they, "Gosh, if I can get off this operating table and if I can have my site,
I don't want to be greedy, but if I can keep my site, I promise to really figure
out my life purpose and live it." So I made that pact. He,
they kept their end of the bargain and so now it was up to me to keep my end
and I didn't know what it was to be honest with you like what my life purpose was
going to be. And I got a call one day from a fabulous woman who was double Ivy
League worked amazing companies in the city and she was on her second company.
She'd worked in corporate America and now she was on her second entrepreneurial
startup. And she was worried about making payroll. And I thought,
my gosh, here's someone who's followed the American playbook,
the American dream, the
construct, right? Like be a good girl, stay in school, get good grades, get a good
job, right? All these things society tells us. And yet here, when she needed
society, aka the financial markets, the investing venture capital market,
to meter halfway, crickets. No one showed up.
No one showed up. No one answered the phone. And so that was my aha moment. I
thought the social contract for women is broken. It's frigging broken.
- Yeah. - And we talk so much, I'm in the rooms, right? With all the bros. We talk
so much about the financial markets and how efficient they are. No,
they're not efficient 'cause they're missing some of the best investment opportunities
out there. And so I thought, all right, Dan, let's go, let's do this.
So I went to my husband and I said, "Hey, I went through, here's our balance
sheet." Hmm, maybe this big, this big little. I was like,
here's our balance sheet, here's our debt, here's our cash, here's our investments. I
was like, I'm just gonna take this much of it. (laughs) And - Yeah,
just this, this is a bit, just a bit. And I'm gonna start supporting women
entrepreneurs. That was it, that's all I had. I didn't have much more than that.
And so what came from that is Wocstar Capital.
And so we now, and what we do is we invest, we celebrate and we story tell about
women. And now the company is called Wocstar, which stands for women of color
stars. But that's not all we do, right? You can't be inclusive if you're still just
focused on one segment, one demographic. But I wanted that in the title because I
wanted it to be front and center because I truly believe that if you have a woman
of color, if you have a woman even at the table, Everyone gets an invite and
everyone will get fed. - Yeah. - Everyone will have a seat at the table and everyone
will be given a plate and be fed. No one will go home hungry if a woman is at
the party.
And so that's what we do. We invest in women led startups or women co -founded
startups or women that are at great startups, right? So we have some male founded
companies, but again, we're female forwards, so there's women. And then we celebrate
and we train women through our academy, which is free. We'll make sure we get you
information. I encourage all Tri Deltas who are either raising capital or who are
wanting to learn how to tell their story differently because there's such so much
social media out there. It's hard to break through the noise to sign up for the
Academy. It's a eight week investment in yourself and it doesn't cost you anything,
at least not this year.
- Get in now. - Get in now, exactly, get in now. And then we have Wocstar Media
that we recently started to tell the stories of amazing, just people,
the female lens. I love um well there's so much I love about this the women
there's a lot to unpack I know I'm sorry um but you know there's this there's this
sort of historic stereotype around women and money that we don't ask for it whether
you're a political candidate or a business owner or whatever the stereotype is I've
heard it across the board women Women don't ask for money. Well, how do you,
what is your secret sauce? How do you help women gain the confidence to be able to
go out and ask for money for their business? - Yeah, I love that you asked that
because it's really important.
It's really important because you're right.
Asking for money is very un -ladylike. Most of us don't, weren't raised talking about
money at the dinner table, right? Like maybe our brothers, you know, got to hear a
little bit from dad about it. And as women, we, you know, we didn't really have
that conversation, you know? Some of us are raised in single -parent homes and those
single parents didn't know how to have that conversation with us, right? Regardless
of a two -parent household. Those weren't conversations we traditionally had.
And I remember even the first time I went out to raise capital for what's now our
multi -million dollar fund
Someone just and they weren't being malicious. They were just like, oh, this is so
un -lady like to For you. What must that be like? And I thought I Never thought it
was un -lady like till you told me it was un -lady
But I get it I get it right It's absolutely true. So one of the things in the
Academy, we do a lot of talking about like the types of capital and how to run a
capital campaign. But here's the little secret and where we spend a bulk of our
time is practicing how to ask. It's just practicing how to ask.
So we have things where we talk about how much you want to raise and I always
tell women whatever the number is double it just double it and then go practice it
in the mirror as you're brushing your teeth as you're you know blow drying your
hair as you're in the shower whatever you're doing just practice it practice a
hundred ways to ask for the money and get it to a point where it's just rolls off
the tongue and even thing so small as that is just practicing does so much for
your confidence because you've said it so many times you don't have time for the
the wiggles and the nerves and the butterflies to come up because you just you know
how to ask it and you know how to ask it in the airport you know how to ask it
at a cocktail party you know how to ask it over the phone and an actual investor
meeting but here's the the other thing I'll say that we talk a lot about is we
stop asking. Now, everything I said, yes, you wanna practice it,
you wanna double the number, you wanna figure out a couple of different ways to ask
it, but here's the thing, the asking is actually an invitation.
If framed as an invitation, people are more likely to RSVP. I could learn this to
myself. I went out to, I can't even tell you how many investors. Hey, I'm raising
this fund, it's called Wocstar Capital, Wocstar Fund. We're going to invest in
women, it's going to be amazing, you're a tech investor, these are tech companies
I'm investing in. I got a hundred million nos. Hundred different ways people had to
say no. Here's the other thing. Most people on the other side of the table were
men, is the investors typically typically women.
And no one wants to be a jerk. No one wants to be, you know, an asshole or,
you know, racist, right? No one wants to, you know, be seen as sexist or racist,
right? So they don't want to come. They don't really want to confront women, right?
And so what you get is a, "Hey, that's great. Stay in touch." Or, "Wow, do you
know Susie? You should meet Susie."
Because they don't want to just say hey, you know what not for me. That's a shitty
idea. I don't believe you can you know Triple my money,
right? Yeah, they don't want to confront us So in some ways, we don't even get a
real no from people because they don't want to tell a woman no, right? So Inviting
I had to think about it and I thought hmm Maybe I need to change how I quote
unquote ask Maybe I need to tell them what cool stuff I'm up to and the cool
companies I see and that I'm gonna invest in and Invite them to join me like I'm
gonna do this. I've even put my own money and I'm already writing checks Would you
like to join me? And you know what the power of an invitation is huge,
it's more powerful than an ask.
- That's, I think there's a lot to that. People do like to be invited, but also
you're putting yourself there first. Like I'm willing to do this. I wouldn't come to
you if I wasn't willing to do it. That probably games or has carry some weight
with it.
- That's right. - Yeah. - You have to step into it yourself. - Yeah, no, people wanna
see you have skin in the game for sure. - Yeah. I also feel like all of this
work, there's the actual impact on those businesses and those women. But the
magnified impact of more women getting funded, more women getting support,
going back to what you said at the beginning, the societal pact is broken for
women.
Do you feel like this is changing that?
>> I hope so. that is the intent. And I think about that not at a large scale.
I think about it just on a daily basis. Like, if everything I can do can be
impactful and help the next person, the ripple effect of that is boundless.
Yeah. So how
up even like with my team. There's development moments where I say I need to either
give some tough love, right? I either give some tough love or I give flowers, but
it's all in pursuit of making sure that I have a team that wherever they go after
being at Wocstar, they're their most amazing, fabulous self and that they can carry
on this work and whatever that may be. We have someone that's going to be leaving,
it won't be on our team towards the end of the month, I mean at the end of the
year. And where she goes next, I want her to be as fabulous and be a Woc star
wherever she goes next, right?
Likewise, Another course that we're going to be introducing next year is how to
invest like a Woc star. And I'll come back to you when we launch that because I'd
love to try it out to sign up for it. It'll be free. But I want more of us as
women to be investing in other women. Yeah. And we can do that now without even
dollars, right? Like, where we get our thank thank you gifts from. Every time we
have to send out flowers, my team knows exactly what I tell them. Go find a woman
owned florist. I love 1 -800 flowers. Don't get me wrong if you're listening to
anyone at 1 -800 flowers. But go find a female owned florist.
If we need, you know, new stationery, If we need legal services, if we need
accounting services, we have a retreat that we're going to use a try -doubt for.
So now my new thing is use try -doubt women, source and invest by taking our
purchasing dollars and directing them to women -owned businesses and led companies,
or they don't have to be women led, right? Like there could be that amazing lawyer
at a big law firm. And if we can give her some business and it helps her with
her next promotion, like let's do it. Let's do it. - And who else,
yeah. And who else is championing women? I think we forget as women how much
purchasing power and monetary impact we have on the world. I think we just take it
for granted. We're going about our daily lives. We're busy. But the more intentional
we can be, we have such great power, collectively, to impact,
to drive, to move the needle, to change things. Absolutely. Our voices and our
pocketbooks are very important. That's right. That's right. Yeah. We have to be
intentional. it, it, it's just another layer of all the other things we have to do
each day, right? But it starts to get easy after a while. I promise you,
if you're listening, I promise you it gets easier, right? Now, all of a sudden
you've got a list of like, you know, you know, floors across the country.
Now you've got legal services, you've got a bookkeeper, that bookkeeper probably knows
someone who's a graphic designer, your graphic designer knows someone who can, you
know, do X, Y, Z, like it just blossoms and it gets easy.
But we do have to start with that intentionality for sure.
So you have so much going on and I think there's so many great things going on.
I'm sure there are difficult days too. How do you stay driven? How do you stay
focused and driven when it gets harder, when there is a no at the other end and
how do you keep on going on? Yeah, great question.
I'm practicing to say no more and someone said to me once that no is a full
sentence that you can say no and just put a period at the end of it And that
grammatically that is a full sentence and that stayed with me because I was always
trying to qualify it or I was trying to apologize for it or I was trying to like
think of another way how I could be helpful or how I could do what I was being
asked but trying to say no. So one is I, in hard days I remind myself that I can
say no to things, like when I get overwhelmed or I get too much on my plate I
can say no. Also, on those hard days when I get a lot of no's, I remind myself
that it is just a word. And I remember something my mom said to me when I was a
kid, and she would say it all the time, was, "No one ever died from the word no."
No one ever died from the word no, Gayle, and she'd make me go and get the paper
and go through the obituaries and see if anyone died from the word no. Now,
I couldn't really read, so she was also using as a way to make me learn. And so
I'd be like, and you know, she'd be in turn,
in turn, she would help me with all these big obituary words.
But here's a smart mom side note. What's one of the things I love now as an
adult, adult, the immemorial during the Oscars. My favorite part. What's another thing
I love? The New York Times obituary. Fascinating. Fascinating. Like, oh, my God,
the guy that invented the Wigidi -Wigidi -Woo, he just died the other day. Oh, my
God, like, I never knew who invented the Wigidi -Wigidi -Woo. Now I know because I
was in the New York Times obituaries. But okay, I'm off track. So one is I just
remind myself that no is a full sentence and to use it myself to not allow myself
to get overwhelmed. And then I remind myself that no one died from the word no.
And then the other thing other two things I'll say is that I always try to go
back to my why. And for me it's it's women pernors.
And so on those difficult days, listen, there might be some wine,
there might be some, you know, spa appointments thrown in, there might be some
tears, whatever, however, I'm responding to that day. I always try to just take some
time to think of the why and the women, the why and the women, for me. And then
It's not taking myself too seriously,
like those walks and those moments to just breathe in and out.
Like I just have to remember like, there's bigger, some big shit out there,
big hairy stuff out there. Like this is, it's okay, it's okay.
Yeah. And give my grace like yeah well that's hugely important grace to have the
day where you have to figure out how to keep going yeah so what I know there's
some cool stuff coming what is next for you oh gosh um so we're still investing
we're actively investing so if you are a startup and you're looking for capital and
you're in the tech space or a tech enabled company we are still investing. So come
introduce yourself to us. We'd love to hear from you. So we're still actively
investing. We have started another cohort of the Academy. I love these women and men
some really cool businesses that are part of the Academy.
And then what I'm also really excited about is Wocstar Media.
This has been in my heart for a very long time. I think it started when I used
to go to school in Asia, and I was in Vietnam, and I was in this very remote
part of Vietnam, this remote village, and someone started asking,
I was in conversation, they started asking me questions, and I was like, "Oh my
gosh, they are just assuming
I'm being raised by like a single mom who's on crack and you know my parents in
and out of jail and and I mean they didn't say exactly like that right there was
it was kind of new right it's like oh my gosh and and then as I got to know
them better and I you know and I could get to a place where I could be like
remember when you said and and like where the hell is that coming from and part of
what we kind of figured out is just like that was the what they knew of black
people new jack city boys in the hood every law and order all that black
exploitation foxy brown like that's that's that's what they say oh my gosh isms so
many isms are Mobile because of media media gives ism's feet to travel.
- Yeah. - And so I thought, wow.
If we also think about storytelling, it's so foundational to who we are in our
cultures, right? Whether it be the Hispanic culture, Southeast Asian culture, German
culture, you know, whatever the culture is, Irish culture, like storytelling, oral
history is so powerful, a medium of how we connect as humans, that I thought I
wonder if we could eliminate isms and hate and divisiveness if we told stories in a
way that allowed us to connect as humans. What would that look like?
And maybe if we did that, if we changed the story, right? If we changed the
narrative, if we changed the stories that were being told, maybe we could change
capital flows. Maybe we could change how we look and invest in women.
And maybe we could change the world. And so I did little things. I have invested
and supported a number of different films, don't ask me any of them.
They're probably on, you know, they're on IMDB and stuff. And then I started doing
plays because I wanted to see like live storytelling. I thought that was really
interesting. So all this had been in my heart and in little ways I was supporting
it. And then I thought, right, that bigger, you know,
go bigger, go home. I was like, we've got to start our media. We've got to start
supporting different authors and playwrights and get films and television shows out
there, start supporting books. So we're going to have a book party, a book club.
The Wocstar Book Club will be coming out next year. We've signed a bunch of
authors and optioned their books. And so we'll be taking those to various studios
and streamers to hopefully get to screens and theaters.
And we're working even with artists
in terms of like painting and graphic design. So you'll see some art as well that
we'll be supporting in galleries and such. So that's the best and greatest. - Yeah,
I love that you've brought this full circle, like there's the money and there's
changing that and getting the businesses going, but really looking at what else
influences and how can we bring this full circle and you'll probably happen upon
something else at some point in time, probably step into that because now I know
you.
But I love how you asked me, I will always say yes, I find it very hard to say
no to you, Mindy. So yes, if you just step sure I will.
I just love how you like oh there's another place where it's not working you know
we can change society let's just step in there and listen yeah don't get me wrong
my counterparts the bros right that are venture capitalists many of them get to just
get up and be venture capitalists right they get to look at a bunch of companies
all day and then they can write a company write some checks right and I don't want
to I don't right? And I don't want to simplify what they do. They're just great
guys out there. But don't get me wrong, I would love just to get up every day and
just look at companies, hang out with entrepreneurs and write checks. But again,
as women, when we see problems, we can't turn away.
We try to Yeah, right and so that's really what's happening is that in the work
that I'm doing when I see a problem and To the extent I think I and a team that
I can pull together it can help be a part of a solution
Then I'll Always step into that role and I think that's true for you know For
women and for the sisterhood of women. I've met in the sisterhood that that's true
for. So that's not unique to me.
Um, it's exhausting. Don't get me wrong. It can be exhausting.
These dark circles under my eyes, but you know, I wouldn't trade it for the world.
Well, we wouldn't turn this body and cold and cold, tired and ragged when I get
done with it. I just I love how you're living out our values as Tri Delta and
doing it in your own special unique way, so. - Values with some spice and a few
naughty words, yeah. - With a hat on, values with a hat on.
So how, I know there are now, we've got everybody excited out there. How can they
find you? How can they reach out to you? - Yeah, so LinkedIn is a great one, and
I'll make sure we give everyone the handle. So LinkedIn is a great one. My email,
happy to give gayle @Wocstar .com. Happy to give that.
But here's the thing. I'm not afraid to give out my email because you know what,
most people don't use it.
Most people won't use it. So I remember being on stage once and someone said,
Oh, and I gave out my email on stage. I just remember like 500 people.
And when I got off stage, the coordinator said, "Oh my gosh, like no one ever
gives their email out on stage. "That was so brave of you." I said, "Not really."
'Cause a lot of people don't use it, right? Like, we all write it down. We get,
you know, we go to conferences, we run around, we're getting a million business
card, but we never follow up, right? But Gayle @Wocstar .com. So anyone who has the
hits bit of follow -up, I will respond. We'll put it in the comments for the
episode. I love that. Well, I can't thank you enough for joining us. This has been
a great conversation. I'm sure there are a lot of inspired people out there just to
have you in Tridelda, but also some people who probably were thinking about opening
a business or starting a business who are now thinking harder about it. So - I
would love to meet them. - Well, thank you for giving us time today. Thank you for
doing everything that you do for Treadalta. You've been an amazing guest. - Oh my
gosh, listen, thank you for your leadership. I am so proud and honored to be a
part of this organization. And I love that I'm now in a position to truly serve
and hopefully contribute and add some, some add It's meaningful things to the
organization, but wow, I am just so proud of the sisterhood. I'm so proud of the
organization. And for those that are listening who aren't involved, it's really pretty
impressive. Like I am blown away every time by the professionalism,
the operations, the outcomes and the goals that you guys achieved. Like,
And again, I look at hundreds of companies a week. Your company is well run.
I would invest in it tomorrow. I am invested in it, right? Like my time, my pocket
book, like I'm invested. This is a good investment. It's a smart investment. And
it's an amazing company to invest in. So thank you. - Well, thank you, Gayle.
Aren't we lucky to have her. Just I'm so thrilled that She joined us today and was
here to be a part of TryDelta. You know, it's interesting, Gayle is a volunteer.
And so if you have ever thought about volunteering for TryDelta, as she said, it
can be an incredibly rewarding experience. There are lots of different positions
available in TryDelta. So if you're interested at all, want to bring your skills and
expertise to bear for the organization, all you have to do is go to trydelta .org.
And at the top of that webpage, there is a button that says "Volunteer." Click on
that and we will get you plugged in. You will be glad that you did. We hope
you'll like, subscribe, and rate our podcast. We have three stars in our crescent
but we love those five star ratings. Thanks for joining us today and until next
time, Delta Love!