“I could use my tech skills for good, right? My experience and my education in technology could be used for something good. I can't change that technology has taken over the world but I can change who is losing their jobs and who's getting jobs.” -- Kristina Newton

---------------------

ROB RICHARDSON
Welcome to Disruption Now. I’m your host and moderator, Rob Richardson. With me is Kristina Newton from the HYPE foundation. It's an organization that is really about… It’s doing several things but mostly, it's about empowering women of color to make sure that they are getting their rightful place in technology; that they don't accept the constructs and narratives that are presented in front of them. Very, very important work that’s, frankly, not done enough and then also not done enough by people that look like us because I think there could be people that are well-intentioned but don't have the experience and that leaves a lot of rooms for gaps and mistakes.

KRISTINA NEWTON
Absolutely.

ROB
Kristina, thank you and great to have you on the show.

KRISTINA
Awesome. Thank you, Rob, for having me.

ROB
I am curious. You have a technical background. You were in a career where I’m sure you were doing well. Stepping into the nonprofit world is not for the faint of hearts. It is a hard, hard thing. It's very similar to being an entrepreneur where it is not guaranteed what you're going to eat. You have to keep what you kill. It's a very hard life but it's a noble life and I’m glad you're doing it.

But what made you take that leap of faith, if you will, into what you're doing now? And I’m glad for the things that you're doing but why did you decide that “I need to do this and I have to be the one that leads this”?

KRISTINA
Yeah. It was decided for me, if I can be honest.

ROB
Okay. Yeah, I want you to be honest.

KRISTINA
I did not choose intentionally to start a nonprofit organization. As you mentioned, I was doing well as a computer engineer -- worked as an engineer for seven years.

The problems that I’m sure we'll talk about more and that everyone is very much becoming aware of now around the lack of diversity in technology was my experience from my entire career.

In seven years, as a consultant where I worked on many different projects for many different companies -- it's not like I just stayed at the same company -- I never had a teammate or a colleague or someone on my tech team who was a black woman. So seven years, never had another black woman on my team in the tech side of things.

And then I also never had a manager or any person who was a lead on the tech side being a woman at all, no matter what her race was. It didn't have any women leaders or managers in tech. To be honest, I was going to accept it. I was just like, “This is just what it is.”

ROB
“It is what it is. I’ll just suck it up. It’s a part of being--“

KRISTINA
Yeah. I can't control it.

ROB
Yeah.

KRISTINA
I can't control it. It is what it is. I chose technology engineering but it must just not be what people who look like me want to do. I can't control what people want to do.

ROB
Yeah.

KRISTINA
So that was the way that I originally kind of felt about it. But there was one day, when I was in a meeting and we're building out all of these like automated processes, and if you know anything about automation, what we know now is that it's getting rid of jobs. We're automating processes and we're creating systems that essentially remove the need for people.

ROB
Correct.

KRISTINA
And after hearing in a conversation with the client… Our tech team kind of talked about what we're going to do and then I actually literally heard the VP of technology at the client that we were working for say they are so glad about this because they will be able to get rid of an entire department. This came out of their mouth.

That was the moment where I just was like, “I do not feel good about this.” I couldn't say it then in front of the client because they're paying the bills but when they left, I talked to my team and I asked them like, “Hey, do you all feel good about this” and everyone… because of course, they don't look like me either. They were all like, “Yeah, of course. Why wouldn't we? It’s a very high-profile company. This is a great project. We're going to be doing a lot of great things.”

ROB
It's business. That's how it goes, right?

KRISTINA
It’s business. It’s business. So I had, of course, this moral dilemma… this internal dilemma because when I think about the people whose jobs are going to be lost and the people who might work in that department -- They look like my dad. They look like my brothers. They look like my friends and people who I grew up with -- I was like, “I don't want to be responsible for my family losing jobs. That's not what I wanted to do.”

So I would say a couple of weeks later, I put in my two weeks’ notice. I struggled with this for a little bit. A couple of weeks later, I put in my two weeks’ notice, had no idea what I wanted to do, did not, of course, decide that I was going to start a nonprofit organization. I had nothing lined up. I just knew that I needed to figure things out.

I actually went on a whole year of soul searching, trying to serve and do missions overseas. And it was while I was doing work overseas that I realized that I could use my tech skills for good. My experience and my education in technology could be used for something good. I can't change that technology has taken over the world but I can change who is losing their jobs and who's getting jobs. So that's kind of what made me realize that our people need to be trained on these systems so that they're not losing their jobs.

ROB
There's so much there. One, you're right, you're not going to stop innovation from happening. But the key is how do we make sure it happens in the most equitable manner possible?

And there will be inequities and there will be some suffering. When you look at what happened with the Industrial Revolution, there are people that tell me… And they're right. They’re like, “Okay, it created a lot of jobs.” But they're also forgetting about this tension and the jobs that were lost during those years. Those people, they’re like some lost generations.
And then when the Industrial Revolution was going on, the amount of exploitation that happened… You're talking about child labor. You're talking about unsafe conditions. Lots of people would die.

And there needed to be a reshaping of how we view the economy with the Industrial Revolution. I don't have the answers but I know there needs to be a thought process in terms of how we're going to view the emerging technologies -- the AIs, the automations, the facial recognitions.

KRISTINA
And that’s what they’re calling the world that we're entering into -- the “Fourth Industrial Revolution.” That's what we say is we're preparing students for the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

ROB
Yeah. But it's larger than that though, right?

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
It’s larger than that because the Industrial Revolution, at the end of the day, even though some jobs moved, you still needed people… And you will need some people to do some of these things but there’s a lot of jobs that can be and will be probably replaced.

KRISTINA
They’ll go away.

ROB
Yeah, they'll go away. And the question is, “How do we make sure that people -- we're talking about black people and brown people right now -- are positioned to not just be on the end of being left out and exacerbating the inequalities we have now.

I looked on your site. You really mentioned the fact that 50% of black women in tech leave within the first five years.

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
You've already kind of alluded to what's kind of contributing to that. I would also say I think black women -- I believe this is true -- are the leading demographic for entrepreneurship. I believe these two are related. People like to celebrate that line about… But I think the reason for that is because there is no support within corporate America and so they have to go out and start as entrepreneurs. And that doesn't mean they're getting that type of support they need there.

KRISTINA
No.

ROB
You're making a good point. 50% of black women definitely leave tech. This is a monster problem you got. Let's say you were president -- like Kristina president today -- what would you do immediately to look at addressing these wicked inequalities and constructs?

KRISTINA
I made it seven years, thankfully. But some of the main reasons that women and black women are leaving, as you mentioned, technology, are lack of community, lack of clear opportunities for upward mobility -- so not seeing themselves in management and not seeing an opportunity for them to escalate into a place of management as well; toxic work cultures.

I think that would probably be one of the first things that I would do would be to address the work cultures of companies that maybe thrive on technology innovation or have like large monolithic groups of white men, basically, and kind of address what their work culture is; what is your process of onboarding -- putting policies in place for the onboarding processes, recruitment processes for HR.

ROB
I would say, just to interrupt you, what's the process for your processes, too? They go in and create these algorithms and they end up doing things like the racist Microsoft bot and they're surprised. It's because your process is flawed.

KRISTINA
Yeah, processes are flawed. And just like we regulate so many things in like the health industry and in science, there should be regulations in place for the toxic work cultures and the inequitable recruiting practices that a lot of these companies participate in.

ROB
Yeah. Let’s actually pivot a little bit. Talk about the future of HYPE, if we can, a little bit. What do you think, in terms of your vision, HYPE successful, what does that look like 10 years from now? What does success look like to you for HYPE?

KRISTINA
We’re building a pipeline of leaders. So there's a pipeline from K through 12 into the tech space. And for women of color or girls of color, it's broken. There are cracks. There are holes. There are leaks. And for some reason, girls of color are not making it into college and career in the tech space. So we're building a pipeline.

Success means that that pipeline is replaced or repaired or rebuilt where we are seen as a… Just like HBCUs, people are trying to see them more as where you go to recruit diverse talent where HYPE is seen as an organization that schools and companies come to to source and find their talent especially if they're looking for diverse talent. We want to see our girls be across the country, be able to go to school, major in--

I graduate high school in Georgia. I go to college in DC. Another student graduates high school in California or goes to the same college in DC. They're in the same Intro to Computer Science class and they both were a part of the HYPE program. We want to see those connections built.

And success looks like when we find and we identify and see women matriculating into leadership, whether it be in tech or not, that we can pinpoint where that interest was sparked and where that flame was fired and was fueled. And it would be through HYPE or because of HYPE.

ROB
Yeah. I believe that's so important because a large part of what we have to do is to -- we’re talking about black women but this goes for black people overall as well -- change the mindset of what we're supposed to do and what is possible when the world says, “This is who you are. This is what you're supposed to do” and having to always fight against that narrative.

Is there anything you do in particular to really talk about improving, I guess, the emotional intelligence and pouring into them when a lot of people are trying to take away from them, if that makes sense -- trying to tear down black women? How do you go about approaching that within your curriculum, within your leadership development program? Does my question make sense?

KRISTINA
Yeah. And there are so many messages and voices that we have to fight against every day for the girls that we serve and work with. But we let them know that this is--

We have a mantra that it's more than code. It's not just about coding. It's not just about technology. I mean, to be honest, the coding is just a skill that we're teaching you. It's just a skill that we're helping you. We could be teaching you writing for all I care but it's a skill that we are teaching you.

But our curriculum really drives on… We call them the “Five HYPE Scholar Profiles.” They're kind of like pillars of success that our girls should grow in and they all begin with a “C.”

We're helping our girls grow encouraged -- so develop “Courage.” “Curiosity” -- so remaining intellectually-curious. “Celebration” -- so we emphasize celebration and not competition with one another.

ROB
Amen. That's important.

KRISTINA
Yeah. “Creativity” -- so helping them to understand that they can use their natural creative bits and their love for art and fashion and entertainment and combine those passions with technology and--

ROB
I’ll get on before you get to your fifth one. This is an important point because technology is not boring. I think a lot of us got the view that what it means about “I’m going to be in technology,” you have to sit through and learn a bunch of boring equations which--

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
You got to do some of that but that's not the end-all be-all. And some of it is just understanding the process. And you can really be creative. I mean some of the most creative--

KRISTINA
Yeah, it’s mostly creative especially now.

ROB
Exactly.

KRISTINA
You can find anything you want on Google. I don't have to memorize any algorithm. I don't have to memorize any formula. It's all creative. It’s all about understanding what I want to do.

ROB
You just need to learn how to learn.

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
You learn how to learn.

KRISTINA
And being creative about what you want to create and then understanding… You do have to understand technology because you have to understand what's possible. Creativity is so huge.
And then the last thing is “Community.” Community, not just with one another but being community-minded in what you create. So understanding who it impacts. What are their habits? What are their needs? What are their life and their process?

One of the things that we do that we didn't get a chance to do this year… HYPE got a lot of attention this past year. But one of the things that is our signature program that we actually didn't get a chance to do and no one really knows about or has spoken about lately is our international experience trip. That is kind of where that community is built in where we… This is a core piece of our program where our students learn how to code. They go through an after-school program.

Then we teach them how to teach others. Studies show that you retain 90% of what you teach. So we train them on like, “How can you look at what you've learned and think about other people's learning styles and techniques and how can you get them to understand the same thing?” So they learn how to teach others.

And then we take them overseas where they lead a one-week coding camp for kids in different cultures and really begin to understand why community is important and why thinking about other people's experiences and backgrounds are important in the things that we create.

So that kind of holistic approach that we take in developing our girls is… Honestly, it's why HYPE is going to be successful. It’s why it is successful today and it's why our girls are going to be more than just coders. They are going to be world-changers and influencers.

ROB
Yeah, that’s great. So what is the most difficult challenge in this process if you had to narrow it down -- if you can think about a story without obviously identifying who the people are. What's been the most challenging moment you've had during your journey here? I’m sure there are some stories that sticks out.

KRISTINA
Yeah. Battling the messages is one of them, so like combating everything else that our girls are going through.

“Student recruitment and retention” is another one because we not only work to serve girls of color but we really intentionally focus on students from low-income and rural communities. Reaching them and recruiting them is a struggle. It's a challenge especially today where everything is virtual.

But I would also say -- and I have more than one experience in the challenge being… -- of course, lack of funding from companies and foundations and funders who want to see numbers more than they want to see impact. You know?

ROB
Yeah.

KRISTINA
They actually don't care about my girls.

ROB
They want to check the box, the process, say, “Oh how many people did you get in there? 100?” That fits my quota versus if we got 20 people and made a huge impact, already served 100 people, just to say… Because the grant says, “Serve 100 people.”

KRISTINA
Yeah. And that's a challenge because I will not budge there.

ROB
It’s the nonprofit political BS world.

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
It’s a lot of politics.

KRISTINA
Exactly. And I get a lot of people who want to encourage me to be like, “Oh why don't you just do this” or “You need to go after government funding and you need to do AB and C.”
But some of these models and some of these--

A lot of the grants don't allow us to have the level of impact and really go deep into the lives of our students like we want to. At the end of the day, they are going to be our sounding board, right? The programs and the students and the impact is going to speak for itself. And even if it takes longer--

This mission is personal to me. It's very personal to me. I see every person who goes through the program and they are personal to me. And so we do what we have to do to make sure that they're successful.

ROB
Yeah, that's true. When you think about the people, a lot of folks that are funding this, they're not proximate to the problem or to the issues. It’s easy to offer solutions when you don't have to go through what the people are going through.

I found that a lot of these organizations… Some are well-meaning, some not well-meaning. But at the end of the day, I don't measure your intentions. I measure results and what you actually do.
When you don't have to live in the communities, if you don't have to deal with the communities, you have a bias and something prefixed in your mind that is not in alignment with how things are actually going.

I’ll tell you, just doing some… because I’ve done a lot of this work, too. One of the biggest challenge I had -- that's definitely part of the challenge -- [is] not having culturally competent leadership in some of the foundations or really sincere leadership. But in terms of internally, the biggest issue I think is sometimes the parents. And I say this in a way that--

I have empathy for the parents, too, who have been victimized in their own way but sometimes, they've internalized that narrative and they hold their kids back because of things they've been through and what they think is not possible.

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
Have you ever dealt with something like that? How do you navigate that? I think that is one of the biggest challenges I’ve seen. How do you navigate getting parents on board -- because sometimes parents can be obstacles, too.

KRISTINA
Absolutely. It’s unfortunate because we can't just do our program, you know.

ROB
No. No.

KRISTINA
I wish we could just do it but we can't. We have to provide thought leadership to companies to help them understand and really see the problem.

And we have to do the same thing for parents because not only can they be a hurdle but they don't--

And our programs are free. The student is not paying anything but we need the parent’s involvement and engagement. And they don't quite understand the long-term impact of going through a program like this in their child's life, like they can being in a basketball camp. You know what I mean?

ROB
Yeah. That's the narratives that have been presented as, “This is what you do to be successful.” You become an athlete. You become an entertainer and… I mean that's the dominant narrative, right?

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
“We need to make you popular to be in tech.”

KRISTINA
Yeah. And that's why representation matters. Sometimes, what we have to do is we have to play. We've had to play just a very intentional mentoring role for some of our students saying like, “Hey, your parent can't bring you to the program” or “They're not going to let you stay after school because you need to do AB and C.” We step in and actually show the parents that we care.

I think that's the big thing is showing the parents that we're not just trying to… Well we're not trying to take anything from them. We want to be a part of their lives. We care. We will provide transportation. We will write letters of recommendation. We will help them get whatever they need outside of being a part of our program.

But another thing about representation is, when we do info sessions for the program, one, inviting the parents and like possibly… One of the strategies that we take is being a part of the student-teacher, parent-teacher night at a school, so that it's not just about us. But the parents are going to be there anyway and we just kind of step in as well.

And having other women who have been successful in technology who look like us talk about the importance, talk about their career path, talk about the struggles that maybe they have because they didn't learn this in high school; that they didn't take the opportunity to participate in it. Talk about how much money they're making. Talk about how they're able to take care of their parents and their grandparents now that they kind of work in this industry.

It’s not enough for our parents and our kids’ parents to know that technology is a successful career path because what they don't know is that their kid can be successful in it. So we have to show them people who have done it and that this can happen for your kid as well.

ROB
Oh that's great. We’ll move on to the third and final segment of the show and to think about the long-term legacy about you and getting some kind of insight questions that I always like to ask. Who inspires you and why?

KRISTINA
That’s funny because I actually was just asked this question last week for a different blog. The people who inspired me… And I’m so glad to give them a shout out publicly. But they're not people who you all are really going to know. I mean they are people who are close to me and have been a part of my growth and development. One of those people is my mom. Shout out to mom, [Faye Smith - 24:52].

ROB
Hey, mom!

KRISTINA
Hey, mom! What I learned from her was persistence, how to truly care about people, how to be a giving person.

I’m also a very spiritual person, very involved in my church. I have a small group. I am a small group leader at my church -- really inspires me because she's so intentional like the way that she communicates and interacts with all the other people in the small group.

And I see the benefit of that intentionality and not just doing things because it looks good or whatever, like loving people and treating people the way that they need to receive it and understand that every person is an individual and we need to be intentional about our engagements with them at their individual level.

ROB
Before you go on that, I’m curious with your small group there. I think it's so important to have a group of friends, family that you can lean on, that is supportive but is also willing to wound you with the truth, right, that is willing to tell you when something is in your teeth -- metaphorically.

KRISTINA
Oh yeah.

ROB
Right?

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
Can you remember the last time you were wounded with the truth and how you grew and responded from that?

KRISTINA
I would probably say the person who wounds me with the truth the most is my oldest sister. [Laughter]

ROB
It's always your sisters. So give me a truth she wound you with -- a couple. Share between me, you and--

KRISTINA
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Her name is Kanitra.

ROB
I love Kanitra.

KRISTINA
What’s the truth… the most recent or the one that has impacted me the most? She's gotten better at her messaging and approach. So I would say that… Gosh. What's something that she shared with me? Sorry. I’m thinking.

ROB
No, you’re fine. You’re fine. I didn't prepare you with this question. Sorry. I told you it goes like a conversation. I just go with the flow of it.

KRISTINA
Yeah. No, it's totally fine. One thing that she--

My sister is also like a professional publicist. She does marketing and public relations and things like that. One thing that I, as a leader of HYPE -- I think as like an engineer by trade -- I’ve never wanted a spotlight. I still don't to be honest. I’m not very comfortable in that space. So I have always tried to manage our program and our organization, put processes in place, lead and tell people what to do but not want to kind of be like a forefront leader. And I don't think if you're a leader, you have to be in the spotlight or anything like that.

But one thing that she has recently shared with me is that sometimes people want to know about me, kind of like this interview. She's like, “Kristina, sometimes you do a great job of talking about HYPE” -- you know what I mean -- “and what you do and the impact you're making and blah-blah-blah but sometimes, you have to let people in. They just want to know about you. They want to know about your background. They want to know some truth that somebody told you that’s had an impact on you.”

ROB
Yeah. To her point, I think, inherently, people want to know your “Why,” your mission, because what you're doing is extremely important. How you're doing it is important. One of my favorite authors is Simon Sinek, if you read the book “Start with Why.”

KRISTINA
“Start with Why,” yeah.

ROB
That is important because people follow organizations and do things for the long term, not for what are the “How” but for the “Why.”

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
People are going to contribute to you because they believe in you and they believe in your vision. Of course, it's not about you per se. It is about what you stand for.

KRISTINA
It is.

ROB
It is about your narrative…

KRISTINA
And your story.

ROB
…and your story and how that reinforces into the mission. I’m a believer that you can't tell your story enough. I’ve told my story so many times people are probably sick of it. But my “Why” is extremely clear about what I do and why I do it. And I’ve had people tell me you shouldn't tell that because people might think you're not smart. I think I’ve told you my story that I had a learning disability -- have one. I mean I have ADHD. Fine.

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
I was told I was stupid and all that stuff. But teachers were wrong. I’ve graduated engineering and law. And my goal is to make sure people know they don't have to be defined or confined by their current situation or the narrative that people present them.

KRISTINA
Yeah. And that's your conflict, right? And what she shared with me is that people don't go to the movie... Like what makes any good story and makes something that people are talking about for years and years to come is the conflict that occurs and how they overcame it.

And I, as a black woman in Louisiana, also have grown up to be strong and to not let people see any type of weakness, not to let people too close. Like, “You got to do things this way.”

And she really just kind of shared with me that if you're really going to lead this organization into the next phase, some of it is you just being more vulnerable as the leader. This is my baby. HYPE is my baby. I can't have someone else kind of come in and take it into a place where I know is not destined to go.
ROB
All right. Let's say you got a committee of three, living or dead, advising you on… It could be for HYPE. It could be for life. It could be for -- whatever -- future aspirations, business -- whatever -- mentorship. Tell me who these three people are and why.

KRISTINA
You actually just sent me this question but I didn't think about it. I was like, “Oh he's not going to ask me this one.” [Laughter]

ROB
I always ask the question.

KRISTINA
It’s like, “There are so many questions in here. This is not going to get…” This is living or dead, right?

ROB
Living or dead, yes.

KRISTINA
Jesus Christ, number one.

ROB
That’s a good one.

KRISTINA
Yeah, number one -- JC. And I can also talk about why because I can't assume that everyone knows who Jesus is. Again, I talk about intentionality -- because of His intentionality with people and… whatever, being Jesus, even people who He knows are not going to take his advice or do what He wants or whatever.

ROB
So what would you ask Jesus? You got Jesus in front of you. What are you going to ask Jesus?

KRISTINA
Oh gosh. I would say, “How on earth, Lord, were you able to have dinner with Judas…” [Laughter]

ROB
That's a good question. “Knowing what’s about to happen.”

KRISTINA
…”knowing what he’s going to do?’

ROB
See? That’s why He’s Chosen because I would have to beat down Judas. I’m just being honest. I’m a Christian but I can’t--

KRISTINA
As soon as I became privy to what he was going to do in the future, I’d beat him down and he would be like, “What are you beating me for?” “Because I know. I know.” [Laughter]

ROB
Yeah. You can give me the power to… for the future to see who is about to betray me. I’m like, “Mm?”

KRISTINA
Yes, not going to have it. So, JC first.

ROB
Yeah, Jay-Z.

KRISTINA
No. I said “JC” -- Jesus Christ.

ROB
Oh my bad. Oh I thought you said, “Jay-Z next.”

KRISTINA
No, no, no.

ROB
Okay, Jesus Christ. Sorry. Jesus Christ.

KRISTINA
I didn’t have my second… No, it’s okay.

ROB
You have your second one.

KRISTINA
Yeah, my second one would be… Gosh, I’ve been really inspired by Stacey Abrams lately. I want to meet her. I live in Georgia. I should know her. But I think what I would ask her is… or if I’m looking for a mentor, just looking for advice, I think I would just kind of like ask her to be a mentor for me in that continual perseverance, like the continual fight in the face of things seeming as if it's just not going to turn around. You know what I mean?

ROB
Yeah. I can personally attest to how much dedication she has. I ran for public office in Ohio. I ran statewide, believed the whole time I was going to win because most of the time, Ohio was a swing state and… We're just not a swing state right now. I think there's no argument there.

KRISTINA
Yeah. [Laughter]

ROB
Right? I know how hard it is, how much you have to put on the line when you do that. And she was worse than me. She was cheated out of it, right?

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
And she still went full--

KRISTINA
And she kept going.

ROB
And she kept going.

KRISTINA
I’d be like, “All right, on to the next.” You know what I mean?

ROB
Yeah.

KRISTINA
“It just wasn't for me.”

ROB
You give a whole lot of yourself to run for public office. And unless you've done it, people really don't have an idea. I mean people have given Stacey credit as they should and accolades as they should but people have no idea the amount one has to give up.

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
If they're serious about trying to help people and they're running for office and you're not just wealthy on your own, it's a lot to give up.
KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
It is. I agree with you on that. Okay, who’s your third?

KRISTINA
Yeah, I love her. And then my third would… It would probably be… People might be surprised I’m going to say this -- Kimberly Bryant. She's the CEO and the founder of Black Girls CODE.

People try to compare me with other similar organizations all the time. And again, we teach our girls celebration and not competition. So I’m not in competition with anyone doing anything similar. But it would be like--

ROB
You're in complement like you said because listen, I tell these people all the time because there are similar people in my space who said we… There's not enough people doing this so I’m never going to say it's bad. We're not in competition to figure out how we can really help people. We are complementing to figure out how we can lift up more.

KRISTINA
Complementing. We have the same mission.

ROB
Yes.

KRISTINA
My question to her would be a business question because right now we're based in Georgia but we want to scale. We want to go nationwide. So it would like be advice on, “What does that look like to have these regional models where you're able to scale your organization and your company nationally? How were you able to do it as a black woman in this space?”

ROB
Yeah. That’s a great question. All right, two more fast and quick questions.

KRISTINA
Okay.

ROB
An important truth you have that very few people agree with you on?

KRISTINA
So that would be kind of what I mentioned earlier about “Success does not equal…” like chasing numbers. You know what I mean? That's a conviction that I have. Success for us is about impact on the individual level and we are not going to chase after… You know, exposing one million girls to code or to science or STEM and after that, one day workshop or exposition, they never do anything about it again.

ROB
Exactly.

KRISTINA
That’s just not what we're going to do.

ROB
Yeah, I get it. All right, final question. You have a billboard or a Google ad that summarizes your belief. It's a saying. What does that say and why?

KRISTINA
I did think about this question and it would be, “Keep God first and everything else falls in place.” This is my mantra. This is not easy even for me to do especially in business because in nonprofit and entrepreneurship, everybody has advice for you and everybody has a strategy and things never work out.

I’ve wanted to give up so many times, something that my sister has had to get me back on the horse so many times and having me to remember like, “How many times have you either messed something up or thought something wasn't going to work out” or whatever “and at the end of the day because you kept God first, it turned out… Is this any different?” She's had to remind me like, “Is this any different?” “Okay.” “Okay. So you're good, right?” I’m like, “Okay. Yeah, I’m good.”

ROB
That’s a good accountability partner.

KRISTINA
Yeah, yeah. I hope she doesn't hear this because I don't want to give her the credit but she's pretty awesome -- whatever. [Laughter] But yeah, that's what it would be.

ROB
I have a challenge to that. How do you make sure you're keeping God first? It’s easy to say, right?

KRISTINA
It's easy to say. It has to be practical.

ROB
I’ll give you an example. Ta-Nehisi Paul Coates, one of his books -- I just can't remember which one -- it cited a letter from a town in Pennsylvania. It's an all-white town that was fighting against having black people integrated into their city and they sent a letter to the government and it was phrased like this: Said, “We’re good-going Christian people...” I’m paraphrasing a little bit but this is essentially what they say. “We're good-going Christian people. We obey the rules. We just don't want black people coming to our area.”

I think there's a whole lot of people that call themselves “Christians,” that believe it. They go to church every Sunday and they do things all day every day that are in direct opposition. We're not talking about making a mistake. I’m saying like you believe you're a Christian and you go out every day and you practice racism.

KRISTINA
Yeah. That’s a question of just Christianity. Like, “If you're not keeping God first, you're not a Christian.” [Laughter] You know what I mean? That's just what it is.

ROB
But people believe this stuff, right?

KRISTINA
Yeah, [I care - 38:43] to believe.

ROB
I look at it like this, Kristina. I think to really keep God first, it requires a level of constant self-awareness because it's so easy to put ourselves first over God and to believe we're putting God first but in practice, we're putting something else first. And I think unless we're willing… I’m giving you my opinion. I want to hear yours.

KRISTINA
Yeah.

ROB
And unless you're willing to check yourself day in and day out, you're not going to put God first. So how do you do that?

KRISTINA
So in that situation, I think it actually is all about other people -- loving other people. I guess the answer is putting God first and loving God. But you can't like love God or put him first if you don't love other people. And when I say “other people,” I mean every person… every people… every person. It does not matter how they're alike from you, how they're different from you, what they do to you.

I was talking to my husband about this the other day because I was… I think about this actually a lot. It’s hard when you are so busy to actually be intentional about other people.

ROB
It is hard.
KRISTINA
Yeah, it’s hard.

ROB
It's something I’m not very good at. I’ll be very honest.

KRISTINA
Yeah. So it was like, “What does this look like?” So it's little things. I’ve started to try to put in practice. As soon as someone else comes across my mind, I’ll text them and say like, “Hey, I’m thinking about you. Is there a way I can pray for you? How are things going?”

I schedule so much in my calendar. So when you talk about putting God first, I schedule so much in my calendar why… If I’m not scheduling things that I need to do for other people in my calendar as well then I’m not keeping God first and I’m not making other people intentional as well. I’m making everything else in my calendar first. And whatever extra time that I have left is the time that I’ll give to other people. That's not putting them first.

So with the God thing like, I have to spend… And I’m saying this because this is something that I believe. I don't always do it so I’ll be the first to say that. It’s something I’m trying to get better at.

I try to wake up earlier now and spend the first part of my day, 45 minutes to an hour… Put it on my calendar, set an alarm to spend some time just meditating and praying and trying to see what God says and not allowing--

This is where it gets hard, is whenever there's a deadline, I have a grant due, I have something else going on. It's easy to be like, “Oh what if I don't write this grant then I won't get the money.” I’m shooting for the money.

If I choose to do that other thing and say, “Well God is going to understand” or whatever then I’m not keeping God first. And it's not that He won't understand but it's about me and it's about my heart and my thought and my position.

If my mantra is “Everything is going to fall in place” then I have to believe that, truly believe, that it's going to fall in place because I kept God first and not because of something else that I did to make the other things happen.

ROB
Oh that's so well-stated. As we conclude, if you look at anything that we need to be more intentional about… From a book I read… I think it's called “Atomic Habits.” That's the book. Yeah, Atomic Habits. And I’m paraphrasing. “We don't rise to the level of our aspirations. We fall to the level of our systems.” So it's really about creating habits and being intentional about what you want to do versus hoping and being aspirational about it. You’re going to fall every time to your aspirations…

KRISTINA
Every time.

ROB
…but you will meet with whatever you are intentional about and have systems and habits in place. And it's something we have to continually put more habits and be more intentional when it comes to all things.

KRISTINA
Yeah. If someone looks at your calendar and/or your bank account, they should be able to know what you prioritize or what's important to you. If they look at your calendar, what you put on your schedule and if they look at what you give your money to or how you spend your money then they should be able to know what's important to you. And if what you say is different than what appears from that then there needs to be some type of reconciliation that happens.

ROB
Yeah. -- Kristina Newton, hey, you dropped the mic right there. Thanks so much for coming on. I look forward to having you on in the future.

KRISTINA
Yeah, no problem. Thank you.

[END OF TRANSCRIPT]