Michele:
Hello, everybody, thank you so much for joining me. I know it is a Monday. And here I am, because it is a very, very special week coming up. And I'm going to be introducing to all of you well or reintroduce e to some of you some fantastic women who are speaking at my women of color in STEM virtual Summit, where the theme is the power of you Why oh, you today I have Francesca Scotto, she is one of the speakers. Actually, this theme is because of her a conversation we had look at. on its nose. This is why I love having her first this week to talk about for you to learn more about her. And this theme, and we had this conversation. So I'm gonna let her first tell you a bit about herself, her background and a little little fun tidbit about herself. So Francesca, thank you for joining me.
Francesca:
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. Now I want to hear this whole thing about how I helped inspire the theme. I am curious. So a little bit about me, I am a serial entrepreneur started my professional journey as an engineer, way back in another day. And I started my first venture writing software to track the performance of aircraft engines, that was a great learning experience crashed and burned. And it was fantastic. And then from then on, I started multiple things from fitness to your Mary Kay lady, to finally settling on continuing to do software development and coaching startups. And so I've been able to work with organizations like black and brown founders, dear to my heart, which is how we met the show, I co created curriculum there with a new year Williams and I'm Director of Education for them, helping continue to train the next wave of black and brown entrepreneurs. I mean, I've done a lot, but I don't want to bore people with like the things I've done, I want to share with people that one of the reasons I continue to do this work is because I strongly believe that entrepreneurship is the most effective form of activism. And so if you want to change the world you live in, you change how people make money. And you can even change the game of work itself, redefining a lot of those parameters and redefining who gets to succeed and what success is. And so to me, entrepreneurship is such a powerful tool for economic development, for social disruption, and for upward mobility of groups that typically are disenfranchised, from whatever success metrics are in the general population. Something funny about me. Gosh, I thought it was going to be easier like impromptu, I can come up with this. I have a fabulous sense of humor. That's that's the thing. I know, right? i Some people would argue that I don't, my kids would be the first ones. Um, so something fun. I think I picked up painting. That's my COVID hobby. I am loving it. I used to draw charcoal drawing for a long time. And so my realism was on point. But color was something I didn't know what to do with or how to do. And so I picked that painting and I have been thinking up a storm. So not funny, but I love it. But more fun, new passion.
Michele:
Yes, that's the that's the tech meets art. Right there. I love it. I love it. So but let's take a step back. Yep. First, the first software company now you're in software. But you are actually you actually have an industrial engineering degree. How does that work? We're well,
Francesca:
so what happened was, um, while in college, and I, I thought about this multiple times throughout the last 25 plus years, I did take computer programming courses that was part of the curriculum for my degree, I kind of chose that track. And I took this database course. And I got the best grade in the class. And the professor was a female. And so she came up to me, she was like, you know, you have the best grade in this class. Like she wanted me to know that. And I didn't know what that did. But I was like, I'm good at this. I believed it and so I ran with it. When I started work, I went to work for GE. And I did their technical leadership program for two years, thank God that I had just a dynamic personality, they wouldn't let me go into manufacturing, they put me in segments. And I was annoying, because I didn't want to sell that wasn't where my passion was, I really wanted to work with the people aspect of manufacturing, you know, just the production line and doing the automation and the robotics and improving processes that was like the heart of Industrial Engineering. However, quickly, I found out that software was becoming this tool to do just that to automate processes and to find efficiencies and to improve just quality in general how, you know, software was really revolutionising that. So I started to play with software. And with between the courses I took and just diving into stuff, I was like, I can improve and streamline processes using software. So that first venture, what we were doing now we have sensors and all these things that collect data and tell you how not just an aircraft, but any machine is doing a point in time. But at that time, we didn't have the technology wasn't as developed, right. And so I was really fascinated by the challenge of commercial aircraft and by commercial is not just passenger flights, but cargo and other kinds of flights, right, that are smaller aircraft, but there's a lot of accidents that it's very accident prone industry. And so our task was to figure out how we could predict when an engine needed to be serviced. And so the manufacturers of aircraft engines have their proprietary software that they use for diagnostics. But if I am managing a fleet of multiple aircraft that have multiple engines, right, so managing different engines, the question was, how can I mechanic at this airline, manage all of this data and be able to know this plane needs to come off, you know, the wing needs to be taken to the shop and be able to kind of recycle that throughout. And so it was a process that was broken maintenance process, and we were coming up with a solution. It was we were learned so much, what not to do. But we were at the cusp of something really good. I
mean, our first year was like a million dollar a year, just off the gate. And all we had to invest in was a freaking computer, you know. So it was just a really good place to play. I think that aviation is still a great industry to be in. There's a lot of new stuff, especially because we think of cars going green. But when we think of airplanes going green, there's a lot of technologies developing and new ways. But I digress. That's how things went from industrial engineering to software.
Michele:
What what did you start with the startup?
Francesca:
So that was 1998. Before startup was a word?
Michele:
Yes. That's right. Before the.com Boom, so So I just want everybody to really reflect on this right? Because startups is really popular. Yeah. But then he was such a novelty. And so it is completely Oh, yeah, here to hear hear about that. This is why I love it. This is why I have you on set. Okay, so your topic for the virtual Summit is what
Francesca:
it's basically about leading the revolution, is it and I think it's what you just said, I really want women and black and brown people in general to know that at every moment in time, we are in a position to shift the whole thing. And I mean, the whole thing. And we live in a geography right, like we're in the United States, that's where our feet are planted. But we belong to something bigger. And there are so many ways to make a difference. So many ways to take art skills, especially in STEM and take it to a small pivot, that brings about ridiculous amount of change. If anybody wants to read some books, because you're into that that's what I do in my free time. There's out of poverty by Paul Poehler. And one of the passions I have is how do we take existing technology and shift the revolution towards the global South, where we are all originally from? Right? So whether that's Latin America, or it's Africa, or India or anything that is global South, you know, when you think of countries that are still catching up technologically, whatever that might mean, the way they are using technology is very different than how we use it. And so when we're thinking about like, oh, I want to create the next Facebook, well, Facebook was already created, I want to create the next Uber was already created. However, there are places in our world right now, where that last mile, for example, from, say, the post office to that person's home, that trajectory, there's no road infrastructure, how do you get water to those places? How do you bring electricity to those places? How do you bring food there, right? So things that have been solved for us remain to be solved in many other places that technology exists? The question is, can you build a business that is profitable and makes an impact, right? So you really can turn this whole thing around with what exists today already? Being a disrupter is great. Being an innovator is great, starting something from scratch, all of that is fantastic. But can you take what exists and do something miraculous, right? So I won't get into the whole topic this this morning. But I do want to empower people to see themselves with the privilege that we already have, by being in the most economically stable, and the most politically powerful country in the world right now.
Michele:
I absolutely love it. So how did this come about was, I said, I'd hit you up to talk about becoming a being a speaker. And we we finally connected, you're like, No, no, Michelle, we have to talk about the power we have as, as people, we always talk about the power and privilege of white people, but we have our own power and privilege. What does that look like we have to own it, we have to direct it. And, and that's what we should be talking about. We need to be harnessing our own power house like this, we do talk about it. And we don't often talk about it, I reframe it in different ways. But when we specifically talk to black, and brown women, specifically, who are often hushed, or are overlooked and ignored, you still have a voice. And we talk about how to how to do certain things. But we don't outwardly say your power, or the hour of you. And so that's really why I named the conference, the summit after that, because we do have power and asked for issue. And that's really why I focus on it. So it came from that that that brief conversation that now you remember
Francesca:
that now. And there was more to it too, because one of the things we discussed I remember was the impact that COVID has had on disrupting the future of work, and how we get to shape what comes next. Right. And so as a female, haven't been told 100,000 times you cannot work from home, when I needed to have the flexibility because I am raising children. Right. But I you know, it's not just women that will benefit from this men have been deprived. The flip side, right men have been deprived from that home life, because they were told this is the only way that you can participate in the professional world in the corporate world. And so while women traditionally and it's stereotypical, I know but women traditionally have been stuck at home and men have been stuck at work. We all now have a proven record. This is not theoretical. And that doesn't person saying I can do it, I can do it. It's like we did it. We all did it. And you know what, it was fine. When the dog barks, nobody died. The deal didn't fall through. You know. So there's a lot that I think we have the power now to power, we have data, we have a year worth of evidence, not me, but a world that functioned in a new way. And so we have the opportunity to take that bull by the horns and really continue to drive that revolution that change. For sure. I remember
Michele:
that now. She all fired up this this is like oh my god, I gotta take this. I gotta I have to do so much. So much stuff coming in 2021 and 2022. After that conversation, because I am in the future of work. That is what I built out and because of the pandemic, there are new issues and problems to be solved. Even though we we have proved to employers, women are still productive at home. Even with kids, they have to homeschool it's a lot to manage right now, right at the same time. are employers willing to make other changes? To make sure these women have inclusive workplaces still feel as they belong, and are going to have career opportunities to grow in advance. So I have a whole other thing I'm working on.
Francesca:
Yeah. And then how do we continue to level out pay? Right? Because it's out of sight, out of mind, then there are, there's a lot that we need to do around here. This is a great opportunity for our fellow ally men, to also rally behind it and say, Wait a minute, I work from home to win. You thought I was fabulous, right? And like, so there's yes, there's a lot. There's a lot, and I'm excited for it.
Michele:
 I am, too. So everybody, if you haven't already, number one connect with Francesca, on LinkedIn, if you haven't, number two, you need to head over and register for the women of color in STEM virtual summit. The theme is the power of you. We are absolutely about what does that look like? What What should you what can you do? And so we have six speakers, we do one speaker per night. That way you like you know what, Tuesday and Wednesday I don't need to be there I have other stuff I need to do. We get you there as a 24 hour replay. Or you can pay for by the whole summit replay for the next 12 months. Because we know life is real different still in during the pandemic. But we only do one speaker for one reason number one, you have other things going on. It is you can be very focused in at one short time span with that one speaker, ask questions, get actionable steps and really use that to harness and push you through for the next 90 days. And for some of you the next year. And so I love I love having everybody come on at we had a speaker, I think it was last year. February. One speaker actually one of my former mentees, she was an executive at GE for 14 or 17 I think 17 years. And somebody came through a few months ago she like I'm still she's like I'm taking action on the notes I took from that event. months. Wow, exactly. So when reporting free, people don't see value. But we literally have black women and Latinas who are sharing with you, their experiences, the information, they gather the studies, they have the results to help you move forward. So this is not just just free or low cost doesn't mean there isn't value. I just want to make sure you have access to great women who look like you who understand additional barriers that you often encounter that can talk through that lens and that is why I bring on specific speakers for for my very niche audience of black and brown women. So everybody, if you haven't go sign up, we are going to get out of here because guess what, it's it's sort of like late lunchtime. And Francesca, thank you so much for joining me. Yeah. I'm excited for your session next week, everybody. Be sure to be there and have a great Monday, everybody. Yes. Bye bye.