I Sent My Role Model a DM, Never Imagining She'd Respond — Then This Happened The whole experience taught me a valuable lesson as a woman and a business owner.

From a young age, I collected role models.

In school, as a teenager, I tried to channel Beyoncé. In the working world, after my first big promotion in retail operations, I paid close attention to our female executives. By watching and emulating others — especially women of color who looked or sounded like me — I gained confidence in my own abilities.

But when I started my own company, my pool of potential role models shrunk. Only 2.1% of venture capital goes to women-founded companies, and a small fraction of that to women of color. Who could I look up to? I wondered. Who can I emulate? I decided to create an inspiration wall in my office, with framed photos of the role models I could see — women like Katrina Lake, Sara Blakely, Oprah, Michelle Obama, and Vicky Tsai, cofounder of the Japanese-inspired skincare brand Tatcha. I never thought I'd meet these women, but their success gave me hope.