Teaching Kindness and Persistence with Tiffany Pham
At the NYWICI Student Communications Career Conference on November 18th, there was no shortage of incredible capable women. The only way to start a weekend like that is with a superwoman in her own right, Tiffany Pham. Pham is the Founder and CEO of Mogul, “an award-winning technology platform that enables women worldwide to connect, share information, and access knowledge from each other”. She kicked off the conference by sharing her story and some advice.
Tiffany Pham started her story by talking about her Grandmother. Everyone has an idol, but Pham was lucky enough to have one in her own family. Her grandmother, being an incredible woman with strength and inspiration, led Pham to promise to find what she was meant to do. Her purpose would be found through unbelievable dedication, persistence, passion, and kindness.
Pham spent her childhood in Paris before being uprooted to Texas. She expressed dedication and persistence long before she entered the professional realm. When she moved to the United States, she didn’t speak english. She learned to speak english by watching shows like Friends and I Love Lucy and listening to tapes. She attended Yale after watching Rory Gilmore on Gilmore Girls. She then went on to Harvard Business School, attending both schools on scholarship. Beginning to make her mark on the business world, she worked as Director of Business Development at CBS, handling strategic initiatives and partnerships for more than 150 digital properties for CBS TV stations and radio stations across 29 US markets. Along with this job, she had two side hustles.
Side hustles are important. They ensure when the floor drops out from under you, there's something to catch you. When most people hear the words “side hustle” they think waitressing or bartending or some other job to make ends meet. When Tiffany Pham says the words “side hustle” she means working with the Beijing government and producing independent films, one of which was hailed as “the most important film”. Most people would feel accomplished having one of these careers. Pham is not most people. These careers led the way to her passion project, Mogul.
Mogul is a place for female voices to be expressed and hear. Pham got the idea to create the platform when she realized the disconnect between the presence of females and the presence of female voices. Mogul is described as a “platform reaching millions of women per week across 196 countries and 30,470 cities. Mogul is democratizing information for women worldwide by enabling users to connect, share information, and access knowledge from each other”. Along with helping female voices be heard and information be shared, Mogul’s partnership with the UN, stating for every dollar Mogul makes, a free education is provided to a woman in need. Along with her incredible story of hard work and success, Tiffany Pham gave us some great advice.
Pham told us not to worry so much about things being perfect. Many times people, especially women, get caught up in the idea something should be perfect out the gate, and if it’s not, it’s not worth pursuing.Get something into the world and trust you can work towards perfect. If you don't pursue an idea and give it a chance, it will never become the idea you saw in your head. She talked about this in her own life. How while she was working her three jobs, she would come home at night and learn coding, because she wanted to create Mogul. She told us the first version of Mogul was ugly, but it worked.
She told us the key to networks isn’t passing out business cards and keeping tabs on your LinkedIn connections. They key is making friendships. If you make friendships with people, they have a personal stake in you, they want to help you succeed, and you end up with a partner you are actually excited to work with. Networking is great in its time and place, but friendships prove stronger and more valuable. She talked about her time at Yale, and how through creating friendships with business owners in the community, she pulled the school paper out of bankruptcy.
The point we came back to over and over again was to treat people with kindness and respect. It feels almost too simple an explanation, like her mountain of achievements should be built on something much bigger. But looking at the world, she may actually be tuned into something the rest of the world isn’t. The world has its fair share of bullies. People in the working world, especially women, hear they need to act professional and be a hard ass to get results. People reach for status and power to get a job done. And yet over and over, Tiffany Pham told us to practice kindness and and to treat others with respect. Considering she was someone named on Forbes “30 Under 30”, Business Insider’s "30 Most Important Women Under 30" in Technology, ELLE Magazine’s "30 Women Under 30 Who Are Changing the World,", and a lengthy list of other accolades, as well as being a certified badass, I am inclined to believe her.
