Episode 5 - Brittany McDonough of MassChallenge #backcatalogue

Welcome to the Canopy Founder Friday series. 

In Episode #5 of our back catalogue series we are joined by Brittany McDonough who is the senior director of global partnerships for ​MassChallenge 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/brittanymcdonough/ 

• Boston as a home. 
• Working with early stage startups 
• Building a global accelerator program 
• From State Government to Startup Accelerator 
• Building on a background of music 

Share in her gifts of wisdom and experience & join us as we seek to discover what makes this inspiring founder tick. 

Co-hosts ​Stewart Noakes​, ​Sofia Fernandes, Ani Gupta

Note: this episode was first recorded as a webinar in May 2020 and converted to a podcast so we could all enjoy it away from our screens.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

Welcome to the Founder Friday podcast series from Canopy, where we interview inspiring entrepreneurs and innovators about their experiences and seek to find out what makes them tick. This series was recorded live as a webinar and then converted into a podcast so we can all enjoy it away from our screens. All right, let's dive into this episode.

SPEAKER_00: 0:25

So here we are, everybody, live and unleashed. We are on Founder Friday, and we are a four today. So we've got the star of the show is Brittany, and the three of us are going to ask her lots of questions. Just before we introduce you, Brittany, could I just ask Annie and then Sophia to introduce yourselves? And Annie, if you could take your hat off anytime you like. No, the hat's not going to happen. It's glued to my head. All

SPEAKER_03: 0:46

right. I can just start. I'm Sofia from BGI. I'm head of projects and marketing for BGI, which is actually an MIT spin-out with the Portuguese government. So we pretty much take startups from here to Boston. That's how actually I met Brittany because some of our startups aim to enter at MassChallenge.

SPEAKER_00: 1:08

Fantastic. So glad you can be here as well after your Unfounder Friday interview a few weeks ago. So thanks for making the effort to be here today. And Annie?

SPEAKER_02: 1:16

Hey guys, I think a lot of you in Canopy probably know me, but I'm Ani Gupta. I've been with Canopy for about two years, two and a half years. Met Stuart in 2017, he kind of roped me in. Been in Lisbon for two years, I was a nomad before. I've been in tech for a long time. I mentor startups here and work with scale-ups and growth startups in different capacities. And I've had my own businesses, so happy to be here. And Yankees will get the, you know, the people up north, sometime soon.

SPEAKER_00: 1:49

Yeah, yeah. You're in the wrong house for that kind of conversation. I'm sorry. I've got the power of the cross. I've got the power of the cross. So Brittany, over to you. Why don't you tell everybody who you are and a little bit of your background.

SPEAKER_03: 2:07

Sure. So thank you so much for having me, guys. It's really good to be here and to see a couple of you again. Ani, it is I suppose good to meet you, even though you're trying to play games with that hat and all of your poke in the bear. But okay. So my name is Brittany McDonough, and I'm the Senior Director of Global Partnerships at MassChallenge. And MassChallenge is a global startup accelerator. So we are founded in Boston. So our headquarters is in Boston. I'm from Boston. I'm based here. We have accelerators in Boston. a number of other cities, both globally and nationally. So in Austin, Texas, Houston, Texas, Rhode Island, Mexico City, Luzon, Switzerland, and in Israel. So those are for our early stage programs. And we work with both early stage startups and growth stage companies. So early stage, by our definition, are companies that have less than$2 million in annual revenue and have raised less than$1 million in private capital. So we... take that determination for the stage of the company because you can be a very early stage life sciences company, for example, and still need lots of support and have raised a significant amount of money. Or you could be a true idea stage company and have absolutely no funding whatsoever. So we want to help companies across the spectrum and we are industry agnostic. So we have companies that run the gamut from life sciences to clean energy to food and beverage companies. MassChallenge also has ecosystem development activities, and those are what I run. So I run all of our international engagements, and we have a number of really strategic partnerships with great government partners, institutions, and foundations. And it's really exciting to be able to work directly with founders and the people that are making decisions to run ecosystem growth opportunities. So for example, right now, we're running our Impulse program, which is based in Morocco, and it's an ag tech program. And when you're looking at some of the biggest challenges that are facing humans in general, not just one particular country or region or nation, agriculture, the entire food industry, the pipeline for sustainable growth, that affects all of us. And so these companies are primarily based in Africa, with actually one company being based in Portugal and then one from Brazil. And we're running now that program entirely virtually. We normally would have a lot of in-person boot camps and curriculum, and we've now gone 100% virtual. So that is like a change that we're excited to see, and it's made the program actually more engaging and more international. So if you're a company that's made it more accessible and you want to mentor that's from the Mexico program or the Australia program, you can tap in, and we're trying to make all those connections. So a little bit about MassChallenge. I always feel weird talking for too long. So Stuart, I'm going to stop for a sec. Tell me if you'd go or not.

SPEAKER_00: 5:05

You know, it's a real treat for me to have you here today, right? So apart from being a raving fan of yours, I'm a huge fan of Mass Challenge as well. And as I've told a number of people on these things before, John Hawthorne is a bit of an inspiration for me as well. So like on a personal basis, he's helped me lift my sights and look further into what we can do and stuff. So really, real treat to have you here today. Thank you very much. Why don't you talk a little bit about who you are, though, as well as Mass Challenge? I know you from the state government stuff before and then into Mass Challenge. to tell people a bit about that?

SPEAKER_03: 5:37

Sure. So I'm from Boston. I grew up here in the city and I actually found my way to MassChallenge in a very different way. So I came from the government and I worked for both Governor Patrick and Governor Baker in the Massachusetts Office of International Trade and Investment, which is a lot of words to say we ran the foreign direct investment and the export promotion activities on behalf of the state. So it was an amazing job. It was one of my favorite things I've ever done because we literally were there to be the link between companies from the Commonwealth to the rest of the world. So we would both run the governor's trade missions, but also work with all the consulates and the trade offices, the larger firms that were opening the city, but also with entrepreneurs and startups that were interested in coming to Massachusetts. So There's a lot of opportunity, certainly if you're doing R&D, if you're in the life sciences space or a number of other industries, if you want to join partnerships. And actually, Sophia has come and been at MIT. So there's a lot of activities like this where folks are coming from one particular region and coming into the city. So that's how I got involved in entrepreneurship in general. Otherwise, I'm a very government-y person. All of my other roles were 100% government and entrepreneurship. Looking at what MassChallenge was doing was really attractive to me. So the funny story about how I actually got to MassChallenge starts in 2014 at this point. We had a trade mission from Mexico City. Then there was an MOU, a memorandum of understanding for economic development between the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Mexico City. And then a year later in 2015, MassChallenge was very seriously considering launching in Mexico City. They had run or we had run a number of bridge activities and there's just great entrepreneurs across the country. And the organization was looking at having this big announcement event. And the officials from Mexico City were really excited because this was something that they could hold up and champion as a win for the MOU. And we needed a representative from the governor's office in Massachusetts to go down for the signing and the launch of Math Challenge Mexico. And I was the person that went down for that. And that's kind of how I ended up at Math Challenge almost two years later as an actual staff person. So you never really know where these things will take you. I think the best part about working both in government and then for an organization like Math Challenge is the remit is very much about building communities and it's not about just picking winners and losers. It's building up structure. So that's what's fun to me.

SPEAKER_00: 8:19

Very cool. So, Sophia, what do you want to ask Brittany today?

SPEAKER_03: 8:22

Well, I'm going to ask kind of maybe it's more like a hobby, but I checked on LinkedIn that you used to be a music teacher. And I was like, what? So she comes from the politics area. She right now manages one of the most important, even worldwide, accelerators. And she also plays music. So I'm actually curious. What do you play? Do you still play it? And how do you combine these two things, the crazy life of helping entrepreneurs and scale abroad and play some music? Yes. Oh, my God. This is a great question that no one has ever asked me before. So... I, like I said, I grew up in Boston and Boston actually is a pretty musical town. People don't really, I think, recognize that Boston has both Berkeley College of Music, but also the Boston Conservatory, New England Conservatory, they've now merged, but has a symphony and has many artists and whatnot that have come out of the city and people that at least come here for um, for school and then move on. And there's Grammy winners left, right, and center coming out of Boston. So the other thing is I, you know, an eighties, nineties kid and new Jack swing was like the thing. So, um, I don't know if anyone on this call remembers like, um, any of another bad creation or even go back to the seventies, Donna summer, like all, these are all Boston people. Um, Bobby Brown all day. He went to my high school. Like, It's just like part of the culture of the city, especially when I grew up. And I ended up going to a school specifically that was a math and science school, but had a great music program. And so I then from there went on and I did the five-week programs at Berkeley. And so I was at Berkeley from 2002 to 2007, which is really cool. So when I was taking the decision of what I was going to do for college, I was just like, go to Berkeley and do music and do the thing, or find a job that I might be able to like, it's more reliable and steady and all that fun stuff. So I played a number of instruments. So my first primary instrument was the harp, actually. Really? Weird thing to say, 20 years later. So I played the harp and then I played steel pan. So Boston actually has a really, significant West Indian community and we have both Carnaval and Jube. So there's just a big community around specifically like a Trini and overall just West Indian community. And so I played steel pan for years. And then in 2007, I started teaching music theory, percussion and steel pan. And I taught from 2007 to 2009. Yeah, so it was great. I taught I taught, I don't know if anyone on the call is from Boston or is familiar with Boston, but I taught at the Timothy Middle School. And then I also worked at a couple other schools for like after school programs and stuff. Do you still play? I haven't played in years. So my really, really good friend, his name is Charleston Sargent. He's just a phenomenal musician. He has perfect pitch, which is like, if you ever meet someone with perfect pitch, it's just like, it is a genuine superpower. Like it's incredible to hear him. But so he still runs a steel pan band in Boston. So the last time I played was probably three years ago. Like it's, it's not a thing I do often. I wish I was still playing. I

SPEAKER_00: 12:01

just like to raise my hand and say, I absolutely do not have perfect pitch. Okay. Even slightly close to anywhere. Great insight. I

SPEAKER_03: 12:11

certainly,

SPEAKER_00: 12:15

I'm wondering what Annie's going to bring with his first question. I'd just like to point out that my first ever baseball game was Red Sox versus Yankees. So let's see what

SPEAKER_02: 12:25

happens. And how did it go for you?

SPEAKER_00: 12:29

It was like the longest ever game I've ever been to. We were super lucky because my wife and I, we'd never been to a baseball game before. And so she got us really great seats behind the dugout. In fact, behind the Yankees dugout. So we heard all the swearing and all the stuff. It was really good. It was a really good game, but it went to a 10th inning. So it's a really long day.

SPEAKER_02: 12:56

Oh, nice. Yeah. Well, baseball is the first sport, I think, opening up in the states right i think that's something i was reading about it somewhere but anyway okay i'm gonna go with my question so um Great to meet you, Whitney. And yeah, it's an interesting thing, your background in music. Maybe you guys could... My question is around how going virtual has changed the program and the format. And you mentioned you're in four different cities. So does it still matter because you're now virtual? So it could be from anywhere and the program is virtual. So how do you manage that now?

SPEAKER_03: 13:30

Yeah, that's a really good question because we're literally in that process right now. So... With the Impulse program, the partners are based in Morocco. All of the startups are across the African region, though. So they were in the normal process going to boot camps in Morocco and Boston and then in Switzerland. And we took the decision to cancel the Boston. Oh, I disappeared. Oh, I'm back now. Sorry. So we canceled the Boston program. And what would have been accomplished within a week and some change in Boston is now actually spread across a six-week accelerator virtually. So it actually just takes a lot more time to get all this done because you don't want people just sitting on Zoom calls all day long. So you actually don't have any good return from that. It's not a good investment of time for the startups. So they're meeting twice a week for the next six weeks instead of doing one week in Boston. And for their final demo day, we actually haven't decided... Oh, I think I'm talking too fast.

SPEAKER_02: 14:38

Sorry. I can understand, Brittany, fine. Tiana, I have no idea what she can

SPEAKER_03: 14:43

say. So we are working out what the demo day will look like. Initially, we were going to have a huge event at... the university in Ben Gurir in Morocco with the partners from OCP, with some other mass challenge partners. And now we obviously can't do that, but we want the startups to have some type of engagement with the public. So we're looking at maybe doing video pitches and then putting them online and then having people be able to log in and see all the startups pitches and contact them directly. So we're still actually working out some of the details for the virtual activity. To your question about, does it matter where you're from? So all of the mass challenge programs by default are international programs. So normally between 20 and 30% of the cohorts are international. And with the change of going virtual, the biggest difference is that the curriculum will be centralized. So if there's a pitch competition or a pitch prep or a marketing and branding session, instead of having it just the hundred startup cohort from Boston, it will be roughly the 300 or so startups that are based out of Boston and Boston that can all do it together. The other thing is we're still doing very specific programming per market. So we do a lot of work to intentionally connect people in the city they're in. So there'll be a lot of really specific Boston activity, Austin, Houston, etc. And that will be centered on just the companies that are in that accelerator, because normally, we see a lot of companies that use the accelerator as a chance to explore the market. So if you're not from Boston, you can use the Boston accelerator to have mentors and build your network. And we want to make sure that the accelerator is still doing that for startups and founders. So one question, I think it's right now, I think it's two is also, We're having some troubles. But my question would be more directed with, let's say, the A people. What would be for you people that you like to work with? And obviously, you have to work with people from many places, different cities, different countries. But in the end of the day, there are some characteristics that might run across all places. So what is for you an A team? What would you be looking for? when you're trying to choose, is this the right person for me to start working with? Or is this the right person to enter at the accelerator? And how do you choose this? Even like as a gut feeling, do you have any gut feeling when you meet people? What is it? Yeah, on the startup side or on the partner side? So as a nonprofit, we have partners that are funding partners. And so normally they're either governments or corporates or foundations. And on the startup side, mass challenge doesn't actually pick the companies that get into the program. So we make sure that the judges that are part of the pool that will get the companies to come to a decision if they're getting into the program, those judges come from both the partner networks, investors that are in our networks, and then usually folks from academia, a combination of experts in industry. So the judging for the startups is different. taken out of the hands of that challenge and given to experts. And that's important to us. And then on the partner side, we certainly decide who we work with and who we don't. And to answer your question for partners, we look on the government side for specific leaders that are responsible for economic development, because we believe that startups really are what will lead to economic growth and solve real problems. So normally we're working with heads of economy or if there's a ministry of innovation or science and technology, we're usually situated within those types of initiatives because they do feel really well together. So an example, in our Irish program, so we were working with the Cork County Council and we were working with the woman that's responsible for economic growth across the county. And we've focused on life sciences because there's a strong life science niche specifically in Cork, more so than tech, which is kind of what Dublin's known for. And then in the same type of partnership we have in Spain with the government in the Basque region, we work with Vizcaya, which is a government agency responsible for not just job growth locally, but also helping companies internationalize. So usually we're part of a broader government remit. And that's for government partners. On the corporate side, we're working usually, it's kind of one or the other. So we're either in marketing development budget, or we're in a very specific line item related to growth. And for the challenge-based models for health tech and fintech, corporates will approach mass challenge and say, we want to solve X problem, find me a company that does this. And we'll literally scour the world to find the right grouping of companies. And we'll have a pitch day specifically for that corporate to interview those startups. And usually it's around six or 10 and they'll pick one or two to work with for six months internally. So the startups don't physically come to MassChallenge. Usually they're embedded within the corporate.

UNKNOWN: 20:09

All right.

SPEAKER_03: 20:09

And is there any specific characteristics of an entrepreneur that you think it's across all areas, across all countries? It's like one, two, three main characteristics that you would definitely want to see on an entrepreneur that enters the program? Yeah. The consistent feedback we've gotten from every pitch around is that judges and corporates are looking for coachability. So they're looking for founders and entrepreneurs that are really passionate and dedicated to coaching solving a problem and not just their own solution. So being able to take feedback and to answer questions and you can suss it out pretty quickly. So the question and answer component of a pitch is very important to both the corpus and the judges because it shows whether you are there just to defend your own idea and that's all you care about or are you there because you actually want to work with people, solve a problem and take feedback in a constructive way. So I'd say coachability is the number one thing we look for.

SPEAKER_00: 21:08

All right. Nice. Thank you, everybody. Sorry about my little mic issue there. I managed to hopefully untoggle it. I have a bizarre question for you to see what you make of it. So, When I've been in Boston, it's a good ecosystem. It's a thriving ecosystem. There's a lot going on. You know, when we opened Canopy, we were like the 58th co-working and incubation space in the city. There's a lot to keep up. And my constant problem was how to keep up with all of it. And so I'd like to ask you, particularly as you're not just Boston, not just Massachusetts, but thinking globally, how on earth do you keep up with everything that comes to you?

SPEAKER_03: 21:41

Yeah. So as an accelerator or just like getting to be familiar with the innovation community?

SPEAKER_00: 21:48

Like you personally, like how do you keep up with all the different people, all the different things going on? How do you stay current with not just startups, but the other things in the city and everything else going on around you?

SPEAKER_03: 21:57

Yeah, I think it's important to manage time in a way that is helpful to you in a broader sense. So I don't know if people remember like 9,000 years ago, everyone was reading the book, The 4-Hour Workweek. And so part of the suggestions that Tim Ferriss had was that you don't actually have to be an expert on anything. You can just surround yourself with people that are experts on things. And then you can use all of their knowledge and all the time they've spent to become experts to then take your own opinions from that. So the example in the book was about elections and how he reached out to like six friends that had different political opinions that really care about elections. And instead of him spending weeks and weeks and weeks following up on things, he just took pieces of information and then tried to get like a, almost like a half-assed decision, but a good enough one for me. I feel like you can kind of do that when it comes to just being on top of events and things. In Boston, pretty much consistently, I think you probably saw me everywhere all the time, I'm going to like two or three events sometimes a day. Like I'm just always at places. At a minimum, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday evenings, I'm always at something. And usually there's a breakfast or some type of webinar, luncheon, throughout the week as well. Especially when I was working for the government, I was just always at something. If I was at my desk, I felt like I was not doing my job because my job was not to be behind a computer. My job was to be meeting companies and creating channels and networks. At MassChallenge, it's similar where The resources that companies need are not going to come from me just sitting in the office all day and trying to be there. It's going to come from me being out and about and getting to know what's happening. When I'm traveling, it's a little bit different. So I spend just about half the year on the road and half the year at home. So the way that I've found to stay connected with ecosystems that I'm either participating involved in and want to stay involved in or regions that I care about is to usually do some type of volunteer activity for another accelerator. So I do a lot of work in Dubai. I spend one to two months a year in Dubai. And so I work with Womina, which is an accelerator focused on female founders from the Middle East. And so I do some judging for them and I work with their partnerships team. I also work with the FinTech based accelerator called FinX. And so I go out there in September for their hackathons and awards. And so I'm a judge for that. And that's a really good way for me to stay on top of what's happening in the region. And then for Boston, I'm on a few boards. One is the Boston Irish Business Association, which if anyone's in Boston, it's a very, very Irish city. If you look at me, you'll surprise. Another group that I'm part of is the Chile Mass Association. And that is, I was appointed by the government to represent the Commonwealth. And so it's a board of that came from another MOU that Governor Patrick signed with the president of Chile. And it's meant to drive economic development between Chile and the Commonwealth. So there's two of us from Massachusetts and then there's two representatives from Chile. And we do a lot of work actually with MIT and a lot of work focused on not just mining, because Massachusetts have a huge mining sector, but actually things around manufacturing and agriculture So that's been a really interesting way for me to be tied into an ecosystem that's growing. So Santiago and startup Chile in general are doing a lot of really good work and are driving, I would say, the South American and Latin American innovation communities further and just having a kind of a bird's eye view on what's happening in that region.

SPEAKER_00: 25:47

You're saying you keep up by moving faster and faster and faster until you're doing so much that nobody can be faster than you. I like it.

SPEAKER_02: 25:59

That's great. Thanks for sharing that, Brittany. And I think you probably will have a very interesting perspective on how networking, which is so important to your job and for startups and everything, being in person and, you know, How is that changing for you with this new situation, the new normal? And it's probably going to be around for a while. And how is that working for your network and ecosystems as well in different countries? How are people managing this?

SPEAKER_03: 26:26

It's changing a lot. So we had a call on Friday today. The call was on Wednesday. So for Bebo, we used to do these things called First Wednesdays, which were uh, at a pub called Emmett's. And it was literally from five o'clock on come grab a beer. People can just talk to each other. And it was meant just to be like a very, just casual thing where people can come and talk to each other. Um, and now we've turned those into virtual hour long sessions. Um, with the focus of actually having about 30 minutes of curriculum, curriculum where it's not presentations, but talking for a reason. And there's only an hour long. I think people are getting exhausted by being on Zoom for eight, 12 hours a day. And they don't want to just sit here and hear things all the time. So having shorter engagements, like an hour or so, that's what I'm seeing as successful. In terms of investment and whatnot, that's such a human-driven industry, which trust and reliability is a huge factor to it. So I was on a webinar series that was organized by Mint 11, who does a lot of companies from Ireland, the UK, and parts of Europe into Boston. And the investors they were working with and that were speaking were saying that they still have funds to invest and they're still ready to invest in companies, but their network is so much more important and that they're only looking at either founders they know personally or founders and companies that are getting referred to them by a personal relationship. So either companies they've invested in or they have someone on the board or something like that. So I think it's getting more difficult to develop new networks necessarily, but digging really deep into the network that you already have and building those relationships. So is it,

SPEAKER_02: 28:24

So is it in your opinion that people still want to meet in person, that they haven't figured out how to build relationships online? Because a lot of people do that in other ecosystems. Is it more difficult for the people in your ecosystem or is it general that investors, for example, still want to meet somebody in person before they can actually trust them, let's say?

SPEAKER_03: 28:46

Yeah, I think it depends on the investor. I think it is really... Because when you're... working with an investor and you're taking funds, it's kind of like you're getting married, honestly. You're in bed with them for the life cycle of that investment and a lot of people are still tied to the idea of working together and meeting in person. I think due diligence is taking a little bit longer now than it would. There's not a ton of investments that are happening right now, at least that we've seen through our network and whatnot. There's certainly movement on the company side. We've had a lot of companies with COVID and developed solutions for COVID. An example of that would be one of our companies that's based in New York that was actually a premium vodka company. They were making the best vodka in the world, and it was just air, water, and time. They're now just making hand sanitizer. So

SPEAKER_04: 29:37

we've

SPEAKER_03: 29:38

seen companies that are pivoting in solutions that are coming. We haven't had as many investment updates. But to your actual question, I think younger generations of people are more comfortable with these virtual course meetings. Because everyone's life is online. So if you look from professional networks to dating, everyone's used to having some type of first conversation virtually. But I think there's still a lot of people that need some type of like handshake to really matter.

SPEAKER_02: 30:09

or elbow bump, there will be many handshakes. Yeah, definitely one of these, right? I'm

SPEAKER_03: 30:14

going to be honest. I'm half Irish, half Italian. And if you go in the North End or if you go around East Boston, no one has stopped hugging and kissing or doing anything. When it's embedded in the culture, it's really hard to change it.

SPEAKER_00: 30:27

Sophia, what have you got as a question?

SPEAKER_03: 30:31

Actually, there is here a question that popped up for a long time now. So I think it's from Nick Everset. And he asks, does the online program allow startups to move at their own pace more easily? At their own pace more easily? That is a good question. So I would say maybe not. So the main tenants of the program are still the same where It's four months long. Well, three months and a quarter long. There are pitches at certain stages. So over the course of the program, you're still pitching. What is different is that the startups might not feel the same pressure to attend as many curriculum sessions. So the way that MassChallenge likes to present the program is kind of like a buffet where we don't demand that you go to anything necessarily. It's really that you're taking advantage of what's in front of you. So... I think startups in terms of their own pace might take the option where they only want to focus on pitch preparation or mentorship. So they can opt out of curriculum. But the main stage gains are still exactly the same, where they have to participate in the pitches at the particular cadence. And at the end of it, they're actually pitching for funding. So they're not pitching for an equity-based funding. We don't take equity. We don't charge the program. So we just have grants. And in Boston, the grant pool is just under a million USD. So they're looking at anywhere from starting at$25,000,$50,000 or$100,000 checks. Okay. Then, Brittany, after that, I have my own question. You talked about how you go to Dubai and help, actually, on a program that empowers women. I think that that's very interesting. Right now, actually, right now, we are starting to work with the European Commission Initiative just for agri-food sector because, you know, one of the main problems that even if around 80% of people working the agri-food sector in Europe, I don't know how it is in US, but in Europe, are women, but only one third actually are leading the company. So you have like a huge discrepancy. So my question to you is, and since you have been helping as well in Middle East, which probably the situation there might be even more acute than it is in Europe, the first topic would be, why is it happening? A first point. Then the second, benchmark a little bit with your experience with US. Like, because the US definitely is a little bit more advanced in this. I know, for instance, in Boston, there are VCs that only invest in women. We still don't have that, at least that I know of, in Europe. And then the last point is, and since you have such a strong political background, does this have to start as a political movement or should it be private? Should it be both? Or how do you think, like, how can this actually change? Because at this moment, people talk about these there are incentives there are grants but it's not changing the numbers the statistics are still very like a small small change so this would be like a three-part question um of of your vision yeah so You

SPEAKER_00: 33:44

know we only got an hour here, right? You know we only

SPEAKER_03: 33:48

got an hour. There are still really staggering pieces of data about investment and the opportunities for women in innovation and entrepreneurship. So it's still something around less than 10% of private capital that goes to female-founded businesses. On the flip side... female founded companies are like more profitable and usually just as, if not more successful. So I would say that there isn't a huge, like shining star that we can hold up in the U S in terms of investment related to women enterprises or women led enterprises or mass challenge. We have found that our judging process actually is really attractive to female founded companies. And we're, almost consistently just at parity when it comes to the cohorts. And that's across not just Boston or Texas, but the program that actually is consistently seeing 50% or just over 50% of the companies having at least one female founder is the Mexican program. So the program that is based out of Mexico City and those companies have gone on and raised really significant amounts of money, especially for the market there and are doing very well. I think there's a couple of things here that's a combination of who's running the program, the ability of the actual professional capacity. And when you have to manage a family or have other commitments, it's actually really difficult to found a business. And it's very difficult when there's no security in that job. The other thing is, it was interesting when we've run programs in Taiwan, Thailand, and Korea was that there were just massive numbers of female founded companies. It was very different from even the US program. So I think different regions have a different approach. When it comes to investment and when it comes to programs that are expressly focused on female companies or female founded companies, I think that there is still a place for those types of initiatives. Some people aren't fond of them. Some people don't like kind of the rigidity of having a program, whether it's just for women or just for founders of any particular background. But I still think that at this moment, it's relevant. And I think that there should be spaces where either whatever your background is, that you're able to have a support network and a support system. There's a group that's growing in the US called At The Table. And their work is very interesting where they have casual one to two hour dinners together. And it's all women that are founders of tech companies. And it's meant to be a network to talk about the challenges that they're facing, not just growing a business, but getting access to either the right corporates or the right funders, or even just the simple fact of hiring and best practices in hiring and developing a culture within your own company that is supportive of other women joining the team or hiring the right people because that's another part where it's super important to start building culture from day one. And if you're building a culture of 12 to 14 hour days with no flexibility, you're not going to be able to actually hire people that are over 30 or fathers or whomever. You need to have some type of company culture where you can work hard but also have a work-life balance. That is something that we've seen in our European startups, for sure, and I would say also the companies that are in the Impulse program more so than the startups that are in the U.S. program. Just the value on work-life balance.

SPEAKER_00: 37:45

Does that answer your question, Sophia?

SPEAKER_03: 37:47

Yes, Sophia, the third part. I don't want to monopolize Brittany, so...

SPEAKER_00: 37:55

Okay. Okay. So I've got a question I've been wanting to ask you on this one, which is what is your fondest memory of Deval Patrick, Governor Patrick, working with him and kind of like seeing him around the city and stuff?

SPEAKER_03: 38:08

Yeah. Oh my goodness. There's so many good memories. So one of my best memories of Governor Patrick is actually when he was campaigning and I was still in high school. So this is 2004. at the time. And he came, so I grew up in the city and I went to a high school that is now really a strong school, but there was a really significant amount of violence and we had a murder capita rate. The murder rate per capita was higher than New York for that one couple years we were

SPEAKER_00: 38:48

higher than new york that's incredible that place you

SPEAKER_03: 38:51

know a number of really rough years um and governor patrick actually came and spoke with students um that had been affected by gun violence and gang violence and was literally just like what will change this what do you all need and it was really different to see a politician that wasn't just running for city council to do that. And so Boston also had the same mayor for 22 years and everyone, most everyone loved Mayor Reno. I loved Mayor Reno. So there was never a mayoral race during my youth. Like that just didn't happen. It was Mayor Reno for the whole time. So that's one of my favorite memories is like having a politician that actually talks to the people that want to be heard. And then the consistent memory I have of Governor Patrick is just profound compassion. And so there was, there was an instance at the state house where the state house in Boston is like a beautiful, beautiful building. And the state house in Boston is actually older than most of the federal buildings and whatnot. The U S constitution is based off of the Commonwealth's constitution because of the state we're older than the country, which is, makes us feel good about ourselves being from New England. We just have this like epic superiority complex. It's impossible to interact. It's true. But so there was a public forum and there's this big grand staircase and there's usually seats in front of it. And Governor Pratchett was standing at the podium and this woman was just like shouting and shouting about something that she was very passionate about. And I don't know if this would fly today, but it worked. He literally just came out to me on the podium and just gave her a hug. And she just calmed down. And then they went to the office with one or two other supporters. And they just had a regular conversation and just calmed down. And that moment of compassion, I think, was really inspiring. And it was like, people are still humans. And often, if they're screaming and shouting, there's some type of driver behind it. because they care about something and something's not right. And that you don't have to always just shout back. So that was one of my favorite, favorite memories. And then we traveled a lot together the last two years of the administration. And so seeing him just jump into different rooms with different people and be able to have a conversation and have something relevant like truly relevant to say in all those conversations like that's super impressive because he would get off of a 12-hour flight just like shake a suit jump into it and go right to a meeting like that's hard to do

SPEAKER_00: 41:41

yeah i i have to say you know he obviously helped us uh with some of the stuff we did with tech hub and and canopy and and my enduring memory of him is that watching him walk into the launch party where he'd say, he'd said to us, you know, I don't want any fuss, I don't want any press, I'm just going to step in at the back and shake a few hands and say hello to everybody. And he came in and I think he got off the tee, you know, he just kind of walked into Davis Square, which is crazy to think about. He's got a hat on, he's kind of semi-incognito, he walks into the back of the room and everybody's you know the event started and there's a speech going on and stuff and everybody's looking forward and he takes his hat off and there's this little ripple where the person next to him realized who it was and it just rippled all around the room everything stopped turned to him and they wanted to shake his hand and they wanted to say hello and everybody i spoke to afterwards and the entire event had a memory had something about governor patrick that they remembered very fondly about a way that he'd interacted with them or a thing he'd done to help them and he did a very good job and i don't know how real it was but He did a very good job of making it seem like he knew exactly who everybody was that he met.

SPEAKER_03: 42:47

He

SPEAKER_00: 42:47

seemed to have this recollection. It was amazing.

SPEAKER_03: 42:50

He's amazing. He really does take the time to get to know people. And the thing that I thought made him a great politician is that he's not a politician. So his term in office, his two terms in office were the only elected terms he's ever had. And like we were, we were in Mexico city on a trade mission and he had just wrapped up a meeting with the transportation secretary because we were trying to recruit a flight from Boston to Mexico city. And so we had these like back-to-back meetings with the people that were working on transportation, the primary airlines and whatnot. But then he was, I look over and he's just like sitting on his phone and like I'm, I'm a staff person, so I'm responsible for his time and ushering him places. And I'm listening into what he's doing. And he was on the phone with American Express because there was all these fraudulent charges on his card. And I'm like, you could have had someone else do that. But he was very much a regular person. And he used to have the staff over the house for holiday parties and things. And it was just a very... Kind of inspiring person to work for, for sure. And not taking it away from Governor Baker. Like Governor Baker, they're more similar than they are different, I would say, which I think people would be surprised by. What is super different is just their overall demeanor. So Governor Patrick is a very measured, very calm person. And Governor Baker is a very feisty and fiery person.

SPEAKER_00: 44:26

Fantastic. So I could honestly talk to you for an entire day. So I'm going to yield the floor to Annie. It's probably your last question, Annie, if I may.

SPEAKER_02: 44:36

Yeah. So what would be one tip and one advice you would give startups to weather this, you know, the changed reality that we're living in? What are the one thing that you'd focus on to continue on the journey? And the similar kind of thing, in the similar vein, what is the one thing um, hope that you'd get from that you, that you, that you expect from, let's say investors and government partnerships that you've got, that they will implement from their end to continue the evolution of these businesses and entrepreneurs.

SPEAKER_03: 45:09

Yeah. So for startups, I would say that customers are your number one focus. So even beyond accelerators, beyond worrying about capital, if you are going to be selling something, go out and try and sell that. Um, That's really hard to do in a moment like this. So don't spend hours and hours and hours on cold outreach or just exhausting your marketing budgets. Try to be really measured and focused and reach out to people that can be channel partners for you. So I think this is when we'll see channel marketing being the most effective strategy for smaller companies because you'll have people that are either comfortable with what you're selling or your product or are interested in listening to you. So I would say using your networks and using the channels, that's where this moment in time will come in handy. In terms of government and I would say the leaders that are responsible for getting us out of this type of pandemic, my hope is that there is a renewed investment and a continued investment into job creation activities. So having either multiple, well, I'm going to say that's just for the U.S. I can't say this for other governments, but for what I would hope on a state level in the Commonwealth is a continued forbearance on eviction. So helping with the main pieces of what a company needs to thrive and not penalizing people for not being able to pay for rent, et cetera, when there's been no business for

SPEAKER_04: 46:49

a

SPEAKER_03: 46:49

couple of months. So that type of taxation leadership is really important. That's a very wonky answer to say, but legislation in this area is really, really important. And that's what small businesses certainly need. And then from there, I would say programs, this is another like super legislative answer. There are really good programs that are run that support the ability for companies to recruit talent and having additional staff, having those types of incentive programs for the next three plus years to help companies be able to build up their team and grow their company and have that be money from the state that is given in a way that is a reimbursement and not just the state giving funds directly. I would want to see that type of leadership because that helps companies grow with staff and then with capacity. There are also some questions here from the chats. Another one from Nick. This goes back a little bit more to your program, Mass Challenge program. Yeah. Which actually has to do with the judging criteria. How is the judging criteria at MassChallenge? And how do you think it's different from the other programs, accelerator programs? Yes. So one, did I answer your question, Ani? Because what I will do is I will send, I'll give it to Stuart, but I can give a link to the program I'm actually talking about. It's run through the Mass Life Sciences Center. And you can essentially, a business can get four staff people reimbursed with taxpayer dollars, but it has to be run through universities. It's an amazing program. So I just didn't want that to get lost somewhere. So I'll make sure I'll send you the link so people can know what I'm actually talking about. Thank you. The judging criteria, the mass challenge criteria is based off of impact, which is very different from tech to the other accelerators. And impact to us means what are you going to be doing that's different than a solution that's already in the market and why does it matter? And it's not just finance and raising money and you're going to be the most profitable company. It could really just be that you are doing something that matters and will help in the broader scheme. And so sometimes people think mass challenge is just a social impact accelerator and we're not, but we definitely have that lens on a lot of what we're looking for is companies that are going to provide solutions and move things forward. So an example of a company that is not going to be a billion dollar company and they have a product that everyone knows and likes already is one of our wine companies. So it's called Proud Four. And They're an awesome company. They're a small shop. It's only about six employees total. The red wine that they have is a Pinot Noir and a portion of that funding goes to planting wildflowers that help support bees and having bees be able to eat and be happy and grow stuff. They have a white wine that goes to oyster farms and oysters actually grow really well in not captivity, but oyster farms go this way vertically into the water and it like purifies the water. And they, they're, they, they help the aquaculture of where they're growing. So their white wine goes to help funding that. And they have a cider that goes to some other initiative. So that's a company that we know was successful because it's, you know, alcohol. It is a special company because their money is back into a system that needs support. And that doesn't necessarily align with a billion dollar tech initiative, but really good company that we're excited about to have. And so now actually at mass challenge events, we serve, pretty much all alumni booze, which is kind of fun. It's really cool. So we have like five or six different companies from the Boston program over the past few years that are in like the beverage space from Archer Roost, the Proud Four to Farmer Willie's. It's a lot of different options and it's cool to be able to support our alumni in that way. So the criteria is on impact and that's what's different. And the other thing is the fact that we don't have judging criteria in a sense where there's five judges in alignment that three say advance, two say don't, so the company advances. Each individual judge is contributing to a score. So the judges have their kind of independence where one judge might give a 10, one judge might give a one or whatever, and the companies advance based off of their scores because we usually have five to seven judging rooms happening at the same time. Okay. And then there's also one last question from Tijana, which is a little bit more as a project manager, let's say. What have been your biggest learnings by actually building this program, this accelerator? What were the wrong turns? What were your main challenge? And what were your key lessons learned? Yeah, I

SPEAKER_00: 52:13

think... And do that in two minutes

SPEAKER_03: 52:15

or less. So partnerships are important and making sure that You're taking the time to get to know who you're working with. And certainly on the international side, we make sure that we have alignment when it comes to values. So that I would say is the main thing that we've learned over the years is that Money isn't everything and a sexy region isn't everything. And just having names and titles and things doesn't mean that you're doing the best thing for the startups or the organization. So I would say a fundamental alignment on values is super important. The other thing is growing strategically. So we tried to be everywhere and it didn't work out for us. We had an office in London for a few years. And at the same year we opened that, we opened... Israel and Mexico. The next year we opened up health tech in Switzerland and it was just wild. It was too much. And we didn't take the time the same way we did for Mexico to try to get to know London. So with Mexico, we had run a bridge program for two years. We had strong support. We had a really strong board of advisors. We had money coming from both governments, corporates, and philanthropic groups that were focused on entrepreneurship. So we were very much engaged with the right people. In London, we went on a trade mission with the government, which was great. We had some government support, but we didn't have the same level of board, advisors, and network. And we ended up closing that office because it just wasn't going to be sustainable. So I think grow smart, not fast.

SPEAKER_00: 53:54

Fantastic. Good wrap up. So we're at the end of our time. And like I say, I could honestly speak in this forum for the next day and still be very happy with what's going on. So thank you so much for spending your time with us today, Brittany. It's really, really been amazing. And thank you, Annie. And thank you, Sophia, for being here to kind of enrich the discussion and ask your own questions and stuff. I guess the thing I'd ask you to leave us with, Brittany, is these vids are principally for first-time founders. So to get some inspiration and some understanding of what makes people tick and I wonder if you could leave them with a piece of advice you know if there's a first time founder watching you right now what would you like to say to them

SPEAKER_03: 54:33

yeah be bold so make the asks and reach out to people directly so I think right now you have captive audiences or people are home and bored and losing their minds so reach out to anyone that you can if there's someone in the mass challenge network that you think you want to get in touch with add me on LinkedIn hit me up and I can see if I can get you the right people that Be very direct and don't waste people's time. So don't just have a coffee just and be like, I'm going to have a coffee and I don't know what I'm going to do. Be honest with what your open is. Be like, I think you're really cool. I want to get to know you or I want to talk to you because this is what I'm doing. I want to get down to business. So I would say honesty and directness.

SPEAKER_00: 55:13

Fantastic.

SPEAKER_03: 55:14

That I want to see.

SPEAKER_00: 55:16

Thank you so much. Thank you so much. So I wish you all a lovely weekend. I can tell you here it's a national holiday in the UK, so I'm going to enjoy the rest of the day. Lovely to see you all. And thank you, everybody, for watching this today. Give your fist bump to say goodbye. Yes.

SPEAKER_04: 55:30

And

SPEAKER_00: 55:32

a round of applause for Brittany. Thank you

SPEAKER_02: 55:34

very much.

SPEAKER_00: 55:34

Thanks,

SPEAKER_02: 55:34

Brittany. Thanks, everyone.

SPEAKER_01: 55:36

Thank you for listening to the Founder Friday podcast series. If you've enjoyed this episode, please feel free to rate, review and subscribe on your preferred podcast listening platform. We really appreciate that effort. If you'd like to recommend an entrepreneur or innovator for a future edition, please go to our website, www.canopy.community and tell us all about them. This series is made possible by the kindness of the members of Hashtag Tribe, along with support from our sponsors, Damia Recruitment, Core Angels Investment, and Ideas Spaces and Coworking. Obrigadísimo a todos.