Creative to CEO: Build a Brand That Actually Makes Impact [Extended Version]

What happens when a culture-shaping creative pivots into purpose-driven impact? Dara Cook shares how she went from leading at MTV to building a company transforming maternal health.

If you’re building a business for impact, this conversation will challenge, inspire, and equip you to create with intention and longevity.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How to pivot your career into purpose without losing momentum
• The power of maternal fitness in reducing pregnancy & postpartum risks
• What it takes to build a mission-driven brand that actually saves lives
• How to balance ambition, creativity, and business
• Why having expert-backed products (like OB-GYN-approved fitness) matters

👉 Follow the podcast and share it with a sister who needs this conversation. We’re on a mission to help Black women make it through the first five years in business — and thrive far beyond them.

#BlackWomenInBusiness #WomenEntrepreneurs #MompreneurLife #MaternalHealth #PostpartumWellness #PregnancyFitness #StartupJourney #PurposeDrivenBusiness #EmpowerHER #BusinessGrowth #CreativeEntrepreneur #WellnessBusiness #FounderStory #BuildInPublic #HealthyMotherhood #SideHustleToCEO #WomenSupportingWomen #OBGYNApproved #PodcastForWomen #EntrepreneurMindset

✨ Support the Podcast ✨ 
Become an EmpowerHER Insider for $10/month → HERE

🌐 Visit website: www.empowerherbusiness.us
📧 For speaking & sponsorships: linette@empowerherbusiness.us 
📱 Connect on Instagram: HERE @empowerher_biz 

Together, we’re helping women entrepreneurs thrive beyond Year Five!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

Welcome, you've stepped into a protected space for Black women founders to think, build, and breathe. A dedicated space for those of us carrying brilliance and the challenges that come with it. Here, we honor your time, your growth, and your unique journey. So if you're navigating to year five and beyond Jesus, you're in the right place. These conversations offer insight, relief, and honest perspective. I'm Lynette Catrell, and this is the Empower Her Business Podcast, where we talk mindset, money, and thriving. Let's get right into another great episode. Oh, hello everyone. So happy to see you guys back here today. Welcome, sisters, back to the Empower Her Business Podcast, the space where we blend money, mindset, wellness, and CEO leadership, helping black women build businesses that thrive beyond those critical first five years. I'm your host, Lynette Catrell, and today's conversation is one you are absolutely going to feel in your spirit, especially if you're a woman entrepreneur who is a mother or dreaming of motherhood while building your legacy. Today, we have with us Gerard Cook, a powerhouse creator who spent years at MTV Shaping Culture. She served as head creator for the MTV VMAs, brand manager for Nick Cannon's Wild and Out, and Senior Vice President of Business Development. So when we talk about brilliance, creativity, and strategy, she brings all that in much more. Since this episode is transformational, whether you are a mom planning to be, supporting moms, or simply honoring the journey of building a business that impacts real life. This conversation has something for you. So take a breath, settle in, and let's welcome our guests today. Hello, hello.

SPEAKER_01 2:25

Hello, so great to be with you today.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

Wonderful, wonderful. So we're gonna jump right in. You were at the top of the media world with um MTV, VMAs, and Wild and Out. Global creative leadership. What inner knowing was it that told you that it's time to build something more purpose-driven?

SPEAKER_01 2:50

I love that as a first question. Well, the inner knowing that inspired me to build something purpose-driven was me waking up in the middle of the night and asking myself this question: Am I using my superpowers for good? And this was a nagging question that just got louder and louder until I couldn't ignore it anymore. And I loved working at MTV. It was truly a dream job. I think of it as dream jobs, really, more than one, because I was so fortunate to be able to do so many different things over the years. And at the same time, I started to question whether I was taking everything that I had learned there and whether I was using it in a way that I could change people's lives in a positive way. And I had learned so much about creating content. And I always joke, when I started MTV, all I knew about television was how to turn it on, right? And when I but I learned how to create content. I was so fortunate to learn how to create it under pressure. I was a producer and writer on TRL, TRL hosted by Carson Daly, and was really put through the ringer, so to speak, of the production world and got a chance to learn how to be a CEO under my boss Chris McCarthy, who is the president of MTB, and then went on to become the co-CEO of the entire parent company, Paramount, uh, the conglomerate that it is. And I realized at that point I had I had graduated, so to speak, from that experience. And I think that's something that your that your listeners, your viewers might relate to is this idea of it's almost like if you're in school and you stay in school forever, at some point it, you know, you you do have to graduate. It doesn't make sense to you to move on. And I I felt that I had learned so much about production, learned so much about dealing with talent, building businesses on the on the business development side, it was time for me to take on a newer challenge. And that was it.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

I love that. I love that. So what you just described was a journey of understanding that um you started on the ground floor, you graduated up, learning more skills, shopping more skills, working under pressure. But I think a big difference in what you just explained in your journey is that you realized you were aware of that graduation process, and not only that, you were willing to get out of your comfort zone. Because a lot of times when we're graduating through levels like that, we can just feel so comfortable being in that space, like I know how to do everything here, right? And that feels good, so let me just stay here and keep doing everything here. But you um had a different realization. Your feeling was okay, I know I you know I've learned so much here. Now it's time to go do something else somewhere else. And that doesn't come, um that doesn't hold so naturally for most of us. Usually, what happens is something pushes us out of the nest versus us realize, okay, it's time to step out and fly. So I love that you had that that natural realization that okay, I got some superpowers here, and how do I really want you to feel? Yes. That's that's that's very insightful. I love that. Love that. So let's talk about going from an employee mindset to an entrepreneur mindset. I find there's a lot of nuances that we're not aware of till we actually step into that seat. So is there anything that sticks out for you that you realize that okay, I have to think differently about this now that I'm building my own business?

SPEAKER_01 7:04

Right, absolutely. Well, one of the first things that hits you when you move from employee to CEO of your own company is that you have to do everything. And so there's this clip, an old clip of Steve Jobs that has gone viral recently in the entrepreneurial world, and he talks about it's a little quaint, some of what he's talking about. He's talking about building a business many decades ago, and he's like, everything falls under you, the coffee, and then you think about he's really talking about setting up a true physical office. And when you're an employee, you have a defined role, right? And it's only really when you get to be maybe the CEO, and still the CEO, the still the CEO is answering to a board, right? But the vast majority of employees, you have a specific function that you're performing, and you don't have to deal with things like uh taxes and corporate taxes and payroll unless it's actually your job, right?

SPEAKER_02 8:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

And there is nothing that is not under your purview when when you've started your own company, and so that's the responsibility. On the flip side, the thing that I love the most is that if I have an idea to do something, we can just execute it. There's no internal interference, there's no selling it up the ladder and hoping someone will buy into your vision. And that's the beauty and the agility of having a smaller operation where it's my co-founder and I, and and we discuss, and it's and it's good because we have a we there's creative friction there too. And and that's helpful in terms of making sure the best ideas surface and that that our plans are vetted between uh each other. And if there's something we want to try, we can just try it. We can just put it up. And so that's the positive side of moving from an employee. Very rarely as an employee, even at the highest levels, can you have an idea and just execute it, right? Right. You still need to get buying an okay. You know, you need to get a budget and and all of that, and and get an okay for the budget. Well, you can just say, look, we're gonna try it and do it. So that's what I that's that's the beauty of it.

SPEAKER_00 9:34

Love it, love it. So let's talk a little bit more about your um origin and um share with the audience the um passion and motivation behind you creating this this really special company, Expect Fit. So tell share with our audience what ExpectFit is and the experience that really turned on the light bulb that it was really a misleaded business.

SPEAKER_01 10:03

Yes, yes, thank you. So what I saw was two things. It was the problem, and then I saw the purpose. The problem and the purpose and the and the promise. So the the the problem I was seeing in gyms, and and I mean an array of gyms. So I was going to everything from the local community center gym to the YMCA to Equinox, which is really expensive. It could be up to$300 a month, and I was seeing pregnant women struggling to work out in these gyms. And they were being underserved in group fitness classes, given ad hoc modifications. An instructor would say, Oh no, you in the third trimester, you shouldn't do that. That's not safe for you. Do something else. I was also hearing and reading reports of our high and rising maternal mortality rate in America, and how even the best minds in healthcare couldn't seem to get a grip on changing the tide.

SPEAKER_02 11:14

Right.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

So that was the problem. And then I saw the purpose and the promise. My sister had her first child over a certain age, and her OBGYN, who's who becomes an important part of our journey, Dr. Rachel Villanueva, rightfully advised her to exercise to reduce her risk factors. And that is because the American College of OBGYNs, which sets all policy for OBGYNs in America, had based on years and years of research showing the positive benefits of maternal fitness, that means working out in pregnancy and postnatal, on reducing complications, everything from premature birth to postpartum depression. At that point, the American College of OBGYNs had issued an edict, an official committee opinion saying if you're pregnant, you really we highly recommend that you exercise if your doctor clears you to do so. So uh my sister's physician, who's a fellow of the American College of OBGYNs, recommended that she exercise in pregnancy. And my sister did exercise, and she had such a smooth pregnancy and delivery, and I was there for delivery that was so fast. The OBGYN was only in the room for 15 minutes. And so that defied my expectations, pun intended, of what uh what a labor, a first-time labor for a woman who is over a certain age, considered advanced maternal age. And the OBGYN who delivered my niece looked back at my sister as she walked out and she said, Did you exercise? And my sister said yes. And and the physician said, I've noticed that women who exercise have labors like this. And that's when everything came together. Me seeing the pregnant women in the gym struggling to work out with being underserved, me seeing these reports about our high and rising maternal mortality rate and trying to figure out what we can do around it. Me being so excited that my sister was pregnant, but also being a little worried given her age and the high risk factors that we were all hearing about in the media, and then seeing her defy expectations through fitness, I realized there was an opportunity for me to help other women reap the benefits of maternal fitness. And that's what that's what led me to start expect.

SPEAKER_00 13:46

Okay, wonderful. I can really feel that. Um, how you were you were inspired by your personal experience of seeing the success your sister had, right? During a pregnancy where you would was worried about what the results would be, but hearing that, okay, these results were so smooth and easy because she worked out, right? And then connecting the dots between um seeing women struggle in gyms, trying to find the right workout to get fixed, and saying, Okay, I have a solution to this, and I want other people going through this process to feel this relief I just felt, right? Where it was so successful. So that's beautiful, that's beautiful. So from the time where you said, um, I can provide a solution to this for women going through this process to the time your business actually launched, what was that period like for you? What were you working at in that process? Did you just jump right in and start it real quickly? Was it a gradual process based on research? Or tell us how that process transpired.

SPEAKER_01 14:57

Yes, it was gradual based on research. So expect is grounded in science first. So even though it's called Expect Fitness, it should really be called something like Expect Healthcare or Expect Medical because we we approached it more from a medical standpoint. One of the first things I did, I was at Harvard Business School, and I had this idea, and I reached out to some folks on the other side of the river, and the dean of the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, uh, Michelle A. Williams, and uh, I had read the research that she had co-authored on the impact of pre and postnatal fitness on some major complications. And um, she recommended I speak with Dr. Ayman Lee, who who did a lot of that research with her, who is a professor at Harvard Medical School. And I asked her, I said, you know, I have this idea to uh have a platform where digital platform where women can find pre- and postnatal exercise that has been vetted by OBGYN so they feel safe to perform these exercises. And I just want to know if this is even a worthwhile endeavor, right? Is there any there there? And uh she said, wow, it's it's actually great that someone is finally putting the the science to use, right? Uh and and she said, I want you to talk to the head of the American College of Sports Medicine. So I spoke to the head of American College of Sports Medicine who described all the changes that happen in the body when you're pregnant that really necessitate some modifications in your exercise routine. So then I realized, yes, there is a space for us that it's just not the case that if you're pregnant you that you will feel comfortable just doing exactly what you did pre-pregnancy, right? There is value in creating a new routine. So, so started there with the research and and with really the best minds when it comes to maternal health. I looked at the competitive landscape, right? And so this is this applies to any other business, right? You want to speak to the people who know the most, and and it's you'd be surprised at who would actually talk to you, right? Exactly. So um, so really speak to the experts, do the competitive research, look, look to see who is operating in your field and what are the gaps. And we realized that there, I knew that there weren't any real brick and mortar solutions, right? So across the board for women who were looking to exercise in person digitally, uh, the solutions were sparse. None of them had the rigor of OBTYN betting, and so we realized it was a space to us to really play in. What was then one of the initial hurdles was us developing this advisory of OBTYNs to vet all the fitness because I had one of the things, despite having a tremendous amount of passion and doing a lot of the work in terms of research, etc., I was coming from the world of media, not medicine. So I didn't really know any OBGYNs. Like, I mean, besides my very own, right? So thankfully, it was my sister's OBGYN, Dr. Rachel Villeneuve, who became the first OBGYN on our advisory. And and Dr. Villeneuve is a luminary in medicine. She became the president of the National Medical Association and and is is really the beacon behind this, behind Expect. And it and it just and it just started. But now we have 17 from top hospital systems, so uh all around the country, and they span from OBGYNs who deliver, all of them are practicing uh OBGYNs to maternal fetal medicine doctors, and that's someone you may go to if you have a more complex pregnancy, if you may have gestational diabetes, and they have certain things that they look out for to urogynecologists who are gynecologists who are trained in the pelvic floor, right? And uh, and so we work with these physicians who share with us uh their one-on-one experience of advising women to exercise in pregnancy, what their results are, and they review every exercise that's in the Expect app. And if there's something they don't like, we get rid of it.

SPEAKER_00 19:54

Hmm, that's wonderful, that's wonderful. So there's a lot of research that went into what you um present as a solution for staying fit during pregnancy for women. So, and it's backed by um specialists in the field. Right. Yeah, that's very reliable. So, as you stated, research clearly shows that exercising during pregnancy reduces complications drastically. Why do you think that it's still this life-changing information still isn't reaching enough women, especially black women?

SPEAKER_01 20:31

Right, I think the reason that this life-changing information isn't reaching enough women, especially black women, is that we're coming up against many years of misinformation when it comes to physical activity and women in general. So, one of my favorite books is by the New York Times writer Danielle Friedman. It's called Let's Get Physical, and it's about the history of women and exercise. And she recounts really, we think this would is absurd, but this happened not that long ago that women were not allowed to run marathons in America because it was believed that if a woman ran more than two miles, her uterus would fall out. Yes. And yes. Um so the the gender barrier was not broken and uh officially uh until the 1970s in America.

SPEAKER_02 21:31

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 21:32

Uh it wasn't until the 1970s that women were officially allowed to sign up and register as women to run marathons. So that's not that long ago. Okay. I was born in the 70s. Okay, that's not that long ago. So when you when you come through this perspective of we didn't even believe that a woman could run a marathon without her uterus falling out, it it Fast forward to the 80s, I remember reading when I was doing research, reading uh an article from the New York Times, uh, interviewing a physician who said, Look, this was around the the time of the fitness craze started hitting in America, but Jane Fonda workout was all the aerobics workouts and classes, right, with the leg warmers, all of that. It was the it was the and jazzer size and all that. And and this physician said, if you're pregnant and you're so compelled to exercise, don't do it for more than 15 minutes. This was in the 80s in the New York Times. So we're this is our history, this is where we're coming from. That's wrong. Okay, so so we know now, obviously, that women can run marathons and they won't suffer uh prolapse in that way. Um and and we know now the guidance from all the leading health institutions is that if you're pregnant, you should be exercising at least 150 minutes a week. So this is a we've come a long way, baby.

SPEAKER_02 23:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:14

Pun intended. And and even just to give you another example of how far off sometimes public health guidance can be, there was a point before the Surgeon General, the big Surgeon General report that came out in the 1960s warning uh against the the dangers of smoking. There was a point when physicians would recommend to pregnant women you should smoke cigarettes.

SPEAKER_00 23:37

No.

SPEAKER_01 23:37

Because it'll calm your nerves. Oh my goodness. I mean, this is where we're coming from, right? So we have this history of, but science is just like anything else. And you know better, you do better, right? And so we learn and we and and and we do studies and we figure things out, and and and it's also incongruous with the way that we've been living. Um, you know, the modern society has afforded people the ability to be sedentary in pregnancy, but that wasn't the case. How do you think we got here? Thousands and thousands and thousands of years when um it wasn't an option for a woman to be pregnant and and just be on bed rest. So, so we're at this place now. So that that's sort of that's part of the reason why that message hasn't proliferated. Um, but every year we are seeing a higher and higher percentage of women working out in pregnancy. And that is because really the science is so clear and unequivocal about this. Speaking about the marathon, speaking about marathons, uh pregnancy has a similar impact on the body as running a marathon. And so when you think about it in that way, you would not train for a marathon. You you would not you would not run a marathon without training for it, right? You would not do that.

SPEAKER_00 24:51

You wouldn't be sedentary and then go run a marathon.

SPEAKER_01 24:54

Exactly. And then what if someone said, okay, you know, actually, you're just gonna relax for nine months, you're gonna be on bed rest, and then you're gonna run a marathon. And actually, the stakes of this marathon uh are your life and the life of your child.

SPEAKER_00 25:10

Go. Right.

SPEAKER_01 25:14

That's what we've been expecting women to do. And and uh it's unfair, it's been unfair, it's been unfair to women, and we're here to fill that gap and and to acknowledge the athletic event that pregnancy, labor, and recovery uh the athletic event that it truly is, and to help women prepare for it and train for it better than anyone else. And so it's really even just to zoom out in terms of anyone who's thinking about starting a business, it's really about is there a need and how crucial is that need, right? This idea of the proverbial painkiller, a painkiller will sell more than a vitamin, or they'll be there'll be more interest around a painkiller, right? People, this is a this is a major pain. It's it's our existential pain, which is that it it's too dangerous to bring a life into this world right now, right? Um especially in America. And and is there a simple solution that can make it easier, make it healthier, make it cheaper to have a child uh and not end up with some sort of debilitating complication like gestational diabetes, um, hypertension, stroke, hemorrhage, etc. All these things that can come with a complicated pregnancy.

SPEAKER_00 26:41

Got it. And this even helps also with um postpartum, um, the postpartum experience, too. Right.

SPEAKER_01 26:48

Correct. Postpartum depression. There's been so much research. We're actually working with Penn Medicine. They're uh they have the Penn Center for Women's Behavioral Wellness, which is uh which is really a collaboration between the psychiatric department and the OBGYN department about uh studying the impact of expect on postpartum depression. Yes, and and we one of the this is also coming out in the research, right? And so this is not just for pregnant people, this is for everyone. The research is now showing that exercise um has the same or better impact on severe depression as medicine and talk therapy. Oh wow, yes, so when you think about it that way, you realize that you know that if if you if if you can fit exercise into your schedule, it is so effective uh in terms of uh mental wellness.

SPEAKER_00 27:59

Right. I love that. I love that information. So that's um that's a very valuable gem, especially um because I am very um a great advocate of building holistically, building holistic businesses, taking care of our well-being. So just knowing that when you talk about depression, when you talk about um your mental state of mental wellness, and we're saying just incorporating exercise into your daily process can help you heal those areas and elevate those areas, and that helps you nothing but to dedicate the time. That's just that's great information to share. So thank you for that. I also love that you're building a um a database of uh information based on expect your results. You're building a database on your results, very helpful information. Pause with me for a second. I just want to thank you for being here. And if this is home, tap five stars, leave a quick comment, and send this to a sister who needs it. You help more women find this space when you share. All right, back to the conversation. So let's talk about the process of entrepreneurship and building a business. So when you first started your business, what was your process for funding your business? Because a lot of us, when we're getting started, depending on the type of business we're starting, it requires a different type of funding, a different amount of funding. So for your um building your medical-based business, what type of funding did you utilize and how did you utilize it?

SPEAKER_01 29:49

Yeah, it's absolutely so our funding came from four buckets: grant funding, uh, angels, institutions, and bootstrapping, which meant me. So um actually, one of the the positive sides, so expect is what you would call a social enterprise, right? So um which really means that in success, the world would be a better place because we exist. Now there are some there are some enterprises out there that you can argue are not contributing to the advancement of society in any way, right? Uh and um so one of the pro and and I'm also a visiting entrepreneur at Stanford Graduate School of Business's uh Center for Social Innovation, where I help advise these brilliant students at Stanford as they start their own social enterprises. And what's wonderful about the social enterprise is that I believe that it's it's it can be easier to attract capital and to attract a variety of capital to a social enterprise because there's this there's this other element to it that it provides, it doesn't just provide value to shareholders, it provides value to stakeholders, it provides value to society at large. And as much as we think that money is only interested in chasing returns, it's not true, right? I mean, if that's the case, philanthropy would not exist. So we we got grants very early on, and I think the grants were also a way for us to validate did this even make sense for us to keep going? So that's one of the things in terms of when you're thinking about starting a company, you can iterate and and test, test your assumptions, right? And so, like I said, one of the things I did early on, speak to experts in the field. Does it make sense for eat for us to even do this, right? Are there other solutions in the market that are already doing what we're doing? So we don't need to create something else. Uh another thing that we did is that we entered into grant competitions to see could we pass muster, right? Just fair contests, could we pass muster? And we were able to get grant funding from Wharton, Harvard Business School very early on in that way. Tiger Global, which is uh people in the finance world, they know what Tiger Global is. We were able to get grant funding from Tiger Global very early on. So that was an indication. All right, if Wharton and Harvard and Tiger Global, if they think there's something here, there's something here. Let's let's keep going. Um, next were angels who really deserve that title because they are angels through and through. So these angels are individuals who are accredited investors, and there is specific criteria for what an accredited investor is. And uh angels, they are on the ground floor and they are really investing in you. So angels, they have been uh friends of mine, classmates that I've known for a long time, and who really believed in our vision and believed in me. And that's one of the things I tell people is, and and especially young people, because they they could really take full advantage of this advice, is that everything you do is an audition. So be excellent in all aspects of your life. So when you're in the classroom, you never know, uh, you never know who will become partnered with you in some future endeavor. And how do you show up in when whether you're you could be in school right now and you may just be blowing it off? It's like, no, these people in your class right now, they could be future investors or not, depending on on how they perceive you, right? Um so all that is important. Uh, next institutions. So we were part of Techstars Healthcare. Techstars is uh one of the leading um one of the leading incubators, accelerators of startups, really globally, and they have uh uh tech stars healthcare accelerator that we had our eyes on, I mean, dead set on. And the acceptance rate, it it's worse than any school. So it's it's worse than Harvard, it's worse than Stanford. It's it's like three, it's under 3% acceptance rate. Over 500 companies applied, uh, 12 got in, and and but we were dead set on it. And and and we got in, and so Techstars invested. Uh also uh VC, the Lairdal Million Lives Fund. Um, uh it's a European-based uh VC firm that is deeply concerned with the with the high rate of maternal mortality in America, right? And then my own money. So another big indicator of whether or not you should go into business is or do you believe in it enough to put your own money into this? And if you don't, don't do it. So it's it is a motivator like none other when you have skin in the game, right? And we we just know this in general, right? We know that when you have your own skin in the game, you're more responsible, all these things, right? So so those are the those are the big buckets of funding, and and that's how we that's how we approached it. And the so the and even in that order, really, the the grants came first, um, then the angels, and um the bootstrapping was always there. So I was always, I mean, I was bootstrapping of course from the very beginning, right? Because it's me, you know, so bootstrapping came first, then uh, and always, that's always the underpinning, and then uh then there's grant funding, then there's angels and institutions. So it really and and that tends to be the order. Now, a lot of people don't have grant funding as a pathway, right? In um, like let's say if I was starting a dating app, right? I don't know who wants to give anyone a grant for that.

SPEAKER_00 36:30

Right.

SPEAKER_01 36:31

Oh, that might be a little harder. Uh but um but but some people they just they kind of they they depending on on what line you're in, that may decide. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 36:43

Right. So when we talk about grant funding, you say that was like the outside of bootstrapping, that was like the first bucket. What was your primary resource for looking for grants? Because there are so many resources out there, sometimes it can be overwhelming, like where do I start? And and um how do I start? So, what did you find was your um greatest resource in finding grants?

SPEAKER_01 37:11

Greatest resource in the beginning was the university. So universities are places of yes. So when it just in general, when I think about I think institutions have souls and the soul can align in a continuum of like yes to no, right? So VCs, for example, they're they're no, like they're places of no, but generally speaking, um universities are places of yes, even for people who are not even at the university, and and and and I think it's it's the spirit of what the university is there to do, right? The university, and I'm talking about the university at l at large, is there to cultivate young people, to advance um research and and the arts. And they you know, I just remember even me being in college, and you might have an idea for an independent study, and they'd be like, Yeah, sure, go for it, right? I mean, this is what the universe is how universities are, right? They're places, yes. So universities in general are fantastic places to explore grant competitions, uh business innovation competitions, etc. And what it was was that Wharton was offering an executive ed class. Uh, and anyone could anyone could sign up for this, right? I mean, I there may be some criteria, I don't know, but it's an executive ed class that was being offered online, uh and and it would it it was about entrepreneurship and it culminated in a in a competition, right? A grant competition for your startup. And I signed up for this class because I needed structure, right? I needed someone to force me, because this is another thing. So there might be a lot of people who are listening who have ideas for business, but you're like you're working a day job and you're taking care of your kids, and it and it's it's like, how do I even fit this into my life, right? Right, how am I even just gonna get a plan out?

SPEAKER_02 39:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:30

So I knew the realities of my life that I had a huge job, and I wasn't even working full time, I was working all time. So, like, you know, you know, people like, you know, you feel like you're working all the time, right? Like it's not just nine to five, it's you know, five to nine and weekends too. Yeah. And I needed a structure where every week I had to submit homework that had something to do with this this business, right? So I had to do all the elements to it. And at the end, there was a pitch competition for your idea, and I said, and I wanted to put it to the test. I'm like, look, if it but the class was, I think,$2,000, and the grant funding was more than that, and I was like, I'm gonna make that money back. That was my thing. I was like, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna make that money back, and I did, and so we won grant funding, but I worked my face off.

SPEAKER_02 40:27

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 40:28

Okay, so that's the other thing. Like, I don't think people they see there was a grant, we we won grant funding from another competition last year, um, MedTech Color, which part of that money came from um uh NIH seed and Johnson and Johnson MedTech, but I've rehearsed so much for that I lost my voice. So the minute, the minute that thing was over, my it was like my voice took it, it was like it it held on for the pitch, and after that, it was you know, because I was just pitching, pitching. I mean, every time I got in the shower, I was pitching. I was I was pitching all day. I was pitching in in the Uber on the way to the place. I pitched so much I still know the whole thing by heart. It's a lot of work, but it's that's what it takes, right? That's what it takes. So um, so so that's how, so I would look at, I would look at universities. If you're I would look at university, local universities to you, look at their at their uh entrepreneurial pitch competitions. I would get on any listserv that you can related to the industry that you're thinking of starting your business in. And these grand competitions are good because they're early on, so you can even just have the concept. Love that by the time you get to V, you know, by the time you get to institutions, really institutions that you need to have something, right? You need it so as much as people say, Oh, I'm an early stage, I mean, early stage is like you have a million plus in revenue, that's what that means, at least, right? That's not early stage is not, I have an idea, okay?

SPEAKER_02 42:09

Right, right.

SPEAKER_01 42:09

So it's it's some of these early grant competitions, uh, etc. And um, and just read, tell people, tell people what you're doing, right? You'd be surprised at who has some information that could be helpful to you. And uh, so that's what we did. It was it was the universities. The universities, uh Wharton had this pitch competition, Harvard had a pitch competition, and we did it, and we uh and we won funding. And and Tiger Global, there's this great platform called Hello Alice. So I would say go to Hello Alice. It is uh they're particularly um they're really about empowering women entrepreneurs, they have a ton of funding opportunities and non-dilutive grant funding opportunities on there. So if you're not on that, get on Hello Alice, hello Alice.com, just get on their mailing list. That's how we got the Tiger Global grant. That was it's that was through uh that was through Hello Alice, so do it.

SPEAKER_00 43:17

Yes, I love that. You dropped a couple of gems there. What I one of the things I love you dropped was that you took the course because you know you need a structure to basically guide you through the process of get this all together. Because in your work schedule, it was not um, it was not easily possible to carve out okay, what do I need to do and what do I need to do next? But with a structured program that guided you through what you need to do. And you knew you were going to get it done because you wanted to win that tuition you paid, right? So that gave you the structure. So one thing is key is knowing who we are, right? What is what is what are my strengths and weaknesses? And what do I need though? So you are the like okay, this structure will help me get it done. And me having paid for it's gonna help me get it done because I've now invested in it, right? So that helps you walk through the process to get everything organized and then to pitch. And you also talked about how you uh how hard you were pitching, how hard you were practicing, how you had to get it down, how you lost your voice in the process. But that means that by the end of this process, you clearly understood everything you wanted to get done, right? You had the answers to the questions because you had looked at it upside down and back and forth, and you um intimately knew what your business was about, and you structure for so that is wonderful, and I love you share the university option because I had never heard that before, so that's a great resource for our listeners to now be aware of. Yes, happen to these universities and hello Alice. I had heard about, but again, a great reminder for everyone to check that out. Hello, Alice. Wonderful. So building a fierce sometimes black member, we do it out of sheer willpower. You talk about having a structure. A lot of times we don't do it out of structure, we just do it out of I want to build it, and we're kind of growing our way that we are falling down, right? We just jump out the window and I'm gonna put this together at some point, and one of the things I am very keen on with my advisory firm is helping women build sold-aligned systems. So build your business so it runs in a way that aligns with your soul, so you're not all over the place and overwhelmed and burnt down. Right. So, how do you, in the structure of your business, um how do you um infuse sold alignment or systems that work with you and for you?

SPEAKER_01 45:58

Right. Well, I think the the number one way that I'm soul aligned is that I am completely on board with the mission of the company. And I think that's the most important thing. I think if I were maybe in a different doing something different, I would feel I think burnout can burnout isn't just about physical burnout. I think you can also have spiritual burnout. And when you are uh when you're not aligned with the work that you're doing, you're doing a lot of work in in a a in a field or the company that you don't believe in. There's something about it that you don't that that doesn't sit well with your soul, and that can burn you out. So you will find it's almost like this kind of funny analogy. You know how it is when you're like you've eaten food, you're and you're like you're full, and then like dessert comes out, and for some reason you find the extra pocket and you're like it's it's like you know what I mean? Because it's like because it's like dessert is so good. I mean, I'm that person who likes dessert. Um it you I feel that way about being fully aligned with what you're doing from a purpose standpoint because when you're fully aligned, you find that little extra pocket of capacity, right? It's like it's like, oh yeah, it's like, oh, I've eaten so many of these, uh so so many of these crab legs, and I'm thinking about red lobster. I'm thinking, I've eaten so many of these crab legs and and shrimp from the seafood boil. But yeah, now you're bringing out that chocolate, and I can't eat another thing. But you brought up that chocolate cake with that ice cream. Weirdly, I can finally have my appetite is returned, right? So this is this is sort of this is what it is when when you are doing something that you firmly, really, truly believe in every molecule of your body is that you increase your capacity, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 48:07

Right.

SPEAKER_01 48:08

So I I I almost I think about it a little bit more like that. And so even last night I was like, all right, it's time to go to bed and went to sleep. And then I then I had this idea, and I was like, oh, now of a sudden I'm awake, I feel lively again. And I just got up, got on my computer, and I started doing some stuff, and then I was like, oh, I feel great. Now I'm gonna go back to bed, you know. So I I don't really I that's more of how I think about it. Um, there is something practical that I do though, um, and that I encourage people to do. And there's been a lot of just research around this, which is chunking your days. So, what does that mean? Is that um I have days where I do meetings and there are days where I don't. So there's this great book called Flow, and it's about being able to focus and work on something for a long period of time and and really having a singular focus so you can achieve this magical state called flow. And and I think you know, a lot of us have achieved it when maybe you're writing something and now you just feel it's you're just you're sliding through it, right? Just feel so good. Uh, but you really only achieve that when you can focus in uninterrupted time. So what happens when you work for another person, your days at the the this is also this is something, a phrase that was coined in another book called time confetti, where you just don't even have y'all you're you got a meeting here, you got a meeting at 11, you got a meeting at 12, you got a meeting at 2, you got a meeting at 4, and you and it this is like this every day. So you can't even get into any kind of flow with anything, and you can't think, and you can't work on anything deeply. So, what I would say, practically speaking, is set certain days where you have your meetings and and just chunk them, and then you have days where you do deep work and and you and you focus in that way. And I I also find places to work where, you know, we have we have our office space actually through NYU, which is fantastic on the Brooklyn campus, and that's through um when I say universities are places of places of yes, right? NYU um has a fantastic catalyst program. Um and it is and it in the Empire State Development Corporation in New York, they they uh co-fund that and and they give really fantastic startups office space. But you know, I often find in terms of deep work, I I go to almost more of like a library space to really just, you know, so I'm not in the fluorescent lighting and uh and and no one is talking really, and I'm just it's like I'm communing very deeply with what I'm doing. So find spaces that work for you, right? And so again, about structure, it's like sometimes we think that it's just us, right? You're like, no, I need to be stronger. It's like, no, I need to just carve some time out of the confetti of my schedule to work on this, or I need to find some time in this loud office that I'm in, or in my loud home where my kids are yelling and screaming to focus. And it's, you know, let's be easy on ourselves, right? Is sometimes we understand in healthcare, we've been talking, we talk a lot about social determinants of health, which is really about how your environment, where you live, shapes everything from you know, your the diseases you may develop to your life expectancy, right? So we know now that where you live can determine how long you live. I don't think we talk enough about social determinants of success, of social determinants of achievement. And what are some of the things, how can you align your environment in a way in which you can actually optimize your performance? So, do you need to be in a quiet, quiet space? What kind of lighting do you need? I need tea, I need decapitation, little stuff like that. Um, even like I mentioned the the Wharton class, I needed a structure, I needed someone to force me every week. Okay, turn that in, turn that in, turn that in until it becomes a habit, until I've now I've gotten hooked and now I'm here. So, whatever you can do to give to structure your life so that it becomes easier for you to accomplish what you need, do it.

SPEAKER_00 52:38

I love that. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 52:39

So just leave it to willpower.

SPEAKER_00 52:41

Yes, yes, that is goal. And so understanding, so that takes taking the time to understand yourself enough to know, wow, when I'm doing this, it feels so easy. And when I'm doing this, I feel at peace. Or when I have this, you know, burn this candle, I just relax and exhale from knowing how to put those things together to trigger or create those moments for you. Right. Right. I love the way you said it. Wonderful. What's your go-to self-care um activity? When you feel overwhelmed or burnt out or just tired, and you want to do something for you. What is your go-to?

SPEAKER_01 53:22

My go-to really is exercise, and it's the first thing that I do when I get stressed, especially when I have excess energy. I put it into exercise. I always feel better, and it and it may vary the different types of exercise. Yoga can be more meditative, and I I come especially yoga first thing in the morning. And when you haven't even looked at your phone, and you just get up and you just start doing yoga. It's like I feel like I'm communing with the universe, that get ideas that way. Um, meditation. I I started meditating again recently. It just it's and I have found it allows you to elevate over your life, and so it's almost like your life is this is just a crowded highway, and then meditation allows you to rise above it and then just kind of float. Like someone just gave you a hover craft, and now you don't have to stick in this traffic, and you can just go, I'm gonna go over here now. So, so that's what I those are the things I do, but it's always been it's fitness, has been, and it sort of has to be. Now it's like, you know, even this morning, I was like, I didn't want to work out today, and I was just like, but you have to, Dara. You have the company, it's called Expect Fitness. You have got to, you got to work out. So uh, so yeah, that's another thing. It's structural now. Now I'm like, God, I committed to the whole thing, gotta keep working out.

SPEAKER_00 54:54

Yeah, love it, love it. So it's been just beautiful having you here with us today, sharing all this great information with our entrepreneurs that are listening in. So now I'm gonna give you the opportunity. If there's anything that I didn't ask you that's been on your heart or on your mind as we conversated, or something that you want to leave our audience with, now the floor is open to you to share that right now.

SPEAKER_01 55:19

Yes. So I wanted to encourage, especially your your viewers, listeners who are black women, to start companies. If this is something you're thinking about doing to do it, and to not be discouraged by any of the negative statistics, etc., out there about how hard it is to be a black woman entrepreneur. Uh remember that what you have on your side is what you the most important thing. And whenever you whenever you he see interviews with great entrepreneurs, they always say the same thing that the most important trait for an entrepreneur to have is resilience. And I think who is more resilient, right? So um do it. If this is something you're thinking about doing, do it, do it. And I I do remember there's this, there was a woman um I I met, it was at a Wharton reunion a long time ago, um, Abby Greensfelder. And she, if you've ever seen, I don't know if you've ever seen a TLC show, Say Yes to the Dress.

SPEAKER_00 56:24

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_01 56:25

So it was a huge show. So um her, she started the production company that developed that show, right? And so just me coming from the media background, I know they made a ton of money on that show because that show is like always on. And you know, and so um I met her at this reunion and she said, Um, I came here for you. And I said, and she's like, not you, because I don't know you, but she's like, I came here for you to encourage you to start your own company. She said, because this was it was a it happened to be this was a it was a Friday afternoon. She was like, it's a Friday afternoon, and I have three kids, and I live in the DC area. And if I was still working, um, she had worked also in media, I believe she worked at Discovery as an executive before she left to start her own production company. If I was still at Discovery, I would not be able to be here this afternoon. But the fact that I have my own company, I can do that. And she said, having your own company is your best shot to have it all. And I never forgot that. And when I finally left MTV to start Expect, I emailed her and I said, I never forgot what you told me. And I always I tell this story forward, and I still thank her every now and then. And so I want to share this with everyone else is that if you're thinking about how do I have it all, this is this is your opportunity to do it. It's your best opportunity to set your own schedule, right? Um, and really when you set your own schedule, that is when you truly become the master of your life, because your life is nothing but time. Your life is time, that's it.

SPEAKER_00 58:03

Right.

SPEAKER_01 58:04

It's not your life is not money. You can run out of money, you can run out of money a million times, but when you run out of time, that's it. So your life is time. When you are the master of your time, then you have fully controlled your life.

SPEAKER_00 58:18

So yes. Thank you. So thank you again so much for being with us here today. All the great information you share with our audience. I'm sure it's gonna uplift many, it's gonna encourage many and help them take the next step forward. Thank you. Welcome to After the Show. This is our quieter, more intimate space where I ask today's guests three thoughtful questions that invite reflection, honesty, and the wisdom that often lives behind the surface. These conversations are for those of you who've chosen to support the podcast and sit a little closer to the table. Thank you for being here, for investing in this work, and for helping us create a space where deeper conversations can unfold. Let's begin. So the first one is you have shaped some of the most iconic MTV moments. What is the one of the behind the scenes stories from VMAs or Wildin' Out that makes you laugh or shake your head right now?

SPEAKER_01 59:32

Oh goodness, yeah, there's so many moments. I think about the moment I wasn't allowed to talk about when I was there, but now I'll talk about it. No, but no. Um, I think about um the year that Kanye jumped on the stage, Taylor Swift.

SPEAKER_02 59:52

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:53

I had known Kanye for a long time because I did Kanye's first interviews in life ever. And he he, to his credit, he every time I see him, he says, never forget you did my first interviews. And uh I did them as a favor to his cousin, um, Devo Harris, who's now an entrepreneur. Um, he has an amazing company called Adventurer. I can't even call it a startup anymore. But um, so I was head creative uh on the video music awards that year, and you don't get to sleep, you know, the days before the show. I was tired, I was tired. And and I remember I was just like, wow, you know, I'm I'm because I'm backstage looking at the live feed of the show, and I was like, Yeah, I guess it's finally happened. I've started hallucinating. You know, I've I'm so sleep deprived, I'm hallucinating because Connie should not be on stage right now.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:46

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:46

And then I was just like, but he yet he is. So um, so that was a moment, you know, uh he was kicked out. Uh, I don't know if people know that he was kicked out. No, uh, and then there's some other things that about Taylor Swift that he tailored, but I will say that Taylor Swift was such a trooper in terms of she ended up performing um later that night, um, and she got herself together. Um, but that was a moment that uh I'll never forget. And even just, I mean, this is just a hip-hop moment. Oh, wait, wait, I talked about this on Instagram actually. This is it's funny. Um there's this video of Lenny Kravitz that's kind of going viral, and I I did comment on this. This is one of my favorite moments is I was interviewing Lenny Kravitz, right? So he was coming in to the MTV studio, and this was like 2003, let's say. And he walks in. First of all, I'm already like Lenny Kravitz is coming in, okay? So you know, I was already like, hey, it's Lenny Kravitz. But you know, I'm always professional. So Lenny Kravitz comes in, he walks into the studio, he walks towards me, someone is behind him, and the person behind him is Denzel Washington. And I'm like, what is going on? You know what I mean? It's just like an it's like an embarrassment of riches. It's like too much fine. It's like the building was gonna fall down. Like I was I was like, you gotta, you know, it's like you can't have like the president and vice president in the same place. It's like you can't have these two people together, it's just too much, right? And so I was like, you know what? I literally was like, why is I was I was appalled. I was just like, why is he here? And and and uh and Lenny was like, oh, you know, he's my best friend. And I was like, oh hell no. You know, I'm thinking, how is it that these people are these people are friends? You know, it doesn't make any sense. Like I was like, they have never they have never heard no. Okay. Anywhere, they go anywhere, man or woman. No, oh yeah, yeah. What do you want? What do you what do you want? It's like whatever you like, salt and pepper, they got it. What do you like? So so that was a great moment to discover that. And so I guess people are just now realizing, because I think this recent interview of Lenny Kravitz went viral. He talks about how Denzel is like part Denzel, I think he said we pronounced pronouncing his name incorrectly, but that um Denzel is his best friend, he's part of the family, and I said, I found that out 20 years ago, and I'm absolutely amused. Okay, yeah. That was a great moment in MTV history.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:38

That is a great moment. So if you weren't um doing expect it right now, what passion or career do you think you would be exploring?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:53

I would um I I would be, I I I would be a doctor, I think. Um you know, there's this theory that you do these shadow careers. It's like you you do something, you work adjacent to like the path not taken. And so at MTV, I'm someone that's like I can't sing, dance, or act, right? So um those are the three things I cannot do. And so I wanted to be very close to people who could do those things. Now, I could have been a doctor, I just had to make this decision. I remember in college, I had applied to some colleges as biochem major, and then I applied to Wharton, and then I just said I'm gonna go do business. But there was always this idea of like, what if I had gone into medicine? So I think that's why I do this because I get to work very closely with doctors. I sort of feel like I'm in the crew, you know what I mean? Right, right. I'm a plus one energy of it, yeah. Right, I'm a plus one in the medical world, so I like it. So I think I I had sometimes I was even thinking about that the other day. I was like, Maybe I just go in there and get a little degree in medicine, which is like a you know, kind of absurd at this point. But yes, that's what it would be.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:09

Wonderful, wonderful. I can see that you are out of line with that. What do you see for expect in the next three to five years? What are your dreams for it?

SPEAKER_01 1:05:18

Yeah, so our dreams for expect is to become the number one maternal fitness brand. So that so even beyond us is that when we think about pregnancy and the hallmarks of the of a healthy pregnancy, that fitness takes its rightful place with eating well, not drinking, not smoking, right? And once once the science truly proliferates, and it does take a while for public health messages to truly disseminate, right? I still remember it when I when I was a kid in the early 80s seeing every now and then you'd see a pregnant woman smoking, right? Even though the Surgeon General reports. Had come out in the 60s saying smoking was dangerous, but it took about 20 years for people to really at least to stop smoking in pregnancy. Now, I'm not saying that people are not doing it, but you don't see it, right? You don't see this anymore the way it used to be public media, yeah. Right? Used to see it happen. Um so that we will see people understand that pregnancy is a marathon, it's a it's an athletic event, it requires training, and that when people train for this maternal marathon, that they go to us first. And and we have done more work, we believe, than anyone else in terms of aligning with science, aligning with the experts in this. We're approaching it from medicine first, you know, versus fitness first, uh, so that we it can have the best results and and really have women feel safe uh in in what their uh regimens are. So um so that's that's our goal.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:08

Wonderful, beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:10

And that we save lives that we can say, you know, we've averted people who use expects, they have um you know, x percent lower risk of of avoidable C-sections and gestational diabetes and postporum depression and death. I mean, that's it, that we can actually say we have saved lives, and then we see these babies and they come up and and they're working, and we there's more to come with the babies that's coming. But that that and the babies are healthier and look at look at how beautiful they are. So that that's that's the goal.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:45

Got it. So building those real in real-time statistics that are now um like your report card. Yes, is why we say this works. Here's your proof.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:58

Absolutely. So get on board. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:01

Sounds wonderful, beautiful, thank you. This episode is brought to you by Empower Her Merch. Thoughtfully designed pieces created to support women in business, from journals and mugs to t-shirts and everyday reminders. Each item is rooted in clarity, intention, and care. They make meaningful gifts for the woman entrepreneur in your life or a beautiful way to honor yourself. You can explore the collection at your pace and carry this support with you wherever you work and create. Visit empowerherbusiness.us and shop today. You've been listening to the Empower Her Business Podcast. And before you go, I want to thank you for being here. If this episode supported you, please pay it forward. You can do that by hitting the follow button, rating us five stars, leaving a comment, and sharing us with others. This is how we ensure the podcast reaches more sisters in business. Until next time, I wish you the very best of joy, health, and wealth. Be well.