Techquity: Fostering Diversity and Wealth Creation in Tech with William A. Adams

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Welcome to night Beat Media's Living the
Dream podcast with your host Gregory Tucker,

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where we discussed the entrepreneur's journey of
turning a dream into reality, showing you

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how to learn, overcome, and
acquire strategic action steps. If you're ready

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to turn your dream into a reality, then get ready to take action.

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Here's your host, Gregory Tucker.
Welcome to this episode. Today, we

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have a very special guest with us. His name is William A. Adams.

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He is a technologist and engineering trail
blazer and a philanthropist. With over

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thirty five years in the tech industry, William has run his own company.

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He's been recorded in the Computer History
Museum, which is the equivalent of the

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Computer Hall of Fame, and served
as the first technical advisor to Microsoft's current

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CTO, Kevin Scott. William has
founded in overseeing global initiatives at Microsoft,

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from the XML technologies as early as
nineteen ninety eight to the d Diversity and

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Inclusion Initiatives in twenty fifteen, the
LEAP program with a focused on diverse hiring.

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He was named Microsoft's D and I
and that's Diversity and Inclusion Program of

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the Year in twenty twenty. Today
William is focused on techquity, and we're

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going to explore that a little later, the creation of intergenerational wealth through equity

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based shares of technology for women and
minority owned businesses. He is turning his

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years of experience in wisdom into actionable
tools for the creation of modern tech centered

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businesses. When he's not writing code, giving talks, or otherwise building technology,

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William enjoys woodworking, biking, and
the pleasures of family life. Let's

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welcome William to our show. Hey, hey, William, thank you,

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thank you for that intro. Now
I read all of that, so we

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know your titles. Now. We
always like to ask our guest to tell

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us about yourself. Yeah, well
about me, give me one second here.

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There was one of those issues I
had spoke about. Yeah, there

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we are, OK. Yeah,
well about about me. I've been in

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tech my whole life. I mean
literally, I got my first computer when

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I was twelve years old. And
that was way back in the day,

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back in the seventies, nineteen seventies, and that was the birth of the

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personal computers as actually before the Apple
computers came out just by a couple of

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years around the same time. So
I grew up in tech. I was

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self taught programming. I went to
UC Berkeley eventually and learned a bunch of

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stuff there, and my brother and
I started a company in nineteen eighty four

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called Adamation to do software, you
know, and this is the heyday of

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soccer in Silicon Valley, the birth
of like I said, Apple was roaring

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by then. Some companies that are
still around, like Adobe, were created

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and fermenting at that time. So
I just said technology, technology, Technology

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starved our way through, made a
little bit of money, made some famous

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sales, hooked up with Steve Jobs
for a while to sell his next computers,

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and then eventually in nineteen ninety eight, I went off to Microsoft and

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I was there for quite some time. I just retired from Microsoft last year

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actually about a year ago. But
this is things I've done. And at

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Microsoft, I did all sorts of
things technology related. But the crown and

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you kind of read it. In
twenty fifteen, I started this program called

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Leap because it was just a revelation. It's like, well, here I

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am black guy in tech. It's
time to give back, not just you

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know, not just to make money, but to give back to my community.

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And I would clearly stay. Up
until that point, I wasn't really

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thinking about my responsibility to my community, my home tribe, if you will.

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So I created this program because we
were like every other tech company saying,

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oh, we can't hire women of
the minorities. Where are they?

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There's not enough of them. It's
like, no, there's plenty of us.

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You're just not looking in the right
places, You're not thinking in the

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right way. So that's what I
did. So since that time, I've

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been much more focused on I know
that having an equity share of technology is

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what creates wealth. So that's what
I've been focused on doing. And since

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I've left Microsoft, that's that's my
focus. So that's that's me. And

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is that where the uh term tequity
would is something that you coined? Yeah?

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Yeah, now you'll you'll find other
uses of that term out there in

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the wild. But my I did
this about three years ago. I was

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just thinking, it's like, how
do I, in a single word,

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explain to people what I'm talking about? And tequity is like, well,

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technology, okay, fine, we
all know what technology is. It's computer

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stuff mostly, right, Automation Equity
is a harder one because people don't not

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all people understand what equity is.
Equity just means you own a piece of

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the thing. Right. I own
stock in Microsoft, Therefore I have an

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equity share. As their stock price
goes up, my wealth goes up because

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I own a piece of the company. Right. So tequity is combining those

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two things and saying owning a piece
of technology from a share perspective, meaning

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patents, shares, and stock running
companies that are tech based is a good

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thing because technology is where all the
money is at right now. Right If

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you go look at the Forbes list
of top hundred billionaires in the world or

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whatever it is, the top six
or eight are always tech bros, you

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know, and that tells you something. One hundred years ago, it would

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have been a bunch of industrialists,
right, railroad barons, steel, maybe

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tex stiles, bankers, stuff like
that. But today, and for the

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last ten years and probably for the
next twenty years, it's all tech people.

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That tells you the rising tide is
technology. So if you want to

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rise with that tide, you need
to own pieces of those tech companies so

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that you can also rise. Right. So that's what tequity is about,

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is just to inform people. It's
like you need ownership in technology, whether

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it be just as simple as buying
a few shares of Apple stock next time

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you buy an iPhone, you know, or when you do go to get

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that job, make sure you get
some stock options in whatever company it is

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you're going for, if it's a
tech company, or if you're going to

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create a company of your own that's
related to tech, you know, make

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sure you own your patents if there
are any, you know how to do

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your licensing deal set so you don't
give away your equity share of that stuff.

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So as that technology rises, your
wealth rises as well, and you

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get a pass it on to your
kids. So yeah, that's what tequity

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is all about, is to say
all that in one word, okay,

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And one thing I would like to
go back a little bit, and that

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is when you were in the seventies, you're tooling away far as in your

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garage or in a garage with your
brother to my bedroom, because you know,

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sometimes I kind of go back and
share a story my brother. He

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was a tinkerer, and that was
one of the things right there that we

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enjoyed sci fi movies. So a
lot of that gave us that feeling of

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okay, let's see how this works
right here. So first thing is taking

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away that little transistor radio in order
to see Okay, how does these pieces?

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Can you put it back together?
Exactly? Yeah? How was that

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when you were growing up? I
know you ran into some obstacles or there

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were some challenges because you know,
it's somewhat the norm for us in the

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African American community because usually it's like, okay, let's pursue sports or pursuit

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to that effect, or music,
but not not technology. Well, you

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know, it's an interesting one because
that was early enough that technology didn't even

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exist. I mean, when I
first knew anything about computers, I'm just

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trying to think. I had a
coach at the Boys and Girls Club named

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Jackie Robinson, and he was at
college and he was learning Fortram programming,

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and he had brought home for me
one time a computer print out and a

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book on programming. And I was
nine ten years old. Okay, I

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didn't have a computer at that time, but you know, that was my

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exposure to computers. My father was
a type of writer repairman, so I

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was used to the tinkering thing mechanically
at least, and then this computer thing.

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There's not a single child within a
five mile radius of where I lived.

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Who would have known anything about any
of that? Right now? I

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was also into sports, you know. My brother was into My brother was

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the big jock two and a half
years older than me, you know,

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so I followed his footsplit. I
played football, I played baseball, and

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later in life, I ran track
and all that. So I got out.

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But I was a shy, precrocious
kid. I was playing baseball.

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But at home, I'd tell my
mom, Mom, I went for Christmas.

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I want a physics set, I
want a chemistry set. I'm gonna

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build a box camera. You need
to go out and buy me some films

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so I can expose pictures in my
pinhole camera. You know, I was

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ten years old, right, This
is the kind of things. Mom.

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I'm gonna jack up your car so
I can take the wheels off and put

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them back on. You know.
That's the kind of kid I was.

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I had an erector set, which
was an old school like metal bars and

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things, construction set that I used
to build stuff out of. I would

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build forts out of cardboard boxes and
just all sorts of fun stuff like that.

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So that's the kind of kid I
was. I was a tinkerer,

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and I was very shy, and
I had a protective brothers, so no

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one would mess with me because my
brother would beat him up. Right So,

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at school, even if they thought
I was a little smart ass brainiac

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kid. Sorry for my language,
it's made it clear. You will not

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touch my brother. I don't care
if you have a problem with him,

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you think he's smart, alec or
anything. You come to me, I'll

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beat him up, you know,
but you will not touch my brother.

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So I was never touched by anybody
ever except for my brother, you know.

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So then finally when the computer did
come along, it was natural for

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me to just kind of take to
it like a duck to water. You

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know, it's like, here you
go. It was a computer given to

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me by my uncle. He worked
the Navy doing weapons something or other.

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He said, I've got this computer. You can have it. I got

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this a new thing, So,
you know, he gave me a computer,

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I gave me some books. You
know, here you go, good

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luck, And I just took to
it. You know. I taught myself

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and everything. I wrote little game
programs and did some hardware tinkering and whatnot.

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My mom knew I was like that. She just let me do my

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thing. But I still ran track, I still did baseball, still played

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football, right A had a few
friends. I did music, you know,

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I was in the marching band in
high school. And I still did

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all this other stuff. So it
was just like that. There was no

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We did not live in a big
black community. If anything. We lived

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in a big Mexican community, you
know, and we didn't mix to the

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point where there was any sort of
attitude of, like, what you're doing

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with those computers. By the time
the computer came along, we were in

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a more upscale neighborhood and like a
friend of mine, he did have a

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computer by that time, so it
was more upscale. So it was more

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natural that I might be doing something
like that. But I was isolated enough

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that no one would be. I
wouldn't listen to anyone's attitude, and I

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didn't care. Right, It's like
I was just doing my thing, you

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know. It's like playing with taking
apart TVs and radios and buying transistors tubes

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at the store. Mom, I
needed to go buy this tube to make

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this radio work, you know.
That's just what I did. So people

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probably kept me on the arm's length. It's like, oh, that guy's

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a whacko. We're not going to
play with you, and I don't care.

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So I just did my thing.
I never I never really experienced at

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a young age anyone saying what are
you doing with those computers? You're not

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going to be you know, I
never experienced any of that. Okay,

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So a pivotal point in your career, were they when you started going to

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Berkeley or we did that? Yeah? Yeah, it was certainly at Berkeley,

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so nineteen eighty four. So I
went out to college in eighty two

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and buy eighty four, my brother
and I decided, oh, we're going

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to start a company, because why
not, That's what everyone was doing,

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right, going to do a company. And we had an aunt who worked

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at IBM, who showed us how
to write a business plan and all this

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sort of stuff. So we just
it was just a natural. I was

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the manager of the computer store at
UC Berkeley for a while, so I

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was around the birth of the Macintosh
computer from Apple. You know, we

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sold a bunch of them. We
actually made a piece of hardware for so

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you could have a joystick on a
mac and you know, so it was

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natural and with all our classmates and
with all the just Silicon Valley around us,

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starting a company is just what you
did right now, So we just

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did. We we just say,
all right, we're going to start a

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company. We're going to do some
stuff education for application, We're going to

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teach people how to use computers.
And so we did have some challenges in

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the earliest days where we had a
hard time getting a bank account. You

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know, and I've told this story
before. Where was it because of your

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age? So I'm telling you I
don't know, but what they told us,

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they just tried to discourage us,
like, oh, companies fail and

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blah blah blah. It's like,
look, I mean I already had a

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bank account, a personal bank account
like Wells Fargo whatever. We just want

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to open a business bank account.
We didn't want to borrow money. We

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just went to deposit money that we
had gotten from sales, right, And

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this one banker like, no,
no, not gonna happen. No,

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It's like huh, I wonder So
we complained to the Better Business Bureau and

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all that sort of stuff, and
then we went off to some other bank

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and they yeah, no problem,
here you go, here's a bank account.

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So you know, I'd love to
say, yeah, it was it

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was because we're young, but no, I mean the other bank had no

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problem. So something was I miss
there, you know. And usually when

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things like that knife heard, and
sometimes I've experienced the things like that,

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it tends to kind of put fire
in the belly. You look and say,

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oh no, I'll show you now, I gotta show you. So

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that meant to dig in deeper and
I get to work harder. Yeah,

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And that's that's probably what it did
for us. We were not discouraged in

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the least. We were perturbed and
like, oh no, you don't you

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know, you're not going to keep
us down. And there's other there's other

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places where you know, we did
explicitly get told we will not deal with

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people like you. And that was
like the VC community at that time.

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It's like, what do you mean
people like us? You mean handsome young

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black men with curly hair. Do
you mean you see Berkeley people? What

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are you talking about? So there
were certainly Silicon Valley is is is not

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a complete meritocracy. But we never
let that get us down. We're just

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like, well, we're smart people. We're just gonna do what we're gonna

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do. So so but but that
was the beginning, was you know,

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college years where we just started a
company and then went on from there.

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So would you say one of the
major assets or soft skills that you and

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your brother possessed and that was curiosity? Oh yeah, I thought you were

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going to go more. I was
going to say curiosity and your imagination.

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Curiosity, imagination, fortitude, stubbornness, you know, veracity. I mean,

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yeah, there's a number of attributes, but certainly one of the strongest

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ones I would say is imagination.
You had to dream big, right because

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we we were out there young.
I mean think we're like twenty something,

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twenty two, twenty one, two
twenty three, pretty young, and it

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wasn't quite the environment that we have
today in terms of entrepreneurship. It was

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much more wrong and at that time, most of the companies were more hardware

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companies than software companies. But you
know, we had a dream. It's

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like, we're gonna make it big, We're gonna be on the world stage,

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We're going to create software that no
one's ever seen before. And we

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had to believe it. And it's
like we're we're freaking geniuses, you know,

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let me show you. And we
did have stuff that for that day

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was unique and different and no one
else did have it, and we did

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get sales in a very small pond. So yeah, you had to have

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belief in yourself and this is true
today. Right. You have to have

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a vision, you have to have
us, you have to be right about

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something, and you have to have
a strong belief in yourself that your vision

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is as powerful as anyone else's vision. Right, it's like why not me?

240
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Right, It's like yeah, like
that, Now, would you share

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with us some of your failures?
Also? Let me get my list?

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So, I mean, the failures
can be categorized in probably different ways.

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There's failures to I don't know,
failures to catch trends, failures to see

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the writing on the wall, failures
to capitalize on an opportunity, failures to

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leave something behind when you really should
have. And I'll give you an example

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of that. We were into this
thing called Next Computers, which was Steve

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Jobs had left Apple for a while
and created this thing called Next Computers,

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and we were on that platform with
trying to make sales there for a long

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time, and we failed to see
that it wasn't going anywhere and that we

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should have shifted to being on Windows
or the Mac perhaps earlier than we did,

251
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and we never did, so we
kind of went down with the ship

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as next went down. Now next
got to they got bought by Apple,

253
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so you know, they lived on. But we were pretty much done with

254
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that at that time, and then
shifted to some other business that was one

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and it's like, Okay, we
failed to catch we failed to see that.

256
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We were a big fish in a
small pond, and the small pond

257
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was drying up, and we didn't
get off fast enough to do whatever the

258
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next thing was. I actually left
Adamation at that point and joined Microsoft.

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That was nineteen ninety eight. My
brother continued onward with another incarnation of the

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company doing some other stuff, but
I wasn't involved with it at that point.

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There's there's plenty of failures of my
life at Microsoft itself, and they

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get enhanced with things like how did
you deal with the personnel situations or product

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situations, or how not to upset
the wrong people, how to climb the

264
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ladder or not climb the ladder,
how to identify your your detractors and avoid

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them or deal with them better.
So there's a myriad things like that that

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I've certainly gone through personally, but
there are they're just lessons. Hopefully you

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learn from them and go on to
fight another day. Right, And that

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is one of those things. That's
why I asked those questions right there,

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is about the failures because that's part
of that journey, because yeah, we

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start out then there's the ultimate outcome
right there, but it's the journey in

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between right there, right before getting
to your destination. Yeah. Yeah,

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And let me just say one thing
here because it's kind of critical to how

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I think. At some point,
and this came much later in life when

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I was abound forty, I was
sitting on a beach and Yo, I

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was about to go off to live
in India for a while, and I

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came to the realization I created this
thing called my life creed, which is

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words I live by, you know. And the l in life is learning,

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learning, intentional, fearless, empathetic. And the learning part was the

279
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most important because I basically told myself
and tell myself daily life is about learning,

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right, no matter what, no
matter how good or bad something is,

281
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you have to learn something from it. It's therefore you to learn.

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So I take that everything I do
there's something to be learned and that makes

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for a more fulfilling life and it
makes for better progress. Right, Oh,

284
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yes, definitely. Now, as
one of the first black entrepreneurs in

285
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Silicon Valley, you've had a unique
perspective as far as on the tech industry.

286
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What advice do you have for aspiring
entrepreneurs, especially those from the underrepresented

287
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backgrounds, who are looking to break
into the industry. Yeah. I think

288
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what I would say generally is to
at this point, and this is,

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you know, twenty twenty three,
the age of AI is on the rise,

290
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you know, which is pretty monumental
of a shift. First and foremost

291
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is to understand that the the industry
is no longer a singular thing anymore.

292
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When I was coming up, the
industry meant the hardware companies, the software

293
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companies like Apple, Adobe, Microsoft, Oracle. That was the tech industry.

294
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Today tech is everywhere, So tech
is across all industries. So you

295
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don't have to break into the industry. You just have to find the tech

296
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angle to whatever industry you're interested in. So the way I tell people to

297
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break in is essentially to say,
what are you passionate about, whether it

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be baking or makeup or hair design
or farming or automobile repair. What are

299
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you interested in? What is the
tech angle to that? Right? How

300
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can you leverage technology to make whatever
that thing is better? Right? And

301
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then focus on that. So if
I'm into farming, I would say,

302
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well, the hot thing in farming
right now other than automating tractors, you

303
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know, and John Deere does this. They're GPS guided, you plot in

304
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of course, and you just tell
it to run, you know, is

305
00:27:17.880 --> 00:27:22.279
gathering data from the fields, analyzing
it and coming up with watering patterns.

306
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Oh, the field is dryer over
here, and these fertilizer over there,

307
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And you can tune the watering systems
and the fertilizer systems to be more targeted

308
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and therefore use less of the inputs. Right. Don't pour water where it's

309
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not needed, right, Don't don't
buy fertilizer and put it on places where

310
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it's not needed, because you're going
to overfertilize the other places. Right.

311
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So a farmer, someone who's into
farming, who has a tech bent to

312
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them, is like, leverage all
the get all the tech angles you can

313
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get, because that's going to make
your farming more efficient and you're yielding is

314
00:28:00.160 --> 00:28:03.119
going to be better and you're gonna
make better profit or whatever your thing is.

315
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So that's how I tell people to
get into it. What I do

316
00:28:07.079 --> 00:28:11.359
not tell people to do. And
I was just having this debate today with

317
00:28:11.440 --> 00:28:18.200
someone, is we're past the time
where you just go to college, get

318
00:28:18.240 --> 00:28:22.640
a four year degree in CS and
then go look for the job. We're

319
00:28:22.759 --> 00:28:26.480
past that time. And I know
plenty of people say, are you kidding

320
00:28:26.480 --> 00:28:30.799
me? Don't discourage people from going
to college. I'm telling you, by

321
00:28:30.839 --> 00:28:36.079
the time four years from now,
if you think AI and things like chat

322
00:28:36.160 --> 00:28:41.519
GPT, you're good. Now roll
forward four more years. That thing's only

323
00:28:41.559 --> 00:28:44.400
been out for a year. I
don't know if you know what chat gipt

324
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is, but yes, yes,
yes, yeah, So chat gpt has

325
00:28:48.519 --> 00:28:52.920
only been out for a year,
okay, and it's already got people and

326
00:28:53.039 --> 00:29:00.359
it issy roll forward four more years. Where's that gonna be. If you're

327
00:29:00.400 --> 00:29:04.359
chasing those tail lights, you're not
gonna get anywhere, right. So that's

328
00:29:04.400 --> 00:29:08.759
why I say it's like, Okay, go to college for your socialization,

329
00:29:10.720 --> 00:29:17.240
for this, for that, study
the humanities, and in all the spare

330
00:29:17.279 --> 00:29:22.759
time that you have, study chat
GPT as a tool that you can use

331
00:29:22.799 --> 00:29:27.880
to get stuff done, right,
that's how you get into stuff because you're

332
00:29:27.920 --> 00:29:32.519
gonna learn a lot faster that way, and you're gonna be more useful that

333
00:29:32.599 --> 00:29:34.720
way. So by the time you
come out two years, four years down

334
00:29:34.759 --> 00:29:38.480
the line, you're equipped with the
right tools. If you don't do that

335
00:29:38.880 --> 00:29:44.119
and you follow the standard curriculum that
they currently have in colleges, you're gonna

336
00:29:44.119 --> 00:29:47.799
come out and you're gonna be four
years behind the times. Right, you're

337
00:29:47.799 --> 00:29:52.880
not gonna be employable. And all
the people that did learn that CHAT,

338
00:29:52.920 --> 00:29:56.920
GPT and other things tools like that, they're light years ahead of you.

339
00:29:56.920 --> 00:30:02.720
You know. It's it's literally the
difference between between you going to school to

340
00:30:02.799 --> 00:30:07.079
learn how to do animal husbandry and
how to deal with a horse and a

341
00:30:07.119 --> 00:30:12.680
buggy and your neighbor going to learn
how to deal with the new horseless carriage.

342
00:30:14.240 --> 00:30:18.759
Right, that's the difference, right. And it seems hyperbolic, like

343
00:30:18.799 --> 00:30:22.640
I said, Oh, it's not
that traumatic. It's like, yes,

344
00:30:22.680 --> 00:30:27.160
it is. It's literally one of
those transition points in human evolution. But

345
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right there, right, And that's
one of the key things that you had

346
00:30:33.000 --> 00:30:40.559
mentioned, and that is it really
takes some self reflection, you know,

347
00:30:40.720 --> 00:30:45.559
inspection, and that is to look
and see what are some of your passions,

348
00:30:45.480 --> 00:30:55.240
what really strike your curiosity, just
like the technology or computers struck your

349
00:30:55.599 --> 00:31:00.200
curiosity when you were growing up,
And that is something that people need to

350
00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:07.799
look at right there, I think, And I'm not a I'm a trained

351
00:31:07.880 --> 00:31:17.319
psychologist or behavioral scientist, but one
of the things it seems to happen,

352
00:31:17.400 --> 00:31:21.519
and that is with chat GPT,
because it is all over the news,

353
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It's almost everywhere, and you see
the fear in any people's eyes that hey,

354
00:31:30.400 --> 00:31:36.359
this is going to sideline me put
me out of work, which as

355
00:31:36.400 --> 00:31:38.960
you alluded to, and that is
it is just another tool right there.

356
00:31:41.319 --> 00:31:45.119
You know, when the car came, it didn't put the farmers out of

357
00:31:45.200 --> 00:31:48.279
work, you know, far as
with the horses. The horses, you

358
00:31:48.319 --> 00:31:53.640
know, they were still being used
right there, but it just allowed them

359
00:31:53.759 --> 00:32:00.759
to carry more stuff in a faster
period of time or transit in a paster

360
00:32:00.880 --> 00:32:06.799
period time. Yeah. Yeah,
I mean the technology as a tool is

361
00:32:07.559 --> 00:32:12.440
a challenging one, particularly when we
don't understand it, right. I Mean

362
00:32:12.519 --> 00:32:15.400
we can all say chat GPT,
but the number of people you know who

363
00:32:15.519 --> 00:32:21.720
actually understand how it works, including
the people who are building it, is

364
00:32:21.880 --> 00:32:27.880
really small, right. I mean
the scientists that are building these things.

365
00:32:27.920 --> 00:32:30.519
I know these people because you know, they're my friends at Microsoft and other

366
00:32:30.559 --> 00:32:35.680
places. They're like, we don't
know, We're not sure how this certain

367
00:32:35.720 --> 00:32:42.039
behavior has come because some of it's
emergent behavior. Throw enough computers at a

368
00:32:42.079 --> 00:32:45.480
problem, give it enough data,
something magic starts to happen. I mean

369
00:32:45.480 --> 00:32:49.400
some of it we program, but
most of it were like, we don't

370
00:32:49.400 --> 00:32:52.559
know how it did that. You
know, So it can be kind of

371
00:32:52.599 --> 00:32:59.279
tricky that way. But you can
just say it is a tool, and

372
00:33:00.559 --> 00:33:04.200
it's going to evolve, and we
can just learn how to evolve with the

373
00:33:04.240 --> 00:33:08.799
tool and will become more powerful and
will have more time to think more creatively.

374
00:33:10.759 --> 00:33:15.240
I will say. And when we're
talking about education, I said,

375
00:33:15.400 --> 00:33:20.200
you know, go take the humanities. What's critical for this particular tool,

376
00:33:20.440 --> 00:33:24.359
more so than any tool we've created
in history, is that we need to

377
00:33:24.480 --> 00:33:29.920
program in and this is hard because
we don't program it. We need to

378
00:33:30.000 --> 00:33:37.319
program in ethics, We need to
reduce bias, we need to ensure that

379
00:33:37.359 --> 00:33:45.599
it understands and understands and serves humanity. Right. This is why my ability

380
00:33:45.640 --> 00:33:52.039
to write code is becoming less and
less important and my ability to communicate with

381
00:33:52.119 --> 00:33:58.400
this thing and express to it that
it needs to be humane is becoming more

382
00:33:58.440 --> 00:34:05.839
important. Right, So I'd rather
you go to school and learn about philosophy,

383
00:34:06.119 --> 00:34:10.079
psychology, you know, the various
humanity, art, the various humanities,

384
00:34:10.119 --> 00:34:16.280
because if we don't, this tool
could possibly snuff us out. Right,

385
00:34:16.400 --> 00:34:22.400
if it's only motives or things like
a profit motive or this person getting

386
00:34:22.400 --> 00:34:27.480
ahead of that person, that does
not bode well for humanity, right,

387
00:34:28.159 --> 00:34:32.519
because it'll just leave us behind as
an inefficiency. So we have to ensure

388
00:34:32.719 --> 00:34:38.360
that the machine cares about us.
Or when we ask it what's the best

389
00:34:38.440 --> 00:34:42.760
way of feeding one hundred people,
it's going to come up with the answer,

390
00:34:43.000 --> 00:34:49.920
well, kill the other two hundred. So right, science fiction like

391
00:34:50.039 --> 00:34:53.960
Spock, Yes, I mean we
had to be careful. We're now at

392
00:34:54.000 --> 00:35:00.000
that point where all the stuff we
knew as science fiction is today, right,

393
00:35:00.880 --> 00:35:02.679
So we have to be careful,
and we had to think about Okay,

394
00:35:02.880 --> 00:35:07.880
this thing is capable of a great
many things. Let's be careful what

395
00:35:07.880 --> 00:35:15.039
we asked for. Now, I'm
going to transition over to the leap program.

396
00:35:15.199 --> 00:35:21.039
Okay, hitting up right there,
could you tell us more about that?

397
00:35:22.320 --> 00:35:25.800
Yeah? Sure, So leap came
about because there's a challenge of,

398
00:35:27.559 --> 00:35:30.119
well, this challenge of how do
you hire more women and minorities, right,

399
00:35:30.679 --> 00:35:38.320
and particularly in tech, where we
classically say things like they don't meet

400
00:35:38.360 --> 00:35:43.199
the bar, there's not enough of
them, we couldn't find qualified people,

401
00:35:43.760 --> 00:35:46.599
you know, it's just this litany
of reasons why we can't hire these people.

402
00:35:47.239 --> 00:35:52.719
And I just wanted to break the
back of that, that that trope.

403
00:35:52.920 --> 00:35:55.639
You know. It's like, well, there's plenty of smart people in

404
00:35:55.679 --> 00:36:00.400
the world that are women and minorities, we just have to look different.

405
00:36:00.320 --> 00:36:06.440
And it's the realization that the way
that we get people into tech jobs typically

406
00:36:06.559 --> 00:36:13.519
is a company, a large tech
company will have interns from college and that's

407
00:36:13.559 --> 00:36:15.360
how you get in, right,
It's like you interned with us. We

408
00:36:15.440 --> 00:36:21.840
have a couple of thousand a year. We make offers based on internships,

409
00:36:22.039 --> 00:36:25.199
and if you didn't come through our
intern program, then you're an industry higher.

410
00:36:25.480 --> 00:36:29.119
Well, the industry higher means that
you're just going to hire whoever is

411
00:36:29.119 --> 00:36:34.280
already an industry, which invariably is
you know, not women in minorities.

412
00:36:35.000 --> 00:36:37.280
So it's a vicious cycle. It's
like you didn't come through college and you

413
00:36:37.320 --> 00:36:40.960
weren't around for ten years to be
an industry higher. Therefore you're just never

414
00:36:42.000 --> 00:36:46.280
in the pipeline. So Leep essentially
said, well, hold on, what

415
00:36:46.320 --> 00:36:52.480
we need to do is produce a
program whereby we can go to other industries,

416
00:36:52.920 --> 00:36:54.400
find the people where they are,
and they so happen to be like

417
00:36:54.480 --> 00:37:00.039
coding academies or community colleges or various
other avenues other than the top fifteen schools

418
00:37:00.039 --> 00:37:05.440
in the country. Let's get those
people in, let's give them a chance.

419
00:37:05.519 --> 00:37:10.559
Let's give them an internship like environment. So sixteen week program and they

420
00:37:10.599 --> 00:37:15.320
pretty much do what interns did,
you know, some coding and working in

421
00:37:15.320 --> 00:37:20.000
the team and all that sort of
stuff, and then let the hiring manager

422
00:37:20.039 --> 00:37:23.079
make a hiring decision after that time. So that was the essence of the

423
00:37:23.119 --> 00:37:29.800
program, was to run it in
cohorts. Started out with only eight ladies,

424
00:37:30.599 --> 00:37:34.880
and then we've got a twenty,
and then thirty, and then the

425
00:37:34.880 --> 00:37:38.239
cohorts were fifty at a time or
however many they are, and now they're

426
00:37:38.280 --> 00:37:44.960
run around the world. So that
was the lead program was essentially to create

427
00:37:45.159 --> 00:37:51.719
an internship program for industry hires.
Now it's called an apprenticeship program. So

428
00:37:52.360 --> 00:37:55.559
we created that program and they're still
running it today. So from twenty fifteen

429
00:37:55.559 --> 00:38:01.400
to nownce what eight years running,
it's been getting women and minorities into the

430
00:38:01.400 --> 00:38:10.159
company. And as someone who has
continuously grown and evolved in your career,

431
00:38:10.880 --> 00:38:20.880
what habits or practices have you contributed
to your personal and professional growth? And

432
00:38:21.199 --> 00:38:30.599
any recommendations you would have for or
resources or habits for someone else to improve

433
00:38:30.599 --> 00:38:36.159
their self improvement or in the area
of self improvement. Yeah, I suppose

434
00:38:36.199 --> 00:38:43.199
they'll These will just sound typical.
But first and foremost is a health regiment,

435
00:38:44.360 --> 00:38:50.920
meaning fitness is important. I'm Muslims, so I wake up very early

436
00:38:50.920 --> 00:38:53.400
in the morning, I do a
prayer. I think spirituality is probably important.

437
00:38:53.480 --> 00:38:58.440
You need something to anchor you.
You know, it's hard to be

438
00:38:58.519 --> 00:39:01.079
out in the world thinking big idea
ideas and not have anything to fall back

439
00:39:01.119 --> 00:39:06.559
on, like why am I doing
any of this right? So, having

440
00:39:06.599 --> 00:39:10.719
a point of view that's rooted in
some sort of philosophy or religion or whatever

441
00:39:10.800 --> 00:39:15.920
does it for you is useful.
Having an exercise program where you're trying to

442
00:39:15.920 --> 00:39:20.639
stay healthy, particularly in tech where
you're sitting down all day long, it's

443
00:39:20.679 --> 00:39:25.679
like you have to exercise or by
the time you're forty, you're suffering heart

444
00:39:25.719 --> 00:39:32.320
attacks and strokes and other stuff because
you're just not moving right. So having

445
00:39:32.400 --> 00:39:37.559
an exercise program these days, I'm
I picked up a mountain bikes, so

446
00:39:38.199 --> 00:39:43.599
you know, I'm riding bicycle,
being challenged by my son, you know,

447
00:39:43.800 --> 00:39:47.880
all that sort of stuff. Reserving
time for family if that's what you're

448
00:39:49.119 --> 00:39:52.199
If you have that, I mean
there has to be a cut off point.

449
00:39:52.239 --> 00:39:54.559
Now I don't always do perfect on
this one. You have to have

450
00:39:54.599 --> 00:39:58.800
a cutoff point where it's like,
okay, I'm now present, especially when

451
00:39:58.840 --> 00:40:00.719
you're working at home. You know, you have to be able to say,

452
00:40:00.840 --> 00:40:05.920
okay, I opened the door at
six o'clock or five thirty or whenever

453
00:40:05.960 --> 00:40:08.599
it is, and once the door
is open, I'm now in the family.

454
00:40:08.679 --> 00:40:14.719
I'm not at work right. So
making sure that you're keeping your relationships

455
00:40:15.679 --> 00:40:21.559
good. And then from a technical
standpoint, I've been I code a lot.

456
00:40:21.760 --> 00:40:24.320
So I write code, and I've
been writing code since I was twelve,

457
00:40:24.440 --> 00:40:30.800
so it's just a habit for me. But I also read a lot

458
00:40:30.840 --> 00:40:36.960
of code other people's code because I'm
always trying to learn. I think I've

459
00:40:37.000 --> 00:40:43.039
counted ten different coding languages that I've
actually used over the years. So over

460
00:40:43.079 --> 00:40:50.000
the course of some forty years,
I've learned, used, and perhaps lost

461
00:40:50.519 --> 00:40:55.960
ten languages, ten different programming languages. I read papers on the latest and

462
00:40:57.079 --> 00:41:02.079
greatest stuff, right, because,
uh, if you knew something four or

463
00:41:02.079 --> 00:41:07.000
five years ago, chances are it's
no longer the latest and greatest anymore.

464
00:41:07.039 --> 00:41:09.679
So you've got to look up every
once in a while, you know.

465
00:41:10.559 --> 00:41:14.400
And then on top of all of
it, is I have a personal mission,

466
00:41:14.519 --> 00:41:20.480
right, It's like tequity, for
example, whereas I've written down words

467
00:41:20.519 --> 00:41:23.159
that I want to live by and
a mission that I want to live by,

468
00:41:23.880 --> 00:41:29.360
and I check in with myself regularly. Am I living that mission?

469
00:41:30.280 --> 00:41:37.320
And that goes into even things like
what I invest in philanthropically or where I

470
00:41:37.400 --> 00:41:39.519
go. It's like, is this
related to my personal mission or not?

471
00:41:40.199 --> 00:41:44.840
And if it's not, I don't
need it. So that's what I do.

472
00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:46.960
All of it seems like a lot, but it's not. It's just

473
00:41:47.079 --> 00:41:52.280
regular habits, right, okay.
And if that leads me, that kind

474
00:41:52.280 --> 00:41:58.920
of goes into something else in that
collaboration, Because you had mentioned that you're

475
00:41:59.519 --> 00:42:06.000
use something to read other coders work
in order to or their papers in order

476
00:42:06.039 --> 00:42:09.880
to stay up to date faras with
the current trends, because that's something you

477
00:42:10.000 --> 00:42:16.239
learned when you were working with next
is hey looking for those trends right there

478
00:42:16.320 --> 00:42:23.760
and knowing when do you pivot?
Yeah? What would you say it important

479
00:42:24.159 --> 00:42:32.639
for developing collaborative partnerships for an entrepreneur
out there. What advice would you or

480
00:42:32.760 --> 00:42:38.320
suggestions you would do? Probably the
strongest one is about knowing yourself and knowing

481
00:42:38.320 --> 00:42:44.400
your limitations so that you know how
to find someone that compliments you. Right,

482
00:42:44.719 --> 00:42:45.960
And I don't mean, hey,
you have a nice shirt that you're

483
00:42:45.960 --> 00:42:50.280
wearing, but I mean has the
skills that you don't. Right, So

484
00:42:50.559 --> 00:42:58.800
I know that I do not prefer
to do things like accounting, okay,

485
00:43:00.119 --> 00:43:02.280
scheduling meetings, you know, all
these other sorts of things. So I

486
00:43:02.400 --> 00:43:09.320
personally have a digital virtual assistant,
and when I partner with somebody, I'm

487
00:43:09.360 --> 00:43:15.880
partner with somebody else. We're doing
we're going to produce some content. And

488
00:43:15.920 --> 00:43:22.960
she's excellent as a project manager,
whereas I'm excellent as the technical advisor,

489
00:43:22.960 --> 00:43:27.840
if you will. So I know
that I don't like doing the project management

490
00:43:27.840 --> 00:43:30.280
stuff. I can do it,
but I'm not as great at that as

491
00:43:30.320 --> 00:43:36.719
I am at the programming. So
I think it takes understanding. I mean,

492
00:43:36.800 --> 00:43:38.280
you have to be honest with yourself, right, It's like you have

493
00:43:38.360 --> 00:43:44.360
to understand what are you actually really
good at, what do you enjoy doing?

494
00:43:45.360 --> 00:43:49.480
And knowing the bigger pictures, Like, well, for any successful venture,

495
00:43:49.519 --> 00:43:53.440
you need these five qualities. So
identify the ones that you're not great

496
00:43:53.480 --> 00:43:59.239
at and find people that are great
at those things. Right, Yeah,

497
00:43:59.280 --> 00:44:01.320
and then the other part, if
it is, come to it, it's

498
00:44:01.400 --> 00:44:07.559
worth the effort to come to a
shared mission upfront with whoever that partners are.

499
00:44:07.639 --> 00:44:10.039
It's like when you go to someone
and say, here's my vision,

500
00:44:10.519 --> 00:44:15.079
this is what I want to work
on, so you know up front where

501
00:44:15.079 --> 00:44:16.760
you're trying to go. If you
don't do that, you just say,

502
00:44:16.800 --> 00:44:20.400
hey, you want to work together, then it's going to take you a

503
00:44:20.400 --> 00:44:22.760
long time and as soon as you
run into a problem or challenges, you're

504
00:44:22.760 --> 00:44:25.440
going to be at each other's throats. No we should go this direction,

505
00:44:25.519 --> 00:44:30.119
No we should go this direction.
It's like settle that before you even start,

506
00:44:30.559 --> 00:44:35.519
know which direction you want to go
in jointly. Then it makes everything

507
00:44:35.559 --> 00:44:40.440
else easier because it falls in line. No, that is that's some great

508
00:44:40.880 --> 00:44:50.039
advice right there, and again we
really appreciate I really appreciate you taking the

509
00:44:50.119 --> 00:44:55.920
time far as to come on and
share all these golden nuggets wisdom right there,

510
00:44:57.599 --> 00:45:02.039
and someone it will be taken away, you know, getting a lot

511
00:45:02.280 --> 00:45:08.920
far as from this right here,
because that is something key, and that

512
00:45:09.119 --> 00:45:16.440
is partnering when you're collaborating with someone, making sure that it's not just because

513
00:45:16.760 --> 00:45:23.039
okay, you're duplicating the same efforts
right there, because sometimes that can be

514
00:45:23.119 --> 00:45:29.599
a detriment right there. And really
to know yourself, you know, because

515
00:45:29.599 --> 00:45:35.360
that's the hard sometimes that can be
the hardest person to really understand, and

516
00:45:35.480 --> 00:45:38.239
that is self, right, Yeah, especially when you're trying to come to

517
00:45:38.280 --> 00:45:46.119
grips with your true self, right
and not your elevated ego colored self exactly

518
00:45:46.199 --> 00:45:52.159
exactly. Now. You also do
a podcast, right I started to do

519
00:45:52.199 --> 00:45:57.159
a podcast, Yeah, just starting
okay, And what's the name of the

520
00:45:57.159 --> 00:46:01.360
podcast. Well, it's the Technicity
Podcast. But we've only done one intro

521
00:46:01.599 --> 00:46:07.519
so far, and we're now currently
working on the scripts for the what do

522
00:46:07.559 --> 00:46:12.480
we call this the Winter season?
Oh, but yeah, it's gonna be

523
00:46:12.639 --> 00:46:17.320
talking about of course, tequity and
in particular some of the subjects we talked

524
00:46:17.320 --> 00:46:22.719
about today, like AI and effects
and what to do about AI and all

525
00:46:22.800 --> 00:46:27.719
that. So, okay, now, if someone wants to get in contact

526
00:46:27.760 --> 00:46:32.559
with you, now I have some
of the contact information right here. Yeah,

527
00:46:32.599 --> 00:46:38.000
there you go, William A William
dash a dash Adams dot com.

528
00:46:38.880 --> 00:46:44.400
Uh. And then you get to
all my other stuff from there. Okay,

529
00:46:44.440 --> 00:46:50.639
and I put X there because Twitter
is now x oh yeah, good

530
00:46:50.679 --> 00:46:57.480
old Twitter. Okay. So,
in partying words, sir, in parting

531
00:46:57.519 --> 00:47:04.239
words, what would you like to
share or a message of inspiration or encouragement

532
00:47:05.519 --> 00:47:13.920
for listeners viewers that they can take
with them. I'll throw out two more

533
00:47:14.440 --> 00:47:22.320
classic analogies. The first one is
we do not need to get a set

534
00:47:22.360 --> 00:47:25.079
at someone else's table, We need
to build our own tables. That's the

535
00:47:25.119 --> 00:47:30.760
first one. And the second one
is a rising tide lists all boats.

536
00:47:30.760 --> 00:47:35.440
So let's not be shackled to the
shores where we drown. Let's build some

537
00:47:35.599 --> 00:47:43.199
boats. And those boats can be
built off of technology, and that is

538
00:47:43.559 --> 00:47:52.119
great words of inspiration right there again, William, thank you very much,

539
00:47:52.800 --> 00:47:58.400
thanks for listening to night Beat Media's
Living the Dream. If you enjoyed this

540
00:47:58.519 --> 00:48:01.840
podcast, please live a comment or
hit follow and subscribe on our late so

541
00:48:01.960 --> 00:48:07.880
you can stay up to date on
new episodes until next time. When writing

542
00:48:07.960 --> 00:48:10.440
the story of your life, be
sure you're holding the pen