We talk to StartOut members about how StartOut can better support Black LGBTQ entrepreneurs.
By: StartOut
We could all feel that this Black History Month was going to be different than those in previous years. We knew as an organization that the events of 2020 had a large impact on a lot of our members, especially those in the Black community who experienced the compounding of the COVID-19 pandemic and the murder of George Floyd in a more visceral way. We spoke to some of those members about how their business was affected by the events of 2020 and how StartOut can best support Black entrepreneurs. But we also wanted to see what they have in store for 2021 and beyond.
How did the events of 2020 impact your business?
For DuMarkus Davis, the Founder and CEO of Musicbuk, the pandemic required a quick adjustment from providing an in-person music lesson service to a virtual one, which led to unexpected upsides for customers. “Geographic location was no longer an issue, students now had access to great teachers from all over the world. Students in rural areas could now receive lessons from instructors in big cities like New York. It’s really broken down a lot of barriers for customers.”
Leading up to 2020, Stephanie Lampkin, Founder and CEO of Blendoor, noticed the combination of the pandemic and the killing of George Floyd hit people a bit differently. “It’s interesting because even though you’ve seen the interest in DEI increase you haven’t necessarily seen the action, and so for that reason, we pivoted our product to focus more on what actual behaviors these companies are exhibiting to show they care about these things beyond public statements.”
Initially, the pandemic impacted the work Dr. Tiffany Jana, a current StartOut Board Member, the CEO of TMI Consulting Inc, and Co-Founder of Loom Technologies, did outside of their company, requiring a step back from various other boards and councils. “After George Floyd was murdered, we had the anti-racism and the uprisings across the country and across the world and suddenly the work I’ve been doing at a steady pace for over 20 years just went through the roof in terms of demand, but because of the pandemic we shifted 100% of our service offerings to virtual just in time.”
How does the intersectionality of being Black and LGBTQ impact you as an entrepreneur?
A year ago, Demetrius Curry, CEO and Founder of College Cash, would have never considered doing this interview. Not being out in his professional career, Demetrius felt like he had to be two people, working hard to not let those two aspects of his life overlap. “I wasn’t out to anybody, and that can really affect you as a founder. If you can’t truly be yourself as a founder it’s going to affect how you pitch, how you have meetings. There’s already enough obstacles being African-American, but once you can fully be yourself on a personal level you can embrace your role as a founder and startup CEO.”
In terms of intersectionality, both Dr. Jana and Stephanie identify with more than just their Black and Queer identities. As Stephanie explained, “I’m at the intersectionality of four marginalized groups, but the Black part of it is so overpowering it’s hard for me to describe the other 3 in any detail. Being Black is by far the hardest thing I have to deal with, while being Queer is the least impactful thing on my life.”
In Dr. Jana’s case, through the diversity work that they do, it’s always been important to them because they represent five underrepresented identities. “All of the onsets of my personal identity play into the way I see the world, the way I experience the world, and certainly the business that I do. I was always prepared to be Black in a corporate environment because people see that, they experience that first while my Queerness has largely been invisible, and what’s happened now is I’m feeling a really strong pull to lead in that space, especially since I began identifying as Non-Binary.”
“Being Black and a Founder is hard enough,” expressed DuMarkus, “but being LGBT adds another difficult level of nuance to an already difficult industry when it comes down to it, and we’d like to think the world has become more accepting, but that’s harder depending on where you’re located. But I see it as my differences are what make me who I am, what makes me special.” For DuMarkus, he wants to be the example for those who come after him.
How can StartOut and the Queer community better support Black entrepreneurs?
“Understand that we still face one more hurdle than the rest of the community,” confided Demetrius. “Before anyone learns that we’re LGBT, you’re Black, so understanding why it’s harder to be ourselves due to those inherent biases is important. And seeing diversity represented outside of those who are exceptional but rather those just getting started, or working on things in the background makes us feel more comfortable.”
For Stephanie, organizations like StartOut can be more intentional when it comes to supporting and identifying folks at the intersections, those that are the most marginalized within our own community. “Oftentimes those groups need just as much if not more support from these organizations. It will take a more concerted effort and understanding of realizing we’re not all in this together.”
Responding candidly, DuMarkus spoke about intentionality. “Organizations have to be more intentional about creating honest diversity and step out of the biases to build a meaningful connection with communities of color.”
“I think those of us that want to be supported don’t always find ourselves in Black spaces,” admitted Dr. Jana. “When we’re talking about oppression at the scale we see in the US, we’ve got to take a proactive step to show up where Black founders are. We need to be making sure we’re not waiting for people to come to us, instead we’re forging relationships across all kinds of organizations, institutions, and incubators that focus on those communities. You have to put the welcome mat out, you can’t just wait for people to show up.”
What do our founders have in store for 2021?
Demetrius will be graduating from our Growth Lab Program in the Spring. College Cash is in the process of partnering with corporations as well as other accelerator programs to help Demetrius during his next seed round.
Watch Demetrius speak on our panel for “Entrepreneurship and Racial Equity”.
Dr. Jana is joining the Jackson Ward Collective, a hub that connects Black business owners to each other and to resources that can help our businesses thrive, on Loom’s behalf. They are also aggressively expanding their technology platform Loom, which has been streamlined to take large organizations and disaggregate their culture and identify their equity gaps.
Watch Dr. Jana interview Arlan Hamilton during our recent Fireside Chat.
2021 is going to be the “Year of Receipts” for Stephanie and Blendoor. After 6 years of collecting data on over 300 tech companies, Blendoor is ready to use its data to create Diversity Rating Scores for job seekers. A Social DNA Glassdoor if you will, with the plan to expand into financial services and retail. Watch Stephanie speak on a panel during our Equity Summit for ‘Business Case for DEI: How Diversity Increases Business Performance’
2021 is all about growth for DuMarkus and Musicbuk. After working for so long to figure out how to pull a lot of levers from how to build tech to walk customers through the onboarding process to how to acquire customers, 2020 gave them the opportunity to figure out a lot of that, so 2021 is about figuring out how to do those things better.
Watch DuMarkus pitch during our 2020 Demo Day event.
