Christine Tsai Quotes
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I mostly read online - tech/VC blogs. I also enjoy the 'NY Times', 'Atlantic', 'New Yorker'.
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In life, you don't get what you deserve. You get what you negotiate. So don't be afraid to ask - the worst you can hear is 'no.'
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Moms get their fair share of conflicting advice, with a heaping of unsolicited advice. Parents debate the pros/cons of different types of disposable diapers, whether the supposed carcinogens in Johnson & Johnson baby products hurt their kids who used it, which method of sleep training to use.
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There are huge pain points experienced by parents. It's hard to find good child care options in one place. It's hard figure out things to do with your kids on the weekends or after school. It's hard to find iPad apps for your kids that you are confident are helping them learn vs. just being entertained.
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The best thing women in tech can do is to invest in other women.
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When it comes to creativity and to leadership, we need introverts doing what they do best.
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I can say without a doubt that being a mom is the ultimate test of my multi-tasking skills. I spend my day meeting startup after startup, helping our portfolio companies, bringing in speakers, and soon gearing up for Demo Day for our accelerator program.
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While your intentions may be good, this is something every expectant working mom fears - being phased out. I'll put myself out there and admit this has been/is a fear of mine. Let her be the one to decide whether something's too much for her to handle or not.
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Throughout the day, I'm always thinking about 500, the team, and how we can do things harder/better/faster/stronger.
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The change I want to see is a start-up environment where everyone, regardless of gender and background, feels welcome and safe; where sexual harassment or discrimination will not impede great talent from producing great impact.
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Once your company grows past a certain point, upholding values becomes more and more difficult. This is where companies get into trouble. Thus, it's absolutely critical to take your company values seriously and practice it every day.
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At 500, our policy is 12 weeks of fully paid leave for all parents in the U.S. Parents can choose to take this leave consecutively or spread it out through the first 12 months after birth.
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Unfortunately, a lot of Silicon Valley venture capitalists are disconnected from African Americans, Latinos, and other people of color.
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Your role as a founder changes dramatically once your team hits 10, 20, 50, 100, and so on. Sometimes you forget how big you've grown and continue to act as if you're still 10 people.
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When you grow up in poverty, suffer from abuse, live in a violent neighborhood, come from a broken home, lack positive role models, are told you'll never amount to anything, etc, the challenges are enormous.
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If you invest the time earlier to create structure and process around communication, planning, and goal-setting, you can prevent missteps before they occur.
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Offering unequal leaves just reinforces the longstanding notion that parenting responsibilities aren't equal, and that doesn't help anyone.
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Entrepreneurs don't have a regular 9-5 work day. They don't take vacations. They live and breathe their business 24/7 and wear many different hats.
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Values are the foundation of a company. Culture is the manifestation of values - the day to day actions and behavior. Adapt tactical cultural behavior that helps you execute on your values.
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Many people are allergic to process and structure because it causes traumatic flashbacks of working at BigCo and suffering through bureaucracy for bureaucracy's sake.
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There's a good amount of research out there that shows generous parental leave policies have a significant positive impact on employee retention and morale.
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As a society, we're failing. In so many ways. Such high incarceration rates of underrepresented minorities ultimately means we're missing out on great potential from black and Latino communities. Yes, there's immense talent brewing even within the most impoverished neighborhoods. Talent is universal, but opportunity is not.
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I think kindness is actually under-rated. Especially with Silicon Valley - and probably in business in general - it's seen as being a pushover or ineffective as a leader.
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It was my first time in prison. I was there to volunteer with Defy Ventures, along with 500 teammates Tara Graham, Brian Wang, and Aerin Lim. While I didn't feel particularly scared about going to prison, I had no idea what to expect.