A good mentor will provide guidance, motivation and emotional support. They can help build your skills, support your career growth and are an invaluable source of knowledge
So how do you get a mentor – and how do you know you’ve got the right ‘one’ for you? Getting a mentor can seem like a daunting prospect, but in this podcast we meet one woman on a mission to make mentorship easier and more accessible.
Dayo Akinrinade is the founder and CEO of Wisdom, a social audio app with the mission to democratise access to mentorship and create an open and diverse community centred on knowledge sharing
Dayo is one of the few Black female founders who was able to tap into VC funding in recent years and raised $2million from First Round Capital and a number of angel investors. She is also one of the founding members of OneTech, London’s largest diversity-in-tech programme, the experience of which helped Dayo observe how lack of access contributes to systemic inequity and the need for a platform like Wisdom.
In this session, we take a look at why mentoring is important, how it could help improve diversity within the tech industry, and Dayo’s advice for those looking for a mentor.
hello everyone and thank you for listening in today I am Kaylee Bateman the content director at chican code and
today we are going to be discussing the importance of mentorship now lots of
women in business talk about the importance of finding a mentor for guidance motivation and career growth
but how do you find a mentor and more importantly how do you find the right one for you I am very lucky to be joined
by Deo Akin Ronaldo the founder and CEO of the social audio app wisdom Deo is on
a mission to make mentorship easier and more accessible for all so welcome
welcome thank you so much and thank you so much for having me I’m really excited to be
here thank you for joining us um to start off um can you tell us a
little bit about yourself and your background to begin with okay so from when I was young I’ve always been
interested in stem I studied computer science at University
and from there I went into it management consulting where I spent a number of
years at Big Four consultancies I started doing sort of testing and quality
control then moved on to business analysis coding design and development
and finished up as a program manager after doing that for a number of years I
I had a feeling that I could do more and I had sort of ideas and visions and I
wanted to to lead a company so I left management consulting and I moved into
the diversity and Tech space where I joined the founding team of a program called One tech which to date is
London’s largest diversity in startups program and my primary role on that
program was to increase the profile and diversity of
Founders in London that were accessing investment uh very specifically seeking
more female Founders to get funding more ethnic minority Founders and more
Founders that didn’t have University degrees whilst working on the program I
and we noticed across the program that a key barrier to Tech Founders in London
to access funding was a lack of access to mentorship so we found that there is
for example there is no shortage of female Founders or female would-be Founders who want to start Tech
businesses however from the point of having an idea within
startups it’s very critical that you can access a mentor somebody knowledgeable
within the area that you want to build to ensure that you’re solving the right problem and building the right solution
so at that stage to me it was crystallized that a lack of access to mentorship and networks was a challenge
and although we have great products like LinkedIn which is like an amazing directory of people you know who who are
would-be mentors but LinkedIn isn’t set up for you to connect with people who
you don’t already know it actively discourages you to connect with people or stops you connecting with people who
aren’t within your immediate Network so that’s where wisdom was born
and our mission is to first of all democratize access to mentoring but also
to leave the world a little bit wiser than we found it and so the the
principle of wisdom is you know we are an open social audio Community we connect people for live one-to-one
conversations and Q a centered on knowledge sharing and self-discovery
I mean I was going to say what what makes wisdom unique um but I I think you just um explained it perfectly there
have you found though that this um this is it’s so so much I mean it was
important before covered but but now as well you know those connections that I
think we took for granted um and like you said if you’re if the only way that you’re making connections is on LinkedIn which can be quite
limited um surely now you know this is this is definitely something
um that is imperative for especially for Founders to to make those connections to ensure that their company is their
success I would say um absolutely in a post in a post-covert
environment and also with the current state of funding within Tech it is you
know the the numbers and the reports are saying that it is more challenging now
for Tech Founders to gain investment which the then puts more Earnest on
Founders to have a very solid case for funding and a key part of having a very
solid case for funding I would say it is having access to mentorship and to and
and to knowledge to ensure that what you’re building is is solving the right
problem in in the right way can you tell us a little bit about wisdom can you
give us a bit of a rundown sure absolutely so wisdom we are a venture
capital-backed social audio app and our mission is to leave the world a little bit wiser than we found it and what
wisdom does being a social audio app we connect you for live one-to-one conversations and Q a centered on
knowledge sharing and self-discovery so what this means in Practical terms within wisdom is and will let’s go with
because in essence with wisdom being a community and we tend to have two two types of users or or members and you
know we have users who are knowledgeable people experts coaches and and people within
them who who have something to share and something to give back and and then we also have people who are knowledge
Seekers or on their own self-discovery Journey so in essence we sort of have two types of mainly two types of user
for the user who is on the self-discovery journey or who is knowledge seeking they would download
wisdom you know if you go to the we’re in the Apple Store we are in the the Google Store as well and you could
download the app and within a few seconds you’re in and there are two main
ways you can use wisdom the first main way is our voice answers feature now
think of voice answers as an audio version of the traditional q a and what
it means is that you can find any expert on wisdom and
Tap a button and send them a question offline and if the expert chooses they
can record a voice note answer which you can then receive back yes and find on
the app so in essence you text a question and you get a voice note answer reason being is I find a lot of us are
really busy you probably also you have an inbox and a mailbox full of queries
and when when I think about going through them and typing the responses oh
it’s quite so destroying and I put it off but on wisdom you know I can open up
the app and I can see all the questions that have been submitted to me offline and I Tap a button and I’m able to
record it has to be less than 60 seconds uh a voice note uh answer which they can
receive back and so and and something that’s you know key around voice answers
is it’s some it’s it’s asynchronous short form audio and in essence what
that means in simple terms is for me to ask a question of an expert on
the app we both don’t have to be online at the same time having a live conversation I can text the question in
my own time they can record the answer in their own time which I think makes it a lot more practical yes in terms of you
know we’re talking about mentoring today and you know the traditional mentoring model uh the traditional mentoring model
it’s I find it’s very labor intensive and it’s it it has a low success rate
and I say this from my time working within the diversity and Tech space where we would you know set up mentoring
programs but on one side there was a lot of effort to recruit the mentor and then the mentees and then they would have to
schedule a meeting whereas will be love on wisdom is it it’s you know it’s Dynamic it’s live um and so yes so we
have Voice Answers which is our q a feature and then we have the live one-to-one
audio conversations and on wisdom anyone can go live but particularly perhaps a
knowledgeable person or an expert or a mentor and they can give a talk on a set
topic about what they know and the audience can listen in and if the
audience have a question they can send a guest request and if the speaker accepts
they will be granted a timed slot with the speaker to ask their question a
typical thought on wisdom would tend to be 10 minutes or 15 minutes and so in
essence you know we set up a platform where people can go live to speak about what they know uh listeners technology
because can listen they can participate to ask questions and then every
conversation on wisdom is recorded and is saved to the mentor’s profile also or
all of our mentors answers are saved to their profile as well which means that
if you share the link to your wisdom profile it’s like your sort of mini audio library and I can see these are
all the one minute uh answers that you you’ve given these are all of the talks
that you’ve given and and that’s really set up to help creators and experts to
sort of package up their knowledge make it shareable to the world and making it
easier to share because it it means that a lot of the time I think
some of us we get asked the same questions uh perhaps how do I get into Tech uh if I start coding what language
should I start with I’m not great at maths you know I I don’t know but what
wisdom will enable you know a knowledgeable person to do or somebody intact is to record one-minute answers
to all of these questions and then you can just share them the link and say Hey you know go and take a listen here so it
means because I’m keeping this within the context of you know coding and and mentoring it’s it’s allowing people who
want to give back they can use wisdom to you know to mentor and and to educate
but almost in their spare time you don’t have to be online all the time having conversations your knowledge gets
sort of captured and then it’s shareable you can share it out on social media and you could share it on Twitter
yeah which which is amazing because I think I’ve heard of um you know those
stories where ladies say you know I got a mentor within my company but actually our meetings kept getting moved and as
you say people are busy and they might start out you know with good intentions of of saying that you know this is
definitely going to happen and especially if you have somebody uh who you’re very lucky enough to secure
someone in senior leadership and then all of a sudden you know you can’t secure a meeting with them or even you
know there are great mentor programs within companies sometimes but it’s meeting that person within your own
company when you both happen to be in the same building but meeting people outside of your company
um to help you progress you know outside of that particular role and in other
areas of technology that you haven’t even thought of before because um you know you know you’ve never met
anybody um in a different area um is is invaluable uh to find lots of
different people across the tech industry willing to to share to share their wisdom
I’m you’re an incredibly successful entrepreneur um and one of the few black female
Founders able to tap into VC funding um so why do you think there are so many
barriers for female entrepreneurs when it comes to funding
so pitch books 2021 data indicates a significant gender gap in funding and
female founded companies are receiving just 2.3 percent of U.S Venture funding
also when we look at investing Partners at Venture Capital firms women account
for only 11 of the investing Partners so there’s a vast underrepresentation on
the side of female Founders accessing Venture Capital just 2.3 and then if we
look at the side of who’s writing the checks and making the decisions that’s just 11 of women
um so you know I think it’s it’s safe to say that the the funding and the Venture ecosystem is
largely male dominated you know that’s that’s indeed what what the numbers are telling us and I do think that there’s
gender imbalance has shaped the Dynamics of fundraising and has embedded systemic
level biases that disadvantage women in a multitude of aspects and I’m and I’m
specifying on uh the word systemic because I think where there are
systemic imbalances those are particularly challenging to identify and
to tackle because it’s inbuilt it’s it’s systemic and it’s been there for decades
um I think one great example is uh it’s a Harvard study and they studied
Founders pitching for investment and they focused on the typically after a
pitch you say does anyone have any questions right and that opened up for the questions in the Q a and what they
found was that male Founders were asked promotion questions promotion question for example
oh I hear there’s a massive Market in this aspect of your business what are
you going to do to go after it whereas female Founders were asked
prevention questions such as oh I hear there’s uh how are you
going to protect your business from potential intellectual uh property theft they’ve seen us risk yes
um and and that’s a dynamic that it’s it’s been observed within within the study and of course the type of
questions that that you are asked and to your point that that them the Investor’s perception of the you
know like the mindset and as she said the risk profile and the potential of the founder is is being sort of shaped
up within the fundraising process I also went pitching for Investments and these
are anecdotal observations they indicate that female Founders are more
conservative than male Founders in terms of Revenue forecasting which in turn
disadvantages their fundraising efforts um that when we look at I think uh
gender and how often times boys and girls men and women are raised
differently to me it’s it’s unsurprising and and these these are all things that
you know I think Angel Investors and investors I think there’s great work
Happening Now within the tech ecosystem to make individuals on both sides of the
of the coin so the founders and the investors to be more aware of these of these
biases because I think once once they’re called out and and they’re aware then it can be mitigated again so for example if
perhaps there is a female founder giving a more realistic modest Revenue uh
projection you know versus the malefounder of the startups are similar you know I would say don’t take those
valuations or projections at face value you know ex examine them and and come up
with you know what what you believe the the actual picture is
yeah and I think you know we we’ve all heard those stories as well and there
are some quite famous ladies who you know they tried to go for funding um and they struggled and then when
eventually they got their funding and they sold their business for you know millions of dollars later in life um it
just kind of highlights as as you say um to that the ladies do struggle to to
find the funding necessary um and I think as well and this leads on to our next question
about diversity in in um Tech and why that’s important but also diversity in
investment is incredibly important um because you know there are more uh female you know Angel Investors
um that just understand a little bit more about you know not just what’s being pitched but where that lady is
coming from um then you know there there is a lot more chance that that lady will secure
the funding she needs rather than you know pitch into a normal male panel
um but the same with with um working in technology obviously and why do you think it’s important to improve um
diversity within the tech sector Okay so particularly speaking to her and I think
you know of course being you know in the UK we could speak to this from a UK perspective although I believe this is
largely applicable uh globally um but I mean I think within the UK
reportedly women make up just about 29 percent of the tech Workforce and I think
although participation is improving there are still barriers and I mean if
if we can increase female participation within the tech Workforce I mean I think from an from an economic perspective we
we you know we will benefit collectively as a country from an innovation perspective there are numerous studies
that show a linkage between diverse teams and and the rates of innovation so
this is something that can benefit also uh Innovation at large I think Tech is
also a great opportunity for women to improve their own socioeconomic
outcomes and and situations because of course there is currently that there’s a
skill shortage across Tech and I would say probably pretty much any country and
so upskilling and being able to participate within an industry where there is a skills shortage and and
there’s a and there’s a really alarming projected skill shortage as well so not not just today but if if the trend
continues uh that way so yeah I think there are there are numerous great
reasons why we want more female participation in tech and and in terms of solutions and improving this I say
I think I believe there’s a complete life cycle and there’s so many aspects that it can be improved and and that
starts with me by examining why within schools are there us girls participating
in stem subjects because that then affects the pipeline further on I believe in looking at parents being
conscious about what types of toys they are buying for children because we do still see the toys that are more perhaps
geared towards you know maybe that sort of construction and modeling and those
are early visualization skills that that are being built even with the the toys that little boys and little girls are
are playing with and maybe having more uh Equity there and then going into
education and then of course within within the the workforce and companies themselves and trying to make them more
welcoming places for women for also mothers for parents for individuals that
perhaps communicate with different communication Styles and archetypes something I found I definitely
experienced within my time within corporates is that I would say typically you know within a corporate company
there is typically an archetype of person that will be successful within that company and that can be down to
sort of communication style and presentation style and where we find that women are often we are often
perhaps more more modest about our achievements and we sort of believe that working hard will get
rewarded but actually I I learned in my time and I had mentors that told me in
my time it’s not just good enough to work hard and get the result it’s that you have to be visible you have to talk
about what you’ve done you have to have more senior influential people talking
about you and what you have done and and
you know and on one hand I think women have we we have one job navigating those
structures and arguably playing the game but then on the other hand I think companies also have a job
to neutralize those structures so that if we have uh perhaps more introverted
leaders you know more you know quieter leaders quieter people with ideas
companies and it’s something I’m very conscious of as well ensuring that you create space for different archetypes of
communicators you know how people you know do all of the ideas come from a
noisy brainstorm and everybody around the table where some people may prefer to say or let’s reconvene in an hour and
you know work on their own and come back if not it tends to be the same type of person and you know the same type of
ideas that are promoted through and then the similar type of person that’s retained within the organization who
will then go on to recruit more people you know like them yeah funny you saying that you you I
completely agree with people work differently and and especially across different teams as well you tend to to
get you know the louder people are stereotypically on the sales team and you might get the quieter developers
um I you know work with words so I mostly uh you know known as quite quiet
people um work with words but I think as well mentoring is so important for that just
to just to let people know as well that artists to hear from somebody else that you’re not the only one that is feeling
that way and I think to hear it from somebody else that is in um a leadership position and to say you
know what I felt that way or here is that guidance to get you to get you through this and that it’s okay
um that you’re you’re having these thoughts and feelings at work um that doesn’t necessarily mean
um that you know you’re not going to be successful and so I think sharing stories across
um mentoring and is is absolutely key um obviously to somebody’s success but
also um my next question was about um you know do you think mentoring could be the
key to cracking the lack of diversity within Tech I think it’s absolutely I think
mentoring is absolutely a very key component
for as you said cracking the lack of diversity within tech and and I think
that can that can start from childhood and formative years
and providing exposure to STEM related activities it
could be toys books Science Museum programs and things like that which I think in essence is a different aspect
of mentoring and then I would say yes all the way through to schools and education and you know the workplace and
then in terms of external role models and mentoring through that I think that
that’s very key as well so where they say that what is it if you can’t see it you cannot be it and and I think it
sounds very simple but I think it is very I I find it it’s very
critical especially with uh with with younger ones when when they’re asked you
know what you want to be when you grow up that’s typically very directly influenced by
what they’ve been able to see like I think now I recall on a recent survey one of the top
um careers that young people said they wanted was uh to be a like a YouTube
influencer and it’s not surprising because that’s a medium within which they’re spending uh a lot of their their
time and I think absolutely having early exposure to role models and
and showing that Tech can be fun showing that Tech is embedded into
so many aspects of that the products we use and how we experience life and and I
think it’s it’s a great medium through which to I think create and to bring um
ideas to life and you know it’s a mentorship it’s absolutely something I very much believe in and um and it’s
absolutely what wisdom is is built around so to know that you can open your
phone and access a community of our helpful wise and intentional people
who are happy to to share and give back and you know exchange exchange ideas
because as you said sometimes the key barrier as well is that it’s the environment I believe that as individuals oftentimes the environment
that you are born into that that can shape who you have access
to and and what you get to see and you know who you can talk to about certain ideas and so the more we can do to open
up opportunities to access people you know smart people irrespective of where
you happen to you know be born I think is yeah very important yeah yeah I agree I just wanted to talk
a little bit about um the mentees and the mentors um do you have any advice
um or tips for a mentee looking for a mentor and also you know do you have any
words of wisdom for those wanting to become a mentor
so I would say for a mentee who is looking for a mentor I would advise to
not just look for One Mentor look for look look for a panel of of
mentors because we we often need guidance on different aspects of sort of
whether it’s life or or mental health and career I think it’s also important to have multiple mentors because it
avoids putting too much pressure or expectation on one particular
individual and and um and then I would also advise when you identified the
person also um sometimes people will automatically identify perhaps the most senior or the most successful person
around them and and I would advise sometimes those people are very busy and sometimes
if they are two if they’re maybe 10 15 years ahead of you they can give you some advice but actually oftentimes the
person who is perhaps five years uh ahead of you can still very much remember what it was like to be in your
shoes so don’t always just default to the most senior person and then also um
don’t ask don’t start the conversation by saying I would like you to Mentor me
start the conversation by asking a question start the conversation
by by having a conversation and in essence you know bringing it back to I
was very intentional around the design of wisdom because there’s two main ways to communicate on the app and one is to
text a question where you get a voice note answer and then the other one is to have a one-to-one conversation so we
don’t start by saying uh will you be my mentor we start by having a meaningful interaction and then from there if
that’s naturally going to build to more interactions and then um for anybody
wanting to become a mentor um I would say great absolutely do it uh
there’s so many organizations now that’s that you can join to you know to
uh who can sort of structure things and put things in place um and of course you can you know go to
the App Store and download you could download wisdom and you know the beauty of wisdom is you could be mentoring in
your pajamas at home after work you don’t have to wait to be matched to go
out and meet someone you can go on wisdom create a talk title and do a talk get the link to that talk and email it
to a few people you know email it to a few people who you know would benefit from it and and then you’re the best
thing I think about wisdom as well is that your knowledge is encapsulated and it lives on so you you can be helping
people uh beyond the the actual moment beyond the live movement of the
mentoring yeah yeah it’s interesting um what you said about you know just
don’t don’t just say to somebody do you want to be my mentor because I think that’s such a good point that it’s
almost sometimes we forget our manners on you know across technology and we go straight in and say can I have this from
you can I have that whereas you would never have walked up to somebody at a networking event and said hello I’m
so-and-so will you Mentor me you know you probably would have stood there and had a chat and exchanged business cards
and had a drink and you know eventually you know you might meet them again for a
coffee you know a later date and then kind of develop that relationship
um but you’re absolutely right it’s best to have that conversation with somebody
um first instead of just you know texting them and saying please be my mentor um and that you’ll you know you’ll get
more from the relationship because of it and hopefully we’ll be a longer lasting relationship as well not just you know a
couple of messages exchanged and and that’s it
um my last question for you is um do you have any advice for those looking to get into a career in Tech now you have um
quite a career in technology you mentioned at the start um how you got started is there anything
that you wish somebody had told you oh that is a really good question
yeah I would say a piece of advice that would have really
benefited me early on in in my career in technology would have been that
I was focused I was focused on upskilling and learning new skills which
I think is it’s inevitable within a career in Technologies so I was learning
data modeling functional design and all other kinds of kinds of things but um a
piece of advice I would have benefited from when I was an employee was that do not
just focus on learning uh soft skills and technical skills to
also focus on learning and understanding the Dynamics of the business model of
the business within which you are working and understand the value levers
understand the path to profitability because then you begin to understand how
these senior people are thinking because they are not just thinking about producing the product and the service
whether it’s a product or service that the business is doing they are also thinking about the running and the management of the overall business which
in turn oftentimes shapes the decisions that that are being taken and so that
that is a tip that I didn’t know um also invest time to understand the
business model of the company or of the business within which you are working
um so we are running out of time but we would love to know um if you could share with us what are
the next steps for wisdom yes so I would advise for anyone listening in if they are curious about connecting with a
community of people who are sort of sharing and not knowledge
seeking and on a self-discovery journey you know head to the App Store and search for wisdom social audio and in
terms of what’s coming up next I would also love to share that just two weeks ago we were out of the Day in the UK
Apple App Store yeah which is super super exciting and a
massive honor and you know in terms of what we have coming up next I’m I’m super excited we’ve just launched our
new voice answers feature which is the audio take on traditional q a um and I definitely advise people to check it out
now as soon as you open up the app you are fed a stream of one minute voice
answers so bite-sized chunks of wisdom that has been sort of curated and pulled
from the whole uh community and um yeah I would actually advise people to check it out and because I always say as well
that I think um I believe everybody can mentor because I think we each have a unique lived experience that others can
benefit from even if your advices don’t do what I did but that’s still very
that’s great advice useful advice and you know what we want to do is uh take
it out of people’s brains and you know record it somewhere so it can be useful
to others in the future lovely well thank you so much we would love to have you back
um again on a future show to hear um about those new features from wisdom
um empty here where we were doing so thank you so much for joining us today um and sharing your insights
um and to everybody listening thank you for joining us again and we hope to see you again next time
