What I see now is that we often have to create the space for each other and to bring each other along through the community. I think it's still not first nature for everyone in the industry to think about women first or to make sure that the environments they're creating are inclusive enough for women to feel like they belong in those environments. And so there's still, I still see very clear pockets where we're not. There yet. Um, I think the ideal state for me is a place where we don't have so many. Groups focused on helping to drive, um, female leadership, female inclusion, pay equity, all of the things that come under that umbrella. We'll discuss race and how

it plays a factor and how we didn't even talk about this topic because we were afraid. A black executive perspective. We are coming to you live from the new BEP studio for another thought provoking episode of black executive perspective podcast. A safe space where we discuss all matters relating to race, culture, and those uncomfortable conversations people tend to avoid. I'm your host, Tony Tidbit. So before we get started on this fantastic show, I want to remind everyone to check out our partners at CodeM Magazine, whose mission is to save the black family by first saving a black man. Check them out at CodeMMagazine. com. That is CodeM Magazine. So today, Lori Goode, Chief Marketing Officer at Index Exchange, joins us to discuss her inspiring journey in ad tech. In addition, her unwavering commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. Lori will share how she's breaking barriers in a woman predominantly on a predominantly male field and how she's reshaping the narrative around inclusivity in the workplace and preparing the ad tech industry to embrace a more equitable and innovative future. So let me tell you a little bit about my good friend, Lori Goode. Lori Goode is the Chief Marketing Officer at Index Exchange, where she leads a global marketing strategy, learning and development, and the company's sustainability, as well as DEINB efforts. With nearly two decades in digital advertising, Lori has had leadership roles in Amazon Ads, Meta, and Microsoft. At index, she has redefined the company's mission, enhanced its brand and launched initiatives like the index explained video series, which I mean, I definitely wanted to learn more about that, right? A champion, a champion for sustainability as well as D E I N B. Lori serves on the boards of bridge. She runs it and she's a part of the leadership group on at net zero us and is an active member of chief. In 2024, she was named the working mother of the year and the CMO to watch. You guys are definitely gonna watch her today. Lori lives in New York with her fantastic husband and her beautiful twin daughters, Lori Goode. Welcome to a black executive perspective podcast, my sister.

Thank you. I'm so excited to be here.

Oh my God. I mean, I could have kept going on your bio next thing. You know, that'd have been like, and they gave her a land in title. All right. I wouldn't be able to sit here for that. Well, listen, you are doing a lot of fantastic stuff in an industry. That is male dominance. Right. And so we're excited to learn your story and the things and how you're affecting change and more importantly, how you're helping others. But before we dive into the deep stuff, love to hear, tell us a little bit about where you're currently living and a little bit about that fantastic husband and those beautiful daughters.

Look at that. So I'm currently in Westchester. We've been in New York for. four years. We moved height of pandemic 2020. Um, not recommended as a time to move, just so you know. Um, but, um, husband, um, gosh, married almost 19 years, I would say. And I have two, as you said, uh, identical twin girls, uh, ninth grade this year.

Wow. So they're freshmen, high freshmen in high school. How is that?

It's okay. Okay. Yeah. It's they're doing well. Yeah, there's a lot of pressure these days and you have daughters too, who are also in the thick of it, I think there'll be 18 and

17 this year and my oldest is a senior and the youngest is a junior. So colleges, we're looking at colleges. So there's a lot of, uh, happiness, stress. Yeah, there's no question going on. Yeah. Right. So, you know, 19 years, beautiful daughters. And then also managing, uh, you know, a CMR, a CMO role in ad tech. That's a lot of juggling to go on. Right?

Yes. Yeah. There's a lot. Yeah.

So how do you stay, you know, I don't want to say the word sane, but even kill.

Uh, I think I have to, honestly, it's a survival, it's a survival mechanism that I'm, I've honed down, uh, to a T, uh, I think it's, I think the most important thing is listening to yourself and checking in on, on how you're feeling on any given day. And when stress starts to mount, I tend to be a private sort of an individual and I can tell when something is wrong when I physically. Yeah. Yeah. Kind of bury it until, you know, something feels a little off and I'm like, okay, now I need to check in what's happening. Where's the stress coming from? That kind of thing. But I think the, you know, the, the long of it is that in, in, you know, you have kids, so you know this, you go through phases. There's so many phases, you know, from when you're just married to when you have kids and the different ages that they are, phases can last a month, they can last two years, um, but it's a little bit of an up and down and in each one of those phases, you start to modulate and figure out what needs to give at this moment, where do I need to add more? Um, and then how do you achieve, um, balance in the construct that not everything will be evenly balanced, but that you'll make them weigh enough on either side of that heavy balance. That you don't feel off kilter.

That is awesome. And I love what you said about, because nothing is never a hundred percent equal, right? But understanding where they fall and making those adjustments along the way is real key. So I'm honest with you, you're fantastic already. And we haven't even gotten to the rest of the stuff. But my question I have for you, you know, look, and that's part of, you know, what you're dealing with. You, you have an active family. You have an active husband. You in an ad tech, uh, you working at a company that is growing substantially in the ad tech space, you're traveling, you're building that brand of that company and dealing back to that balance, dealing with all the things that go good, bad and indifferent of that company and trying to keep the ship level as it, you know, navigates the, the digital advertising sphere. So knowing that you have a lot on your plate, why did you want to come on a black executive perspective podcast? Talk about this topic.

Well, when we met, um, I, and learned, I learned more about you and what you were trying to do with this, the mission of the black executive podcast in sharing stories and offering perspective is something that's very important to me. And I. I think, you know, when we talked about what drove you to start this podcast and having conversations and being able to listen to other people's perspectives and asking the questions to be open, I think is, is critical. And that's how we move forward as a, as a community, really. And so I think it's important to offer. Voice offer perspective, but also to as well, and I thought I would learn a lot from you. Uh, so it brings me here.

Well, listen, I think the feeling is mutual because I'm looking to learn a lot from you as well. So we're excited to hear more importantly, we're excited that you're here. You're ready to talk about it. I'm ready. All right, let's talk about it. So look, you know, you've had a lot of success in your career, right? Obviously there's been. You know, we all try to get on the yellow brick road of success and like Dorothy, you know, we, we get off in the woods, right? And then we find the 10 man and then, you know, the line, the cowardly line and all those things. So let's back up a little bit. Cause I'd love to learn more about that journey. Um, because you didn't just wake up no matter how talented you are. Right. And bold you are that you just broke in. I'm going to be CEO, CMO tomorrow. Right. Right. Don't work that way, but let's back up a little bit. Let's talk a little bit about your early career. Number one, you know what, tell us a little bit about those attributes that you have, because there takes a lot for people to overcome. I think one of the things that. Right. Talk a little bit about you, what motivates you, and then more importantly, what brought you to the digital advertisers.

Yeah. I think one of the things that. Is a little bit different about my journey is that I don't I lacked very clear ambition. I'm going to be honest about that. I don't think I have that much ambition for a thing. I don't look at something and think I want that title. I want to move up a rung in the ladder. I don't believe in the ladder anymore. Um, and I. Started out with a very different career and, and also not knowing what my career would be. So I was in school for secondary English education. I wanted to be a teacher. I was a minor in journalism and I thought I would teach high school students or potentially college-aged students. And when I started to do my student teaching, uh, I realized I didn't have the capacity for. Carrying the burden that I saw in the students emotional lives, if that makes sense. So when you say carry the burden, what

do you mean by that?

So I mean sitting in the back of a classroom and observing the interactions with teachers and people of different abilities. People of different, um, uh, I guess, uh, interest levels and things like that. You kind of look at that landscape and you think you start to see some, uh, in inequality and how teachers were handling students. And I'll give you an example. We were, I could observe honors classes and I could observe. Regular class, quote, unquote, regular classes and, uh, what, what was called at the time, remedial classes. And what you would see is that the teacher really handled the advanced classes much differently than they would, she would handle the average different from the remedial that was

struggling

100%. And I just sit in the back of the classroom or I take it home with me and I worry about these kids that aren't given, even from the beginning, the same opportunities in. Even assuming that they could rise to the challenge, assuming that they're capable and, you know, this is going back in the depths of my, you know, origin, but I just thought, I don't know if emotionally I would be able to separate, uh, care for these kids and my job, right? And I was like, okay, this is going to be really hard for me and I will. Not like the system and I will, you know, I hope you'll for these kids every day and there's not that much that I would be able to do about it in their daily lives. And I knew I couldn't do that. Right. Um, and then I ended up, uh, not quite knowing what, what I was going to do. And I ended up becoming a restaurant manager. Yes, for four years, fast

food diner.

Maybe I know I was, um, in college, I was a bartender and a server at a restaurant, Italian restaurant, and it was a pilot to become a chain. And I left college. I moved back home to figure it out. And they came back to me and said, Hey, if we moved you back, could we offer you a job as a manager? Because we need help with, um, writing our training programs for front of the house staff. We need help with scheduling. We need help with X, Y, Z. So I was like, huh, well, I loved working at this restaurant, this company. And so I went back and I started to work with a marketing agency on. Copy for the menus and I wrote the training program. I used to train and hire all of the front of the house staff schedule them You name it I did I started a secret shopper program And I realized since then that all of the things that I started doing there the things that I actually do today It's customer experience. It's the marketing, copying, writing, it's training and developing people to give customers an experience. We always said it's not dinner. It's an experience. And so, uh, you know, it's seems like a non sequitur, but when I look at the fundamentals of everything I've done in every job, those things surface all the time. So as a restaurant manager for four years, and then, um, I ended up. deciding to go back to college to be a college professor. This is when everyone was going back to college. There was a job crisis. And so I didn't get into my, I applied to Ivy leagues with Ivy leagues without any basis for doing so don't know what happened there, um, but I didn't get in. And I was serving in a restaurant. and I got a recommendation to apply for a job at an ad agency and so as a copy editor. So I did, and I didn't get the job by now I'm like 28, 29 years old. So I'm, you know, I'm like, you know, moving on my, my, uh, possible career life. And, uh, then they, but they liked me, they called me back and they said, Hey, we have a project manager position open. Why don't you apply for that? So I did. And I didn't get that job. And then the third time they called me and they said, we have a position open for the interactive traffic coordinator. Which is a new role or, or newer role in digital, interactive, it was, uh, it was, um, at operations. And so I did get that job. And so at 29, I started my new career in advertising and I was a traffic coordinator and I learned the ins and outs of digital at the time when it was still very new. It was an interactive department in an agency. And that was kind of the beginning of learning about advertising, learning about ad tech and learning about marketing principles. And from there I went to the technology itself, uh, ad trafficking. It was called Atlas. Yes, if you've been around for a while, you remember, where are they? They are nowhere now. Um, RIP Atlas. Um, Atlas was part of a quantum, which was a massive company that was acquired by Microsoft. So I joined Atlas, moved to San Francisco and, um, Atlas grew over time. We, I was part of a deal team to sell Atlas away from Microsoft. I started out in technical account management. I moved into sales. And then I moved into product marketing, and that's really how I started with marketing. It was always offered, I mean, it was not something that I sought for myself necessarily, but as product marketing head for Atlas, I was responsible for the positioning and for the customer feedback, voice of customer program, and for the training of the teams on product releases and things. So. You think about it. It's basically my restaurant restaurant, but now I was doing it advertising on a global scale and I was part of the deal team. We sold Atlas to Facebook at the time and I led marketing and product marketing at Facebook for the Atlas business. We relaunched it at that time. I joined Amazon and started to lead product marketing team there. And within a year, I, they just kept giving me things. So I got events teams, I got the website, I got training for the sales teams. Um, the brand and content email programs, it just kept growing. And so I was there for five years and grew the teams from pretty small. I think I started out with three people on my team and, you know, there was a 130 in, in five years. Um, and when the index exchange opportunity came up. It was a big shift for us. Um, and part of the shift was we moved cross country from Seattle to, to New York. Our family did. Uh, my husband actually worked at Metta at the time and they relocated us, but the bigger thing was values orientation. I wanted to go back to a smaller company, um, where the value was on people. And aligned goals and moving in the same direction. And, you know, Amazon was a, a busy place to work, I would say. I mean, we were in the growing phase. Ads was growing like crazy. There was a lot to do, but it was a lot of hours. And, uh, when we decided to move, one of the things I looked at was, okay, I need more balance, right? I need more time. Uh, I need to feel really valued and I need to know I'm making an impact. And I need values that really align with my core values as a human. And I think as you get older and more experienced with your work, you often have, um, the desire to align those things because values are the things that don't go away. If they're not aligned,

I mean, well, I, so number one, I, I, I, I agree with you. I think today people say they changed their values based on what they can get out of it. Right. But we'll get into that later. Um, but I love what you said. I love how you just shared your story and there's a lot of nuggets out of that. So teacher, I don't know if I can deal with this emotionally.

Yes.

Okay. I'm going to go back to school. Restaurant. And then. You could have just saying, okay, I'll be a waitress or whatever the case may be, but you dove into a bunch of things that eventually, what's that old saying? Life is like a boomerang. Whatever you throw out comes back, right? You took the initiative and you thought experience. Versus they come in here for a meal.

Yes.

Okay, thought experience. And then all of a sudden you fell into digital advertising from a back end standpoint, which I know a lot of people who started on the back end, I think. My boy, Jason Askinasi, right? He was my account manager at Undertone back in the day, right? And he started this in the back end. Look at him now. There was a ton of people started on the back end and learned all the ins and outs. And then ended up rising. But more importantly, um, you said something about Uh, it was offered to you from a marketing standpoint more than you, uh, suck it, suck it out. You looked out for it. You reached out for it. Why was that? Why do you think it was, it was more offered to you?

It has, my career mostly has been approaching me and saying, have you thought about X? And even, you know, I started at Atlas as a technical account manager. I was in that role for five months before someone came to me and said, you're in the wrong role. I want you in sales. Um, and I remember hearing feedback that somebody on the sales team said, well, she shouldn't go into sales because we need her as a technical account manager. She's our best one and we can't lose her. But that was holding me back. Um, and so somebody saw and, and pulled me out and put me into the sales role. Um, exactly. And then product marketing was the same. So in what I started to do with my customers in the, in the account capacity, I had the biggest customers, um, globally. And I was really good at understanding their. And so I was pretty passionate about our product and passionate about how it could help people's businesses, but what I started to do was then when they came with requests, I would get to really, uh, find points like, um, one of the agency holding companies, for example, So I started a group where I sat them down monthly and said, Okay, let's prioritize all of your requests because I can't get one through if you're all competing with each other. And this is just one holding company. So we'd sit down and go through all the requests. It got to the point where I was working directly with the product teams on everything that my customers wanted. And then as we built them, because I knew what they wanted and was able to translate that value, then I could business position it back out to other customers, right? And And so at some point, the product manager kind of product said, I'm going on paternal leave. Can you cover these products for me? I'm putting you on my out of office. So I started covering product management, um, as an account person. And that led to him coming back and asking me, Hey, nobody can present product roadmap to Viviki at the time. Can you go present the product roadmap? I said, okay, sure. I'll do it. And then he's like, okay, that was your final test. I want in the product team. And, uh, you know, let's, let's figure out how we move you over. And I was like, I'm not a product manager. And he said, well, how about product marketing? You could stay close to customers, position things. And I said, if you think so, okay, but I didn't have the schooling for it. You know, I was in class at, at Microsoft at the time with my peers were all. So I had a couple of, um, of, uh, you know, Harvard business graduates and things like that. And I thought, well, I went to university of Kentucky with an undergrad in education. Here I am, but I, they had faith in me and they pulled me up and I went through and they coached me and they trained me and I figured it out. And so everything I think that I've done, I didn't have aspirations to be a CMO. I never thought that was a possibility for me, but Amazon was the same way. They kept giving me stuff. I think you have to have that curiosity. Um, maybe that's ambition in a different way, but it's the capacity for learning the interest in how everything works, uh, and applying ideas towards that being open, I think is, is all the difference in being accepting of new opportunities that could possibly come and then giving it. Everything you have when you're in it,

there's no question. Right. And you know, number one, you have to be receptive. Okay. You got to be open. There's an old saying, the mind is like an umbrella. It only works when it's open, but you also, there are people who have to, you know, one of the things in terms of success, um, especially when we all have doubt, we all at some point have lack of confidence. Um, we all, you know, some people call it imposter syndrome, whatever the case may be. Okay. But the key is, is having someone believe in you, having someone says, yeah, you can do. Yes, and yeah, you may not went to Harvard Business School. You didn't go to Yale, but you still a talented and it's still in you. Right? And then they're willing to work with you and they're willing to train you. And then you're acceptive of the feedback and the stuff that I know. And then you're working on your own growing. Really diving into the opportunity, right? And so nothing happens by accident to be fair. Right. And we, I fell into this or, you know, people ask me, Tony, so how did you strategize your career? And this is that I'm like, I did, but I was open and people saw something in me. Now, one of the things though, let's be fair. You talked about meta. You talked about Amazon. Now you had index exchange, right? You talked about Atlas and let's be, you know, this is the digital advertising. This is ad tech. So talk a little bit about your experience as being a woman working at these behemoth companies, companies that is male dominated, right? You still was able to navigate your way, but tell us a little bit about that experience and what did you learn from that?

Well, I think, The answer is probably a lot different now than it was a few years ago. I just came back from the Consumer Electronics Show CES. It happens every year. It's a massive industry show and that has been one of the worst shows historically for being like the only woman there because it's a consumer electronics show. So everyone's coming in from all over the world with their wares plus the advertising agent or advertising industry kind of gloms on. And I remember, you know, seven years back thinking. Gosh, you know, I, I'm literally the only woman walking down these halls and it's in Vegas. That doesn't feel great. Um, and, uh, it really stands out. And this year was a very different CES every year. It's different. But this year was, I wasn't in the minority. I don't feel like a little bit, but there's a lot

more than it was seven, eight years. Absolutely.

And so it has progressed. And I will also say that, uh, earlier on when I was in product marketing, And my world was comprised of meeting with engineering and product teams that I was always, always, always the only woman in the room now in a marketing role. I would you know, my team is comprised of many women. Um, and I think generally our, our company is fairly balanced in men, women. Not necessarily in all of the teams. I think engineering still has numbers that are, um, definitely outsized on the, on the male side. Um, but I do think that it has progressed a lot when I was younger. I learned to understand that it can be a differentiator. If I spoke in a room of engineers, I really did feel like people stopped and like, okay, what does she have to say now? That could be because I don't think it was because I'm a woman. It could have been because I was customer facing and these engineers needed to know what the customer needed so that they could build the right things. And I wasn't like everyone else. I sort of, I think I've always. Understood and embrace the things that make me different, and then just lean into it because, uh, there isn't another way really. Mm-hmm Um, and I'm not gonna hide behind that, but I think in, in a lot of cases, it's actually helped me to not have the same perspective as everyone else. And then I want to surround myself by the people who recognize and value that perspective for not being the same one Right. As everybody else. Right. And so I think that, you know, back years ago, I would say in a lot of those cases. Um, it was a little bit of a differentiator because people, because I was the only one, I think they felt more self conscious than I did. Oh, a woman's, ooh, ooh, you

know, there's a girl.

I mean, where my Sunday bests. Um, but it shows up. And then of course the Me Too movement happened, which was a whole different, you know, time to be in the industry. I think where there was a lot of reckoning and fear, I think amongst a lot of men in the industry and people being called out. Which I think also changed the trajectory of women's inclusiveness today. As you mentioned, I'm, I'm, you know, on the board of bridge. I sit, uh, in close, um, committees where she runs it. I'm part of an organization called chief. I participate a lot in the female quotient. And what I find is that there's a massive community of people now, um, then leadership positions and advertising and ad tech that are decision makers that are investment leaders. And that just wasn't the case a few years ago. What I see now is that we often have to create the space for each other and to bring each other along through the community. I think it's still not. First nature for everyone in the industry to think about women first or to make sure that the environments they're creating are inclusive enough. Um, I think the ideal state for me is a place where we don't have so many groups focused on helping to drive, um, female leadership, female inclusion, pay equity, all of the things that come under that umbrella. What I'd like to start to see is that it's not such a force anymore where you're having to Right. And then it becomes part of inclusivity that I, I would love to look at a panel that someone's constructing and not have to worry about how, how many perspectives do we have on this panel?

Yeah, I mean, that's the, you know, Martin Luther King's birthday. I mean, look, by the time this is released, but his birthday is a few days from here. Right. And that's, it was part of his ultimate dream, right. That, you know, we can just. the world and just be who we are as individuals. You know, one of the things I'm hearing, I'm listening to what you're saying and you know, it's part of the, you know, my life as I, you know, we talked earlier that, you know, I never spoke about race, never even brought it up, never even thought of it because I always thought that if I was the best Tony, that would matter. Right. And a lot of times that was the case, but then the world reminded me that I was black, right? Not that I said something, not that I raised my hand and said, look, the world by little bitty things and stuff to that nature. Right? And so what you're saying is, is that, hey. It'll be great. If just women or anybody can just be there. We ain't got to be looking and saying, Oh, here's a woman. Oh, there's fair pay for everybody. Oh, you can pay equally to, you know, and people are not trying to lift up this boulder. Right. Or somebody has got to say, don't look at me. I'm just over here by my, or this group or whatever. That's the goal, right? I mean, that is exactly why we, what we're trying to do, but here's the thing. I want you to, I want to get your response because obviously some of the things that, you know, just going back to what you were saying earlier about being, um, uh, with the engineers and you were the only one and they were like, Oh, You know, we're open to hearing because your, your diversity, you being different was a differentiator. And then people were like, let's hear what she has to say, or you being client facing and they're in the, in the office and they're not out. Oh, maybe she's going to bring something that we're not understanding and our clients need. But let's hear about some of the other things that women throughout the industry is going through.

The biggest challenges that women currently face in our industry are men. And what needs to change in our industry is men. The roles of women, what women have been tasked to do needs to evolve and change. And I think what we're seeing is that women need more support. They need more resources and they also need flexibility to not just, you know, run their day to day lives, but also to soar. While we've made a significant amount of progress. Over the past number of years, we still feel like a qualified group of people. And by that, I mean, there's too much conversation. There's too many questions around, um, how do you feel as a female leader? How do you feel as a female, this as a female, that and real progress starts when we think about ourselves as independent, intelligent contributors. In other words, being able to say, you know, what is your point of view on leadership or what is your point of view on this?

Actually, they said a lot of stuff that you just got finished talking about, right? So let me hear your thoughts on that.

Well, there are a lot of perspectives too, right? I think the first one was maybe the most direct. The problem is men. Period. And I think my reaction to that is like, Ooh, okay. I

was, you know, I was about to walk out the studio, right? I was just

like, what did I do wrong? Sinking down into your, yeah. The ad

tech problem is men, right? I

get what, what, what she was trying to articulate, right? I do too. I do too. I think it's so much bigger than that because the, it's the environment, you know, you and I were talking earlier about environment and what you're exposed to. I have seen women in the same ring as holding other women back or the perspectives or what they're used to and what they have expectations for. And so I don't know if it's one set of people that I would ascribe to the issue that we have, but it's deeply rooted in systemic. And so I think the ability to chip away one by one, what those different issues are, happens over time, but it's not an overnight thing.

So when you say systemic, what do you mean?

I mean it's foundational to, gosh, it goes way, way, way, way back in time. You know, for the same things that we've talked about with race. It is, So beyond what, you know, there's nothing, there's no individual, it's not like we get rid of this individual. It

changes. Right. No, when we say systemic, that means it's baked in the foundation, baked in the system. Okay. And it's, and yes, there are people that's champion is trying to overcome it. But it's a system that needs to be looked at and overhauled. Right. And, and so one or two individuals are not going to make, yes, they can make a difference in individual lives. Right. But in terms of the whole, right, is that what you're saying? Basically?

Absolutely. And it's in all of the different corners and pockets that people don't realize when you talk about things like unconscious bias, which is used. All the time. There is an unconscious part of these things where I think some people don't even know. They don't even

know.

They don't even know.

They don't know.

And also, I don't know that I have expected them because I think until I've been told some things, I also didn't know, uh, an example of that. I read, I would recommend this book, Invisible Women. It was written a few years back, but it's all about All of the data and the way the world works today is because it was predominantly based off of data that was built for men in a world built for men. So an example of that is, um, heart attack symptoms. So we all know what to look for. If you're about to have a heart attack, what is you tingling, right? Yeah, you're tingling your left arm, whatever that is. Women don't have the same symptoms. But no one ever did a study on women, black women, even further than that, have different symptoms. Right. And so, but the studies were never given. And so even the health treatments, the, the women's rate of, of dying from heart attacks is much higher rate than men. Because originally the, the subjects were never given or the. Uh, crash test dummies, seatbelts only ever tested on a male body. And that's true.

Yes. Right.

And not a woman, not a pregnant woman. And so it's, when I, when I talk about unconscious until somebody tells you those things, you're like, Oh my gosh, I didn't even think about that.

But not only that. That's also systemic because it was baked that way from the get go without thinking of the other person that's perspective. That's the easy, right? That's the different. That's what people need to understand. I love the crash dummy thing because that's it. They wouldn't think in a way it wasn't even thought of. Right. So it was created from the get go until years or whatever. Somebody said, wait a minute. Yeah. What about, does this work if the woman, if it's a woman and she's only a hundred pounds versus a man who's a hundred and seventy or two hundred pounds, right? What does those stats show, right? So totally get it. I love it. You know, but here's the thing though. You're one, I just want to back up for a second. Um, cause you said something that's very important. And a lot of times we, we paint broad, but brushes, right. And, and when we do that, um, we, we actually turn people off because they become defensive.

Yes.

Right. But when you say systemic, you're not saying this is an individual, you're saying it's a system.

It's a system. When you

say it's all men, then there's an issue. And then look, I'm not saying that men hasn't, haven't caused a problem. But when we come at it that way and anything that we're trying to correct, right? Then people get defensive and it takes away from the solution. What's your thoughts on that?

I totally agree. I think blanketing and saying it's one group of people or one thing is misrepresentative of how large the issues are.

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and where the pockets still exist, even in the future. I mean the, the crash test dummies. It's it's a fairly modern example. AI fairly modern example. If you've looked at any of the generative AI prompts, if you feed in bad data, it's going to respond. It's going to respond to it. And I think that's, you know, kind of going back to this whole. And that's why I think diversity is so important in any team and organization is that you don't have this myopic viewpoint of what is the correct thing in the world, what is the right thing to test and what the world looks like, but you start to fill out all of the gaps that you have inevitably because you're not an omnipotent person.

Yeah. I mean, so just so everybody knows our producer here, Matt Albano, you know, I hit a button by mistake and I guess my voice was coming across like James Earl Jones.

Yeah.

All right. Should we go back to that? I loved it. Right. But we had to fix it just so we can make sure that everybody can listen to Laurie. Right. So, but excellent point. But let me just play this next clip because I want to get your thoughts because there still are. Gaps, you know, when it comes to, you know, uh, people of color, women of color, when it comes to leadership

glass ceiling, it's a thing you would think, you know, after hashtag me too, and all of this time, and we're in 2022, that that wouldn't be a thing anymore, but it is. And so I think the biggest thing that can address that is to continue to open up opportunities for women. To let them come into spaces where they haven't been previously or they haven't been in enough numbers to show their stuff, to exercise their experiences, to may be able to make a difference in so many ways inside of our industry. In 2020, the amount of women executives or women CMOs went up, but the actual diversity of those CMOs went down, and so I think there needs to be more representation of different types of women, women of color. In the marketing industry, in that senior leadership in the C suite.

So, you know, one of the things, you know, you talked about in your career, where, uh, your leadership or the people that, uh, you worked with, they brought you into, uh, the areas that opened up opportunities. Right. Even though if you didn't seek it out, like you said earlier, right. Hey, they were saying, Hey, well, I'm a part of marketing. Hey, why don't you do this? What the case may be. So what we just heard is, is that that's something that needs to happen throughout. Right. Right. Where there's more people are seeing the talent. You don't, I want to get your thoughts on something. And look, just so you guys know, I jump around a lot. So I'm sorry. It's just the way my mind works. But one of the things that I always, it's, it's a challenge for me. Is that you have the check the box, right? I can't hire them unless they check these boxes versus I see, you know, they only check two boxes, but guess what? I see the person has the talent. And I see that if I'm willing to work with them and invest in them, they'll fill all these boxes and more. So talk a little bit. When can we get to that? Talk a little bit about that.

That is a huge part of how I think about building. And I think it's because of probably the opportunities that I was given before, I don't fit neatly into a box. Uh, you know, if I were like, well, I'm as a restaurant manager and now I'm going to be this, I'm, I'm not, uh, that neat. I'm a little bit out of the color outside the lines a little bit, uh, I think. And so for me, I think there's, I like the difference. I like the designation of sponsorship versus mentorship. Um, and I have a lot of mentorship. I have a lot of mentorship. I think the biggest difference is in sponsorship being someone actively raising you up, saying your room, your name when you're not in the room and putting you up for the opportunities that you don't necessarily have for you. It's an advocate. It's a pusher, uh, versus mentorship, which is giving advice and giving support to an individual. A sponsor is very different in pushing your career forward. And that's where I've been fortunate enough to have in my career. I think, and I think about it for my team a lot. What I hire for now is more like what you're saying. I hire for behavior, not as much for experience. And so I look for what are the competencies, what are the, um, values and the behaviors that will make this a person successful in this role and also align them to the values of the company as well. And so I score people based off of, you know, I think past behavior is the best indication of future behavior. Do they demonstrate ownership in the things that they're doing? I mean, that's one of the most indicative qualities of success is that as ownership, that's the desire, the recognition to see something and make something happen.

But you did that at the restaurant, right? You took ownership. I'm not just a waitress. I'm going to own this. I'm going to build out the, the, the, the customer experience, all those things. Right. And we train

actually at the restaurant we had, that was one of the values. And what I used to train my servers on is if you're walking through the parking lot and you see a piece of trash on the ground, you pick that trash up because pretend you own the restaurant. This is yours and you need to carry some pride to me. That's like one of the biggest, I think, qualities that has been useful in any job that I've seen. Um, and so I look for behaviors more than experience. You brought up a good point though, which is. If you have the willingness and the, the time to help support and train them. And so there are very few times, but they exist when I haven't had the luxury of hiring someone in that doesn't have experience because you need something very specific and acceleration. Exactly. But I prefer, especially at levels that are mid to lower to really look at. What I call the passionate weirdos. You know, it's who kind of doesn't fit in. But I like their skillset for this thing, and I've hired many of them. I hired it at Amazon, a science teacher and charter schools to train on targeting, um, to be a, a training specialist, learning to our targeting features at Amazon. Um, this woman came in, she learned, I mean, targeting is complex when you work in ad tech. And she learned all of the systems in the backend systems and audiences. She built out the training. She delivered it. She's now a product. She became a product marketer, now a product manager moved to the UK. Now she just moved to another company, but I like to hire these people who are just outside, but I think, well, they bring something that's different that nobody else who has the years of experience would bring because I know hiring people who I, when people say, oh, I've already done this. This is exactly what I did. This company that is a turnoff to me. Right. Right. I don't want, I don't want it if you've already done exactly this at a company, because what's the interest for you in doing it here? Right. You know, how are you learning and growing? I want to know that people have capacity, that they are not just rinsing and repeating, but they're adding on more and then really thinking about what they learned. Taking some of it, but then really blowing it all up and figuring out how to reassemble it and, and move it forward into the next company. Right. So I, I really look for those people who are not the norm.

Yeah. I mean, but that's how, uh, greatness has been. Right. Is that at the end of the day, you can, you know, um, well, somebody taught me this a long time ago. The cream always rises

to the

top. Okay. And at the end of the day, the only reason, but the cream can't rise if you don't pour the, the, the corn in the, in the, in the pot. Fill in the can. Okay. So opportunity is key. You would not be, I would not be, if somebody didn't see something, you just articulated your whole career. Somebody saw something in you. Yes. They got to hire somebody. I got to have this person. We don't have time to train. I got to hire this person for this. They can just keep running. Don't only get that right, but it's also something I learned a long time ago. You got to develop your bench, right? You got to find those other individuals and bring them along. And those are your next future leaders. And I, that, uh, dovetails into the thing that you're doing at index exchange, right, that you you've been, you've been champion is that, you know, I've always heard a DEI, you know, diversity, equity, inclusion. I have not heard D. E. I. N. B. which also incorporates belonging. So talk a little bit about that.

I did. I did add that last year in 2024. So I very similar to you when you were talking about not having spoken about race. that I started to take an active role in D and I, and it wasn't because index didn't have it already. Um, So when I joined, it was September, 20, 20. There were employee resource groups in place, index pride, index, black index, women, like there were things in place already. Um, but previously Amazon Meta, well, it was Facebook. I'm going to call it Facebook forever. Facebook, especially now only worth a trillion. I know I'll only call it Facebook as I worked there when I, you know, when it was tiny, um, but all of those companies really had a lot of programs in place. And I think because there were so many programs in place, I didn't feel the need to add my voice to those programs. You know, it's one of many. And I was like, uh, you know, I guess I'll go to this room with women and we'll just talk about women's stuff. You know, I kind of was like, I'm, I'm too busy. I've got other things to do and other people will take up the mantle. Right. And then I go to index and I realized, no, I am the person who. Puts up the, the head fireplace where the mantle, like, I, I needed to do something more.

Right.

Um, it's almost the, the higher you go up, the bigger your responsibility is to create a space where diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging thrive and for you to push that agenda. Right. And I really felt as a part of the executive team, that I needed to be an active participant if not pushing for some of these things. And I hadn't felt that way before. Mm-hmm. I always thought somebody else could do it. And at index, it has been really important to me. And again, not because it didn't already exist, but because my role in the company changed and the way that people saw me and what they expected of me changed. And I needed to be that person for other people. And I knew that I had to, um, and so the belonging I added this year, last year, really because I think the outcome is belonging or you get diversity, equity, inclusion when there is a sense of belonging. I think that that's a critical to it. And I sort of refuse to keep it off because if you don't state it explicitly, that that's a goal, I love it. I just don't think it happens as easily.

I love, well, and I, so here's the thing. And to be fair, I didn't, you know, um, you know, when I, when we wanted to chat with you and I saw the things that you saw the beat, Oh, and, um, you know, and then I looked at it and I was like belonging and I really meditated on. thought about it, you know, more importantly, how that is the most important,

right? So

you can have diversity. You can make sure that people hopefully on an equal playing field. You can make sure that their voices are included, or they're included in ideas, or you ask them what their ideas and stuff to that nature. If they don't feel like they belong there, you're not going to get the best out of them. No. Right? And, and when I look back at my career, um, you know, for me, where I thrived is where I felt I belonged.

Mm hmm.

Right? I was also I was only black dudes. How they had the diversity. Yeah, you see my point? Yes, and it included me and me and all that. But it's really you belonging. It means and what does that mean? That means you wake up and you're excited to go to work because you when you walk through that door. You feel like this is my right place, right? Right. That baggage that you come in with prior to that, like, okay, am I doing a good job today? All right. Do I, am I, do I belong here? They say I do, but I don't feel that. Right. Right. That is huge. That's

why it's the harder to measure, right? Like when you talk about your diversity, equity inclusion, you can measure. Those to an extent, right? You're, you're checking the box. You're, you know, are you being inclusive? Are you like, what are your numbers? What are your pay number? All of that stuff that can fairly be checkbox. The belonging is the hardest because it is the feeling, but when you think about recruitment versus retention, retention is most closely tied to belonging.

Correct. Correct. Right. You're a hundred percent right. You know, I, I love chatting with you because. You get it. And sometimes it seems so simplistic, right? But you have to, you know, you have to really. Uh, love people to understand it, to be willing. And you said it earlier, I added that this year because I, people, I got this role and they were expecting, they're looking at me and they expecting something more out of me. Right. To give back to them, to make them feel special, because at the end of the day, when you can make people feel special, you know, you got the sign right behind, you see the picture on the wall, Maya Angelou, and one of my favorite quotes is, you know, people forget what you did. They'll forget what you do, but they'll never forget how you make them feel. Right. And when you can make people feel that they belong, watch out for that company

because you

can't stop it.

Right.

And watch out for the talent and then the retention. Like you said, they're not leaving. They're going to stay. And then they're going to bring other people and they're going to create something special. So creating something special, talk about what the future looks like in the ad tech field, right. When it comes to DEI and B, and then more importantly, Talk about some of the things that you're doing that index exchange is going to take off in 2025 and

2026 moving forward. Well, I think Um, and the belonging part, we have a bit to do. Uh, there was a LinkedIn post recently or an event that, that someone ran. Who's pretty prominent in the ad tech industry. And somebody commented on LinkedIn. Oh, but where are all the women, you know, that your event and the person responded, I invited them, they didn't come. And I, I thought a lot about that comment because we have had that in the past. if, you know, for a sporting event or something, I think a lot about golf as an event. It kind of precludes a lot of people who don't play golf or haven't grown up playing golf. That is

true.

And it's intimidating.

That is true.

And so I consistently, so we launched last year an afternoon TV, clever title, afternoon TV for women in broadcasting and TV. Um, because a lot of that kind of sector, especially in the UK and other places are really dominated by men. And so we did, let's do an afternoon tea. It has the length of not quite the length of golf, but it's not that you just go have cocktails and leave. You have to sit down. It's a production. You. Get your tea or tea plates. It's multi courses. It feels special. Um, and we started to run this. We did one in Sydney, two in London and New York Paris. We started to do these different offshoots Japan, which was the traditional Japanese. And we invited all women and said, let's bring a community of women. They're competitors with each other. But it was the most fun open conversations. What's happening in streaming TV. These are really intelligent women in leadership positions that don't often have the opportunity. We're invited to the golf course. I don't play golf. I'm not going to play with a bunch of people who play golf all the time. Um, it's intimidating

and you don't hit the ball, right? It's going to be so

embarrassing. Well, you know, mini golf is even a struggle for me. I have so much fun doing it, but. And so, um, when you think about belonging and inclusion, I look at these types of events and experiences for our customers and think, yes, we invited them, but why didn't they come? Do they like spending time with us? Are we making it in comfortable for everyone? Are we making them feel good? Um, I think that's a really important thing. I think about, um, this concept of a friendship bench. I want to launch it in an event. It was at my kid's elementary school, you know, a bench on the playground. It doesn't have somebody else to play with. They sit on the friendship bench and other kids have to go collect them, play with them. Industry events are very similar. Yes. And I think there's a weird barrier between men approaching women who are by themselves to introduce themselves because they feel kind of awkward about it. But at the same time, how are you going to connect with people and network with people you don't know? Uh, I feel like we, you know, we kind of need the friendship bench and ad tech.

I love the friendship bench. You know, you brought up something I just thought about and it's so true, you know, um, you know, a lot of times people who know me and been out with me like, oh, Tony, you know, he's so outgoing. He, you know, he lights up a room and he's got so much energy and all these things, right?

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They really don't understand though, and they wouldn't, because I do those things because I need to do

them.

But I'm really a shy person, okay? And then I've been at events before where I didn't have the energy to come in and like walk in like I own the place, okay? And I did kind of melt, but there was nobody there that made me feel like I belong. Right. And had somebody came up and said, Hey, man, what's your name? And I don't think people do it on purpose to be honest. I think we all have a lack of confidence. And then, so we go to the little clicks that we know, right. And we stay in those little clicks because we feel like I found somebody that I can chat with. Right. I ain't by myself. Right. And then unfortunately, then you have people who come in. That's my, probably not, who's not part of that. This is their first time or like you said, hitting on golf and those things. And then they don't feel like they belong because nobody puts an olive branch out to bring them in and make them part of that community. But I think that's something that we can all do collectively, regardless of, you know, where, where it is, because, you know, I, I, I'm like you, I, I like to make people feel special. I like to make people feel that they belong. Because I felt that I didn't sometimes, and that didn't have anything to do with the work or whatever. It's just sometimes you go places and you feel like you just don't fit in. Right. For whatever reason. Right. And so I look for those individuals and I see them. I love that dress. You got, Oh my God. All right. Do you know blah, blah, blah. Oh yeah. I didn't know. Yeah. And the next thing you know, that person feels good. All right. And so I think that's something that every human being can do. And be cognizant of my thought. What's your thoughts on that? We're the same.

Yeah. I think because I also feel I'm like somewhat, it's harder for me. I'm more of an introvert, but my job expectation is that I'm not. And you know, if I find the people that I know, I will tend to just stick with them if I, if I can, because it's awkward for me not to, or I, you know, I'm not sure, but I think the, I really have to push myself. To get out to a place, especially if I don't know other people, it's, you know, people have expectations of, oh, well, you know, he's the CMO of this and therefore she's, and I'm, she knows everything. She's the most

gregarious person on the planet.

Yeah. So it's those, those events take a lot of energy anyway from, like, so even walking through the door is a big step where I'm like, okay, I made it good for me. And then now how do I stay there? You know? And, and it's. Great when you meet people, and also when you do recognize that people are by themselves. And it's almost easier, it's interesting, when Index hosts events, if I do see somebody who's not talking to somebody else, for some reason, because it feels like it's our event, it's easier for me to go up and say, I'm with Index, it's great to meet you. I'm on it. Like, come on in. If it's not your event, it's, it's still, it's hard, you know, it's a little bit harder to make that divide. But I think if we all focused on how do we really bring everybody in, it's all about community and networking. It's

all about. And if you can see the other person first, right. As part of your family, part of you, like how you would feel, then I think it's a little easier to say, Hey, come over here. What's your name? Or whatever the case may be. You're talking about walking through the door. I'm glad you walked through a black executive perspective doors today. So I got two, I got one final question that I want to get your final thoughts. We talked, you know, look, you've, when we started this, we started this, we talked about the yellow brick road to success. Right. We talked about, we all want to get on it and we get into the woods and we find it. But then you were able. And here's the thing we get in the woods, we get on and then we get in the woods. It happens. It's part of the journey. And you spoke today about, you know, how you navigated that success. And now you went in the woods and came back. And then more importantly, the cowardly lion or the 10 men pulled you back and say, Hey, why don't you try this? Try that, right? All those type things real quickly. Tell us, what do you see? How do you see the future of ad tech? Do you see it evolving? Cause you spoke not too long ago. You said how it was eight years ago at CES and how it is today. You've seen a big change. Tell us a little bit about what do you predict? Are we on the move? Are we making the right changes? Because right now people are attacking DEI trying to get rid of it. Um, for all for whatever, I'm not gonna get into it as a whole nother podcast, but you're, you know, D E D E I and B at, um, index exchange. So give us, give us a little bit of your prediction on how things you think are going to move forward.

I do think there's realness to what we won't talk about on this podcast, that's probably for a different podcast. Have you come back? Yeah. There, there is a lot of worry and concern, I think, amongst the group who cares about DEIB. And implementing this and instilling this in our, our companies. A lot of our, a lot of my friends who are involved in this work are under threat. Their jobs are under threat and what, how they exist and what they're doing, the value they're adding to their companies. It's more important than for me to make sure that we're steadfast in how we approach DEIB. It's not a fad. It's not a trend. It's not a buzzword or acronyms, but it's core to how we operate as a company and it needs to be. And so for me. It's really about doubling down on how we're implementing them thoughtfully, all of the programs that we have, how we're ensuring that they continue in a way that starts to permeate through all of our operations so that it's not an add on, but it's sort of, it's almost like you wouldn't even be able to, to detect that it's happening because it's just how we operate. So for me and ad tech broadly, I do expect that we're going to see some more wavering from maybe not ad tech, but maybe the advertising in general, um, things always have their swings back. There will be some event that will swing the other way. I think the companies who are really intent on business outcome. There's a real business outcome to this, to retaining and attracting the best talent possible, uh, will remain steadfast in their, in their efforts. And so I, I think that there's going to be progress, and I think we might just have to be more patient on how quickly that progress comes in the face of what we're seeing in, in the, the drawbacks from

DEI. Wow. Well said, well said. Final thoughts, my friend. What do you wanna leave the audience?

I want to leave the audience with what your core message is. It's perspective and it's openness and so if you are someone like us potentially who are in circles are embedded in D. E. I. B. practices and thinking about it step out of your bubble for one minute and maybe look at a social media or other things that are outside of your norm because that will open your perspective. Not everybody thinks like we do. Um, and then I think that also gives you perspective for the types of information and news and environment that they're in. Um, I think the perspective is really what changes mind and heart over time.

Well, number one, listen, I think I met a sister from another mister here, right? Uh, Lori Good, this has been fantastic. I can see why, you know, index exchange. As you at the organization, they're, they're blessed to have you. As a matter of fact, make sure she gets a raise. I'm saying you want to lock her up. Okay. Because you're awesome. I love your mindset. I love the purity. And more importantly, what I love is that it's real, the authentic, the authenticity, um, your character. I just love it. And so, you know, uh, final question I have for you is how can a black executive perspective podcast help?

I'd like to be more self serving in this request, but I, I ask that you keep listening to this podcast. I think, you know, anyone who's listening that we continue the work, um, be open and look for the companies that are, are on the path towards continuing our progress. Look to align yourselves with those companies and the values. I think that's really important and continue to spend in the areas where you need to spend money. Um, I think that's in the future towards diversity, equity, inclusion, belonging, and underrepresentative, um, groups. Uh, so continue that work. Don't give up.

Wow. This lady's a giver. You see that? Yeah, she gives, I love it. I love it. So really appreciate you. We love that you came on BEP to talk about this. I want you to stay right there because you're going to help us with our call to action. So I think it's now time for Tony's tidbit. So the tidbit today, breaking barriers isn't just about personal success. It's about paving the way for others to rise alongside you, because inclusion isn't a goal. It's the foundation of innovation, growth, and a better future in every industry. And you heard a lot of that today from the CMO. Of index exchange, Laurie good. So I want to remind everybody to make sure that you do not miss the upcoming episode on need to know by Dr. Nsenga Burton. Dr. Burton shares timely, crucial topics on the things that you don't want to miss. You ain't got time. So you want to listen to her every Thursday because she's bringing stuff to keep you aware of what's going on on a black executive perspective podcast. Need to know by Dr. Nsenga Burton every Thursday. So now it's time for the BEP's call to action. Our goal is to help to decrease all forms of discrimination as it walks in our path. Our call to action is four letters. It's called LESS, L E S S. This is something that every person can do. This is in your control. You don't need to talk to your congressman. You don't need to write a letter to the mayor. You don't have to be president. You can do this. And if you do this, we're going to bring people together. So Laurie good is going to help us with our call to action. Laurie, kick it off.

All right. The L stands for learn, educate yourself on racial and cultural nuances. Do not wait for someone else to give you your education. Take it upon yourself.

Absolutely. And then after you learn, you have the letter E that stands for empathy. Now, since you've learned about what your colleagues and friends are going through, now you have a better understanding of how to help them. And more importantly, what they've been through.

S stands for share, share your insights to enlighten others. This is incredibly important. Consider your vulnerability and your openness in those transactions.

Absolutely. And the final S is stop. As we stated, we want to stop discrimination as it walks in our path. So if you're at the Sunday dinner and auntie Jenny says something that's inappropriate, you say, auntie Jenny, we don't believe that we don't say that, and you stop it right there. So if everyone can incorporate less. L E S S we'll build a more fair and more understanding world. And more importantly, we'll be able to see the change that we want to see because less will become more. So again, you can follow all Black Executive Perspective podcast. You can watch all our episodes on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast. And don't forget to follow us on our socials of LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook at a black exact. For our fabulous guest, the CMO of Index Exchange, Lori Good, but a man behind the glass who made all this happen. He cussed me out a couple of times. You guys didn't hear it, right? My man, Matt Albano, I'm Tony Tidbit. We talked about it. We learned about it today. We love you. And guess what? We're out.

A black executive perspective.