I guess you could say I’ve always been an entrepreneur, but I didn’t know the word. My parents are academics, so we weren’t talking about business and entrepreneurship in my household, but that being said I was always the first one to raise my hand when I noticed a problem and tried to find a solution. For example, in high school, I started a recycling club and created a student representative role on my high school’s board. I think that's the seed of entrepreneurship - you have to be aware of your environment to see potential problems. Then you need to be willing to do the work and get others to work with you to address the problem you’re trying to solve.

We delivered our Alpha 2.0 station to Gilbane’s downtown Indianapolis construction site in October 2022. Before even plugging in the unit, the Project Executive asked to buy the unit. That is a huge moment for any entrepreneur - your target customer wants to buy your product, even before he knows it works! I asked him, “Why do you want to buy it?” And he responded, “What am I going to do when Kadeya leaves? Go back to buying a bunch of single use bottles?” The aha moment in that conversation was realizing that for him, Kadeya was not solving for single-use plastics, but solving for logistics. It is a logistical headache to transport thousands of plastic water bottles onto a construction site. However, construction sites must have water available to ensure workers have access to water and are drinking enough water to stay hydrated while on the job. Since October 2022, we have gone from that one unit to many more units committed at that construction site in Indianapolis. Also, three other construction sites at Gilbane want to buy units so we are in the process of finalizing a company master wide service agreement with Gilbane. To go from deploying one unit in October 2022 to having the company buy our entire system has been amazing. Other milestones include winning two contracts from the Air Force, which has been a huge seal of approval and validation of what we are doing, and having Evergreen Climate Innovations write our first institutional check. Since then, we’ve booked nearly 40 units to be deployed in the next year, exceeding sales targets by 75%.

My family and friends are a huge part of my support system. Part of why we moved to Chicago was to be close to my in-laws and make it possible for me to stay focused and do the hours of work I need to do because I know my son is being cared for by loved ones while I’m at work. Of course, my colleagues are also a massive source of support. One of the highlights in this journey has been building the world class team at Kadeya. For example, Kadeya’s COO/CFO has taken three hardware companies to exit. When we’re going through a difficult fundraising moment, I look to our COO/CFO and her calm demeanor and confidence in Kadeya helps reassure me that we’ll get through the rough patches. The team has fully embraced the mission of Kadeya and remain unnerved by the fundraising challenges - that alone gets me out of bed everyday. I know they’re working hard to change the world, so working hard to fundraise feels less overwhelming in comparison.

When I get feedback from investors, I’m not sure if that feedback is biased because of my gender. That said, the data does show that women are held to different standards. For example, many women get promotions and raises when they are already doing the work while many men get raises and promotions for their potential to do the work. Because I’m building the future, I would rather be judged “like a man” - based on the potential of what I’m building and what I’m capable of - rather than what I have built. If I’m being judged on Kadeya’s past track record, rather than where we’re going, we look like a much smaller company than we are capable of becoming. Isn’t funding a likely but as-yet-unbuilt future the essence of venture capital and risk management? One good thing about being a woman founder in this space is people tend to notice me more and remember who I am: there just aren’t a lot of hardware women founders focused on the construction space based in Chicago. There are also many nonprofits and organizations that are talking about Kadeya’s impact and choose to spotlight us, which helps to generate additional revenue opportunities, which we are clearly capitalizing on.

Start now. Also, people always say, “get comfortable with rejection and get comfortable with failure,” which I think is true but rejection and failure seem so final. For example, many of the investors who invested in Kadeya originally said no and watched us continue to make progress, and then they decided to invest. I think it’s better to say, “get comfortable with imperfection,” and then hit the ground running before you have complete confidence in the data - which would mean you’d never start in the first place! That’s why it is important to build a company culture with open dialogue that allows people to admit their weaknesses and blind spots.The hope is that we make fewer mistakes, which is something I believe we’re doing at Kadeya. Women are taught to do things perfectly and not make any mistakes. We need to throw out that idea. Don’t let perfection be the enemy of the good. We need to get good at being good, not perfect.

I enjoyed participating on a panel for the national Tech Equity Working Group meeting. It was great to meet the other panelists, and I really appreciated how honest and collaborative they were. It was also great to see all the work the Tech Equity Working Group is doing and how they are approaching this ecosystem problem in a holistic fashion, slices of which I see but not in its entirety.