Female Disruptors: Deepa Purushothaman of nFormation On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry
An Interview With Candice Georgiadis
Decide. Make a decision. Don’t waver — When I first made Partner I was afforded a really unique opportunity to sit down with the Chairman of the Board at one of my clients. I used the dinner to ask him questions about his path, what he had learned, and his advice for me. His most important piece of advice to me was to not be afraid to make a decision. He said that good leaders weigh options but at some point they decide. He said they decide the best they can and then push the ball forward. He said, “you don’t always have the luxury of waiting. And good leaders know when to decide.” What I have learned since then is that great leaders know when to be transparent too. Good leaders decide and great leaders decide and if it wasn’t the best choice with hindsight, they admit it and move forward.
As a part of our series about women who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Deepa Purushothaman.
Deepa Purushothaman was a “first” senior partner at Deloitte, where she spent more than 20 years focusing on women’s leadership and inclusion strategies to help women of color navigate corporate structures. She was the first Indian-American woman and one of the youngest people to make Partner in the firm’s history. After leaving Deloitte in 2020, Deepa co-founded nFormation, a membership-based community for professional women of color, offering brave, safe, new space and helping place women of color in C-suite positions and on Boards. Deepa’s book The First, The Few, The Only: How Women of Color Can Redefine Power in Corporate America, published by HarperCollins comes out March 1, 2022.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?
As I was deciding if I wanted to end my twenty-year career in corporate America, I started gathering senior women of color to figure out if I should stay or go. The dinners started as 1:1 meetings and over time grew to larger gatherings over ten across the country in total. I thought these would be informal networking sessions where I might get some ideas of companies to explore but something magical happened as we came together in community. There was so much shared story, shared struggle, and shared power that when I finally pivoted my career I decided to write a book about some of the themes from the dinners and to launch a company to help more professional women of color find community.
Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?
I am bringing together professional women of color to share their truths and their stories through a company I started with my cofounder called nFormation. We are talking about the microaggressions, racism, and the challenges the system creates for women of color. There is something special that happens when women of color can share their stories and witness each other’s truths. The women end up realizing they are not alone and step into individual and collective power. Many of them are then able to return to their workplaces and ask for greater responsibility, more money, or share more of what they need to survive and thrive. Being in spaces like the one we have created helps women of color find their full voice. This is important because many of us grow up in systems that don’t help us do this.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
Early on in our launch process we gathered a number of women of color together to do a COVID-safe photo shoot. I selected eight women from all backgrounds, races, and ethnicities. We wanted to show the breath of women of color in the working world. Two days before the shoot the women called me one by one trying to back out. Some felt they presented too white, others felt not old enough or too old, and some felt not senior enough to belong on our website. Here we were trying to share a message that women of color were worthy and the women in our photoshoot were questioning if they were enough which is a very real issue for many women of color. It made us realize how much work we had to do and also what happens when we are not used to seeing ourselves represented in popular media.
The funny part of this story is at one point we tried to augment the shoot with some stock photos. We could not find many professional WOC images. One of the few images that came up was of ME at an event and it cost over $800 to license. We had a good laugh about that. And no, we did not use it.
We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?
I have been fortunate to have many mentors and sponsors. One in particular is a Southern gentleman from Atlanta. Even though upon first meeting each other we struggled with our connection, he became one of my biggest advocates especially when I wasn’t in the room. He put me up for every opportunity and stretch goal and gave me hard advice when I needed it.
He has given me the best business advice I have received to date, “never need a client, more than you want a client,” and I expanded that to many aspects of my life, even my dating life when I was single.
In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?
Towards the end of my corporate career, I remember having a deep conversation with a colleague if I was perceived as a change agent or as an agitator. I was struggling with the idea of how much to push on norms and when it didn’t serve me to share all my truths.
My work today falls completely in the DEI and leadership space. This work is pushing on topics of race and even white supremacy. I challenge structures themselves and point out ways they don’t show up the same for all of us. I don’t think you can do this work and not be disruptive. And, I think we are in a moment in our history when we need to question everything around us.
This work requires honesty, bluntness, and pointing out issues people don’t want to see. I call it truth telling. But, I have also learned that you can truth tell in ways that don’t always agitate. I am ok being a disrupter and even an agitator but I think success in this work is helping people feel their feelings and to breaking open their hearts and their minds. And sometimes that requires patience. I love Dolly Chugh’s work in this space. She says you can approach a difficult issue with heat and use force and anger to get your ideas across, or you can use light and convince people with reason and compassion. Both work but sometimes light is more lasting and easier. So, I am all about disruption but it is how you disrupt may be just as important as what you disrupt.
Can you share 3 of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.
- Listen to those Who May Offend You at First: A few years ago, I was sharing some information with the CFO at one of my clients and he told me that the CEO provided him some feedback about me. The CEO felt I was smart but sometimes irreverent to his CEO title. The CEO felt I should be more cautious in how I delivered my opinions to him since he was CEO. The CFO told me that he immediately told the CEO he had missed a great opportunity. The CFO told the CEO that people who have the courage to tell a CEO how it is and not kiss the ring are the people you must make time to meet. The CFO said he told the CEO, he should have met with me every other week because I was telling him what he needed to hear — maybe didn’t want to hear but needed to hear. The CFO looked at me and said, “never change that. Know that most people don’t take the risk and you have it in you and that is the quality that makes you different and successful. Always tell it how it is. Those who don’t want to hear it won’t be around for long.”
- Decide. Make a decision. Don’t waver — When I first made Partner I was afforded a really unique opportunity to sit down with the Chairman of the Board at one of my clients. I used the dinner to ask him questions about his path, what he had learned, and his advice for me. His most important piece of advice to me was to not be afraid to make a decision. He said that good leaders weigh options but at some point they decide. He said they decide the best they can and then push the ball forward. He said, “you don’t always have the luxury of waiting. And good leaders know when to decide.” What I have learned since then is that great leaders know when to be transparent too. Good leaders decide and great leaders decide and if it wasn’t the best choice with hindsight, they admit it and move forward.
- It’s Lonely at the Top — When the CHRO at one my client first started in his role I offered to take him to lunch. It seemed like a normal thing to do. He was new at the client and I had been there for over a year. As we were sitting at lunch he said to me. “You know you are the only person — -vendor or peer who has asked me to lunch. I have been eating by myself every day this week.” He went on to say, “it’s lonely when people are too afraid to stop by.” My most important lesson came from that discussion. Leaders and execs are people too. They want to be liked and included as much as everyone else.
We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?
nFormation is going to focus on disrupting the process to qualify and place women of color on Boards and I can’t wait. The criteria we use to call a person board ready supports the same candidates being short listed. We need to evolve the criteria we use and find ways to place importance on the lived experience women, especially, women of color bring to the table. As “firsts, fews and onlys,” women of color have had to navigate a lot and the navigation alone brings new and valuable criteria to the table that should not be overlooked.
In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by ‘women disruptors’ that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts?
It’s the old tale. Men are rewarded for taking risks, being bold, speaking without all the facts and answers. For women and women of color that path is much harder. There is less leeway, there are more questions, and we have to provide a mile-long fact trail to often be heard and to justify our decision making capabilities. There is less permission for women and WOC to take risks and play big.
Do you have a book/podcast/talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us?
I love Women Who Run with Wolves. I remember reading it the first time and feeling like it was a special maybe even secret book. It talks about the innate power of women, what happens when we come together and how many of our stories have been displaced from historical canon.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I want us to rethink power. What it means to be powerful and what we reward. The last few years have shown us we are on the brink of many things as a planet, few of them good. Maybe power shouldn’t be about how much we have or hoard but how much we share, how we amplify, and how we do good.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
I have a quote in my bathroom that I look at each morning. It says, the universe will not give you more than you can handle. So often we tell ourselves a story that a challenge “is being done to me.” That places us in a victim mentality and keeps us away from all the synchronicity that can show up in the world if we open our eyes. I have used some really hard times in my life to figure out who I am and who I want to be. Sometimes challenges are just doors to what is next.
How can our readers follow you online?
Linked it at https://www.linkedin.com/in/deepapuru/
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!
Female Disruptors: Deepa Purushothaman of nFormation On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.