Why Ambitious Business Women, Like Me, Need #IAmRemarkable

In 1975, my Vietnamese parents came to America as refugees. My parents had nothing to their name, did not know how to speak the new language, and had a baby to feed. Despite the daunting reality regarding their livelihood, my parents never told me how poor we were. I keenly remember that my parents worked 2 jobs in order to keep our family afloat. As much as they kept the Asian face of effortless austerity, it was clear they hustled hard for a reason.

Growing up, there was an immense amount of pressure to perform at a high level and collect prestigious accomplishments. After all, my parents made countless sacrifices for me. If I couldn’t get the best grades and become a doctor, was I honoring their sacrifice?

The benefit of growing up like this, is that I developed a strong sense of dedication, resilience, and grit. My upbringing helped to foster my growth-hacking mindset from a very young age. Just as my parents did as I was growing up, I learned to work harder than my peers while making it look effortless.

The negative part of growing up like this was that I didn’t know how to speak up for myself. I always made choices that benefited or honored the majority of other people in my life (bosses, parents, spouse), and it caused me to remain unfulfilled on a large scale.

This is the story many women are living right now.

Despite being a very hard worker, I often got passed up for raises and promotions because I made my work look effortless, and didn’t speak up about what I did. If a deadline was looming, I was the girl who jumped on the project to make it happen — and you never heard a complaint pass my lips, nor did you hear me boast about the long hours I worked.

I started 2 successful companies, but sold them so that I could move and take care of my mom whose health had been deteriorating rapidly. I guess, in this sense, I made a choice to take care of family over the “status” of being a business owner.

Duty has prevailed for much of my life, usually at the cost of my own happiness and reward.

After over 30+ years of doing this in my life, I realized I couldn’t continue living like this. I had a deep sense of unfulfilled potential, I felt like I constantly wore a false mask of identity (especially at work), and it was affecting my emotional health and family life.

I was very lucky in having established a reputation for myself as a dedicated growth marketer. When I quit my last position in a large billion-dollar tech company, I quickly gained consulting clients. Shortly after, I started an incredible opportunity at InVision App, a company that values female and minority inclusion. InVision App took my career desires seriously, wanting to elevate my work as a woman in their company, even empowering me to speak on stages at conferences. Not many women will be as lucky.

When you’re seen as a “superwoman” who “effortlessly” does everything, your story is often overlooked.

It can leave you feeling like you need to live up to this statuesque version of yourself that’s impossible to sustain. (And if you come from an Asian family, this is doubly asserted in your life. Asian family culture teaches everyone to silently bear their burdens, and look as “perfect” and effortless as possible. It’s extremely unhealthy on an emotional level, creating a closet that further amplifies daily stress.)

This is one of many reasons why women in the tech and startup space are silent contributors — especially minority women. Being a silent contributor is what keeps us from getting the accolades, recognition, monetary raises and bonuses, as well as promotions. At the same time, for many women and minorities, speaking up could mean we lose the security of our jobs. And yes, that means our families will be affected. So we silently toil on, hoping one day our hard work will be recognized by someone else, for fear that speaking up will leave us jobless.

This is what Google’s #IAmRemarkable campaign is working to change.