Ep. 191 - Zainab Ghadiyali of Airbnb & Wogrammer on Ignorance, Curiosity, and Persistence

On this week's episode of Inside Outside Innovation, Brian Ardinger, Inside Outside Innovation Founder,  sits down with Zainab Ghadiyali. Zainab is a product lead at Airbnb. She used to work at Facebook, and she's the co-founder of Wogrammer, a nonprofit showcasing amazing women in technology. We talk about the power of curiosity and persistence in building a career in today's environment of change. 

We talk about Zainab's journey from coming to America with $107 in her pocket, to working some of the best and biggest tech companies in the world. And we talk about the power of finding mentors, telling diverse stories and the new trends that you're seeing in the world of technology. Let's get started.

For a full transcript, check out insideoutside.io.

Interview Transcript

Inside Outside Innovation is the podcast that brings you the best and the brightest in the world of startups and innovation. I'm your host, Brian Ardinger, founder of Inside Outside.IO, a provider of research, events, and consulting services that help innovators and entrepreneurs build better products, launch new ideas, and compete in a world of change and disruption.  Each week we'll give you a front row seat to the latest thinking, tools, tactics, and trends in collaborative innovation. Let's get started. 

Brian Ardinger:  Welcome to another episode of Inside Outside Innovation. I'm your host Brian Ardinger, and as always, we have another amazing guest. Today with me is Zainab Ghadiyali.  She is an amazing woman who came out to our IO Summit. She works at Airbnb currently, but has had an extraordinary career and we're excited to have her on the show.  Welcome. 

Zainab Ghadiyali: Hi.Thanks Brian. 

Brian Ardinger: Hey, I'm excited to have you back on the show. You were one of the first persons I thought of to bring out to the IO summit last year. I saw a blog posts written by First Round Capital.  It was basically an interview with you talking about curiosity and the secrets of designing a curiosity-driven career. And after I read that and got in touch with you, I said I had got to have her at the show. You've had a pretty amazing career. You came to America with about a hundred bucks in your pocket and have managed to work at great places like Facebook and now Airbnb. You started great programs like Wogrammer. Why don't we talk through what it's like to come to America and kickstart a career? 

Coming to America and Kickstarting a Career

Zainab Ghadiyali: Yeah, absolutely. You know, one thing that I talk about a lot is the importance of ignorance. For me, for example, I had no idea what living in U.S. Would be like. Of course, I was familiar to some extent, based on media outlets and looking at life, watching Friends or Seinfeld or like, you know, some of the more famous American sitcoms. I'm like, that's America. Cool. Once I landed here in a small town in South Carolina, obviously a very different world, but I could not have been more excited. For me, it was just such an adventure. I had no idea about how anything would be.  No expectations, which meant it would be hard to get let down. On hindsight, had someone told me about the challenges of like, Hey, a hundred bucks doesn't go a long way, which in India, that's a lot of money. So for me, that was like, Oh yeah, that's like one month expenses, and then I'll figure it out. 

Had someone like told me about that and some of the other challenges along the way, I would have probably been apprehensive about, oh my gosh, there is no way I can do this right. When someone tells you this and they're well, meaning, but when you learn about these challenges, about like how they find it hard or they could not do it, you start telling yourself that story, that you can also not do it, or you start validating and saying yes. 

Brian Ardinger: And you have managed to build a career in technology. Maybe tell the audience about how you even got involved in your first hack-a-thon. 

Finding a Path to Facebook

Zainab Ghadiyali: When I thought about my career. I honestly didn't know what I wanted to do, like what role I wanted to do. I knew that I'm someone who is very curious. I like to learn about new things. Like I'll read anything, even like I'll sit and read like something on a cereal box. I'm constantly reading, and I know I'm like very curious. I knew that as long as I was learning new things, I would be happy. And the second thing I knew was that I wanted to have a lot of impact in people's lives. Like I wanted to my world to reach as many people as I possibly could. And do as much impactful work as I possibly could.

I knew these two things, but I didn't know what role I should really do. I signed up as a theater major. Cause I just love arts and I love acting.  It's more of a hobby than thinking of my career. And then I also signed up for the biology program because one idea was just something my parents were really excited about was me becoming a doctor. I started those tracks, realize that really like being in a theater major, like it's quite expensive with like you have to buy the props and the equipment, and I was like, I have no money for this. Doing theater was just not a realistic option at that point and continued along with biology, chemistry. I loved our chemistry department so much. I love the professors there so much that I decided to take on the chemistry courses. 

I did that. I realized that, you know, I wanted to get some more hands on experience and working in a hospital. I learned that to apply to medical schools, you needed to have volunteer experience, have some experience working in hospitals. But I did not have a car or any means to get to a hospital. I was like, well, how will I do this? And I was also working as much as was possible. And I was also taking classes and I was feeling burnt out as well, three years in. So long story short, I found an opportunity to go and work in Germany on research projects with doctors there. And I thought, well, this is cool.  You know, I don't have a car to get to a hospital here.  Maybe I'll just stay in Germany and go work in hospitals there. 

And I found this opportunity and applied. And became one of the few research scientists chosen from North America, and that's where I learned that I don't necessarily enjoy the life of a doctor. Instead of being the one on one with patients, I wanted to do things that would reach more people, and so I thought maybe public health might be a good option then. Because then you're building programs and you're thinking about how you help a wider population. And I started volunteering and working with a nonprofit and after I graduated, worked with them full-time to build business models in some of the remotest parts of the world. Like this was in South America, in the Andes, remote parts of South India. 

I realize two things. One is to make a difference in those communities, felt like there was a need to have power or influence in other words and/or money. And then I didn't have any of the things. I thought, well, if I really want to have an impact and maybe I have to figure it, how can I influence and how can I build something that will reach more people and actually have meaningful impact. And so then again, I started researching...