Randi Zuckerberg

spokesperson for Facebook and a sister of Mark Zuckerberg. After seven years at the company, Randy left to start her own entrepreneurial venture and is now leading the charge in Web three. Randy, you are one of four kids. What was it like growing up in the Zuckerberg household? Definitely chaotic, Amy, My hat is off to you, having grown up with four kids. I bow down before mom before. I think I didn't quite appreciate how challenging it must have been until I had three kids of my own and it

was like, no way, there's a fourth here. But you know, we grew up. It was like, I think people would be shocked at how normal our household was growing up and how kind of wildly different interests everyone had, and you know, pretty sure I was like that mean bully oldest sibling who like sent my my sisters to therapy for years. So now now when I see my own kids doing it to one another, it hits a little harder.

What's the age range between the four of you. Yeah, there's about about two years between everyone, two to three years. So my poor mom spent about a full decade pregnant. I once asked if I could borrow any of her eighties clothing for an eighties party and she's like, sorry, I only have maternity clothing from the eighties, Like that's that's all I have. So I feel like the three

of us can relate to that now. Of course. Um, you know, I thought I had my own independent life, and then the pandemic hit and I had just had a newborn baby, so we had just had the youngest, and uh, I found myself back living with my parents again for two years. So there you go, everything comes

full circle. Okay, So I want to go to Randy Zuckerberg, the mogul, because I think that what's so incredible about you is you've really been able to build your own brand right and and a lot of people would think that you, you know, being the older sister of Mark Zuckerberg, that you would be in some way overshadowed. But you've really developed your own following your own brand in your own career. How have you done that? You know, it's funny you say that. And I loved working at Facebook

and and starting my career there. I was in Silicon Valley for almost a decade and it was just the most incredible experience. But you're right. I had this kind of moment in my early thirties where I realized if someone wrote a book about the story of my life, I wouldn't be the lead character in it. And that was kind of a really shocking realization. And I think it's a realization a lot of women have. I don't

think it's just like me having a famous brother. I think a lot of women are the supporting character in their own lives. And and I realized that in my early thirties, and I was like, Okay, it is time for a drastic change in my life right now. And that's when I feel like I really jumped in, as you know, starting my own company, pursuing my own dreams a lot more. And it's taken a long time. I think, you know, probably took me almost a decade since then for me to really feel like I was making an

impact on my own. What was the first day like after you left Facebook? Um, well, it was kind of a crazy ending because my my whole life, my dream was to sing on Broadway. And I know that's silly, A lot of people have that dream. I grew up, I got realistic. I like went to work in technology and Silicon Valley, and then I got a call out of the blue. As thirty two years old, I got a call out of the blue asking if I wanted to come star in Rock of Ages on Broadway, which

is an eighties rock musical. They were looking for a tech personality to come star in their Broadway show. I guess they couldn't afford an ABC or D List celebrity, so they're like, Okay, we'll go with a tech personality. And I had just found out that morning I was pregnant, and so I I really I was like, this is the sign that the universe is giving me to shake

up my life and to focus on myself. And so it was kind of a whirlwind end of my time at Silicon Valley because I accepted that role on a Thursday, moved to New York, and started rehearsing on Monday. So it was a bit of a kind of just blew up my entire life over the course of four days. But was the plan before the call for rocket ages There was no plan. We had just bought this beautiful home in in suburban California. Like on paper, I feel like you would have looked at my life and thought

it was great. In reality, I'm not like a suburban homeowning person. Like I was carrying that house on my back. I was not happy. And you know, Silicon Valley, there's a lot of amazing things, there's also a lot of very toxic things about Silicon Valley, especially as a woman, and so I don't know, I just felt like I really was needing a soul change, if that makes any sense. And so when that um, when that call came out of the blue, it was just it was a sign

from the universe. Actually, when I went to New York, I never returned. My husband sold our house, moved all of our things across the country, and we've been New Yorkers ever since. So it's um, it was kind of a wild experience too, and so you know, sometimes though you uh, you learn a lot about yourself and your resilience when you kind of just blow up everything overnight. How was your husband able to make such a move,

because obviously it required a lot of flexibility on his part. Two. Yes, I feel very lucky to have a partner who has helped me prioritize my career when i've needed to. I feel like we've struck a really good balance of prioritizing one another's careers. And um, you know, at the start of the pandemic, he had just started as the CEO of Parsley Health and Awesome Health start up with a female CEO, and so I was like, Okay, great, this is your opportunity to double down on your career. This

is amazing. I'll play more of the role of like the default parent and the support And I felt good doing that because there have been so many moments in our partnership where he was like, yes, I will pack up our home and get a new job and move our life in a week from California to New York. So I definitely feel feel very lucky to have a partner like that. How did you meet him. We met in college. We did not date in college at all,

and then we we re met after. It's funny. He's from South Africa, and I just was so blown away by how kind of worldly he was. And I remember our first date. We went to the museum and I was so nervous because I liked him so much. And I pointed to this map on the wall and I was like, that's where you're from. And he's like, that's

South America. And I was just like, I was like, I went to Harvard, like college education, I obviously know the difference between South America and the continent of Africa. And it was and luckily he came back for a second date. It was so funny. It was I mean, I still cringe about it today, like twenty years later.

He I still like, you know, when you lie down at night and you're and instead of going to bed, you replay all the mistakes that you've made in your life, Like that's a that's a story that replays a lot um but what but you probably think he's even more amazing after this story. He turned down one of his dream his dream job at Jannette Tech in San Francisco to be with me in New York because I was living in New York when we first met, and then two weeks later I moved to San Francisco to work

in Facebook. Oh my god. So the fact that we're still married after all of that is really a testament. I want to go back to the part where you shared that you felt like Silicon Valley was a toxic culture. What was toxic about it? I think from the outside it's hard to understand. We hear that all the time, but if you don't live it, what does that mean exactly on a daily basis. Yeah, I mean there's signs of hope from what I've seen. But when I got out to Silicon I mean I had no clue what

I was in for. I was working at an ad agency in New York City where we had a female CEO who had gone from being the intern all the way up to the CEO. Right, So my whole career had started in this environment where anything's possible, and suddenly I went out to Silicon Valley, where like a lot of offices didn't have even women's restrooms, and um, people would come to to Facebook for a meeting, asked me for coffee and then realized that I was the one

running the meeting that they were going into. I mean, I often say that my biggest advantage in life was that when I would email with people, they would think emailing with Randy was a dude, and like I would actually be able to get meetings and get things done. I guess I was like I was like anonymous before it was cool now with Crypto, So that that's the kind of environment. So on one hand, here I was at the cutting edge of all of this amazing innovation

Web two and pushing forward a whole new industry. And then the other hand, it was so difficult to get things done being the only woman in the room and just always an uphill battle. How did you change that culture at Facebook or how how were you instrumental in sort of making sure that environment didn't mirror the rest of Silicon Valley? You know, obviously all of these tech

companies have a long way to go. Still. I do think that bringing and Cheryl Sandberg was a huge turning point early on in Facebook, and that really made a big difference in the culture and at least made the female employees feel seen and heard and excited and hopeful. And because of that. I think that was a real turning point for a lot of executive teams across Silicon Valley to to really think about investing in female leadership. It's crazy. Until that moment, I think I could count

the number of female executives on one hand in Silicon Valley. Now, when you look at venture firms, it's um pretty we beard. If a venture firm doesn't have a female partner. It was not weird. Fifteen years ago, it was strange to find a female VC. We could obviously still do a lot better with funding, but there's you know, at least some a lot of signs of hope and change from

what I'm seeing. So I'm excited about some of the progress in Silicon Valley, But at the same time, I'm seeing a lot of it repeat itself on the front lines of Web three where I am now, and it's it's frustrating to see those same patterns just playing out over and over. Let's talk about Web three. I mean, you've done a lot of things since you went out on your own, So why did you get involved? Like

what drew you to this brand new frontier? That sometimes makes my head hurt because it's learning something completely new once again. It definitely makes my head hurt on a daily basis. And it's funny. I feel like most of the things that have happened in my career have been kind of happy accidents or act you know, luck, because

I've had my eyes open for for accidents. It's interesting because I, you know, I talked a little bit about this split identity that I had with Silicon Valley and being an artist, and I always felt I was a little too artsy for the tech world and I was a little too techy for the arts world, and I

never really fit into either of those. And suddenly, about a year ago, I started getting all of these calls from investors and companies saying, you know, Randy, we really need the skill set of someone who can evaluate both an artistic project and a tech project because we want to get into n f T S and so we need someone who can speak both of those languages. So I didn't really set out to get into crypto or

to go down that world. But suddenly it was like the last twenty years of my career all made sense in one moment, like there's a small group of us that can understand how to work with artists and speak techy language, and I was like, all right, this is put me in coach, this is my moment. What was the first entrance into it? I mean it still is like the wild West. How have you educated yourself? And how much do you feel like you know today? I

mean it's a it's an insane learning curve. I would say, I've got into the space in September, so it hasn't I mean eight nine months that I've been in the space. I was speaking on a panel at n f T n y C last year and I had my phone out writing down words that my fellow panelists were saying, because I had no clue half the things that they were even saying. And they would get to me and say,

you know, Brandy, what do you think? And I'd just be like, my fellow panelists summed it up so well, there's absolutely nothing that I have to add, you know, that could be better. And then I would go home and look at this list on my phone of a dozen vocabulary words and be like, Okay, I don't know what a daw is. I don't know what like what I need to like figure out all of this stuff

on the blockchain. What is salona and and so little by little I started to educate myself and I definitely went slow, and that's something that I would recommend to a lot of people. It's a there's a lot of vocabulary and lingo when it comes to crypto and Web three, there's a lot of chaos at any time you're on the front lines is something new. So just kind of sitting in that environment and learning from people around you and absorbing content I think is the best way to

get started. And before I knew what, I found myself advising about twenty different n f T collections and founders and then becoming a Web three founder myself. So it's definitely been a wacky, wild learning curve. And now a quick break. Are you a woman owned business looking for a new sales channel. I'm so excited to tell you about our newest partner in the W Marketplace. Founded by two women, it's a nationwide e commerce site for women

entrepreneurs and the shoppers who support them. It offers day verbal terms and is a supportive community for female founded companies. With over five hundred women owned business is selling thousands of products and services. The W Marketplace might be your favorite news sales channel Intrigued learn more at join the w marketplace dot com. Which company did you found? I know you've advised many companies. What is your company about

and what's it called? Yes, it's called hug and I we've named it Hugged because so much of crypto is so intimidating and unwelcoming, and it's like those early days of Web two. It's you know, nine percent men, and the way they like everything is sir and bro and this and so. First of all, I really wanted to create a welcoming, embracing place for people to come into crypto. But the other gap that I saw is that there's a ton of awesome communities for brand new people into crypto.

So there are great places to learn the basics, but there's not a great second stop on someone's crypto journey. So once you do learn, and you you do decide, you know, yes, I want to go a little bit deeper. I want to start collecting n f T s or I want to start trading crypto. There's no second stop that's friendly for women and diverse artists and founders in

the space. You go straight from the friendly newcomer communities to like the super bro alpha communities, and so I wanted hug to be like the friendliest second stop on someone's Web three journey. We began this conversation going into Web three talking about Silicon Valley and how it can be a hostile place for women or other marginalized communities, and that there's a risk of Web three becoming like that as well. So do you think that we're starting

differently today than we did in the valley? Like, do you think we're starting from a different place and that it will be more inclusive? I would say in certain areas of crypto, it's pretty demoralizing what you see when you look in the straight up like trading cryptocurrencies. I think that's why for me, I've really loved focusing on the n f T world, because you do start to see the culture changing there. I mean, a lot of women can relate to buying art and collecting arts, so

that is a great gateway into crypto. I find it's very difficult to convince a woman to just like open a crypto while and start buying and trading and doing all this like decentralized finance and um, but I can convince a woman to check out art and purchase it with a theory um and help her start her Web

three journey that way. But to your point, Amy, which is such a good one, Um, I've definitely noticed, you know, because it is a new world, the kind of people that are winning early on, or people who have disposable income to just you know, to throw around and test things.

And so I've tried really hard, even in our own community, to even take a back seat myself and not be kind of the voice that's heard, because at the end of the day, I mean, I am a white woman with privilege who has had success in business, and so my point of view on my own personal finance is really, you know, probably not a typical view that most people

coming into crypto would have. So in our community, I'm really proud of it's six bipoc creators and collectors, almost women, and I really try to have my voice be a very distant one in the chorus of voices. You've been a champion of women in so many different ways, right, You've invested in so many female founded startups. You know, I think that hug is creating this incredible space. So one question I have that I don't know the answer to is what roles you female friendships play in your

adult life. Wow, that's I mean, it's such a great question. And one thing I will say is one thing that shocked me about Web three is how collaborative women are with one another. I almost feel like I have had to unlearn everything that I've been taught, you know, Like I feel like our generation we were taught that women compete and that one woman's success is your failure, and like being happy for a friend was always tinged with

a little bit of jealousy at the same time. And I, Um, the wonderful thing that I can say about Web three is that I don't see any of that behavior at all. I see women collaborating and teaming up and working together, and so um, I would say that female friendships have a much bigger part of my life today than they did even um nine months ago, and that um the only way for women to succeed and Web three is teaming up and just like hunkering down with other amazing

women around them. So that has been something that I've had to, like very excitingly unlearned about my entire past. Who are your closest friends? Who are Oh gosh, um, you know, I feel like I have I have friends of like different interest categories. So I have my theater friends like suit. I have close friends who I produce with and who I go see a lot of theater with. I have my golf friends because that sports saved my sanity.

During COVID, I was like, Okay, there's no theater to produce anymore, there's nothing to do, so I'm going to come out of this with a new skill. Um, and now I have like these amazing friends who we traveled together on like golf trips with our families is pretty wild. And now I have my crypto friends, So it's it's pretty fun to to have, um, you know, different, really

passionate friend groups. But I don't know. I don't know about you guys, but I definitely have found myself over the last decade, Like being in the trenches with three young kids does not leave a lot of room for for like doubling down on friendships, and so I feel like it's only just now that I'm able to say yes to traveling on trips with friends. And I feel like for a decade I wasn't able to prioritize being

a great friend at that point. I think all three of us have this kind of network of women around the country where when you go to that city, you see each other. You don't even need to necessarily be in the same city to be close friends. And I think that's one of the benefits of being out in the world and outside of your home and really, like you know, having a career that's that's so expansive, is

that that's something that adds value. And just like about that to everyone who joins us, unless your story is that, like we all come from completely different backgrounds and there's no like ticket to enter this club of supportive women around the country, because Randy, to your point, like, it isn't this world where another woman's success is your failure. It's like we all rise together and there's a ton

of upper tunity there totally. I mean, even just to give an example that just warms my heart so much. I started to get really frustrated by the fact that pretty much only the top twenty performing n f T collections are visible and they're all created by men. And it's this you know, perpetuating cycle because then you know, because they're selling well, they rank high on all the n f T marketplaces. I put a tweet up I was like, I would love to build something that gets

visibility for women led projects, diverse lad projects. If anyone wants to help me, just you know, send me a message. Three hundred women responded to that, and we started this community where everyone has honestly just been working tirelessly to find n f T collections, evaluate them, review them like no compensation. I mean, it's just people who want to lend a hand with a shared goal around promoting women's voices. And I've never seen anything like that in my life. Honestly,

what do you think about Elon Musk buying Twitter? I know, it's pretty pretty insane. I oh my gosh. I it's certainly not going to help the like browie uh kind of vibe that we're that we're fighting against in our little corner Web three. But I guess the jury is out to see what happens. I mean, listen, I respect everything that he's done is as a business, as a person in business, it's pretty insane to be able to found multiple companies that all have like built like many

billion dollar valuations. So I guess we'll see how that trickles down to to the average person using it. You were at Facebook in the beginning, you were a big part of building it. You have now lived sort of from the outside to see it become the darling, the villain, that darling in the villain. It goes back and forth. What is that like for you? You know, because you are so close to it, not just as a former employee, but obviously as the sister of the founder and CEO.

What's that like for you? Yeah? I think you have to have a thick skin and business. I mean, the press builds you up to to tear you down, to build you up like I you know. I mean, no one can be a darling forever. No one's a villain forever. Um. I think I used to take it very personally when I was young, and I think as I grew up and kind of looked around the world and I saw even the same thing like happening to Britney Spears next to me, and then it's, um, there's just there's natural

ways of things, you know. I do think for sure, there's people are pushing back with this with web three against a few companies holding all the centralized power. And I can understand why people are pushing back and why they feel that way, I do think that the utopian ideal of complete decentralization probably doesn't work the way that

that people are pitching it. I think the ideal situation in the end is kind of a hybrid, like a Web two point five, where if your crypto while it does get stolen, you have someone to call, like there's some centralization to protect people in the space. But um so I can understand that right now people are in a time where they're really pushing back against like a few big companies holding a lot of power, and it'll be interesting to see how that evolves as as Web

three evolves. And then why do you think, you know, when you see someone like Cheryl right I was, I was quoted in lean in I was such a big fan of Cheryl, as you were, in terms of changing the culture at Facebook, what do you think is going to sort of happen with her story, given how dramatically

it's changed. I mean, I think as women, especially hits hard because there's not that many role models that are out there doing huge things in the world, and so it almost feels personal to all of us when someone you sort of you know, saw as this beacon of hope is taken down definitely, And you know I see

that all the time all around me. I you know, it just it hits a little harder when it's like women being taken down, and I feel like, especially um, even in the crypto world that I've seen myself in

right now, the men can do no wrong. You know, they're out there raising seventy five million dollars in a few hours on nothing right on pixelated pictures, whereas you know, the women around me are facing constant takedowns, often by other female reporters, of like, oh you're you're not like elevating this voice enough, You're not doing this you know, Oh you're too like well off to give advice, you're not well enough off to give advice, and um, just

at some point it's like when is that going to end? Like the you know, the takedown of like the female role model, and of course people need to be held accountable for their actions are but it's it hits a little harder because the men are not getting that same takedown treatment. And now a quick break. You're such a positive person. What gets you down? Well, for sure, I think as a mom, you're only as happy as your

least happy child. At the moment. So you know, we've definitely the addressing the situation with the pandemic and re entering life has been stressful, but I feel lucky to have a lot to be grateful for in my life.

And I have found at least that even though you know things might be in chaos around me, it often takes the same amount of energy to be positive than to be negative, which I know is like probably a silly soup or cheesy, ridiculous thing to say, but um, it's ah, they often say in method acting, like I learned in psychology, if you just by smiling in the mirror,

it actually like lights up a positive area of your brain. Um. And so even in all the cheesiness, I I think, you know, this has certainly been a very very stressful year. You know, overnight, the two main industries that I were

involved with collapsed. I had to personally, you know, layoff dozens of actors and people who didn't have a plan B in their career, and that was probably one of the worst worst moments of my life professionally, and then figure out, you know, like navigating a complete pivot into an area where most of the people that I talked to in my life think that I'm a lunatic. That's like trading JPEG's in pirate money. So you know, it's

I feel like it. Sometimes you have to just be self aware enough to laugh about it, you know, and embrace the silliness in the situation. Who in your life do you go to for advice? Um, It's funny how that's changed over the years. I feel like I spent the entire decade of my twenties trying to find like that one person fifteen levels above me who would solve

all my problems. And I never found that person. In fact, a few times I came close, they would end up asking me a million questions about Facebook and social media, and I would end up mentoring them and getting like nothing out of the relationship. Um. And honestly, it wasn't until a few years ago that I realized that my best mentors are like the two of you, like right right next to me. They're they're the women who are right next to me in my life, all along going

through the same thing and rising up together. And uh, I wish I had realized that sooner in career, honestly, And it's funny back to that question, around positivity and how you stay positive. I also find that in the last few years I have been ruthless about acting toxic people out of my life. I used to tolerate a lot of bullshit from people around me. Um, and maybe you know, earlier in your earlier in your career, you

sort of do you haven't really earned the right. But now I'm like, there is just no time to surround myself with people who are toxic or anything but positive. And so that has definitely affected my own outlook as my ability to just like spring clean also spring cleaned as we talked about all the high heels out of my closet too, because I also I don't have time for toxic people and I don't have time for a heel that's over two inches. All right, we're going to

go to our speed round now. Um, we're gonna ask you some quick questions and you can give us quick answers. Me. Do you want to kick it off? What book are you reading right now? Um? Oh, my gosh, do people read books when they're starting companies and have kids. That's like a horrible, horrible question. Now, Okay, I'm reading our friend Bobby Rebel's book about how to learn tips for your children about finance, and it's an awesome book. What's

your morning routine? I have about fourteen cups of coffee. I know this is this is good health advice. Um. We have three three, three different children that go to three schools with the exact same drop off time. So morning is just running around like a lunatic with a lot of coffee. Grab a child and bring them to school. What is your nighttime routine? Okay, well I love nighttime. Everyone in my house goes to bed pretty early, and I'm a late night owl, and so I get to

enjoy like three four hours to myself. So I put on like some TV in the background, owned I sit and I work. I'll take a bath, I'll do like my whole face routine. I'll do like I feel like it's my my time every night to like have the whole house to myself, which I love. Who leaves you star struck? Oh my gosh, um, so so many people. I think some of the incredible female politicians that are

just like pushing the boulder uphill right now. I know, like the two of you have met Stacy Abrams, who would like I know if I ever met her when I would just I don't even know if I know what to say. I'd be so star struck. All right, Well, Lou Burns has been listening and he always comes in at the end with a male perspective and often the sharpest perspective. So, umlu take it away. Where do you imagine how to be like in the next ten years? Well,

there are to two directions we're trying to go. The first is we're trying to launch almost like a trip advisor of Web three companies, so that you could go on and search for an n f T collection by the type of founder or the social cause it supports,

and kind of see reviews on it. The other side is I think there's an entire new skill set that's going to be in demand with Web three, of this curator level of the Internet, of people who understand enough to curate artists and curate different information for websites and for companies, and so I'm hoping that hug can become kind of the default curate as a platform for Web three. Also,

how can Lou get involved in hug? Okay, Well, the first thing I'm going to say is that if you're new to crypto Hug is a second stop in crypto, So I'm going to recommend to start with Curious Atti Trading Club, which is a crypto community for total newcomers. It's the hands down best community for for on boarding into crypto. Once you've played around there and you decide you know that you want to go a little deeper down the rabbit hole, come find me, because I'm all

the way down there. Then I would check out the Hug dot x y Z and everything we're doing there because we are taking people on that next journey to either become founders and web three, create their own n f T collections, become big collectors of crypto and n f T s, and so once once you fall in and become a digen, as people say in crypto, come find me at at the Hug and we'll be delighted to hug you with open arms. The thing about Randy that I will never get over is how lovely she is.

Not telling these stories like other people would just never share, but like Randy always shares the unvarnished truth about her own life, her career, everything, and I just feel like that's so rare. She can also laugh at herself, which I love. That is one of my favorite qualities about her and just anyone, but also she she really her positivity is contagious and I love it and I you're right. I mean, she was laughing at the fact that you moved in with her parents during the pandemic. She she

laughs about her childs and failures. And I also thought she was pretty honest and talking about Mark and Cheryl and Facebook. She she really didn't shy away from it. We've had some guests on our show who kind of asked us to take things out or get nervous, and we asked the hard questions, and we always feel like it's our responsibility to ask the hard questions. But she handled our hard questions with such grace. I love it.

She is amazing. She is incredible, and I I am really excited to dig in further with her offline about Web three and hopefully we can come back to everyone here and give you more guidance because I think it's something we all need to embrace. Coming soon, there might be a What's Her Story and f T collection thanks to Randy's inspiration. Thanks for listening to What's Her Story

with Sam and Amy. We would appreciate it. If you leave her review wherever you get your podcasts, and of course, connect with us on social media at What's Her Story podcast. What's Her Story with Sam and Amy is powered by my company, The Riveter at The Riveter dot c O and Sam's company, park Place Payments at park place payments dot com. Thanks to our producer Stacy Parra and our male perspective, Blue Burns