11 Takeaways from 3 Days at Stanford University Innovation Fellows’ 5th Anniversary Conference

A weekend filled with inspiration, connection, realization and strength.

I was blessed to have the opportunity to go back to Stanford d.school for the University Innovation Fellows #ui5 Silicon Valley Meetup/Conference. It was the program’s 5th year anniversary, celebrating 1,000+ fellows and 5 years of inspiration, innovation, transformation and revolutions across hundreds of campuses through 20+ countries. As a University Innovation Fellow, it's an honor to be able to go back!

The theme was around Music - and I felt super inspired to learn about the music industry - hear from folks like Common’s representatives, Pandora executives, and Pinterest designers, and artists like Grace Weber. Before I share my experience, I want to thank the Colin Powell School, the Zahn Innovation Center (specifically @Lindsay Siegel, our mentor and sponsor), and the MPA Program at CCNY for making this trip possible.

The 3 days I spent there were filled with design challenges (like How might we can integrate music to k-12 education), inspiring talks (about transforming universities and campuses), practical workshops (fast prototyping), music, dancing, meditation, bonding, love, smiles, and tears. I am so grateful. I thought I should share some of that experience for everyone else and also for myself.

This weekend, I was reminded the importance of design in many settings. Design-thinking can be used anytime and anywhere in life. With your organization, with your club, with your company, with your family, with your relationships, and most importantly with yourself. Wondering how Design Thinking works? Here’s a wonderful resource by Stanford’s design.School: A Virtual Crash Course in Design Thinking.

A list of 11 things I took away, was reminded of, and am working on internalizing:

1. Ownership.

Own your successes just as much as you own your failures. Own where you come from, how hard you work, and where you are going. Having a sense of ownership around your projects, jobs, family, and your life will overall push you to work harder but to also be proud and grateful for the work you produce (whether it’s good or bad). Always hold your head high no matter what happens and where it happens.

2. Not Entitlement but Self-Worth.

This thought started early in the weekend after my close friend Kurt and I met with a good friend of ours, James Zamora, who started the Invention Corps at UC Berkeley. We realized there’s such a big difference between CCNY students and other students in colleges like UC Berkeley--because many of us were low-income, underrepresented and minorities, and went to a university that is constantly underfunded, low on resources--we had a total different view on life and the way we thought about ourselves and others around us. We were overall less competitive, thought less of our accomplishments and skills, which killed our confidence and pride. This, I noticed, destroys you internally and externally: you start believing you're not worthy, deserving, or capable of the things happening in your life, and people start believing it, because that’s the type of energy you are putting out.

Entitlement is often shed on a very negative light and I don’t think it should always be looked at as the feeling that people owe you things or that the world revolves around you. I was recently reading about this in The Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, where he was highlighting the most successful people in the world--how they always questioned the rules, administration, and the status quo--because they had some sense of entitlement towards certain situations. They didn’t accept how the system was already set up and knew something had to be done. They knew they deserved better. Which is hand-in-hand with realizing your self-worth. Knowing your self-worth means you won’t undersell yourself. You won’t put yourself down. You won’t take up mediocre projects or jobs. You won’t settle for less, when you deserve more. It’s okay for you to be entitled about certain things: like when you are inside a university and you’re paying tuition for it (as a product), you are entitled to receive a decent education and you should never feel bad/ashamed to talk to a professor about the way they are teaching a class or something they said that they didn’t like. So, always remember what you’re worth. Don’t go for less.

3. Push yourself through the most uncomfortable moments.

When you don’t feel like it, is when it will matter the most. When you constantly throw yourself in a place of being uncomfortable, you are allowing yourself an opportunity to grow. I felt it this weekend at Stanford - the moments I felt like I didn’t want to network or talk any more were the moments I was most glad I did. Talk to more people. Talk to less people for longer times. Get up in front of a crowd and tell your story. Put other people in situations that can allow them to grow. This will leave you more fulfilled.

4. Confront your feelings.

Don’t just suppress the way you feel. If you feel down and weird, there’s a reason for it. If you’re feeling out of place and disrespected, there is a reason. If you’re disappointed and upset, there’s a reason. Check in and take a moment to see why you feel the way you do. Which leads us to a really important topic….mental health.

You don’t have to be happy and driven 100% of the time.

It’s okay to feel sad. Accept your feelings and accept what’s happening in your life. If you don’t allow yourself to feel sadness, stress, or anxiety then you are only pushing yourself to a place of negligence and unreality.

5. Mental health is probably the most important thing you should take care of.

A big portion of the meet-up highlighted the importance of mental health and self-care. One talk in particular, given by Nadia Gathers, reminded us the importance of checking in on yourself and giving yourself the time you need to slow down and heal. Depression and anxiety -- and everything in between -- is something very real that I’ve experienced countless times and I could say that you will never be able to serve others effectively if you don’t serve yourself first. So, take some time do that. Self-care and self-love; through investing time, resources, and energy into your soul, your mental, physical and emotional health. I highlighted some of this on my article about self-love and how It’s The Most Important Skill You Can Acquire.

6. Starting with love. Which means starting with Empathy.

Remember that with ANYTHING YOU DO IN LIFE (projects, relationships, situations, conversations) to always start with the end in mind. The end user. The end goal. Start with understanding their perspective: how they feel, why they feel that way, how you can serve them, how you can build around them. The best companies, schools, the best people and best projects always focus on their customer/end user. Be empathetic (not just sympathetic (feeling bad for someone) vs. empathetic which is putting yourself in their shoes). And always keep love in the loop. UIF’s new hoodie design said this on the back “Start with Love”. Which is always starting with a place of deep understanding and care. This reminds me of an article shared by a close friend where Jack Ma, the CEO and Founder of Alibaba says successful leaders around the world not only do you need IQ and EQ (Emotional Intelligence) but also LQ (Love Quotient). In the article, Jack Ma says, “A machine does not have a heart, [a] machine does not have soul, and [a] machine does not have a belief. Human being have the souls, have the belief, have the value; we are creative, we are showing that we can control the machines, -- These are the qualities that will allow people to pursue globalization that is humane.” So, keep that in mind the next time you are working on something: start with love & empathy.

7. Designing with Inclusion in mind

This year’s meetup was full of diversity from different cultures, races, religions, languages, countries. It was beautiful seeing people from all over the country and the world -- Uruguay, Puerto Rico, Chile, to India, Morocco--Indiana, Wisconsin, California, Florida, Atlanta, and everything in between. It was a reminder about the importance of inclusive design - one really awesome talk by Lily Zheng, who worked at Stanford’s Office of Diversity, said: Diversity is a FACT. Inclusion is a PRACTICE. Equity is the GOAL. This essentially means that we all know diversity exists, it’s something that can’t be denied. Inclusion is the work we have to put in to make sure that those people from different backgrounds are included and feel welcomed and can work together. The goal is equity: “fairness or justice in the way people are treated.”

8. Assume good intentions.

In whatever scenario you are facing, always assume the person you are dealing with has good intentions towards you and towards the thing you are dealing with. Starting with good intentions will help you eliminate all assumptions and internal biases. It’s a great way to start a conversation or start solving a problem; without going through the hassle of misunderstanding and fake stories (or news :) ).

9. Positivity matters.

Especially in today’s climate. Being positive, excited, happy is pretty underrated. The truth is, people navigate towards positivity. In a conversation with my friend Nathaly, we dug deep into why it mattered: because the world is already negative, because we are all already going through shit, and because it’s tough--being a positive light is important and critical. So, whenever you can, drive towards positivity and promote it, always and forever. It will make people happier and more welcome around you and your ideas.

10. Always be present.

This is a reinforcement of something I’ve been trying to work on for a while now. If you’re not living in the moment you are in--the present time (aka the gift)--then you are not living at all. I still struggle with this but I believe if you give yourself a few seconds, minutes, or hours before a conversation, project, or big conference--to be intentional, mindful, clear-headed, and purposeful--you’ll be ready to be there and nowhere else.

11. Gratitude.

When we meditated in Stanford’s dance studio; we were asked to go to the happiest place, spend a few minutes, and leave with something. I left with Gratitude. I am leaving this meet-up with Gratitude, thankfulness, happiness and with lots of love and inspiration, for myself, my team, and for the 1000+ family of fellows.

Changing higher education is going to be a tough, long journey, that’s filled with roadblocks, challenges, tough times, and barriers. It’s not easy changing an institution that has been operating the same for hundreds of years. But no one said it would be easy doing that, or changing the world.

Let me me know your thoughts on some of these learnings--and feel free to share your own from a particular experience below! :)

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