Pride Month Employee Spotlight: Boost Bustamante and Laura Torres

During each Commemorative Observance Month, we spotlight two amazing colleagues nominated and voted for by a focus group of employees who identify with the given month. We are delighted to kick off our celebration of Pride Month by spotlighting Laura Torres, GTM training and enablement manager, and Boost Bustamante, people operations program manager. Here they discuss their journey as LGBTQIA2S+ and the importance of representation, family, and community.

Please tell us your name, pronouns, role at Airtable, and how long you have been at Airtable? What is a weird or interesting fact about yourself?

Boost: My name is Boost. My pronouns are he/him, and I am a program manager on the people team. I started working with Airtable as a consultant in April 2019 and converted to an employee in February 2020.

One thing that I'm particularly proud of is that I've biked AIDS/LifeCycle twice; in 2018 and 2019. ALC is a charity ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles, and it supports the LA LGBT Center and the SF AIDS Foundation. It's something that’s near and dear to me. It was also an incredible mental and physical challenge.

Outside of that, I really love sushi ginger. I don't know if that's a weird thing, but I can just eat sushi ginger by itself. I have a little jar in the refrigerator and sometimes I just want some sushi ginger.

Laura: I am Laura Torres or LT. My pronouns are she/her. I am the GTM training and enablement manager here at Airtable. I joined Airtable in November.

A fun or interesting fact about me is that I really love music festivals. I've been to Bonnaroo five years in a row. I just love the sense of community that comes from camping at music festivals. You get the opportunity to meet people from across the country and world who enjoy music and making connections without distractions like phones or media. I've seen some of the greats like Lionel Richie, Billy Joel, Elton John, and The Killers live.They are experiences that will always mean the world to me. I’m excited about? attending Electric Forest in June!

What’s your favorite part about working at Airtable?

Boost: Hands down, it's the people. I've been able to see this company grow from 66 people to almost 1,000 now. It aligns with the work that I do, since I get to build the programs and processes that support employees.

One of the things that I'm really proud of that we're rolling out during Pride Month is support for gender affirmation. These are the kind of projects that I get to work on, whether it's something that touches the company as a whole, or even just a smaller subset of folks.

Laura: I really love owning and leading our onboarding sessions for customer engagement new hires. Seeing the talent and energy that our new hires bring every two weeks is what makes my job so much fun. I get the privilege of welcoming every new hire cohort in their first week at Airtable.

The diversity of our cohorts spans experiences, walks of life, locations, and roles. It’s so inspiring to see Airtable grow and to get to join our new hires on their journey here starting on their first day.

What is it like to identify as LGBTQIA2S+ and work in tech?(ex: What do you enjoy/what would you like to see more of?)

Boost: As a queer Latino, I represent a small part of the company. What really grounds me is that I have an incredible team. I have leaders that are supportive and inclusive, which makes it less difficult to advocate for work that is essential to folks who are underrepresented.

I've also found an incredible queer community at Airtable. I have really deep friendships that have grown from work relationships. The wildest part is that some of these people I have never even met in person. But we have really close relationships that have been fostered over Zoom and from being intentional about building that community.

Laura: It's been a journey of feeling comfortable with sharing my personal life with my leaders and team. I've been really privileged because when I did open up I was encouraged and supported. All of my previous teams and leaders have made me feel welcomed and celebrated. Although when I think of identifying as queer in tech, I also think that it becomes really obvious when companies say that they are standing with the community, but only show up by changing their logo during Pride Month.

I think it’s been really important to see an inclusive environment being represented by action. For instance, seeing benefits like parental leave for all kinds of parents, supporting trans rights, gender affirming surgery procedures, or it can be as simple as being intentional about encouraging and using pronouns in your signature. I’d love to see more companies show up for the community through meaningful action.

I’d also love to see more folks from the community be involved in mentorship. It has meant the world to me to have a community-identifying leader. I'm a big believer in visibility and representation because tech doesn't require you to look a certain way. And that should be reflected in all of our orgs, teams, and leadership.

How has your experience as part of the LGBTQIA2S+ community shaped your present-day identity?

Boost: Family is so critical. Sometimes in queer communities of color, there are challenges with family and identity. I've been really privileged that people in my immediate family have had same sex partners. I think it helped me come to the idea that it doesn't necessarily need to be this big thing. You can just come to the table as you are, and just bring your voice.

I am intentional about how I navigate and engage in spaces. I try to bring my true self, whether it be by my hair living its own life, or the clothes I wear. That said, I know that the way I live my life isn’t how other folks live theirs, so I always bring an open-mind with the goal of understanding another person’s perspective because being heard, is being seen.

Laura: It's been incredibly important in my present-day identity. The journey that I've been on has made me incredibly grateful to have such supportive and encouraging friends and family. I know that in our community, that's not always the case.

It's also encouraged me to be brave about who I am and who I love. It’s helped me find my voice and be comfortable in my own skin. It also encouraged me to extend that community to my cohorts by creating a really supportive and open space where everyone knows that they can be who they are and where there is respect and understanding that we want to hear different voices speaking up.

For me, it's a constant reminder to create space for everybody. It’s my opportunity to lead by example and encourage everybody to come to the table.?

What does Pride month mean to you? Is there any particular way that you like to celebrate?

Boost: I think Pride Month is a reminder of visibility and the importance of representation. You spoke on it earlier, I think it's important for corporations to invest in the community, but it's also a reminder for folks, for us to continue advocating for inclusive policies. For safe spaces and for resources for ourselves and within the community. Being able to reach out your hand and help bring someone up with you or even to receive help from someone else in the community.?

And like you said, it's also a celebration, right? I think Pride Month is always known for its unabashed display of queerness across the spectrum. And so I'm particularly excited this year. I'm going with a friend to West Hollywood Pride to go see the one and only Lil’ Kim, Queen Bee.?

Laura: Pride Month really means gratitude to me. It means a celebration of myself and the community because of the brave movements that came before all of us; like Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera at Stonewall. I realize that pride can mean honoring those in the community that stood up and pushed back. That we do have a place and we do matter.

By doing that, we're honoring ourselves in the future of our community and realizing that the fight isn't quite over just yet. However, just bringing everyone together seems so simple it can be forgotten even in the queer community. There are ways that we can still reach out to better understand each other, support each other, and further the community as a whole.?

I got engaged in February and recently went to visit family in a small town in Texas. While celebrating my little brother's high school graduation I was talking with my aunt about our recent engagement. Naturally, we got to the topic of the wedding and the fashion choices. Rather than assume I would wear a dress, she asked, “What are you going to wear? Are you going to wear a tuxedo? Because you should just wear a white tuxedo and better yet, your fiance should wear one too.”

That kind of conversation might not seem like a big deal to everyone but it meant so much to me. Those kinds of moments make me incredibly grateful for my family and are moments I wish I could send to a younger me who was so scared to be something different. The support of my friends and family is a privilege that I appreciate all the time but especially during Pride Month.