Ep 9: Profitability Through Strategic Diversity with Helen Ahrens

We are all in business to make money. And when we're leaving money on the table, that can be frustrating. The problem is we don't always know where, when and how we're doing that. Today's conversation comes from someone with a ridiculous resume working for some of the largest companies in the world, but also having six startups of her own, and she's got a unique perspective that was enlightening to me. There's a lot of nuggets and tidbits in here that I've never thought about, even though this might be a slightly uncomfortable topic for some people. So my challenge to you is to listen to the whole episode, get the tips out of here that are definitely going to benefit your business. And yeah, let's jump in now.

Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of The Growth Gear Podcast. When I think about starting my own businesses, especially my e-comm businesses, I built things that I liked. I built things that I was familiar with, that I was comfortable with, that I wanted personally to own, right? These products could be anything from car accessories to pipe and cigar accessories. And when I really think about some of the growth phases that I had in my business, they were when people introduced something to me that I had had no exposure to before. And it was kind of difficult, it was a little bit awkward, it was a little bit weird to be trying to understand a product, trying to understand an audience that I personally wasn't familiar with. And I have nobody on my team that's familiar with those either. And when I look back now six, seven years ago, I feel like I had probably missed some opportunities by not diversifying my team, diversifying my circle around me, my peers, my community to find other opportunities that weren't directly within my vision or my realm of understanding.

And that's what we're talking about today. We've got an exceptional guest. She's got an amazing resume. She's built six businesses herself. She's worked with companies like Shopify, with Google, with Salesforce. She's worked with some of the largest brands out there, Pepsi, American Eagle, and others. I'll let her explain more of her background here in just a second. And while we were talking before this episode, she threw a statement out to me, which is like, "You're missing out on money on profitability if you don't do this one thing, which is start including diversity early on in your startup." So without further ado, let's welcome to the microphone, so to speak, our exceptional guest today, Helen Ahrens. Welcome, Helen.

Thanks, Tim. Very excited to be here to chat with you today.

I went a little bit over your kind of resume, some of the things that you've done. Talk a little bit about your current role right now, specifically regarding diversity, maybe how you discovered this position, this expertise, this kind of authority that you have and how you're using that in the world of business now.

Absolutely. I think there's a couple of different things that I'm doing today that I hope are creating impact for different folks. One of those is at Shopify that I'm very proud to be the global sheriff OUT ERG employee resource group. And essentially that is the LGBTQ group for both folks at Shopify, but also for our merchants. And it's helping to lead a team of seven different folks and 43 activators. So 50-something folks around the world. We help advocate and create more opportunity and more space for different voices. In addition too, I do some work with Google as their Women Techmaker Ambassadors, where we help create space for inclusion, attraction, retention, and success of women and non-binary folks in technology as well.

And I know that as we think about politics, as we think about businesses in the headlines, I don't want to get into the politics, the legality of exclusivity, none of that stuff. What I want to talk specifically about is a statement that you made, which is that companies are absolutely leaving money on the table by not getting different opinions, different viewpoints, different ideas, and this diverse workforce or even partners within their small businesses. Is that a fair statement that you see people constantly, especially working the e-comm world with Shopify, like leaving money on the table because they're not thinking broad enough? Is that a fair statement?

Good business is diverse business. And you are leaving money candidly on the table if you are not, you don't have diverse teams and you don't have diverse products. The reason I say that is that there is a significant amount of research out there. I think there's a wonderful Harvard Business Review article that kind of encapsulates that in a nutshell. But essentially, diverse teams drive greater profits, and that's shown time and time again through series of researches. And it's also, actually, there was a report that came out recently about there are some VC firms that specifically prefer to invest in diverse teams because they have greater returns as well. So whether you're talking about product, whether you're talking about your customers, whether you're talking about profitability or return on investment to VCs, it just makes sense to have more diverse teams. There's more money in diverse teams.

So as a small business, I wouldn't personally know where to begin to start thinking about diversity, like I wouldn't know how to resource even the strategies for smart diversification, especially early on in a company. Can you just kind of brain dump some ideas of when we should be thinking about reaching into those different resources, what those resources are, a good strategy for starting, even thinking about diversification and how to do it, I guess smartly, if that's a word?

Yeah, absolutely. There are lots of resources out there on how to work on DE&I, diversity, equity, inclusion. There's not only consultants and agencies out there, but there's also different groups that offer a wealth of information. One that comes to mind is one of my favorites called QueerTech. They essentially help folks in technology. So if you are in e-comm world, that also counts. They have resources such as, I think a report just came out called Queering the Ecosystem, and it talks about opportunities of how to attract queer folks and retain them and basically what that means economically for your business as well. So definitely think about different groups that are out there.

I think just having different conversations with people like we are today is super beneficial. Being a good ally to all sorts of different folks, whatever their facets of diversity are. And we know that sometimes it may be one, sometimes it may be multiple because diversity is not just like a straight track. I think having those conversations is really important.

So once you have those conversations, you might be able to identify specific groups that, "Hey, my team is not representative of this type of group. We need more of this perspective." Or maybe you might even go and partner with another business and start to look at their folks and be like, "I'm looking and seeing and hearing different things. I'm not having that input in my business and I'd really like to have that." And then asking other people in your communities, "Hey, what are you doing? How are you finding these people? How are you attracting them? How are you retaining them? How are you keeping them successful?" Because it's not just a case of finding your diverse folks, it's also about retaining them and then also creating space for them to be successful. It's kind of a three-part piece.

Okay, so let me back up just a second and use myself as an example. As an e-commerce brand owner, one thing that you're talking about is like team dynamics for multiple reasons, but one of them is being able to create product or sell, create marketing for more diverse groups of customers. Can you give me an example or maybe some advice on where I would go to see what other audiences may be looking at my product or maybe ignoring my product because my marketing is wrong, my messaging is wrong, maybe I don't have the right product for them? Just for some of the small business owners that are listening here that are thinking maybe they have their audience dialed in, they have their avatar dialed in, and we made the statement that a lot of times we're leaving money on the table. So kind of shed some light if you would, into that perspective on how to go and find opportunities we may be missing so that we can start bringing in team members to address that.

Absolutely. There's a bunch of different resources out there. I recommend maybe thinking... When I think about Shopify e-commerce leaders that I work with, I often talk about the ADA for Americans specifically, but it's about accessibility. It's about understanding can your website be actually read, seen, heard by different folks that have different abilities. If no, not only are you not compliant, which is problematic in itself, but you are missing out on those folks.

There was some research that came out last year that there was something like multi, multi-millions of dollars worth of this market of folks that fit within the ADA accessibility guidelines. If you're not even meeting those guidelines, which you need to be doing to be legally compliant, but also to be grabbing some of that cash that is on the table working with those folks that actively are trying to buy from you, they're coming to your website and leaving because they can't read it or they can't hear it or they can't access information about your products and actually purchase on the way out. So it's about thinking about maybe it's even the web lines of just starting with the ADA and working from there.

All right. And I hadn't thought about that actually being accessible, having our brand message and marketing accessible. What about just different marketing messaging for conversions, right? So as an example, I was selling pipe cigar and whiskey accessories. And when I think about my avatar, I think of one very specific group of males typically who are professional, they're a little bit rugged. I've got in my mind this very specific avatar. And now that you've been just talking in a few short minutes, I'm thinking, "Holy crap. How much money did I leave on the table because I wasn't marketing and branding and maybe creating a little bit of a distinct product line for people outside of that avatar that I had identified?"

And I'm not even talking about some of these more dynamic groups, I'm thinking just larger women in general, different age brackets. I had very kind of hyper focus on this one avatar. So I suspect there is some opportunity just in the marketing and branding and product side to bring in folks to start thinking larger than that. If that's the case, what's the first step? Do I start bringing in more diverse team members to start thinking differently than I do? Or should I go out and try to understand the different avatars that may be buying similar products to mine and then try to match teammates to lead the charge in those areas? I don't know how to even begin that process, but I suspect you have some guidance.

There's no perfect way, Tim. We just start. We just do our best and we start. What I'd recommend is in terms of marketing and branding, being in May when you and I are having this discussion and June being just around the corner, Pride Month is a classic example of marketing and branding.

What I see as a lot of different brands, what they do is they think about, "How do we engage with a different audience?" And that might be the LGBTQ+ audience. "How do we engage with them? What are they doing? How can we be part of that conversation and how can we diversify our audience and all support that current audience here?" So thinking about marketing or branding, a classic example is thinking about a belonging month or an identity month such as Pride Month, which is June. What are other brands doing? What conversations are they having? Where are they having it and testing and seeing how that lands. And then doing all your usual metrics and analysis, looking back through your analytics and seeing, "Did this campaign work? What does the profile look like?"

You can also ask questions of your audience as you go through. Perhaps you have an opportunity to do some surveys, perhaps you have an opportunity to do some market research. Ask some deeper questions that perhaps you haven't before. There's also a way to incentivize that. So for example, if you are sending out a post-purchase survey and/or some sort of data gathering activity, there is a way to say, "Hey, how do you identify?" And then maybe asking the question, you could leave it as an open field, which is always an easy way. Otherwise, you could say, "Are you female? Are you male? Are you non-binary?" and have this kind of list available to folks. That will help give you intelligence as well that you can translate into marketing activities and insights that drive sales.

All right. So I'm going to ask you to kind of preach for just a second. I know that inclusivity and diversity can be a very polarizing topic. And I think that there are a lot of people in the world, probably myself included, that don't understand maybe the big picture, like we see what is on the media or we hear a small group talking about something and my inclination is usually to play it safe. I think a lot of small business owners would probably prefer to play it safe, right? They're having some sales, their marketing a specific way, their team is functioning relatively well and they would be maybe fearful to, for example, include a big promotion of certain products with Pride Month in June. What would you say to people that are maybe worried about stretching themselves out there a little further than what they've been used to to start including more diverse audiences, especially if they're afraid of negative reviews or negative feedback from maybe their existing audience or a piece of their existing audience?

DE&I might seem scary to begin with if you haven't engaged with it before because it's change, it's different. And that's uncomfortable and it's okay to be uncomfortable. Sit with that uncomfortableness that says "There's an opportunity here."

I have the privilege of working with billions of dollars of Shopify merchants and seeing their wild successes. And not one of those large businesses that I work with don't prioritize DE&I. I can tell you firsthand from what I see every day day in and out, they do prioritize DE&I, and it makes them money. And it makes them successful because they have missions aligned. There are just terrific people doing terrific things in the billion dollar world.

I would encourage you to step into that uncomfortableness and try to do marketing campaigns, marketing efforts around creating new audiences and being inclusive and make sure it's mission-aligned. So whatever your company's mission is, make sure it makes sense. Don't do anything just because of the sake of doing it. It should always be in line with what you're trying to achieve overall as a company. But if you are reaching out to a new audience that is aligned with your mission, it will always make sense.

So when I think about companies that have faced some backlash, there are companies even very recently, very large companies, prominent companies, very public companies that were a little bit more inclusive in some of their messaging or some of their branding. And we saw in the headlines a lot of blowback, a lot of people getting upset, even people that you would think are in their target market being upset. But my suspicion is that companies like that that even get some of that, that feedback or some blowback, actually end up a lot better off on paper when it's all said and done and kind of the rough sea settled. Would you say that's an accurate statement?

Absolutely. Absolutely. And I get to be so lucky to work with lots of very large brands where I do see them trying different things and it does work out for them in their favor. I think what you see in the news is perhaps this one or two small examples of things that had backlash. But let's be clear, the backlash that we hear is not necessarily... Just because it's loud doesn't mean it's widespread and it doesn't mean that it turns into dollars necessarily. So doing the right thing, being inclusive and working in different communities and running public campaigns and all sorts of things like that that are inclusive, that does both, from my opinion, what I see in our Shopify merchants that I work with and also in the public research, they are more successful and they do make more money.

So what about small businesses? I mean we're talking about big brands, we're talking about large companies. At what stage of a company's growth or what size of a company do you think it's important to start thinking about maybe getting out of your comfort zone or intentionally hiring diverse team members for the purpose of not just strengthening your team, but also strengthening the ability to reach different audience members and different target audiences?

Day one, I think you don't partner with someone that's identical to you because you think the same way. You go and find business partners specifically because they do think differently or they have different strengths and skill sets, but you know how to work with that person. That's a natural behavior, unconscious bias called when you specifically go and seek out someone that is just like you but slightly different and you think, "Wow, we're a great team."

Now, imagine if you stepped into your uncomfortableness of, "Ooh, you know what? Let's go and find someone that doesn't look or think or sound like me even more than just a little bit. What could I achieve with this person? What could we unlock together?" So honestly, the sooner you start, the better. The reason why, additionally, your customers are diverse, your product needs to be diverse. All of these things are beneficial and they will drive greater market share and better results.

Yeah. And as you say that, I'm thinking that I have this fallacy that I'm guilty of very often, which is thinking that diversity is extreme, right? Diversity is kind of all the way over in this polarizing lane of different minorities or gender identification. But diversity just really is different. And maybe I'm guilty of, and I know other people are probably guilty of, ignoring this idea of diversity because they're thinking too much to an extreme. But what you just said makes a lot of sense.

I've had business partners that were exactly like me and the lack of diversity even in just the way that we think. I'm not talking about gender, I'm talking about race, I'm not talking about age, just the way we think is different. So one thing that you're opening my eyes to is diversity is just different. It's not something that has to be polarizing, it's not something that has to be all the way on the extreme side of what you're comfortable with or thinking about. Diversity really is inclusivity of everybody. And as I think back to some of the best colleagues I've had, some of the best projects I've worked on some of this marketing campaigns, yeah, you're right. The more different opinions and different ideas and different mindsets that were involved in those projects, those campaigns, it was significantly better overall.

Absolutely. And even if you think it can be subtle as you just said, so hiring someone who's neurodivergent, their requirements and their needs might be just closed captions and it might be, "Oh, I just need a little bit more processing time or I need these things." And it's like, "Okay, I've hired someone who's neurodivergent and they are brilliant. They think completely different to the way I do. They ask questions that I've never asked questions about." This is a subtle thing, but it's something that can bring immense value to your business and to your customers as well at the end of the day.

So we've been talking about diversity, well, a little more focused in marketing and branding and product offerings to specific audiences. But the folks that are listening to this podcast are probably thinking about exiting their company at some point to an aggregator, to a PE fund, to somebody. When we think about the value of our portfolio, is our company more valuable when we're able to show an exhibit that we're much more diverse on the leadership team, on the staff, and then of course to the audiences? How much difference does it make in the value of our business?

I've been really lucky lately to speak with a lot of VC firms and a lot of partners about what they're thinking about, what they're looking for specifically. And a lot of them have mentioned, one of them specifically said to me, "If you are a queer migrant woman, I will make time for a coffee for you any day over others." And I thought that was so interesting. That was the first time that I'd heard someone say, "These folks, above all others, will have a seat at my table and other access to my money first." These conversations are happening more and more.

If you come with a company that looks all the same, you are now a liability to that VC firm. When they have other options that have diverse companies, they know are going to cover greater return for them. They will actively choose those companies over yours. So in terms of leaving money on the table and different strategies around that, it also applies here. You have to have diversity at the table to be attractive for the funding to exits, all these good things, but also for your customers, but also for your product. It literally is so intrinsically linked. DE&I is table stakes in 2024.

All right. So if we've gotten anybody excited, we've convinced anybody that's listening that they should be thinking about diversity in their business, where should they go to start learning more, right? Are there resources? Are there YouTube channels? Where would you point people to just get a better understanding of this entire concept and how it's going to impact their business? I know people are going to follow up and get more information.

So many different places to go. One of my favorite ones to start is actually Better Allies, which is a speaker and it's a weekly newsletter. I think there's a book as well. Better Allies is where I recommend everybody start. Just sign up for the weekly email. It will send out real world examples of conversations that she's had, learning she's had as well. I think we all have an opportunity to be better allies, myself included. Allyship is something that I'm constantly working on for all different folks. Starting there and educating yourself around these things.

As I mentioned, there's a range of different resources out there in terms of consultants and agencies and things like that. So you can look in your specific areas, but then also look to different groups. So for example, I mentioned QueerTech if you're thinking about LGBTQ. Lesbians Who Tech as well is another resource that I'm also involved with. If you're looking for women, specifically women and non-binary folks specifically, to maybe join your team and/or be upleveled. Google's women Techmaker program is also fantastic. So these are just a couple of places and the communities that I'm involved with that I see great success and great resources coming out of. So I'd recommend that. But also just thinking maybe even locally, what do you have in your local communities, in your local areas? Go and do some Google work and I promise you absolutely be worth the time that you invest in that.

Helen, it's obviously you've got a lot of experience, you've got a lot of knowledge and insight. For anybody that's listening and wants to follow more of what you're doing or maybe has questions for you, where can they connect with you?

I would love to connect with the folks on LinkedIn. I think that's obviously the best place to have professional conversations about these topics. I also share a lot of resources about events, webinars, resources, guides, in-person events, virtual events. A lot of those things come through my LinkedIn and I share them with the community more broadly.

You can also maybe catch me at a Google event that I'm speaking at with Women Techmakers. Shopify as well, I also do a lot of events around that. So I would love to see any of you folks in the community. If you happen to be based in Toronto, there's also a Women in eCommerce meetup that's held that I attend pretty regularly. So if you're one of those folks or looking to engage with those folks, I'd love to see you there. Again, a lot of these things are published on LinkedIn, so I would love to connect with folks on LinkedIn and hear what they're working on and share resources there too.

So as we wrap up, I would ask all of you that are curious about this topic to go look at some of those resources that Helen shared and leave a review, leave a comment. If you're listening on a major podcast platform, we'd love reviews. If you're listening or watching on YouTube, leave a question in the comment section of the video and we can get that question over to Helen if it pertains to her and try to get a public answer. And as we sign off Helen, are there any last thoughts or pieces of advice or guidance that you'd share to wrap things up?

I'm just thrilled that both you and your community of thinking about how we can be more inclusive for different folks. I think this is just fantastic. And the reason why is because, one, it's good for different communities. Two, it's really good for your customers, and three, there's money to be made around this. So I just think it's fantastic and I encourage you to keep doing allyship work and I encourage you to keep building diverse teams and I just think it's great.

Awesome. Well, thanks so much. Thank you all for listening and we'll see you on the next episode.