Empowering Equality: On Standing Up To Stop Racism And Support Women’s Rights With Debbie Pope
There are many things in our life that we have no control over, be it how we are born, our skin color, gender, etc. However, this shouldn’t stand in the way of us and the opportunities that the world provides. Women’s rights issues and racism stem from systemic injustices and oppression, thus fighting for one should go hand in hand with the other. Debbie Pope is the CEO of YWCA Boulder, dedicated to eradicating racism and empowering women. Driven by her personal experience with MS through her mother, she is also the National Executive Vice President of Development at the National MS Society, helping families and patients deal with the condition. Debbie’s works have been centered on helping others and providing equal opportunities. Get to know her story and how she’s cultivating equality starting at home.
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Empowering Equality: On Standing Up To End Racism And Support Women’s Rights With Debbie Pope
I'm with Debbie Pope who is the CEO of YWCA Boulder. Prior to that, she had another interesting position as the National Executive Vice President of Development at the National MS Society. MS has hit a friend of mine so that's really close to home. That’s what Debbie's doing in Boulder and around the country with 210 different parts of her organization. I'm excited to have her on the show. Boulder happens to be where my daughter is headed off to school. That will be cool too. Debbie, welcome to the show.
Thank you. Thanks for inviting me.
It’s good to have you here. I like to help our audience connect with you by asking you first about early childhood. Some of our passions, priorities and what we care about in life, we learn at a very young age. I was born in Wisconsin and you may have been from there as well.
Equality: It's so wonderful nowadays for somebody who's newly diagnosed with MS because there are many treatment options.
I was born in Sheboygan, Wisconsin right along Lake Michigan. My early days were spent along Lake Michigan. There were lots of wooded areas and lakes around there. Many memories of swimming in the summer and snowball fights in the winter.
Plenty of snowball fights in the cold weather there, I'm sure. What got you up in the morning? What were you passionate about? Did you notice something then that now has become part of your life? What's the thread between then and now?
My mom was a huge inspiration in my life and my sister’s life. She was an artist. What I used to love is it would be a beautiful day and she had all the things you have to do that I know now as a parent. She'd say, "Let's go," and we'd get in our Malibu station wagon. She would drive until she's like, "Let's stop. This looks perfect." It would be an open field. There are a lot of sceneries of dairy farms and things like that. She'd bring her paints along and we would sit down in this field. She said, "Paint whatever you see." It was a beautiful way to think about life because my sister’s was always exactly what was there. Mine never looked like what was there. I came up with all different renditions of that.
What got me up in the mornings, she helped us see things through a different lens. We'd be driving down the street and she'd say, "How many colors do you see in the sky today? Did you notice that tree that's been changing over the past three days since we've been driving to school?" That was a huge way to start my childhood in a way that I've held onto that.
Many of us float down the river and don't take notice of everything as it goes by. Have you watched the show called The Chosen?
I haven't but I've heard about it.
It's good. I've had at least a dozen people tell me about it. My wife cracks up because I love the credits that's like 45 seconds. At the beginning of the credits, it plays a song and shows all the gray fish swimming in a circle. One of them turns blue, then more turn blue. It's an awakening to being kind, helping others and doing the right thing. The music plays and when the fish turned blue, I'm like, "That's a good mission statement." Turn gray fish blue, and recognizing and see things in the way your mom did.
There's always something that we go through in life that helps us become a better person. At the time it might feel like, "This is difficult. Why do I have to go through this?" Is there one you're comfortable sharing that you can talk about how you made it through and what your process was? That's helpful for our audience.
Interestingly enough, it also has to do with my mom. My sister and I used to say that we have what we considered this perfect childhood and it changed very abruptly. My mom was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis when I was thirteen. It's one of those things that people can have for a while and not know about. You have an onset of it and it can be incredibly drastic. She went from taking a walk with me in the morning to not being able to get out of bed the next morning. We had no idea what was wrong. She couldn't walk. She couldn't paint and it changed our life immediately. There's no runway. Suddenly things change quickly. We were fortunate that she was able to go into a place of remission on her own. She'd have relapses and you never knew when they were going to happen. You constantly lived your life from that point forward.
I always felt like waiting for what's going to happen next. Things are going too well and you’re thinking an onset is going to happen. The other thing that was hard about it is that she was a very strong, positive and spiritual person. She didn't want to sit in that place of sadness or “I can't do this.” There were a lot of denials and places that we didn't talk about it. We all knew it was there but we didn't talk about it. That was hard because how I dealt with it initially was to try to pretend it's not there and it was always present. These things have a way of working. I was a TV news anchor in Texas and I happened to be invited to the cover story that was the Multiple Sclerosis Walk. I've never been connected to them. I had no idea. That changed me a lot.
All of a sudden, I met all of these people who were going through similar things. They were talking about them and there was hope. I was learning about all these exciting treatments that were in place. Long story short, seventeen years of my career were spent with the National MS Society. It was a near and dear mission to me. That's the thing where my mom had said, "Maybe I had MS because that was a road you're supposed to take and you might not have found your way there." I would always hope and wish that she didn't have to live through that. These things happen in life. In hindsight, we can see more clearly.
It's a great story. I love the painting and the things that she taught you, that you’ve invested seventeen years to make a difference. There has been big progress that's been made in MS.
Equality: It's important for all of us to see different types of people in leadership. Whether it's their race, gender, or identity, all those pieces are important.
Huge progress. When she was diagnosed, there were no treatments. The doctor said, "Go home and pretend you don't have it because there's nothing we can do." It's so wonderful nowadays for somebody who's newly diagnosed, there are many treatment options. We know that it's helping to help the disease so that they can live a more full life. Every year there are new treatments that are incredible. The experience like you were talking about your friend doesn't mean it's still not hard, but the experience of having to think of it is different than somebody who's diagnosed years ago.
My other show is called AI for Sales. I talked to a lot of leaders in the AI space. It's interesting because in biotech and healthcare, there are many things that the AI can run like A/B testing and figure things out with big data. I have to believe things like MS and cancer and all those things that have plagued us for so long can now start to be solved. That helps us transition into the next part of the conversation.
What you're doing now around eliminating racism is a great thing to focus on. We don't need that in our society and world. AI has the potential to also have a positive impact there, interestingly enough. A manager who reads a resume may bring their biases to the equation on accident. It's hard-coded. AI can read the document differently. I'm optimistic about where things go. We've made a lot of progress over the last several decades, but I'm also equally excited we can make a lot more. Tell us a little bit more about what your current organization is focused on. I'm curious.
I'm the CEO of the YWCA. I have a wonderful team of close to 40 staff. Our mission is to eliminate racism and empower women. It's that idea of you have to be able to empower all women. We aren't able to do that as long as racism is in existence. It is taking into account this full community and how we are all working together. It's about having human dignity and being human. I know that sounds simplistic but what's unfortunate is the biases that have come into our minds and have been so hardwired. We need to unwire. We need to relearn because there has been a lot when you even still look at the inequities. I have three daughters.
Even as a CEO, when I compare my salary to other men in a similar role, they're making more than I am. It's this idea of there's enough for all of us. We will be better if we open that space up to everybody. That's where we are. We're focused on early childhood education. Were in schools doing a lot of reading about racism, using literature to start early with children so they have a more inclusive perspective to be allies for anti-bullying. We work with parents on how they can talk to their kids about racism. We're doing a lot of programming for young girls in STEM, how do we set up opportunities for them now for their future. We still have to work with the day-to-day, and then how do we set up work for the future.
To hit on an interesting perspective, we reach out to people to be on the show. Both my AI for Sales show and Living a Better Story. Something I've noticed is that men are more likely to respond and say, "Sure, let me go ahead," no questions asked. They'll take a risk, generalizing. From a percentage basis, I've probably had on this show 7 or 8 women and 30 or 40 men. It's interesting because that's probably what society says, "Don't step out." Part of the solution is educating that it's okay, “Take a step and a leap of faith. You are an amazing person. Share your story. God created you like He created me and everyone else.” I love what you're doing there. Having a son and a daughter, you want equality for both.
I have a son too. We spend a lot of time focusing on building programming, empowerment and confidence for women and girls, but we have to do the same with boys. We have to give them the confidence to also be who they want to be because we’re socialized a lot around gender. This is for all of us to work on collectively as well, but it's better for all of us in the end. I appreciate you bringing that up because we have lots of studies that show that these things are socialized very early, and we don't even realize that.
There are a few sales leaders that I have high respect for that are running women in sales and leadership. There are many movements across the country. It's above the threshold. People are aware and they're open to learn and understand. I remember seeing one of the commercials from years ago and it said, "You hit like a girl," or something like that. It was like, "Time out," but it's unconscious to the people that probably created that commercial.
There's a lot of progress made. The more we can see people who reflect us and I mean that for all of us, then we can see it and dream it. There's something concrete about it. That's why it's important for all of us to see different types of people in leadership. Whether it's their race or their gender or their identity, all those pieces are important.
One of the Cofounders of Living a Better Story is Robert White. He is a friend of our family that I knew when I was a kid. I used to cut his grass. He's sent 1.3 million people graduated from mindset transformational human potential movement companies that he's run. What I've found is when it's experiential learning, it's so much more impactful. I'd be happy to make an intro there sometime because I'm sure he could put some experiential things together, which you probably are already doing but why not talk to the guy who's done it 1.3 billion times?
How we'll be able to accomplish and achieve that is by leveraging all those incredible talents and strengths of everybody. Yes, I would love to.
To give you an example at the last event that we did. I know I'm breaking one of his rules because you're supposed to keep these a secret. Robert, sorry if you're reading. We went in a circle. Let's say there are five people sitting down and five standing up. The things we didn't hear as a kid that we wished we'd heard from our parents, you would come up with three of those. For me, it was hard. I got the first one, but the second one was hard, and my son was there. It was neat and powerful. You go up. They're closing their eyes, sitting down. You put your hand on their shoulder and you whisper in their ear what you wished you would have heard. Mine is, "I love you no matter what because you can do anything and I still love you.” I said that to my son and he's heard me say it my whole life.
My parents love me. They are amazing but since I didn't necessarily hear it, there was that missing gap. He went around and said, "Don't try so hard." My wife and I pushed the kids to education and things, but those kinds of experiences that open up your mindset, I'm sure there are some that could be done and have been done in women and racial equality. It would be powerful.
Equality: There are many more commonalities we share than differences. In some ways, the way society has been set up divides us, sometimes intentionally.
I would love it because we do a lot of training around this. I'd love to bring those two things together because it is about making a conscientious change and being intentional about it which takes work on yourself and exploring, “Why do I feel that way?” Being able to be authentic and real because there's a lot of layers to it.
I think of you driving down the road and your mom pulling over and saying, "Here, let's paint this." That's exactly how life should be. We're in the machine. Let's just pause for a moment. Understand the perspective of the other person because they hold on to certain beliefs. We hold beliefs. Let's look at it from 30,000 feet. How amazing that is. Think about three years from now and you're back on the show, "Great to see you again, Debbie." What's transpired over the next three years for you when you're doing the look back?
For me, the personal part of it is the people I love and my children are feeling fulfilled, achieving their dreams, feeling happy that they're living a full life, and they're making a difference. They have that freedom and are starting to give back as well. That would be meaningful to me as a parent. I hope I can say that. In terms of our society, I hope we can get to a better place. There are many more commonalities that we share than differences. I feel like in some ways, the way society has been set up divides us and sometimes intentionally.
My goal is to try and figure out how do we come together around the things that are foundational, fundamental and human. Within there, how do we make sure we identify those areas that need to be where equity is needed, and how do we get there, and how do we get past our own barriers and fears? The reason we're not is there are people who get afraid. Fear is so powerful. When we let it overtake us, we can't see things clearly. We don't take opportunities the way we maybe would.
With the power players, the influence in media, social media and all outlets, it seems like the goal is, "Let's divide” because it works for the sponsors.
There are reasons but it's been going on for hundreds of years. It’s being able to see more of that. I'm a connector so I'd love to be a conduit to figure out and I'm working within the women's movement. It's like, how do we all come together on issues that are so important to us? The safety of our children and our families, education, our own health and safety, and economic advancement. How we're being able to fulfill our dreams. That's a space that years from now, I'd love to be able to say, "Here's how I've been able to be a part of them."
Let's rewind the tape and go back to the early mid-twenties, maybe when you're twenty. Is there something you would tell yourself back then? What would you tell yourself from when you were twenty?
Probably so many things. The beauty of it is as I get older, I see more lines on my face and things than when I was twenty that I wouldn't have thought of. You do have a better sense of who you are and how to look at the world in a different way. What I would probably say is I was focused on being a television broadcast journalist. That was what I was going to do. I knew the whole path. I had it all laid out. I was doing everything that I was supposed to be doing and I was very determined.
What I would probably tell that twenty-year-old is like, "Sometimes the roads that go off of that are sometimes the most important one. If you're so focused on that just one road, you miss these other opportunities that can take you to incredible places if you let them." It's hard at that age because there's a lot of fear about, "Am I going to succeed? What is this going to look like?" Maybe it's easy to say in hindsight, looking at where my life is now but I would say what I learned throughout that process was being more open as those opportunities arise and seeing how that might be the direction that you need to take.
One degree off could change everything. Our good friend, Arjun Sen, is the CEO of ZenMango. The Brand Whisperer is what he goes by. Tiger Woods is one of his clients and says, "You're the brand caddy." This guy is amazing. He talks about how everyone is one-of-one at something in the world and figuring out what you're one-of-one at is important. A lot of times you might feel like, "I'm a salesperson at this company. It's the best job I've ever had," and yet your true passion is a degree off. It feels like that's the transition I'm in. Halfway point, I'm heading into the back nine of life and looking at it going, "I've gotten good for 25 years of doing sales and leading. How can I use that to impact the world in a positive way?" It's a lot of fun.
Sometimes it's taking a leap of faith. Sometimes that path does not work the way you thought it might but it might help you inform your path you shouldn't be on.
The last question is always one of the best and the most fun questions that I ask. You never know because we're talking through with a lot of different people and we've covered a lot of ground. That is, what role does faith play in your journey? I've heard you've used the word a few times. What role does it play in your life?
I would call it spirituality. I do believe that there is a reason each of us is here. Sometimes it's hard to see or understand. I'm hopeful that somewhere in my journey, I'll better understand that. Because of our experience with my mom’s chronic illness, it would have been easy. I still get mad about it. Speaking about it at her funeral, I still don't understand why she. Why did this incredible woman and artist get this? Why all of this is taken from her? I feel like you can go into those places easily. When things are going well, it's easy to have faith. It's like, "Everything's great." It's when it's hard that I found my faith being the strongest because it has to be. It's hard and it takes trust, understanding and patience of like, "I can't understand this right now." Sometimes we're not meant to understand it at that moment.
My mom used to say, "You're never given something harder than what you can handle." It doesn't always feel that way when you're in it. When you get over it, then you see, "I did get through that." I can have more confidence that I can get through things, but I don't believe that we can do that by ourselves. My faith has been a gift and I don't take that for granted. I don't judge others either where they are. We all have different journeys and ways we look at things. I believe there's a fundamental truth that we probably all believe.
We're launching this app called 77Pray. Its purpose is to help people make a connection. Even people who are like, "I'm not sure." Give it a try and see what happens in 20 or 30 days of asking, "What's your will for my life?" Being open to hearing it. Sometimes it's the whisper. Sometimes it's a dream you have at night. When you tune into the dial, it seems to me that it does open up that pathway too. For you, your work with MS for seventeen years, you got the message and you helped change a lot of people's lives.
As a parent, we can understand this. You can tell your kids things over and over but sometimes they need to experience that. They need to learn it on their own, which is also part of faith too because we have free will. We do make our own choices. There are a lot less that we have control over than we'd like to believe.
That's a fair statement. I want to write a book called Frictionless. Think of the friction part like sandpaper has maybe even on the book where it's rough. A lot of us live in a friction life where we're not in alignment with what we're supposed to be doing. The less part is like maybe almost a fast car looking thing where it's like, "When you can find your lane, it's so much more fun than having friction in your life.”
It can go up and down once you get on it.
You can hit the buzzsaw from time to time as I call it. This has been an amazing conversation. Debbie Pope is the CEO of YWCA Boulder. The website is YWCABoulder.org. Check it out. My daughter is a huge proponent of what you're doing. I'm optimistic that the next generation carries the torch.
I'd love to meet her when she's coming up here to see you or your other daughter who's not far from here too.
I will do that. It’s good to have you on the show. Thank you for joining. We'll catch everybody on the next episode. Thank you, Debbie.
Thank you.
Important Links:
AI for Sales – Podcast
About Debbie Pope
Provide strategic leadership, vision and direction to execute the National MS Society development plan to achieve $172 million in annual fundraising. Lead a team of 420 fundraising professionals and 45,000 volunteers to plan, execute and achieve engagement in 700 special events, corporate engagement and individual giving programs. Provide fiscal and operational oversight as a key member of the senior leaderhsip team.
