Graduation season is coming quickly around the corner, and with it, a fresh crop of new employees joining the workforce. Recently, I spent a morning in a classroom at a university, talking to students about general leadership. Quickly, however, the conversation turned to the transition from college to the real world.

I walked away from the conversation with a huge insight. These incredibly bright, capable students are in for a bit of a rude awakening. It doesn’t really matter if they played on that championship Division I team or were academically at the top of the class. All of those things don’t matter in the real work world. And students need to figure out how to navigate it fast.

Whether you are a soon-to-be-grad or relatively new in your career, below you’ll find a few mindsets you might want to embrace before you step foot into your new career.

YOUR SOCIAL LIFE IS ABOUT TO CHANGE

College may seem hard when you try to balance your coursework with a sport, a part-time job, or campus activities.  However, it’s typically quite a different time allocation than needing to show up and work 8-9+ hours. Every. Single. Day.  When we start work, we sometimes think we can manage to power through the day, and then head out after work to party with our friends.  Perhaps rolling into class after a pub night works in college. You can slump in the back, hoodie pulled low, chomping on whatever breakfast burrito you can keep down. Or perhaps you just skip the class altogether.  When you are working, it doesn’t work like this. Sure you can try, but your co-workers don’t want to deal with your hungover look, smell, and behavior. You’ll get fired if you skip work. No one is suggesting you give up your social life, but set some limits.  Get sleep, work out, and eat well. Creating these healthy habits will truly help you get off to a great start in your new adult life. And maybe consider tempering the partying for the weekends.

ASPIRE TO BE A KARDASHIAN?  THINK TWICE.

When you are in college, social media is huge.  Students today are curating their own brand identities, whether it’s intentional or not.  While your college buddies might hit you up with hundreds of likes for how hot you look in your provocative Halloween costume, consider who is also looking at it.  Both companies and people within them will begin to follow you. Posing with a drink at a friend’s birthday celebration? No biggie. However realize post after post of shots that make someone pause and think, “Hmmm, what does this photo tell me about this person?” is a reality.  Perhaps consider removing some of your most questionable photos. A general rule of thumb: if you don’t want your mom to see your pictures or posts, you may want to rethink your content. In addition, you’ll find LinkedIn will become an adult version of social media for you, and you should treat it as such.  Consider a professional looking headshot rather than using a picture from a fraternity party. If you manage LinkedIn with as much care as your other social media accounts and treat it as a professional tool, you’ll gain some serious street cred for adulting and acclimating in this new world.

MONEY DOESN’T GO AS FAR AS YOU THINK

Whether you paid for school yourself or you have a small savings account from your summer job, by the time you enter the workforce, most recent grads have a basic understanding of their finances.  However, now you’ll find all types of new money considerations to contemplate. No matter how much you are making, seeing that first real paycheck makes you feel like you just hit the Zuckerberg lottery. You’ll be so excited about this new influx of cash, you’ll be tempted to spend it on things you’ve never been able to afford, like a nice apartment, or designer clothes. Hold off.  Create a budget to determine how much you REALLY have to spend once your bills are paid. If you’ve got student debt, this becomes even more important; make sure you get rid of as much debt as you can before you start any new big spending.

DON’T LOSE YOURSELF

The reality is, you need a job.  While everyone graduates hoping to find the perfect fit, you won’t always find it on your first try.  Embracing the fact that your twenties are about discovering yourself where you will thrive is inevitable and expected.  However, you can make it a little less painful a discovery process if you choose wisely. Do your research. Select a company -  if you have options - that best aligns to your value set. Stay true to who you are, and take notes with every experience. Even in the worst companies, there are lessons to be learned.  Go in, listen, learn and establish your own point of view about environments where you with thrive. If you keep building on that story throughout your career and stay true to who you are, you’re likely to find success and fulfillment with your work.  In other words, if you highly value collaboration and teamwork, but you elect to work at a cut-throat company where people are only out for themselves because they offered you the biggest paycheck, you may be setting yourself up for a pretty miserable experience.

Transitions are a challenge no matter what stage of your life you are in.  However, morphing from college to your first job is one of the tougher ones. It doesn’t involve rocket science; most of these tips are merely common sense. When you apply them, you’ll learn adulting isn’t as bad as you think. Just think in exchange for having to grow up a little,  how nice it is to get a paycheck and not have to cram for exams anymore!

Christina Luconi is Chief People Officer for Rapid7. Follow her on Twitter: @peopleinnovator. 

Carbon Black is committed to investing in diversity and inclusion and views this as a critical source to our long-term success. To help us improve, drive change, and foster our people’s professional development, we found Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) can play a significant role in creating a better workplace. If you're an organization considering ways to enhance your company culture, consider ERGs.

What is an Employee Resource Group?

ERGs are employee-led, self-directed volunteer groups that investigate and share opportunities to network, foster mentoring and career development, and attract diverse talent.

Why are ERGs Important?

ERGs not only create inclusive communities where employees can feel supported, but they also enrich your overall company culture. Here are some things they can do:

• Serve as champions for diversity and inclusion at your organization and help identify opportunities to become more inclusive.

• Identify best practices and communicate broadly for others to consider using.

• Benefit personally and professionally through networking, professional development, and learning opportunities.

• Share knowledge, raise cultural awareness, and enhance your company’s cultural competence and links to the community.

• Work as an employee support system, providing coaching, education, personal growth, best practices, and idea sharing.

• Help with recruitment and retention efforts.

How Does it Work?

Internal employees sign up to serve as ERG leaders. These leaders will fully run and manage all events and communication for their ERG group, with support and guidance from your HR or Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) team. A D&I Project Manager (PM) will host quarterly check-ins to ensure progress is made toward initiatives and money is allocated efficiently.

How Can Your Company Support the ERGs?

You'll need to work with your finance team to determine an annual budget and share this with ERG leaders at the time the ERG is formed.

In establishing the ERG, you need to appoint someone who can manage the expenses for accounting purposes. They need to understand how to forecast and budget so expenses don’t exceed available funds.

Recommended Positions for ERGs

The following are the recommended positions when forming Employee Resource Groups. However, individuals can take on more than one role if interested or needed.

ERG Chair

The overall lead for the ERG will manage the group and is responsible for communications, activities, and frequency of meetings. Groups will meet quarterly (in-person or virtually) at a minimum. This person will respond to employee inquiries that can be tied to the group’s mission.

As your ERG forms and grows, you may need to customize and add roles that align with your group.

ERG Bookkeeper

This ERG member will be responsible for managing the annual budget. The bookkeeper is accountable for providing the accounting of their expenses to HR at quarterly check-ins.

ERG PR/Events Chair(s)

This ERG member will be responsible for managing the ERG’s communication channels.

For events, ERG groups can host internal and external discussions and events (depending on available resources). Should they chose to host, promote, or attend an event outside of your organization, have the ERG work with the D&I PM to ensure leadership and/or PR is aware of how and when your company’s logo and name will be utilized in a public-facing manner.

ERG Advisor

This is a member of your senior leadership team who is a supporter and advocate for the group, providing strategic guidance and serving as a liaison to other leaders within the ERG and HR. He/She acts as a mentor to the ERG Chair. This role is recommended for those ERG Chairs who have not managed a team or been part of a highly cross-functional team but is not required.

Employee Resource Groups are invaluable in an organization’s mission to become a more inclusive employer where all employees feel like they can bring their true self to work. Building these and supporting them will not only help your company culture, but they will also be a wonderful resource while improving diversity and inclusion.

For the 85th episode of our podcast, I interviewed David Chang, CEO at Gradifi.

If you’re a member of the Boston tech community, there’s a good chance you know who David Chang is. As an operator, he’s been part of some amazing teams at companies that have all scaled and exited like TripAdvisor, m-Qube, and WHERE. As an angel investor, he has invested in 40 companies. And, one could argue that the most important role that he’s played is one as a mentor and advisor to countless entrepreneurs.

In his current position at Gradifi, David is leading a company that is trying to solve a $1.5 trillion problem: student loan debt. Gradifi gives employers the opportunity to make direct contributions to their employees’ student loans, allowing them to pay off their loans faster. It’s a great benefit, for sure.

In this episode of our podcast, we cover lots of topics, like:

• David’s philosophy on paying it forward and why it is so important.
• The details behind David’s background and a deep dive into his experience at TripAdvisor, m-Qube, and WHERE.
• Advice on whether or not to attend business school.
• The story of his own startup, which was like an early version of Instagram.
• All the details on Gradifi in terms of its mission and how they are helping ease the burden of student loan debt.
• Why he is bullish on the Boston tech ecosystem.
• Plus, a lot more.

Are you hiring? If the answer is yes, then you might want to consider adding a BIZZpage to VentureFizz. It’s the best way to engage with our targeted audience of professionals in the local tech scene. It includes an employment branding page, unlimited postings to our job board, content, and more. If you are interested in the additional details, send an email to [email protected].

The University of Massachusetts Amherst (or as its commonly known, UMass Amherst) is the first established college in the University of Massachusetts system and it's also the largest in terms of both size and student enrollment. 

Several UMass Amherst alumni have gone onto illustrious tech/entrepreneurial careers. We put together a slideshow of alumni who have made an impact on the startup/tech sector by either being a founder, investor, or CEO. 

Please keep in mind that this is not meant to be a comprehensive list, but just a sampling.

Going through the pictures, there's bound to be at least one person that will make you go, "I didn't realize they went to UMass Amherst?"

Modulate is creating a different kind of voice-based technology software what they call “voice skins.” The software allows anyone to change their voice to match a celebrity or cartoon character in an instant. The Cambridge-based startup recently closed a successful seed round where $2M was raised.

We spoke with Modulate’s Co-Founder and CEO Mike Pappas to learn more about their voice skins and how anyone could sound like President Obama through their software. We also touched upon how they are combating not-so-ideal use cases with people impersonating others for unscrupulous reasons.

Colin Barry [CB]: Let’s start at the beginning. How did you and the rest of the team at Modulate come together?

Mike Pappas [MP]: Carter Huffman and I first met as undergraduates at MIT when I came across him working on a physics problem at a whiteboard. We hit it off and quickly became friends and began collaborating on projects, both for and outside of class. After we graduated, we kept in touch and continued working on projects together. When Carter first hit on the idea for voice skins and realized he might know how to make it work, we immediately connected and began brainstorming how to develop that technology into a successful company.  More recently, we've enlisted Terry Chen, our VP of Audio. Terry is an old friend of mine with over a decade of audio engineering experience. He was thrilled when we told him about the concept for Modulate, and we jumped at the chance to add his audio expertise to the team.

CB: Why get involved with voice technology space? Does anyone on the team have prior experience with it?

MP: Modulate isn't voice recognition software - our voice skins actually have no idea what it is that you're saying. (This allows them to work on nearly any language without needing any additional training!) Instead, we effectively swap out your vocal cords - changing how you sound, but not the content or style of your speech.

As for how we started working on voice skins, that comes from Carter. He spent some time at NASA JPL as a machine learning scientist, working mostly on problems involving images - for example, object detection for a spacecraft to avoid collisions. While there, he read about new research into something called visual style transfer, which applies the style of one image to another - for instance, rendering your family photo to the style of Picasso. He was inspired to ask the question of what would happen if you tried audio style transfer instead - and immediately realized what an enormous value this would be. Thanks to his machine learning experience and his physics background - which focused on signal processing techniques similar to those involved in manipulating audio - he was extremely well placed to be the first to crack this problem.

CB: As someone who enjoys a good impersonation for a comedy skit, I’m curious to know how the technology works. How can I go from sounding like me to sounding like a former President?

MP: When comedians want to impersonate, say, Barack Obama, they don't need to hear him say every single word first - they can listen to only a few short snippets in order to learn what his voice sounds like.

Our technology works the same way. Based on a few short clips of someone's speech, the algorithm learns what kind of voice they have, and stores that information. We then use something called a generative adversarial network (GAN) to actually convert your speech. The GAN consists of a network that tries to make your speech sound more like the target voice, and a second network that, knowing what the target voice sounds like, provides feedback about whether it sounds good enough. Eventually, this feedback loop tops off, with the first network able to convincingly make you sound like the target voice, no matter what words you're saying.

CB: How long was the development process on the technology and what kinds of tools were used?

MP: Carter first began researching voice skins in late 2015. It took nearly two years of experimentation before he landed on a system that was able to convert voices realistically and quickly. Of course, the system is always improving - as more people use it, it continues to learn to sound cleaner and more emotive.

CB: You and your team probably get this question a lot; What if someone uses Modulate’s technology for unscrupulous reasons?

MP: We've certainly thought deeply about this problem! We wanted to make sure to take concrete steps to keep voice skins as a positive technology, so we built in safeguards from the ground up. On the technical side, we watermark all of our audio, so that automated systems could detect that it's synthetic. We're also not allowing just anyone to use any voice - we're restricting voices of real people or characters to be purchased by those who own the relevant rights.

CB: Switching over to something a little more positive...what would be the typical use case be?

MP: Imagine playing a character in an online game - say, Overwatch, as the character Genji - with a distinct appearance and voice. As you engage in voice chat with your friends, you might want your own voice to match that character's, in order to add more depth to the experience.

Many other players have expressed interest in using voice skins to design new, unique voices for their online character - or even simply to mask their real voice so they're more comfortable chatting online. Really, the use cases vary as widely
as those for voice chat itself - in every application, there are reasons to want the freedom to design how you'd sound!

CB: What was the inspiration behind the name?

MP: We had three goals for our company name. We wanted it to capture the essence of transformation/customization that voice skins deliver. We wanted it to be simple and clean. And we wanted to stand out from other startups, which to us meant using a properly spelled, real word in our name instead of the many alternatives. (Bring it, Google!)

Modulate hit on all three, and we loved that we could use it to describe what our technology was doing more concretely as well, so it quickly stuck.

CB: Any other additional comments you’d like to make?

MP: We're hiring! We're particularly focused on engineers who can help us continue improving our technology and develop integrations with other voice platforms, but of course are always interested in connecting with anyone that shares our passion for voice skins! See more info at modulate.ai/careers or feel free to reach out at [email protected]!

Colin Barry is the Content Manager to VentureFizz. Follow him on Twitter @ColinKrash.

Images courtesy of Modulate

I was in LA last weekend with my Insta-obsessed daughters. As we drove down Melrose, they shrieked “There it is! The pink wall! Pull over!”  I have driven by this wall numerous times, but it never occurred to me to stop. Aside from its gorgeous vibrant color, to me, it was just...a wall. To them, it was a selfie Mecca. And just how did my Boston-based kids know about this wall? “From an influencer, Mom!” they told me as they rolled their eyes at me.

We had to wait for some space to clear, as about twenty other teenagers waited their turn to strike a pose. While we sat in the lot, I asked them what the concept of an “influencer” actually meant to them. Essentially, in the land of social media, they shared that they view this as a serious sign of cache. An influencer is someone you follow and defer to their advice on topics ranging anywhere from where to get the cutest shorts to where you go to take the best selfies. And I rolled my eyes back at them.  

Candidly, I think my reaction comes from the use of the word “influencer” as a verb or being used like it’s an actual job. “She’s an influencer” sounds like a made up thing to me, paling in comparison to what the actual intent is: “She has the ability to influence.”  Of course, this is all in my humble opinion. Sure, mastering social media and building a brand that people trust is a skill. If I have a business, and I cultivate a set of people who have the power to affect purchasing decisions or behaviors based on how they engage with them, that is, in fact, a valuable thing. These are ultimately people who have taken the time to build an audience and promote products or services to them. They gain credibility by using products or services which they then promote themselves.  They might be photographers, models, marketers, negotiators or some form of an expert in their field.

In some cases, these people are paid simply for showing up at a club (think one of the Kardashians) and in others, there is actual work involved to gather reviews, get feedback, etc. Social media has exploded to the point where brands hire these people to connect with audiences in ways we’ve never seen before, and there is some serious value in that.

But this is where I begin to feel old.  

The concept of an influencer has been around for an awfully long time. To me, I’ve always thought of those people as those with tremendous credibility or expertise that has been built over time. For example, influencing my buying patterns (Steve Jobs could influence me to buy just about anything with an “i” in front of it) or my behaviors (Michelle Obama influencing me with the motivational reminder, “When they go low, we go high”).  In other words, even though they might have been powerful, influential faces, I had followed them for years and had built trust with what they stood for. I suppose it’s a virtual relationship based on trust over a sustained period of time. The influencers my daughters look to have become trusted resources, but in my humble opinion, they haven’t done much to earn it. It feels like it’s based on surface level perception, rather than true reliability. I realize that could be a completely unfair assessment.

I also know that I’m not someone who looks to others for guidance on basic life choices.  For example, just this morning I saw a Facebook post where a mother in my town was in search of a good steak restaurant.  She posted to a group of 1,000 other moms, and they were all too happy to influence her choice with their colorful recommendations. Candidly, it would never occur to me to ask a community of people I don’t know for input on such a basic thing. I’m not one to obsess over Amazon reviews before making a decision, as I know many people do.  Perhaps I’m just not that easy to influence. Or maybe I don’t put a lot of stock in what other people believe is great if I don’t know them. Or maybe I’m just missing out on some good decision-making techniques.

We’ve become a celebrity-obsessed culture, which scares me a little. Consumers do their best to avoid advertising, so it makes sense that they are making buying decisions influenced by what they see “cool” people subtly promoting. When we see a picture of Tom Brady wearing UGG boots, we think “Hmm, I thought those were so 2012, but I must be wrong...I must have a new pair this winter.” Some cute relatable teenage girl posts pictures of herself at Coachella wearing an amazing flower crown? I must make one. If we view people as relatable or living the lives we aspire to have, we buy.

I must admit I had a pretty negative reaction to my kids' interpretation of what constitutes an influencer because I can’t relate at all to a bunch of young women telling other young women where the best place to pose for a selfie is...and they listen. And yet, I have to give these influencers some major kudos; they have built a following, and people listen to their guidance. Perhaps today it’s about a selfie location; tomorrow it might be a far larger consumer purchase. Whatever it is, they’ve gained the trust of their audience. That, no matter who you are, is a powerful thing to be able to do. So while I still have some negative reaction to someone’s job actually being “an influencer,” the skills required to actually influence another human being to do anything is relevant to all of us.

Christina Luconi is Chief People Officer for Rapid7. Follow her on Twitter: @peopleinnovator. 

For the 83rd episode of our podcast, I interviewed Ash Ashutosh, Founder and CEO at Actifio.

Ash is someone who fully embodies what it means to be a serial entrepreneur. In addition to Actifio, he also founded Serano Systems as well as AppIQ, a data storage company that was acquired by HP in 2005.

Actifio, his latest company, is the world’s leading enterprise data-as-a-service platform. Powered by patented Virtual Data Pipeline™ technology, Actifio frees data from traditional infrastructure to accelerate adoption of hybrid cloud, build higher quality applications faster, and improve business resiliency and availability.

Actifio is backed by some of the top venture capital firms in the industry and in case you didn’t know, the company is one of the unicorns in the Boston tech scene with a valuation of over $1B.

In this episode of our podcast, we cover lots of topics, like:

• Ash’s background growing up in India and migrating to the US.
• His early career in the tech industry, including his time at StorageNetworks, an early cloud storage company.
• The details of Serano Systems and AppIQ, the first two companies that he founded.
• What he learned during the time he spent as a VC at Greylock.
• The aha moment behind Actifio and all the details on the company, its technology, and the massive market opportunity.
• Advice for founders raising early-stage capital.
• His thoughts on sharing a company’s valuation in the media after raising funding.
• Plus, a lot more.

Today’s episode is sponsored by Pluralsight.

It is amazing what machine learning can do. With mounds of data being harvested every day, there’s so much we can learn and create.

Pluralsight, the technology learning platform, is using this data for the good of tech professionals everywhere. Their AI helps you see what level your tech skills are at and recommends opportunities to keep learning.

And they’re looking for help to make their algorithms even smarter. If changing the way the world learns technology through the intersection of Design, Product, Data Science and Engineering is right up your alley, apply to work at Pluralsight.

Want to work here? Visit pluralsight.com/venturefizz to learn more.

Spoiler Alert:  It’s been great.

I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on bad behavior lately.  In just the past few days, I consumed both Surviving R. Kelly and Leaving Neverland. Both horrifically disturbing to watch. Then I started reading Emily Chang’s Brotopia, the tale of boys behaving badly in Silicon Valley. By the end of the weekend, the sum of this content caused me to pause and reflect on how all of these stories relate to my own experiences, if at all. As highlighted in Chang’s book, so much has been written about being a woman in tech over the last few years, primarily with an abundance of negative stories attached to it. This has largely NOT been my experience.

I grew up in a pretty traditional family. My father is a highly educated serial entrepreneur, and my mother worked in the home raising my younger brother and I. Much like many of us experience in our own workplaces, the people my dad worked with became his best friends, and ultimately good family friends over the years.  My first memory in life took place when I was four with one of these friends. My parents had bought their first new home, and my dad recruited a bunch of his colleagues/friends to help with the move. I remember sitting on the floor of my new bedroom, intently watching as my dad’s friend put together my first “big girl bed.”  I remember thinking how mature I felt in that moment, and how kind Tom was to lend a hand in making me feel that way. To me, he was a wonderful family friend who went on continuing supporting me as a started a career. To adults, he was a respected executive. The point is, this man was warm, kind and helpful to me, and didn’t make me feel “less than” because I was a kid.  That became my mental model of what working with men would be like. And over the next several decades, I learned I was largely right.

My first job in a hypergrowth consulting firm was largely run by a well-balanced mixture of men and women. Just out of college, I saw them working together collaboratively, and treating each other with respect. As the company grew larger, a bright young woman came in to play the role of Managing Director, and she raised the bar for all. In other words, my most formative experiences in business started with seeing women celebrated as equals; and the men they worked with believing this was the norm.

When I went on to my two next companies, I joined up and coming startups that are fairly stereotypical of what we often still see at the surface level in tech. Charismatic, talented and visionary CEOs, leadership teams made up of mostly men, and the majority of talent under the age of thirty. And yet, even then, I viewed the fact that I was a woman as a competitive advantage, not a detriment. These men made it easy to feel like, “Sure I might be the only woman in the room, but that just provides me with a unique point of view I can contribute to getting us to a better solution.”

When one enters into these hyper-growth environments, there is no doubt that just about everyone feels some degree of imposter syndrome at some point. Regardless of your skills and experience, you are forced into a world where there often isn’t a clear cut right answer, and you must collaborate and take some disciplined risks to survive and thrive. I consider myself fortunate to have partnered with some exceptional people - both men and women - to build some pretty exceptional companies. And along the way, of course, I dealt with some bad behavior.  I’ve had my a** grabbed on numerous occasions. I’ve been told my work was irrelevant by older men who didn’t understand or value it. I’ve felt left out when the boys go off to football games and didn’t invite me. And yet, I’ve also had a senior woman leader suggest I was moving quickly up the ladder because a male mentor must be giving me “special favors.” I’ve had female peers talk trash because I was able to build successful relationships with executives. In other words, acting like a jerk is genderless. And it’s how we choose to respond to it that’s important.

When I was in college, I interned in a software company. One day, my job was to fetch coffee during a board meeting. Rather than get upset that I was being asked to serve a bunch of men, I took it as an opportunity to ask these board members questions and attempt to connect with them. They didn’t ignore me; rather, they seemed impressed that I was courageous enough to engage. I didn’t view it as being bold or audacious, or “finding my voice.” I just chose to think of it as “these are just people with more experience than me. I can learn from them.”  And when the inevitable bad behavior did happen, like when male colleagues touched me inappropriately, I’ve responded with a simple, “WTF are you doing?” It stopped immediately. And when women talked trash, I didn’t try to convince them otherwise. I just ignored them. Nothing pisses off a bully more than not letting them get to you. I learned it was up to me to take control of the situation, not let the situation take control of me.

I’ve heard it said numerous times over the last year, “It’s a tough time to be a white guy.”  I don’t agree; unless of course you are a white guy who happens to be a total a**. There are people who behave badly just about everywhere - it’s not limited to the Valley, and it’s not limited to men.  And yet, it’s our responsibility not just treat people the way we’d like to be treated, but to not allow others to treat us badly in the first place.  I appreciate not everyone feels like they have the confidence or the voice to speak up, but it’s a critical business skill each of us must learn. “Knock it off” shouldn’t be difficult words for anyone to utter, regardless of the circumstance. I’ve found that when they are in fact spoken, it’s actually quite effective.

Yes, there are toxic environments, and bad people operating within them.  However, it’s been my experience that there are far more people who are working hard to build professional, collaborative and productive relationships. I’ve been incredibly fortunate to work with men and women during my career who have helped to create that dynamic, as well as been exposed to a handful of jerks. Surviving and thriving comes with holding the bar high with the people I choose to work with (company culture really matters) and speaking up when things aren’t working.

Christina Luconi is Chief People Officer for Rapid7. Follow her on Twitter: @peopleinnovator.