A Path to Success for Entrepreneurs with Miki Reynolds, CEO & Co-founder of GRID110

About this episode:

Miki Reynolds, CEO & Co-founder of Grid110, joins us on the podcast this week. Her LA-based company, Grid 110, is an early-stage startup accelerator and community development non-profit for entrepreneurs. Since 2014, Miki has focused on activating the startup ecosystem in Los Angeles through her work with Grid110, fostering community, and connecting the dots for entrepreneurs through access to mentoring and critical resources. Prior to co-founding Grid110, Miki launched the Downtown LA location for tech education company, General Assembly.

Topics Discussed:

• How Miki’s own career transition helped inspire her to create her current company, Grid 110

• How her company, Grid 110 helps early entrepreneurs through mentorship and resources

• Why she believes it’s so important for entrepreneurs to lead with their “why”

• Her advice on doing whatever it takes to get out of your own way. 

About Miki:

Miki Reynolds is CEO & Co-founder of Grid110, an LA-based early-stage startup accelerator and community development non-profit. Since 2014, Miki has focused on activating the startup ecosystem in Los Angeles through her work with Grid110, fostering community, and connecting the dots for entrepreneurs through access to mentoring and critical resources. Prior to co-founding Grid110, Miki launched the Downtown LA location for tech education company General Assembly.

Miki has accepted commendations from Mayor Eric Garcetti on behalf of General Assembly and Grid110. She has been recognized by LA Biz Journal as a Woman of Influence, was named to Techweek’s #Techweek100, and sits on advisory councils for two of the Mayor's diversity inclusion initiatives: PledgeLA and WiSTEM LA.

Read a raw, unedited transcript of this episode:

Thank you for joining us today, Miki. You are the CEO and co-founder of Grid 110. Share with us about your early experiences. Prior to joining Grid one, you've launched the downtown L.A. location for the tech company General Assembly. What did you like the most about your time there?

Yeah, so I've been in tech my entire career since graduating in college. I went to UCLA. I knew that I always wanted to work in some capacity in the internet, and the digital space just didn't really know what that would look like for me. So I spent my first 10 years working at the movie studios. I was on the digital team for MGM and Fox realized really quickly that I did not want to work one in entertainment or two for large corporations. And so I moved down from there to working for a smaller software development company where I got to be really hands on and helping to build technology. And as somebody coming from a completely non-technical background, it was really exciting opportunity just to learn. I work a ton of different hats during the time that I was there and just wanted to get involved in building things. That was something that was really exciting for me. And then it came to a point a career crossroads for myself, where that company I was there for six years. It ultimately ended up shutting down. And so went through kind of a period of trying to figure out what it was that I wanted to do next. I spent the first 10 years building things for other people trying to figure out what I liked and what I didn't like, but ultimately that feeling incredibly fulfilled with the work that I was doing. I learned a lot that was looking for something that was more mission aligned and felt like there was a sense of fulfillment in the work that I was doing. And so that's actually what brought me to General Assembly was it was at a point where I saw that they were doing different workshops and classes outside of the Santa Monica campus that they had and myself living in downtown L.A. was really trying to figure out, how do I figure out what I'm going to do next in my career? Where can I go to a network where the events that are happening? And I know I could go to General Assembly in Santa Monica, but I didn't want to work in Santa Monica. I wanted to find something that was a bit closer to home. And so I was really excited to see them thinking about expanding and offering up opportunities outside of the West Side area. So I actually reached out to them directly, and I was unemployed at the time trying to figure out my next thing. I told them I had some spare time on my hands and if there was anything that I could do to help with their expansion efforts and that resulted in, I'm actually bringing me on board to launch the expansion into downtown L.A. and to help support in some other new markets that they were exploring across the L.A. region. So it was exciting for me to be associated and to be connected with such a mission driven company of trying to help get more people into tech. So, whether it was on the marketing side, on the software side, the design side, technology and this industry was booming at that time. But for folks that maybe didn't study computer science in college didn't have a background in that. How were they able to access these, careers that could really be life changing for them? And so it was exciting to be a part of that community and to help bridge the gap in terms that people that were looking to either level up in their career or to access a new, completely new career point for themselves.

And that had to be such a great place to be because I've attended events at General Assembly in Santa Monica and they do so many different events. It seems like every event that they do is different. I'm sure you met so many interesting people.

So many different people, my personal and professional network really kind of exploded at that point. I was sitting in this position of working in marketing and hosting events and classes and workshops and really kind of being at the top of the funnel for the General Assembly community of how can we bring people on the campus? How can we expose them to all these different career opportunities, to different companies, to maybe things that they hadn't really thought about before to entrepreneurs? And so being able to leverage the General Assembly brand to bring in incredible speakers from different companies across the alley ecosystem to really highlight, in particular women and people of color in these spaces so that attendees could actually see themselves in these roles.

I love that. Tell us about Grid 110 and why are you passionate about it?

Yes. At the same point of joining General Assembly again looking for this sense of community, I'm trying to figure out what I was going to do next, kind of prior to actually landing the role with General Assembly. I connected with a group of people in the downtown area. All entrepreneurs that lived or worked in downtown felt like downtown had the potential to be the next startup hub in L.A. and beyond. There was a lot of resurgence and excitement happening in the downtown area. It was becoming a place where people wanted to live, work and play, as you are very well familiar with it. But feeling like there was a lack of a sense of community, of a connective tissue in particular for startups and entrepreneurs. We knew that this existed on the west side. And like the Silicon Beach area where a lot of startups, co-working spaces, venture capitalists like a lot of the community resided. But in a place as dynamic as downtown L.A., where in other major metropolitan cities, usually the downtown area is that hub of activity. We just didn't see that happening here in downtown L.A. And so we kind of talked for about a year. That's kind of an unofficial task force of how could we create the type of community that we feel like we're missing. And good one time was born out of that. It was talking to entrepreneurs, different stakeholders, the mayor's office, different city buildings about what could we do to provide a platform, a sense of connectivity for entrepreneurs? What are they missing? How can we provide some sort of support in terms of what they're lacking? And so Grid 110 was really born out of that to create the sense of community that we felt was missing and develop a programmatic element. On top of that. So, what we ultimately ended up launching is a startup accelerator. And so it was a cohort based model of working with at the time, it was five founders for six months. Now it's 20 companies for three months and really providing business support, mentorship, access to resources, access to capital and this sense of connective community among entrepreneurs. A lot of them are first time founders have never done this before. And so really being able to bring all the tools and resources, but also the people together to help them at this critical stage in their journey,

That's so great. And I would think that with any city, it's difficult and challenging to bring people together at times. And I mentioned I work for the Los Angeles Dodgers and as you were talking, my experience of being downtown, the stadium was so far away from, the buildings and the action. I would think if I went to leave for lunch, it was, an hour to go right a mile and then get back. And I also lived in Silverlake for a while, which had that sense of community. But when you think of downtown? It's interesting to think about how do you bring people together, and it's so great that you're helping entrepreneurs and particularly people who are starting out and have never done it before, because so often someone wants to work on their craft and running the business and the business. Part of it can be challenging at times because you just want to focus on what you like to do and what you do best.

Yeah, absolutely. the challenge, a blessing and a curse of Los Angeles as it's being so large and spread out, right? And so it's given rise to these different pocket communities that have been created to support innovation in our very own backyard. Pasadena has been doing it for years. Glendale, Culver City, Hollywood, the South Bay. And so I think that it was once perceived as a challenge of, everything being concentrated on the west side and having to truck through traffic for a 7:00 p.m. event. Now are there things that are happening all over? And even because of COVID, most things have been virtual, so the accessibility factor has enabled people to connect in a way that they've never been able to before. And to your point, I think something that we've seen oftentimes with entrepreneurs, whether they're first time or it's their fourth business, they're often so much in the weeds of what they're doing. And in the day to day and the operations of it. And so our program really enables them to pull back out a little bit and to work on the business and not in the business. And so they can think a little bit more strategically, they can get other perspectives from the other cohort members or the team members that are coming in. And it really allows them that headspace and that designated amount of time to not think about, you know, the conversion rates for sales for the new product that they're launching or the bug that they have to fix in their app or website and really think more big picture. And why are we doing this cool? We're doing this for who actually wants this? Are we being successful at it? And so I think it's a really helpful time that most entrepreneurs don't take for themselves or they have a hard time kind of creating that space

That's so smart to help entrepreneurs see that vision and bring in other perspectives. Because you write so often we do get into the weeds. Sometimes I think, you know, she built it with someone else's business. What would I advise them to do? Because it makes you think in a different way and in a different perspective. You offer friends and family and a residency program. Can you share with us a success story that has come out of it.

Yeah. So I see friends and family as one of our success stories. So for the past six years, we have been running programs solely focused around Los Angeles. So one of our primary funders is the City of Los Angeles with a partnership with the mayor's office. So we're even. At first, we were hyper local, focused on downtown L.A. and the east side of L.A. and focused on helping entrepreneurs there. And then as word got out about our programs, we wanted to support entrepreneurs across the region. But it's been solely focused here in L.A. and pre-pandemic, we thought about what would it look like to expand. There are so many other emerging startup cities that are doing incredible things across the country. Is there an opportunity for us to partner? Are there gaps that we could help fill given that a proven programing model that we've developed? And so it was kind of a city by city approach in our thinking. And then the pandemic hit and we went completely virtual. Our programs had been in-person before, based out of a co-working space because our building community really happened in-person for us. And the pandemic really forced us to think about that in a completely new way with running our program virtually and even running for them for the past two years still focused on entrepreneurs here in L.A., it just enabled us to meet people exactly where they were at. We have a lot of parents in our programs, and so prior to the virtual nature of our programs, they would have to commute into the location and childcare like all of these things, that are priorities for them. And so being able to just zoom into a program session, whether you're here in L.A. or maybe you're somewhere else for the week, I think it really made it much more accessible. And so it opened our eyes to what expansion could really look like outside of the Los Angeles area. And we just knew that we wanted to find the right partner to do that with the softening company, which is a local venture capital fund that just raised their first fund at the beginning of last year and 2021 was a really well aligned partner in terms of their focus around entrepreneurship and economic inclusion, around investing and in a very inclusive lens in terms of the types of founders that they're looking at and similar to us. We've worked about two hundred and thirty five companies where 70 percent of those are led by women and seventy four percent are led by founders of color. So this sense of inclusive entrepreneurship is really important to us and finding a partner that would want to launch a national program and support entrepreneurs outside of the area was really exciting. And so we actually just wrapped up the first program for friends and family. And so being able to be this local kind of grassroots community led initiative in L.A. to now running a national program and being able to provide non-dilutive capital. And attachment to that was really exciting for us. And what I see as a success story. And I think the the other things like I can name a bunch of different companies that we've worked with that I think have gone on to do incredible things. But I think that the majority of the founders and I see successful the ones who have gone on and raised funding or who or have survived the pandemic and are still operating businesses today, mostly women and mostly women of color. And so when we look at the statistics of who is getting funding or rather who is not getting funding, and it's an at an alarming rate of no less than two percent of women and people of color, that number is not growing. And when they say it grows, it's fractionally. It's really exciting for us to see that the success stories that we're seeing are the inverse of that and that it is possible. I think if you're intentional about who you want to support and seeking out incredible entrepreneurs to work with.

Absolutely. I had a conversation with Naomi in and we were talking about the statistics of women leaving the workforce during COVID. So it is great that what you do is supporting women to stay. And, it's the same way she built it. It's like we want to empower women to stay in the workforce, do what they are good at doing, do what brings them joy and make money doing it. we need more companies doing this because you're right. Absolutely. Look at the statistics, and it's great that you now offer the virtual support for parents I have eight year old twins and I was homeschooling eight year old twins throughout all of COVID. So, when you look at that balance and that dynamic of trying to run a business and grow a career and homeschool kids, it's just really great that you're doing what you're doing for women in business at this point in time.

Yeah, I think that the reports that we've seen, just that the number of women that had to leave the workforce because of the pandemic to be whether it's primary caretakers. What we've seen is a large number of businesses being created during the pandemic time. And so perhaps it was because of that. the typical kind of nine to five corporate structure was not something that somebody could really at work anymore for them, for for lifestyle reasons, for family reasons. And so having to create a new stream of revenue, having to create a new type of business was born out of necessity. And we've also seen that there is opportunities that were created because of the pandemic, so customers are now being reached in a different way. The future of work and different types of platforms and systems to help the hybrid and remote workforce have given opportunities for people to create solutions to these new problems that we're now experiencing.

I look at it as exciting. It's an exciting time. It's just everything is also changing so fast. Mm-Hmm. So it's great, but it's how do we keep up with the speed?

Great. Great.

What is your approach to managing teams and what do you think is the most crucial component of leadership?

When it comes to focusing on what you're trying to accomplish or working with a team and helping them stay focused, it's really keeping an eye on your North Star and understanding what your why is. Simon Sinek has a great book and Ted talk around, you know, leading with your why and understanding what that is and why it's so important to leadership and how you rally everybody else, whether it's your team members, your customers, potential investors around that way. it's really important to have a clear idea of what that is, and it can help you in terms of prioritizing. It can help you in terms of focus. I think about different partnership opportunities or program opportunities that we've been given. And does it align with our why does it align with our mission? And that helps to determine if it's something that we should move forward with or if it's something that this doesn't really fit right now, and maybe it's a better fit for somebody else. So a really great activity that we went through kind of two years and once we get started was doing the mission vision values exercise of being really clear with what those are and and sharing those with everybody. So it's on our website. We talk about it in infosec teams, by our programs, we talk about it with perspective and team members that these are the things that are important to us and we hope that this aligns with you. And so being really clear on those and revisiting them to ensure that this is still kind of true to who you are still aligns with your why. I think those are things that in when things can get stressful and confusing and frustrating if you're really clear on those things that they will help pull you through.

That's really good advice and great that you did the mission vision value because what I found is it's hard to be simple. We wanted to be do so many things for companies that businesses and people, it can be very difficult to be simple. And you're right about going back to that Northstar, because when you go back to it, it just everything kind of sinks into perspective after that.

What do you like the most about what you do?

The highlight of my day is talking to a founder and maybe having advising hours with them and talking them through something or reading feedback that they shared with one of our sessions and talking about the impact that this program or a speaker or another founder had on their outlook, the support that they got. And so being able to connect people to whether it's these resources or to each other through these types of shared experiences is really the joy of the work that I get to do. And even doing that outside of the programs that we run, if there's opportunity for me to connect with founders separately through volunteer work or mentorship opportunities, I do a lot of pitch competition judging. And so if there are things that I can think of or people that I can think of to connect them to, and something comes out of that, that's really exciting for me to see if I would do that again, that connectivity that's really rooted in community

As someone who has such a social business. would you say you're more of an introvert or an extrovert?

I am 80 percent introvert. I am a capital I to the core, and it's been really interesting. Just the progression that I've seen in my own self through the pandemic I had to be around people a lot. And so when it comes to Fridays, I'm exhausted. And as much as I love that work, it's very, very depleting, especially because they're supporting a team or supporting other founders. You're constantly problem solving for other people, which requires energy or speaking at events or producing events that can take a lot out of you. But I it was something that I enjoy. I just needed to find the time to recover from. And then early days of the pandemic being home alone, most of the time, 95 percent of the time I was like, This is actually kind of nice. I don't mind this at all. And it was really interesting just to see what life was like before and after of having to strip away all that unnecessary things. really allowed me to focus in on what was really important, what I wanted to focus on now, giving that energy back to my team, getting that energy back to the companies that we were working with. But two years later, I definitely am itching for the quality time with certain people. So I love kind of more smaller, intimate environments. Not a fan of the small talk. I definitely have social anxiety when I have to go to something where I'm not sure if I'm going to know somebody there. I was actually just talking about this with a friend last night where the smaller dinner parties were. I might not know anybody are OK, but larger events where I'm like, OK, what's the agenda? What time of day might actually start? Can I avoid the networking part in the very beginning and find my seat right away? So, yes, hard part introvert. But I consider myself a digital extrovert, so I think a personality comes out a little bit more online.

Yeah, I believe in abundance and no two people will ride a business the same and I'm listening to you and what we do is very similar. And so I had to ask this question because everyone says, Oh, Melanie, you're an extrovert. I'm like, No, I'm really an introvert. I could be out and I love talking to people like you were mentioning, but I need that downtime. And some people get their energy from talking to other people. I get my energy from, that alone time. And I think it sounds like you and I went through similar experiences with the virtual right,] how do you connect with people virtually and then appreciating the downtime? Yeah, because you're right with what we do every day, all day, by the end of the week, it's like, Oh, was that a year or just a week?

And I don't think of them as necessarily made it any better. So even though I'm not having to run from one place to max or commute from one place to the next, there's still an energy transfer that happened through Zoom. And you're probably a. Finding yourself what used to be a phone call is now a Zoom call and and that requires energy and then trying to figure out how to best manage your time and be respectful of, like even your own team's time off. when do we want to do team meetings versus one on one versus actually having time to do the deep work part of what we do? And so it's definitely been something to try and figure out.

Yeah. And you mentioned meeting people you don't know. I was an ambassador for the Downtown L.A. Area Chamber of Commerce very early in my career, and the company I was working for said, we want you to join the chamber. So I joined the ambassadors, and what I had to do is walk into rooms and meet people and get them interested in the chamber. And it was the best thing that kind of happened to me because it forced me to learn to walk into a room and talk to anyone. I learned to say, Oh, how are you involved in the chamber? Or just ask those questions that get people talking? So, it's definitely something that doesn't always come naturally.

Yeah, yeah. My my role was always know quality over quantity. And so if I'm going to event, I'm like, Let me make one or two really good connections here, and that will be my goal. And once I've done that, I just need to have a quality conversation with somebody and not have any agenda around it, just to make that initial connection, maybe something will come up later. And I think that's something investing in relationships has always been a big thing for me of making sure that they're not transactional, that I may not have any idea what this is going to go when we first sit down and talk. But let's understand each other's goals. See where this can go and a couple of months, a year or two years, if you maintain and invest in those relationships. I have seen things come about because it was the right time. I was able to connect them to an opportunity. We got to work together, whatever it might be. So investing in relationships has become a really important value of mine.

So true, and it's so genuine, and I'm sure it's so appreciated.

Yeah

I believe that magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business. That brings us joy. What is one tip you can leave with us today about how you find and live your joy?

So I can't remember where I heard this, but I have written on a post-it and they're quoted. Don't be complicit in your own diminishment. And I think oftentimes we get in our own way. And I definitely struggle with imposter syndrome and self-doubt. The more quote unquote successful I feel like I've gotten, maybe even the worse that it gets a finding myself in rooms that sits at the table with people that I greatly admire and wondering how I got there and kind of having to remind myself that that I was invited to that seat and then I'm there for a reason. the only thing standing in our way between you and I think that you want is yourself. And so really, just do whatever it takes to get out of your own way so that you don't live in that space of fear and self-doubt. So whether that therapy, getting an accountability partner, a mentor and this can be for work related things or personal things, it could be like personal things you want to accomplish, whether it's having a better fitness routine or writing a book or getting that promotion, whatever it might be. let somebody else be the one that tells you, you know, and not yourself. And I think those are the ways that I have found in both work and personal life to find that kind of joy. And even though I continue to struggle with it, it's definitely something it's a work in progress. But it's something that has really resonated with me even more recently.

Such good advice, and I know I can relate to what you just said and I know our listeners can do. Thank you so much, Miki, for joining us today. Please tell our listeners how and where we can find you and grid 110.

So Grid 110 is at grid one, one, zero, on all the social channels, and also grid 110 dot org for the website, check us out. You’ll get access to our newsletter to find out about our programs, and we have really engaging content on social media. And then I am at Mixer on every channel imaginable. Feel free to reach out and connect.