129: How to Advocate for Yourself in Grad School with Amanda Peña

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Welcome back, everyone to the Grad School Femtoring podcast. This is your host Dr. Yvette and I am really happy today because we are going to get a chance to talk about how to advocate for yourself in grad school. We've got a special guest. Her name is Amanda Peña and she is an entrepreneur. She has been one for six years, she leads a small brand consulting agency. She has been a leader for a marketing communication team for a design tech firm in Seattle that focuses on mobility. She has expertise in brand strategy, storytelling and narrative building for social media platforms. She's currently a brand strategy manager for Anita b.org, which works towards diversity, equity and inclusion in tech. And she's also working on her own master's program at USC in the aisle vine, I believe, y'all, it's gonna mess that up. As I have been right, I mean, and young academies, where she focuses on integrated design, business, technology, machine learning and AI for underserved groups. So specifically building tech for women, and people of color. Woof. Welcome to the podcast, Amanda.

Amanda Peña

Oh, thank you so much for having me. I'm so glad. I know. You hear it read back to yourself. And you're like, Oh, you're tired all over again.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Yeah. But that's, I mean, that's you, that's really impressive just to hear more from someone who has experience in entrepreneurship, who has experience and brand strategy, who also has experience in being a grad student, and then you're here to talk to us about advocating for yourself. I would love for you to introduce yourself a little bit more. Tell us more about your background, your backstory and what led you to your current career and to pursuing your current grad program?

Amanda Peña

Yeah, I'd be happy to do that. So I graduated from USC with undergrad in Business Administration. And I graduated in 2008. Which, if you remember, well, you know, I'm a millennial. So it was one of the worst times for anyone to be out in the job market. And it was really difficult. And I remember these people with accounting degrees, that had worked at the yard house, brilliant, you know, brilliant women. And that's all they can get, you have to pay your bills, you have to keep going. So it took them a really long time. And so I was struggling. I took my first job at a downtown LA Fashion District, I was very tiny agency, I started off as a copywriter. And I had a lot of face to face time with the clients that we came on, right? There were fashion brands that were in Nordstrom and Bloomingdale's and stuff like that. But they were they were people who were just starting to understand ecommerce, and what it takes to build your own platform, right. So all these these small brands were empowered to do their own thing. And I was helping them build their brand identities and logos and blogging and back when I even managed a few MySpace, you know? How do you how old I am? Honestly, that's honestly where it started. And because it kind of turned into a blessing because the studio was so small, I got the opportunity to do everything, I got to art direct, I got to build platforms, I got to work with developers, and had I been in a bigger corporate setting, it would have taken me years to do that, right? But they're like, Hey, you're pretty smart, you should go ahead and handle that and go ahead and take on this responsibility. So I got to do everything in in, you know, two years there. And so it turned out to be a good thing. And when I was ready to leave there, I had a few people telling me, Hey, I know, you know, I had resigned and they're like, I know you left, but could you just work with me a little bit. And I was like, Okay, I don't have a job yet. And then so I started consulting, okay, I can help you write this, and I can help you design this. But you know, that's it, nothing else. And they were like, well, we told our friends about you. So if you could just help them for two weeks. And I was like, okay, just for two weeks, I'm not gonna do it. And that turned into two months, and then two years, and I became an LLC. And then I got insurance. Someone was like, I remember this woman saying, you know, you put together this whole strategy for us and and actually, that's, I'm about to give you a lot of money. I think you're just straightforward and not nice. She was like, Yeah, you're super smart, and you're super worth it, but you need to buy insurance. And I was like, Okay, well, I guess I'll buy business insurance. And so I was totally just kind of Like, Rolling Stone, just figuring things out, I'm on the way. And I did that for six years. And it was really exciting. It was really nerve racking. It's like having a child and watching it grow. And you know, watching it stumble. And you know, being an entrepreneur, especially an accidental one, is all education unto itself. Yeah. It's really exciting to kind of see what I was capable of managing people. Someone asked me one time, you know, you have to pay the bills. Can you train a sales team? And I was like, Oh, absolutely, I can train a sales team. Never done that before my life ever trained anyone? So I wrote a plan. And I just wrote kind of like a script, hey, I think you should say this, you know, when they ask you questions, if they're unsatisfied, and I wrote out just every possible option of, you know, of like, frequently asked questions and things like that, I wrote responses, and I help coach them to, you know, say this and always say, thank you and always greet them. And, and so we went through that whole exercise, and they were like, Oh, that's amazing. Thank you so much for doing that for us. And I was like, yeah, no problem I've done. I've done several. Definitely, I made it through a lot of that I ended up writing a speech for CEO after that, because I said that I did that. Oh, yeah, I consult with you know, C, C, suite level people. And I can totally do that. I'm a pretty good writer. So I can usually make things up on on the fly. But that was an it was it was an amazing experience. I was really proud of myself. But after six years, I was kind of burnt out. And I did feel like I don't want to sell dresses, and luxury flatware and fancy plates online anymore. Um, I had a bunch of clients. But yeah, I ultimately decided it was time to move on. And this incredible experience came up in Seattle.

Amanda Peña

And I'd never left Southern California. And I was like, I think it's time so I got an offer. And I moved in two weeks, found an apartment moved in two weeks away.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Can you can you go back to how did this offer come up? Was it something that like because a networking or you applied?

Amanda Peña

Oh, no, I just applied for jobs. I was starting a job. And then I decided, You know what I was applying. I think it was one of those things after I knew I didn't want to continue on with my company. I just started I applied in Georgia, and I applied in New York, and I applied in San Francisco and Seattle. And I was like, I think it's time to leave LA. And yeah, so the Seattle job came back. Um, they they flew me up there. It was great. God, incredible. It's one of those offers that he couldn't refuse. And it's funny, because I was like, oh, I want to get out of here. And then as soon as you it's time to like, pack your things and leave la I was like, Oh, I don't I don't know if I could live somewhere else. Um, so I think that's that's a good learning, right? Sometimes you have to step out of your comfort zone. And you have to learn how to be who you are outside of the environment that you were raised in. Being in a different city. I went, I didn't know anyone. I knew my boss, who I'm friends with today. And your few people who interviewed me, I literally had had no friends knew no one in the region. Right. I didn't have family for 1000s of miles. And and Seattle is interesting. It's that's it's not super diverse. I live right in the city. And and I felt like that was getting used to like the Patagonia North Face culture, right. I didn't even I didn't own a puffy jacket I wasn't trying to acclimate to that was really interesting. But I did. And teak folk focused on the user experience of the future in mobility, autonomous vehicles. And I spent three years researching that. And so at the end, I kind of became a mini expert in women's safety for autonomous vehicles. And that's what I decided I wanted to study in grad school. So full circle that kind of brings me back to grad school. I know I don't want to MBA. This program is not a traditional MBA. It's integrated design, business technology. So there's a little X there's aspects of a lot of things. And I in my research when I was in Seattle, even before I started my program, I learned about the inherent bias in so much of the technology that we use. The majority, I should I'll share stats later on. But the majority of a lot of the technology that we use is developed by men and not men of color. I won't be more surprised. Yeah, right. The number have women technologists, women, computer scientists, engineers, the people who are actually building the code line by line. Less some, in some instances, less than 3% of them are black or Latinas or indigenous women, or even Asian women, sometimes they're not very well represented in these groups. And so that's really hard. So if you're not making it for a demographic that you have intimate awareness for, you know, your needs are not considered. And so learning about that, and learning about how uncertain autonomous vehicle structures, darker skinned people, facial recognition did not pick them up. Paul, taller people who were very who are pigmented, right, who very melanated, just darker complected, people were recognized as poles, right and inanimate objects that cars might be able to run into in an accident. And it took a while for that to want to get noticed and didn't get corrected. But when it did, when that kind of information got released, that just puts so many other things to questions, right. That's what we know is wrong. And it's happening. But there's so many other things that we don't know about. And, you know, our community doesn't know to ask. And so as we use more and more technology built by people that don't look like us, or sound like us, or come from where we come from the implications of what that means, kind of get more and more severe, right? When something's not made for you, it's not looking out for your best interest. It's not serving your highest good. And so that just became very important to me. And that's what I've tried to focus on in my graduate program.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

I'm curious, for you, I know that doing having this experience in Seattle was a big kind of change for you. Was there a moment like a catalyst, something that happened that made you realize, oh, wow, I think I need to go back to grad school and learn more. Or, you know, for you What was that that decision process like, because a lot of folks are more than willing to keep moving up in their career without necessarily going back to grad school. And you said you didn't want to get an MBA. So there's, there's a decision making process behind that. There's a reason why you said MBA is not the right kind of option for me. So can you tell walk us through a little bit more on that decision making process? Because I know, as folks who listen to this podcast, they themselves are maybe thinking about their careers and whether or not they want to go to grad school? So how did you make that decision for yourself?

Amanda Peña

So after I did undergrad, right, you're supposed to give it a couple years, no, go go get an MBA, and I just thought I could not do it. I couldn't do finance classes, I couldn't do another section of accounting. I liked finance, actually, let me not give that a bad name. But I cried through accounting, and I just thought I don't want the whole degree if I have to do any of that. I love being in business, I love the interaction of you know, business development and building decks and selling products and and kind of explaining, you know, user flows of product experiences, right, non tangible digital items that are being sold more and more, I loved understanding that and helping build that in the background. And because I was spending so many of my days, doing research, and and learning about user experience and learning about facial recognition and learning how artificial intelligence is becoming a more and more standard, integrated element and ingredient in so many of the things that we use, I thought I yeah, I love it. And I'm learning about it, but me knowing that is not enough. Right? I have a business background, I have mostly marketing experience. How do you validate that I'm, I've, you know, input almost 10,000 hours into research that makes that makes me an expert, but I'm not an expert, because I don't have the degree. And I and to be quite frank, like no one was kind of giving me that chance. No one is gonna be taking me under their wing and being like, yeah, you're, we know how smart you are. You don't need any other stuff. We're gonna just kind of vouch for you. Unfortunately, I didn't have that. And so, um, as after the pandemic, when I came back from Seattle, and I was job searching, I just felt like, I had interviewed with a few people and they were like, Yeah, but you know, you have there's other MBA candidates and if you had a master's degree, and that, that really poked at me like if I had a master's degree, you would pay me this amount or you would take me a little bit more seriously and so I just But you know what I never want anyone to ever tell that. Say that to me again. And so let's get this degree I was in lockdown. I was like, I'm not going to be traveling anytime soon. So it was one of those kinds of decisions, I was like, I might as well do it, I really want it. I got laid off two months into the pandemic. So that had something to do with into that was a big, a big catalyst to this decision. But I think for a while I was just really afraid of, of getting into a master's program, not knowing what I wanted to do, knowing that I could get an MBA, but that really wasn't going to make me happy. And that's why I didn't do it sooner. I knew enough to know to know that, you know, master's programs are expensive, and I don't want to pay for it if I didn't love it. I think as you go to graduate school, you have to understand that it's an investment in yourself. And it's, it's something that I understand better now than I did when I was 1819 2021. You kind of I think adult mentality like I'm paying for this, I'm going to squeeze every drop out of it right, I'm going to utilize all the resources that people are sending to me. And I'm a different person, this is a decade later, right? I have different thought processes, I understand the world differently. So I think you have to go through that undergraduate experience and why work experience is so important before you get a graduate degree, if right, especially in the business field, I know for other more more technical, like engineers, like it makes sense to go directly there. But, but sometimes, maybe you do need some work experience to understand like how you love to work, what makes you feel really alive, I don't, I didn't understand coming out of undergrad what, you know, the corporate life was like, and what professional professional experiences how they shape you have meeting different different people having a difficult boss, having a difficult client, and what that means for your day to day and how that you know, if you have a difficult client for three months, that that shaped you as a professional, for better, or for worse kind of thing, right? Sometimes you're really proud of yourself at the end of it, because it's an accomplishment, you can still do your job and be really successful, even navigating different personalities or different difficult environments. And sometimes you come out of it thinking I never want to do that again.

Amanda Peña

You know, and the earlier and the younger, you're able to kind of set those hard boundaries. This is really important, because a lot of young people, a lot of young Hispanic women are just like, I'll just get through it. I you know, I won't speak up for myself and I just have to get through it's not, you know, you don't have the strength behind your voice yet. And yeah, I'm totally, I will admit that I did that for a few years, right, and I just kind of like, just kind of sucked it up, it's fine, you have to work you have to make money can't mean you have responsibilities, a lot of us have that over their head. And so you kind of just you take one for the team, and you do what you have to do. But I think as you get older, you understand that you don't want to invest your time in places where you're not appreciated, or doing work that doesn't make you feel good or is not, you know, and work is not always great and sunshine and rainbows every day. But there are certain instances where you know, you're growing, despite the pain, right, growing pains, you will work through it, it's it's worth it. So I think, I think the last couple years have really helped me to understand that and, and, and be really more confident in where I invest my time and my energy and my learnings and, and even knowing where I want to contribute next.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

I think there's definitely a difference. You know, when I went to grad school, I went to grad school right out of undergrad that to a Ph. D program. And I could sense the difference between the folks who had had that work experience because there was that sense of confidence, that sense of knowing their boundaries. And just having had that experience to to give them that perspective while they were in grad school. And you're actually here to talk about advocating for yourself. I would love for you to kind of talk a little bit more about that. Because I can imagine that all that experience that you've had from having taken time off between undergrad and grad school. Like only strengthen your ability to advocate for yourself. Can you tell us a little bit more about like, why you chose that topic and kind of let's kind of get into it?

Amanda Peña

Yeah, so even from the moment that I was interviewing for my grad program, I just felt so much more empowered to ask difficult questions when I was an undergrad, I remember my thought process. And I remember being scared. And I remember so many times me wanting to raise my hand and say things or raise my hand and ask questions. And just this, this kind of crippling fear took over. And I would just be like, Oh, maybe I'll write it in an email later, I'll ask after this event, um, I didn't want to seem too aggressive. I didn't want to. I did not want to ask dumb questions. I didn't kind of want anyone to think badly of me. And I that was so prevalent in, in kind of my process when I was younger. And now my my first question, you know, in my grad school interview process was like, Well, how well is this program rated? And tell me about your professors? And, um, you know, what are their backgrounds and there were, there are no current women of color in, in my program, and I brought that up immediately. And the response that I got was we don't have it, we're working on it. But maybe when you graduate, you can be the first one. And like, well, that's kind of what I'm here to. To get. I was hoping there was already someone who can teach me but I have brought it up. And I thought, you know, this is two years later, I have acquired a wealth of knowledge. I'm absolutely useful. Yeah, maybe I do need to come and teach a class. And I have expressed that to, you know, the program administration. And they're like, you know, it opens doors. They're like, Absolutely. What what do you want to talk about? You know, what do you have to offer? What do you have to share? What do you want people to know? And having that going from no options to all the options, right, is really empowering. It's, it's an incredible experience. And had I not said that, right? I wouldn't have had that opportunity. I think I would have made these other people think and I've brought it up several times. You know, I've asked a few times, when would the there be women of color in this faculty, it's super important. It's equally as important to the men as it is to us. They need to hear these other perspectives in and expertise coming from a female figure of authority, it's really important. So I brought that up. And when advocating for my, my scholarship, like, Yeah, I'll come here, but I need this much money. They're like, well, then I'm like, I think you could find it. This is this is what I need is like negotiating a job offer. I was like, I know what I bring to this cohort. I know what I'm going to add to your student diversity metrics. Yeah, you need me. So you should find some more money to help me get here I'll pay for you know, a certain amount of myself. But advocating for other scholarships, asking lots of questions. I've chosen an artificial intelligence machine learning specialty. And that meant I've had to take classes outside of the program. And just asking for what you want, I want to study this, I want to learn about this. I'm going to, you know, specialize in this. It's important because right? It's important, because there's not a lot of Hispanic women with expertise in machine learning and artificial intelligence, where people are moving more towards smart televisions and their phones, right? Even street vendors now have smartphones, I would love for street vendors to understand how algorithms affect them. How could it increase their sales? How could it grow their business? How could it educate them? Just just all of it my I would hope that when autonomous vehicles reach, you know, neighborhoods of people of color, Boyle Heights, Compton, right, I was born and raised in Boyle Heights, it's my favorite place in the world, I would hope that there's a whole fleet of vehicles to serve this community, because they really need it when they get here, I hope, would hope that this community understands their value and understands how to interact with this kind of technology. It is, it is super important. And I think there's really no one talking about it. And I think in order for the technology to become adapted, these conversations have have to happen. I think I would hope that the Latino community becomes more and more comfortable with being computer science engineers, or understanding what software as a service is, even for non English speakers software can exist and work and compute in any language. You don't have to speak English perfectly. You don't have to speak English at all.

Amanda Peña

I would just hope also that this community kind of begin to understand that there are careers in this and it could help on a multitude of different levels. And it's a good career to have right not just doctors and lawyers. There's there's all kinds of other things that you can do. So I know we're making small steps, I just hope that in the future, the strides are a little bit larger.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Just hearing you talk about your experience in this grad program being the only Latina, right, in the program?

Amanda Peña

No, there's other Latinos, there's no Latina faculty.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Okay, so you've made it really clear that, you know, as as one of the few in the program, you've been really clear about advocating for yourself when it comes to your funding when it comes to even just right away like asking questions when you got in, you know, asking for what you need in terms of the curriculum, who the faculty are who you know, who teaches the courses. Now, if someone is listening to the podcast, and they themselves are also, you know, Latina and tech or black, female in tech, or just a person of color in tech, and they are interested in and advocating for themselves, but they're, they might be struggling, maybe they're dealing with what you mentioned earlier, you know, when you said when you were when you were younger, when you were an undergrad, you struggled with asking the question, so what are some ways that they can start to advocate for themselves? I guess, are there any baby steps or any just recommendations that you any advice you would give them if they're if they're struggling with it?

Amanda Peña

Yeah, so the people who kind of introduced me to my program, they're student advocates, there's program coordinators, and I think they are always super friendly and willing to help. And I would, if someone feels uncomfortable, I would ask that person to help facilitate meetings. Can you set up a 15 minute meeting with the professor so that they can explain this program a little bit better? If you have doubts? Or if you're curious, can you know, can you make an introduction to, you know, the head of that department, you'd be surprised at how much time they would be willing to give you and help you understand. I've met a lot of people in academia who actually have been really open and in willing to help make the connections let's let's make the connection on LinkedIn. Let me send them a note on your behalf. Let me introduce you via email. And I think zoom right has made that has broken down that beer, someone has 10 minutes to meet you on Zoom and answer some questions, someone will answer your, you know, your email, if you if you send them a list of questions, I'd be more than happy to do that, or send you resources on how to learn more. I think I just had a meeting with one of my adjunct professors, I shoot she kind of made the offer, if anyone wants to, you know, meet after class or after this discussion. And I signed up for a time we talked for 45 minutes. And it was it was wonderful. You know, she kind of shared like, this is how my story, this is how I got to be a professional, this is what I'm doing now. And we've had excellent conversations, and we've networked and shared, you know, our mutual kind of mutual personas that we think this, I think this person will help you in your career, I think this person will help you in in yours. And that's really powerful, right? Because sometimes you only need that one introduction, helps you in the door that helps you understand something or introduces you to something that you didn't even know you needed. That's really important. So, so I would say if even if you're a little timid, write the email, ask, ask for introductions can do you know someone who can help me do XYZ, right. And in a lot of master's programs, it's there's, it's someone's job to help make those connections and help facilitate those introductions. I would say always advocate for yourself in that, and always ask for more. If they made one, they could make two, they can make three until you get comfortable, and you're able to do that for yourself.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

That's great. That's really, really great advice. Now, is there any other advice that you would want to share with a student or if you could, like, do things over again, or any, just like lessons? And you're like, oh, you know, if I if I had known that I was going to be going in this direction, I would have done a little bit more of this or that like, what would you what do you wish you had known when you were an undergrad?

Amanda Peña

Yeah, I think I would have I would have kind of sang my own praises to more people. I think you should definitely pad your resume with everything that you've done. Don't hesitate to speak really highly of yourself, when there isn't someone else around you.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

That is so hard to do, especially for those of us that are that come from the Latina background, the culture of like, humility and you know, not not showing off too much. There's that gendered aspect of it too.

Amanda Peña

Oh, absolutely, Calladita. And I don't know that that, that works anymore for where we are in life. So many Hispanic females are our breadwinners, and our head of household and when you're in that position, it's not really fiscally wise to be quiet or to not put yourself on on your own pedestal, right, people are not going to know what you're good at. And know all the things that you've accomplished just by looking at you are by osmosis, you have to tell them, you have to tell them several times my background is in, you know, marketing, you have to make seven to 11 impressions before someone starts to really understand the value of your brand. That's true of products, it's 1,000% true with people. So don't hesitate to tell people what you're good at what you're interested in, what you're working on the research you've done, the time you've invested to build a skill, all of that is super important. It's super valuable, it, it literally helps monetize your skill set your education, your, your professional history, right there, there is $1 amount that's associated with that. And if you you know, and if you're able to outline all the things you've done, your your worth so much more. So I think that, especially when you talk about yourself professionally, that is not the time to be humble, or have too much humility, your lifeline is directly correlated to that. And so you want to give yourself the best chance that you can. And I, I learned that in free know, from the time I was an undergrad to the time that now I'm in grad school, through other other men who are not of color because they are happy to inflate their price to inflate their skill set and their list of qualifications without hesitation without a second. Second thought there. You know, I've seen a lot of of men just be like, oh, yeah, I can do that. Oh, yeah, no, I'm more than qualified. No qualifications. Right.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

That's what I tell my girlfriends when they asked me if they should I apply to that job? Like, yes, yes. Like, you don't have to have all of the all of the requirements.

Amanda Peña

There's so many men who are in the positions that they're in, because they said yes. And someone assumed that their confidence level was indicative of their skill level, and just kind of open the door for them. And so I think we need those same kind of doors open for Hispanic girls. You know, women of color everywhere you can do it, I think we're all the thing that I'm most proud of, from my mother from my grandmother, we're just so hard working. Right, my grandmother worked well into her 70s after she retired when she didn't need to. And I think we all have the same drive in us. And there's really no reason why more of us shouldn't be at the C suite level. Leading Teams and kind of changing the paradigm for for what a lot of companies not only companies in text, but just what all companies how they operate and how they treat people.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

That's amazing. I love that you are reminding everyone about, you know, tooting their own horn. They don't do it, who is going to do that about their own value. If they don't realize their own value again, who else is going to do it for them? And how this is going to help them reach their their goals and perhaps change the world. So if folks resonated with what you said, and want to be in touch, want to connect in some way, shape or form? How can they reach you?

Amanda Peña

I'll send you all my links, but you can email me at amandapena@usc.edu. I'm on LinkedIn. Amanda E. Pena. I'm based in Los Angeles. I'm happy to answer questions. I'm happy to, to kind of have meetings with people. I think everyone needs a good a good pep talk. I've had a really incredible advocate who is a senior member at Amazon and she's she's wonderful and she's taking the time to talk to me and she's kind of told me the same things you know, don't stop pushing. Don't take no for an answer. Don't sell yourself short. Right. I think I think something this will be my final thought there's other people that I've seen I went to USC right so everyone understands kind of the, the the level of wealth that exists sometimes at USC and connections And I didn't have that. I didn't have that when I went in, I had very little of it on my way out because I didn't network as well as I should have. But a lot of us don't have the benefit of nepotism. And so you have to build your own network, you have to make your own connections. And sometimes, it's always great if you have a mentor and someone to guide you, and lead you and recommend you. And that's amazing. And I'm lucky for the situations that I do have that. But when you don't have that, you really have to think that you are your own best friend, you are your own best recommendation letter. And it really can change the course of your entire existence when you apply for things or when you try for things or when you tell people you know, I'm capable of this. This is what I want to do. I'm I'm an asset to your organization to your team, it's always important to reiterate that people need to be reminded.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

That's right. No, no, no, that is so true. And I think more of us need mentors and need to remind ourselves that we are our own mentors and mentors. Because at the end of the day, we have ourselves and, you know, hopefully we have we were able to build community and we're built to we're able to like, find other people who have our back who can give us those pep talks. But, you know, if it doesn't happen right away, or if you're in transition, I think comes up, you got to be the one to be applying and like you said don't take no for an answer. So I always tell people no means next. So someone gives you a no, move on to the next thing or some people say like, rejection is redirection. I'm like, Whatever gets you to the next thing. Sometimes it's even just a numbers game. It's like put yourself out there, see what happens. And you never know what might come out.

Amanda Peña

Yeah, no, I totally believe in that. Sometimes when people say no to you, it really is just kind of heaven sent sometimes that you shouldn't you shouldn't be there that you're you're made to be somewhere else.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Right, right. Well, thank you so much, Amanda. I feel like you shared a wealth of knowledge in such a short period of time. I am really impressed with everything that you shared about your experience about what you're doing about the future. I can't wait to see you're going to be the next CEO of I don't know what.

Amanda Peña

Well, I would love to be I'm gonna put it out into the universe. I want to be the next CEO of you know, an autonomous vehicle company that serves people of color in underserved neighborhoods. It's so important.

Dra. Yvette Martínez-Vu

Yes, yeah, I believe that I believe in the power of putting it out there and manifestation. It's gonna happen. Well, thank you so much, Amanda.

Amanda Peña

I appreciate your time.