 Live from Houston, Texas, it's The Cube, covering Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. Hello and welcome back to The Cube's coverage of the Grace Hopper Conference here in Houston, Texas. I'm Rebecca Knight, your host, and I'm joined by my co-host, Pooja Sivaraman. She is one of our tech reporting fellows. Our guest today is Nora Poghi. She is a French journalist and filmmaker. Her documentary, her latest project, is the documentary called She Started It. It is a film about female entrepreneurs and the challenges of women-led companies. It premiered last week to great acclaim at the Mill Valley Film Festival, and we're going to have it in special screenings this week at Grace Hopper. Welcome, Nora. Thank you for having me. Hello. Yeah, Nora, thank you so much for being here. Can you tell us and the audience a little bit about your movie and what inspired you to make it? Yes, so She Started It is a documentary that follows the lives of five young women in the trenches of building their own startups. So in CSIA, who's my co-director, co-producer, and I, we decided in 2013 to start putting the spotlight on women who are building tech companies. We're kind of tired of seeing only, you know, the Mark Zuckerberg and the Bill Gates of the world and thinking there's great women out there building companies, and we want to really put the spotlight on them. So we ended up following five exceptional young women who kind of met throughout our research as journalists, and for two years, we followed them through the ups and downs of their startup journeys, so. That's amazing, and from your journey following these five women, what did you find were the biggest challenges they faced in the industry? Well, there's a lot of challenges. I would say fundraising for women entrepreneurs is one of the biggest hurdle. So as you know, 96% of VCs are male and people tend to invest in people who look like them. It's this pattern recognition problem which is also happening in recruitment. And, you know, a lot of them, even though they were extremely talented, had a great track record. So Stacey Ferrera, one of them, you know, had sold her company at just 21, and we followed her when she started her second company. And it was a lot harder this time around to fundraise without her brother. And it's just those things that a lot of young guys in Silicon Valley raise money up, not even a prototype, you know, for something that doesn't even have any traction. And she had that track record, and yet it was still very hard for her to raise money. It's just one example out of many, but I think fundraising is a big issue. And how did the women that you were following deal with issues like that or other barriers in the tech industry? Well, one thing that was very inspiring, which is why we made this movie, is that they were extremely persistent and resilient, and that's really the trademark of an entrepreneur. Women or men, it's really about that grit that you don't give up no matter what happens, you keep going. And all of them, basically the whole movie, goes through those ups and downs. And we don't sugarcoat it, you see a lot of the struggle, but in the end they keep going and that's what makes it inspiring, I think. Yeah, definitely. And I don't want you to give away too much about the movie, but if there's one character in particular that you could share a little bit about and why she was so inspiring. Well, Tuy Trong, who's from Vietnam, she joined the 500 Startups Accelerator and that's how we met her there. She was just freshly arrived from Vietnam, went through that accelerator and she was just an extremely inspiring person. People just, when they see the movie, automatically relate to her, being a foreigner, being young women, trying to make it in America. And she went through a lot of hurdles, but she built a second company back in Vietnam that ended up being successful and she's extremely inspiring. All of them are, the five of them are, it's like choosing between your kids, I can't. Yeah. So you were, I mean, before making this film, you were a journalist as well. So from, you've been covering tech for a really long time and what are the biggest changes you've seen for women and are you optimistic about the future? I am optimistic. I mean, being here at Grace Hopper, it's extremely, you know, energizing. I think about 15,000 women here, technical or, you know, interested in technology, entrepreneurial, it's very encouraging and there's more happening now. You know, when we started this movie three years ago, no one was really talking about women entrepreneurs and now it's a big thing, you know, which is positive. But the numbers are not changing fast enough. You know, the money is still not going to women-led companies and, you know, any kind of entrepreneur who's basically not a white male, you know, you're talking also about LGBT, you know, Latino, African-Americans, you know, all of that. And same for just people building companies. We don't have enough spotlight. We don't really have enough visibility for the people out there who are building companies, again, who are not white males. So we send it to work on it. Yeah, I mean, what's great about your movie is you're giving a platform for that visibility for women who are really striving and making it in the industry. So that's really great. And do you think that films and journalism and documentary are a good platform for social change? Do you think that by bringing these issues to the forefront, we can get companies and people talking about it and it can drive some change? That's a great question because that's what we hope. That's what we hope. I mean, the thing is a lot of people might not realize the importance of media, the weight media plays in our everyday lives. But the truth is we consume a lot of media, young people especially. And we relate, we identify to protagonists on the screen. So I think there's nothing more powerful than seeing someone who looks like you on screen being a trailblazer and a hero and kind of relating to that. And that's what we're trying to do with the documentary. So I, yeah, I believe in social change through media very much so. That's great. And so for your own documentary, what's next? And what do you hope to see come out of your documentary? Not only in media portrayals of these women, but also just in the industry on a whole? Well, our goal with this film for NCI and myself is we want to reach one million women and girls in 2017, which is pretty soon. So we are doing a massive screening tour right now. We're going through universities, high schools, corporations, conferences like Grace Hopper, film festivals, and then broadcasts hopefully and online later. So we think by kind of having this tour, we can have single conversations, spark discussions on the ground with people. We don't want to just put it online and hope for the best. We think conversations need to happen. And hopefully people can start kind of identifying with new role models and talking about these things out loud. Absolutely. And I was at a talk with you yesterday and someone asked, is there going to be a sequel? How do I get featured on this? So there are some great women doing really great things. And from your experience in talking about your film with people on the ground, what are some really interesting conversations you've had? Yeah, I mean, one thing that's very inspiring is that we need so many women entrepreneurs throughout the store who are like, like you just said, hey, like I want to be featured. And that's great. We're like, there's millions of women out there also building companies and we're not being given a platform. So I think we're trying to put the spotlight back on them. And we're not the only ones. There's so many organizations out there. I mean, you know, Grace Hopper, Girls in Tech, Girls Who Code, all of that. But basically what's been really great is seeing that influx of women entering the industry. And I think we just need now to give them the tools. They're there, there's a lot more interested. We need to support them, give them money, mentor them, sponsor them. So yeah. Yeah, and I wanted to ask also about the pipeline problem because while there's also this influx of women entering the industry, there's an issue with keeping them there and company culture. So what are your views on how to keep women in the tech industry? Yeah, so I might not be the best expert in terms of the corporate side, but we do see a lot of women obviously now leaving the tech industry. And it's a big topic that Cheryl Sunberg talks about in Lean-In and all of that. And the main thing is company culture and the tech culture. So that's why Grace Hopper is the best example of that is trying to show that technology doesn't have to be in men's world. You can have people here who look like you who have the same kind of, you know, sensitivities and that you can have mentors and sisters in the community. So I think that's one thing that we need to change at tech companies is the culture. Because otherwise people are just going to keep leaving if they don't feel represented or heard or listened to. And I know a lot of my, you know, girlfriends or people I meet talk about those things off the cuff. They don't necessarily want to talk about out loud, but there's a lot happening that's not really fair. You know, a lot of women don't feel heard enough in those companies, so. Yeah, so it's not only about representation in the media but also just in a corporate space. Yeah, feeling heard, feeling like you're in a safe space to express yourself, that people listen to your ideas, don't interrupt you, you know, all that. Yeah, that's really great. And are there any future documentaries you guys are thinking of? I know there's no sequel right now, but what are you looking in the future? What kinds of stories are you looking to tell? I would love to keep going, but I mean, right now I think she started is the main, like I said, we have a huge vision for the next year. We're looking for sponsors actually, if anyone's listening, to kind of really scale this, take it to, like I said, as many people as possible. And after that, I think I'm going to take a nap, take a break. But who knows, maybe someone will want to find a sequel that we can film in lots of other countries. There's not just, you know, you're up in America and Vietnam, there's a lot of other countries, so maybe a sequel, who knows? Yeah, were there any stories in your first movie that you came across that you just couldn't include and potentially could include in the future but that you found, but that didn't make the cut? Just more of the ones we had met because we quickly focused on these five, but I wish, for example, Sheena Allen or Agatmolina, who's from France and Sheena Allen is from Mississippi, both of them, we had to condense it, but I think we could always shoot more, they're awesome. We're just about out of time, but I want to ask you one final question, and that is, if you could get all the funders out there, the VCs, the angel investors in a room and give them one piece of advice based on what you have seen and heard and learned about in doing the film, she started it, what would it be? For the financiers? Yes, fund women, basically a lot of them talk a lot and I want to see them open their checkbooks and actually funding women, so if you're a VC, take that meeting, like you have to go a little bit further than what you would do in general, you have to seek out the women, they exist. There's Female Founders Conference Group, there's 500 startups, they have tons of amazing women founders, seek them out, go to those events, network, and really try to be open-minded, take that meeting with that young woman entrepreneur. She might not know exactly how it works, but make that extra step because otherwise it's never going to change, so I want them to actually walk the walk. Nora Poghi, thank you so much for joining us. Your film is, she started it, it's going to be in theaters, in special screenings nationwide. I'm Rebecca Knight, for my co-host here, Pooja Siviraman, thank you so much for joining us. We will be back with theCUBE's live coverage of the Grace Hopper event here in Houston, Texas after the short break. Hi, I'm John.