IWD at Hebbia 2024

On March 8, 2023 I wrote an article about working with Swetha. 

In the last 12 months - we built a team with 8 more exceptional women. 

Some of the brightest minds at the intersection of LLMs and User Experience.

In the last 12 months - I became a better leader, operator and person, working with and learning from them.

In the spirit of Hebbia’s value of cogency, I asked Hebbia’s Matrix product to choose one adjective to aim to exemplify each of these women. I’ll limit myself to one anecdote each for today.

Swetha: Trailblazer

I learn something new from Swetha everyday. 

From her skill in communicating vision, and distilling complex topics to any user.

From her ability to solve deeply technical problems, and maintain a lens for user empathy.

Swetha is (one of) the first of her kind: a technical woman leading a large team of engineers in AI.

Henna: Dynamic

One of the coolest facets of Henna is how exemplary she is across the board.

Handle a tough customer conversation? Ask Henna.

Strategize on important new vertical objectives? Ask Henna.

Build 400+ prompts for our prompt library? Ask Henna.

Henna is dynamic and versatile at her core. When I ask Henna for help with virtually anything across product or customer - I know it will be executed at the top 0.01%.

She is dynamic in her force, energy and breadth of skill. Henna is writing the book on compassion, poise, excellence, and tenacity everyday.

Kelly: Ambitious

When I set a business target, Kelly meticulously crafts a plan to surpass it.

Kelly had no intentions to move to New York - but she did so because she wants to move the world forward. 

Every day Kelly nudges the world forward a bit, and she inspires me to nudge it forward too.

Kelly is as reliable as she is ambitious, which means she is constantly raising the bar for those around her.

Jackie: Driven

Jackie has the gravitas of a CEO - and that is because she is as creative as she is knowledgeable. 

Jackie is driven to do the work that matters.

She doesn’t take short cuts. 

She consistently pushes us to get to the “so what” and to keep ourselves honest.

Most days I think Jackie must’ve been born driven, yet she chooses to amplify her drive everyday. 

Shirley: Creator

Anytime someone asks Shirley about her favorite week at Hebbia, she says it’s the week she rebuilt the app. She toiled over every color on the Figmas, every hover state on the screen. She went to sleep thinking about the project and woke up thinking about it too.

For Shirley, building Hebbia is a craft. It’s something to constantly chisel away at, and something worthy of tremendous care. 

And we may not work together daily, but it’s obvious as soon as I open the app that Shirley’s been there and I am so grateful to be an audience to that. 

Divya: Forward thinking

Divya often doesn’t admit this herself - but she is one of the most skilled PM’s in LLMs in the world, who has spent more time than almost anyone in this domain.

Divya and I joke that sometimes she has “too much” model empathy. What that really is - is a deep understanding and intuition of how these systems work, and then an ability to translate that understanding into building a great product.

When I work with Divya I feel like she is ahead of our time, and I’m grateful that she brings me into the future with her.

Alex: Strategic

Alex has been a close strategic partner to me since Tripleplay. 

I laughed when the model outputted “strategic” for Alex - because she is the one who taught me that “strategy” at an early stage startup usually means getting deep in the weeds and becoming an expert.

It always means leading by doing.

It often means getting on a late night customer call or demo yourself.
Alex is one of the most strategic people I know - because of her ability to operate at every altitude.

Because she deeply understands that strategy is only really strategy when it’s met with relentless execution (which by the way, she is world class at too).

Nicole: Collaborative 

Nicole was the nucleus of yesterday’s Matrix launch.

She meticulously thought through details and looped in the full team.

As soon as she started working with us - it felt like she was always part of the team.

She listens, she brings people along.

She brings the right people to the table.

Selfishly, the 5 min I get with Nicole at the beginning of our exec check in everyday when she and I are the early joiners is a highlight of my day.

I checked the model's citation for “collaborative” and wondered why it prioritized that adjective - it pointed out that she regularly comments on and celebrates others’ achievements (Linkedin was my input source).

The model was right - Nicole is a leader who rises by lifting others. 

Cher: Resilient

I was pleasantly surprised and impressed when the model gave me “resilient” for Cher. 

We have only worked together for a few weeks - but that is exactly how I would describe her.

She seeks a challenge.

Happy International Women’s Day.

To these women who are driving technology and the world forward.

To people whom I am honored to work with and learn from.