Bozoma!

The first time I saw a press photo of Bozoma Saint John she blew my mind wide open. A statuesque African woman, dripping in stunning fashion, her nails wildly long and bright, while daring to be a successful Apple executive? No shade to "pant-suit nation”, but this femme energy is a whole other thing! Fierce, shameless, and unabashed.

Of course I hopped onto her instagram feed, and followed her journey from Apple to Uber, to Endeavor. In offices across the land her posts illustrate how she inspires employees to bring their brighter, longer nails to work, and their bigger, braver ideas. “Nobody talked about me, until I talked about me!” she says of her glass-ceiling-busting trajectory, insisting that each of us must document and utilize our accomplishments to reach our goals, however elevated they may be.

Poached by Netflix in a multi-million-dollar deal halfway through 2020, as their Chief Marketing Officer, she became their first ever Black c-suite executive, climbing the ladder and smashing biases as she goes. She's a marketing maven, driven, experienced, and not afraid to say she's "the best" at what she does, but who doesn’t miss opportunities to cheerlead women, especially BIPOC ladies, who are taking their power in hand, being rich, and being visible. Bozoma often repeats a Verna Myers quote in interviews: “Diversity is being asked to the party; inclusion is being asked to dance.” Her lived experience, and by all accounts her efforts in the workplace, demonstrate that she feels this in her bones.

Her advice on diversity is that “if you are in a hiring position, hire someone that is nothing like you. We keep looking for the commonalities, but find someone with commonalities that are nothing like you.” Hire for diversity, and then build a company culture of inclusivity, is her style. Not afraid to use her large platform, she started a hashtag in the midst of the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests that encouraged white women to offer their accounts to Black voices, and using #sharethemic she and 52 other Black women were welcomed to take over social media accounts as big as Kim Kardashian’s and Julia Roberts'.

Another subject that holds a place in Bozoma’s intersectional basket of passions for which she advocates is Ghana. I’ve learned more about this African country since following her posts, than I did in all my general education to date. The flavors, the challenges, the colors and the styles and art, with descriptions featuring a piece of history, or an emotional tie-in for her personally, and a little information to broaden the minds of her followers.

If you peruse her bold social media feeds you’ll see her middle-schooler daughter featured. They often wear matching party dresses or jumpers, and look very happy. They get their hair done and celebrate their Black-girl magic, and look to be jet-setting around to all the world’s finest locations, living the dream, and it’s not that they aren’t, but theirs is a tear-stained day-dream: in 2013 Bozoma’s adoring husband and father to their little toddler lost a fight with cancer. This year she openly shared that she took the anniversary of his death day off work as a personal day. She advocates for mental health and grief support, because it’s what she knows, and she uses her voice to advocate as loudly and effectively as she can.

This year she’s using her voice to write an autobiography that I can’t wait to get my hands on, and her website lists the “Badass Workshop” for sale that I just might have to put in my shopping cart. Speaking with Gayle King in prep for her autobiography she says that her husband told her on his deathbed to “keep hustling. Find the answer when there doesn’t seem to be one.” She is certainly doing that, and I for one am inspired to keep hustling, to keep seeking, and to keep shining as big, and bright as my little white-lady heart can handle.

Netflix named Bozoma Saint John its new chief marketing officer on June 30, 2020, making her the third CMO for the company in 2019–2020.[24] She is the first Black C-level executive at Netflix