From Purpose to Profits: How a Coaching Session Led This Immigrant Woman To Become a VC Founder | Kelly Lei

The Delivering Happiness Podcast

Some DH podcast listeners have wondered "What happened to the Cohost Kelly Lei?" Let's just say one of our DH coaches was too good at his job, lol. After some one on one coaching conversations Kelly realized that her purpose/dream/mission was really to find a way to provide people from traditionally underrepresented groups new opportunities to create capital.
Born in Macau, Kelly immigrated to the U.S. when she was 12 and her parents were a waitress and chef who did not speak any English. Kelly realized that because her parents had family members who believed in them and helped them invest, they were able to build capital and create financially stability for her family. Now, Kelly is taking that same type of family support global. She founded a successful new VC firm, Finclusive Ventures who's goal is to elevate diverse founders and investors in early stages by creating new opportunities for all.
In this episode, Kelly shares how a coaching call led to her following her dream, as well as the process of using values to form the foundation of a new start up. In discussing the meaning behind her work, Kelly shares that about 87% of VC funding goes to all male founding teams, about 2% goes to all women and less than .5% goes to women of color founders and that there are huge gaps in the marketplace for ideas from some of these underrepresented groups.