Color Me Brave is a blog series that celebrates amazing women that are both successful in their careers and supportive towards other women trying to make it. This series was created especially for millennial women of color because I want them to see other women of color that have been in their place, walked in their shoes and persevered. Color Me Brave is full of fabulous women leaders with dynamic stories. Enjoy and join me in applauding these industry leaders. To contact our Color Me Brave leaders, please email hello@thecolormeb.com.
Renita Francois
Color Me Brave: Where did you attend college?
Renita: the University of California, Berkeley
Color Me Brave: Graduate school?
Renita: Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University
CMB: What do you do for a living? Where do you work?
Renita: I work for the Mayor of New York City as the Deputy Director of the Mayor's Action Plan for Neighborhood Safety, a $210 million dollar initiative focused on reducing violent crime and improving the quality of life in 15 of the highest crime public housing developments in New York City. I work out of the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice where we focus on reducing unnecessary incarceration, driving down violent crime, increasing fairness and building safe and strong neighborhoods.
CMB: Why did you decide to take on this position? Is it part of a larger plan for you?
Renita: When I first started business school I thought, "as soon as I get my hands on my shiny new ivy league MBA, I'm going to run as fast as I can away from public service". I had worked in the sector for so long trying feverishly to make change but seeing little return on my investment and I was exhausted.
I come from humble beginnings in south central Los Angeles, but was fortunate enough to be one of the ones who "made it". I stayed out of trouble, excelled in the classroom and fought my way into the ivory tower that is UC Berkeley. I was lucky. I was blessed; but I was not ignorant to the fact that success, for those of us who know what its like to grow up in a tough community, comes at a price.
For me that price was never being able to turn my back on where and who I come from. That mindset is what drove me to work for programs like Section 8 with the housing authorities in both Los Angeles and Compton and for the Juvenile delinquency bench at Brooklyn Family Court.
I have a heart for my people-- my people being black and brown folks, people who are struggling, those who are barely holding on...people fighting to just BE-- deep down I knew public service was where I was meant to be, but life is a process and I had several corporate doors slammed in my face before I realized that.
When I found my current role, I was in despair. I had been home for a year after giving birth to my first child and felt the pressure to get back to the workforce. With every 'no' came the voices of doubt, betrayed by my own mind. I'd spend days thinking "you aren't smart enough," "no one is going to pay you that amount JUST because you have an MBA," "you're going to have to take an entry level job because your work experience is not valuable," "you don't even know what you want to do"...I could go on. I had literally been going on job interviews in heels in the summer in humid New York City through my ninth month of pregnancy and back again just weeks after delivering. The pressure was real!
My support system, my husband, family and close friends, would keep telling me when the time was right something would come--but all I could think was, "can somebody tell these bills the time isn't right". When I reached my lowest point mentally, my Black girl network came through in the clutch! A friend from undergrad, who I had sparingly spoken to over the previous 10 years, had been contacting me randomly over the recent few months. Neither of us really understood why. We would share small talk via text and one day we prayed together on the phone after talking about my situation. At the end of that conversation she offered to share my resume with the person who led the interview process for a new position she had recently accepted (she is an attorney), we didn't even know if anything was available.
That person, the COO of our office, responded back saying that he thought I'd be a great fit for my current role. The rest is history. All of the things I anguished over, salary, title, level of responsibility, possibility for learning--were a non issue, but even more perfect than that I was making a return to the public sector in the way I had always dreamed; at the administrative level where I could truly make change. The cherry on top: it was a marriage between both my previous public sector lives- public housing and criminal justice; it was like it was all meant to be. I didn't have to deviate from the plan: Enhance my skillset. Continue forward progress. Never leave my people behind. Set an example for my daughter.
Color Me Brave: Are you a member of any professional organizations? If so which ones?
Renita: I am a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated which is just as much a professional organization as it is a sisterhood. I am currently a member of the Psi Lambda Omega Chapter in Brooklyn and it's great because just being in close proximity of women with so much class, so much know how, so much fire, so much passion, so much grit, so much experience, so much history-- you are bound to soak some of that up no matter what. I am also an alumni of Management Leadership for Tomorrow (MLT) and the Consortium for Graduate Study in Management (CGSM).
Color Me Brave: What are the biggest challenges you face in your job? In your industry?
Renita: The biggest challenge I face in my job is being seen as the government. In my role I engage with the community a lot in an official capacity and often times it's hard to sit back and let people vent their frustrations on you without being able to say
"I know!" "I understand!" "We are from the same place" "I am YOU!".
It comes with the territory and it helps keep me sharp because it's a reminder to work hard, to do more, to make it so that folks are taken care of and no longer need to vent. It's a tall order, but I didn't take this role to back down from the challenge. On the other side of that, it is also a challenge to look at the crime data and hear about the ills plaguing communities of color, but I feel a responsibility to fight against people's desire to sit up high on their perch and look down low, making suggestions that may or may not work for those communities. It's a balance, but I am glad to have useful perspective on both sides to share.
Color Me Brave: How do you overcome obstacles in the workplace?
Renita: By powering through. Only way I know. I'll kick, scream and cry in private if I have to...vent to my support network-- but when I show up to work I'm there to do just that.
Color Me Brave: What’s something you wish you could tell your college freshman self?
Renita: Yes! Pick a major that people will understand! (lol) I would tell her to explore different career paths and opportunities. Learn about what's out there. Get off your butt and go to those career fairs! That might be automatic for some folks, but growing up with NO college-educated adults in my life, I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing in college. I only knew how to get in and how to get out!
Color Me Brave: How can women show their support for other women in the workplace?
Renita: In my office, us brown girls have a safe space that we communicate in where we mostly crack jokes; but we are also there as listening ears for vent and rant sessions. It stays between us. We don't even talk about the existence of the group in the office. We aren't always hanging together yapping at the water cooler. We rarely go to lunch together.
It's like a secret network. Lowkey smiles and expressions as we pass each other throughout the day, but in our safe space, we're girls! We have each other's back. We give each other feedback. One of my main vices is my facial expression. If they walk past the conference room glass and see me making a crazy face, they let me know! It's all love. The best way to show support is to BE supportive! Not as easy as it sounds.
Color Me Brave: What do you do to relax with your girlfriends?
Renita: Drink wine and cocktails, laugh at nonsense, discuss celebrities and reality tv stars like we know them and talk mess... isn't that what we all do?? lol
Color Me Brave: Anything else you want our millennial hustlapreneurs to know about you?
Renita: Nothing worth having comes easy. I've learned nothing more crucial in the past 18 months. I almost let the weight of the world smash me, but then I remembered who I am and WHOSE I am. Don't ever forget that...
