Sept WoS [Pt.II] : Charlene Liu — Journey to Acceptance & Final Message to SheUp
The SheUp theme for this September is acceptance. Now more than ever we need to recognize the importance of equality, especially with our place as international communities in China. No matter your race, culture, religion, or sexual orientation, it is only with the celebration of diversity and not its division that we will be able to thrive as collaborators, innovators, and leaders.
One of the women leading the charge for inclusivity in China is Charlene Liu, the founder of Ladies Who Tech, ShanghaiPRIDE, and Diversity & Inclusion Consulting. She has also been a member of SheUp for almost two years, and we are a community partner of Ladies Who Tech and ShanghaiPRIDE. As one of the women leading the way towards equality in China, we are proud to have Charlene as our September Woman of the Month feature.
SheUp cofounder Rachel K Zhang got a chance to speak with Charlene about her journey following the phenomenal 2020 Ladies Who Tech convention (that we had a group of SheUp ladies at!). Read Part II of the transcript below, where they talk about her journey towards acceptance, how she found her motivations, and a final message for the SheUp Community.
This transcript has been modified to fit the article length and all mentioned names have been altered.
Rachel K Zhang: I know you’ve done this for a really long time. What do you think is your main motivator for being such a big advocate for all of these different communities for acceptance, for inclusivity?
Charlene Liu: I think two things. One is my own background. For the longest time I didn’t know, I couldn’t put my finger on it. What is gay, what is LGBT? And maybe back then - I was born in the 70s, grew up in the 80s - these words were almost unheard of. They were taboo words. People don’t talk about it. No one’s supposed to think about it.
RKZ: Especially in Malaysia, right?
CL: Yeah, especially not in conservative societies and countries. So for me, one, it was so difficult being in the closet. And for the longest time I didn’t know what it was, and for the longest time I realized, “oh, I’m different.” And then for the longest time I thought “oh, I have to hide it.” And it’s been difficult. I don’t think I really came out until I was in my 40s. And that’s a long time! The motivation is that I don’t want people to go through the same things. And I’m not saying I’ve had a bad life - I had a good life, but the thing is the thought behind it — being in the closet — is something that is very difficult. If there was a me twenty years ago and I was going through what I was going through and at that time I had a community and a network that I could look upon and that I could connect with, like PRIDE, maybe my thoughts would have been different. So I hope that PRIDE communities would have done something for me like that back then. That’s one motivation.
Same thing with Ladies Who Tech that motivates me. I come from an engineering background, right? When I was growing up, I really like to play with, well, they call it “boys toys”. And now that I think about it, why should it be “boys toys?”. I like fixing cars, I like building those small little cars, playing with those little gadgets - I like playing with that! But I’ve always been told that they are “boys toys”, and I had to play with dolls! I HATED dolls!
Okay. So if you consider Star Wars figurers as dolls, then yes I like dolls.
RKZ: Gotcha!
CL:The only engineer that I knew in my family was my uncle. And he said that it’s not for girls. Another uncle said I should study economics because it’s more for girls. And so these were the people who didn’t support me studying engineering. But my mother and my grandmother said that “if you’re interested just do what you’re interested in”.
And there are a lot of people who say [girls] can’t do it, but you know tech has no gender.
So I thought to myself yeah, you know what, I’m going to prove these people wrong and that a woman can become an engineer! So fast forwards to today, this is exactly what I want to show. I want to tell other people that girls and women who are thinking of doing science, tech, engineering, mathematics, whatever in the STEM industry — they can do it! And there are a lot of people who say they can’t do it, but you know tech has no gender.
The second [motivator] is really the feedback that I get. The feedback that whatever we’re doing, it’s changing their minds. It’s changing the minds of the people next to them, and they are connected to people who are in the same space. That is the biggest motivator.
When I wake up in the morning and I see a message, someone thanking me, someone saying “you know what, I was there and I met this person and we had a good talk, and now I understand”.
I could cry.
I mean, it’s that emotion, that “oh wow!”. I’ve been doing this for so long and these are things that keep driving me forward. And I shared this on Saturday morning, a father actually wrote to us and said “you know I attended your event, the one in Beijing that the Beijing team organized. I attended the event and learned a lot. Thank you for doing this platform and I hope that I’m a good role model for my daughter, and hope that they will tech one day”.
RKZ: Yeah, that’s really incredible.
CL: It’s like, wow. A dad saying that. I mean, you always think that some people will have this one-track mind, but then when they see and they see that it can be done, it’s just “oh, wow, okay!”. If you see a woman who is an engineer or one who is in a management position, they’re like “oh, okay, I can do that too. Because she has done it too”.
RKZ: So what do you think is the proudest thing either you’ve done or a moment you’ve had? You’ve done so many things and touched so many people’s lives, so what’s your proudest moment?
CL: You know, I’m so proud of my team. I really am.
I am a kick ass boss.
I can be very harsh, and tough. But at the end of the day, everything is teamwork, right? You know Ladies Who Tech or ShanghaiPRIDE. At the end of the day, they’re all volunteers and they all have that passion. And every time after an event, it’s just, I’m like - this is my A-Team.
If someone asks me what I’m proudest of - it’s that. It’s my team. And I always tell them you have to achieve Olympic standard and they have. Actually my team is my achievement. They’re awesome.
RKZ: Oh that is so sweet.
CL: I wanna cry.
RKZ: It sounds like you really do have a phenomenal team. Really something to be proud of.
Is there any final message that you have for the SheUp community of entrepreneurs and leadership-driven women, especially under our main theme of acceptance this month?
CL: Okay, I have this. The world is really like a jigsaw puzzle. And diversity is like putting colours in a big jigsaw puzzle. Imagine if it’s all one colour, one grey colour. It’s going to be very boring, but diversity is when you have a colour in each piece of that jigsaw puzzle and it makes that beautiful. So some people actually ask “why do we need diversity?”. Well it’s not only for business, we already have data to show that. But it really makes the world a more beautiful place. A different place. It’s how we accept diversity that really matters. How we - I won’t say make use, but how we embrace diversity to work in communities and in societies, in schools, whatever. Even in the household. I mean everyone is different, this is just how we have to work together. And maybe we don’t work well together, but okay, move on!
Acceptance is not really an overnight thing. You have to understand, you have to learn, and then you have to be able to figure out how it works for you and how it doesn’t work for you.**
Find Charlene:
Instagram: @liucharlene
LinkedIn: Charlene Liu
Ladies Who Tech: www.ladieswhotech.cn
Ladies Who Tech Instagram: @ladieswhotech
ShanghaiPRIDE: www.shpride.com
ShanghaiPRIDE Instagram: @shanghaipride