🎮 Join us as we sit down with Trinidad Hermida-Black, the Executive Director of Black in Gaming Foundation and CEO of The Hermida Company, focusing on "Building Equity through Empathy." Her work includes shaping inclusive strategies at billion-dollar corporations, launching Niantic's Black Developers Initiative, and so much more. Listen now for insights on hiring based on potential, fostering genuine internal communities, career cheat codes, navigating board positions, and more.

🎧 Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn: 

• Importance of hiring for potential over current skills in gaming industry
• Strategies to promote true, positive change in DEI efforts
• Building internal communities and empowering employees at Niantic
• Advice for combating imposter syndrome and prioritizing authenticity in one's career
• Cheat codes for success

Resources Mentioned in this episode:

• Here’s Waldo Recruiting
• Lizzie Mintus on LinkedIn
• Trinidad Hermida-Black on LinkedIn and X / Twitter
• TrinidadHermida.com
• The Black in Gaming Foundation

Sponsor for this episode...

This episode is brought to you by Here’s Waldo Recruiting, a boutique recruitment firm specializing in the video game industry that prioritizes quality over quantity and values transparency, communication, and diversity. We partner with companies, creatives, and programmers to understand the why behind their needs and provide a white-glove experience that ensures a win-win outcome. The industry evolves. The market changes. But at Here’s Waldo Recruiting, our commitment to happy candidates and clients does not. We understand that searching for the best and brightest talent can be overwhelming, so let our customer-first staff of professionals do the leg work for you by heading over to hereswaldorecruiting.com.

Welcome to the Here's Waldo Podcast, where we sit down with top visionaries and creatives in the video game industry. Together, we'll unravel their journeys and learn more about the path they're forging ahead. Now, let's get started with the show.

Transcript

Welcome to the Here's Waldo Podcast, where we sit down with top visionaries and creatives in the video game industry. Together, we'll unravel their journeys and learn more about the path they're forging ahead. Now, let's get started with the show.

Lizzie Mintus: Hi, I'm Lizzie Mintus, founder and CEO of Here's Waldo Recruiting, a boutique video game recruitment firm. This is the Here's Waldo Podcast. In every episode, we dive deep into conversations with creatives, founders, and executives about what it takes to be successful. You could expect to hear valuable lessons from their journey and get a glimpse into the future of the industry.

This episode is brought to you by Here's Waldo Recruiting, a boutique recruitment firm for the game industry. We value quality over quantity, transparency, communication, and diversity. We partner with companies, creatives, and programmers to understand the why behind their needs. Before introducing today's guest, I want to give a thank you to Eve Crevoshay for introducing us. Eve runs Take This and is a wonderful person. Thank you, Eve. 

Today we have Trinidad Black with us. She is Executive Director of Black in Gaming and founder and CEO of The Hermida Company, and she drives change by building equity through empathy and expanding technology access for underserved groups.

Her work includes shaping inclusive strategies at billion dollar corporations, launching Niantic's Black Developers Initiative, and championing human connection through various roles. She is an avid traveler, volunteer, and engages with diverse topics, ranging from pop culture to technology on her social media. Let's get started. Thanks for being on the show. I'm so excited to have you. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Thank you, Lizzie. It's an honor. 

Lizzie Mintus: I would love to hear more about what is Black in Gaming for anybody that doesn't know. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Black in Gaming is a nonprofit association that focuses on building in empowering and retaining talent in the gaming ecosystem of black folks. A lot of times, when you look at the numbers, which the numbers don't lie, there is a less than 2 percent of leadership in the gaming industry that's black. And so with that known, our desire and our mission is to really focus on how do we retain talent by empowering them with information? 

I believe my people perish for lack of knowledge. If you don't know, you don't know how to get in there and get in where you fit in, through finding access to leaders that have been sustained for a long time, finding access for the next gen that's coming up. So we have a three prong approach with those who are seasoned in this game industry, those who are fresh and those who are looking forward to. The Black in Gaming has been around for 20 years, so we just hit 20 years last year. And we started off at a GDC 20 years ago, which is crazy. 

Lizzie Mintus: So many good things happen at GDC. What's the most touching story since you've been there? Like the most rewarding thing that's come out of it that you've seen.

I'm sure like your whole job. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: There's a lot. I think I'll give you like, can I give you two examples? More recently, those who work in tech know about Grace Hopper, a huge tech conference for women and engineers. And one of our members reached out and was like, I've never been to Grace Hopper.

I don't know what to do. I don't have an internship lined up. I'd like to get access. And so literally, this is what I talk about when we. When we go into this realm of you have someone that's gone before you, right? So if I grew up with someone who has gone before me into gaming or someone's gone before me into tech, that is my key with the cheat codes to know how to enter in and how to be present, right?

And if you don't have that, you're at a disadvantage. And so for her to be able to reach out to me, who's been there, who's done that, and then be open to being empowered, right? Because a lot of folks, if you think you know it all, you're not, you don't have the capacity to receive with someone who may know just a little bit more than you, right?

Because you already know it all. So her coming to me in the organization and saying, I don't know. I would like to know, we were able to coach her with how to pre get ready before Grace Hopper by posting on your LinkedIn, reaching out to the companies that you're interested in meeting with, how to show up to Grace Hopper, from how you dress to how you're prepared. You need some walking shoes. It's a huge place. You don't want to You know, you could look cute, but you're not going to last more than a couple hours, right? So how to schedule interviews during Grace Hopper and then what to do after. And I'm proud to say that she has an internship with a gaming company because of those coaches.

And then also, I would say that another big deal is being able to build a team of folks that are excited about empowering each other. Being in the industry for a while, you get kind of get jaded. Sometimes you're like, who's excited. So at black and game, and we have some fresh folks who are excited about the mission. Not saying that my, my older season folks are. Are no longer valuable because they, they have so much wealth of knowledge. And I feel like 1 thing is learning how to approach folks who've been there, done that in a way where you can pull the cheat codes, pull the gems, pull the diamonds, because a lot of times they're so engulfed in their job or in their role or what they're doing that they don't even think that they may have something to offer.

And this is something else that Black in Gaming is doing is teaching people many people know, like, no, everybody has the genius. Everybody has something to offer. No matter who you are, what level of expertise you have or how long you've been in the industry. We all have genius. It's just a matter of finding out what that genius is, tapping into it and then sharing it. 

There's a movie called, geez, is it Lily? No, it's not Lily. Oh my gosh. There's a movie. And this movie is about a woman who drinks this pill or this drug. And it makes her life limitless, right? All this information. And there's a quote in that movie that says, what is information, if you don't share it. That's like drop a mic walk away for me. Cause it was like the whole movie was about getting her to this place so she can plug into a computer and download all her knowledge, but before she dies, right. Cause she was about to like combust and that's my charge to anybody and everybody who has information and that's not gender. That's not race. Information is information, and the reason why we see disparities, not only in the gaming industry, but in life, is because of lack of information.

I'll pause there. 

Lizzie Mintus: That's great. I like what you said about people being open to receiving information, because that's totally the other side of the coin if you're not open, or if you're not curious, I guess. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Mm hmm. Curiosity is amazing. I think there are some things that the society has tried to kill in our kids. And that's imagination and creativity. And honestly, those are superpowers. So it's funny to me that society would want to nip it in the bud or even families like, no, you need to be more serious. No, our geniuses have been able to imagine our geniuses have been able to be creative and think outside the box. That's actually where all the money is. And that's what makes people thrive in the industry. 

Lizzie Mintus: How do you think companies or people can go about finding their genius personally or their employees genius? 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: There's so many different things that companies do. Some of them are corny. Like, you think of Myers Briggs or what color wheel are you? I say they're corny, but I think that there's a good effort in it. It's really trying to help people be able to see each other's value so that we can work together. Because if you don't see someone's value, you're not going to respect them. When it comes to us finding our own genius, there's one thing that a lot of people don't do, Lizzie. They don't meditate. They don't sit with themselves long enough to say, Hmm, what am I good at? What do I love doing? What do I do without even thinking? What do I do and then five hours later, I'm like, was I working? That's your genius. 

It's those times when you get lost in something that may be difficult for someone else, but for you, it's fun. It's invigorating. It's life giving. It's something that pushes you and it may not be easy. Even having a genius doesn't mean like someone who is a genius in math. It doesn't mean that there's no problem that they can't solve. There's still problems that they may have trouble solving. It's just that they love it. 

Like my father loves math. My father, who, when I was a child, I would be like doing my math homework. He would solve all the problems and he'd be like, okay, now work backwards and figure out how I solved it. So that's like how he, but he would just like, I don't know. Dad, you're doing it. And he's like, no, go backwards. It taught me how to do math, but he loves it. He loved it and still does.

Lizzie Mintus: My friend Colleen said you should put things into different quadrants. What am I good at that I love doing? What am I good at that I don't like doing? Maybe what am I bad at that I like doing? And then what's like a no for me? So yeah, you're right. People don't sit with themselves very often.

Okay. I pulled my LinkedIn. I said I was having a DEI expert on my podcast and what do they want to know? And one of the question is, how can companies make their interview process more welcoming to people of color? Or anybody that doesn't look like them.

Trinidad Hermida-Black: More welcoming...

Lizzie Mintus: Maybe welcoming is not the right word. You know what I mean, though. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: I know what you mean. I pause because it has to be real. It has to be authentic. There's all of these things because we've, we all have seen it where we make sure that we use inclusive language, right? There's software now that you can plug your job descriptions in so that it can pop out more inclusive, more welcoming for women and non binary. There's all this software.

Fun fact is an eight within all of us, there's a lie detector. Du du du du du du du. It's just in us, right? So it's like, if I go to the first round of an interview and your website's welcoming, the JD is welcoming. I see a lot of people of color, or women, or non binary on the website, and then the first person I meet is trash, what's all that effort for?

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: It's fake. So I say to the person to answer their question directly, there's websites now that you can drop your JD in so that you could get more welcoming language along with more inclusive language. There's also disclosures that you can put like at the end of a J. D. or on the website that states your values. 

If you're a company, you have company values that you stand by, I say very highly that you should list them. You know what I mean? List them so that folks can see them and understand what makes your company tick and why would I want to work here?

I think another thing is being aware that everybody goes to places like, what's the job website where you could get the reviews? Now there's a couple. 

Lizzie Mintus: There's Blind.

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Blind is crazy. Glass door is a little bit more balanced, right? You still get some crazy responses, but it has more... I'm not saying Blind doesn't have credibility, but I feel like Glass Door has more credibility and people pay attention to it.

So I do say to companies that if your Glass Door is trash, you really do need to go through the different comments and address them. Comment back to them, speak to them, let them know what has been done and what hasn't been done. And line on the other hand, you have to take with a grain of salt because it's anonymous, but it's really not. The tone, sometimes it's funny, you could just guess who it is.

I would not go to Blind if I were you. And Blind don't sue me. I have no stake in your company, but anyways. It's one of those things where if you want credible feedback, go to Glassdoor. If you want real, you go to Blind and go to Reddit, start a thread and see what people say. But these are things that, welcoming is one thing, truly ready to empower a person of color or a non binary person in your ecosystem of your company is another. 

Lizzie Mintus: Okay, that was my next question, because I see a lot in recruiting. People are like, oh, well, we're early, and we want to be intentional and really hire a variety of people, as our game serves a variety of audience. And also, I just want to point out your company is more profitable when you have a diverse group of people. That's the most important thing.

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Your game, your ecosystem. 

Lizzie Mintus: Like everything, yes. But how can companies that are super early let's start here, build an intentional culture that, I think hiring is a part of it that people think about, but how do you support people once they join, right?

They're like, Oh yeah, like we're going to hire people of color. We're going to hire non binary people, women, but they don't have mechanisms once they get these people on board, right? It doesn't pan out. So how can companies build the culture and then ensure that they are properly supporting the people once they get hired?

Trinidad Hermida-Black: You want my short answer? 

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: It's really short. I'm getting hot because I'm turning the heat up here. The short answer is give people the benefit of the doubt. 

Lizzie Mintus: That's great. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: I know that doesn't seem prolific or profound, but in all reality, we'd have more VCs, black and brown and women and non binary funded games. People are so used to just allowing what they know. There's a book called, Who Moved My Cheese. I think we all had to read it at some point in my career because I worked for a corporate office and they were like, Oh, we're moving who everybody remove who moved my cheese.

It's about change and it's about how we receive change. And one thing particularly that is very unfortunate is you could get to the last round, but are you going to give me a chance? Are you going to give me the benefit of the doubt? Cause a lot of times I'm overqualified. A lot of times I'm coming with multiple degrees and you're like, why do you want to get in gaming?

Because I do. I do just like your do and your children's children do, and your cousin did. You got them in with nepotism, but we're not calling you out. Like we're not even going to come in here and flip tables. We really do want to come in here, work, get a career, build a game, get the information because guess what?

We're not but being funded to make our own games right now. So that forces us to have to go and work for someone else who got the fund. But at the same time, we all want to be creatives. So give us the benefit of the doubt in your company. Once we're hired for that promotion, for that stretch opportunity, for that project, when there's crunch time, all of that.

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah, I think that's so important and I talk to hiring managers about that all the time because they're like, Oh, this person has a gap in the resume. Short stints? Why is this? Let's get curious or sometimes it's just like a flat out no, but you don't know that the studio shut down or they took care of their family. Oh, there's so many reasons There's so much behind it. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Yeah, that's not even to mention women who have children and it's like, okay, I took a couple extra months off, but guess what? I'm the most productive person that you'll ever have in your team. I'm the best project manager, program manager, you know, digital marketing executive, all those things. And that's where the benefit of the doubt comes in. It's as simple as, hmm, you checked all these boxes. But just this one, why is that one so important when Tom over there and Tom can be anybody and anyone. Tom could be non binary, Tom can be like all those things, but Tom doesn't check five boxes, but you're more comfortable with Tom because Tom looks like you.

We're so past that. They say insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results. We're expecting different results, but doing the same thing. We haven't looked at the cracks within our foundation and either broken them up and relayed the foundation, or we haven't even dug out the dirt and then refill the cracks. Like we haven't done the work where we're basing stuff off of 40 year old HR policies and systems.

Who's going to be bold enough to change the game when it comes to how we operate internally? And I think some of the smaller studios have an opportunity. It's just that what you find is when you start hiring folks from these bigger companies, your people don't realize who you bring in, you're bringing the past with them. You're bringing every game studio they were at. 

If they're coming from Microsoft, they're coming with that culture. If they're coming from Amazon, they're coming from Google. You may not think so but if you put someone in leadership who just came from Amazon, they're going to operate with their comfortability is which is Amazon culture. You would have to deprogram them and then program them into your culture, or at least let them know the standard and say, We live by this standard. These are our values, and that's how we want to keep it moving, and then go by there. But if you don't do that and you give them autonomy, they're coming in with that culture and eventually the whole ecosystem of your studio is going to shift. If you hire 20 percent of people from Google, your ecosystem is going to feel like Google. But people don't recognize that. 

Lizzie Mintus: And I think people think a lot of times that they're working at a startup and maybe it's VCs, right? The VCs want you to have the shiny person from ex Call of Duty. Everyone's like ex Call of Duty, ex Halo, right?

But is that person, like you said, a culture fit for your startup? Culture fit? Cancel word. Are they the right person? They're going to come with this big company attitude and they just worked in this big company ecosystem, right? And maybe what they did worked there on call of duty, but like you're 10 people, right? You're going to have to be way more hands on. You're going to have to be way, way different. People don't really think that through. 

What you said about Tom and by the way, I was picturing MySpace, Tom and like being about, I know you, how can companies be more objective in terms of promotions? Is it just literally, here are the skills, here's what this person is good at? How do you get over promoting Tom?

Trinidad Hermida-Black: So you mean when you're talking about opportunities? 

Lizzie Mintus: Obviously people have implicit bias, right? And there are all these issues with companies being unaware or not addressing that. And maybe Sally should get promoted and Tom should not, right? How do you make that clear in your organization, like your intentions and your true lens of objectivity over their talents and have nothing else influence? And how do you get everybody on your team on the same page too? Cause I see that. A few people have good intentions and then one person doesn't and they ruin the whole thing.

Trinidad Hermida-Black: It's funny cause I just thought about AI and the revolution that AI has been having right now. Because in the past, maybe a couple of years ago, someone would have said is the answer and then we started to dig deep into we recognize that is as powerful as the information that's put in it. Right? And so if the person who's putting these this information into it.

Is bias, then that cuts the system. I use that example as, when we have blind, we call them blind interviews or blindness. They're blind that. You could essentially hire someone that may not look like or feel like or whatever, because you're not seeing the person. So you cut out the visual bias. Right. But at the same time, this is a reason why we started implementing tests. Or we started implementing prerequisites and different things like that.

These are all things to weed out someone who is not capable of doing the job. So we think, right? But there are classes at Stanford University that teach you how to ace a Google interview. 

This is where I talk about information is key because when YouTube came up in life, we used to call it YouTube University. It is still YouTube University. When it came to YouTube University, folks who just knew this is something that I want to learn about. They started realizing I could go to YouTube for it. And then eventually folks started going there more often and interacting and different things of that nature.

When I found out that Stanford had a class on how they should show up to their Google interview and all those different things, I was like, wow. This is just the epitome of a disparity for folks who are trying to get in. And so, for example, when it comes to the industry and let's say, wanting a game design job, there could be a test or just a process. And each studio has a different process.

I know folks who have a masters, right? They've gone to school, they've done everything and they cannot ace or get through that level of what's next. And so I think that having opportunities for folks to teach, or at least have that, let's say on your website, you want to be more welcoming, if you have game design, if you have all these different levels of jobs, it's like having a video that just says, this is what the process is going to be like. That could actually be a dope kind of experience where Someone tell you, these are the steps that we go through. And when you go into this route, this is what is expected of you. Here are some of the questions you can ask.

Because, guess what? In college, we all test, we all study, we all go forth and we try and do these different things, but at the end of the day, It's those who put the work in that are going to ace it.

And another example that I have is, for example, sometimes in studios, they'll hire folks that don't have a certain coding language with the expectation that you'll learn it. Right? And I had someone who didn't know Unity. And it was imperative to their job to be able to do Unity. In that space, it's like, okay, so what's my timeline? How much time do I have? But at the end of the day, I really do think it's not fair to hire someone with the expectation to the learn without giving them possibly an opportunity to do a boot camp or to put them through that boot camp so that they can be ready for the job. So you're kind of like ready, not yet. And you're getting paid and it adds the stress of, okay, I need to make this happen. And it's, yeah, it opens the door because you want to hire someone who may not look like you or add balance to your team, but at the same time, you're not preparing them or setting them up for success. 

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah. I like that a lot.

And I think it's so important for companies to hire for your possibility, right? What you could be opposed to generally what you are right now, unless maybe you're so close to shipping your game and someone quits and you need this plug and play person right now. I would say that's an exception. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Right. I mean, a lot of game studios want to hire folks that have a high quality quote unquote or many years. And just because you don't have the capacity to hire a junior level or an entry level person because of your budget. A lot of these games are expensive. If you're a startup, you may only have enough to pay someone to , let me get the top dollar person because then I know that they're going to produce what I need for my game. But at the same time, then that creates a trend in it of this is all we want. Right now, nobody is really fulfilling all of their roles. There's a shortage of engineering's with engineers with the skills set. So that's where we're transforming these things. 

Lizzie Mintus: So I want to talk about your career and you worked at Niantic, Unity, and Dell. But before we get into that, from a small company perspective, at what point do you think somebody should have a person that is dedicated to diversity and inclusion and making the company more welcoming to all and versus having people on the team creating some kind of committee.

Sonia Michaels asked, which is like the best question, so many people who do DEI work at companies go above and beyond their regular jobs. For example, you're a designer or a producer or an engineer, but then you're on the DEI committee and then they get pushed toward burnout by doing all this extra work, also doing their full time jobs.

So how can game studios promote positive change in this area without relying disproportionately on people who are already marginalized to do the groundwork? 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Oh, I hate that. So there's a lot of different efforts that have been made to change that. One, they've tried to pay DEI folks, right? They've have like BRGs, ERGs, and they've done the efforts of trying to give them a stipend and say thank you for your extra time and your extra work. The easiest way to kind of shift that narrative is to actually focus on leadership.

Make it a part of their goals or like it's ingrained within leadership and how they operate. So then it becomes a part of their objectives of their of what they're trending for with through the year, because at the end of the day, it's not something that Is just one person's job.

It's not just one person's opportunity. It's everybody's. And if that's not the focus, then it's going to fall on the shoulders of few. And that's not something that we personally can handle. And that's why you see burnout. And I hadn't in my opinion, which is not popular. I was in the role of Diversity equity and inclusion, right?

I don't think that there should be a diversity equity inclusion role. I think the role should be the person who is HR. They like to separate it. You're the chief people officer. This should be part of your job. You're a VP. This should be part of your job. You're a COO. This should be part of your job. 

Yeah, you have an expert who understands the culture a little bit more higher, more HR folks who understand the culture and who are not just about the business. So, yes, HR is focused on the business. And I know this is unpopular as well. But at the same time, you have to be able to understand what the business is trying to accomplish, understand what the culture is and bridge that. 

And when you create a separate role, you're telling everybody that you don't understand the system and you want this person to be the expert. That puts all the onus on them. It doesn't put the onus on your HR, your business development.

Like when I say DEI should be ingrained when you're acquiring companies, you should be looking into the culture of the company and not just the money value because you could acquire, and this is something that's happened in my career, you acquire a studio. It's 95 men, five women, there goes all your numbers, right? That you're quote unquote, looking to balance out and have more diverse and balanced teams. Right. And you're not doing that. You just totally just like, Oh, let's just take this whole studio. That's being immersed in your culture and your company, and you're bringing on their culture.

And so I believe that, it's something that we all need to be well versed in. And I believe that there's great books, there's great people, there's great places, and there's great studies. And all that jazz, but if you're not willing to take on the onus yourself within your goals within your bonuses and all that other kind of stuff, then you're just being performative.

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah, absolutely. That's good advice. So you said there are a lot of resources which people can turn to. What are your favorites. What do you like to recommend. If you are a studio of 25 white guys and you want to be better, truly in your heart, where do you start?

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Hm, I would say, so I have a method. I'm writing a book about it. It's called Head Heart Hand. And essentially, a lot of people start with data, they want data to prove, right? Like, show me the data, and then I'll prove it. If you stay in the data realm, it's not going to move to your heart. There has to be something that connects you to the data.

So there has to be a physical person or an experience that transforms you into understanding that this is something that's imperative. And then once you understand that it's imperative, then that goes to your hand where you're willing to put your hand to the plow. You're willing to volunteer. You're willing to change a culture and do those different things.

Lizzie Mintus: In terms of your own career, can you talk about starting at Dell? You wore a few hats, you were a diversity HR business analyst. What is that role? 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: It's everything that you can think of when it comes to assessing like different business units. So for example, I worked with folks in sales. And so looking at sales, looking at their culture. So it's a business within the business. So we have the overall corporation, right? EMC was huge at the time. Got acquired by Dell, one of the biggest acquisitions, I believe in history of tech acquisitions. And you have sales and you're like, okay, why is sales disproportionately men?

What are the cultural aspects of it? What are some things that need to be shifted? What are some things that we can think differently about? And then sitting with the leaders, I have an example of, it was the biggest conference at the time. It was called Massachusetts Women's Conference, and it was 10, 000 folks. And one of our sales leaders was like, Oh, I need more women in sales. There's no women in sales. And there was a panel that was focused on sales. And I said, you should be on the panel. He's like, what do I have to give or offer to that panel? I was like, number one, you're an executive at a billion dollar company. And number two, you are going to approach these women with your top cheat codes, and you're going to, and it's coming with like a peace offering.

And, and then number three, you're going to stand there at the end and you're going to say, whoever is looking for a role in sales and doesn't have an opportunity, please, I will give you my personal information. His life changed in that one time. He was like, I didn't understand how many women are out there who can't even get into the door because of bias.

And from that point on his whole organization, his whole unit shifted. Now that doesn't come without growing pains. That doesn't come without hiccups or realizing that there might be some bias or disparity or different things of that nature, but he shifted from his mind to his heart. 

I have another example of a senior executive telling me there's no black engineers.

And I said, 

Lizzie Mintus: Oh, we would hire them, but they're just don't exist. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: So I said, do you trust me? He's like, yeah, trust you. And I said, okay, can I get a week of your time in March? He said, is it GDC? I said, no. And he's like, okay, as long as it's not GDC. I was like, all right. I brought him to. NSBE, the National Society of Black Engineers Year of Conference.

And I brought this white man into the expo hall, stood him there and I said, look around. What do you see? Every company you can think of, from the government to private, to equity, to this, to that, like everybody was there. Why? Because that's where the talent is. Then brought him into a couple of Panels and luncheons and he was sold. A lot of folks don't have experiences that connect the data to them. If you don't have an experience, then it's not real. 

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: So a lot of times if you're not willing to give up yourself and allow yourself to experience something. Then you won't go into that realm of my it's something I should actually do. 

Lizzie Mintus: Those are great stories. So you would recommend people attend different conferences and get out of their comfort zone? Well first, find it within themselves right? Find the reason and get into your heart and then put yourself somewhere where you can find where the talent is. Go where the talent is and don't look in the places where you would maybe think to look first, right?

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Well, a lot of times, it's not great to hear this, but a lot of folks, they're like, oh, my cousin's gay or, my daughter's boyfriend's black. People say those things because that's their connection to the other. And in that connection, it gives them an inkling of a desire to actually do something for the other. It's not perfect. It's actually cringing, right? But at the same time, there has to be a connection. 

You see folks who back in the day used to, and I believe it still happens, where they'd be those commercials where it's like, adopt a child. You know what I mean? Then they send you a card. Then they send you this and that. There has to be a connection between. You can't just say like, Oh, I want to help this disproportionate group of people. You haven't taken time to hear a story, or hear, experience. And I'm not asking for hand me outs.

No, our folks are highly qualified above qualified and willing to do the work. But if you don't see me as someone that you would like to honor, celebrate, or even welcome in and acknowledge and accept, then you're not going to get the best work. And you could see that in a lot of our companies and environments. 

Lizzie Mintus: That makes sense. So can you talk a little bit about, I know you accomplished so much at Niantic.

What can you share about your work there. What are you most proud of?

Trinidad Hermida-Black: I would say I'm most proud of the community internally that we built, along with the black developer initiative, but mostly the community internally. We have some amazing folks that I say, I still say we, because Niantic was like a home. It was a community that didn't have a DNI vote before I got there. And so going in, having the support of my leaders and being able to build a strategy, empower folks, not only with tools and information, but empower them with autonomy, being able to tell someone, okay, you can run this, or here you go, let's be a business resource. What are some things within the business and analyzing the business and finding how our employee resource groups or business resource groups can contribute and feel like they've impacted the bottom line of the company. So every time that there was the company's vision or goal for the year, we would then go within our community and say, okay, how can we align our goals to the business goals that are going to help the business goals? 

And that's what kept us relative. That's what kept us not relative relevant. And able to stay connected to the business. You know, ERGs are amazing, but it's not just about parties and singing Kumbaya and coming together and hearing about all the problems in the company.

It's about finding solutions. And so being able to coach and empower folks to say, okay, we can approach the business with these solutions. And the worst thing that they can say is no, or they can say, let's try it out. So these are the opportunities that we built within Niantic. And although time has passed and things have happened because of just the big influx of overhiring to then having to skim back down, all those things, which are not fun and nobody likes to experience. At the same time, there's still core folks that are there that are still pushing without a leader.

You know, and that's the part that I talk about where it's like, we need more folks to not focus on one person to do the work of all, but to empower each person with the tools and the autonomy within that space to be the change that they desire to see. 

Lizzie Mintus: So I also saw that you're on the Beamable board. Congrats. I just had John on my podcast. I was like, what a funny connection. 

Can you just talk for anybody that might be interested in being on a board, but doesn't know what it's like or what steps they can take and how they can get connected in their career? Can you share a little bit about your experience there?

Trinidad Hermida-Black: So, Beamable approach me. Thanks, John. As an advisor, and we actually met on clubhouse. So this is something else that is back in the day during COVID. But this is something that you would. When you go hard in the paint in these streets of studios and gaming, there's a lot of opportunity to be a voice or be the change that you desire to see.

And if being on a board is a desire of yours, it's about what are you doing to contribute to the success of the organization that you're on the board of? And starting to build relationships. It's all about relationships. There are websites that you can go on and pay, there's an organization called Women on Boards and all these different things, but the true and the best connection is an organic one.

And so if you're interested in being on boards, learn about the organization, start to volunteer for the organization, get into the organization and show that you are someone who's adding value to that organization. And a lot of times when that seat comes up, because that's who you are and what you're doing, they're going to pick you and ask. 

Lizzie Mintus: You're authentic, you're real, you're putting in work, you're putting yourself in the right situation.

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Yeah, I've met a lot of board folk who don't do anything, and who don't add value, and they're just sitting there for recognition or whatever. That's not helping the cause, and that's not a true board member. A board member should show up, not only to the board meetings, but show up to when there's town halls or when there's different things of that nature. 

But when you start to go into corporate boards, it's very different. So corporate boards are more about the bottom dollar. What is our numbers? If you're a public company, what does our stock look like? And how to mount manage and balance those things out.

Lizzie Mintus: Thank you. That's helpful. You've had so much success. You're on boards. You've consulted with these multi billion dollar companies, but can you talk about imposter syndrome when you've had it in your career, how to combat it? I think it's so important to highlight that everybody struggles with this, even the people with all the success that you see that you wouldn't think 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: I would say. Okay. So, I'm a millennial. I'm on the cuffs, but I even though I'm 41 at this time in my life. I would say that imposter syndrome was earlier on in my career. Once I got autonomy or power or a budget or a team, I think that it started to slip away because I was the authority in that space and I had to show up. So not just for myself, but for the people around me.

Now, not everybody has that ability or that opportunity. So I would say that, because I combated it earlier on in my career. I did have a lot of problems with my bosses, with my leaders, because they're like, who does this person think she is? And I fought for my voice. 

So there's 2, there's multiple roads you could take. There's the easier road where you don't necessarily fight for your voice. You just start to implement it in your actions and how you produce. 1 thing is, if you walk in excellence and you're producing good work, there's really a hard line around, oh, I just don't like the way you're talking to me or I don't like your tone.

I found that, men particularly don't have as much as an issue with me. White men particularly don't. I would say more women have an issue because if another woman is dealing with imposter syndrome and then I come into the room, it's just going to increase her imposter syndrome. I'm not saying that in a mean way. It's just, I find it hard for women to really empower and connect with other women. And that's something that we need to do better with because even these women organizations don't focus on black women. And that's another thing is that when a black woman walks into the room, you're going to know it because the atmosphere shifts because she comes with a level of excellence and she knows how to produce what she says she's going to produce. I'm not saying other people don't, I'm just saying that there's a shift. And so when I would walk into rooms, the atmosphere would shift and I had to notice that. When I would go silent, people like, Trina, what's your opinion? And I'm like, you want to know my opinion? Okay great. 

But at the beginning of my career, I had too much opinion. I talked too much. You know what I mean? I was always combating things and saying, this is not right. And so I had to really fight. So I say that this generation is more vocal. 

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: So they have more opportunity to be authentically theirselves. I mind you, I had to fit the outside mold. In my career in my time in my season, the outside mold, which was corporate and in that season until I got to Niantic, which was Even in my interview at Niantic, I said, this is how I dress this. I'm from the East coast. I'm not going to come to the West coast and start wearing flip flops and socks to a board. That's just not who I am. I'm going to wear heels. I'm going to wear my hair a certain way. But I said, except me how I am, because I had failed a Google interview because of that, because they have a culture. And I was sitting in their culture.

And I said, we have to break that at Niantic come as you are. Do you really mean that? Because this is how I come. And because I walk in excellence, doesn't mean that I shouldn't make someone else uncomfortable who's in the room. 

So I would say with imposter syndrome, as you find your voice and you recognize your genius start to combat it with baby steps of showing up and not necessarily forcing yourself on people, but being present. And when there is something that needs to be said because you're the expert of that in the room, not backing down because essentially if you back down and you're the expert, you're hindering the success of the product of the game of the environment of whatever. And so we can't do that in 2024. 

Lizzie Mintus: That's great. Yeah, it takes some time to be comfortable with yourself. And I think as a white woman, I've definitely been told I'm opinionated. Everyone told me I should be a lawyer as a kid. You're bossy, right? But eventually, you're always like to something, but eventually, it's like, No, this is who I am. It's good. I'm gonna run with it. Right? I'm like you. I'm wearing my heels. I live in Seattle, but I'm not stumbling out of REI. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Yes, but that's who you've come to a place where who you are is, and we evolve, right? So I may be wearing heels this year, but I may have children next year. I'm like, okay, I need some Crocs. 

Lizzie Mintus: Okay. Okay. I feel very strongly on the croc thing. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: But what I'm saying essentially is like we have, we're all evolving and growing. And if we take the time to really set ourselves, sit with ourselves, and be with ourselves. I go back to the beginning where I talked about meditation.

We're not sitting with ourselves enough. We're on a road. We're on a train track. We're trying to get to court, like upper level corporate, or be successful in this range or this range or whatever. And we're not really asking ourselves why. 

Lizzie Mintus: Yes. I talked to people all the time. Like, why do you want to market Google? Do you really want to work here? 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Why do I want to be a VP? I want to be a director? Is it the money or is it the title? Is it the autonomy? Is it more more work, more responsibility? And why do I want the house? Why do I want the husband? Why don't I want the kids? Why don't I want the dog? Why did I want my masters? 

You go through all these things in life. And then one day you wake up and you go, why did I do all this again? Is it for other people to recognize me? Or is it because I actually want to do this. And that's something that I believe everybody has to ask themselves. At some point in your life, you're going to stop on the train tracks, you're going to look around, you're going to look at your house, you're going to look at your kids, you're going to look at your husband or your boyfriend or your partner. You're going to look at your car, your job, and you're going to say, why is this what life is about? Or is this what my genius has produced? Or have I done this because my community, my society, my parents, my culture has told me that this is what success looks like. When in all reality, that's not success if you're not in your true place. 

Lizzie Mintus: Or even happy, right? You have this big job. You have this fancy house. I see this all the time. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: I know this isn't a podcast about like health and wellness, but at the same time, like these are things that are imperative when you look at folks who took a risk to start their own studio to build a game. It's because they finally got to a place where they're like, this is my vision is my passion. And then they found other people to align with them. But what's our vision? What's our passion? And are we willing to take the risk? Because I know my parents couldn't take the risk because of society. They couldn't afford to take the risk. This generation, I think, is taking more risks. So that's why you see more things blossoming, more innovation, more technology.

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah. Definitely. It's good advice. I mean, this podcast is about talking to successful people and figuring out how they did it. So thank you. 

I have one last question before I ask it. I want to point people to your website, the big foundation. org. The last question you touched on cheat codes from WIGI and you gave some great cheat codes already. What cheat codes do you have? If I wish I knew X at Y stage in my career?

Trinidad Hermida-Black: Cheat codes, at first I would say, I would talk about the imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is something that we have to address by finding our true self. Sitting with ourselves and asking ourselves, what is it? Why am I doing this? And why do I believe that this is going to bring me happiness, wealth, whatever it is.

I would also say networking is key in the industry. If you don't know now, go on LinkedIn, go and follow your favorite people, then look at the people who they comment on and who they follow and reach out to them. Don't be afraid there. There's a lot of people who are successful and who are senior in this industry, or even younger in this industry who are willing to have a 15 minute chat if you reach out to them. So networking is huge. 

I would also say, walk in excellence. Do everything that you can with excellence. And show up on time yourself. If the people who you're interviewing with are not tingling in here, but you're desperate and you need the money, pass it. Don't do it because that's your body telling you that's the Holy spirit. That's God. Whatever that you believe in, that's telling you, this is not for you. And you need to take that into consideration. 

A lot of times we take things because of desperation. Then we realize it's killing time. It's killing time. That's the one thing that we don't have freely. And that's the one thing that getting on that train and just allowing it to go and to wherever it goes is not an option for me, because time is of the essence.

So, even these moments of spending time with you and spending time with this information is because I have a core value that information is to be shared. So cheat codes are show up and show out in excellence because when you show up with excellence, they can't really come against what you're doing because you're producing. Now it's a character or a, it's not even a character thing. It's more a personality flaw. 

Lizzie Mintus: Yeah. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: So take time to really sit with yourself and ask yourself, what do I desire to do in this world? Why am I here? Why am I on this earth? Is it to create games? Okay. If it's to create games, I'm going to create the most banging successful games in the world because that's my purpose.

Now, if your purpose isn't creative and in drawing environments, do it with excellence and you're going to just be successful regardless because people are going to see what you produce. And so then you could show up authentically yourself because you're the one who they need. When you need me and I don't need you, I show up authentically myself because you want the genius in me. So then that changes the whole negotiation process. 

So there's a lot of opportunity, but networking is key. Being in excellence is key and finding your genius. So that you're not wasting time. Time is not unlimited. 

Lizzie Mintus: So true. You're very wise. I love it. We've been talking to Trinidad Black, who is the executive director at Black In Gaming.

Trinidad, where can people go to contact you, hear more about what you have to say, get involved with Black In Gaming? 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: You can find me on LinkedIn, Trinidad Black. You can find me on Instagram, this is Trini. Twitter, this is Trini. T R I N I. Or on my website, TrinidadHermida. com. 

Lizzie Mintus: Thank you. 

Trinidad Hermida-Black: All right. 

Thanks so much for listening to the show this week. To catch all the latest from Here's Waldo, you can follow us on LinkedIn. Be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes. We'll see you next time.