Web Summit: Jessica Alba, Founder of the Honest Company, Talks About the Importance of Representation for Young Girls
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Jessica Alba, founder of The Honest Company, talked about the importance of representation for young girls, from her setting an example as a rare female Latinx entrepreneur to the example set by US Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.
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Thrive Global founder Arianna Huffington, who joined Alba in this interview, said one positive of 2020 is there’s now “no CEO of any company who doesn’t recognise that well-being and the mental resilience of their employees is central”.
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Huffington and Alba talked about what they’ve learned about leading during a crisis, from their personal self-care habits to the necessity of creating an environment where employees feel free to share their struggles and emotions.
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Both women are speakers at 100,000-attendee online conference Web Summit, along with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer, and Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban.
Out of a year of crisis, Jessica Alba and Arianna Huffington said they are hopeful about the rise in more flexible workplace practices and representation in leadership, and about the fact that caring for employees’ mental health is no longer a taboo topic. Alba, who founded The Honest Company, and Huffington, who founded and is CEO of Thrive Global, were interviewed by Glamour editor-in-chief Samantha Barry during a panel at 100,000-attendee online conference Web Summit.
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Alba said companies like hers are now forced to think differently about productivity, and to stop wasting time on meaningless travel.
“There’s no one who loves travel more than me. But I do think that there’s so much that can be done virtually. That is just an amazing tool that we now really have,” she said.
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The Honest Company founder and popular actress also spoke about her unique status as a Latinx female entrepreneur, and the importance of representation and creating practices that lift up women and diverse communities – “that is 90 percent of it.”
Alba said: “When little girls see Kamala Harris, they’re like, ‘OK, I can now see myself in one of the highest offices in government’. When they see someone like me, they’re like, ‘OK, I can start a company one day and it can stand for something and have purpose’.”
Jessica Alba: “I really had to allow myself to take time to centre myself. A mom needs a time out, a wife needs a time out. I had to allow myself to not be so type-A all the time, and wanting to execute with excellence all the time, for everyone, because it’s just been really draining.”