Jun 2, 2021
Today we are joined by a true entrepreneurial powerhouse, Joanna Riley, aka Jo. Jo has a diverse and rich background as an entrepreneur, investor, and technology advocate. During her undergraduate year in college, Jo was recruited by the FBI and deployed to Africa and the Middle East to work on case management, terrorism, and drug investigations. After her stint in the FBI, Jo pivoted her focus into entrepreneurship, where she built and sold her first company after only two years in her early twenties. Jo pursued the next chapter in her life by jetting off to China and founding another company called 1-Page. However, she, unfortunately, lost that business to a hostile takeover shareholder situation which we discuss today.
Jo and her many accomplishments have been featured in Fortune, Fast Company, Forbes, The Financial Times, and Huffington Post. Starting again from the ground up, Jo is the epitome of perseverance as she has created and co-founded the company Censia, which is growing exponentially. Tune in to this episode as Joanna shares the experiences and mindsets that helped her become braver, rebuild after setbacks, and how to stay fearless in the face of daunting obstacles.
In This Episode:
Key Takeaways:
Bio:
Jo Riley is not one to shy away from a challenge. As a collegiate athlete, Jo’s singular goal was to become an Olympic rower, but when fate intervened and an injury left her unable to compete, she began her journey to create a new dream: First as part of the international training unit at the FBI, and then as an entrepreneur determined to solve the biggest problem plaguing businesses today.
Today, Jo is an entrepreneur, advocate, a mentor for diversity in technology, and the CEO and Co-Founder of Censia, an AI-powered Talent Intelligence platform designed to eliminate unconscious bias from talent decisions by providing companies with clean and structured talent data that looks past job titles (which are often biased) to reveal people’s true abilities and their future potential. Her technology is delivered into any existing talent software via API, giving all companies access to the best talent and unbiased talent decisions.
Jo was named one of the Most Powerful and Influential Women by the California Diversity Council and Forbes Next 1,000. She currently sits on the Board of Directors for Young Presidents Organization (SF Bay Chapter) and is an active angel investor in early-stage companies. She sits on the Advisory Boards of CerraCap Ventures, Veterati,
Perksy, DroneShield Ltd, and is a mentor at Singularity University and Founder Institute.
Connections:
Find Jo Riley on LinkedIn and Twitter or visit Censia.
Check out our website, Potential to Powerhouse, for more details and to learn about past, present, and future guests. Be sure to follow us on Instagram and Twitter, and join our Facebook Community for a deeper connection with the P2P tribe.
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Until next time… High Five!