Women of Legal Tech: Kisha A. BrownThere’s a scarcity of girls in science, generation, engineering, and math. And there’s still a 17 percent gender gap in pay—throughout the board—in all of the felony (18 percentage at Big Law). But within the prison era community are many girls with thriving careers. Monica Bay these days interviewed Kisha A. Brown, forty, founder and CEO at Justis Connection. Home base: College Park, Maryland.
Education: Wellesley College, B.A. 2000. Georgetown University Law Center, J.D. 2004. I am barred in Maryland.
Current activity: Justis Connection is a web platform committed to connecting legal professionals of shade with new customers using a greater personalized method. We are committed to empowering the community via energetic engagement and academic series. We consider a higher-knowledgeable neighbor is higher-organized to proactively have interaction the legal system.
At any point in your schooling did you consider a profession in science, era, engineering or math? No, I continually stayed away from STEM. The ultimate time I took a math route became junior 12 months in excessive college. Those subjects were never of interest to me and I never considered them to be a place that I could ultimately pursue as a career. I haven’t been a traditional attorney in over a decade spending most of my career in coverage and legislative affairs, so the progression into entrepreneurism thru legal tech become a stunning evolution.
Your first paid activity? Babysitting my neighbor’s kids when I turned into thirteen years vintage. I saved the money over time and purchased my first car at 16.
Your “first seat on the desk” and the way did that revel in having an effect on you? An early experience became attending non-public college in the South in which I changed into the simplest black youngster in high school. I constantly become put within the position to protect and/or explain all things now not white. Although demanding at instances, the experience turned into a precious schooling floor for existence. It turned into hard experiencing unfiltered white privilege early in lifestyles wherein wealth become incredibly valued and people who did no longer exploit it were ostracized and marginalized.
There are still in many instances that I am the most effective black/female/man or woman at the table; but, now once I display up and I am the “simplest,” I am no longer intimidated or touchy to my otherness. After all, I’ve been doing this when you consider that high faculty.
First obstacle and the way you overcame it: Building my enterprise—identifying what I didn’t realize. I carried out for (and widely wide-spread) the LexisNexis Legal Tech Accelerator program to hook up with other prison tech entrepreneurs. We have been at exclusive levels of development—smart people figuring out the dynamics of constructing a business in an enterprise that is particularly hard. Knowing I was now not alone in my quest was a huge comfort, and the exposure with top rate facts and people made me extra assured in my felony tech journey.
Most flagrant sexism you individually encountered and how did you deal with it? While I became running because the director for legislative affairs for the attorney widespread of Maryland, I was routinely burdened through several male legislators. They could supply long hugs and lingering gazes, use demeaning language and make unprofessional advances. One of the most flagrant befell within the hall of the House of Delegates. A maximum egregious delegate noticed me speaking with colleagues and proceeded to yell in my route, “The Lord is my shepherd, He is aware of what I need!” I become embarrassed and aggravated. I rolled my eyes and unnoticed the legislator as different men in earshot gave the entirety from a well-mannered laugh to a delighted chuckle.
