We were lucky to catch up with Eileen Lee recently and have shared our conversation below.

Eileen, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Do you have any thoughts about how to create a more inclusive workplace?

Womxn are still incredibly under-supported in the workplace (and this country!) and The Lola is a community and space where we come together to support one another under an abundance mindset and a psychologically safe and comfortable space where womxn can have unfiltered and vulnerable conversations. One of our community values is committing to be an anti-racist community and our priority at the start of our launch was to be intentionally diverse, inclusive and equitable for womxn across races. Our community is 51% womxn of color, we have a transformative justice process in efforts to support anti-bias and discrimination and we recently were audited by a DEI strategic consulting firm in order to ensure we are being intentionally inclusive in every way. We’ve still got a lot more to do but are proud of the progress we’ve made to date to particularly support our Black Members and womxn of color.

Eileen, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’m a native New Yorker and first generation Korean-American womxn. I started off my career in management consulting at Accenture then left after 6 years of full-time travel and burn-out. I started my first company, Venture for America (VFA), in 2011 and served as COO for its first 6 years – VFA is a national nonprofit and fellowship for recent grads to launch their careers as entrepreneurs. I am now co-founder of The Lola – a womxn’s club and community in Atlanta, GA that launched in July 2019 – it’s my first time living outside of New York, second company but first one after having 2 kids and a dog.

I love problem solving and creating new things that can make a big impact on communities. I’m a culture and community builder and am so proud of the community of professional womxn we’ve brought together through The Lola. Our Members are majority entrepreneurs, freelancers and business owners who often feel isolated in their careers. Our goal is to connect our Members in order for them to find ways to thrive with more ease and less hustle.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

The pandemic completely changed our business overnight and for the long-term. We were opened for a short 7 months before COVID hit and our 5,000 square feet of space shut down in March of 2020 for several months – we quickly pivoted to be an all virtual community but had to continue to tweak how we supported our Members as their needs changed (Zoom fatigue, COVID variants etc…). Since we serve womxn, many of them had to take a step back from work to take care of kids or elderly parents or many lost their jobs – we lost a lot of our Members in 2020 and 2021 was very quiet. It’s been a slog to rebound our Membership ever since, but we survived through the worse of it and through 2+ years. We could have never anticipated such a change and are still working our way through what our new normal will look like. Anyone with a brick and mortar business understands the challenges of having to continue to pay for building costs while not being able to control revenue drying up because of a pandemic.

What’s worked well for you in terms of a source for new clients?

Hands down word of mouth through our existing Members has been the number one way we meet new and prospective Members. Members who have been with us from the beginning have been incredibly loyal and supportive cheerleaders – we wouldn’t be around today if it weren’t for them. One of our Members said it best “Share The Lola with someone who will love it as much as you do.”

Contact Info:

• Website: the-lola.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelola_women/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thelolawomen
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/thelola/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkKNBBQTG99JcF4E7KfKcgw/about

Image Credits
Photos of The Lola space by Mali Azima