We had the good fortune of connecting with Christina Blacken and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Christina, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
My first inspiration for creating my business was how can my pain be turned into power?

Growing up I experienced being an extreme minority – racially, politically, and religiously I was on the outside of the dominant cultures I was surrounded by on a day to day basis which meant I faced significant mental, emotional, and physical types of discrimination. This included many harmful things from being followed around in stores, to being harassed by neighbors, to being called racial slurs by classmates, and being subjected to teachers who were unsupportive or harmful because of their own bigotry. I always believed these behaviors didn’t have anything to do with my worth but they still were painful to go through.

My company The New Quo has taught over 12,000 leaders across 9 industries how to discover their own unique practice of collective leadership, to co-create goals and communication practices that benefits all, using the values and insights within their personal and cultural stories. My approach uses narrative intelligence, story rituals, and neuroscience to help leaders set status-quo breaking goals and practice conscious communication habits that deepen trust, belonging, equity, and innovation in their relationships in and out of the workplace. Turning the painful experience of being othered into a strength helped me build a social impact business which has made a difference.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
My family was part of the Great Migration of Black Americans from the Southern region of the U.S. and migrated from Memphis, Tennessee, to Utah in the 1950s and 1960s. I grew up in Utah, and my childhood of being a minority religiously, politically, and racially taught me how powerful stories can be in influencing how we treated one another and inspired the work I do now.

In my career, before starting The New Quo, I spent 10 years using storytelling to change behavior in various roles and industries, from motivating 300k young people to get involved in various social causes, to closing 6.5 million in sales with various teams I worked with all through using narrative and building story campaigns. Every time I began to shift my own narratives and beliefs about myself, my work, and my life and shared that with others, dramatic growth and change occurred.

As I deepened my research and learning within my career, I discovered that studies by neurobiologists and cognitive psychologists estimate unconscious habits drive an average of 50% of our daily activities – influencing how we think, what we say, how we work, and how we connect with one another. Many of these habits are driven by limiting personal and cultural stories we pick up over the course of our lives, creating the self-doubt, distrust, and inequality that can get in the way of healthy relationships and achieving goals. I founded The New Quo, a leadership development, and equity consultancy, to help current and emerging leaders disrupt these automatic thinking patterns to create more conscious and inclusive practices, habits, and goals through their narrative intelligence.

I create transformational learning experiences using behavioral science techniques that help people deepen their narrative intelligence. Narratively Intelligent leaders uncover the power of the unique lessons and skills within their own life stories as well as cultural stories to better collaborate with others towards equitable, status-quo breaking goals.

I’ve applied this methodology to various equity problems, from social media content moderation to creating equity goals and practices for every area of a business to helping companies create more inclusive language in their content and services. I’ve trained over 12,000 leaders across 9 industries.

My business began as a side hustle while I was working full time which wasn’t easy. I eventually saved up 20k over a course of a few years as what I called my f-you fund, to self-fund my business venture and take the risk of running it full time. When I quit my full time job in 2019 I had leads for client work and was making great momentum. Then the pandemic hit. I lost every client and really had to think through how I would survive the uncertainty. I created a 360 risk plan of best case, middle case and worst case scenarios with triggers that indicated which scenario was developing and action plans to react to it and I set forth. I ended up beating my best case scenario within a few months due to pivoting my model from in person training to online webinars and courses that could still reach my clients and audience. I’m glad that I didn’t give up when things got tough and stuck with my values while building something I’m proud of.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I’ve lived in NYC for 14 years and recommend that arts, culture, and parks here as a first stop for anyone visiting. Governors island, the highline park, central park, Ft. Green Park, Brooklyn Bridge Park, Brooklyn Museum, BAM, Lincoln Center, BRIC, Chelsea Piers, Little Island, Prospect Park, Coney Island, Schomburg, Central Public Library, Bryant Park, South Street Seaport, Ellis Island, Smorgasbord food festival, Coney Island boardwalk and rides, to name just a few. Everyone of these institutions and locations have year round incredible programming, events, music, food many times they are free or low cost as well.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I want to give a shout out to Mrs. Call the first teacher I ever had who made me realize I had writing talents and gifts to the world. Ms. Anke Wessels who’s college course on Social Impact Entrepreneurship was the first spark for the path I have taken with my career. Dreamers and Doers a community that helped me incubate and grow my business idea to eventually become a full time business owner and The List another women’s business community which helped me make the right connections to land some of my largest clients and business experiences. And all the friends and colleagues who provided insight, support, and cheerleading along the way.

The books that also changed my life: The Desire Map, Attached, $100 Start Up, The Artists Way, The Power of Habit, Pleasure Activism.

Website: thenewquo.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/christinablacken/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinablacken/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/cblacken

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheNewQuo

Image Credits
Traci Elaine

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