I had not spoken to Slivy for what seemed like forever, until a couple of weeks ago. Yet her laugh was unmistakable. It returned to her conversation easily and often as she expressed her curiosity, shared new interests and freely reminisced. It had always been an endearing trait of hers; a punctuation that disarmed, added clarity and emphasized an important point. At times it reflected true humor enjoyed, while at other times it acknowledged the discomfort of ironies too obvious to ignore.
Slivy Edmonds was one of the most successful founders I backed in my earlier venture fund, UNC Ventures. An African American woman, she had partnered with an African American man, Chester Davenport, to acquire an environmental services engineering division of United Technology, had doubled its size within 18 months, gone public within three years and returned 10 times my original investment in the process.
In so many ways Slivy and Chester were an emphatic retort to the common mainstream “wisdom” that black folks, in particular, are not a good bet when it comes to scaling profitable businesses and attracting traditional sources of capital. They were familiar with this wisdom and had confronted it themselves, as well as other biases that assumed their demise before they even started their remarkable quest. After all, neither Slivy nor Chester was cut from the usual cloth of the most recognized entrepreneurs; not even close. Beyond not being white, straight, young males, they didn’t grow up in similar places, they didn’t go to the same schools, and they certainly didn’t have the same access to capital. Nevertheless, they “found a way out of no way,” as the expression goes, to achieve a level of success that most entrepreneurs only dream about.
Yet as Slivy and I spoke, the images of three black women recently brought out of the shadows of history in the movie Hidden Figures kept coming to mind. These three women — Katherine Goble, Dorothy Vaughan and, Mary Jackson — had made remarkable contributions, as a gifted mathematician, computer programer and engineer, respectively, to our NASA space program in its formative years. And they did so while enduring the discriminatory practices and indignities that were the norm at that time for women in general and black women most especially. Yet not even I had heard of them. For 50 years their story was untold and they remained among the African American hidden figures of American history.
As my conversation with Slivy continued, it became clear to me that she had spent most of her life — like Katherine, Dorothy and Mary — largely invisible. Except to the few who saw her potential, offered her a helping hand and didn’t stand in her way, she remained remarkably unknown, even as she became among the “first” African American woman in several categories usually associated with high achievement and special recognition. An extraordinary pioneer by any measure, she was a hidden figure in her early career in corporate finance at a leading insurance company, and remained so as she co-founded and successfully built a public company. With her mounting success, her status as a hidden figure — one who exists in plain sight, but is unseen — transformed her into a figure hidden — one who is seen, but ignored until invisible to all but family, friends and adopted community of fans.
Wait. Slivy has since received several awards and served on many boards. Could it be that she is simply a modest person not prone to public attention or adulation? Yes, in fact she is.
Yet the invisibility to which I refer is not personal, but rather a cultural mask. The occasional tribute does not make it go away. And it is not by choice. One is not invisible to oneself; one is invisible to others. It is the others who are blind to what is in plain sight. This blindness has deep historical roots in America, expressed even today as a cultural norm and experienced by people of color as an alternative reality. In 1952, Ralph Ellison explained this condition eloquently in the prologue of his brilliantly incisive, award winning exploration of race and identity in Invisible Man.
“I am an invisible man. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids — and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, because people refuse to see me.”
This invisibility is justified by a narrative that misrepresents history and our American experience. It is a narrative perpetuating a view that folks of color are largely undereducated, lacking in ambition, consumers not contributors, too often angry, and sometimes just plain scary. Of course the narrative admits selected exceptions, but they are far and few between. Some of those exceptions you know personally: a co-worker here, a neighbor there, a parent at your kid’s school. Some you know from a distance: an extraordinary athlete, a pop culture icon, a gifted actor. But the exceptions are not enough to justify changing the narrative.
So it continues, masking generations of innovation and achievement by people of color in the arts, in science and technology, and, yes, in business.
I see things differently. I see the invisible among us because I look for them. When I look at Slivy, here is what I see:
A woman who first wanted to be a nurse. It was not a straight path. Vocational training and college preparatory courses in her high school in Philadelphia were followed by seven years to earn her undergraduate degree in nursing before finally landing a head nurse position. Deciding she needed to move out of her small world into a bigger one, she jettisoned nursing and became a flight attendant. As she traveled the world, her sense of the possible expanded and her ambition grew.
A woman who ignored the memo that corporate finance was for men. While traveling the world Slivy met a man in finance and, fascinated, asked him what she needed to do to do what he does. Considering his advice, she found her way to Wharton and asked folks there, “If I want to come to Wharton what do I have to do?” She listened. She took courses at Temple University. She overcame one obstacle after another and finally applied to Columbia and Wharton. She was accepted by both. After a brief stint at a Fortune 500 company, Slivy accepted a corporate finance position at The Equitable. And then accepted the risky challenge of heading up private equity at an insurance company because “No one wanted to have anything to do with it!”
A woman who left an enviable corporate job to become an entrepreneur. First as the CFO of a historic commercial airline founded by an African American entrepreneur. Then as a partner with Chester and Drexel Burnham to co-found the largest African American controlled private equity firm, Georgetown Partners.
A woman who had a big vision and executed on it brilliantly. She co-founded Envirotest, acquiring a sleepy small division of United Technologies. With Chester, Slivy built it into the nation’s leading vehicle emissions testing company, one of the largest African American controlled businesses and a successful public company — all within three years.
A woman whose ripple effects continue to change lives — known and unknown. A wealthy woman on her exit from Envirotest, Slivy next established The Edmonds Group, a private equity and merchant banking firm, and continued successfully investing in a wide range of companies — funeral services, consumer product companies and community banks, to name a few. She also shares her wealth through philanthropy, particularly in her now hometown of Tucson. With the goal of increasing opportunities for people of color and women, Slivy has focused her generosity on education, theater and the arts, and projects that empower people of color and women. Her explanation for doing so is quite simple. “I always had others with whom I had no relationship make a difference in my life. This is my way of giving back to all the folks I never had an opportunity to thank.”
Slivy’s story is exceptional because she was given the opportunity to make it so. But she should not be the exception. We need to bring her and countless others who share her talent, skill, drive, and persistence out of the shadows. It is in our collective interest to make visible all those who have formed our history and who continue to shape our present.
The film Hidden Figures — like these Ed Talks — advances a new narrative that begins to correct the blind spots in our history. One that recognizes that opportunity is the key to success — for people of color, women and for the entire multi-cultural nation we are becoming — and that invisibility cancels opportunity. If we truly want to achieve greatness, we need a narrative that embraces all those who have been hidden for far too long.
We at Reinventure know that we are not alone in recognizing it is time to bring forth this new narrative. Join us. Be our partners as investors, ambassadors and collaborators. Or start your own effort to see things differently; to make the invisible visible. Either way, don’t wait. There are countless people who have the potential to achieve just as greatly as Slivy, Katherine, Dorothy, and Mary, but are daily deprived of the opportunity to succeed. We can change that, and share in their success. Our moment — their moment — is now.