On the concept of ‘balance’

“I don't want a relationship. I'm not a naturally monogamous person. I date younger men casually and recreationally. I adore being single, I cannot wait to die alone. And I'm deliberately very public about all of this because we don't have enough role models in our society, for women and for men, that demonstrate you can live your life very differently to the way society expects you to and still be amazingly happy—and I'm the happiest person I know. So when I'm asked in interviews, as I regularly am, ‘So Cindy, as a startup founder, what’s your best stress management tool?’ My response is not having a husband and children.”

On #MeToo

“The women and men who wrote to me are terrified, and they are too terrified to speak up on the record and name names, because the powerful men doing the harassing are the gatekeepers of everything. They're the gatekeepers of jobs, pay raises, promotions, awards, career paths. So much so that what I heard time and time again was 'Cindy, I'll never work again if I tell my story.'”

“I am still trying to get those stories told, and I'm still hearing from women in Asia. The social cultural barriers are even more difficult in Asia. But at the same time, the women I speak to across Asia, they've had enough. Women in Japan, which is one of the most sexist countries in Asia, they've had enough with their place in society. So I am very confident that more and more of us are determined to change this, even in Asia, and I'm confident that we will.”

Woke washing

“We need to see a lot more men not talking but doing. What you say and what you do, regrettably, can be very different for men in every industry. There are a lot of men out there who are deliberately, as the term goes, woke-washing. Talking a great game, and totally against it in private. But there are equally many very good men out there who are not acting as they should.”

Male allies

“I often get asked by men, ‘Cindy, I want to be a male ally. What can I do to help?’ And I say, it's very simple. As a man, you just need to do two things. The first is to listen to women. Because you don't, men. Every day as women, we are man-terrupted, mansplained to, talked over, not heard, not listened to, ignored. So men, number one: listen. Stop talking. Listen to women. And number two, believe women. Because again, you don't. Believe us when we tell you what our lived experience is because your lived experience is not our lived experience. You will not believe how many men mansplain our own experiences back to us.”

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