Dr. Roshawnna Novellus is the founder and CEO of EnrichHER, a Techstars backed FinTech lending platform that streamlines capital deployment process for individual and institutional investors who want to support businesses led by women and people of color. EnrichHER has been in-market since 2019, deploying $14M in capital to traditional businesses from 47 states.

In our conversation with Dr. Roshawnna we talk about many obstacles facing small business owners, women of color in particular, when trying to raise capital for their companies. We also discuss Roshawnna’s backstory and how she got into entrepreneurship.

Dr. Roshawnna shares her insights regarding lending landscape for small businesses and speaks on systemic bias and discrimination against black women in the financial ecosystem.

We also cover different types of financing available through Roshawnna’s company, and talk about the early days of building the product. Roshawnna gives her thoughts on what are the most important traits to look for when hiring employees and shares lessons learned from her experience of going through Techstars accelerator.