Interview with Emma Grede, Entrepreneur and Co-Founder of Good American and Founding Partner of SKIMS

What does it actually take to succeed today?

Not the Instagram version. Not the vision-board-only version. Not the polished career arc that makes it look like some people were simply chosen.

Dr. Thais Aliabadi and Mary Alice Haney wanted the real answer, so they sat down with Emma Grede, entrepreneur, investor, mother of four, co-founder and CEO of Good American, and founding partner of SKIMS, to talk about ambition, confidence, money, motherhood, AI, failure, and the stories women are still being told about success.

Emma’s story matters because it cuts through fantasy. She grew up in East London, left school early, learned later that she was severely dyslexic, and started working young. By 31, she had already built and exited multiple businesses. She did not come from a traditional pipeline, and she did not wait to feel ready.

What came through most clearly in our conversation was this: confidence is not something we inherit. It is something we build. Usually, the hard way. Usually, by doing the thing before we feel fully prepared.

Table of Contents

• Career, confidence, money, and motherhood with Emma Grede
• Key takeaways from our conversation with Emma Grede
• FAQ

Career, confidence, money, and motherhood with Emma Grede

You’ve become such a powerful example of modern ambition. What shaped you earliest?

Emma took us straight back to the beginning. She grew up in East London as the eldest of four girls, raised by a single mother. That alone gave her an unusually early sense of responsibility. She was not just a child in the household. She stepped into a parental role with her younger sisters and learned very young that life would require resilience.

Her path was not traditional. She left school early and never went to college. Later, in her early twenties, she found out she was severely dyslexic. Suddenly, a lot of her school experience made sense. She had wanted to learn, but the system was not built for how her brain worked. Math was especially difficult. Frustration came out as acting out. At the time, dyslexia was not widely recognized or discussed as it is today.

But what looked like a disadvantage in one context created something powerful in another. She started working early. A paper route. A deli. Clothing shops. Any job she could get. And through all of it, she held onto one dream: fashion.

That dream was never abstract. She did not romanticize the industry from a distance. She got in there and worked her way up from the ground.

There is something important in that for anyone who feels behind because they did not follow the approved path. Emma’s story is a reminder that traditional credentials are not the only route to authority. Skill, observation, work ethic, and self-belief can create one’s own path.

Where did your confidence come from if you weren’t handed a conventional roadmap?

This part of the conversation was one of our favorites because Emma made a distinction that too many people blur: self-belief and confidence are not the same thing.

Her mother gave her an idea that stayed with her for life: you are not better than anyone else, but no one is better than you. That message grounded her in equality rather than insecurity. She did not grow up assuming certain rooms were off-limits to her. She did not automatically place other people above herself.

That gave her self-belief.

Confidence, though, came later, through action. Through trying things. Through making mistakes. Through seeing firsthand that the thing you fear usually does not destroy you.

“Look at any successful person, and you’ll see a failure. So many times.”

That line gets to the core of her philosophy. We often think successful people are the ones who have avoided failure. In reality, they are usually the ones who survived it, learned from it, and kept moving.

Emma talked about how women often live with stories about themselves:

• I’m bad at math.

• I’m not a business person.

• I could never do that.

• I’m not the kind of person who starts companies.

The problem is that repeated stories become identities. And identities shape action.

If we tell ourselves long enough that we are not capable, we stop attempting the very things that might prove otherwise.

This is where Emma’s framework gets practical. She is not interested in motivational fluff. She is interested in useful thinking. Confidence is a muscle. Action is how you train it. The willingness to dare, fall, and get back up is not personality. It is practice.

For anyone who struggles with the critical inner voice that keeps them stuck, there is a lot of overlap here with the idea of learning to stop being relentlessly hard on ourselves. That is something Dr. Aliabadi has explored in more depth as well in this piece on self-criticism and self-compassion.

So what do you make of manifestation culture?

Emma had a refreshingly grounded answer.

She is not anti-manifestation. In fact, she said she is a huge manifester. But she also made it very clear that ambition has to find you working.

That is the missing part in a lot of modern self-help advice. It is not enough to visualize a future life. It is not enough to say what you want. It is not enough to paste it to a board and hope the universe takes it from there.

You need a vision, yes. But you also need labor.

What she prefers over vague manifestation is a long-range vision. She asks bigger questions:

• How do I want to live?

• What matters to me?

• What are my principles?

• What do I want my twenties, thirties, forties, and fifties to feel like?

That kind of vision is stabilizing because it helps us stop borrowing goals from social media, culture, and comparison. It is very easy to judge ourselves as mothers, businesswomen, partners, or creators against somebody else’s external life. Emma’s point was that a goal only matters if it belongs to your vision.

“We underestimate what we can do in 10 years and overestimate what we can do in a year.”

That is one of those ideas worth taping to the wall.

People burn out because they expect total reinvention in twelve months. But if you give yourself ten years of consistent work, reflection, and adaptation, the scale of change becomes enormous. Long-term thinking is not just strategic. It is emotionally protective.

Was there one person or one moment that changed everything for you?

Emma’s answer was simple and strong: me.

Not in an arrogant way. In a responsible way.

She was clear that yes, she has had pivotal moments, incredible opportunities, aligned stars, and extraordinary partners. But she put herself in those positions. She raised her hand. She built a reputation. She made the calls. She took the bet.

That level of ownership can sound uncomfortable, especially for women, because we are often taught to soften our role in our own success. To say we got lucky. To deflect. To attribute everything outward.

Emma challenged that instinct.

She has spent much of her life with her hand up, saying, “I’ll do that.” That willingness to go first, try, fail, and try again is a through-line in her career.

She also stressed something that matters just as much as skill: emotional management. Fear, guilt, and old narratives can end up making our decisions for us if we let them. And that is dangerous.

“If you let fear and guilt and your emotions contribute to your decision-making, you’re going to be in real trouble.”

That does not mean pretending we have no emotions. It means noticing when they are driving the wheel in unhelpful ways. Emma’s approach is to interrupt those patterns when they show up. Not with shame. With discernment.

Ask: Is this useful? Is this taking me where I want to go?

How did all of your earlier work prepare you to build Good American?

By the time Good American came along, Emma had spent nearly 15 years at the intersection of fashion and entertainment. Her work involved connecting brands with talent for product placement, partnerships, campaigns, and visibility. She became very good at brokering relationships and seeing where value could be created.

She knew what brands wanted. She knew what talent could amplify. She understood how influence worked in the marketplace before many companies fully grasped it.

More importantly, she had built a reputation for excellence. That mattered.

Reputation is one of the underrated career assets in this conversation. Before there is scale, there is trust. Before there is momentum, there is a pattern of delivering. Emma had earned enough credibility that when she saw a market opportunity, she was in a position to pursue it seriously.

And the opportunity she saw was clear: women above a certain size were deeply underserved by fashion, especially in denim.

She wanted more than consulting fees. She wanted ownership. As she put it, she did not want a slice anymore. She wanted the whole cake.

That mindset shift is huge. Consulting can teach you a lot, but eventually, some people realize they are creating value they no longer want to rent out. They want to build the asset themselves.

Emma also understood something many founders miss. Talent is not the business, but it can be a powerful accelerator for visibility. Her years in the industry taught her how celebrity, culture, and product could work together. When she entered the Good American opportunity, she did so with both conviction and context.

She also said she would have built the business anyway. That is worth underlining. The meeting mattered, but the decision had already happened internally. She was ready.

What happened when Good American sold out immediately, and why was that actually a problem?

This was such an honest and useful part of the conversation because, from the outside, selling out sounds like a dream. In reality, if you cannot replenish product fast enough, it can create a serious operational issue.

Good American launched, and the stock disappeared within hours. What should have felt triumphant quickly became stressful. Praise turned into criticism. One minute it was “genius,” the next it was “you underestimated” and “are you equipped to run this?”

Emma’s response was not self-pity. It was problem-solving.

She did what great operators do:

• She called competitors.

• She asked hard questions about fabric and lead times.

• She checked whether factories were giving her accurate information.

• Most importantly, she went directly to the customer.

She personally reached out and explained the delay. She gave customers an honest timeline and asked them to wait. Most did.

That moment taught her something foundational about building a brand: customer relationships are not marketing decoration. They are a strategy.

Years before “community-led growth” became a buzzword, Emma was already using it instinctively. Listen to the customer. Speak to the customer. Build trust by being present when things go wrong, not just when things are glossy.

There is a broader lesson here for founders and leaders. Mistakes do not automatically destroy trust. Silence does. Distance does. Evasion does. Honest communication often earns more loyalty than perfection ever could.

How do you think about AI, and what should people starting out focus on now?

Emma is enthusiastic about AI, but not blindly so. Her framework is practical: first, decide what in your business requires human touch and should be protected. Then use AI to elevate everything else.

In her world, product fit and product performance still need human testing. No AI system can tell her exactly how a bra will perform on an actual body. Design sensibility, cultural instinct, and customer nuance also deserve protection.

But in areas like merchandising, planning, and forecasting, AI can process massive amounts of data and identify patterns far faster than a room full of humans. It can help predict product curves, timing, demand, and decline. That is powerful.

Still, she emphasized one thing: human discernment remains essential. AI can surface information, but people still need to ask whether that information aligns with experience, context, and reality.

As for younger people, her advice was not “study one magical field, and you’ll be safe forever.” It was more timeless than that.

She wants people who can:

• learn quickly

• stay curious

• adapt fast

• remain open-minded

• avoid rigidity

Those are not just business skills. They are survival skills in a changing economy.

What she values most in hiring is flexibility of thought. She does not want someone who arrives saying, “This is how we did it at my old company, so this is how it must be done.” She wants people who can change with the moment and keep learning.

That point extends far beyond AI. The world rewards teachable people. Expertise matters, but adaptability matters more when systems, tools, and markets keep shifting under our feet.

What old ideas about women and success do you most want gone?

Emma did not hesitate here. She believes women have been conditioned to avoid the exact behaviors that create wealth, leadership, and power.

Think about the language around ambition. In men, ambition is often coded as attractive, impressive, and visionary. In women, ambition is still too often treated as abrasive, selfish, or threatening.

That cultural double standard does real damage because women absorb it. They start censoring themselves before the room ever has to.

Emma’s book organizes many of these limiting beliefs into “old thoughts” and “new thoughts.” The old thoughts are inherited scripts. The new thoughts are more useful, more current, and more aligned with what actually helps women move forward.

Among the biggest shifts she wants is around money.

“We need women to have more money. Money and power are inextricably linked.”

This is not greed. It is a structural reality.

If women are underpaid, underinvested, and undercapitalized, they will also remain underrepresented in positions of power. Emma wants women to be fluent in money. To talk about compensation. To negotiate. To understand terms. To expect to be paid appropriately for their work.

She also pointed out that even new technologies reflect old biases. If AI is trained on an unequal world, it can reproduce unequal outcomes. If a woman asks what salary she should command, the system may return a lower number than it would for a man with similar credentials. That is why women cannot outsource self-advocacy.

The same principle shows up in healthcare. Women are often socialized to minimize, defer, and not make noise, which can hurt them professionally and medically. That is why the ability to advocate clearly for ourselves matters in every setting, including the exam room. Dr. Aliabadi writes more about that in this guide to advocating for yourself.

Why is talking about money so important, especially for women?

Because silence protects inequality.

Emma was blunt about this. Women are often taught that discussing money is tacky, aggressive, or somehow ungracious. Meanwhile, men exchange information about compensation, deals, lawyers, advisors, and investments all the time. That information is power.

She believes women need to speak more openly about:

• what they are paid

• what they should be paid

• what they charge

• who they hire

• what those services cost

• how they structure deals

• what terms they accepted or rejected

That kind of transparency can feel vulnerable, but vulnerability often opens the door for honesty from other women, too. Once one woman says, “I’m being paid X, and I think it should be Y,” it becomes much easier for someone else to share useful information.

“Just because you’re making money doesn’t mean you’re not doing something impactful.”

That line deserves more airtime. There is still a deeply ingrained moral discomfort that many women carry around with earning well. As if generosity and ambition cannot coexist. As if purpose and profit cancel each other out. Emma rejects that entirely.

She also rejects the scarcity mindset that says one woman’s success takes something away from another. It does not.

“Just because you get something doesn’t mean that I get less.”

That is the point. Abundance thinking is not denial. It is a refusal to participate in the old script that pits women against each other for too little.

What is one failure that ended up being incredibly useful?

Emma pointed to her first attempt at building in Los Angeles.

She had a business model that worked well in London and New York and assumed she could export it directly to LA. Instead, she discovered that every market has its own ecosystem, and LA in particular is a tight, relationship-driven community. People already knew each other. The networks were local, long-standing, and difficult to shortcut.

That failure taught her what did not work there. It also exposed smaller mistakes inside the larger one, including hiring choices and assumptions about how the local business culture operated.

Years later, those lessons helped her return and build Good American with a much more realistic understanding of the market.

This is another reason reflection matters so much. A failure only teaches if we are willing to study it. Emma did not just survive the setback. She examined it closely and stored the learning for later use.

What personal traits can you not work with?

Her answer was clear: arrogance, ignorance, and the belief that you already know everything.

Emma sees herself as a lifelong learner. She believes every person in a room knows something you do not. The person is doing lights. The assistant holding the phone. The executive running the meeting. The point is not hierarchy. The point is openness.

People who think they are above learning tend to become brittle. And brittle people do not adapt well.

That answer connects beautifully with everything else she said about hiring, leadership, and growth. The people who thrive are not always the people with the most polished answers. Often, they are the people with the most curiosity.

If your younger self could see your life now, what would surprise her most?

Emma’s answer was funny and moving. She said she is not sure her younger self would be surprised exactly. She always wanted a big life and a big career. She did not hide that. She was willing to work for it from the beginning.

What that younger version of her would likely feel most is pride.

That matters because women are so often trained to downplay desire. Emma did not. She wanted something expansive. She admitted it. Then she built toward it.

There is a quiet lesson in that, too. Sometimes the bravest thing is not only doing the work. It is being honest about wanting more.

How has motherhood influenced the way you think about ambition and raising children?

Emma is raising four children, and she spoke about motherhood with the same directness she brings to business.

Her children are growing up with far more privilege than she had. She does not think it is her job to artificially manufacture hardship for them. But she does believe it is her job to help them care deeply about something.

That was one of the most memorable parenting ideas from the conversation. She does not need them to follow one specific path. She does not care what the “thing” is. She just wants each child to have a real investment in something, some area of effort and meaning they genuinely care about.

She also emphasized integrity. Do what you say you will do. Tell the truth. Follow through. Those values came from how she was raised and remain central to how she parents.

At the moment, her children are 12, 9, and 4-year-old twins, and she said something a lot of mothers will recognize instantly: she knows she is in a beautiful season. The oldest still wants to be with her. The youngest still needs her. She is aware that these years are precious.

That kind of presence is not accidental. It comes from perspective. She knows what hard seasons feel like. Because of that, she can recognize and appreciate a good one.

There is something deeply healthy in that. Success is not only about building more. It is also about noticing when life is already good.

What are you trying to build next?

Emma spoke about her podcast, Aspire, as an extension of something she cares deeply about: access.

People ask her for mentorship all the time, and one person cannot mentor everyone individually. But stories can mentor at scale. Books can mentor. Conversations can mentor. She herself learned from Oprah, from books she could get her hands on, and from bosses she studied carefully.

That is why she likes going deep with guests. Not just the glossy origin story, but the actual mechanics:

• How did you make that product?

• Where did you source it?

• How much did it cost?

• How did you raise money?

• On what terms?

Her point is that talent is fairly evenly distributed. Opportunity is not. So when she shares concrete information, she is trying to become part of someone else’s opportunity structure.

That may be the best summary of the whole conversation. Success is not just something to achieve. It is also something to demystify, especially for women who were never given the inside language or the old boys’ network.

Key takeaways from our conversation with Emma Grede

• Confidence is built through action. You do not wait for it and then begin. You begin, and confidence follows.

• Self-belief and confidence are different. One is internal worth. The other is earned through repetition and recovery.

• Long-term vision matters more than short-term fantasy. Ten-year thinking is more useful than one-year pressure.

• Ownership matters. Sometimes the person who changed everything in your life is you.

• Emotional discipline is a leadership skill. Fear, guilt, and insecurity should not run your decisions.

• Customer trust is built in the messy moments. Not just when everything goes perfectly.

• AI should support, not replace, human judgment. Protect what needs human touch and use technology wisely.

• Women need more money and more fluency around money. Power follows information, advocacy, and compensation.

• Scarcity thinking hurts women. Another woman’s success does not reduce yours.

• Curiosity beats arrogance. The people who keep learning are the people who keep growing.

FAQs

What does Emma Grede say creates real confidence?

She believes confidence comes from doing things, making mistakes, failing, recovering, and realizing those experiences do not destroy you. It is not something you wait to feel before you act.

What is Emma Grede’s view on manifestation?

She is not against manifestation, but she believes it is incomplete without work. Her emphasis is on holding a clear long-term vision and backing that vision with consistent action.

What advice does Emma Grede give people entering the workforce in the age of AI?

She recommends becoming a great learner. Curiosity, flexibility, adaptability, and openness matter more than rigid expertise because technology and business are changing so quickly.

Why does Emma Grede talk so much about women and money?

Because she sees money and power as deeply connected. She wants women to be better paid, more financially fluent, more willing to negotiate, and more open in discussing compensation, investing, and deal terms.

What was one of Emma Grede’s most useful failures?

Her first attempt to scale in Los Angeles. It taught her that business models cannot always be copied into new markets unchanged, and that understanding local culture and networks is essential.

What traits does Emma Grede look for when hiring?

She values flexibility of thought, curiosity, openness, and a willingness to keep learning. She struggles with arrogance, ignorance, and people who assume they already know everything.

How does Emma Grede think about motherhood and raising ambitious kids?

She focuses less on dictating a specific path and more on helping her children care deeply about something. She also emphasizes integrity, follow-through, and appreciating the season of life you are in.

Emma Grede’s message is not that success is easy. It is that success is far more practical than people think.

It is less about waiting for the perfect moment and more about getting out of your own way.

It is less about trying to become fearless and more about learning not to let fear make your decisions.

It is less about pretending money does not matter and more about understanding that money, information, and power are linked.

Most of all, it is about refusing the old stories that tell women to be smaller, quieter, less ambitious, less direct, and more apologetic.

If there is one idea from this conversation we want to keep coming back to, it is this: start with yourself. Not because the world is fair. Not because systems do not matter. But because your willingness to act, learn, ask, adapt, and advocate is still one of the most powerful assets you have.

And if you are in a season where you are rethinking your health, your energy, or your fertility alongside your work and ambitions, understanding the role of whole-body health can matter too. Dr. Aliabadi has written more on that connection in this article about how health impacts fertility.

This article was created from the video What It Really Takes to Succeed in Today’s World ft. Emma Grede | SHE MD for Dr. Thais Aliabadi’s website.