Fireside Chat with Deborah Liu
There are some conversations that feel especially timely — not because the challenges are new, but because more women are finally naming them out loud.
Join us for a Fireside Chat with Deborah Liu, former CEO of Ancestry, former Facebook executive, founder of Women in Product, and author of Take Back Your Power: 10 New Rules for Women at Work.
Over the course of her career, Deb has built and led at the highest levels of tech — from creating Facebook Marketplace and helping shape major platform businesses at Facebook, to leading Ancestry as CEO. But alongside that success is a story many women know intimately: being underestimated, overlooked, interrupted, or expected to make themselves smaller in rooms where power has long been defined by someone else.
In this conversation with Deb, she will reflect on the deeper themes behind her book and her TEDx talk, Let’s Make It Awkward — including what it means to speak up when silence feels safer, how women can reclaim power without losing themselves, and why discomfort is often the very place where change begins.
Together, they’ll explore leadership not just as achievement, but as self-definition: finding your voice, learning to advocate for yourself, building the right allies, and challenging the assumptions that often shape who gets heard, seen, and taken seriously at work.
About the Hosts:
Deborah Liu
Deb Liu is the co-founder of Ember AI, a startup bringing workflow automation to enterprises, and the former President and CEO of Ancestry. A veteran technology executive, she spent over a decade at Meta, where she created Facebook Marketplace, and previously held product leadership roles at PayPal and eBay. She serves on the Board of Directors of Intuit and is the founder of Women in Product, a nonprofit with over 30,000 members. She is the author of Take Back Your Power: 10 New Rules for Women at Work and holds a B.S. from Duke University and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.
About the Moderator
Candy Lee
is a 2x Tech CMO (Homebase, HelloFresh), advisor, investor, and executive coach. A 2021 alum of The Marketing Academy’s CMO Fellowship and now Alumni Council Co-Chair, she’s led award-winning brand work at Budweiser, HelloFresh, and more. Candy brings a wealth of insight into personal leadership, branding, and the emotional layers of executive growth. Her perspective is especially resonant for women navigating visibility, influence, and identity at the highest levels of leadership.
Connect with Candy
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Please note that this is a space that centers women and those who relate to their lived experience. If you do not identify with this and would still like to support or engage with the community, feel free to reach out to The Authentic Asian team. We’d be happy to explore other ways to include you.