Meet Serena Allen

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Serena Allen. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Serena below.

Hi Serena, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?

Before I started working on my startup AirVitalize, I spoke to as many people as I could about their experience living and breathing in polluted air. Their stories were honestly devastating. One mother even shared that the air quality was so bad where she lived, her son collapsed on his way to school.

There was no denying it – something new had to be done to improve outdoor air. And, since I didn’t see anyone else doing it, I decided to give it a go.

And while these stories keep me grounded, I really think I learned how to be resilient from my mom. She once made my family literally pick up everything we owned and move across the street because rent was $50 cheaper and we didn’t have any money. She grew up in a war zone, fought cancer twice, and climbed the socioeconomic ladder. The true American Dream.

I feel like a lot of people think you need more money or more experience before working to make a change. But really what matters is starting now and keeping at it until you make a positive change.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

I fundamentally believe everyone deserves an outdoor space where they can breathe healthy air. That’s why, at AirVitalize, we’re engineering technology that creates healthier air outside. Our product, Vita 1.0, improves air quality outdoors within a range of 1-2 football fields. We envision a world where parks, schools, stadiums, and more can integrate healthy outdoor air into their location’s experience.

We’re launching our first case study soon in Echo Park at El Centro Del Pueblo, an incredible community organization empowering inner city youth. They’ll be the first place in the country to have healthy outdoor air in one of the most polluted cities in America!

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

I think this is a personal aspect of each changemaker’s journey. My advice is to just get started, and you’ll find out what you need to know quite quick!

Before we go, any advice you can share with people who are feeling overwhelmed?

There’s a few things that’ve definitely helped me for preventing burnout:

Don’t feel the need to respond to every email right away. It’s distracting from larger tasks, and a 2-3 day response or even a week is usually fine.

See who in your network has the skills you need to overcome an obstacle. Books and YouTube go a long way, but if you can get a real person to teach you it strengthens your network and often opens the door to more opportunities.

Set boundaries for your work. For me it’s taking at least 24 consecutive hours off a week.

You can be professional and still tell people you’re feeling burnt out. Having more experienced mentors plus peers in a similar space as you to talk to really helps!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.airvitalize.tech
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/serenaal