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Women's History Month
In Conversation with
ANA GONZALEZ GALINDO
A Techronicler interview with Ana Gonzalez Galindo, Founder & CEO, Friendly.
Welcome to our Women’s History Month edition of Techronicler. Today, our guest is Ana Gonzalez Galindo, CEO and Founder of Friendly (Friendly Together). Ana’s journey to the founder’s seat wasn’t a calculated climb up the corporate ladder. It began with an unexpected cross-country move, the arrival of her daughter Luciana, and an encounter with profound isolation. Instead of waiting for the stigma of loneliness to lift, she took the problem to Stanford, researched the science behind the epidemic, and built a company to solve it.
In this interview, Ana dismantles the myth of “work-life balance,” explains why she stopped apologizing before disagreeing in the boardroom, and shares why she views AI not as a threat, but as the ultimate tool for removing the entry fee for women in engineering.
Techronicler: Thank you for joining us, Ana! Well, a lot of careers look like straight lines on LinkedIn. How was yours different? Was there a pivotal moment or ‘happy accident’ that actually steered you toward your current role or niche?
Ana Gonzalez Galindo:
I didn’t plan on becoming a mom when I did. And then Luciana arrived and rewired everything. I moved countries, knew almost no one, and for the first time in my life I felt truly lonely. Not the kind you complain about. The kind that sits with you. That’s when I went deep on it, researching loneliness seriously at Stanford, reading every study, understanding the science behind something I was living in real time. What I found was staggering. An epidemic hiding in plain sight, with almost no one willing to talk about it because the stigma is so heavy. I decided I couldn’t stay quiet. Friendly Together is what happens when you stop waiting for someone else to solve the problem you’re living.
Techronicler: Are women in leadership still penalized for being too direct or ‘sharp-elbowed’? Have you ever had to consciously unlearn the habit of being ‘too nice’ or ‘accommodating’ to get a project across the line?
Ana Gonzalez Galindo:
There’s a version of this that every woman knows. You soften the ask. You add “just” and “maybe” before anything bold. You apologize before disagreeing. Now do that in your second language, in a country that isn’t yours, where you’re already translating your tone in real time. At some point I decided that being understood mattered more than being liked in the room. The right people always respect clarity. The ones who don’t were never going to be on your side anyway.
Techronicler: From your seat, how do you see the rise of AI tools changing the trajectory for women entering engineering today?
Ana Gonzalez Galindo:
AI is removing the entry fee. You no longer need a specific degree or a specific background to build something, understand a product, or belong in a tech conversation. That is not a small thing. For women who were told this world wasn’t for them, or who simply never had the resources to get through the traditional front door, this is genuinely new. AI isn’t replacing women in tech. For a lot of women, it’s how they’ll get here at all.
Techronicler: What is the one book every woman in tech should read this year?
Ana Gonzalez Galindo:
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It has nothing to do with tech. It has everything to do with having the courage to keep going when nothing is working yet, when the path isn’t clear, and when every practical voice around you is suggesting you stop. Every founder has a season where that’s the only thing that matters. Read it then.
Techronicler: What is a piece of ‘common wisdom’ in the tech industry that you completely disagree with?
Ana Gonzalez Galindo:
Work-life balance. The longer we pretend it exists, the longer women spend feeling like they’re failing at something nobody actually achieves. What’s real is that you have a life, and inside that life you make choices every single day. Some days work gets more of you. Some days your family does. The goal was never balance. It was building something you actually want to show up for.
Techronicler: Can women in tech really have it all?
Ana Gonzalez Galindo:
Yes. But “all” is not what anyone sold you. Having it all means being there for every moment that actually matters with your kids. It also means working after they go to sleep, answering emails before they wake up, and running on less rest than you knew was possible. There is no balance. There is just the life you’re building and the choices you make inside it. I choose Luciana and I choose Friendly Together every single day. Neither is easy. I wouldn’t change either.
Techronicler: What is your favorite movie and what does it say about how you work?
Ana Gonzalez Galindo:
The Pursuit of Happyness. Because it shows that the people who make it aren’t always the most talented or the best connected. They’re the ones who simply refuse to quit. There is a scene where he’s doing everything right and nothing is working and he just keeps going. That scene lives in my head. Building a company from scratch, as a woman, as a mom, in a country that isn’t yours, you will have that season. The only question is whether you keep going.
Ana Gonzalez Galindo’s journey is a masterclass in resilience and human-centered design. By treating a widespread, stigmatized human experience—loneliness—as a structural problem worth solving, she has created a platform that redefines how we connect. Her candid reflections on the realities of founding a company in a second language and refusing to quit when nothing is working yet serve as an incredible blueprint for modern leadership.
As we celebrate Women’s History Month, Ana’s story reminds us that the people who make it aren’t always the most connected—they are the ones who have the courage to keep going. Thank you, Ana, for your transparency and your vision.
Ana Gonzalez Galindo is the founder and CEO of Friendly, a platform on a mission to end loneliness by bringing people together through curated experiences designed to enrich and connect. A Stanford GSB alumna, Ana has spent her career building what the world is missing: connection. She founded Enseñando, a social venture expanding educational access for underserved communities in Mexico, and later served as Chief of Staff at Fiado, a fintech empowering Hispanic immigrant families. After rebuilding her own community from scratch across countries and cities, she came to understand how deeply connection shapes our lives. What began as a personal challenge became her life’s work. She is a proud mom based in New York, reimagining what it means to belong.