Marjorie Rodriguez heard her name called and moved toward the stage of the Hilton Bangkok ballroom. She had received awards for her advocacy work for the LGBTQ+ community in the Philippines before, but this was the first time she’d been recognized for Zevoron, the business she’d started three years earlier with the goal of providing jobs for transgender people in Manila and throughout her home country. Zevoron manufactured and distributed polvoron, a soft, crumbly shortbread made of flour, sugar, milk, and nuts, popular in the Philippines. The company name came from a combination of “ze”—a gender-neutral pronoun—and “polvoron.” What set the company apart, and the reason for the award, was that all its marketing and sales staffers were transgender. This unique positioning had struck a chord with customers and helped Marjorie to create a profitable business in a short period of time.1
A version of this article appeared in the January–February 2022 issue of Harvard Business Review.