– Tools of the trade. When President Joe Biden took office in 2021, supporters praised him for assembling a historically diverse cabinet, including leaders who represented the U.S.’s Asian American and Pacific Islander community, like Ambassador Katherine Tai, U.S. trade representative.

Tai leads U.S. trade policy around the world, a job that taps her professional expertise as a litigator and trade policy expert as well as the unique perspective she brings through her personal history and heritage.

Tai is a “second-generation American and a second-generation public servant,” she said in an interview in honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, which celebrates its last day today. Her parents were born in mainland China and grew up in Taiwan. They raised her outside of Washington, D.C., where her parents both worked government jobs. Her mother is still a government employee at the National Institutes of Health.

Kevin Dietsch—Getty Images

That background shapes Tai’s experience in her role, where she guides U.S. trade policy across the globe, from China to North America. Recently, Tai has made waves on U.S.-China and Taiwan trade policy. “I’m very used to translating—literally translating between languages,” she says. “But also translating concepts, translating assumptions, translating between cultures. I’m a third-culture kid, and that’s been a real asset. Lots of times I find myself having to translate how we approach trade, our economic viewpoints, our interests, and also our challenges.”

Those communication skills have come in handy at home, too, like when Tai recently responded to a Republican congressman who said she was “too nice” to do her job. “As a woman, and as a member of the AANHPI [Asian American and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander] community, there are a lot of assumptions that people put on you—or put on me,” she says. “At the end of the day, you have to show that you are yourself. You have to focus on how to be effective and doing your job.”

One thing that makes that easier is not being the only one. The number of AAPI women in the Biden administration is growing. In addition to Vice President Kamala Harris, Tai works alongside Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy Arati Prabhakar, and acting Labor Secretary Julie Su, who is awaiting Senate confirmation. “I’m very proud to serve with them,” she says.

Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
@_emmahinchliffe

The Broadsheet is Fortune’s newsletter for and about the world’s most powerful women. Today’s edition was curated by Kinsey Crowley. Subscribe here.

ALSO IN THE HEADLINES

- New gig. Dina Powell McCormick, one of the most prominent women on Wall Street, is leaving her post at Goldman Sachs, where she's worked since 2007, most recently as global head of the sovereign business. (She left the firm for a year to serve as former President Donald Trump's deputy national security adviser.) She's joining BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank formed by former Goldman staff; she will be its first vice chairman and president. Wall Street Journal

- Little luxuries. Gen Z, men, and the Hispanic community are proving that the "lipstick effect" applies to fragrances as demand for the small luxury surges despite economic uncertainty. Coty CEO Sue Nabi says fragrance sales at the Marc Jacobs, Gucci, and Calvin Klein parent company are up from 60% above pre-pandemic levels. Fortune

- Locked up. It finally happened. Elizabeth Holmes reported to prison yesterday. She is expected to serve her 11-year sentence at a minimum-security women's prison in Bryan, Texas. She will be allowed visitation from her husband and two children under 2, but they currently live in San Diego, Calif. 

MOVERS AND SHAKERS: Anna Manz will be the new CFO of Nestlé. Unilever's chief digital and commercial officer Conny Braams is stepping down. Cambridge Associates has appointed Samantha Davidson as president and head of global investing. Local Bounti named Anna Fabrega as its new CEO. At Covatic, Sarah Lawson Johnston has joined as chief revenue officer and Sarah Whitfield is the new CMO. 

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

- Hungry brain. A year into her tenure at Weight Watchers, CEO Sima Sistani oversaw the $106 million acquisition of Sequence, which will help members connect with clinicians who can prescribe weight-loss drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic. Sistani says that Weight Watchers will still have a role in educating people about healthy eating and that the acquisition could be an opportunity to bring back customers who canceled without finding success. Wired

- Money marriages. A study of 74,000 marriages in India between 1930 and 1999 found that economic growth in the country led to higher dowry payments, the opposite of what has occurred in other societies. The caste system and the disproportionate growth of men's jobs and education could be partly to blame. BBC

ON MY RADAR

The revolt of the other mothers New York Magazine

Kim Petras wants to be a superstar The New Yorker

Reductress doesn't want to work quite so hard to make you laugh Time

For the ladies of Selling Sunset, fashion means business Washington Post

PARTING WORDS

"The minute you get a seat at the table, you grab someone else and pull them up.”

—Nextdoor CEO Sarah Friar

Correction, May 31, 2023: A previous version of this article misstated the amount that Sequence was acquired for.