I WAS WRONG CHASING THE ILLUSION OF "SUCCESS"

Amber Venz Box was a designer and personal shopper-turned blogger when, in 2011, at the age of 23, she founded the influencer-commission network RewardStyle. By 2021, the Dallas-based company had expanded into a global influencer-marketing platform, rebranded as LTK (short for LikeToKnowlt), and earned a valuation of $2 billion. As the company morphed, so did the founder's sense of its purpose.

- CHRISTINE LAGORIO-CHAFKIN

"I grew up believing that success should be highly visible. And my professional experience prior to LTK was in communications. So, in the company's early years, I needed to have press and awards, to have celebrities using our products, and to have the right investors. I'm embarrassed to say that early on, almost half my time was spent working maniacally to achieve those things.