Translator Inc.

Translator Inc.: Scaling Empathy Through DEI Technology

Translator Inc. builds diversity, equity, and inclusion software for corporations, schools, and nonprofits, combining technology with facilitated conversations to help organizations build more inclusive cultures. The company was founded in 2016 in New York and is now based in Philadelphia, by Natalie Egan, who serves as CEO and Founder (Cornell University Diversity and Inclusion, 2026). Before founding Translator, Egan, an openly transgender entrepreneur, was CEO and founder of PeopleLinx, a venture-backed sales technology company acquired in 2015; she also held sales leadership roles at LinkedIn, Autonomy, and Ecolab (eCornell course author bio, 2026). Egan has publicly described her own gender transition, which took place around the time she was building Translator, as central to how she came to understand different lived experiences and identities, and to why she chose to build a company focused on empathy and inclusion (Fortune, 2017).

What Translator Inc. does

Translator's platform combines an AI and human-supported chatbot, guided narrative learning journeys, and facilitated group conversations to help employees build empathy and navigate identity-related topics at work, including race, gender, and sexual orientation (Crunchbase; Fortune, 2017). Depending on an organization's needs, learning experiences can include audio exercises, interactive scenarios, or games designed to help users understand identities and situations different from their own. The company frames its mission as helping organizations "scale empathy and equality through technology" rather than delivering one-off DEI training sessions.

Where it fits

Translator serves corporations, schools, and nonprofits looking to build DEI capability at scale, rather than through single-instance workshops. It's a fit for HR and DEI leaders who want technology-supported, ongoing learning experiences that build empathy skills over time, paired with facilitated human conversation, rather than a one-time compliance training module.

Why this matters for people leaders

Most DEI training happens once, gets checked off a compliance list, and doesn't change how people actually treat each other day to day. Translator's bet, building scalable technology around ongoing narrative learning and facilitated conversation rather than a single seminar, points at a real limitation of typical DEI programs: empathy is a skill that needs practice and reinforcement, not a fact to be memorized once. For organizations focused on Culture, Performance, and Retention, that distinction matters because employees who don't feel understood or included are measurably more likely to disengage or leave, and building empathy as an ongoing organizational skill, not a one-time event, is a more durable answer to that risk.

Learn more