Rupal Shah: Principal, PGIM Fixed Income

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Rupal ShahRupal Shah describes her journey, which includes taking uncomfortable (but intentional) leaps in her career, finding her voice, staying challenged, humble and authentic, and dedicating her time to the service of others.

“Create the greatest, grandest vision possible for your life and career because you become what you believe.”

Big Leaps to Follow Her Own Compass

Shah’s parents immigrated to the U.S. from India with master’s degrees and not much else. Her childhood is defined by watching and learning from their hard work and sacrifice. “My parents’ determination and perseverance are in my DNA. They each worked multiple jobs and navigated innumerous obstacles as foreigners in a new country. They had a vision of a life they wanted to give our family and they manifested that vision.”

She lives by the lessons that her parents taught her with their actions. Similarly, Shah paved her own career path, learned from her mistakes and was able to navigate the challenges she faced along the way on her own. “Create the greatest, grandest vision possible for your life and career because you become what you believe.”

Shah recounts, “Each step of my career taught me meaningful characteristics about myself and helped me make my next leap.” Shah spent some of her earlier years in back-office roles within Goldman Sachs, ultimately transitioning to an analytical role within the sales and trading division. Simultaneously, she was getting her MBA part-time at New York University’s Stern School of Business. Despite the hectic schedule, she learned the importance of networking with people around the firm to learn about their roles. It was through these conversations that she was able to determine where she wanted to lead her career path.

“The time spent networking paid dividends and those relationships are my currency,” she says. Post graduate school, after 32 interviews and various naysayers, Shah was given an opportunity to cover strategic relationships within Goldman Sachs’ Asset Management Division, despite various senior professionals deterring her from applying for the opportunity.

“The firm told me they were taking a leap of faith on me. As appreciative as I was of the opportunity, I felt like the underdog. If nothing else, this motivated me to work harder to succeed. There were many times during my career where I was told I couldn’t, or I shouldn’t, or I wasn’t included. I would tell myself that I do not need a seat at that table, I will just build my own. I realized I needed to trust my instinct, and rather than any firm taking a leap of faith on me, I would take leap of faith on myself.”

“Your career is your own. Make sure you’re the one driving it.”

As an Indian American woman in fixed income, Shah has had to reach beyond her comfort zone and override both self-doubt and conditioning, to find her voice. While the context can be intimidating, she realized she had to stop putting up extra hurdles for herself and trust her instincts.

“In my culture, we were raised to not challenge or question anything. We were taught that respect was blindly listening to your elders. But I saw time and time again how this learned behavior would be a detriment to my career,” says Shah.

“In my first few roles, I was scared to ask questions or challenge others. I remember having hard days and I would not speak up when there was something that needed to be said. These situations continued over the years, and I learned that what I had to offer was valuable. I forced myself to develop a voice and really stick to what I believe in and be authentic in that. More than ever, I know my voice matters. It’s been a long path to get here but I see the rewards of taking a view and sticking to it with certainty.”

When thinking back on the journey, she’d encourage her younger self to develop that confidence sooner. “The young women we interview today are so confident and impressive, and I love seeing that.”

Staying Challenged

Shah’s mantra is “if you’re not challenged, you’re not growing.” She continuously asks herself if she feels comfortable in roles. If the answer is yes, she knows she is not evolving. “Comfort becomes shackles to growth. I always want to step so far out of my comfort zone that I forget how to get back.”

Recently, Shah was given the opportunity to build the third-party insurance business for PGIM Fixed Income. Shah has had to push herself out of her comfort zone and trust the strength and skills she has developed over the years. “It’s rewarding to have been able to forge a path that truly will be successful for our firm. I’m incredibly excited to strategically build something new. I’ve been blessed with great opportunities to build and create throughout my career, but this is certainly a new frontier. Thinking of new ideas, strategies, products, building a new team and learning different concepts is challenging and exhilarating.”

“It is important to stay humble and authentic to yourself to be a strong leader.”

Since Shah joined PGIM Fixed Income, she has been involved in recruiting, hiring, and retaining talent. “Our people are our biggest asset. Hiring, training, and nurturing our talent is our greatest responsibility. When people come to work, they should love being here. I want people not only to feel motivated about their work product but also by the work environment,” says Shah. “I’m a huge believer that each person is treated like an individual and should feel empowered. I really nurture my relationships, and that’s a huge part of my leadership.”

“I’ve worked for some truly inspirational people that have shown me the type of leader I want to be. I picked traits along the way and found the style that I felt truly represented the person I am. I lead with kindness and respect, I am the first one to admit when I am wrong, and I embrace that we are all continuously evolving.” Being an authentic leader helps garner mutual respect amongst the team and her leadership is what Shah deems to be her greatest success.

The Most Rewarding Work

As a mother of two, Shah navigates a thriving career, being a fully present mother, running marathons and co-running a charity. Shah says, “It certainly is not easy, but if it’s not hard, it’s not worth it.”

Orphan Life Foundation is the charity Shah co-leads. Her contribution involves supporting orphaned children in India and Burkina Faso from providing basic human needs such as food, clothing, bedding, etc to larger projects such as installing water filtration systems and providing bikes as transport to school.

As a child, Shah’s parents took her family to India every two years. They would visit an orphanage near her father’s hometown and contribute to support the children. The trips were so much more than visiting family.

“It kept me close to my roots, truly humbled me and filled me with gratitude for the opportunities I would have ahead. Those trips really define who I am today,” Shah says. Her charity work continues this tradition, including visits to India.

Shah is currently working on setting up a mentor program between the orphanage in Burkina Faso and a local school in Newark that she has spent time with over the years. She wishes to gift her own children the relative perspective of gratitude for the life they have, the hard work and effort it takes to succeed, and awareness of helping others who were not born into the same.

“This is what I do for me,” says Shah. “I love my career, my family, and the impact I can make. It’s all so exhilarating, but nothing really rewards like this.”

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On Changes After 15 Years: Nicki Gilmour: CEO And Founder, The Glass Hammer

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Nicki Gilmour The Glass HammerThe Glass Hammer was founded fifteen years ago (July, 2007) with the distinct intent of helping professional women – especially within financial services, law, technology, Fortune 500 – understand how to navigate their careers with the ultimate goal of advancing. The mission was to inform (provide expert career advice), empower (by bringing women together with events and networking), and inspire (by profiling women who have blazed the path and broken through the glass ceiling in some form). We sit down with Nicki Gilmour to discuss where things stand now as we celebrate this milestone of the longest running career advice publication for professional women.

Q: How have things developed since The Glass Hammer launched?

The world has changed significantly across these past fifteen years. But the pandemic has created the most seismic shift in how people work, how people want to work and how people live. Many people, women in particular, found themselves suddenly dropped into a very different reality as of March 2020 that included swapping the commute and the long office days for long days in front the computer and longer days in some cases homeschooling kids and sanitizing everything.

Perhaps one silver lining of the pandemic, if you can call it that when there was such sorrow and stress for so many, was the chance for all of us to understand that the future of work could happen more quickly than we realized was possible. We saw how we could switch to Zoom, Teams, Webex, Google Meet and other platforms to conduct conversations and share documents. And guess what? We still managed to do business – despite the constraints and challenges, both for individuals and organizations. ‘The future is now’ comes to mind as it is no longer a theory to work remotely as it pertains to equal or increased productivity.

Beyond the practical logistics of work, people also started to really look more deeply at their personal values. When your back is against the wall, it’s time to ask: what really matters here?

Q: What has changed for professional women in the past 15 years?

So much and yet nothing has changed for professional women.

I think the greatest thing that has changed is that people want to see their leaders show more empathy than before and that success and professionalism, as definitions, have become wider and more diverse.

Ambition remains a very personal trait that is present, to a lesser or greater degree in all people as they are individuals with personalities, specific belief and value sets and varying needs and experiences. Many ambitious women still envision a linear path to the top. But I believe that having been through the pandemic and the shift in many realities, people also understand more than ever that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. I can’t speak for any other human except myself, but I do see, observationally, as an executive coach and Organizational Development consultant, that generally people are tired of accepting the legacy status quo as the only way forward in terms of what dictates how we work and when we work as well as where we work.

With the ‘Great Resignation,’ some people have literally voted with their feet and walked out of very well-paid jobs including Sheryl Sandberg who left Meta recently. Sheryl, as we know, was the author of Lean In. Well, she’s decided to lean out. I think that says a lot. I believe this was an era of ‘celebritizing’ a handful of women and it continues as VC’s are still backing firms that do close to zero for women on a structural change level and continue to implicitly tell women to just network.

Certainly people, and some companies, have also finally decided to stop tolerating the same biases based on gender, but there is still a lack of transparency around pay equality. Just recently, Google has paid out $118 million in settlement to 15,000 women in a class-action lawsuit about gender pay discrimination. I would hope there comes a day when equality is built through solid processes and good human behaviors not litigation – however, as it seems law suits are still the most effective method, that comes at great cost to the women who bring them.

I definitely see a theme where things, that we didn’t contest in the past, are more explicit and more accessible to contest at least. We are asking companies to walk the talk on equality and meritocracy. That starts and ends with transparency. There still isn’t a consistent pathway to get to the mystery of what you’re being paid and why, depending on who you are from a biology or ethnicity perspective, as pay is not really assigned strictly on merit, experience or even qualifications in most companies.

I have spent the past few years contemplating whether breaking the glass ceiling is a redundant concept for younger professionals in the sense that people don’t want to be on the other side of that glass if the traits it takes to be successful there means assimilating to something that just doesn’t resonate at all. When what’s been holding everything up is the structural walls of rules that clearly don’t favor meritocracy, due to flawed cognitive and social constructs around who gets to lead, is the work that is needed to be centered differently? A new way of looking at this? I am not sure the work is as evolutionary in the linear sense that we all once believed it was.

Q: Say more about how you are approaching the big questions, now.

I think futurism is key now in terms of understanding what can be, as well as what has been, or what is. I think that it’s a time of considering a deeper structural review instead of incremental bricks on the old crumbling foundations. Saying that, there are 41 female CEOs in the Fortune 500 right now, or 8.2 percent, which is a record high. I do not want to dismiss the fact that incremental change is happening, but it isn’t enough in terms of impact for anyone to truly celebrate progress with any sincerity, as if this was a product it would be shelved due to slow adoption in the marketplace. The big question is, are we happy with very gradual, incremental change? And how long will it take for equality to happen? Especially when we take huge hits like the overturning of Roe v. Wade, Title IX and other various cultural backslides that hamper women from an equal existence generally, as well as specifically.

Academically, this is going back to Virginia Schein’s (et al) “Think Manager – Think Male,” which began over 40 years ago. Without knowing the human involved, people in aggregate still vote for the straight male manager as the most leader-like with real traits like productivity, competence and assertiveness. Conversely, they continually mark in the traits survey that women are less competent, productive, and assertive even though there is not a specific woman being assessed, just generally as a cognitive concept of a female manager, which is very disheartening and often the respondents are also women. This remains in play in a very real way in a workplace near you! Never underestimate the power of the cultural wallpaper and what it can do in terms of unchecked internalized misogyny.

Q: Systemically, what cracks are we seeing more clearly than ever, especially now?

It goes back to promises not kept – transparency of pay, transparency of promotional track. The entire system has never been truly re-envisioned to integrate women’s lives or value our spherical lives as a whole. There’s also the blunt fact that organizations still ignore life outside the skyscraper. It has been well-documented that women do the second shift at home and do something like 10 extra hours of housework and childcare relative to their male counterparts. And that’s not just something that occurs in heterosexual relationships. It also shows up in LGBTQ+ families, because someone has to pick up the slack. But systemically and culturally, it has always been a majority of women that do that, while expected to be superwoman at work. Kudos to the men who do it as they rarely get recognized and should be, also.

“There’s been various research studies on remote work showing that many working mothers find it quite beneficial to work remotely because, productivity-wise, it’s helpful to not commute a couple of hours a day. We should be moving to results-oriented work, because professionals know what they have to deliver. We no longer need to wear pinstripe suits, ride a train and be in an office 9-5. We have to get away from this model that was designed last century. LinkedIn is redefining what it means to be “professional,” and it’s no longer being a white man going to the office in a three-piece suit with a briefcase.

“The office is now in your head and on your computer, and the cries to get back to the office are not necessarily based in productivity claims. For organizations and leaders to ignore that employees are actually telling you what they want and to ignore the data around productivity is just basing in (disproportionately white and white male) preferences. Many people can’t understand why they’re at the mercy of their manager’s choice. And now people, who would otherwise continue to work remotely, are worrying about falling on the wrong side of proximity bias. Just as paternity leave and full maternity leave are still underutilized because the hidden penalties and state-by-state and company-by-company inconsistencies do not always support people to feel it’s in their best interest. Often women are torn about how much time they can take for maternity leave in the pressure of 24/7 work with many exhausted and typing emails close to the birthing event. I know I was writing emails right up until the delivery room as that was a badge of honor that I just don’t believe Gen Y and beyond buy into on any level.

Q: So what can organizations who want to lean in, and walk the talk, do right now?

Organizations have a place to play in this because within their sphere of influence, inside and outside of their ‘virtual’ four walls, they can create a microcosm of equality – and it’s not that hard to achieve. It comes from:

  • Being clear in your mission and strategy around DEI aspects, and other aspects such as social responsibility, just as you would decide what you’re going to do with your core product. It’s as simple as that.
  • Make your management practices transparent, clear and consistent – so everyone knows what they have to do, what flies and what doesn’t. Make sure there are explicit norms as opposed to implicit norms that are subjective.
  • Surface anything that is a covert process – meaning: in denial, not on the table for discussion, for whatever reason.
  • Make sure everybody knows their role, their responsibilities, what’s expected of them, what are their goals, and ensure their responsibilities are aligned with their ability to execute on them. Make sure their skills and abilities match the job requirements.
  • Remove as much organizational grind as you can: the barriers, hindrances, obstacles to doing the job the way that people see fit, the way each person sees fit as a professional.
  • Understand individual needs and values, beyond grouping people together based on social identities such as gender, nationality, sexual orientation, or otherwise.
  • Help your people understand what success looks like. Let them know what it means to be doing a good job here.
  • Make sure people know which direction the company is going, what the company values and what are overarching goals, and that can include societal topics: because social issues have never been more integrated into corporate life than they have been in the past two years. To leave things unaddressed is a recipe for disaster. Silence is complicit and colluding.
  • Finally, make sure that when you talk the talk, you walk the talk. Ensure that you are creating actions to meet your espoused values, behaviorally. This means coaching leaders of all genders and creeds to understand how to create and implement positive change for all employees to be engaged and performing in a high but healthy way.

It’s not actually impossible or unreachable – and this is the work that has to take place as opposed to telling women to lean in, keep their head down, and keep at it. Because the last fifteen years has shown us that change has been present, but slow.

Thank you all for your continued presence and readership. We wish you a safe, healthy, enjoyable summer season.

Interviewed by Aimee Hansen

*After this week, The Glass Hammer will be taking a publishing break until September. Enjoy your summer as we are walking the talk on our values and focusing on coaching leaders and developing organizations to connect to the human factor better via our sister site evolvedpeople.com. Enjoy our 8,000+ articles and we will be back in the early Fall.

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Mary Cassai: Senior Vice President, Perioperative Services, NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital

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Mary Cassai“When you’re building teams, you always want to be strongly committed to the diversity of your team’s experience and ideas,” says Mary Cassai. “You don’t want to have uniformity in thought or expertise, as it could challenge disruption and innovation.”

Cassai is responsible for all operational oversight for Perioperative Services at NYP, including 140 operating rooms, 10 central sterile reprocessing departments and 40 endoscopy suites, producing over 180,000 procedures annually.

Converting Empathy Into Purpose

“I love problem solving. I am driven by challenge and uncertainty,” says Cassai. “I find comfort in bridging operational gaps and in understanding the dynamics of people and process that will lead to the best outcome and solution.”

Cassai finds purpose by creating the best possible environment of care for both patients and the interdisciplinary teams. She loves building relationships, partnerships and discovery – as well as finding what inspires people, the why it matters; and how different pieces of the puzzle and people come together to create the greatest results.

While in nursing school, her uncle was diagnosed with end-stage liver disease cancer. Observing the gaps in his bedside care validated why she was going into nursing. From a young age, she has always been driven by empathy and a keen sense of what empathy means; which is invaluable in healthcare: “I sometimes call it my superpower. I feel like I can decipher quickly how folks feel in certain dynamics.”

At the age of eight, she struggled with the diagnosis of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), which she remembers as world changing: “Rather than suffer through it, I made it work in my benefit in terms of my own perseverance and seeing how I could optimize some of that compulsive tendency into good and being the most productive and healthy.”

She accredits her parents with not ignoring the condition or hiding it away, but rather handling it directly with consideration and thoughtfulness: “I think that experience, which both pained me and also allowed me to become much stronger and even more empathetic, led me towards this desire of being in healthcare.”

Orchestrating Teams to Harmonize

In her present corporate remit, much of Cassai’s work is in leading multiple teams across the enterprise to improve clinical and operational outcomes. She provides the oversight of all strategic planning as it relates to operating room and endoscopy operations across 10 campuses.

Empathy comes into play differently than it did back in her bedside days: “It’s the ability to understand quickly what each person’s strengths are and how to leverage that best across teams in order to achieve success.”

She has found that when you have the right diversity of people and experience in a room, you come to the end-result faster because of positive friction and the ability to leverage each other’s thoughts in a spirited way.

Agility has become even more important as a leadership skill, especially in managing increasing complexity, whether it be facing the “untoward circumstances” of COVID-19 and having to create more hospital bed capacity for the surge of acute patients or transitioning from a clinical operational world into a more technology-based environment.

“Orchestrating” part of the why it matters for Cassai means helping everyone to harmonize together as a group – even beyond words through body language and action. Encouraging fluid, interrelating working dynamics – to drive for the best solutions. The previous years’ Covid 19 required orchestrating unprecedented collaboration: “We had to figure this out together, and that’s what we did. The solidarity of the team was absolutely amazing. It was beautiful in the face of disaster, and I walked away feeling like this is a once-in-a-lifetime experience.”

Fail Fast and Fail Forward

Humility has served Cassai, including being able to transparently acknowledge to her team when something didn’t go as planned. She’s learned the criticality of asking more questions and leading by coaching her teams.

Encouraged throughout her career by mentors who supported her professionally and in growing in emotional maturity, she received the great advice to: “Fail fast, fail forward, move on.”

When failure happens, Cassai focuses on understanding what could have been done differently, to learn from the mistake, but not to harp on it, noting that failing is less about the failing and more about the learning that comes after, which often makes for even better results. She embraces this mental strategy for herself and imparts this on her teams.

“It’s important that we don’t live in monotony and that we are absolutely thought-provoking, disruptive, and creative. If we start to stifle that because of the unknown, then we’re never going to advance as quickly as we need to.” Don’t let perfection be the enemy of progress.

This advice also helped her to step up, professionally, and take on roles she hadn’t foreseen herself in: “Having been given that gift very early on allowed me to be more fearless in my choices and allowed me to rise into what others saw in me with less trepidation.”

Being Part of An Inclusive Organization

As a lesbian woman, Cassai feels blessed to be part of such an inclusive organization as NYP: “It is definitely an honor to work in a place where I feel so much pride not only for the organization, but for how much pride they take in their people. It’s been truly a feeling of belonging and it gets even better and more powerful day-by-day and week-by-week. I can’t say enough about the sense of belonging and safety that this organization provides.”

She recalls how warmly she and her son’s mom were embraced from the start. Senior leadership demonstrated such enthusiasm and joy in meeting and learning about who Mary called family.

Cassai is also proud of the consistently inclusive hiring and promotional practices at NYP: “There’s been a genuine and tremendous amount of focus by the organization on creating diverse platforms of teams.”

Earned Comfort in Her Skin

Early on in her journey as a registered nurse, Cassai recalls she was not as comfortable in her own skin as a lesbian woman as she is today, and had moments when she felt like she wasn’t being who others wanted her to be – not because anyone else said so, but from her own insecurities.

What Cassai did experience were people would question her sexuality aloud and sometimes make discriminating comments. Worn down by the constant questioning of her sexuality, she decided to take a stance and cut her hair short in her mid-20’s, hoping that would make it clear: “I made the decision to own who I am.”

Shortly after, strangers have said some hateful things to her based on appearance, and she remembers thinking she needed to empower herself to turn the pain into pride: “I had to learn to not take it personal, this was their issue, not mine. I acknowledged that this is going to happen. It’s not okay, but it’s going to happen. I was really shaken up but I just focused on what matters and became my own advocate and ally.”

Having experienced moments when I was not supported for who I am and was, Cassai has made it a purpose to be the person who does: “From that moment forward, I said to myself that I would never allow anyone I worked with, or was close to, to be on the receiving end of that.”

As a leader, Cassai wants to make it safe for people to always feel like they can speak up. It’s important for her to promote a feeling of safety, belonging and acknowledgment. She focuses on checking in, asking the right questions to understand how they are feeling: “I make a conscious choice to acknowledge what’s happening in the world and within my teams on a day-to-day basis, even if it’s just to check in.”

Cassai considers her seven-year-old son to be her world, and loves spending time with him going on adventures, watching movies and doing sporting activities. She rides the Peloton twice a day, enjoys reading and cooking – and hopes to build a pizza oven one day.

By Aimee Hansen

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Valeria Vitola: Managing Director, Anti-Money Laundering Region Head – Latin America (Except Mexico), Citibank

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Valeria Vitola“Any difference you think you may have is not a shortcoming. It’s always your springboard,” says Valeria Vitola. “You have to embrace that diverse part of you, because it’s only through diversity that we thrive.”

Born and based in Guatemala, Vitola speaks about why you have to dig even deeper to understand any problem, moving from shame to pride from the inside-out and the true value of bringing your difference to any situation.

Making a Societal Impact

Valeria comes from an Italian family who fell in love with the textiles of Guatemala and began a textile factory and textiles related industries in the country. Coming from a history of family-owned business, she never envisioned herself at a multinational company.

Now, twenty-two years have passed since accepting her initial offer and postponing her master’s degree indefinitely for the experiential MBA of Citi. Before working in anti-money laundering/financial crimes prevention, Valeria had witnessed the consequences of corruption in her country and found meaning in work that helps to narrow the inequalities that it helps to create.

“I am from a country where corruption impacts society – contributing to a gap between those who have lots and those who have not even a dollar a day to live, and denying access of vital services such as health, education and safety,” she says. “For me, to be in the frontline, making sure that the financial institution that I work for is not used by criminal organizations to launder money, or move proceeds, really feels like having an impact on society.”

Getting Way Underneath the Problem

Valeria brings unexpected diversity to the table – she’s a woman, she leads Latin America from Guatemala (even though Guatemala is not a major regional hub for Citibank), English is not her first language and she is part of the LGBTQ+ community.

“Being from a diverse environment allows me to see everybody’s perspective from a different angle, with empathy,” says Valeria. “I’m a good listener, so my leadership begins with listening. I’m really interested in understanding not only the job and the problem that people are bringing to the table, but also the whole situation they’re experiencing when they bring the problem.”

This proves especially valuable when conducting financial crimes risk assessment on client prospects and transactions. Her ability to get underneath a situation, and ask the critical questions, is one of the key skills that has supported both her career and her life.

“I like to take complex problems and divide them into simpler ones, and I like to do that very fast. Every single problem, no matter how big, can be dissected, once you understand the root cause,” Valeria says. “But when you think you know the cause, you have to dig deeper and deeper. Once you have the root cause, everything else gets easier. You can find the paths to resolve the problem.”

Speaking to a skill that applies in all areas of life, Valeria likens this analytical skill to what empathy asks of us – when it comes to understanding why a person is feeling or behaving a certain way, and not jumping to a conclusion.

“The brain works in a way that sometimes likes to trick you into into thinking that you already know what the problem is,” she says. “But once you go layer after layer after layer, you identify there’s always something deeper. You usually have to go at least three layers, to make sure you’re addressing the true causes of the problem.”

Valeria also possesses an instinct for accountability: “I’m that person that when I see the ball being thrown, will run, catch the ball and make sure that I don’t drop the ball until it gets delivered to where it needs to be.”

Being a Leader is For Others

Vitola confesses that as an economist, what drew her into her profession was the notion of working all by herself, at a desk, analyzing numbers, with nobody reporting to her.

She stared at Citi as a sole contributor and she says that during her tenure she sought positions where she did not have to manage others. Reluctant to be working with and be responsible for so many others, Vitola remembers what her female boss and mentor, told her: “You have to believe that you are enough and more, and that you need to inspire people – and not for your sake, but for the sake of the people that are below you.” And that is how Valeria now leads a group of around 400 financial crimes professionals in over 18 different countries.

Before she speaks in front of an audience or accepts a role with more exposure and responsibilities, Valeria remembers those words. While working with others can be energy-absorbing and disruptive to an introverted disposition, she has come to understand her mission is not about tasks, but inspiring people to achieve their own whole potential, which is part of why listening has become essential.

180 Degrees From Shame To Pride

Within her family and her work, Valeria never felt held back by being a woman. Being comfortable sharing about her family and personal life as a lesbian, however, has taken longer to relax into.

“Back in the 90’s, I don’t think I knew another lesbian, not only in the financial industry but the whole country, so I felt very insecure about letting people inside of my world,” she says. “Citi is an organization that really embraces and encourages diversity, and how diversity brings different views to the table, so it was never about Citi. It was complicated for me because of fears related to my traditional catholic upbringing, my family, my friends and society in Guatemala. Coming out of the closet has been the most terrifying decision I’ve taken in my career.”

Last year, a photo of her family, including her 17 year old daughter and her ex-wife, appeared on the cover of Citi’s annual diversity report. Vitola says that her daughter, Alessandra, has been her greatest teacher: “She’s shown me the path of openness. She’s never been ashamed of her diverse family and has always introduced me as her mother.”

Valeria now feels that pride is the opposite of shame, and the journey towards becoming who you are also includes leaving behind the isolation of shame, which she too long imposed on herself in the workplace. If she has one regret, it’s that she held back for so long, only to suffer stress and fears around her identity, when in the end, it didn’t matter to any of her colleagues, only to her. If she could go back, she’d bring her whole self from day one and hopes that being more visible now shines a light for others, especially those based in countries where it might be more difficult.

In all ways, she’s now come to see her differences as an asset, and encourages those she mentors to do so, too.

“If you have a room full of people thinking the same way, with the same upbringing and same everything, the solution that you’re going to attain is going to be very limited.” she says, “So, you have to embrace who you are. Bring your difference to the table because that is what really adds value to an organization, to a meeting, to a friendship, to anything. That diverse point of view is what makes everything grow.”

Leading and Doing with Heart

Valeria is inspired by how Jane Fraser, CEO of Citi, leads with empathy, giving everybody a seat on the table, and caring about all stakeholders.

“I love having a leader with heart, more than one that just executes,” says Vitola. “Instead of having a chain, like an army, it feels more like a room with friends and family, where everybody is heard and all opinions are taken into account. But someone is responsible, deciding when we’ve all been heard enough and saying let’s move together now, behind this higher vision.”

During the beginning of the 2020 lockdown, and grounded from the three weeks a month she used to spend traveling, Valeria initiated a spare time challenge with her 400 strong Citi team and family, inviting everyone to share their personal interests, as a way of staying connected. The effort was then replicated in other areas and regions of Citibank.

Akin to her fascination of going deep into the mechanics of a problem, one of her own passions is restoring old and defunct machines – from the original espresso machine to a 1960 Vespa (which she rides on the city streets of Antigua, Guatemala on her weekends) – including sourcing all the technical hard-to-find parts they need to work again. As a girl, she watched her father and grandfather repair machines for the textile factory, often with parts imported from Italy that took weeks just to arrive.

“I have a personal satisfaction in bringing something back to its old shine and glory – to see the inside of a machine and how it works, from the time before electronics,” she says. “It’s a tribute to the ingenuity of the people that designed the machine to bring it back to life.”

Valeria is a scuba divemaster and also loves gardening, because it offers many transferable lessons and helps her stay in the present moment, from planting a seed, to waiting for weeks (with trust) until it germinates, to giving it the space to grow, to cultivating the fruit and making marmalade to share with and gift to friends: “Going from the seed to the product, with love, is like sharing a part of me, of my time, of myself.”

By Aimee Hansen

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Louise Carroll: Partner, Real Estate, Katten

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Louise Carroll“People need to feel you’re hearing them and you’re answering truthfully on what you can deliver,” says Louise Carroll, who recently joined Katten as a partner in the Real Estate practice. “That skillset has served me in every situation — whether negotiating a deal, talking to politicians at the federal, state, and city level or calming passionate constituents.”

Carroll talks about her experience as former New York City Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) Commissioner, leveraging her differences, using her voice, and navigating the complexities of the law to find innovative win-win solutions that have helped deliver nearly a quarter-million affordable housing units in the city’s 59 community districts — one of the most expansive affordable housing plans in U.S. history.

Hands-On Career in Creating Affordable Housing

Born in the U.S. Virgin Islands and raised in Saint Lucia, Carroll attained her undergraduate degree in Wales, acquired her MBA in England and worked as a senior executive for a German ship-owning and brokerage company in Cyprus before entering Tulane University Law School. She began her legal career serving as a transactions attorney for the business law division of the New York City Administration for Children’s Services, followed by prosecuting public officials who violated New York City ethics laws, and advising on real estate projects and housing programs and policies, as well as drafting zoning and tax statutes. Over a 20-year public service career, she worked her way up to the General Counsel role and then became Commissioner of the largest municipal housing agency in the country.

At the time, Carroll had no idea how gratifying working with the affordable housing industry would be. She recalled the first time she went to speak to tenants in a supported housing residence in Times Square, in which HPD was a government partner on the building renovation. She saw how much the project affected and changed how the tenants felt more positively about their current life situation, and gave them not only a safe and affordable place to live, but also inspiration and hope at the potential of what might lie ahead in their lives.

“When I look at all those massive buildings on Riverside Drive, or Hudson Yards, all along the Greenpoint waterfront, I can say, ‘This is my building, this is my building, this is my building,’” says Carroll. “I have managed to put low-income tenants and families in some amazing buildings throughout the city, next to good schools and great access to transit. It took a great deal of work —drafting and revising legislation — to make these projects happen. This industry can be so complex, because there are so many different players and different laws, that just finding a way to do it over and over was both amazing and fun.”

Navigating Complex Win-Win Solutions

Carroll prides herself on her ability to listen to many sides, navigate diverse interests and find the best compromise or solution. “In good negotiating, you have to understand the viewpoint of the person across from you — what it is they’re trying to achieve. You have to listen and have empathy, and make sure people understand the parameters of where you can and can’t meet them and why,” she says.

Carroll met Katten partners Ken Lore and Martin Siroka when they were working together on many mixed-income housing developments. “I knew they were clever lawyers who were able to problem solve on really difficult issues, so I’ve respected them greatly over the years,” says Carroll, who herself joined Katten in March.

As Commissioner of the NYC HPD department, Carroll worked directly with Katten on real estate deals that had a combination of low-income housing tax credits, tax-exempt bonds, and other innovative financing structures, each with complex requirements and regulations. “What I loved was that every time I did a deal with Katten, we improved the status quo by making new changes that accommodated the private lenders in a better way. There are often cookie cutter deals in city government, but that was not the work we were doing together,” she says. “Instead, we tackled the intricacies of laws to figure out how to make them work best for every stakeholder involved in the project. Finding solutions to those incredibly complex problems was personally gratifying and provided housing to so many communities.”

When her public service career was winding down, she considered whether to work for a not-for-profit organization or take a post at a law school, but realized she wanted to continue working on impactful deals. “Some people could do the HPD commissioner role as a figurehead job, but that’s not how I did it. I read every piece of legislation. I was there for every policy draft and every brainstorm. I formed the working groups,” Carroll says. “I knew that finding a job that could compare was not going to be easy, but this role with Katten offered me the opportunity to work on affordable housing projects in the way that I love, and to contribute to the firm’s widely renowned practice.”

At Katten, Carroll’s practice focuses on affordable housing and community development, mixed-income housing, public finance and government relations. She is highly regarded at the firm for her experience and capabilities to guide clients through the financial and legal complexities of housing projects.

Leveraging Her Difference

“I went to an all-girls Catholic school, where the nuns told us we were as good as anybody. That’s, in part, why I’ve always spoken up,” says Carroll. “I understand the stereotypes or expectations when a woman is in the room — how we’re expected to speak, defend our work, or refrain from speaking in an authoritative way — and I’ve told myself, ‘None of that applies to you, because you weren’t born and raised in this culture, so you’re going to embrace the otherness.’ So, I speak up, respectfully and never rude, but I have to speak.”

Carroll leverages her experience and seniority to advocate for others. “When I see people not speaking up or being silenced or pushed out, I step into that space and say, no, I would like to hear what this person has to say,” she notes.

While Carroll was warned the commissioner position would be an outward-facing job, she couldn’t have prepared for just how much moment-to-moment adrenaline would be involved and how she would need to transition from a naturally shy person to an extrovert.

“As Commissioner, I was constantly on the move, interacting with many different people in sometimes challenging circumstances throughout the day. I might start the morning with a press conference, go to a 50-person meeting to solve problems around affordable housing, switch to working with my policy team on rewriting legislation, and then shift to being present for heated phone calls with city council members,” recalls Carroll. “I learned to put my game face on and step into the moment, whatever it was. Sometimes that meant winging an impromptu speech.”

No Task is Insignificant

Carroll credits her grandmother for inspiring her lawyer deal-making mentality of getting things done. Her grandmother instilled in her at a young age that no matter how big or small a task, you do it well.

“Everything you touch, you have to do the best you can — even when you’re not leading the team, and are just a part of the team,” says Carroll. “Before I became commissioner, I was the attorney that people could call at 11 p.m. and who would send the agreements back at 3 a.m. People started to talk about my work and every time I got a new challenge, even when they were difficult challenges, I would aim to make things better — and that kept me moving forward.”

A decade ago as a new mom with a rising legal career, she made it home from work for bedtime, and then started working again — knowing it was important to her advancement. “We all have adversity in some way,” says Carroll. “There are real issues, such as childcare. There are also times and places to address it, and how we handle our adversity is as important as the adversity we face.”

Married for nearly twenty years, Carroll has one 10-year-old son and enjoys watching him play travel ice hockey, a sport off her radar growing up as a Caribbean woman. Her sport of choice: tennis. She completes twice a week against tennis pros — and, sometimes, she wins.

By Aimee Hansen

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Ivy Tsui: Director of Program Management for DE&I, PGIM Real Estate

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Ivy Tsui“It is very important to have a sponsor for your career” says Ivy Tsui. “You need somebody to advocate for you and be your voice in places where maybe you don’t have a voice.”

Tsui speaks to staying open and authentic, asking for sponsorship and embodying inclusion.

From Banking to Inclusion

“I have always been open to different opportunities beginning from early on in my career to now–because where you end up may not be where you thought you would go,” she advises. “Life is a journey and it’s not always linear.” Tsui’s parents immigrated to the US from Taiwan and Hong Kong, and she has learned a lot from their adaptability and unwavering spirit.

Tsui started out in banking after obtaining her dual-major bachelor’s degree in economics and international relations at Wellesley College. Tsui spent the first 14 years of her career at J.P. Morgan, and crossed many different disciplines–eventually landing in human resources–while obtaining her master’s degree in organizational psychology from Teacher’s College, Columbia University. In 2017, Tsui made the move to PGIM Real Estate.

While DE&I has always been an aspect of her HR work, in April, Tsui joined a new team headed by Christy Lockridge–the first Chief Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer of PGIM Real Estate–which is focused on advancing diversity, equity and inclusion in five key areas of impact: Talent, Culture, Industry, Investing, and Community. To Tsui, the new role feels like a culmination of her professional and personal experiences, especially as an Asian American woman.

Tsui is passionate about how the work of the DE&I team impacts people directly, and she’s especially energized about building a diverse pipeline of early talent. One of her key programs is the PGIM Real Estate Sophomore Training Program (STP), which gives college students early exposure, training and experience in the real estate industry–an industry that has historically not been very diverse. Tsui noticed the need to introduce real estate to students before their junior year (when students usually apply for internships) and has tripled the number of sophomore interns in the past four years.

“We often see students majoring in real estate because of a family member in the business. STP provides sophomores from diverse backgrounds, who otherwise may not know about real estate as a career possibility, the opportunity to work in real estate asset management.” says Tsui. “Some may not stay in real estate, but it opens a lot of different doors for them regardless.”

Being Open and Authentic

Tsui accredits her openness, adaptability and flexibility to her diverse and varied experiences: “I’ve never strategized about how this or that will bring me to the next level. I’ve been more interested in learning new things–sometimes, you have to take a step back or go lateral to really develop yourself.”

“I’ve always found people feel comfortable to talk and open up with me, and I make connections quite easily, and am able to meet people where they are at, which is quite a valuable skill in the HR and DE&I spaces.”

Describing herself as unconventional and an extroverted introvert, with a quirky sense of humor, Tsui has stayed true to herself and feels she has grown in self-confidence with time.

“One of the biggest pieces of advice to my younger self would be to let go of the fear to share my opinion,” says Tsui. “Early in my career, I was more conservative in offering my perspective and spoke only if I had the perfect comment. I’ve realized it’s okay to not always have the right answer or right idea, but it’s important to use your voice. There is power, value and hopefully impact, in sharing diverse perspectives.”

Tsui encourages mentees to do the same: “It doesn’t matter if you’re a junior level person in a room of more seasoned executives, you’ve been given a seat at the table for a reason and it is in the firm’s best interest to encourage and embrace your perspective. You have valuable things to say, so don’t sit in the background. Use your voice, early on.”

Asking For Sponsorship

Tsui absolutely recognizes the importance of being championed at work. She cites the difference between mentorship and sponsorship as critical: a mentor is someone who provides you with career advice and feedback and a sponsor is someone who directly advocates for you in your career development, whether for a promotion or an opportunity.

She encourages employees to have mentors and a sponsor but while she’s had highly valuable informal mentors, she has never had either a formal mentor nor a sponsor, and never asked for one.

“I think that’s partly because as an Asian American female, we’re taught ‘Just put your head down, work hard, do a good job and you’ll be rewarded or at least you won’t fail. Don’t ask for anything more and don’t rock the boat.’ But that doesn’t work.”

Tsui wishes someone had nudged her towards the advice she now gives: “My advice to everyone, but especially to Asian American women and people of color, is that you have to be in control of your own career and vocalize what you want. Even if it’s uncomfortable, you have to find mentors, formally or informally, and you absolutely need to find a sponsor.”

“I’ve learned that it’s important to be your own best advocate. Communication is key to ensure my manager and leaders in my group are informed of what I’m doing and know what my future interests are. This helps keep me in mind for both additional responsibilities and stretch opportunities.”

Embodying Inclusion

“As I’ve moved up, I’ve felt it’s increasingly important to make sure that all voices are heard. If a few people are dominating the Zoom conversation, and I see someone trying to speak or someone who doesn’t often speak, I will try to bring them in and have their voice included,” says Tsui. “When I was in that junior position, I would have loved if someone would have asked for my thoughts, so now I have that opportunity.”

Tsui also makes a point of saying hello to everybody she passes. And while it might seem basic, she notes you’d be surprised how often people just walk past each other. Especially as the senior person, it can help to create inclusion by simply acknowledging the more junior people you pass by.

Another regular practice is to thank people for their contributions in public to increase recognition. She also may draw a more hesitant person into a group conversation while at a networking opportunity.

“Much of this comes naturally to me, but some of it, I do with intent–especially if I see an opportunity to lead by example,” says Tsui.

Choosing Her Own Path

Tsui was advised by a current mentor not to compare her life or her career path to others, and that advice has served. Throughout her career, she’s made choices that were not linear, but were aligned to her personal desires–whether a lateral move to an opportunity outside of her comfort zone, time out of her career after having her third child, or choosing her location based on family-work rhythm.

“I made all those decisions based on what was more important for me at each of those times and they did have trade-offs – whether it was a less competitive salary or getting that more senior title, sooner,” notes Tsui. “But I am happier because of those experiences and grateful for them. This was my path, and I don’t compare myself to peers who chose a different path.”

Tsui met her Colombian husband, who was raised in Brazil, during her early investment banking years. They have three children – Sofia, 15, Bruno, 12 and Emma, 6. At any given time in her house, there’s a combination of Spanish, Portuguese and Mandarin being spoken. Based in New Jersey, she loves visiting her parents and sisters in California, and considers them to be a bicoastal family. She plays piano, and recently played Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24 by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra with her nieces and nephew, although ballads are her usual jam.

By Aimee Hansen

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Jingjing Liang: Associate, Compensation, Governance & ERISA practice, Shearman & Sterling LLP

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Jingjing Liang“The truth is, if I can be loving and patient, and approach whatever comes my way with compassion, everything will fall into place,” says Jingjing (JJ) Liang. “Being a good lawyer, a good colleague, a good mother, a good partner, a good daughter – it all starts with being a loving person. Approaching things with a loving attitude will make things easier for you.”

Liang speaks about staying open-minded, building your confidence, using your voice and showing up to the moment.

Be Open to Surprise

“Keep an open mind,” Liang advises law students. She never would have seen herself in law, let alone as a specialist in compensation and governance – yet there are advantages to unforeseen changes.

Having specialized in European history in her undergraduate studies at the University of Toronto, Liang became interested in legal history while studying in Europe. She took her mother’s insightful advice to work as a paralegal before investing in law school. After working for a year as a legal intern in Beijing, China and another year as a legal assistant in Toronto, Canada, she headed to the University of Texas School of Law. During her summer associate program at Shearman & Sterling in New York, where she rotated through the firm’s M&A and litigation practice groups, she received an offer to join the compensation and governance group.

“At that time, I thought, I have no idea what this is, this is so specialized, I just want to do M&A,” confesses Liang. “My work was very tough in the beginning as a first-year associate, because there were nothing from which I could draw on from my law school studies. The learning curve was steep.”

It was only when Liang found herself teaching summer associates that she realized how quickly she had grown and how much she enjoyed the work. Relative to her peers in other practices, Liang found she was not just reviewing and proofreading documents as a junior associate, but actually providing substantive legal advice and engaging directly with clients. “I’m glad I kept an open mind to try out this practice, I never would have known how well-suited it was for me if I hadn’t.”

How You Approach The Moment Is the Practice

Being patient, flexible and quick on her feet has served Liang well, but her ability to approach a situation and respond adeptly is her core practice.

When an urgent request comes in the night before an early meeting, it’s easy to stress. But Liang draws on her work as a meditation and yoga instructor: “The person in front of me and the request is not by definition stressful. It could be stressful to me, but interesting or fun to somebody else,” she observes. “So if the stress is coming from me, then I have the ability to change it. That’s how I try to approach difficult moments. I try to ask, ‘how can I ease the situation so it becomes easier for everyone involved.’”

Early on, Liang received two valuable insights into the enigma of work-life balance in Big Law: “It can be pretty impossible to strive for ‘work-life balance’ on a daily basis, so if you focus on balance in the ‘tree’ of a day, it can feel like a fight. But if you can step back and observe the wave of activities that come and go throughout a month or couple of months, you can take in the ‘forest’ and find more balance.”

Liang recommends that junior lawyers make plans with families and friends and surround themselves with people who will understand when something comes up. Even if you need to cancel a weekend plan, it’s important to still create the room to nurture your personal and social life.

Building and Bringing Confidence

As she becomes more senior, Liang’s advice to her younger self would be to take time and dig into the topics in your field you’re deeply interested in. “What did I enjoy most in this deal and what can I do next to strengthen the skills I gained today?” She recommends stepping back after big deals or intense periods of work to reflect on the learning experience to deepen career development.

“You’re learning so many different topics over time and quickly, it would be worthwhile to categorize your specialties so you can reinforce each one, becoming aware of your strengths and weaknesses in the substantive aspects of law,” says Liang. “I think it’s important to build confidence in your knowledge base, and that’s hard to do when it’s go-go-go.”

Reflecting on how her generation is changing the legal field, she feels her peers in her generation are more likely to just sit at the table rather than waiting to be invited: “Even more, when we sit at the table, we’re not afraid to ask questions and contribute. We’re not afraid to give our view and participate in a discussion among more senior lawyers, ” she says, also noting her parents encouraged speaking up early on in life. “I’m not embarrassed to be wrong (of course, being thoughtful about my contribution is important too). I’m excited to have this conversation with everyone at the table.”

Liang recognizes that she stands on the shoulders of women who have paved the way, and for that, her generation of women tends to hesitate less: “Women lawyers at conferences are always talking about not having to stay quiet because you’re a woman, and I am thinking, I don’t think we’re being quiet.”

When it comes to being Asian American, at certain times in her journey, Liang has felt stereotyped, such as the expectation that she would be quiet, being asked where she’s really from, or being spoken to in some Asian language. These problems can be subtle and until she talks with Asian peers who have had similar experiences, it’s difficult to validate what’s happening in that moment. “It’s a difficult conversation,” she says, “but because discrimination, macro or micro, is still there, we’re still talking about it.”

She does not, however, feel she’s facing a “bamboo ceiling” in Big Law, and found it inspiring last year to witness two female Asian women appointed to partners at Shearman, including Lara Aryani. She also feels lucky to work closely with female partners at the firm who value the mentoring and sponsorship of young lawyers through open dialogue and active training on how to be successful in this industry.

An Ever More Compassionate Self

Certified by Three Jewels Enlightenment Studio, Liang became a meditation and yoga instructor. During the pandemic, she was able to establish a more regular meditation practice to help cope with work, the ever-changing state of the world, and more recently, being a new parent. To give back to her community, she currently teaches yoga on Sundays with Three Jewels.

One of Liang’s meditation practices is “Future Refuge” – where you envision your future and step into that version within your present self: “If I can envision all of these aspects of my future self, what’s stopping me from being that today? Even if I can’t change external conditions, how can I embody the characteristics of the ‘future me’ now?”

Engaging in her meditation and yoga practice regularly, she sees herself in five years as being even more calm, loving and compassionate. Going back to when a client asks her for an emergency request, in a difficult moment, she chooses to view the request as if it’s coming from her best friend who she would do anything for, even if it throws her evening plans awry.

She also loves being with her ten-month-old son, watching how he explores the world and looks forward to traveling the world with him in the future.

By Aimee Hansen

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Elena Kim: VP Business Development, TV/OTT at Global Music Rights

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Elena Kim“I found a different lease on my otherness. I can’t chase everybody’s projection of me,” says Elena Kim, “but the more I recognize the uniqueness of my own experience, the more I feel I have to offer.”

Kim speaks to how she learned to dream, connecting through differences, emotional regulation and integrating masculine and feminine aspects of leadership.

How the Invitation To Dream Changed Everything

Kim spent the first six years of her career in investment banking in Moscow, before the financial crisis of 2008. She decided to take the ‘opportunity’ of the market slump to invest in herself by pursuing an MBA. While filling out the application, she had to answer where she envisioned herself in five years, which she had never considered: “It quickly became a self-discovery journey for me.”

When Kim pondered what she cared or was passionate about, she realized she didn’t know what she really wanted.

“It was the first time when I allowed myself to dream as if anything was possible,” reflects Kim. “At that time, it was films and TV series – my window into the bigger world, into a different world. Growing up in Uzbekistan, I never had allowed myself to even consider the possibility of working in entertainment.”

She received her MBA from UCLA Anderson School of Management in Los Angeles when digital media was becoming prevalent in media and entertainment, which created a permissive playing field of newbies. Jumping on the rising wave of digital transformation as major players were just coming onto the scene, she joined a startup and began to reinvent her career path.

For several years, she acquired film and TV content for digital platforms, such as Hulu, Vimeo and iflix. For the past three years, she has negotiated and licensed music rights for programming across broadcast, cable, local TV networks and streaming platforms, which gives her a bird’s eye view of the whole TV and film industry.

“What I’m passionate about is figuring out what makes people’s hearts beat faster. What do they really love to watch and what determines that?” she says.

Having worked across emerging markets, she observed the obvious: whereas what people prefer to watch in Latin America might differ from that in Eastern Europe, Middle East, Africa or Southeast Asia, the love for stories about human experience is shared universally.

The Curiosity to Learn

Early on, Kim believes that her strongest asset was curiosity and willingness to dig deep into a subject. She notes she had amazing teachers who taught her the structure of learning a new skill and how to dissect a new concept to understand it.

“So how do you learn a new industry, for example? You look at the main players and their business models: how do people make money? What is the current political, economic, legislative environment impacting the industry? What are the major trends? What stands behind the main buzzwords?” asks Kim. “As you learn the basics, you then start tuning into where the opportunity is. What forms core competitive advantage, and what is driving the opportunity, what needs to hold true to fully unleash value? etc.”

When she was coming from Russia to the U.S., shifting from banking to media, she applied this process: “It became very clear to me that the wind was blowing towards online viewing, and I knew I wanted a job that had something to do with digital distribution.”

She loves how digital distribution of content included many more voices in a global dialogue. Regardless of where you are from and what you believe, you can connect over Game of Thrones or Friends.

The Value In Our Differences

As an avid globe trotter (over 60 countries and counting), she finds traveling therapeutic. She especially enjoys interacting with local people who don’t speak her language, figuring out ways to communicate beyond verbal. She holds such memories dear to her heart after surviving an earthquake in Nepal, sharing music with children from indigenous tribes in Indonesia, self-driving through Botswana and Namibia with local hitchhikers, getting help from local police after being robbed in Argentina, for example.

During one such trip, she traveled to Peru and had her first experience with plant medicine under the guidance of a local shaman, who held space with due reverence to ancient practices and traditions: “This was learning on a cosmic level. I won’t even attempt to describe it in words. If my spiritual inquiry started with understanding the concepts of neuroplasticity (who you are today is not a verdict), my awakening was turbo charged by living through the learning during this psychedelic experience.”

Kim continues, “One of the things now running through my veins is the knowing that what makes me connect with people is the ways in which we are similar, what intrigues and draws me to people is the ways in which we are different.”

“My personal journey with ‘otherness’ has been an emotional roller coaster. I am Korean ethnically, born in a Muslim country of Uzbekistan, mentally grew up in Russian culture in the Russian society,” says Kim. “Now I live in the U.S. as a gay woman, a scientifically-inclined spiritual psychonaut, where I’m ‘too woo woo’ in analytical circles and ‘too in my head’ in esoteric environments, etc. Of course, these are mostly distorted self-assessments.”

Growing up, she felt the disconnection of being Asian in Russia by not ‘presenting’ as Russian. Yet she speaks Russian, not Korean or Chinese, for which she’s regularly mistaken. Last year, prior to the current geopolitical crisis, she spent time in Russia, where she identified a piece in herself that she feels is Russian: her sense of depth. She does not give people any box to put her in anymore: “I don’t even fit the labels I have for myself,” she notes, “I’ve stopped explaining. ‘I’m from Russia’ is all I say now.”

To Kim, whatever makes us different is what helps us to represent a specific side of humanity as part of the whole. She resonates with Jerome Braggs’s notion that if you believe in universal oneness, then excluding experiences that are unique leads to robbing others of a fuller wholeness. Therefore, the more different we’re perceived we are, the more important it is for us to show up in all areas of life – and she notes those differences are defined in so many ways beyond ethnicity, race, gender or sexual orientation.

Integrating Feminine and Masculine Traits in Leadership

In a previous role, Kim was encouraged to start an initiative to foster diversity, equality and inclusion across employees from 40+ different countries and cultural backgrounds, which activated for her the importance of so-to-speak “feminine” qualities of leadership, especially when dealing with something intangible like what gives people a collective sense of purpose, belonging, safety for authenticity, and striving for excellence.

Kim recounts we have historically glorified and rewarded traits of leadership that are labeled as “masculine” – assertiveness, linear thinking, clarity without questioning and go-getting. But traits that we assign as “feminine” – such as empathy, collaboration, creating constructive atmosphere – are considered nice-to-have but not necessarily perceived as attributes of leadership or rewarded.

“The DE&I initiative quickly led me to a path of dissecting and challenging the leadership paradigm that we were operating under,” reflects Kim. “It’s so clear to me that to be successful in a multicultural organization, you have to have an acute level of empathy and cultural awareness. And the soft skills are increasingly becoming must-have.”

She has come to see that “feminine” leadership qualities are a necessary complement to “masculine” qualities, not a compromise or trade-of. “I used to hold this myth that once you start being softer, you lose your edge, an ability to reach goals in a timely manner. I had this notion you either be like a robot or you float in the clouds, and that was a misconception.”

Reflecting on the evolution of her leadership style, she says: “Even if I was telling myself a different story, early on I was truly managing out of egoic fear of losing control. I was never a micro-manager, but I was a micro-controller. I had to know everything, call the shots, be the one interacting with management to control the narrative, etc.”

Kim realizes this came from being extremely demanding on herself, and meant she came off polished and unapproachable. As she steps up as a leader, her focus is increasingly shifting to creating opportunities for others to push their growth edges, normalizing making mistakes while minimizing their impact.

Now she finds herself at a company that’s thriving despite the global pandemic. “We have set clear goals, roles, strategy and timeline, while the flow and interaction within the team remains fluid, supportive and trusting. I don’t need to chase anyone to get their job done, rather keep communicating progress, so folks can self-direct their work streams to deliver on time. This release of control within set boundaries is still work in progress as my ego peeks its head constantly. With that, I find myself being successful at my job, really supported by my team and a much happier me.”

Emotional Regulation and Co-Creation

Kim feels the pandemic, socio-economic inequity, and current geopolitical crises have brought a set of unique challenges around managing people’s mental and emotional states. Leaders are not necessarily equipped with due skillsets, protocols or guidelines to attend to people’s emotional turbulence. She is increasingly interested in the area of emotional self-regulation and has heard many executives speak to challenges of operating in toxic environments where stress and reactivity are the norms: “Even in my relatively emotionally intelligent company, without the acquired self-regulation practices I’ve exposed myself to in the last couple of years, I could not have managed some of the incidents that have come up inside and outside of the company. A simple thing like taking a deep breath might lead to a more beneficial outcome in an emotionally charged situation. These tools are teachable and the impact is quickly palpable.”

Her latest fascinations include Web 3.0 and decentralization, and she’s presently teaching a blockchain fundamentals course at chief.com to a network for executive women.

By Aimee Hansen

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Kate Kenner Archibald: Chief Marketing Officer, Dash Hudson

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Kate Kenner Archibald“The combination of expressing your needs and doing fewer things better is what I have learned in recent years,” says Kate Archibald, who shares on advancing in a workplace of women, creating a spherical life and managing up.

Growing as a Leader While Surrounded By Women

Having grown up in New York, Archibald idolized the big fashion house vibe. She was magnetized to how creativity and business merged together at Estée Lauder, where she spent 14 years specializing in luxury brands, including Tom Ford Beauty and Bobbi Brown, honing her career towards tech marketing. In November, she moved to Dash Hudson, an all-in-social entertainment insights marketing software platform that works across some of the most influential global brands including Apple, Amazon and Disney.

With three kids (currently, seven years, five years and ten months old) and a husband with a full-time job, maintaining her career through the family journey has been a choice she has committed to, partly because she derives great satisfaction from her work, and also because of the independence mindset she adopted early on.

“My father really impressed upon me the value of being independently successful as a woman and used to impress upon me that I could be a CEO,” she reflects, “He’s been a huge impact in my life, so being independent has always been important for me.”

At Estée Lauder, she was surrounded by a workforce of 85% women, so the vertical track to, and horizontal track across, leadership positions were well-accessible for women who wished to advance, and Archibald navigated across several cross-functional leadership positions.

“I was encouraged and enabled, and there were opportunities,” she says. “You still have to know that nobody is going to hold your hand, and you are the owner of your destiny. But it helps to be in a place where the growth mentality as a woman is appreciated.”

Now at Dash Hudson, Archibald enjoys the mix of professional and personal life supported by the tech-like atmosphere and culture while still leveraging the leadership experiences she gained through her tenure in beauty and luxury.

Creating a Spherical Life and Reserving Family Time

“I am very direct in terms of what we’re trying to accomplish and what we need to do to achieve our goals. I try to get to the root of the problem and reduce the back-and-forth,” Archibald says, accrediting her need for work-family balance for the acute focus. “I also enjoy creating an environment of collaboration by enabling people to see outside of their silos, and to understand how the piece they are contributing is interrelated and contributing to the other teams. I’m a huge proponent of creating a structured collaboration framework and connecting the dots.”

Archibald has recently been inspired by the novel approach her CEO takes to hiring and culture at Dash Hudson: “The mentality is people first. Let’s find the best, smartest, most amazing people and figure out where they can add the most value. The strength of the talent and the true belief that diversity makes us stronger creates an incredible culture. The level of support felt between peers and teams is a real shift for most people when they join the company. Especially in a hybrid environment.”

Within a mostly female environment for over a decade, Archibald has had the benefit of sharing lots of honest conversations with successful women. She has often sought insight on managing professional and family demands, even the basics of keeping a household running. A recommendation she received along the way was to think of your life as a circle or a pie graph that includes everything that is important to you:- family, work, health, friends, spirituality, etc.

“If one part of the pie gets more dominating than you want it to be, you have to consider how to make that part smaller so you can ‘right-size’ your family life or your spiritual life, for example,” she says. “That has really helped me to compartmentalize what I’m doing and how it impacts the other parts of my life.”

As a traditional Jewish family, Archibald and her family observe Shabbat every week, reserving Friday night and Saturday strictly for time with family. Honoring this has been fundamental in helping manage her time, and because that time is a weekly fixed date, it’s also helped her feel more peaceful during the week when she needs to work. Additionally, it ensures that she is aligned with her partner on their collective family goals.

“I think a lot of parents feel guilty if they don’t have dinner every night with their family,” she says. “But for me, every Friday is a guaranteed dinner together with all the family and Saturday is family, all day. No exceptions. It has given me a supportive structure in my life.”

In addition to being influenced by her father’s outlook on independence and her supportive husband, Archibald attests that her mother is the hardest working person she knows. While Archibald went off to first grade, her mother went back to school and obtained her PhD in Neuropsychology. Inspired by her, Archibald wishes to model to her daughter and two sons that a woman can have a career and still be present for her family.

Managing Up and Knowing Your Own Expectations

As she’s grown more senior in her career, Archibald has found herself getting better at reinforcing her own brand of executive presence and managing up: “The transition over your career is toward managing up, and ensuring that you get what you need. I learned this the hard way when faced with health challenges, when I was doing too much and not telling people what I needed. I really have come to see the importance of don’t take on too much and do fewer things better, both of which I pass on to women just starting their career.”

When it comes to mentoring, she also tells everyone, but especially mothers with young children, that if you’re not happy at home, you’re not going to be happy at work.

“If your work is really impacting your home life, take that step back to figure out what and how you can fix it. Push for flexibility, which is becoming more common, or figure out what the issue is,” she says, “But if you’re not satisfied with how much time you have with your family, you’re never going to be happy at work, no matter how much money you’re making.”

Archibald advises women to go back to the sphere and consider the balance across areas and really understand “what does good look like, for you?” which is different for everyone. She says, you have to be able to manage life in a way that works for your expectations for your family and work life ― and honestly, check if your employer is willing to support that for and with you.

Changing Jobs Amidst a Remote Workplace

Having joined Dash Hudson well into the pandemic, and in the middle of her crossover maternity leave, Archibald has yet to meet her new colleagues in person. But in this exceptional context of our times, she has hugely valued a strong and communicative organizational culture, which has supported her onboarding and becoming part of the team.

Together, her family loves skiing in the winter and swimming in the summer in the Hudson Valley, where she loves being outdoors and active in nature. She has a real passion for ice cream and swears her ice cream place in Tivoli, New York is verifiably (just check Food & Wine Magazine) the best in the world.

By Aimee Hansen

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Renee Connolly: Chief Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Officer, Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany

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Renee Connolly“I am retrospectively conscious, but not retrospectively critical. I learn from the past, to move me forward,” says Renee Connolly, based in Massachusetts. “I am prospectively thoughtful that the decisions I make today have consequences: so do I have the right facts to make those decisions?”

Connolly talks to why language matters, going for greatness, learning from the past and having the right resources.

From Communications to DEI

Connolly spent her career facilitating understanding in healthcare-related communications, until last August: “For 25 years of my life, I helped to make complex science and life sciences simple and understandable, so people could better support their lives, families and needs.”

As a college senior, Connolly lost her mother (lifelong non- smoker) to lung cancer and was compelled to enter communications in the burgeoning pharmaceutical biotech and life science field.

“I thought to myself, if I could help people on a journey, similar to ours, to better navigate that maze of specialist talk and treatments, then that’s making a difference.”

In taking on her evolved executive role, she agreed to turn her part-time advocacy of DEI into a full-time opportunity to transfer her skills.

There’s still so much to understand in the deep rootedness of what it really means to help people feel they are heard, included, and really belong,” says Connolly. “Language matters and impacts people in different ways, and DEI is a lot about language and the use of words.”

Listening and Language Matters

Now in her DEI remit, Connolly is facilitating how people better understand each other. She collaborates with Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany’s many stakeholders including advising senior leadership, partnering with recruiters, engaging with employees at all levels of the organization and importantly partnering with Employee Resource Groups (ERG’s), to tell their stories and amplify their voices. Working in this space internationally requires her to keep her “ears wide open.”

“It creates constant awareness to be truly open-minded and to not put on blinders, to not put defenders up, and to really listen, wholeheartedly,” she says. “We’re creating an environment where people feel they belong and are nurtured and where we are nourishing our business for top-line growth.”

Connolly notes that her role requires emotional, mental and physical muscles every day – leading with empathy. She feels like the right person in this critical moment for our company and communities, with the right balance of skills and experience to take DEI to the next level for her organization.

Going For Greatness

“The world could be imploding around me, and I have a mantra of ‘It will be great’ or ‘I stand in a place of believing in an outcome filled with ‘greatness’,” says Connolly. “It’s not just positive mindset. I actually believe that even if the journey to get there is full of hard lessons, I’m always looking for greatness.”

When told something is impossible, a discerning question she asks is: “It couldn’t be done? It shouldn’t be done? Or it wouldn’t be done?” And depending on the answer, she may turn to how to make it possible.

The loss of her mom left Connolly with resilience. While she feels every scale of her emotions, she still tends to be a “glass half-full” person who considers herself fortunate and brings positive energy to those around her. She does what she says and says what she does, rallying her team when she commits to a vision.

“I’m a big believer that it’s the team, not the individual, that drives success. It is the collective good of many,” she says. “I love DEI because it drives progress when we realize – in some way, shape, or form – that we’re more alike than we are different.”

That emphasis on “team” has been instilled throughout her life from playing many organized sports. Connolly was a college athlete, and her entire family (including her three teenage sons and her 8 year old daughter) is athletic. She loves observing the parallels between business and individual and team sports. That spirit of healthy competition has gifted her great skillsets as well as a deep appreciation for excelling and accelerating her own growth.

There are many “dominoes” in teamwork that make you have a successful win or loss. In business, Connolly applies this and has come to find that “there’s a wisdom in knowing what you don’t know” and you don’t have to be the smartest person in the room.

“Earlier in my career, I thought I had to be the one with the voice. Now, I realize what I have to do is give or encourage or support the voices that have the information required, not always be the voice,” she says. “That’s the muscle you develop with maturity and by realizing the amazing contributions that many voices bring to a conversation. That’s the muscle you develop when you embrace the diversity of thinking in a team to drive forward.“

Retrospectively Conscious, Not Retrospectively Critical

Cultivating patience for herself and others is perhaps a skill Connolly built up by raising four children, as this year she has one in elementary, one in middle, one in high school and one in college. Talk about patience. Each age, experience and interaction requires you to be patient and that has mattered for Connolly as a leader.

“In a field like DEI, you see so much potential right away. But it’s necessary to have the patience to realize there are steps to get there, and you have to do those steps well. You can’t run before you walk,” she says. “Patience is not weakness, as I may have seen it before. It’s a virtue of understanding that you must work towards goals in a methodical way to make sure that you’re iterative enough to get the best possible outcome.”

Aware that she makes her own decision based on current knowledge—and that there will always be more to learn, Connolly tends to not focus on criticizing how past decisions were made, hers or others: “I try to learn from the past, but focus forward. Especially now, every day brings new circumstances and we use our best judgement, and most of us have positive intent.”

This makes her retrospectively conscious, not retrospectively critical, as she puts it – focusing on her responsibility today.

Why You Don’t Need “More”

When Connolly was leveling up from doing to managing others, she used to say she needed “more” to get it all done, but one of her mentors changed her entire frame of thinking: “Your problem is not getting more people or more money or more resources,” he told her. “It’s getting the right people, the right money, the right resources.”

Other words she lives by as a communications professional is to treat every opportunity like opening night: “It doesn’t matter how little or big the engagement is, respect and know your audience. Realize that people are spending time to listen or talk to you so make sure your message lands.”

She values the advice to be true to your purpose: “When you’re often counseling senior leaders, do you want to tell them what they want to hear? Or do you want to be true to yourself?” While a job may require different approaches at different times, it’s important to keep a purposeful essence in how one approaches everything (for her, a spirit of greatness and creativity).

Guiding Others and Serving a Mission

Mentoring young talent fulfills her soul. It reminds her of her younger self, looking for guidance after losing her mother. She loves instilling in young women to have the confidence that they can do more than they thought possible. As a mission-centered person, she sits on several boards, from the Massachusetts Conference for Women to the Home for Little Wanderers (child welfare to American Cancer Society (New England). One of her most prized awards was entitled: “Service above Self”—it is this she uses to guide her commitment to share her talents, treasure and time to help those who are in most need.

She emphasizes the importance of having fun. At her best moments in her journey, she was enjoying the work, serving a mission, or making something better.

By Aimee Hansen

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