When Merissa Silk, Senior Staff Product Manager at Onfido, started out in product and technology, she was naturally quiet and reserved, and struggled to speak up in team discussions despite being a subject matter expert.
This was amplified in the workplace as Merissa often worked in male-dominated teams. As she took on more senior roles, Merissa realised she needed to build more resilience. She adopted an overly direct and forward communication style like her co-workers at the time, but this just wasn’t “her”.
Sometimes it can feel like a lose-lose for women in leadership, meaning that we are often judged for demonstrating too many classically ‘male’ behaviours and penalised for being too classically ‘female’.
Merissa decided to shift her focus inwards and developed a style that was true to her principles. As part of this journey, she reflected on personal and professional development, finding her leadership style and voice, and becoming more confident and irrepressible.
Merissa joins us today to share her story and give her advice on being your true self at work, while getting your voice heard.
SheCanCode is a collaborative community of women in tech working together to tackle the tech gender gap.
Join our community to find a supportive network, opportunities, guidance and jobs, so you can excel in your tech career.
hello everyone thank you for tuning in again I am Katie Bateman the content director at chican code and today we’re
discussing being authentic whilst getting your voice heard sometimes it can feel like a lose-lose for women in
leadership because we’re often judged for demonstrating too many classically male behaviors and penalized for being
too classically female so how do you ensure your voice is heard but remain
true to yourself luckily I’ve got the fabulous Marissa silk senior staff product manager at on Fido with me today
who is going to share her story and give her advice on being your true self at work whilst getting your voice heard
welcome Marissa hi thanks for having me thank you so much for joining us I am
excited about this one um it’s something that comes up often on the podcast but
we haven’t gone into it in details how I this is going to be uh really interesting today and can we kick off
though with a bit about you we’ll hear all about you first um and uh your career and how you got into Tech
yeah sure so I am a New Yorker currently based in Berlin
um and I did not intend to have a career in Tech I studied gender studies uh both in my undergrad and my Master’s and I
really thought that I was going to have a career doing program work uh at a place like the UN or ngos
um I really wanted to work especially with women and in many of my early roles it turned out that I was you know the
person in the office who was really good with computers or Tech or software or updating websites and I was really Keen
to like learn on the job um and so I kept finding myself with all of these Tech responsibilities like
sending email blasts or coding a new newsletter template or updating the website I even networked our office once
so I’ve learned all kinds of tech skills along the way um and at a certain point in my career I
found that I had this really natural way of bringing people from different parts of the business together in order to get
work done um and that was really a good fit for Tech
um and so about halfway through my career I had I was working at L magazine
um on the online website and it turned out that I had the chance to work with editorial to sit in the
tech team to work on the website content and I had this kind of job that was at the center of all of these things and
actually a mentor another a woman VP at the business had a chat with me
um and she was like Marissa where where do you see your career going what’s your next job do you want a technical role do
you want a business role how do you see yourself and I talked her through all the things that I loved about my job
really about working in a team and collaborating and she was like I think you should Google product management
because that’s who you are and so when I talk about my career journey into Tech and into product I really do feel like
it’s a career that found me more than the other way around so that’s kind of how I got started and I never looked
back amazing and yeah and it’s it’s funny I hear often a lot of ladies fall
into Tech but it’s also a lot of other people pointing out to that person hey
did you know that you do this because it doesn’t Dawn on people does it even when you you know you get into the world of
work you sort of think I know I never really understood my job or as you said you can move around and do lots of
different things through lots of different hats on but unless somebody steps in and says hey did you know that
what you’re doing is in product management in in your case um yeah you know lucky enough to to have
uh well a woman in leadership that stepped forward and noticed that yeah absolutely I feel very grateful to her
anytime I think about how my my what my career Journey has been like I I always think about her and I often talk about
her uh in in interviews I think especially in the case of tech new jobs
are coming up like almost every day it feels like and so you know a title that might not have existed when you know
person was in university or the start of their career might suddenly emerge um and so I think that having people
around you who you know can coach you and talk you through it and highlight things that they’re observing about you
and about you know New Opportunities emerging I think that bringing you know connecting those dots is really
important yes definitely and today we’re gonna be talking a little bit about um
leadership styles and um a woman that’s stepping into a leadership role
um you mentioned there a great one who you know we’re still um looking back and seeing you know what
other people were doing on her team and how she can lift as she climbs um we’d like to start off today with
though why do you think women often adopt a leadership style that’s not necessarily Lim it doesn’t seem
authentic to them yeah it’s a really tough question but a great one
um and I’ve given I’ve given a lot of thought to to the topic in fact I think there’s sort of a few things that play
or at least I’ll I’ll draw from my own experiences so in my case especially at the start of my career um I worked in
largely male dominated Industries and male-dominated teams and so as far as
like role models that I could see in the business they were all men there weren’t women around there weren’t women in
leadership positions and I didn’t have access to diversity of leadership styles
in fact so you know I I knew what I saw and so when I was coming up in my career
I often you know emulated or mimicked or you know mirrored what I was observing
you know in my own space and in my own teams and how I was being treated and managed and led
um I think the other thing at play is that women oftentimes are given
sort of unsolicited feedback even you know informally and formally and
oftentimes especially in male-dominated industries that feedback is often coming from Men
so early days in my career you know I received a lot of conflicting feedback you know and I never really
knew the right way to act because you know one person you know one manager told me
oh you need to be you know more firm and you know uh authoritative and then
another manager said oh no mercy you’re being too aggressive you know and and you end up you know getting feedback
that’s completely inconsistent and if you’re a young woman in a like
you know early in your career it’s very difficult to know sort of how to be
um because it feels like you’re being criticized or given you know sort of constructive feedback tips no matter how
it is that you act it never at least for me at the start of my career it never felt like the way that I was being was
the right way to be yeah especially if you hear words like like aggressive you need to be more aggressive and and firm
and you’re standing there thinking that’s not me you know but and you’re right it’s hard for
um you know if you’ve only got male leaders above you and you’re trying to relate to them but also they’re trying
to relate to you and how they can give feedback to you it’s just it’s never going to work
um I suppose a good mix as well of of leaders is important
um and you know and as as well having that um we’re spacking a lot on this podcast about mentorship and sponsorship
and I’ve heard before as well that is so important to have a mix of male and
female mentors um to hear to hear all perspectives because also it’s it’s never good just
hearing from um a feminine voice either you know it’s kind of you will never find your style
if you don’t hear from from a range um of of leaders obviously um instead of
just always hearing you know the Polar Opposites probably you’re in the middle
thinking what on Earth am I doing who in Earth you know am I um she’s just not good for anybody I
mean mentally how you know every day you must be you must be thinking I’m not quite sure of myself
I suppose if you lose your own confidence as well that your team would notice wouldn’t they yeah of course I
mean I think any time you come to work wearing a mask I mean we all like mask
to a certain extent at work right because it’s a professional environment and you would expect people to be
slightly different than how they would be with their family or their friends of course but you know if you’re receiving
if you’re a young woman and you’re receiving a lot of feedback telling you to be one way or another way or being
criticized for how you are in the workplace then inevitably what’s going to happen is you’re going to come to work and
you’re not going to be able to be yourself and your team is definitely going to notice because
I don’t for lack of a better term you’re going to be kind of like weird or off or unnatural in in that work environment
and probably inconsistent it when you’re masking and pretending to be something that you’re not it’s really difficult to
be a consistent person uh in front of other people and so I do think that it
really shows and maybe people can’t quite put their finger on it but they’ll definitely think to themselves oh
there’s something something a little off or maybe I don’t know if I can trust her or you know whatever it might be but
it’s definitely going to cause that scenario is going to cause friction between you know you and your co-workers
for sure definitely yes I wanted to ask you about the importance um that we’re
able to to be ourselves at work and actually one of the things there you just said about consistency if you’re
not yourself and you’re bringing somebody slightly different every day your team obviously will notice and as
you said there’ll be that feeling of the the team will be thinking I have Whiplash I don’t know if I’m coming or
going and as you said that trust is is so important because that person you
know they could they could probably pull that off for a few months um but as as you keep going obviously if
you’re not yourself that’s quite hard to remain consistent yeah I completely agree I mean the thing
about you know being able to bring yourself to work it does
um depend quite a bit on what your environment is like the space needs to be safe enough for you to want to show
you know elements of your real self at work right and so there are kind of preconditions for being authentic or
bringing yourself you know your full self to work I would say that you know the goal of really bringing your full
self to work is is unrealistic but I do think that in circumstances where you
know the the values and principles that Define that work environment align with your personal values it definitely makes
it easier for you to be more of yourself in your workplace and that allows you to
be more comfortable to be more open uh for you to be more
um you know impactful with your team to be able to build that trust like you said and ultimately that will influence
the people around you and also make them feel safe to be more of themselves at work and all of this kind of has a
ripple effect because Ulta ultimately people who are you know more of themselves at work will perform better
yeah and that’s that’s like well proven yes definitely um I I had a conversation on here
recently you decided about safe spaces um and the the lady
um the episode hasn’t gone live yet so I’m not gonna ruin it for everybody um if you’re if you’re listening to these in order
um but we were talking about safe spaces and she said it’s I had never fought until she was in a space where she
didn’t feel safe how does that person feel when it’s you when you’re the person that feels like
you don’t belong and there’s there’s something that’s happening there like you can’t bring your full self to work
and she said it suddenly I found myself in a position where I felt like I couldn’t be my authentic self
um and she said something now now I now I’m quite conscious of that about other people and how they feel and and I love
the fact that you mentioned people being feeling safe to be themselves because
people just leave don’t they you know it’s kind of they don’t think oh you
know I’ll stick around here and mentally I’ll just worry about teams messages that are popping up all day and I just
don’t feel great about the environment um that I work in they were just eventually leave if they don’t feel like
they’re being true to themselves um do you think there are things that organizations can can do to make people
feel at ease you know when it comes to being you know authentic at work and feeling safe to be themselves
yeah I mean of course but it certainly depends on hiring a certain kind of
leader because ultimately at the end of the day leaders at all levels of the business set the tone
um and the way that those leaders show up will you know impact the way that everyone else shows up so you know
demonstrating things like situational leadership like applying different styles of leadership depending on the
context creating an environment where it’s okay to speak up including speaking
up about something that maybe you disagree with or providing an alternate Viewpoint
um I think creating forums and opportunities for people to be able to share their voices openly and for those
leaders to demonstrate that those voices are valued in the business those things are all really really important I think
also um leaders demonstrating that it’s okay to fail and that failures are really just a
stepping stone to learning I think that also helps create an environment of safety and I think that that’s really
important because at the end of the day if people if like your your employees if you’re a leader and your employees don’t
feel safe and they don’t feel comfortable in that environment I mean for one you’re not going to get the best
work and the best product out of them but as you said people will leave because it causes so much internal
friction and so much internal strife when you don’t feel like you belong in your space
um and that’s like at the end of the day that’s not good good business no exactly and yeah I completely agree on on
leaders that are so honest when things don’t work and and how you’ll get around
them um I worked in an American company and I must say it is it is a culture thing and
I think in in the UK in particular we took us cells out out of a lot of things
trying a lot of things and we just sort of think well this will go wrong that will go wrong an American company I was
always told if you want to try something just give it a go try not to cost us any
money whilst you’re doing it but give it a go and if it’s okay if if you fell it’s okay
um and I saw that from my leadership team as well and that really did trickle
down I was very young at the time and you don’t have the confidence to try things obviously when you’re very young
but seeing that your leadership team are doing the same thing owning up to you know things that go wrong this created
this safe space that everybody could feel like they they can try things and people at that company they stay a
really long time they leave they go back you know it’s one of those cultures that you just think it’s been fostered to
feel safe where you can just you know be be your true self and and that’s it but
um I suppose it really depends on the company does it doesn’t it if you feel you’re not safe
like you said you’re going to exit yeah absolutely I mean I think so your point
about American culture is really interesting so I’m an American currently in Berlin but I actually moved from New
York to Sydney and then from Sydney to Berlin um and it was really interesting for me so in New York I was working in
magazines and news and we had really big website traffic it was it was a big they were big Publications and so it was
really easy to try something new and if it didn’t work we would just undo it who would have results and we could see
if we had made a good choice or not a good choice and that sort of environment of openness and experimentation was just
part of how we worked when I moved from New York to Australia not only were there cultural differences
but I also moved into Banking and as you might expect a Traditional Bank is quite
you know it’s quite a bit more risk-averse than a newspaper in New York would be
um but even there because of the way that leadership was it was really easy
to sort of convince my peers and my managers take a chance and to take those risks and to be open and show that kind
of safe style so oftentimes you know in Tech we you know talk about things like
agile or scrum or methodologies where really they’re all about kind of trying
something you know in a time box and then evaluating how it went and then either changing or doing it differently
and so I use that kind of tech mindset with my managers in Australia to say what if we try it out for two weeks and
then we regroup as a team and if you know it didn’t work then we never have to do it ever again and this was a
really great way to kind of open up the space and create that safety and create those kind of quick learning loops that
we really needed to do our jobs yeah and a great leadership style as well to to
make people feel like it’s okay to try something it will be safe and you can
trust me as a leader because we’re going to do it in a in a set time period and you know it’s just taking away that risk
and making people feel like um you could you can be trusted obviously and I
always love the fact that you mentioned about speaking up on things that you don’t agree with is it is hard isn’t it
when you’re especially when you move more into a leadership position and you you have to have those awkward
conversations and and as you quite rightly one of the first things you said um when we started this conversation was
Your Role Models up until that point have probably been men so it is
difficult if you’ve seen men have those awkward conversations and then drop in and say that they don’t agree with
something how do you do that had an after you approach that when those conversations
come up it’s um I don’t know have you had an example
where you’ve had to have a an awkward conversation like that oh my gosh there’s so many
um and I have to admit that this was a really difficult skill for me to learn especially I think working in news and
media in New York because in that kind of environment one it’s very fast-paced
um two it’s almost entirely men um and three people are allowed people
are allowed in a newsroom I don’t know if you’ve ever watched you know TV shows where there’s you know it’s it’s based in a newsroom but it’s loud yeah and
people are often shouting from one you know area of the floor to the next or having you know a very
spirited discussion I’ll call but it’s loud in The Newsroom and the truth is
that like naturally I’m really quiet and I’m really shy and I kept you know
like looking for those moments where I might be able to interject and I kept you know like those moments
kept passing me by and then the conversation you know would have you know migrated five six seven topics and
that moment for speaking up was completely gone and I kept leaving these conversations feeling really frustrated
with myself thinking Marissa why didn’t you jump in you had something to say you didn’t agree or you know whatever it was
and I think the environment was probably safe but I just couldn’t quite figure out how to do it
um and of course you know in school you’re used to raising your hand and someone calls on you but that’s not what it’s like in the workplace at least when
you’re co-located of course you know tools like Zoom you know and Google meet have added you know a virtual raised
hand it makes it you know much easier for shy people but when you’re in a really noisy office it’s really
difficult to speak up so I decided to teach myself how to do it
so what I did is I basically looked around the office or I thought about my past jog about people who you know use
their voice productively how did and I I tried to observe so how did this person interject how did this person speak up
how did this person find a way to enter a conversation that seemed like it was completely closed and I just you know
took this approach where I watched for you know a week or two just trying to sort of figure out how other people did
it and then you know when it came you know to attending these kinds of meetings or conversations
I would I would try and sort of like channel that person in my mind and at first it was kind of slow right because
I’m observing and I’m thinking oh you know this person would have spoken up right there so the first moment the
first sort of Step was to observe and then figure out oh I should have jumped in there to try and sort of identify
those moments and then a couple of weeks later once I got good at that I tried speaking up hey I have something
to say hey can I jump in um you know hey I I actually I’m not
sure if I agree with that and I found these ways to kind of jump into the conversation and you know what it worked
people stopped they made space for me I was able to share you know my opinions
and My Views and the more that I was kind of seeing the positive results of my behavior change the more I wanted to
do it and the more I wanted to jump in and the more I wanted to sort of be you know a different version of myself
in those moments and it felt so great to sort of see the progress over those weeks
yes uh I love that I it’s it doesn’t happen overnight she said it happens over
several weeks I think as well that you just noticing how people respond to
other people in a group the people tend to um when people do start to to speak up
and share their opinions it’s people tend to listen as well to people that they know they can trust
that what they say is going to happen and all of that is built over time you
know people you know trust is earned and you need to build that over time um and the more you speak up and the
more you actually act on the things that you say and that you’re going to do the
more you know the more people listen um but yeah it takes a while doesn’t it to to build that up it’s not something
like you go into a workplace and after four days um you’re heard and trusted and
everything’s wonderful um that really does obviously take take a little while it definitely takes time
yeah do you have any advice um on how our listeners can find a leadership
style that is true to themselves spoken a little bit about you know
it is difficult if you’ve had a lot of all-male um leadership and some great leadership
in there as well um but how how do you find a style that is true to you
yeah it’s really tricky especially if you haven’t observed role models in your
own workspace that you can kind of channel in those moments when you’re trying to think about how you want to
grow yourself um but for me I approach it quite similarly to you know what I’ve I’ve
just explained I kind of thought about people from school whether
it be teachers or peers thought about people in my workplace again whether it
was you know leaders from different areas of the business or people in my team and I really kind of thought about
traits that they were exhibiting that I thought were positive and resonated with
me and also were productive in the workplace and I kind of wrote a list for myself to say okay I really like how
this person you know interjects in a meeting and I really like how this person tells a story when they present
and I really loved you know how you know this leader kind of speaks softly when
they’re trying to make a really important point and I channeled all of these kinds of you know traits that I
was observing around me throughout my life and I just kind of made this list
and then when I would go to work I would you know keep this list with me and I would refer to it and I would kind of
think like you know what is what is like professional Marissa do in this moment
well professional Marissa would do this and this and this and over time I just you know the gap
between who I was and who I wanted to be just grew smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller until you know I was
that person that I really wanted to be um so I just kind of picked and chose from the best of what I
had observed in my environment and just kind of tried to channel that person as much as I could I think through this
process there’s a few things that can help you one is to be really gentle with yourself
like creating personal change is really difficult and we really need to you know
give ourselves space to get it wrong or have a misstep or think you know what I
liked how this person did it but it doesn’t work for me actually to strike it off your list and you make a change I
think also having you know people like Champions or sponsors and mentors
you know cheering you on and helping you learn and grow and even giving you tips hey Marissa you know I saw that you
tried a new thing in this meeting you know maybe next time it would go better if you did you know this right so having
people who can kind of observe you and Coach you on that Journey you know can also be really helpful especially when
you know maybe it feels like it’s it’s too hard yes I love the fact that you mentioned
speaking softly actually um you and that you took uh as a positive from a leader
um and you thought actually when you’re serving them you you still that they they are are heard well even though
they’re speaking Softly how do they do that and it was something that you saw as a positive because
people see things especially feminine traits they sort of think well we know that’s that’s almost a weakness in that
point you have to be as you said earlier aggressive and loud and Shout but actually just seeing that somebody can
can have the same effect as speaking softly um it’s so interesting as yeah that you
started to observe you know you don’t always have to be that aggressive male typical male leader
um really interesting because you so you mentioned um you are naturally quiet and reserved
um do you have any advice to someone who is struggling to to find their voice and
and and speaking up I mean you mentioned there about just really just observing
um what what people are doing and and and finding your leadership style you also mentioned earlier
um that things like Zoom really help and I have always wondered that I actually did the associated Tech was it the
introverts that suddenly bought everything just got much easier because now we’re all on a Level Playing Field
we can all see each other and you can just raise your hands like do do you have any advice for people perhaps when
you’re not on zoom and you might be back in person and you know how to how to
find your voice yeah of course so I think finding an ally in the room can be really helpful
so for example uh in University days I was really shy to speak up I often
wanted to contribute to the discussion but I really I couldn’t make it happen uh
when I was you know 18 19 20 for example I was just too shy and and too insecure
to be honest and so I remember at the start of the semester I would approach my professors and say hey I really want
to be a person who contributes to this but I’m too shy so can you just call my
name at different moments of the discussion can you just call my name and ask what I think because inevitably I
always have an opinion I like to have opinions I I think all the time I’m a thoughtful person by
nature but I kind of need you to create this space for me and you can do this in your workplace too so you can you know
tell a person who’s you know if you have people in your team who are often the ones sharing the meeting
you can tell them hey you know a key moments can you just call on me and ask what I think and if I don’t have
something to say I’ll say path and that’ll be fine but more likely than not I will have something to contribute and
I’d really love if you would support me in that way you know what and people want to help their team members shine
they want to help create that space they want people to feel comfortable and so
I can’t imagine a situation where if you approach you know a person who often leads meetings in that way I can’t
imagine somebody saying no to you so that’s my number one recommendation the other recommendation I have is that
actually something that I did is I started volunteering to chair the meetings
so I’ve personally found that it’s actually a lot less scary to be the facilitator than to be a person in the
meeting itself because first off that means that I kind of have been given permission to speak by virtue of holding
that facilitator you know seat but also it means that I can create a mechanism
for engaging the people in the room in a way that feels comfortable for me so maybe I ask people to you know write
some notes and have a quiet think about you know a few questions or a few like prompts and then I go around round robin
and I call on everyone in the room and everyone kind of shares what they’ve written down this is a really great way
to engage people of all different you know personality types and comfort levels
um and thinking Styles and if you are the one facilitating then you have the opportunity to create an environment
that feels great for you yes yes and and I think to a lot of people that are quite shy
that I think that having the thought of thinking sharing something would just be
so frightening for some people but actually it’s one of the best things that that you that you can do as you
said you get to create that space and just getting over that that little herd or that little thought in your head
where you think well no that’s that would be really frightening um you can just get past that and then make sure that you’re making a space for
yourself and everybody else as well um to feel like they can be heard that’s great advice
um I love that I haven’t heard that one before either with the mentors um that is super interesting as you said
most people want to help other people shine I completely agree with that and that it’s always okay to ask because
some people they feel frightened to ask they don’t like other people to say you know will you be my mentor will you help
me with with something but most people no times out of ten they they will say
yes um but yeah there’s always that sort of strange strange feeling isn’t there do
you have any advice on finding a mentor it’s a little bit more than just will you be my mentor
um how do you find one do you do you find them in you know a range or do you find
them in different places what what would you say I have tons of advice on this topic I have been both a mentee and a
mentor for many years uh in my career and actually at on Fido I even run a mentoring program for the product org
um so there’s plenty of weight that you can find a mentor one is that you can be a little bit Brave and approach someone
that you like or You observe or you know you think would be a great you know
companion for you on your journey and you can say Hey you know I’m looking for a mentor do you have capacity I think
that’s a really easy way to kind of bring it to them to see to ask if they have time and energy for that
um but I think that also you can ask your manager to pair you up with someone so I’ve helped you know I do this
through the mentoring program but in the past I’ve also had managers find me a
mentor and that is a lot less scary because ultimately then your manager is approaching peers or people they know or
have relationships with it’s also a lot you know easier for that person if they don’t have capacity or interest to say
no to your manager than to a person like to the mentee space having a manager sort of facilitate that
you know is a really good way to get started also now especially since the
pandemic there are plenty of online opportunities for finding a mentor if you want to connect with someone outside
of your org especially if you work in a small company um so I used to Mentor with an amazing
platform called coffee code break and it’s mentoring by women for women in Tech
and uh their mentors all over the globe speaking of variety of languages with
expertise in a variety of subjects another friend of mine started a mentoring platform called My Mentor path
so if you’re feeling you know too intimidated to find a mentor in your own space or to even you know tell your
manager that you’d like a mentor there’s all these resources online that will you know help pair you with a great person
yes there’s that there’s great advice as well you are right some people might
feel a little bit awkward and might not have the capacity and don’t know how to say to you you know it’s a no now rain
check um but yeah if it’s to a manager um that’s great I mean you you wouldn’t
even I probably wouldn’t even have thought of that of asking a manager to find a mentor you naturally think we
know it’s all on me um also come some companies obviously have like a matching service
um that that can help but um that’s not always available to everybody um while we’re on the subjects mentors
do you you had mentioned that you’ve been the mentor and the mentee um do you have any amazing female role
models um in in your life um that that they can be you know mentors or
they could be role models from from home or home environment who in your life
um inspires you I have to say that I’ve been very lucky over the years I have
collected such an amazing group of of women and men uh who have been role
models for me over the years I think in the earliest days I had some amazing teachers especially in high school they
were women who saw something in me that I didn’t yet
see in myself and they took an interest and they spent time with me and they pushed me outside of my comfort zone and
I really think that those kinds of relationships really started me on a different kind of path to be honest and
then of course doing gender studies you know for my bachelor’s and Masters you know those programs are full of women
amazing women with different personalities and styles and interests
and to see all of the sort of diversity in a group of people that you know
Society kind of views as homogeneous which is entirely not the case I think
that was also really positive experience for me in my current work environment
um I work with a ton of great women I am I have tons of mentees at on Fido in
fact and we have amazing women in our product team is it okay if I give them a
shout yes so our product team is currently led by
our CPO yulin and our VP of product Therese I have amazing mentees in Julia
Virginia reluca and so many more I think that it’s really unusual to find a
product team with so many Stellar women um and I feel really lucky to be a part of this group yes and as a company you
you must have worked hard as well to to Foster that those ladies want to stay
that they want to progress and there’s always that feeling of feeling safe and moving forward
um I think some people especially when they start to companies that start to look into working on diversity and their
culture so they think things might magically happen overnight but they really don’t you know a company really
has to work hard to to make sure um that everybody not just leadership and
everybody you know feels safe they can bring their authentic self to work every day
um and they stay and obviously they’re there to to move the company forward um but that doesn’t happen by accident
yeah that’s right and visibility is so key so I mean as you’ve said you have to
be purposeful in recruiting women and recruiting people from you know diverse backgrounds into your teams of course
but also making them visible internally and externally is really important because it shows you know people who
might be thinking about a career at your company hey there are people like you here and it’s okay you know to be
whoever you are and we welcome you and we value you and we want you to be here and so you know for me especially as
I’ve grown more senior in my career I’ve tried to find moments where I can make myself visible to other women in Tech to
say hey there are women here and there are women in positions of leadership or really senior roles here and you can
have a career just like mine you know and you can be welcomed and belong and you know
find success so I really do think that you know as we get more senior
it’s really important for us to create that visibility so that you know women of the younger generation see that
there’s a space for them yes definitely and that is lovely advice to end it on because we are already out of time I
could keep talking on these subjects um a fair enough a half hour but we are already out of time so thank you so much
Marissa it has been a pleasure thank you so much for agreeing to come on and chat with us today thanks for having me
and for everybody listening as always thank you for joining us and we hope to see you again next time
