 This is JSA TV, the newsroom for tech and telecom professionals, and JSA Radio, your voice for tech and telecom on iHeart Radio. I'm Jamie Skada-Kataja, and on behalf of my team here at JSA, welcome to our monthly virtual CEO roundtable. These virtual roundtables lead us up to our on-site CEO roundtables at our C-level networking event, the Telecom Exchange. Next one up, June 20th in Hoboken, New Jersey at the W Hotel. And then later in the year, Telecom Exchange LA, November 7th, Beverly Hills. More info on both events at ctelecomexchange.com. So let's get started. We are here today, and it's an exciting roundtable. We are kicking off the very first of a biannual series featuring an all-female virtual CEO roundtable panelist. So our topic today, Climbing the Executive Ladder as Women in Tech and Telecom. We should mention that this comes on the heels of JSA announcing its Women's Speaking Initiative, or WSI, where we encourage articulate female thought leaders in our industry to fill in those speaking resumes on jsa.net. So we can share those profiles quarterly to event producers in our industry. And I hope that we can encourage more women as speakers on important tech and telecom panels and roundtables such as this. So truly, it is my pleasure to kick this off. Again, first of its kind, all female virtual roundtable, and introduce you to our executive lineup from five absolutely innovative ladies and five absolutely innovative companies. We have Ms. Sarah McComb, she's the Director of Global Acquisitions of Microsoft. Brynn Fowler, Director of Network Planning, Strategy and Enablement of Oracle. Sandra Dinovales, Head of Partner Alliances of Telehouse International Corporation of America, KDDIA. And Sarea Tarant, Sales Executive, Carrier Market of Telecom Italia Sparkle. And Amy Mark, CEO and Co-Founder of Excite Modular. All right, ladies. So let's go ahead and go around the corner. And our first question, also a little bit about yourself, your role in your respective organizations. Sarah, we'll begin with you. Hi, everyone. As Amy said, my name is Sarah McComb. I am the Director of Global Network Acquisitions for Microsoft, focusing on the Asia-Pacific region. So this is India to the west coast of the United States. We cover everything from network topology to network location and specialty cable acquisition. I've been in the industry for about 15 years, the last four of those at Microsoft. And I'm also really proud to say that I'm one of the co-founders for the Women's Tech Forum, which is a new initiative that started about a year and a half ago. As a new industry group for women in the industry, run by women. And we're really happy with how it worked out. And I should say we are so honored to have two of the very four founders of WTC, Bryn, an introduction for you. Hello, my name is Bryn Fowler. I work for Oracle. I am Director of Network Planning Strategy and Enablement for our cloud products. So I own both acquisition as well as the business development function of our cloud connect product called VasConnect. I've been in the industry for about 15 years. Before Oracle, I launched Megaport's SDM platform into the United States and Europe. And then I also spent some time at Microsoft. I'm very proud to be one of the co-founders of the Women's Tech Forum, also lovingly known as WTF. And I think we really built the network and built the support system to be just that. We recognized that there was a gap in the industry of women not being able to get to know women outside of the industry and conferences and work that we do on a day to day basis. So the women, including myself, decided, you know, since something doesn't exist, we're going to create something. And so it's really blossomed into what it's become today. And I'm really proud of that. Love it. Sandra? My name is Sandra Dinebellis and I am head of partner alliances here for KDDI Tallahouse, the U.S. division of KDDI. For those of you who don't know KDDI, we are a global telecommunications company, Global Fortune 300. And I have been with the company for just about seven and a half years. Prior to my role in partner alliances, I headed up the global marketing effort here out of the U.S. Including digital PR, event strategy, and analyst relations, as well as some partner management. And again, I've been in the industry for 20 plus years in a variety of different roles, working for Sprint, IBM, and also on the ad agency side. I worked for Ogilvy and Mather for many years, as well as having my own consulting firm in the arts and entertainment industry, completely outside of tech and telecom. But so really looking forward to the richness, I think, of this discussion with so many different types of backgrounds and experiences. We as well. Hi, everybody. My name is Saraya Terrence. I've been in the industry exclusively in the telecom industry for more than 25 years, starting as a telecom engineer. I have been with Telecom Italia now and responsible for wholesale carrier sales for North America. Telecom Italia Barco is a large telecom company, global company with investment in undersea cable around the world. And it's a tier one IP transit provider worldwide. And Amy, round yourself. Hi, my name is Amy Marks and I'm the CEO of Excite Modular. We are design builders of steel and concrete modular cable landing stations, as well as modular data centers, edge data centers, micro data centers, pretty much anything in the tech side of things. All of our buildings are designed and built here in the United States, and we ship them overseas to be rapidly deployed in locations all over the world. We've done actually design and built buildings on six of the seven continents. And we are a woman owned certified woman owned business. And I'm an alumna of the Harvard Business School. Wonderful. Excited to have you ladies and we're going to just roll up our sleeves dig right in. First tough question out what challenges and Brent will stop with you here. What challenges have you faced while climbing that executive ladder and tech and telecom. The question, I think it's actually varied at various stages throughout my career I think as I was younger entering the industry in my career, a lot of the challenges that I faced were in many ways within myself. And I had to find opportunities to build myself confidence and build success through the work that I did. I think as I've grown up in the industry one of the biggest challenges and actually I would say this is a pretty big benchmark in my career was the move that I made from an individual contributor going into management. And for me personally, I wasn't finding opportunities within the company that I worked for that would give me those opportunities to lead a team and to grow and develop my own staff. So I ended up looking outside the company and finding opportunities to grow my career and and really expand myself, which is something that I really had a passion in doing as I've grown up into leadership roles. I think the biggest challenges have really been about, again, going back to that authentic self and perception of what my capabilities are and understanding and owning what what I've developed and what I've been able to grow in. And know within myself throughout my career. So I think a lot of it, a lot of my confidence and a lot of what I've been able to do professionally is definitely a reflection of the mentors and the people that I've had around me. But it's also been a function of just getting to know myself and getting to know what works for me and what doesn't work for me. So it's really, in many ways, been an evolving process. And I try to look at every obstacle is also an opportunity to learn and to move forward. Sandra, if you could weigh in, challenges you faced. Sure, I agree. I think that it evolves over time. For me, I think early in my career was learning how to be more visible. How to differentiate yourself. I was working in a large organization where I was starting out in sales. And so, you know, in addition to standing out and being doing the job and performing at a high level, it's like, how do you differentiate yourself and be more visible. And I think part of that was also taking on, you know, different roles or asking to take on different projects or creating a task force, for example, which is something that I did early on in community relations. So I would suggest that that's certainly a good way to go. I think after as my career evolved, there were other expectations that I had. I think a lot of times from my manager or boss at the time, you know, direction that I expected to get and didn't receive. So I think, you know, the process of growing early on is very much to do, as Bryn says, looking within, right. So in the case of, for me, I think it was to definitely, you know, figure out ways to, you know, to evolve and to grow. So, Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well said, Soraya. Jamie, the challenges that I faced as I moved up the ladder are really no different to challenges that many women face, not only in our industry, but in other industries as well. And as I moved up, I kind of the benefit of having supportive mentors and people that pull you up diminished. And I found that performance alone are no longer enough that you need to have a strategy and you have to have allies. By the way, this is supported by research. As women move up the ladder, the structured, structured talent management, and I use the term talent and I like it because talent implies that the talent already is there. And therefore you are supporting it, nurturing it and managing it. And that is unfortunately lacking in many companies, not only in our industry. So that's what the other thing is, of course, you also have your personal responsibility. You really need to find those allies and network and be a team player. And by the way, customers are a valuable ally in your growth. And so, yeah, and one last thing that I want to mention is that this focus on nurturing talent. You have to have a keen eye on it because as we become decentralized and global and you bring in different cultures and their views and biases towards growth, you really have to make sure you keep your eye on the ball. Amy? Well, I almost giggle a little at the question because I, again, I'm in tech and construction, so it's almost like what is not a challenge in every part of my activity I've ever done. So I think early in my career, it was the challenge was about being as knowledgeable as I could about the niche market that I've chosen to be in and to know that better than anybody else. And then as I grew in my career and realized that I took on more responsibility and larger and larger scope and management of more and more people. I think as women, we're incredibly judgmental of ourselves, more so than anybody else, you know, who judges us. And I would sit at a conference table and I would worry that I didn't know the answer to every single system question on every single system within a giant ego structure that we were talking about. And thought, Oh, my God, I'm actually, maybe I, maybe I'm not as good as I think because I don't know the answer to this very, very detailed technical question about one particular system within another system within something else that, you know, look, you can't be an electrical engineer and a mechanical engineer and a telecom engineer, you can't be all those things and be a CEO at the same time. And so I realized, I have to let go of some of that judgment and surround myself with people that I empower to know every single one of those answers. And that actually makes me good at what I do, not necessarily that I know every single one of those answers. And I think this, you know, the industry put so much pressure on us. I used to call it dumps the girl game, you know, I'd be at the table, and like I inevitably get some person, at least a man, that would try to ask me every hard question known to man about every single thing that we were talking about, even if it didn't even apply to the conversation. And at some point I had to say, look, you know, that's not my area of expertise. The person sitting next to me, that's their area of expertise. And let me pass that question along to them. And still feel good about myself. I think that's the biggest challenge that we have as women is that we're constantly, you know, especially women that are successful, I say like I have to carry a very big bat sometimes like to make my way in the industry. But that big bat I use it on myself probably harder than anybody else. And so we've got to kind of learn to let go a little bit and know that we're really good at what we do to get here. You know, that's enough. I couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more. Sarah, anything to round this conversation out? Yeah, I would say so. Everything that these ladies have spoken on, absolutely I've experienced as well. And one of the things that I see it all starting for for me for the one of the biggest challenges that I've had is needing to overcome the perceived weakness of emotion of being a woman. So over the years, I have been repeatedly told to not be so sensitive. Confidence came across in ways seen as convention or that any hint of passion was I need to calm down. So it was all reactions and all emotions that I saw out of my male counterparts, if they received no reprimands. So I've had to then shift the way that I approach things and spend a lot of time carefully choosing how am I going to approach this, what words am I going to use, how is this going to be presented. I think and I've had to do that above and beyond ways that my male counterparts have asked me to be not happy with. Be softer, be softer, right? They say be softer. And we're always coming from this emotional base that these decisions aren't being made with the mind. That's so many examples. I'm keeping it in on the moderate here. So ladies, where do you see new opportunities? You know, we talk about challenges. Now let's talk about turning those challenges into opportunities. So on the horizon for women in tech and telecom, Sandra, why don't you go first? What do you see as new opportunities? Sure. You know, it's interesting when I first got into the industry over 20 plus years ago, you know, one of the things that I loved about technology and telecom is that it's always changing, right? So you have to have the ability to move, to be nimble, to be open-minded. In terms of where the industry is moving, I think it's clear that cloud is certainly a great place to be. IOT, telehouse, certainly the division I'm working in, the data center division is experiencing explosive growth, although the industry is shifting. And edge computing, IOT is definitely creating disruption in the data center industry. You know, for young women starting out, I think that there's opportunity in a way that there hasn't been in engineering, in product development. I think there's more and more hybrid roles presenting themselves like overlay type roles where if you have a new business development background combined with a marketing background, there's a number of new roles and opportunities. You know, it's interesting now that we're living in the world of social media and there's this talk about, okay, you know, are you still communicating face-to-face in a way that we did 10, 20 years ago? And I think the answer is yes. And that is never going to go away. I think more and more the need to collaborate, the need to have those strong people skills will continue to be so incredibly valuable. And I think that as women is really what we do well, right? So that's really good news, I think for all women who like to communicate, who like to reach out, who like to nurture and mentor others. So that's in a nutshell, I think, where I see some opportunities. So I agree. I absolutely agree. And I am really optimistic about the future for women in technology and telecom. How can I not be? Look at the people that I'm on the panel with. I think to forecast those opportunities in an environment where technology has grown so fast is kind of impossible. It is impacting our lives, impacting how we relate to each other and how to lead our lives. So I'm just hoping though that because of that, because of the way technology is moving, that younger women are inspired to pursue science and technology career because it's impacting their lives now, right? With the iPhone and everything else that they're holding. So I'm hoping that they'll see that it's not a boring profession that they can apply that engineering degree or science degree in the right way that is kind of unlimited. And Amy, you're surely an inspiration to those young women out there. So what is your take on new opportunities? So I'm, I'm actually lucky enough to lead up the working group on diversity and inclusion for suboptic. We were just actually having this conversation. And it's scary. I could count on almost, you know, one or two hands in that side of the business, how many women I know they're in operational roles. And in the United States, the people of color that I could mention that I knew in the industry actually went through it with a colleague. We were struggling to really think about who we knew on the operation side. So I look at that and I look at that like everything else in our business. There's a lane that is wide open there. You know, it's like I look around the room at some of these meetings. And listen, I'm 47 when I'm the youngest person in the room and one of like two females. Like that's a problem, right? And a problem can be an opportunity at that point because it needs energy. It needs people that do understand things like social media and the Internet of Things and what the edge is actually doing to change our business. And that's where a lot of the growth is coming on our side. We've actually, we doubled our revenue from last year in one year. I mean, think about the growth of the smaller companies that are out there capitalizing on some of these spaces. There's tons of opportunities, not that they think to step into some of these roles at the larger companies and be a part of what's going on. But to really be entrepreneurial about it and start your own business and think about how you can impact that with the people around you because it is wide open right now. And by the way, I mean construction alone as an example, we are the second lightest vendor on digitization and technology in all industries, second only to agriculture and hunting. Right. So when we talk about digitization and construction, I look at that and I say, okay, well, if I become the most, if I put all of my eggs in that basket, I've got to rise to the top because no one else is going down that blue ocean, right? No one else is going in that place that I can be at and make an impact. So I think I would say the opportunities are in some of the most unlikely places. And I personally love when I'm in that room and I'm the youngest and the only woman in the room because first everybody knows my name, and I'm not shy. So that's good. You know, and secondly, I know I'm going to be there for the long term, and I can take what I've learned from other industries and other places I've been around this globe recently and apply it to this industry that in some ways has not exactly, you know, even though we're in telecom hasn't always been the earliest adapters of new things that are out there. And I don't mean technology, but I actually think more in process and methodology and the way that we look at the business world. So I think, you know, everybody came out of that same genesis of where they came from, like we always say, like everyone came out of bell and so they all grew up in the same place and we all do the same thing. You know, that's the case. What a fantastic opportunity to bring some new thinking and some new innovations to the industry. Excellent. Well said. And Sarah? Honestly, I see the opportunities are endless. I cannot think of a single part of the industry that would not benefit for having more women in it. I can say from my perspective, so running a global network acquisition team and managing a team in Asia arguably one of the more still very traditional, very male dominated just across the industry there. I run a team that is 80% women. It wasn't designed. It just happened. But I have 80% of my team is women and they are dominating in that today. And it just goes to show that it's not necessarily about what appendage somebody has their ability to do a job. And I think that it's important to recognize that the approach that individuals take regardless of their gender and that they bring to the table can be diverse. And that diversity is important and provides additional opportunity just because it's not your way doesn't mean it's the wrong way. So really the opportunities are completely endless. I love that. It's such a great lead in actually to my next question. Ladies, I'm going to ask you to come up with three words that come to mind to describe your ability to climb that executive ladder. So we'll just quickly go around the horn and just hear three words from each of you. And, you know, sort of what it takes that moxie if you will to climb that ladder. Sarah will start with you. Mine are expected bumpy and proud. I love it. Oh boy, data driven, vocal and ambitious. Love it. Sandra. Drive, resilience and enthusiasm. That's so important. Soraya. Ambition, desire, confidence. I was confident working with the sea level and strategy. Amy. Definitely tenacity, passion and humor has been coming to play for me. I love it. I love it. All right, now let's get to the real the real McCoy here the big question. Finally, what would you love to see happen and maybe improve for women in our industry in the next 10 years? Getting at the ball, looking 10 years down the pike. What do you see happening or hopefully improving for women in the tech and telecom space? And Bryn, we're going to start with you. Well, I can speak on this for a long time. I think the biggest thing and I've actually witnessed more and more of this over the last year and I credit a lot of this to the fact that I've become more vocal about women's issues in the industry. But I would love to see more men asking women what their opinions are and what some of their challenges are. And I encourage women at their own companies to speak out to their leadership and to ask for support and ask for help. But I think, you know, it change starts individually. It doesn't necessarily start systemic and change is also not something that you should just sit back and expect your companies just to wake up one day and change. Just like you can't expect to get ahead in your career if you just wait for something to happen. You have to speak up and you have to take and take ownership of your destiny and your success. And I would say the same thing about the industry. I think the very speaking to the change question that came up earlier. We are at an inflection point as an industry and you see articles written in data center knowledge about the gender gap and you see people at industry conferences talking about the problem and wanting to solve a problem. But sometimes solving the problem and changing the perception is simply a matter of asking people individually what they can do. If you have a problem with your talent pipeline, then don't just ask your friends who they know. Go ask a woman that works in the industry if they know someone. Go ask how you can be more creative. How can you pull women in the channel, for example, over into a cloud organization or into a different role within telecommunications organization. Be creative. Ask for help. Ask for support. And I can guarantee you if you ask for the support to build programs and to change and to inspire leadership and to encourage better, better attrition rates than there are right now. People will run hand over fist to try and help solve the problem. And I guarantee you that support will be there. At least that's from my experience. Love it. Sandra. So well said, Bryn. Yeah, I mean, as a whole in general, I'd like to see the percentages of women in upper management increase. Obviously more women coming into the industry and to, to one of the points that was making earlier, I think sort of demystify this illusion or this perception that technology is technical. Technology at the end of the day is a people business like any business. So, so that's one thing. I think also being a woman, a wife, a mother of two of two kids. I don't know how many other moms are on the panel here, but you know, certainly I'd like to see corporations instituting more programs regarding reentry. So, if women have been out of the workforce because they've been taking care of children or even just taking care of an aging parent that they're these enterprise organizations do something regarding reentry and supporting that process of women who have been out of the workforce for a while. So, you know, I think at the end of the day, we also have to own our own destiny and in terms of navigating our mobility and our future. So, to Bryn's point, I think it's clear that we have to try to create our own communities of support within the organization too. So, reaching out to men, I think, you know, we haven't brought up the Me Too movement, but certainly that has created a lot of awareness across the board. And I'm hearing so many more men talk about how the Me Too movement has impacted their mentality or that these men have daughters. There's a heightened sensitivity, I think, to the challenges that we face. So, yeah, that's what I would like to see. So many critical points, absolutely. I wish we had more time. I want to take each point and flush it out further. Saree, anything to add there? Well, what I would like to do is kind of to open the lens and just have a more strategic view as to why do we want women in higher positions in technology and telecom? It's because the technology and telecom in its quantum leap is impacting our lives and we need to have representation at the board level, at the senior management level in order to be heard. So that's one reason we want to beat it. And despite the fact that research shows presence of women in 4,500 boards and senior management has resulted in increased, I mean, real increase in return on investment, we still don't have enough women at the top positions, especially in technology and telecom. And I'm sorry to say that even our colleagues on the West Coast, in those large companies relative to their size, don't have enough women in the board and executive level. And that needs to be improved. So I think what it's going to take, it's really, again, a concerted effort, a structured talent management, especially as you move up. And really the commitment of the CEOs inside and outside the company, they have to be the voice that promotes this. And basically, I think it's a numbers game, right? The more women you have in the telecom technology that come into the industry, you'll have more women moving up, and therefore you'll have a bigger pool at the top. And those women at the top have an obligation to really help the ones who are coming in to move up. So it is an honor and an obligation. Amy? I love how you ended that, actually, Soraya, because I was going to say one of my words is controversies, that seems to follow me wherever I go. And so maybe my answer will be a little bit different. But I do love what everyone has said. I think, yes, we definitely need more women in tech, CEOs need to look at the programs and need to bring more people in. And that also happened. We all know that groups think happens if we don't have people of diversity and women on these boards and things like that. But I'm going to put some responsibility back on us for a minute, which I think Soraya touched on. I believe in 10 years, what I'd like to see is women actually helping other women get business, get those positions, know about opportunities, learn about how to infiltrate companies that they want to gain access. I don't think we actually help each other the way that men help each other. We don't. And every time I go to a conference, it's like, oh, there's a women's breakfast. Let's go drink coffee at 6.30 in the morning now that we've all been out till 2 o'clock in the morning doing our real jobs. And now we have to wake up and go be nice to other women and try to meet some other women. Yeah, at the end of the day, that's great. But what really is going to help us is when you have such relationships in this industry with other women that they pick up the phone and call you when an opportunity is going to come out. That they call you when a position is going to be open, that they call you when they hear there's a change that's going to happen that would impact you and your business that would help you get ahead. And we don't do that. That's a problem. You are literally describing why we founded WTF. I'll be joining after this. I feel like, listen, at the end of the day, no one, we said earlier, no one's ever even asked me for my certification for being a woman owned business and we deal with fortune 10 companies, not one person in our industry has ever asked me about that. And in reality, some women somewhere if those companies should be pushing me as a supplier knowing that I am a certified woman owned business, but that doesn't exist. And so unfortunately, this is going to sound again like a little bit controversial. We need to form those relationships that men form when they help each other and get each other ahead so that they build a network of relationships that actually take action. And we have to do that. We have a responsibility and obligation to do that. So true. Like, boom, my drop. Final words, final words. Honestly, for me, my goal is to stop having panels like this, to stop meeting separate organizations. This is something that is going to take all of the stuff that all of these women have spoken about. And it's going to take, I wish it could happen in 10 years. It's probably going to take a lot longer. But honestly, my goal is to have it not be about being a woman. I don't want to get a job because I'm a woman. I don't want to be, I don't want that to be a deciding factor. I want it to be because I am the best person for the job. So it shouldn't be about our gender. It shouldn't be about our race. And it's going to take a really long time. And we have to make a lot of steps to do that first, where we have to make it about being a woman first, before we can make it about not being a woman. Well said. Amen. So much more can be said about this. And we certainly will have it. Stay tuned. We'll do this roundtable again in a couple of months from now. Thank you, ladies, for your amazing insights. Again, our all-star panelists, Sarah McComb from Microsoft, Bryn Fowler, Oracle, Sandra DeNovellis, Telehouse International Corporation of America, KDDIA, Soraya Tarant, Telecom Italia Sparkle, and Amy Marks, Excite Modular. This wraps up our latest virtual CEO roundtable. Come meet us in person June 19th of the 20th, telecom exchange in Hoboken, New Jersey, where many companies like NIACS and Extreme Networks and Microsoft and more will be there for one-on-one networking and live CEO roundtables. Also, join us November 6th to the 7th at Telecom Exchange in LA, where we will have our own Bryn Fowler speaking live on IoT smart cities and infrastructure predictions. To feature your thought leader here next time, email us at PR at jsa.net. Thanks for tuning in to JSA TV, the newsroom for tech and telecom professionals, and JSA Radio, your voice for tech and telecom on iHeartRadio. Until next time, happy networking.