Transcript:

I'm excited to talk to you today. In the prep, I think we got a good idea of we want to dive into diversity. you know, women in tech, ⁓ all that stuff. I think it's kind of interesting me being like a straight white guy asking you these questions. Maybe I'm the one that needs to hear it, right? So this is, you know, this is my goal is like, want to learn just as much as the people out there. So first, let's just start with like, who are you? What do you do? Like, let's get the Carilu introduction. Yeah. So I am Carilu, Contreras-Melander. I am a senior director of America's Partner Marketing at Zscaler. I've been there for over a year. And I've been part of partner marketing, field marketing for, gosh, over 15 years. Okay, cool. 20? I don't know. How'd you get in it? You know, it's funny how I got into it. I started like internship wise years ago in Dallas with a distributor. They were a supplies distributor and I got to travel around the world with them. I got relocated to Mexico City and to Buenos Aires. So I just had some really great foundational marketing. I assume you spoke Spanish. Was that part of it? I did. And it was amazing, right? Because I did sales and marketing. And when I was in Argentina, it was during the devaluation. And so it was during the ousting of the presidents. So five presidents in like a span of like three weeks or something ridiculous and the devaluation and, seeing my team go from making dollars to pesos overnight. Like it was just, it was a good eye opening experience for someone at that time in my twenties, right? Where you don't see that, right? And how do you. How do you help and motivate your team? Right? So was a really good eye opening experience. And so I knew that I wanted to continue that path of, you know, helping and motivating and leading and, um, and then in tech too. And so it just sort of doors sort of opened up and, um, one of the biggest doors was a friend of mine. Do you remember the go to my meeting? So I know the person who actually started that. and just wonderful human being, Brian Donahue, and they were eventually bought by Citrix. Yeah, So- Was he just a friend or someone you met in the industry or? No, a friend. So a friend of a friend. Yeah. And so we met and ⁓ he put me in connection and I got a job at Citrix and that really is where it just sort of- Did you go into the partner marketing work there or were you doing something different? I was doing field marketing. Okay. And then from field marketing, I went in on the Varsite. So if you remember Forsythe, I don't know if that rings a bell, was the Forsythe as a field marketing manager. And I really got the understanding of what it was like to work with a partner. And so I had that field marketing. So I loved it. I enjoyed it. So as my career progressed, I understood the value that partner marketing had from a field marketing perspective. My budgets could be optimized. I could tap in, I could say to those reps, hey, who is that partner that you align with, right? Who's important to you? Let's do an account-based marketing activity. And so I think that's just where it kind of stuck and I loved it, right? It's almost like the best of both worlds that you end up having. Yeah, and so from there, I went to NetApp, to VMware, to I did a startup, Tentry, I don't know. I don't know if this overlaps, but did you work with a woman named Robin Alboron? at NetApp at all. does that name sound familiar? I don't know if you guys are there at the same time. She was just early on in my career. I've known her for 20 years now and she was at NetApp at some point. Was she in the marketing, the partner marketing? Yeah, no, not partner marketing. That was it. She was more, I don't know, field or corporate. But yeah, she wasn't partner. Okay. Yeah, I mean, it was... NetApp was awesome. Yeah. Right. And then just going there and then I got to AppDynamics. Okay. And I think... acquired by Cisco? They were. Yeah. Okay. were acquired by Cisco back in... Gosh, was it 2017? 2018, I think. And that was just a rocket ship. Was it? It was incredible, right? We were part of this OG partner marketing team and the whole partner organization. So it... At that time, AppD was like 30 % channel, like majority was direct. And we ended up shifting it to over like close to 90%. Was that because of the acquisition or just coincidence? Coincidence. It was really pushing and working with the field and saying, you know, aligning with them, showing them the value. of opportunity there. Yeah, you know, land and expand motion. amazing incentives with the partners to get them to grow and really increase their deal registrations. So it was a lot of fun. So and then I went to AWS with their marketplace. didn't know you were at AWS. Yeah, marketplace, which was also almost felt like a startup. Because everyone was just curious about marketplace and, you know, you sell into marketplace so that was incredible and now I'm at Zscaler. love it. love it. A year in, right? A year in. I love it. I always had my eye on Zscaler and so yeah and so you know this whole trajectory and what we're gonna talk about today is just that leadership, right? ⁓ The authenticity, right? And the opportunities that exist for minorities like myself. And being my first language was Spanish. ⁓ My parents are first born Mexicans. Were they born in Mexico or born here? They were born in Mexico. And that was my first language. you grew up in Texas, right? And I grew up in Texas. ⁓ So the opportunities I notice, you you talk about, I'm just a white guy. And it's like, my husband's a white guy. so I, I consistently have to sit there and be like, that's such a white point of view. Interesting. You know, because when you're raised and you're a person of color, you notice the differences in the opportunities and how people just gravitate to certain things. Right. And so. I am just a huge advocate of that diversity of just, I've been there, right? I've seen some people like their trajectory grow and increase and they've had amazing sponsorships and mentors, but they were all white people, right? And so how do we... really open that door for the other another group of minorities and leaders to walk in. Because if you look at tech, even like 10, 12 years ago, there wasn't that many females, right? And it's still just not that great. ⁓ So yeah, I'm just super passionate about, know, based on my experience with leadership of just that authenticity and ⁓ the sponsorship. equality is important to me, right, and with my teams that we show that with them and help them grow. Yeah, I'd love to get into your perspective on like what we should be doing more, what's working, but before we do that, If you're okay with it, know, can we go back and talk about maybe some of the things you experienced that, whether they were challenges, roadblocks, barriers, whether for you or other people around you, I'd love to. Cause obviously that's shaped your, your perspective today. 100 % 100 % why I'm so passionate about it. So, you know, I've had it, you know, all types of leaders, right? And so one of the things is you obviously people don't leave. bad companies, leave bad managers. And that's, that is so true. ⁓ And in my case, yeah, I experienced it where, you know, I had a leader, you know, who told me once, ⁓ I was too aggressive, right? Like, you're too aggressive, Carrie, the sales team are, you blah, blah, blah. And I'd be like, that's interesting, but I'm knocking it out of the park. team respects me, they love me, we're, you know, have the metrics, like I'm showing the ROI, right? But my male peer was doing the exact same thing I was doing, but he was being praised for being assertive. ⁓ she's right. So it was like, you know, him being assertive, I was too aggressive. That same leader even told me once, which is just horrible. He was like, you know, you're very spicy. Like it's like, Oh, because I am Latina. Like you want to use that word that I'm spicy. Um, so yeah, like those things, like you remember those things and you take them to heart and you're like, Oh man, is that why I need to change? Right. And the reality is no, they need to change. Can I ask you something at the time? Like, did you refute them or is it like, did you just kind of sit on it and That's gotta be tough because it's like, because you probably wish you'd went back and said, handled it differently, but that was part of your learning process, probably, right? 100 % because at that time you don't see what it is today where people actually speak up and all of this unconscious bias. Like at that time, I didn't see anyone like me in fields or partner marketing. Right? So what was I going to say? Right? So those things really, really stick with you and how they are. You have, you know, the manager who is a total micromanager, right? That just will not let up control. And you're like, gosh, if you just let me do my job, right? Like we could all be one big amazing team, right? ⁓ But yeah, I just, I shouldn't say recently, but several years ago, I had one leader who during the time of the, you know, whole George Floyd and you know, we're getting together and They blatantly admitted that they've only been focused on helping certain females, not looking beyond the women of color because they just didn't feel like they were that ambitious. And I just remember being on that call thinking to myself, wow, you have a person of color on your team who raises their hand, right, and wants to do more. And you're just more apt at giving it to someone else because of what your thinking is about them, right? And like I said, I think those experiences have helped shape me in a way to think, I don't want to be that way. I don't want my team to feel this. I want to help them. I want to understand them more, ⁓ see where they're coming from. But yeah, all of these things. sadly, things still happen today where you're just like, gosh, do they just realize what they just said? Probably not. Probably not. ⁓ And it's up to us to. talk to them about it. Like, I remember one time I even said recently to someone, hey, I just want to go back to what you said, right? It was, let's talk about your comment, right? I just really want to help you and Some people just don't want to see it. They don't want to acknowledge that they are narrow-minded or that they came across that way. lot of people don't want to be criticized about anything, right? So especially when you go down a subject like that, like, yeah, I could see a lot of people not wanting to that. They don't. And so, but you got to be open to it, right? Because I always say we're here to help each other out. We're here learn, to grow. I mean, that's what life is about. So what advice do you have for someone that either maybe they overhear something or maybe they're experienced at where they should obviously speak up and say something. But maybe they're worried about like how this is gonna hurt their career or how they're perceived. Like what advice do you have? Like how they should handle that? It's super tough, right? Because depending on the manager, you don't know how they're gonna act, right? How they're gonna take it. You know, a lot of people can be very overly sensitive, but you know, more than anything, you know, if you have a mentor, talk to the mentor. Okay. Talk to the mentor about it, get their feeling and feedback and how to best approach it. And, you know, talk to HR, right? HR has some great resources and to sort of help managers as well to, you know, remind them of, you know, what they say and how they say it as well. ⁓ I would say that's the biggest one. If I ever came across having a mentor to be like, hey, this happened, like, am I being sensitive or how should I best approach this? Right? And so they give me a different set of lens from a leader, right? And say, ⁓ yeah, I probably, you know, wouldn't have or this or maybe talk to them. ⁓ And again, I think when I have approached it, you have people that get very defensive. ⁓ Like I said, it's who they are. You've got to be true to yourself, right? More than anything. And speak up, because the more you speak up, the more you're teaching others more than anything. And you're advocating for yourself, and you're advocating for other people, which is important. I know it's not true to every organization, but for the last one, I was at HR. My company, really like to call, I should say, an IDG, not my company anymore. They call themselves ⁓ business. What do they call themselves? almost like business relationship managers or something like that. And they took it to heart and they were actually really good at helping us understand how to communicate effectively, especially during tough situations. And so I had a great relationship with my HR team and just like, look, I got a sticky situation here. Help me just, almost like role play, how do we handle this? Like, how do I communicate? What should I expect? And again, I know that's not true in every organization, but I also know a lot of people that are afraid to go to HR to talk about these things, because it's like, that's where you go if you're in trouble. They can actually be great partners for you. They can. And again, just having those conversations and being open about it and just trying to say, how should I navigate through this? Not so much like, because that person may be a lovely person. They just said something that was really awkward. Right? So how to navigate through those conversations, those difficult conversations, which as a leader, it's tough, right? And even as an IC, like, there's a book that I read on difficult conversations, which is important, right? Like how to approach it and, you know, how to even start them. and I'm a big believer of that as well. ⁓ because they're tough conversations. you mentioned mentors. So I walked me through the state of mentorship. Do you think enough people have mentors? Are they easy to get? Is there a lot of support? it like what's going on right now? think it really depends. I think when you, you know, when I go to women conferences, I was at the women of the channel West last week and, that's a topic they consistently talk about is mentoring and sponsorship. And the reason is because there's, you know, we're not taking those opportunities, right? And as a leader, you have to have that conversation with your direct reports. Like, hey, let's talk about mentoring, right? For my team, I always say to them, you know, what are you looking for? What do you want out of your career? So let's align you someone that you can have those conversations with. So I actually set the stage for them because what happens is a lot of people, a lot of females probably don't, right? They're not having and they're not thinking about their mentors and the sponsorship can be your mentor, right? As fits in the company, but. You have to think about who's going to advocate for you. Who's going to talk about you when you're not Why do you think they're not thinking about this? Why not? Will they be perceived as being selfish because it's going to benefit them as opposed to, I don't I'm guessing here. Yeah, I think it's just how to do it. Right? It's almost like having that conversation. I was really surprised when you know, as a leader and I'm having the conversation with them, a lot of them don't. They're like, I haven't thought about it. Or I don't know how to ask someone, you know, I don't know what type of conversations to have. And it's important, like, and you can't, you shouldn't just have one mentor, you can have different mentors, right? I mean, I can think about mine and think about all the different roles that they play and you know one's been a CRO and one's a channel executive and and again different perspectives to kind of help you through you know your growth and your career so think about who you want, what you want to get out of it, and just approach them. know, and if someone came to you and said, hey, you know, I'm looking for a mentor, I'm looking for this, would you turn them down? No, no. You'd be like, yes, let me help you. Let's talk about this. When do you want to meet? And I think there's this fear of rejection that someone's not going to take the time to help them. But everyone is. Everyone is willing to help and dive in and say, gosh, well, yeah, let's talk about how to help you. Yeah, I almost feel like you're always pulling on their ego strings a little bit. Because, if I get to help someone, I feel good about myself. I feel powerful. I have my experience asking for help. People really want to help and they'll give you their time. Absolutely. And share those experiences so that you can help someone not make the mistakes that you did. Right? It's kind of like, I mean, we're both parents here, but you want to help your kids develop into amazing human beings and good people and kind people. And here's an opportunity for us to do the same. Right? in, you know, within partner marketing or whatever it is to really help them shine and excel. It's not about, you know, ⁓ I want to be better or competitive. And I hate that, right? Of the pettiness and the competitiveness that exists between females sometimes. Like, let's help. Yeah, I want to ask you about that. So like today in tech, female to female support, is it where it should be or does it still have some ways to go? I've seen so much improvement since when I started my career. think early on in my career, I think it was like very petty and very competitive. And, ⁓ I, I only got male support, sadly. I, and I think that's shifted, right. In the last like seven years, I want to say where I've seen more women step up to the plate and help, right. I have been surrounded by wonderful female leaders that. helped me, right, as well, and had those conversations and advocated for me as well. So I think, honestly, it's getting better. And these organizations like the Channel Company that do Women of the Channel and, you know, all of this, these are just great venues to tap into. they have a mentorship problem, you know, like, ⁓ They have mentors where you can tap in and be like, hey, I want to be a mentor and really help. So they have a process set up to help people. because that's what I'm thinking. Like not everybody has a great network. Absolutely. So it's good they have something there for those people too. Absolutely. And there's even one too, there's a Latinas in tech here in the Bay. They have chapters all over and you can tap into being a mentor. can all sorts of organizations, right, to really to really help. ⁓ But yeah, I mean, I, you know, an advocate for everyone, right? mean, not just, know, ideally I would want to help other Latinas in their career and evolve and grow, you know, anyone is here, right, to help anyone. So what about from like a leadership perspective? Like, what should, I mean, obviously trying to be aware of the environment, but like, how should leaders be approaching this? Just to make sure that everyone is supported and they're creating an environment where everyone can excel. Yeah. you know, I was just on a leadership call a couple of months ago and I actually showed it with my team because I thought it was a great visualization of there's like an apple tree, right? And there's basically saying, go and you can pick an apple from the tree, right? But if you, if you look at the people underneath that are picking apples, you know, you have someone who's short and someone who's tall, someone has, you know, long hands or whatever, right? It's like different. You're being equality is like, I'm going to give everyone the opportunity to have an apple. I'm going to give everyone a pair of shoes, right? But equity is like, I'm going to give you the tools you need to reach that apple. I'm going to give you the right shoes that are going to fit you, that are custom made. And I think that's important as a leader to recognize within your team, because not everyone is going to be in the same stage. And, you know, situational leadership is critical at that point as a leader. It's kind of like, I'm not going to talk or help someone on my team that's new in their career versus someone who's very experienced. It's just a very different way. And so you, as a leader, you have to think about where your team is and how to have the right conversations to help them. Right? Because you can't have the same level of expectation of someone that's been in their career 15 years. and someone that's been there three years. Right? It's different conversations. It's, you know, it's just a different way of talking. And so you have to be aware of that. And I think a lot of leaders nowadays, they think, well, the bar is this and, know, everyone needs to be at this bar. Well, yeah, but not really. Right? So being aware of that and, you know, part of a job of a leader too is motivating. and encouraging, right? So they can feel like they can grow in their career. Yeah, it's tough. I think it's tough in the sense I'm trying to think how I as a sales leader would execute that to the right standard, right? And I'm thinking, know, like sales metrics is a good example. Like I've been on teams where everyone's got to hit, you the bar is the same. Yeah. Right. Sales calls, pipeline, proposals. But I think your analogy is spot on. But it makes me a little nervous. How do I make sure I'm executing that that's in a fair way for people? It just makes me nervous I'm going to fail at it. Not that I need to try it, I need to do it. Yeah. And I think there's a book that I read on situational leadership. And so it really helped define those different conversations and how to approach it. so that's... again, when I look at my team right now and they all know it, that I always say, it's different. Everyone is different. Yeah. But I, you know, here's how I'm helping this person and how I'm helping this other person, right? And when you, I feel like have that situational leadership. And this kind of brings us to the very beginning. It's like the authenticity. Then people know you're being authentic. They can trust you as a leader. that you have their back. And when you have that authenticity, and that's something I advocate for, that's good leadership, right? ⁓ So I feel like those two really fall in line with each other. Yeah, I think from my perspective, years of leading teams of different sizes, I had to learn to be very empathetic. And I think the more empathetic I could be, the better a leader I was, because I'd really put myself in that person's shoes to try to understand, why are we seeing these results? Just asking the question of why, and just try to understand. And then I'd try to base the conversation from that. position and I still fail at it all the time and I'm a hot headed Irish guy who just goes in there with his emotions and they are like, why is this all wrong? So I gotta just always take a breath, try to put myself in their shoes, try to understand and then approach the conversation from just that position of understanding. I gotta calm down and slow down to do that. It's hard, right? When you're in the moment and you wanna react. Yeah, that's it. You wanna react in a certain way and sometimes like, and look, it happens to all of us. It's not just you, right? mean, look, I can probably get an email and I'm gonna like, my God, let me be all crazy with the keyboard. But sometimes I always like pause and I just, I don't respond. I don't respond. I don't respond at that moment. I'll respond. Because what I do is I try to rephrase it in my head like, how should I approach this? Let me think about the best way to approach this. And I think once you change, almost like change the channel of like how it becomes easier to be helpful versus that reactive, you know, and then it becomes, I feel like situational as well. So what advice do you have for maybe young women kind of entering, whether it's tech marketing or tech in general, what advice do you have for them? Yeah, I think for women and women of color, Don't let anyone's narrow mind of how they're treating you or what they're saying to you or, you know, what they're doing. Like, don't let it hinder you. Right? You know, because like in my case, you know, someone said I was too spicy or too aggressive. If someone's telling you you're too loud or too quiet or too bold or, know, whatever it is, that's not the right room for you. Yeah. It's not the right room. Go find a room where you're gonna be valued and you're gonna be respected. And I feel like in our careers, like we're gonna have that, right? And ⁓ learn from them. Like once you're in the right room, you're gonna know it and you're gonna feel it and learn from them and lean in. and ask questions and be curious and be courageous. you know, those were two points that I heard last week from the women of the channel of be, you know, be curious, be courageous. And ⁓ yeah, just, you know, you'll you'll find those those right people that are going to advocate for you that you're going to learn from. Yeah, I love that. Because I, know, I've dealt with some people recently have this you know, they're kind of staying in a bad situation and not dealing with this but other stuff. ⁓ But they have this mentality of, the grass is always greener. I'm like, well, you know, there are a lot of really good organizations out there where you don't necessarily have to deal with this bad stuff, right? And so, yeah, just don't, you don't feel like you have to stick with a bad situation. Absolutely. Like I, there was another book that I read and one thing really struck with me because I was going through something and it said, you may be like someone can hire you and you can be their shining star, their rising star. Like they're going to believe in you. And just like any company, the manager leaves or whatever moves on. And for that next manager, you could be a falling star. And that doesn't mean that that is who you are. Right. Because you are a shining star and you are a rising star. Like go find that manager and that company where you're going to fit in and believe it and thrive. I think that's why it's so important though that we have that support structure and mentors because we all face that doubt, right? And you know, I've even had my new business, right? I had a couple of days where I was like really low. But you just, need those people around you to remind you that, you know, this is not you. This is a situation you're in, you know? You just need those reminders from your support structure. You really do. You do. And find those people and ask them, right? You know, you see someone you admire, go to them. Yeah. And hear from them, ask them questions, ask them to be a mentor if they're, you know, in your organization, ask them to be a sponsor. And yeah, that's the only way, right, that you're going to grow. And I hopefully will see more and more, you know, Latinas or women of color that are in partner marketing that are taking those executive leadership roles. mean, right now in the C-suite, I think there's only 1 % of Latinas, which is just, oh, that number just doesn't grow. And hopefully one day in the future, it'll bump up to 2 % and it'll be an amazing. Let's get you up there. We'll bump up those numbers, right? I'm here for it. By the way, this is the first podcast with that little doggie snuggling on you. I know. I love it. know. He's making his little debut here as well. He's quiet. He's been very quiet. Very quiet. We'll have to get Winston in the podcast art or take a picture with him. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, thanks for joining us. Is anything else that, I mean, I know we covered a lot, but anything else you want to talk about that we might have missed? No. Okay. No, I think it's great. It's been helpful for me. mean, this is always, look, for last 20 years, I've gone around and talked to people like you and learned a lot. And it was always my goal to record those conversations and then just share with other people. I like I did that today. Awesome. Thanks for coming on. No, thank you so much. I loved it. Appreciate it. Okay.