Career Growth Advice from Jillian Kaplan and Sabrina Shafer, business Leader | Career Tips for Women in business

2B Bolder Podcast – Episode 42
Featuring Sabrina Shafer & Jillian Kaplan

Episode Title: #42 Career Podcast Featuring Sabrina Shafer and Jillian Kaplan who share their unique career paths and perspectives - Women In Tech

Host: Mary Killelea
Guest: Sabrina Shafer & Jillian Kaplan



Mary Killelea (Host): Hi there. My name is Mary Killelea. Welcome to the To Be Bolder podcast, providing career insights for the next generation of women in business and tech. To Be Bolder was created out of my love for technology and marketing, my desire to bring together like-minded women, and my hope to be a great role model and source of inspiration for my two girls and other young women like you, encouraging you guys to show up and to be bolder and to know that anything you guys dream of, it's totally possible. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the conversation.

Hi there. Thanks for tuning in. It is going to be a great show today. I have the honor of having two wonderful women on the show as guests. I'm joined by Jillian Kaplan and Sabrina Schafer. Jillian is creative and technical thought leader and marketer for Dell, and Sabrina is the CEO of Transformation Continuum. They have partnered on a few different projects to support women in tech, including The Art of the Subtle Brag and the Unwritten Guide, which features 20 influential leaders in business sharing their top tips for women in tech. Thank you both for being here. I'm so excited. This is my first time to have two women on a guest at the same time. So thank you both.

Sabrina Shafer & Jillian Kaplan (Guest): Thank you. Yeah, we're excited to be here.

Mary Killelea: Okay, so there's so much to cover, and now I have to squeeze it in with two people. So, let's just dive right in. Jillian, will you start and tell me about your role at Dell and kind of at a high level how you kind of got there from 500 foot career path view?

Jillian Kaplan: Yeah, sure. So, I have had a very, I'd say like basic career journey when I think about it. I started out of college at Verizon in a network engineering role. It was at a time when we had first launched the fiber product, so the Fios product, and I worked in central office engineering. So, a lot of what I focused on was sort of a transformation from copper to fiber, which reminds me a little bit of what we're going through now with the transition from 4G to 5G, obviously a different architecture set, but kind of that mindset shift to a whole new way of doing things and really like all new capabilities. I worked at Verizon for about 14 years and really large companies who had a lot of great opportunities in engineering and product management, marketing operations, as well as sales enablement, and found my way to Dell Technologies just about three years ago now. I sit in the telecom group right now and I started off in a more traditional product marketing role on our telecom solutions team focusing on our 5G solutions. And then the beginning of this year, I moved into a thought leadership role still within product marketing, where I focus on really like the use cases that these solutions are going to bring to market, things like autonomous vehicles and smarter hospitals and better manufacturing and really like the real life, what does this enable? So that's what I do now.

Mary Killelea: That's awesome. Around the thought leadership and the solution, those are so important because I think so many people, as fast as technology is going and developing, they don't know how to make it like permeate into what's happening in their own life.

Jillian Kaplan: Yeah, 100%. And when we talk about 5G, it's no longer about, not no longer, but the big use case isn't about your cell phone and making it faster, right? It's about like these enterprise use cases and they have true like life changing and life saving capabilities when we think about remote monitoring for hospitals and someday, far in the future, not tomorrow, but things like remote surgery and autonomous vehicles and getting people out of dangerous situations and making them more mechanical so that you don't have the human error element, which is so large in a lot of these situations. I was just looking at some research in the past 30 years, it's the National Safety Council, it was something like there were 4,600-ish deaths in manufacturing because of human error and it was like 28 robot-related deaths, right? So obviously, we'd love that 28 number at zero, but we're talking less than 1% robot error of the human error. So that's really a huge change when we think about getting people out from in front of the dangers and letting technology do that. And with the low latency and high speeds of 5G, there's a lot of capabilities. So, it's very cool to like be able to see what's coming in the future.

Mary Killelea: And that is work you can be passionate about with that framing.

Jillian Kaplan: Yes, yes, I love it. I'm one of those geeks that loves my job. Sabrina can attest to that as well because I'm always geeking out about it.

Sabrina Shafer: So I was going to say, we talk about that on the regular. That's a genuine fact right there.

Mary Killelea: All right, Sabrina, it is your turn.

Sabrina Shafer: I love these stories because it really, even in my own awareness, has shown that you don't have to have these sort of traditional career paths into IT. And anybody who follows me or knows that I am so passionate about getting diversity and inclusion and equality into IT because it's just such a game changer on so many levels. So, I have one of those very non-traditional career paths. I started as a behavioral analyst and really focusing on behavioral analysis and learning and really helping shape behaviors. So completely different side of the house. And quick side note, when I did finally get into IT leadership, a lot of people gave me a hard time about it because they're like, what do you know about IT? And I remember this amazing quote that an executive over at Boeing told me. He was an executive at Ford. And when he went to Boeing, he was at his first big leadership meeting and he's all imposter syndrome and the whole bit. And someone goes to him, well, what do you know about airplanes? And he said, I don't have to know anything about airplanes. I know what I need to know. You know about airplanes. And so it's so funny how you come full circle because so much now of my job is focused around helping enable new mindsets, new behaviors. We have engineers all the way at the field level who need to start speaking about solutions and outcomes. Like Jillian just talked about, it's not just speeds and feeds. It's not just a bunch of gears spinning or dashboards. It's there's some real meaningful data and outcomes that can be derived from that, but you have to know how to talk about it. So, you're shaping new behaviors and sales teams and engineers and leaders and marketing. We work with some of the largest organizations in the world and how you're marketing now and how you are getting your message across all comes down fundamentally to behavior. So, it's so wild how this kind of came full circle. And then sort of somewhere in the middle of that, I am what I like to call a recovering attorney. I don't think you ever really fully recover, but I'm on my steps. I'm on my path. So I was a commercial litigator for Silicon Valley type companies and got sort of drug into sort of the IT leadership side. One of the organizations I was representing pursued me pretty heavily for a couple of quarters and I kept saying, no, no, I'm not doing, I'm an attorney. I'm in the courtroom. You don't want me. And so they said, we need you to lead sales. You know, you write the contract. So you can imagine I wrote a great contract. I don't mind saying so myself. And they signed it. So next thing you know, it's been a wild ride ever since. And I've had this really amazing opportunity to work with people like Jillian and yourself and be able to kind of build all of these pieces together into a very unique and fun puzzle. So, it's a little bit about my background.

Mary Killelea: That's awesome. And I think two things that I kind of retained from that was one, when we question what we have to offer, it is that unique journey and perspective of our life that we bring to each and every role that we do. And I think sometimes as women, you know, I think we tend to minimize some of our skills or gifts or journey. So, this is great to have this diverse backgrounds. And then also like the behavioral analyst in you, I kind of think of it as emotional intelligence. And I can't think of a more important time in history for it to be relevant and taught to your kind of employee stack from the top to the bottom.

Sabrina Shafer: That's exactly it. I was actually born in Germany. We moved here in second grade. So I'm sort of fulfilling this diverse to the max kind of lifestyle over here. And what I've noticed is to your point sort of understanding your emotional intelligence and the impact that that kind of has is as much an internal importance as it has external importance. So, we talked about how organizations that we help enable and drive go to market strategies for how they're doing that across their organizations from leadership, marketing, marketing, engineering, and sales, but also in my internal in my own organization as a leader, and in working with some of my close friends who are leaders. So, it really has this sort of trifecta. And it is absolutely something that couldn't be more critical right now. And it's not just about DEI and feeling good about yourself. There are real numbers behind this. It's genuinely great for business and study after study shows that.

Mary Killelea: Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more. And so the topic of today's show, obviously, my audience is focused on career, career growth, how to get, you know, build a career strategy. So I'd love to hear from both of you and Jillian, I'll probably have you go first on this, but when you look or think about taking on a career promotion, or moving in or outside of the company, do you have certain non-negotiables? Have you established those? And if could you share a couple?

Jillian Kaplan: I never did until I like got some confidence and started to understand my worth, right? So I never did in my past life. It was always, I'll take on more, I don't need to be paid more. I don't need, it's like, I don't need the title. It's just about like the feel good. But there was a woman actually who did, I don't even remember her name, but she did some sort of like, presentation. And her shirt said, F you pay me on it. And it like, literally made me think about like my growing up in tech and how I just didn't have that attitude. And I thought that was greedy. And I never negotiated things. But as I came to like realize my worth and my skill, and just to be clear, we all have great worth and great skill. I'm a big believer that there's room for everyone at the quote unquote top, because I believe that, you know, what my top is, and what my best skills are, are not your best skills, Marianne, are not Sabrina's best skills. And we're all unique in that respect. So people will say to me like, well, obviously, Jillian, there's not room for everyone at the top, but there is because everyone has a unique skill set, and you all have something to bring. So I think it's really important to remember that. For me, my non negotiables now are what I call work life happiness. They don't like the word balance, but their work life happiness, I have a young child, and I block my calendar every day from 5pm to 8pm. I feel 0% guilt. If there's some sort of emergency, I will take a call, of course. But on a regular basis, I don't have calls during that time or meetings. If you need me, I'm happy to talk to you after eight o'clock. So, I always that for me is a non-negotiable remote work is a non-negotiable. I am a closet introvert. So I call myself an extroverted introvert. I recharge my batteries by myself, I work best alone. And I know that about myself. So even pre pandemic, that was a non negotiable for me. And I would just say like back to the work life happiness, just like loving what I do, you don't have to be a bean counter, right? Like you can be passionate about your job. I've worked at two monstrous companies, right? But then, somehow here at Dell Technologies, I've been able to invoke change and do things completely out of the box. And that's because I found that happiness. And I found that amazing leadership that let's me do that. So those are my non negotiables now. But I didn't always have those.

Mary Killelea: That's awesome. Sabrina, what are yours?

Sabrina Shafer: Yeah, those are really good. Those are really good. I can't echo enough, make sure you're getting paid. And now it's so easy to find out. And I think the other thing I learned, and actually taught my team in some other roles is ask other people what they're getting paid. It doesn't have to be a secret. It doesn't have to be taboo or bad. I think it elevates a lot of different kinds of conversations in a lot of different kinds of ways. And when you undermine yourself, Jillian knows this, I tend to geek out a little bit on the behavioral side of the neural psychology and neuroscience of things. But when you are underpaid, you are reinforcing in your own sort of mind, your own self speak, you're not worthy. Well, I mean, I can tell you just, from the neuroscience alone, you're going to make worse decisions. That's just how it works. That's how the hormones are working in your brain. And worse decisions feed even poorer decisions, because you're creating neural pathways that are not going the way they should be going. So, there are so many scientific reasons, not to mention that you should buy yourself some nice stuff, save some money, have some fun in life. So, I cannot echo enough how important it is to make sure that you're being fairly compensated. A big thing for me is I love to work. Like I said, I'm an immigrant, I'm a German immigrant. You can take the girl out of Germany, you can't take Germany out of the girl. I really genuinely love what I do. And if I were to work for someone else again, it would have to be on my own schedule. And I'd have to be allowed to kind of go beyond and be creative. I have to be able to do things that excite me and get me passionate and get me to work with really unique people. That's one of my absolute favorite things. And then maybe one other little negotiable or non-negotiable I mean, is make sure that you like your leadership, because it really does trickle down. And if it's something that you don't believe in, it doesn't matter how great the solution is, the product, the compensation, especially now with this whole great resignation. If you don't believe in the leadership, it will take you down. It'll take your team down. And it's just not worth it for so many reasons. I won't geek out on the science, but there's lots of reasons to that too.

Mary Killelea: Yeah. And I totally agree with the leadership comment and actually all of them, but how do we get women to talk about what they make? Because there's this guilt like, oh, I'm embarrassed because I know I probably don't make as much as her or him. So, there's that timidness to be vulnerable and honest in creating this kind of open dialogue around how much we make in order to make change.

Sabrina Shafer: I mean, there's a scientific answer to that. In fact, it's a lot of the reason why Jillian and I wrote our first guide and continue to the absolute quickest, best way that you can get women to start talking to each other and being honest and vulnerable is doing it yourself. And there's so many reasons to it. First, even just a little confidence booster, Jillian and I call it a subtle brag, or one moment of feeling vulnerable. We talked about your neuro pathways. It makes it easier. It literally creates a habit. When you create a habit, it's like a little highway that's created in your brain. And the more you travel down it, the more you exercise that, the more you create this habit. So, it's good for you to get vulnerable and it gets easier and easier and you can get more and more vulnerable. It's good for the people you're being vulnerable with because they see it. It feels safe. How many times have you been with somebody and they said, I'm having a really bad day. And you're like, Oh my God, me too, or whatever it might be. So it opens you up. And then there's a third sort of ring to that. It also helps other people who are outside the conversation, maybe not directly involved, but see or hear about it. And it makes it easier for them. So, the absolute quickest way is to do things like this or to have that one conversation and pick one thing to be vulnerable about. And it doesn't have to start with what do you make, right? Maybe for me, I struggle with if I'm not looking perfect, right? I hate getting on camera when I don't look in Jillian smiling. I see, she knows, so one of the things I had to start doing was just showing up without makeup and in his hoodie. Do you know what it's like to show up as a CEO with other executives with no makeup in a hoodie as a woman in 2021? I'll tell you what, it's not easy, but, but it took me a minute and so I started with safe people. And then, you know, I would tell people about it ahead of time, I'm really struggling with this. So I'm going to do it on our call. Okay. And you find safe people, you make it bigger and bigger. And that's how we change the paradigm. That's how we do it.

Mary Killelea: Oh, I love that. Great. Amazing advice. Okay, I have so many more questions. This is, we might have to have a part two.

Jillian Kaplan: Can I just take some credit for what Sabrina said about showing up in a hoodie? We're on a call one day, and I was in a hat, I think. And she's like, I think she texts me. She's like, I can't believe you're wearing a hat. And I'm like, I mean, whatever, like, this is me. Like I'm a I have a toddler, like, I'm working from home. It takes like a whole effort to like, brush my hair and put on my makeup. And, and I think when you see someone else show up like that, you're like I respect this person, and they're in a hat, and they don't look absolutely perfect. And so maybe I can do a two and still be respected. And you 100% can. I was on stage last week at Mobile World Congress, and I wore a leather shirt, because I wanted to wear a leather shirt. Gosh darn it. And so I did. I've given up my corporate headshot. I like I go with a selfie now because it's just not me. And if to be clear, if you are the corporate headshot, like that is what you want. And you want to wear the suit. You do you girl guy, whoever. But that wasn't me. And so I've decided that in 2021, I'm just gonna be me.

Sabrina Shafer: I think the gender neutral term is boo. You do you boo.

Jillian Kaplan: Okay, I was going for they them he her.

Sabrina Shafer: Just the word on the street, I think.

Jillian Kaplan: Okay, all right, I'll work on that.

Sabrina Shafer: And by the way, I've probably easily told 10 people and even if they don't know you directly, I'll say God, there's this person, it's so cool how she does this.

Mary Killelea: That's nice. Yeah. Your impact is greater than you realize. Beyond Yeah, absolutely.

Sabrina Shafer: Absolutely.

Jillian Kaplan: I showed up Monday, I had a recording for something and my hair was all done. My makeup was all done. And people like, are you interviewing? I'm like I know usually I look like a hot mess.

Mary Killelea: Yeah, the moment you put on lipstick is like, what's up?

Jillian Kaplan: Yeah, I know. Exactly. That was exactly it.

Mary Killelea: All right. Let's talk about networking. Clearly networking is important. What are your guys's tips? What are your ladies tips on networking, especially for introverts?

Jillian Kaplan: Sabrina. Well, why don't you tell them how you networked with me? Why don't we start there?

Sabrina Shafer: I would say I'm a master introvert and mostly because I'll say I'm a little bit naive, a little bit of a risk taker. And I just think life is short, and you should have a little bit of fun. So, I too could identify as being an introvert. And the way Jillian I even met was through networking. First and foremost, just be authentic. If you use lots of exclamation points, use lots of exclamation points. If you think something's cool, just say something's cool. Jillian and I started a relationship with the global VP of customer success at Google Cloud. What's that? The third largest company in the world through a LinkedIn post. He had a really cool post and we said, Hey, we like it. And now we're all friends. So, Jillian, to your point, Jillian had this conference and that she was doing with Dell around women in tech and empowerment. I think it was even women in telecom, but in any event, and so I reached out to her and I just said, I think that's so cool. And Jillian, maybe I even said, Hey, if you ever want to talk or I'd love to get some time with you or something like that. It's so funny because I was, when I tell this story, it's, it was probably one of the most awkward conversations, at least for the first like 10 minutes. And I love that it was awkward, because Jillian's just waiting, like, what is she trying to sell me? And I'm like, no, I just think it's really cool what you did. And I'm okay being awkward. I think sort of made of maybe that's the other part of networking. Just be okay with awkward reality is most people are going to forget anyway. And then I would say show up early as an introvert, I've done a lot of studying about how can I get better at networking? And there's a great book. And I think it's like 1,001 ways to start a conversation, which for me, I need because I hate talking about the weather. And find resources, depending on what you're good at, what you're bad at. There's a YouTube series I absolutely love called charisma on command. They kind of break down steps of top speakers and leaders and charisma and all these different sort of behavioral dynamics that you need to network. So figure out what you need to get better at and get better at it, because there's free, you can literally get the free audio book on YouTube right now. There's no excuses for anyone. So I think what did I say? Authentic, be authentic, take a few risks, invest in yourself, and be okay with being awkward.

Mary Killelea: I love it. Jillian?

Jillian Kaplan: I would say on the other end, be open to people reaching out to you, right? So don't always assume that they're trying to sell you something or that it's going to be a one way street. And don't, I would say like, try not to look too much at title, if you will. Like, I hate when people I'm only gonna network with people that are like, above my level or whatever, because a like, everyone has so much to offer, I don't care what their title is on paper. And B, you never know, like, where you could meet again in the future. And networking has always been hard for me because I am an introvert. But Sabrina and I never, we never worked together, our paths literally never crossed until she sent me a random LinkedIn message. And Sabrina can attest to the fact that I get a lot of very weird LinkedIn messages. But I respond to, she knows I'll text her like, look at this one. I some of them are crazy. But like, I respond to every single one, I really try to give people the benefit of the doubt. So I would say that and just be your authentic self, you don't want to be someone to some person A and someone different to person B and person A and person B talk. And they're like, that's not even the same person like that. That's not the Jillian I know, like, you always want to be yourself. And for me, I'm sort of annoying, I ask a lot of questions, I'm really high energy, and I didn't always let that shine through. But when I did finally let that shine through in my career, it completely changed the game for me. And I became so much happier at work. I was never unhappy. But like, I'm just like, always happy. Now you're rare to catch me cranky.

Mary Killelea: Okay, so you told us how you guys met kind of through that LinkedIn outreach. And now let's dive into some of the projects you guys have put out together and what the response has been. And because one, I learned about it when you two came and did a presentation at Intel through our women's organization. And it was a packed house. You guys were great, you were engaging, it was well received, obviously. So tell the audience about that. And the other project that you're working on.

Jillian Kaplan: Sure. So we started off, Sabrina and I, when we started talking, I think I like, did what I'll call word vomit on her just like started shouting off what was on my brain. And I said something about the art of the subtle brag because I had just completed a degree certificate program at MIT in the middle of COVID. And she saw the post on LinkedIn. And she's like it was so good because it was like, this is look at what I did, but like I overcame this and you can do it too. It wasn't just like a look at me post. So, we started to like brand that art of the subtle brag where you share your challenge, share what you did to overcome it, share what you achieved because of it, and then share how other people can do it too. So, it's not a look at me. And then Sabrina mostly actually like I feel like I just contributed, but Sabrina mostly wrote a guide around that unwritten rules, we focused on the art of the subtle brag, how to deal with inappropriate advances, a little bit on networking, finding your cheerleader. So, finding a mentor, right? And it was a very short, concise book. We had some people contributed to it and they were amazing. And then we got an idea to write, like start working with some of these top leaders that we were so inspired by. And that's where our tips from the top came from. I think we ended up with 21, which is such a random number, but basically like 21 really inspiring and more importantly, inclusive, right? People in the business that shared their top three tips for a successful and inclusive career, because that was really the key. We wanted to make sure that we were working with people that valued diversity, not just as women, but just diversity in general in creating a successful career. And that got published. They're both, they're ungated and totally free. They're available at unwrittenguides.com. And then we got asked to do a workshop at Dell and then Intel. And then we got asked back.

Sabrina Shafer: By the way, just to reiterate what you were saying, Jillian, when I reached out to Jillian, I had no idea what her title was. I don't even think I knew you worked for, I did know you worked for Dell because that's right, because I was like, oh, this is such a cool event. And so neat that you did that. But I had no idea. And look at where just one random message can take you. It's wild. Jillian talked about the second guide. We had contributors from Dell, Intel, HPE, VMware, Parallel Wireless, Google Cloud, who am I forgetting? Cisco Systems. I mean, it was like the list, more than a dozen Fortune 50s, you know? And so that just got to reach such a broader audience. So from that we wrote a workbook. So you can kind of start building out some of those skills as well. And pretty soon we actually have on November 18th, we have a workshop that we delivered prior to this just exclusively for like Dell and Intel, but we're opening it up to the public for free on exactly the art of the subtle brag. So here we go again, bringing back some behavioral science into it. To Jillian's point, we broke it down into four super simple steps. And then we created a workshop so that you physically get to build that muscle memory. And then we create this network at the workshop so that you immediately, and you can attest to this, Mary, you immediately, if you're oh so daring to post your subtle brag, you have an immediate support system. And we just talked about the impact that that has, sort of those multiple layers of impact. It's just cool. I am so excited. We have limited it to a hundred people. I don't want to, I don't represent Jillian. I'm not an attorney. Or I think if we do end up getting, you know, more than a hundred, we'll happily host some more because it's just such a cool workshop. It is so good.

Mary Killelea: And I can attest to that. It really is so inspiring what you two are doing. And I love that you're doing another one and that you're opening it up. I'll make sure that I include the URL in the show notes. And so, with all this effort around diversity and specifically around women in tech, what's at the core of it for wanting to support women in tech besides being one yourself? Is there a deeper meaning? For me, I have two daughters for me. I worked as an entrepreneur by myself. I didn't know what roles were out there. I didn't know what my options were. So I'm creating this somewhat obviously for that next generation that I wish I would have had this resource for me when I was younger.

Jillian Kaplan: So for me, I have a mother who is in science and a father who was an engineer and I had the opposite experiences you Mary, right? I always saw my mom as, I mean, we're talking like microscopist materials science, like pure science, right? And both of my parents actually are MIT graduates. And my mother tells this story. I'm not an MIT graduate. They did not pass those brains down to me, but my mother tells this story. That's my favorite. There were like four women when she was at MIT, literally four. And they, because there were only four, they made her be on the cheerleading squad because they needed every woman, right? Every woman had to be on the cheerleading squad. My mom's kind of this, sorry, mom, if you're listening, my mom's kind of this like tall, lanky, kind of awkward person. And she was so bad. They were like, oh, nevermind after day one, nevermind. We'll stick with our three. But she has one picture in a cheerleading uniform. It's very adorable. So, but for me, like, I just always saw it. And so when I got into tech and realize, and I went to an engineering school and there were very few women, and then I got into tech and there were very few women. And I was like, but I grew up with it. So I didn't, my mom never talked about like being a minority, right? And so I was like, we've got to do better because it doesn't need to be like this. So, for me, it was the complete opposite of you where I had seen it and I didn't realize it was a problem until I came in. And then I was like, we can do more and we can help each other. That's the other thing that's behind it is that I think us women get so nervous about supporting someone else means that we don't get the opportunity. That is not true. Like by supporting someone else, I always say we rise by lifting others. You can support someone else 1,000%. And it doesn't weaken who you are at all. It can only help you.

Mary Killelea: Well said. Sabrina?

Sabrina Shafer: Yeah, that's so true. That's so true. I could dive into all of these topics for just individually for 30 minutes. This is so good, Mary. For me, when we moved to the States, everybody, when you're a European, when you're an immigrant, you're like, oh, the US and we moved here. And when we moved here, we really had nothing. My parents had a car, we borrowed money from a second grade teacher to get our first apartment. I mean, we were homeless and to see the way that technology can change people's lives. My own sister who's now in tech, who's a single mom. I sit on the board of one that helps save men and women and children from sex trafficking and gives them jobs through IT. And I've had the great honor of having interns. And working with organizations like Google, to promote more interns and get them into tech. I'm also on the board of another organization that helps get men and women with disabilities into technology. And I have folks on the autism spectrum on my staff. And by the way, they're some of the smartest people that are on the team. So, I just, there, there are so many touch points for me because it's a game changer. And as we're seeing technology be so powerful and can be used in such good or horrible ways in places like South Africa, where they don't have traditional sort of the Westernized means of giving business loans, they now use cell phone data, including, by the way, this is interesting how you store your names. If your first name versus last name first, that tells a lot about how credit worthy someone is. So it can literally be the difference between starting your own business in South Africa to not being institutionalized, but being a productive citizen in the US and helping change what it really means to have a diverse workforce, but also have real business value to what we're building within the IT industry.

Mary Killelea: I think for women in particular, and I just say that because my audience is focused on there, but identifying what your strengths are hard for people to recognize what their gifts are, because their gifts come so naturally. What would you say was a pivotal point in your career, where you step back and said owning these superpowers and I'm in my sweet spot because I'm utilizing them.

Jillian Kaplan: For me, I tried for a long time to do that when I was at Verizon, just in transparency and I have really hard time with it. So I think some people see me and Sabrina go out and do these subtle brags and that we own our superpowers and think it came naturally. I was a 21 year old female hired into engineering. And I think it's really hard when you start that way. Even though I changed roles multiple times, I feel like I carried that reputation with me. And I tried so many times to pivot and kind of change, even though I had changed like internally, right? I still feel like I carried that with me. So honestly, when I came to Dell, I was able to sort of start over as the person that like I had already become. It wasn't like I changed who I was, but I didn't have that still with me, right? I was working with literally all new people. I knew no one here. No one knew me from my Verizon life. I wasn't like brought over here by anyone from there. And that was the biggest pivotal moment for me. And one of the people in our top tips guide gives this actually and says if something's not working for you, or like you're getting stuck, if what just because like you don't, you're not advancing in one job, it doesn't mean that you're not a good worker, right? It just might not be the right fit for you. And I think that that happened to me for a little while. And not because I was bad at that job, but because I kind of got stuck in like a reputation. So, for me, and it wasn't a bad reputation, it was just a 21 year old college hire, right? And for me, it was like coming to a new place and getting to start over that really just changed my whole career for me. And I'm so incredibly grateful that I took that opportunity. I would say to people, take those opportunities when you have them. I'm not saying don't try, but first impressions last even from 21 to 35. So just like seize those opportunities to really be who you are.

Mary Killelea: That's great. Sabrina?

Sabrina Shafer: Yeah, God, that's so true, isn't it? And it's so hard. That's why you start off little ways and in safe places and you make it grow. But for me, I think if one thing shines through, it's that I have enough sense to know what I don't know. And I'm very quick to find resources. It's been astounding to me how eager people are to help you when you just ask. And to Jillian's point, we've written about this in the past. We've definitely spoken about it as well, getting mentors. So, when I first entered into IT leadership, again, the week before I was in a courtroom, I didn't even know what a data center was. And here I'm supposed to lead a sales team. I did not know what a sales call was. I didn't know what a forecast was. And I'm like, I think you've made a mistake here. In any event, I immediately hired an executive coach. And by the way, I asked some of the people that I really trusted and I went straight to them and I said, Hey, what would you do if you were me? And they said, you got to get this executive coach. And I said, great, who should I hire? And then I asked enough people and about four or five of these leaders said, said the same person. So, I hired him because I didn't know any better. And so he taught me this trick that has come in handy. It's also a very interesting party game too.

Mary Killelea: Oh, do tell.

Sabrina Shafer: Yeah, it's been a game changer for me. So you go to five or 10 people that you really, really trust and you go to them and you say, okay, don't think, all right, don't think I'm going to ask you this question and you can even do it yourself. You can do it right now. When I say Sabrina, what three to five words come to mind, write them down now. And you can either have them send them to someone else so that it's truly anonymous or they can give them to you, but start looking for parallels. I'm a behavioralist, so I'm looking for data here, but start looking for overlaps. That's what you're known for. And if you want to change it, by the way, you've got some real data. It's called a baseline, but you've got some real data that you can work with, but you also know exactly how you come off. So you can figure out what you're good at and you can figure out what you're bad at. And then go back to my first rule is get help. You know, I talked about charisma on command. I cannot speak enough about that. You've got to check it out, go to things like free guides, ask people questions, ask them dumb questions. What would you do if you were me? Like Jillian said, she asked a lot of questions and she learned to be okay with being awkward. You've got to do that. You've got to do it.

Mary Killelea: Yeah, I've done, I've done the, uh, what would you do with me? Or what am I not asking that I should be? That's one that I often use. And people are like kind of caught off guard with, oh, this woman's admitting that she doesn't know everything and that she's leaning on me for advice. And so that usually opens up the conversation for advice that nine out of 10 times I'm so grateful for.

Sabrina Shafer: So there are these mirror neurons. It's what they're called in your brain. And when you're with somebody, your brain gets triggered. That's why like they've done studies on athletes and all kinds of stuff around this. So, when you are vulnerable, there is literally mirror neurons triggering and someone else's brain to saying it's safe to be vulnerable.

Mary Killelea: I love the way your mind thinks. So data driven.

Sabrina Shafer: Jillian's probably so sick of it, but this is not just Hocus Pocus because by the way, the whole reason I got so obsessed with this and I'm really into astrophysics. I love all things. I just like knowing the science behind things because you can decide if it's real or not. We can really measure these kinds of things. So you can get some validity behind it. Right?

Mary Killelea: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. And I think that's what's helping kind of the movement for diverse hiring is the facts around businesses are better with a diverse workforce, with women at the leadership, women at the table, diverse insights. I mean, there's data behind that. And so there's no arguing. And when it equates to the bottom line, it's like light bulbs go off in rooms that were light bulbs were not turning on before.

Sabrina Shafer: Exactly. Exactly.

Mary Killelea: All right. Moving on to the rapid fire section, Jillian, start with you. If you could tell your 20 year old self anything, what would it be?

Jillian Kaplan: Oh man, it's supposed to be rapid. I'm not very rapid. Be kind. I would say always be kind whenever possible. And it's always possible.

Mary Killelea: Sabrina?

Sabrina Shafer: I'd say, of course you've got this. Of course you've got this.

Mary Killelea: Great. What does to be bolder mean to you? I'll start with you, Sabrina.

Sabrina Shafer: To be bolder means to grow into yourself. And if you've followed me, I talk about this a lot. I've really studied a lot of amazing leaders and 100% of the time you notice if you watch them over time, they become more of themselves. They grow into themselves. This concept of show up, be authentic means you are automatically and always exactly who you are. You grow into yourself and you reflect and you learn and you grow and you change and you try new things. So be bolder means be willing to keep growing into yourself.

Mary Killelea: I adore that. Awesome. All right, Jillian to be bolder.

Jillian Kaplan: I would say get uncomfortable with being uncomfortable. That's what bold means to me. Like you're going to have to be uncomfortable if you want growth. I'm uncomfortable all the time. I do really, really uncomfortable things.

Mary Killelea: I love it. So true. Who inspires you, Jillian? We'll stick with you right now.

Jillian Kaplan: I have to say like I am incredibly inspired by Caroline Chan at Intel actually. Like I love her. I don't know what it is about her. From the moment I met her, she's warm. She's welcoming. She's incredibly talented. She's incredibly smart. She's just one of the most genuine human beings I've ever met. On top of that, she's an amazing executive and technologist. And I was saying to Sabrina like two years ago, I was running around at Dell Tech World and I was doing a lot of like behind the scenes stuff for her and one of my executives on panels. And yesterday I got to sit next to her quote unquote, right? And that was like a full circle moment for me because she's just such an inspiration to me. I just think she's amazing.

Mary Killelea: I hope she listens to this.

Jillian Kaplan: I hope she listens. She's in our guide too because she's just the best.

Mary Killelea: Sabrina?

Sabrina Shafer: Who inspires me? Boy, that's a really tough question. That's really tough. There's so many people for so many different reasons. There's so many scientists that I absolutely love reading like Max Tegmark and everyone knows I love Neil deGrasse Tyson. I think he's amazing. I'm reading a couple of books right now and on Stephen Hawking, but I think from a personal perspective, something that's going on in the news right now that's really making me rethink the modern workplace in crazy radical ways. Is there's a post that just went viral. I think it's got like 6 million views as of today. And I think within a day or two of a mom, she was asked to present and she's holding her baby because I think she didn't have daycare or something. And she has one of those harnesses where the baby's on the front, and it just went absolutely viral and it's hashtag mom too. And I think that is so powerful for so many reasons. If we could really think of a place where parents could feel comfortable being parents and to make it a hashtag, remember I'm in marketing, it's important we do go to market strategy. I got to think about this kind of stuff, but to make it a hashtag, it makes it a movement. And I think that's so freaking brilliant. It's just really brilliant. And if you look at some of our posts, it's so authentic. It talks about Jillian is a brilliant, brilliant craft at this as well. And so go check out her post where she just says when she feels awkward and she says about why can't I bring my child to work? What if that looked different? And so for so many reasons, it has made me think and just admire what she's doing and seeing how other people are reposting it and sharing their stories gets me fired up.

Mary Killelea: I cannot thank you both enough for sharing your insights, your time. This conversation has been fantastic for me, and I can't wait to publish it and share it with others. How can people learn more connect with you? Jillian, I think you're all over, aren't you on TikTok?

Sabrina Shafer: She's a big deal on TikTok.

Mary Killelea: I know I was watching a couple the other night.

Jillian Kaplan: No, so I actually, so I've taken the TikTok thing and I TikTok about tech and then I post it on LinkedIn. And that's where I get my biggest engagement because people are like, what in the world is this girl doing? So I am the real Jay Kaplan, K-A-P-L-A-N on TikTok, on Twitter, on Instagram, I have a big Instagram following actually. Come find me at Jillian Kaplan on LinkedIn, check out our unwrittenguides.com. I'm telling you everything is free, ungated, we're not going to bother you. We're literally just giving you our resources because this is our passion. So, connect with me, don't be shy. And we say this at our workshops, but if you put out something and you're not getting any engagement you want on it, send it to me or Sabrina or both of us and say, hey, can you just drop a comment on this and we will do it. We will mess with that algorithm so you get the views that you deserve.

Mary Killelea: Great. Sabrina?

Sabrina Shafer: You can find me, Sabrina Schaefer is S-H-A-F-E-R, Sabrina Schaefer is on LinkedIn, Sabrina Schaefer one on Twitter. And I think that's the only platform I really use is Twitter and LinkedIn.

Jillian Kaplan: You're on TikTok too, don't lie.

Sabrina Shafer: I have one video, I do actually, it's with you. I have a couple of my favorite quotes up there. So of course I had to geek out, there is one about Neil deGrasse Tyson and he's speaking about Stephen Hawking, but it's a really powerful, because it also talks about special needs and all that kind of stuff. It's a really powerful quote. But there's that kind of stuff that I tend to sort of reshare then post my own TikTok stuff. Come find me on LinkedIn and Twitter and to Jillian's point, definitely reach out.

Mary Killelea: We could do another part two with all the topics that I have in my head to talk to you two about. So, thank you for your time today and for being a part of this.

Sabrina Shafer: Thank you.

Jillian Kaplan: Yeah, thanks for having us. Happy bragging.

Mary Killelea: Thanks for listening to the episode today. It was really fun chatting with my guests. If you liked our show, please like it and share it with your friends. If you want to learn what we're up to, please go check out our website at 2bbolder.com. That's the number two, little b, bolder.com.