Career Growth Advice from Allyson Klein, Tech Marketing Leader | Career Tips for Women in Tech Marketing

2B Bolder Podcast – Episode 89
Featuring Allyson Klein

Episode Title: #89 Allyson Klein: Pioneering Strategies in Tech Marketing and Leadership

Host: Mary Killelea
Guest: Allyson Klein



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.

Welcome to the To Be Bolder podcast. Thanks for tuning in. Today's guest is a hardworking, ambitious and well-respected inspiring market leader in tech. Meet Allyson Klein. Allyson has a notable track record of leading global marketing communications for Fortune 500 brands and currently the founder and principal of the tech arena. With a deep knowledge of the semiconductor industry, Allyson’s industry recognized leadership spans across various marketing and communication disciplines.

From driving thought leadership and introducing powerful brands to spearheading corporate, internal and executive communications, she has left an indelible mark on the world of marketing. She has decades of experience engaging with industry leaders towards joint go-to-market success and aligning entire industries toward a common technology future. Her corporate initiative marketing expertise spans sustainability, diversity, equity and inclusion, talent acquisition and financial communications. Beyond her impressive professional achievements, Allyson is an exceptional manager, mentor, coach, supporting the growth and development of countless individuals throughout her career. With an MBA focused on international marketing from Portland State University and a BA in marketing and management from the University of Oregon, Allyson academic prowess compliments her real world expertise, making her a force to be reckoned with in the marketing landscape. Allyson, thank you so much for being here. It's super cool to have you on the show.

Allyson Klein (Guest): Mary, I think I'm going to take you everywhere to introduce me to people now. That was amazing. Thank you.

Mary Killelea: You're welcome. Okay. So in your career, you have demonstrated boldness and this show is all about being to be bolder. What does to be bolder mean to you?

Allyson Klein: You know, it's funny. It seems like such a simple question and I, when I think about this, I think to be bolder means different things at different times in your career, but I think it always means being true to who you are and what your vision for where you want to go is and finding that voice that is going to guide you, whether it's in your own engagement and choosing the right path for yourself or having the guts to stand up for other people and making sure that they have the opportunities that you want them to. I think that's what to be bolder is all about.

Mary Killelea: I love it. Walk us through your career journey. You started off in sales and now you're running the tech arena. Tell us what are some of the pivotal moments throughout that journey that shaped your career?

Allyson Klein: You know, I think that what I would say is that I've been spurred by one quality in my personality, which is curiosity. My first job in sales, you probably don't even know about Mary. I was a stockbroker before I even went into tech, and I chose that career because I wanted something where I could research and learn about all sorts of different industries and become expert at what was going on in the broader markets. That curiosity propelled me into that career path. After I got my MBA, I realized that I really had a desire to be in tech. I was raised in Silicon Valley and I love that industry, so I decided to move over and take on a sales job at Intel.

Beyond that, I always knew I wanted to get into marketing. That was what my undergraduate degree was, and it was where my passion was in terms of career growth. I moved into a marketing role at Intel. I was lucky enough to do that and things just kept growing. I think it became about, again, curiosity. Where can I take my career path and what kind of innovative marketing programs and marketing ideas can I bring to the table? In fact, I think podcasting was one of those things that propelled me forward. I'm sure we can get into why that is later in the conversation.

Mary Killelea: You started out doing, I know Silicon Valley was the influence, but you were spearheading marketing and tech in B2B before it was really a thing.

Allyson Klein: I guess you're right. I don't want to talk about how old I am, but at least from a standpoint of really marketing to IT decision makers and figuring out from a data center landscape, how do we talk about technology and what's coming in the future of technology to make that infrastructure decision easier? That started with the birth of the PC server. If you want to think about when engineers flipped PCs over on their side and started putting them in racks in data centers, we started thinking about what are the technologies in these and what does that matter in terms of how IT manages them moving forward? B2B in tech really was formed from a standpoint of hardware around that transition.

Mary Killelea: You shaped your career growth through what you said, letting marketing guide you. I'm thinking of initiative marketing. You saw a need for it. Then did you, throughout your career, was that part of your career strategy in developing and positioning yourself to bring some business value?

Allyson Klein: I think one of the things I realized I was good at early on is talking to engineers about technology and translating that into something broader markets could understand. When you are working at Intel, when you're talking about technology with engineers, it gets really geeky really fast. Being able to do that translation is not something that's necessarily a natural skill set for a lot of people. I love talking about the future of technology and the use cases associated with that and really painting a vision for what the engineering efforts of today will deliver in terms of core capabilities tomorrow. That started with things like virtualization but then extended into the digital service economy, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, 5G networks, the Internet of Things and beyond. I think that when you start connecting and customers with, you will be able to do something better, different, more efficiently because of this whizzy thing that we're inventing in labs. Then all of a sudden you create demand, and you create an opportunity for revenue.

Initiative marketing as a definition is really doing that thing where you're painting the vision of something that's coming in the future and building up demand for it. You're also aligning voices across the industry and ensuring that there's clarity in the way that the industry holistically is painting the picture of that technology.

Mary Killelea: You touched on this a few seconds ago but some listeners might not know that you had been podcasting for what, over 10 years. I heard you shared off with the original Intel podcast called Chip Chat covering tech innovation and now your new podcast, Tech Arena. Between the two you've had over a thousand interviews with industry brightest stars. What is it about the podcast as a platform that you enjoy most and what can someone expect if they're tuning into your Tech Arena podcast?

Allyson Klein: It's a funny story. I was at the time given an assignment by my manager to go figure out social media for business to business marketing. I was like, what am I going to do? The first thing I did is I looked at Second Life. I don't know if you remember Second Life. I think it's still around. I saw something recently suggesting it was still around. Needless to say, Second Life never took off for Intel and B2B marketing. The other thing that I came up with is I said, I'll do a podcast. I've heard this thing,and this is in 2009. I've heard of this thing called podcast and I really liked the idea of bringing to life some of the conversations I was having with engineers and the Intel cafeterias to the masses. I loved tapping into inventor passion for lack of a better word. I thought that could be a really interesting media. I happen to be an auditory learner, so podcasts made a lot of sense for me.

I thought this is going to be a side project. I'll do it for maybe 10 episodes and then that'll be a nice little experiment and we'll move on back with the other kinds of marketing that we've always done. What it turned out to be was one of Intel's most effective marketing media for bringing stories of technology to the industry. I think I delivered over 700 episodes of Chip Chat. I had a couple other podcasts during my tenure at Intel, one most notably around network and 5G. When I went to Micron, which was my next career stop, I was running global communications and marketing. I didn't really have time to podcast, but I missed it. When I decided to form my own company, I decided that I was going to build it around a media platform and a podcast, which is the Tech Arena. There I'm talking about some of the same things, tech innovation, but it's very much a neutral platform. Maybe it goes further into bringing out stories of the diverse landscape of tech innovation and where technology is being developed today. Looking for different stories about different companies that might not be getting all of the attention. Also looking for talking about women and different populations and technology because I think those stories are underserved.

Mary Killelea: I think many of your followers and fans are very happy that you're back on the airwaves.

Allyson Klein: Thank you so much. I've been really enjoying the show.

Mary Killelea: Yeah, it's awesome to have you back. Your career included developing successful partner marketing strategies. Explain the value that marketers can gain from understanding companies, partner landscape and how it relates to sales.

Allyson Klein: Yeah, so I think partner marketing is one of the things that is the secret sauce of any good B2B strategy because anytime that you can align forces with another company, with multiple companies and align a message, you're going to be able to increase your opportunity to influence that sale exponentially.

From a standpoint of where we went with initiative marketing, when you're talking about really establishing a breakthrough technology and talking about how this will deliver incremental value and you're building that baseline of awareness and demand for a technology transition, partner marketing is really important because you're trying to align industry around a common vision and a common message for technology and you do that through joint go to market activation and really talking to other companies about things because in that execution, you're aligning message. That's something that's really important.

As you get further down the funnel and you're actually talking about decision making, demand gen, whether it's account based marketing or broader demand gen campaigns, that alignment of message continues but it's more around the joint solutions that have been developed because no technology solution is developed in a vacuum. Companies are working together all the time and it's important to showcase that with customers about what they're actually getting for their technology purchases. Again, alignment of message, alignment of core value proposition.

Then, of course, that feeds into the sales funnel. Working through those marketing activities to develop a sales pipeline, to develop joint sales opportunity and reap joint value for both companies. There's been a lot of cases where I've worked on joint market efforts that are across a number of companies and that works as well. It depends on what the strategy is for the business.

Mary Killelea: I think that's really a gift to be able to work across companies and still prioritize the internal company's goals and objectives. I think that's a skill that is unique. I don't know if there's advice that you have for women who are looking to go down the path of partner marketing. What are some of the core skills or soft skills that you see them needing to play in that space?

Allyson Klein: I think that listening is probably a fantastic beginning. Also, being able to have the perspective that you can think from other people's perspectives, if that makes sense. Whenever I've been in a discussion around partner marketing, I am so much better at being effective if I can really understand their business challenges because they're not mine. They may be similar, but they're not mine. What are their objectives? What are in common in our objectives? How do I, as a partner, best represent them in terms of the development of a message? Am I willing to do more than my fair share of work so that we get the right message and the right marketing mix that's going to be effective for their business opportunities? Because guess what? There's an opportunity there to ensure that I am the go-to-market partner of choice for them moving forward if I am effective in doing that. I think it's listening to them and just really understanding what they're trying to accomplish. Even if it's not completely aligned, finding those points of alignment that you can really focus on for whatever activity you're going to be driving for the joint effort.

Mary Killelea: Okay, so I know this about you directly because I did work for you. I know you have a real gift for storytelling. It was something that I always admired. You and along with Barbara, I thought you two nailed the storytelling all the time. How did you develop this skill and why is it so important? What tips do you have for other marketers out there trying to take complex topics like tech and make it appealing to their audiences?

Allyson Klein: If I told you that I have an uncle that is a great storyteller and it was something that was established as value from when I was a child, that might be part of the story. But not everybody has that uncle. So, then what do you do, right? I think that one of the things that I've always believed is that you need to forget about the tech and realize that you're marketing to humans and that humans love to be told stories. We all do. That's why we go to movies. That's why we read books. I think that finding a way to speak to people from a standpoint of intellectual, emotional, and gut level communications and integrate a story across those is really important.

So, understanding who you're talking to, what excites them, what keeps them up at night, what are their main worries. Really get to know them and have empathy for them. Then you can craft a story that's going to get through. But if you're just, I think what I've seen so much in my career is that executives are drawn to telling the story that they want to tell rather than the story that their audience wants to hear. And so, as a storyteller and even as a podcast host, query can be such a great form, as you know, Mary, and I think that bridging to how do you help them tell the story that the audience wants to hear from them? How do you get them to be more vulnerable and emotional? How do you get them to be bold? Those are the things that I think make great storytellers.

Mary Killelea: Building on your expertise as marketing leader, share some effective strategies for creating a collaborative and innovative marketing team within a tech organization.

Allyson Klein: So I think that the first thing that needs to happen is that you establish an environment where you know you're going to fail. Marketing is a lot about trying things and learning from failure versus realizing that everything is going to be successful, right? And marketing and tech organizations, tech organizations don't have a lot of tolerance for failure. So, it's setting the tone that we're in a fast fail culture. Maybe making allusions to cloud developers and how cloud software is developed might help with some of the engineers. But I think that establishing that and setting up an environment where inside that marketing organization, it's understood that failure is going to happen and it's okay and it's a learning experience and that we're going to get stronger and better from our failures. That's number one, because what that does is it builds an environment of trust. It builds an environment where people can show up and do their best work and not worry that their job is going to be on the line if something goes sideways on them. It's not that excellence isn't going to be expected, and hard work isn't going to be expected, but we know that in creative spaces, not everything always lands well.

And then I think that the second thing is really getting to know each other and developing the teams that I've led where I've been like, wow, that was a fantastic team. It's the teams that spent time with each other getting to know each other as humans, because that care and just appreciation for one another, I think, is what propels folks forward in a way that just focusing on the work will never do. And so if you've got those two things, you can do crazy things in terms of execution and success, but it really starts to me with that.

Mary Killelea: Okay, so in your view, what current or new skills related to marketing should women be prioritizing to get ahead in today's fast-paced and ever-evolving marketing and tech?

Allyson Klein: Okay, so when you ask that question, my mind went in two spaces. One is very expected, which is you got to get your hands around generative AI and figuring out what that means, especially if you're in content marketing. What does that mean? And what does it mean in terms of relevance long-term for people who are creating content? I think that there is absolutely a demand for marketing, marketeers long-term, but it's going to be in concert with generative AI tools. So get ahead of that. Get ahead of that, number one.

Number two, I think it's finally getting over being comfortable, especially in technology, with being the single woman in a room full of men. I think that this is something that there's so many STEM initiatives to get better representation, but we're still behind. And so just getting really comfortable in representing boldly a female perspective and everything that you're doing and being a representation of women in all of those meetings, I think, is something that every woman should be signing up for. If they're signing up for a career in tech marketing.

Mary Killelea: So, when people are looking at companies and building careers with them, and we know that technology is moving so fast and that AI marketing is here, how do you advise them from weighing out two companies who one might be a bigger company who's playing it safe and taking it longer versus going kind of more start-up? Or, you know, risk-taking?

Allyson Klein: Yeah. Well, Mary, I just left a corporate career behind and started my own company. So, I think that, you know where I stand on this, but I think that that all depends on your risk tolerance and how you view risk across that continuum, right? There may be different trade-offs associated with that, but ultimately, I think that we're in the most disruptive time that any of us will ever see in our lifetimes in terms of how careers are going to change. And so, I think that the risk, in my mind, is any place that keeps you from leaning into that trend and leaning into developing skills in that arena.

Mary Killelea: In your opinion, what are some of the biggest challenges we as women face in tech and how have you overcome them in your career?

Allyson Klein: I'm going to answer that question from a person who's in marketing.

Mary Killelea: Okay. Okay.

Allyson Klein: I think that there's a challenge in if you're not an engineer, you don't have the hard skills, right? You have the soft skills, and everybody can do marketing and establishing credibility to be a respected voice in the room amongst the technologists that are driving the company forward is something that I think is a challenge. As I ascended levels of marketing and moved into more corporate marketing roles, that became worse because corporate marketing is actually seen by technologists as even a rung further from business unit marketing. So just really establishing that marketing is a discipline. It's actually something that people study in school. It takes skills and experience. It's not something that one really does as a hobby. And there are what you may be able to do it as a hobby, but to achieve excellence, there are some things that you probably should know. I think that that has gotten true, more and more true as time has gone on, as digital capabilities have gotten more sophisticated. There are very deep disciplines associated with effective go to market. I think that's one thing.

I think that there's also just if you don't come from a STEM degree, how do you get comfortable with the tech? And how do you lean into talking with technologists about what they're doing and really getting that deep grounded understanding of what you're marketing? I think that that's just asking for time. People love to talk about what they're passionate about. So, asking for time from them, having them do a whiteboard session with you, do whatever you need. It doesn't mean that women aren't coming in with STEM degrees, but I'm just talking from my own experience. I came from a marketing background, and I needed to do my job to learn a lot about various areas of the technology landscape. And that was just through an incredible education that I got from engineers along the way.

Mary Killelea: You built your career in the B2B space, working for the big brands like Intel and Micron. Why did you go B2B versus B2C?

Allyson Klein: First of all, I think that was happenstance. So, when I first came into Intel, I was given an opportunity to sell network infrastructure or ProShare video conferencing solutions. And I had a stroke of luck because I chose network infrastructure and ProShare was a very difficult sale. I think that I would not have enjoyed my first couple of years at Intel if I had chosen it quite as much. But I think that that led me into considering marketing jobs that were more in the B2B space.

What kept me there is that I loved the complexity of data center. I could have gone to client. I probably would have ended up doing some consumer if I was in client. I never did that until I was at Micron actually leading. Actually, I led green computing at Intel across the entire corporation. So, I did do some stuff there. But at Micron, obviously, I was leading across the entire company, so both client and server. But I think that I just love the complexity of it. And I love the complexity of the sales cycle.

What's interesting to me is that as I'm taking on work from my own business, I am doing some B2C. And I'm really starting to appreciate some of the complexities that go into B2C marketing and the different channels and the things that you need to think about. And I think that that is a wonderful experience for me at this stage of my career to really appreciate what it goes into marketing to consumer. But to be honest with you, Mary, I think that the social revolution of the early 2000s really reset the landscape for B2B to be about selling to the decision maker as a customer and a consumer. And so the lines have blurred.

Mary Killelea: Yeah, I totally agree with that. What do you have? What advice do you have for employees who work in a very matrixed organization and find it challenging to either get anything done or to be seen or heard? And how have you built your influence in such big companies?

Allyson Klein: You know, it's funny. I was just having a conversation with a company that I'm working with about my disdain for matrix organizational structures yesterday. So, it's funny to have this question come up. But matrix organizations are important when you get into really complex organizations, and I understand why they exist. They're just difficult to maneuver in. I think that one of the things that I learned as an early manager is that when I was working with my staff on their performance reviews and setting them up for development opportunities, I couldn't just look up my own management chain. I had to use the entire matrix. I had to have a strategy for how we establish relationships across that matrix for myself, for my staff members, for the entire organization.

That's something that's almost like a little bit more chess playing to figure out how are you going to establish the relationships that are key that are going to allow your career to be propelled forward? That means taking on special projects across the matrix. It means signing up for movement across the matrix. And I think that the other part of that is really understand the dynamics between decision makers, because often the decision making in the matrix is less than clear. There might be a decision maker, but also somebody that's going to be highly influential about decisions. And then I think that understanding the landscape of a matrix, the final thing that I'll say is put yourself in a part of the organization that carries power in that matrix, because when you're in, often, matrixes become hub and spoke systems. And if you're on a spoke, you might not get the connection opportunities that you have on a hub. I was in a central marketing organization of a business unit that was driving, and the one that you're talking about, a business unit that's driving 50% of Intel's revenue. And being in that central marketing organization, I got to know everybody because my organization was needed for something that they needed. I saw some peers that were doing really interesting work that didn't get those kind of opportunities to connect because they were working on a hub. So, understanding that model and understanding how you can connect and have influence in that model for you and your staff is really important.

Mary Killelea: As I'm listening to you and thinking about the question that I asked you in your answer. One thing that I hear through the interviews and talking to other women is, they have great ideas they're trying to develop their voice and get credit for the work that they do. But then there's sometimes where others take credit for their work, or their work is minimized within the larger thing. What advice do you have for women who feel like they're not getting the visibility for credit for the work that they're doing?

Allyson Klein: My flippant answer is, ask yourself what a man would do in that situation, and then ask yourself why you're not doing that. That's one way of answering the question. But it's also gets to why my earlier answer was about being an advocate for your team and standing up for women because I think that those moments when you see them happen, it's so important. Because I haven't had the voice to voice that sometimes. I've seen other people struggle to find the voice to voice it. Sometimes it's easier to voice when you're the person standing next to that person that that's happening to. And so I just challenge women to stand up for each other and call things out when they don't seem fair. And then set expectations about what are the right rules of the road if you want to think about it that way in terms of getting credit.

Now credit is an interesting question though because sometimes the broad organizational credit isn't what matters. It could be credit with the decision makers about what you're worried about next, or it could be credit with the champion that's going to get you to your next role. So, I think really defining what does success look like, sometimes credit isn't in it, right? Maybe it's just realizing that you can do what you just did, and that's enough for that particular moment. But I think that really getting clear with what you need, talking to the people in your network and to your managers and champions about what you need, and then making that come to fruition. And then going back to what would a dude do if he didn't get it? And when you laugh like that, you know that maybe you're not acting like that. But I think that that's always a good litmus test.

Mary Killelea: Yeah, no, totally true. In the tech sector, especially in the leadership roles, where do you see the most significant opportunities for women to thrive and make an impact?

Allyson Klein: I'm a real believer in inclusion. I did a podcast with Jahan Manton about six months ago, and she leads these seminars on inclusive design. And her feeling is we're all designers, engineers are designers, marketers are designers. But coming with a perspective of I'm bringing something to the table that maybe others are not seeing. I think that remembering who you are and having a really good grounding in what your experiences are. If you're a technologist, understanding that you're probably bringing very unique perspectives into the development process. If you're in marketing, remembering that marketing is a creative discipline and you're bringing your unique perspective into that and never lose track of your voice. I think that's it. I mean, I could say go get a STEM degree or go get a certification or, you know, whatever. But I really think it's that. It's your perspective. It's who you are. Everybody has a unique perspective and has an ability to change the direction of something just by providing that perspective and being unafraid to use their voice.

Mary Killelea: Where was it along your career path that you started to recognize your superpowers, if you will, of the storytelling, of being a good leader?

Allyson Klein: Every day. I don't really relate to what you just read about me at the top of this episode. I'm just like, yeah, I'm doing my thing. But I think that there have been moments where I've been really particularly proud of what I've pulled off. Founding my business and developing a platform on my own has been, just the latest example of something that I'm incredibly proud of the work that I'm doing and, you know, the interviews that I've done and the clients I've taken on.

I think that for me, it's a moment of realizing that I've accomplished something that I haven't seen other people do. And when I see that I've led an organization towards a goal where people have traveled down that road before and it hasn't gone well, then I know that I've done something that I can be proud of.

Mary Killelea: Yeah.

Allyson Klein: You said the storytelling thing. I think that there have been moments where I've been, you know, in an airport in another part of the world and I've seen an ad from one of our customers and they've used my taglines in their ad. And I know, oh, okay, so I have aligned the industry around something that is having meaning, you know, those are cool moments. And, you know, that's a really wonderful thing. But I also think it's like really small things. It could be like a great podcast episode where, a guest really opened up and I got somebody to say something that was just so meaningful. I just had a podcast with a woman at Washington State who's studying vector borne diseases or tick-based diseases and using technology for their prevention and, you know, getting her to open up about why she's doing that I think was a really interesting story. And that just is one that I did a couple weeks ago, so it's top of mind. But I think those are the moments that I'm really proud of as well.

Mary Killelea: That's awesome. What resources or support systems have been instrumental in your personal and professional growth? Are there any books, podcasts, or courses that you might recommend for others?

Allyson Klein: I don't read about business or marketing at all.

Mary Killelea: You don’t?

Allyson Klein: No, not at all. I read fiction. I'm a storyteller. It's not the right question for me. I think that, and I'm an auditory learner, so it's talking to people. I think that the way that I would answer that question is if you are somebody who's a book learner, there's a lot of people that will recommend books and follow their advice. But from a standpoint of where I've gotten the most insight, it's developing a network of people that are just brilliant. And more importantly, they're brilliant. They see my capability and challenge me to be everything that I can be. Knowing that you've got that group of people is much more insightful and much more expansive than anything that I could learn in a book. And so I think that I would say that.

And then I think that if I was going to say, what do I do to get new ideas? It's just talking to people who are doing great marketing, right? Like, what are they doing? How are they doing? Asking tons of questions. I mean, I am an interviewer, so it is in my nature to just like pepper people with questions and use every single opportunity as a learning opportunity. Right. So if you're talking to somebody who's in a completely different industry, but they're doing something really interesting with their marketing, learn about it, see if it inspires you.

And then the final thing that I'll say. I was working really crazy hours at my office. And I realized that I was lacking one thing that I think really was important for my own work, which is time doing nothing. Because then I posted something on my LinkedIn recently that was basically saying that marketers need time to do nothing so that they can they can get into more creative spaces. And it was the most engaged post I have ever had on LinkedIn. So many people responded to this. So, it's a very visceral thing. Set up time where you don't have an objective. You know, I'm such a driver. Everything must be productive all the time that I had to learn how to spend time without having to spend time with my clients. That was hard for me. But it's so important because it's when the most innovative and creative ideas come, you know, and they and they do come during that time.

Mary Killelea: No, yeah, no, I do. I get that they do come. And I think that's the challenge that many businesses have, or at least employees have at businesses is there's no time to do anything. And that is back to back meetings or back to back to do lists.

Allyson Klein: Yeah.

Mary Killelea: How do you balance your personal life setting boundaries?

Allyson Klein: Well, I think that it comes down to, you know, and I made a huge life change starting my own business. And part of it was, you know, I was a business owner. It comes down to, you know, and I made a huge life change starting my own business. And part of it was that, Mary, was figuring out how do I want to be remembered? Do I want to be, you know, do I want my tombstone to say she really did great product launches? Or, you know, do I want to have something a little bit more meaningful to me? But I think that it's realizing that for you to do your best work, for you to show up best and leave aside that we're all type A crazy performers. But for you to do your best work, the first thing that you need to take care of is yourself. And so what feeds you? What fills up your energy? Is it being around other people? Is it being by yourself? You know, for me, you know, a lot of it's hiking and like being out in nature and being around trees and in doing things that are completely not tech. Doing different art pursuits and creative pursuits light me up in ways that that, you know, writing another paper for tech is not going to do. So, understanding how you tick and really spending a lot of time kind of getting grounded with how do I become my most energized self? How do I become somebody that can be fully present with this experience? That is going to make you so much more able to be more effective and efficient in the way that you're doing your work. I think that there is a point of overwork where your efficient ratio really falls apart. So that I think that's important.

Mary Killelea: Well, and when you say it's true that sometimes women think if they're busy, that it’s a good thing versus prioritizing the work that they do. I think that was one thing that I had to because I'm a task doer. And so there was a lot of OK, I must be doing great because I've got 12 tasks and there, I'm on 11. But I had to refocus always like what is the priority that my manager or my manager's manager really cares about the other eight don't really matter.

Allyson Klein: Right. Or it's what is the most effective use of my time?

Mary Killelea: Yeah.

Allyson Klein: What do I know is going to deliver the most value? And if it's the thing that you do for five minutes. And it doesn't take you an hour. That's all right. Because it means that you're efficient. That is a that is a long road for a lot of women, especially to hoe in terms of wisdom. But I think that understanding that is a way to free yourself from that constant treadmill of I must do more to be valued.

Mary Killelea: Yeah. OK. And then I think that I think, you know, as I as I'm looking at you is you're very succinct in your emails. And I would write lengthy emails, and you would just come back with no cover one topic at a time. And I think that's so important, especially for some of these younger people getting into the workforce. They may or may not know how to best approach or get a response from stakeholders.

Allyson Klein: I think this is part of understanding your audience and understanding their perspective on things. And this was actually a key learning from somebody in my network that I was a mentor that I really appreciated. She told me when you're writing to executives, don't allow your mouse to scroll and really hone in on what you need them to know so that they can make the decisions that you're seeking from them. Or you can inform them of what exactly they need to know, because you may have a lot that you want to say. And I always have a lot that I want to say. But it's really important and it's a discipline and it's a gift to them because they are getting thousands of emails a day. And that is true. I have been that executive that has gotten thousands of emails a day. And I have totally appreciated employees and coworkers who were able to deliver succinct communication like that.

Mary Killelea: It has been amazing, amazing to have you here. Any parting words or advice for women listening, whether they're just starting out in their careers or pivoting, then want to pursue marketing.

Allyson Klein: Well, first of all, thank you for having me on the show. I love your podcast. I love that you're doing it. We've known each other for a long time. And when I saw that you launched this, I was thrilled because I think it's so cool that you're taking this topic and I love how you've scoped your focus on the show. So, congratulations. I know it's been a success, and I'm delighted to be here.

For folks who are listening online and are looking at developing their careers. I think that the best thing to do is get a game plan. I think that a lot of the thing that I've thought about throughout my career is the statement of and this sounds like draconian, but successful people do the things that unsuccessful people are not willing to do. And it's really about effort. Right. Have a game plan, because a lot of people don't. A lot of people have met with me and said, I want your help. I want you to mentor me. And but then I ask, what do you want to learn? And they don't know. So have a game plan for what they what you want to do, where you want to go and who you want to help you leverage things like the people around you to create connections. You know, this doesn't always have to be someone above you in an org chart. Could be a great peer that knows something that you don't. It could be an intern that understands Gen Z way better than you do. It could be anybody that you can ask questions and get smarter.

And then, you know, if you've got questions about things that I've talked about, reach out on LinkedIn. I'm at Allyson Klein on LinkedIn or at techallyson on what was formerly known as Twitter. And I'm always happy to chat about development of badass marketing women. So yeah, just reach out.

Mary Killelea: I love it. Badass marketing women. Thank you, Allison.

Allyson Klein: Thanks so much, Mary. It was a great time.

Mary Killelea: Thanks for listening to the episode today. It was really fun chatting with my guest. 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 2 little bbolder.com.