My second leadership rotation in San Jose
To provide background for new readers, I am writing to share my personal growth experience while taking up the professional challenges doing four new rotations in the 2-year Technology Leadership Program at PayPal.
I hope you enjoyed my last blog where I shared the experiences of my first rotation in Mumbai. This blog will be focused on my experiences in the second Technology Leadership Program rotation of the program in San Jose, CA, which began in June, 2017.
I preferred to have my remaining three rotations in San Jose, which is the headquarters for PayPal Inc. because of the exposure to different domains and projects I would have access to in this office. Also, my teams of interest were also in the San Jose office, and I was looking forward to experiencing yet another culture!
I knew it would be different from my previous experiences in Mumbai, Tel Aviv and Bangalore, and I was eager to get the most out of second rotation without limiting myself to anything.
On the personal side, I had to decide how I wanted to plan with my family. I had already completed rotations without any family in Tel Aviv and as a single parent with my daughter in Mumbai. This time, the distance from India to California is long and the living situation would be different compared to India or Israel.
With lots of deliberations and thoughts, I ultimately decided to take my rotation by myself, similar to my Tel Aviv experience. Due to my husband’s extensive travel schedule, I decided to leave my five-year old daughter with my sister so she could stay in India and continue her education there. So this time, all three of us — my husband, my daughter and myself — were living in different places!
I flew to San Jose from Bangalore after a “very emotional” send off from my husband and sister. Because my daughter and I had been together in Mumbai, our emotional bond had grown much stronger. I knew it would be unbearable for me to say goodbye to my daughter, so we decided to leave her happily playing with her cousin at my sister’s house. Knowing my sister would see to her every need and take care of my daughter did make leaving a bit easier. It also filled me with gratitude that I had such a supportive family who was eager to let me chase my dreams!
My project in this rotation was to work on PayPal’s Core Platform Infrastructure Operations Communications as a Product Manager. The goal is to increase awareness among developers on the importance of Availability, Performance and Scalability of PayPal site to our customers.
Another reason I choose this project was that my host leader was a strong and experienced women leader at PayPal. I wanted to learn the “behind the scenes” of being a leader by working with her.
I found the San Jose team was more reserved than in other countries, but had also heard that it is pretty common in the fast paced, stressful Silicon Valley. It allowed me to learn about a different set of team dynamics and how to connect with my teammates on their terms, through meeting team goals.
Executive Presence was reinforced when I realized I felt timid and uncomfortable during my first one-on-one with my host leader. We agreed to work on developing my own original voice. My host leader helped me create simple and attainable goals — like present every 2 weeks at the new employee training and shadow her in her meetings with Sr Execs.
She provided feedback on my presentations and really helped increase my confidence. Before we worked together, I thought people were born with these public speaking and presentation skills, but she taught me that we all need to practice and prepare,,, all of us! Being fearless is not having no fear BUT conquering the fear with practice!
My goals kept me grounded, and I truly appreciate the support I received from my management. As a result of the great mentoring, I was able to lead the full day Product Summit for 50 Product Managers, which was very well received.
I also had the opportunity to host monthly lunch and learn sessions for 100 engineers, where we have external and internal speakers talk about APS (Availability, Performance, Scalability).
On my personal side, after 3 months it became clear that being away from my daughter was more difficult than I had expected. I started seeing the “missing” in my daughter’s eyes, even though she would not say it openly -and Video Calls just weren’t enough anymore.
I decided to visit a local meditation center one Sunday, to meet new people outside of work and started networking with like minded people. I felt soothed and grounded when I spoke to wonderful people at the retreat community, and they reminded me — The World Is a Lot Bigger Than You Think.
Because I realized that I was not complete with this family setup, I began to prepare myself for bringing my daughter to the United States for next rotation. It was a tough decision to make, and I had to convince my husband and my extended family to support my desire to bring my daughter to San Jose. My family is so supportive and want me to purely focus on my career. But I wanted to balance my two roles — that of a software professional and a mom.
I created a list of things I need to be equipped with being a ‘single parent’ in this country in the interm. My top item in the list was getting a driving licence. Goodness, what a nightmare that was! It was difficult to unlearn my India driving rules (since India had driving on the right side). Perhaps that would be a great topic for another blog! :
On weekends, I spent time looking for a home that is closer to my daughter’s school. At the end of the day, I wanted my daughter to feel completely fine with the new atmosphere in the new country.
I finally found the perfect location and moved into my new home with the help of a friend. I had two weeks to make the house a home before my trip to India to bring my daughter to the US.The week before my flight, I got my driving license.
I happily boarded the flight from India to the United States with my daughter to start my 3rd rotation.
Professional learnings:
- Have Responsible, Accountable, Support, Consult — RASCI model clearly defined for the different roles in the projects
- The importance of talking to the customers — Customer Interviews revealed hidden insights into the customer journey
- “Communications” — Do not overlook this workstream which is so crucial for stakeholder management
Personal learnings:
- I knew what I wanted to be happy and productive at my work and family and realized “When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”
- Honor myself — I continued metta (loving & kindness) meditation which is the simple practice of directing well-wishes towards me and other people
- “Dust off your mistakes and move on” — I understood how to learn and grow from my mistakes.
Thanks for connecting with me through my writing from wherever you are on this planet. It’s my pleasure to share the leadership graduation speech with you in this video!
