Kate (00:00:02) - Simplicity. It just makes my eyes light up when you think about operations, because I think there's nothing more impactful than asking the stupid question again and again and again, until we know the answer so crisply that everyone can say it, everyone can do it, and it just drives in tons of clarity.

Ariana (00:00:22) - Welcome to Secret Ops, the podcast uncovering the world of operations, one episode at a time. I'm your host, Ariana Cofone, and today's guest is Kate Parker, Chief Operating Officer at Transcend. Now, this episode really dives into topics that are at the heart of what we, as operators, need to be thinking about: data governance, tech education, empowerment through technology. There's so many components of what we talked about that just really are brought to life through her experience at Uber and Google and Transcend. I'm really excited for this episode. I really hope that you learn a thing or two. I know I have a whole page of notes that I'm taking away. Let's just jump in though. Let's get to it.

Ariana (00:01:06) - All right, over the episode. Welcome to Secret Ops!

Kate (00:01:08) - Thank you for having me.

Ariana (00:01:10 ) - I'm really looking forward to this. And as I was preparing questions to ask you, I gotta admit I was a bit overwhelmed because your experience is so vast across so many interesting areas of technology and industry, just to name a couple. So you were at Google where you drove the Made to Code movement, which I want to touch base with later, you were also global director for consumer safety at Uber, which that in itself I have a million questions. But most recently you are Chief Operating Officer at Transcend, which is all about data governance. So you've really been at the cusp of technology and human beings for, you know, years and years and years. How did you choose this journey or how did you fall into this path of having all of these interesting twists and turns in your career because they align, but they also differ with each other.

Kate (00:02:09) - All very kind of you to say it was completely by accident.

Kate (00:02:13) - I'm a political science major and a regulatory nerd at heart. So ending up in tech was very, you know, random for me in many ways. It was not something I anticipated. I had, you know, interned on The Hill. I had worked in regulatory affairs. I just assumed that either nonprofit or traditional corporate work was going to be where I landed. But that was definitely during the time when technology companies were starting to play a much larger role on the regulatory landscape, whether it was because of economic tax issues in certain countries where they didn't have large employee bases and offices, or getting swept up in safety and privacy related regulations, it was a very interesting moment to kind of take that jump into the tech world. And I haven't looked back since. I think it's, you know, been an absolutely incredible ride, and I've gotten to see lots of different things and work with just truly amazing people.

Ariana (00:03:10) - Now, if you're someone looking outside of this world and we're talking about data governance, risk and compliance, all of these things, I know a lot of people just sort of numb themselves when they hear those words.

Ariana (00:03:23) - But as we've seen with data privacy laws, with how we're trying to keep up with AI progressing and how we essentially, you know, create laws around that, this is more and more important every single day. So how have you seen it evolve over, I guess, the last couple of years? Has it sped up? It seems like it has, but it might just be because I'm hearing about it more not being in the industry, but it feels like I am hearing and having to do more operational work around it. Is that something that you've noticed has always been there? What are you seeing on your side?

Kate (00:03:56) - It’s definitely speeding up. So I think that that's a very real thing, both in the pace of regulations that are happening, either on a state level or a country level. We are soon heading to a place where two thirds of the global population will have some type of data privacy right, in terms of either owning their data, being able to delete their data, or accessing their data.

Kate (00:04:16) - So it's definitely speeding up. And we're starting to notice that that curve continues. There's also this interesting overlay that happened a few election cycles ago, where folks really started to pay attention to how their data was being used for potentially manipulative ways. And so if folks remember the Cambridge Analytica scandal, that certainly put into the public conversation a sort of wondering about how data could be used, to try to influence or tip scales in certain ways and make, you know, sort of get information in different places and try to manipulate voters. So that I think helped kind of speed up that adoption curve. The other thing I would say is, I think there have been a number of points in the tech industry itself, either coming from inside the house of tech companies realizing this, or outside of the house with a particularly large issue or scandal, but I think there's been a growing realization that we're talking about real people and real incidents happening. And at the end of the day, we're talking about human lives and how we make sure they're well protected, how we make sure that they're set up to succeed and enjoy all of the great bits of technology of which there are so many.

Kate (00:05:31) - But I think there has been this combination function where you're seeing, okay, these are real humans, and we're talking about real issues that are happening on platforms, in apps, you know, in tech companies. How do we make sure we're approaching that with the seriousness that it requires? And I do think that has changed pretty dramatically in the past ten years.

Ariana (00:05:51) - I can imagine that being really real during your time at Uber. Because you're talking about, you know, digital safety but also physical safety. How did that work, I guess deepen your knowledge? Because I imagine a lot of us now are just sort of stepping into the “my home is connected”, and I also need to figure out how my data privacy is working. So a lot of us are just entering that. But you were sort of ahead of that curve in the work that you were doing.. How was that? What I can imagine the challenges were honestly overwhelming, but that's from me coming from the outside. How is it being on the inside?

Kate (00:06:36) - I would say, you know, listen, when it comes to Uber, there were so many incredible things about the company. I enjoyed my time there tremendously. The people I worked with, the leadership under Dara Khosrowshahi was incredible. We had just incredible people across so many aspects of the company. Certainly not without its warts. Right. Very public, you know, sort of reckoning on many different levels. I think what was very eye opening for me and instructive for me, was learning the bits of operational rigor in that context of fast moving, incredibly high growth, incredibly global and very, very well-used brand. That meant that we were, you know, sort of interacting with people in their daily lives two, three, four times a day as you're popping in and out of Uber, as you're interacting with the service, you're on the app, you're meeting drivers, you're getting food picked up. That level just felt like an absolute masterclass in learning and seeing how great operators work, how they get stuff done on an incredibly complex global scale.

Kate (00:07:45) - And it's training that I feel like I will take with me for life and apply to any future role that I'm in. It was definitely something that I feel helped to give so many people who worked there that type of experience.

Ariana (00:08:02) - Yeah, absolutely. It's also, I mean, this is obviously I'm passionate about this with Secret Ops as a podcast, but being an operator requires so much to do your job well, not just being flexible, but being creative and how you approach solutions. Being adaptable, being rigid when you need to. When, when did you realize like, “oh, I, I am an operator. Like, this is a big part of who I am. This is what I kind of see the lens through”. Like, what was that light bulb clicking for you? I mean, I'll speak for myself. I didn't even know I was an operator until somebody said, “hey, there's a job called the director of operations. I think this is the thing that you do”.

Ariana (00:08:41) - So it took somebody saying, “hey, I think that you feel and you think in this lens” for me to understand it. What was that light bulb moment on your side of things?

Kate (00:08:50) - I don't know if I've had that light bulb moment, to be honest, because I think I'm still clicking left kind of this ongoing journey of just getting closer and closer to the core of the business. And so when I started my career, I started out in communications and public affairs, you know, so regulatory briefings, working with members of Congress, you know, press releases, key messages, like all of that stuff. And then I sort of looked over the fence and saw marketing and said, oh, that's, you know, there you get the budget, you get you build stuff. You do, you like creativity, you are a little bit closer into the product development, you know. So then I took that jump there. And then from that marketing angle, I looked over and I saw strategic initiatives and I thought, wow, that's cool.

Kate (00:09:38) - You can kind of fill the gaps between the product elements and how they're working. And so I took that jump there, you know, now currently in my role, I run everything from marketing across our go-to-market, our sales organization, legal, all of the back office, finance, people operations. So it's a pretty wide purview, but I don't know if I've ever had that light bulb moment of it being under the label of operations. But I think operations and operational skill is something that I've always been super passionate about, and I've seen people do it so well at all sorts of different perches, whether they have an operations title or not. Like I've seen comms people just be incredible operators, I've seen marketing folks be incredible operators, I've seen product people and even engineers be incredible operators. So I think for me, I view it more as an underlying skill set and passion area, and that you can kind of see when someone leans into that or might have other skills that they bring to the table.

Kate (00:10:37) - But I think that's been the evolution for me and how I've thought about that.

Ariana (00:10:42) - I couldn't agree more. And that's also, I think the beauty of having that skill set is that you can change your life very quickly, whether it's deciding to go into a different industry, but using that skillset to leverage, you know, a new skill set or staying in the same industry, but maybe going from a region to global. I'd love to talk about your approach in building operations, because we both agreed about simplicity being the key behind beautiful, gorgeous ops. But of course, simplicity is the hardest thing to do.. What is your approach to building simple, smart operations, and what are some tips that we can gain from all the experience that you've had doing that?

Kate (00:11:26) - Yeah, I think simplicity. It just makes my eyes light up when you think about operations, because I think there's nothing more impactful than asking the stupid question again and again and again, until we know the answer so crisply that everyone can say it.

Kate (00:11:41) - Everyone can do it, and it just drives in tons of clarity. I'm also a firm believer that simplicity really powers the way for empowerment across teams. I think the more we can break things down, help kind of drive and squeeze out that chaos and that noise. It gives people this freedom to operate that doesn't feel as command and control, as sometimes I think companies go towards of like, I'm not going to make it simple, but I'm just going to tell you exactly what to do. So trying to like strip that out and being like, this is the goal. These are the parameters. This is the goal. Have fun, build your best work, bring the creativity back into it. Like leave a little bit of room for the chaos, but strip out enough of that noise that you're allowing folks to do that. And I think it's just an incredible way of operating. It gives me a lot of passion. And I think that it helps to bring other folks, you know, into that fold as well.

Kate (00:12:36) - To your point and to your question, it's not easy to do. Certainly. So I don't know if I have the rule book or like any of the tips and tricks that are going to blow people away. Again, it's simple. But for me, it's in asking the most obvious stupid question, I, I cannot stress the amount of times that I have felt and on both sides that I felt that I've been in the room and haven't asked this the stupid question, and then realize later that nobody knows the answer. And I was like, “oh, I wish I just had that courage in that moment to be like, Does the Emperor have clothes in this moment? Like, have we asked that question?”, and I've certainly been in the room and not done it. I've also been in the room and done it, and I've seen those moments where it sort of opens the conversation up for us to actually go back to first principles.

Kate (00:13:30) - What are we trying to solve? What do we know to be true? What are the guardrails, how are we trying to operate? And it drives kind of a deeper, sometimes uncomfortable conversation in that context, but it provides such clarity for the roadmap ahead. So I would say my first, I don't know if it's a tip, but like I would say that it's my my first go to is to always try to force myself in any room that I'm in, any situation I'm in to back up, find the most obvious question, and make sure that we have alignment on that as a first principle. And if not, you know, keep clicking into it. And until we get to that level of clarity, I think.

Ariana (00:14:07) - Also not underestimating that that question, answering it can actually be quite difficult. We think that the obvious question is the obvious. Like there's an obvious answer to an obvious question. It's not always the case. And that's where that repetition comes in. And I have felt so many times like I'm a broken record where I'm like, but what does that mean exactly? Or there's like a buzzword that's being used, you know, like it's our strategy or we're doing OKRs or this is the metric.

Ariana (00:14:36) - And I'm like, but what do we mean by this? And I'm sure I've annoyed people, but I also think it's in pursuit of if you can explain to me like, I'm five, what's going on, then we all can be empowered to do our best work because we've hired the best people. If you don't have that clarity, we’re all sort of just, I don't know, I just don't feel like you could go into things with such a hunger as if you knew what you're doing. Because, again, like, we're all coming in with these learned experiences. You've got all this, I mean, marketing and communications and PR and all that, all this policy work that you're doing. You've got this aperture that you're viewing this work through. I've got, you know, the technology stuff and, you know, performance and customer service. So I'm viewing the work through that lens. Without that North Star, it's like I don't know. I feel like honestly I've seen a lot of wasted resources.

Ariana (00:15:30) - Yeah. Come from it. And it's unfortunate because you know, your labor costs are usually the most expensive part of our operating costs. And if you're not able to use their intelligence and their. Hard work in a clear way. I just feel like you're wasting a lot of time and intelligence to do it, I don't know, have you found that when it comes to clarifying that question, is it harder at a senior leadership level? Is it easier on a lower level if you're doing the work? Like where do you find that environment to be the most difficult to get an answer to?

Kate (00:16:12) - It's a great question. I think it definitely depends on the context in the scenarios. So as an example, I think there's a lot of forward momentum in a business that is incredibly helpful, but is also something for any operator to be mindful of and to watch out for. And by that I mean we've all worked on those initiatives that have kicked off and started with clarity, and then snowballed into a sense of confusion and disparate objectives, disparate understandings of what should be done, how it should be accomplished.

Kate (00:16:52) - Kind of an odd amalgamation, like coming back up to the leadership team, you know, I’ve definitely worked in structures like that where answering the question and providing the clarity is incredibly difficult because you have to spend a ton of time understanding how things got so different. How did team A in, you know, region Y? Why interpret it this way? How did team B in region Z interpret it this way? Why is leader X saying the KPI is this when, you know, leader so-and-so is saying that this is the interpretation of the objective? So in some ways I think that it requires a ton of research. If it's super, you know, if it's at that level of complexity, it requires an operator to really spend time learning not just how things are currently working, but how they got so different. Does this, you know, this leader over here have a different set of objectives that they're being held to? Does their budgeting system work differently? Are they coding things differently? Do you have this leader over here? Does that person have a specific point of view that hasn't really been brought into the room that's influencing the way that they're approaching things? I think that level of research internally is required in order to figure out where to ask the right question.

Kate (00:18:15) - So in the example that I'm giving, you know, I'm talking, you know, in kind of broad strokes about an incredibly complex global operation and asking the obvious question in a room with executives sitting at the centralized office may not actually be the right place, because from their vantage point, everyone is on the same page and the KPIs are very clear and the goals are very clear, but as an example, you know, to kind of carry this forward, if I'm sitting in the room with finance who is going out and actually allocating all of the budgets towards the KPIs, and I look at the, you know, the details with them to understand how that's flowing globally. And I can see that there's, you know, not in alignment with how the KPI…like that's the place to ask the stupid question, you know, why is our budget not aligned with our KPIs in region and Z. But for the executives, they would be like, what do you mean? We set the initiatives, we put it out.

Kate (00:19:10) - Everyone's operating. You know, I'm getting updates. So to me it's probably to summarize, it's in finding the right room, particularly if you're at a large organization, it's in finding the right room to ask those questions. And it's in knowing the research and knowing the details. And I'm always a firm believer that, like, you know anyone in the operator seat, you got to learn how to fly at 100,000ft, and then you got to learn how to dive bomb into something super quickly, like opening up the, you know, the finance budget and figuring out where things are going or getting straight into the details of how a KPI is being quantified and measured, like you just have to be able to figure out where you're going to get into to get that research.

Ariana (00:19:58) - Oh my gosh. I immediately think about my day. Two days where I think to myself, wake up and I have a lot of meetings on my calendar, and I'm like, why am I in so many meetings? And it's to get that high level bird's eye view of all the information that you just need to sort of digest so that you know exactly where you need to pinpoint.

Ariana (00:20:16) - And is that a person? Is it a team? Is it a process? Is it a technology? Is it like trying to figure out what is that thing that you have to really go after, and who's the right person to talk about it? I mean, which comes down to communication. I feel like as an operator, you've got to be a rock star communicator, because without it, I mean, everybody has their own style, but that's literally how I have found that I've solved my own problems. Is being able to communicate or ask the right questions? How have you honed that communication muscle over the years? Because I will tell you, I've fallen on my face many, many times trying to.

Ariana (00:20:54) - What would you say? Did you stumble upon your style of communication? My approach is very humorous, but data driven. It's trying to be empathetic but also rigid. How did you find your communication style as an operator?

Kate (00:21:11) - I think it's still an evolution for sure. I think that I have applied different communication styles in different settings, but I think there's a couple things I know to be true about myself. One, I operate at my best when I just say very simply and very clearly what's on my mind. Two, I operate at my very best, and I think that teams respond well when I inject and continue to use my interest in creativity and sort of these, you know, connection points that I think are organic and interesting and help to bubble up great, interesting ideas. I always want to leave space for that in my communication style. I think that over time, particularly in sort of my transformation across different organization structures, I have loved the ability to communicate more with just hard data and hard facts. And I think as you are in more of the regulatory, public affairs, communication space, that's a more challenging endeavor for a lot of those folks, because you might not have at your fingertips a really strong way of quantifying the trend that you're seeing or the feedback that you're hearing.

Kate (00:22:27) - And, you know, it might be a couple clicks, you might be seeing the trend early before the data or the polls or the information is kind of giving you that signal. But certainly as you get into some of the more quantitative studies of operations, being able to just have that data, have that as an anchor point for communication, start from there, leave room for the creativity, you know, say simply what's on your mind and try to have that can just be a really effective way for me personally of operating and of having that as kind of a core structure.

Ariana (00:23:00) - You summarize that so succinctly and beautifully because the hard part is, as we have more access to data, how do we use that in the right ways, but also bring in the human element. There's those two things you talk about creativity too. The operators have to be insanely creative, but we do need to base the creativity on parameters where that might be process for some people or platforms or technology or data. You have to have a sandbox to play in and figuring out what that sandbox is, is really helpful having those data points to be able to say, okay, here's the thing that's kind of weird going on. We've got to like, hone in on what's happening, and we've got to use all of our facets to be able to figure this out and get through this, which, I mean, it gets us into the world of Transcend and data governance and what you're doing today. What drew you to Transcend and operations? I mean, they are such a beautiful marriage of both worlds, but what would you say at this point in your career was the big draw.

Kate (00:24:02) - The big draw, hands down, was the founders, Ben and Mike are two folks, computer scientists by trade, dear friends who were looking at doing a personal study of their data to optimize their own performance. They were in college at the time. They were like, cool. Let's get our Spotify listening apps.

Kate (00:24:25) - Let's figure out our calendars and what time's our classes are and how, you know, our data off of our fitness trackers and figure out our sleep optimization. Like, let's kind of hack the data of our lives and then they ran straight into a brick wall because every company said you don't have access to that data, and we're not going to give it to you. And they thought to themselves, like, that's super odd. And it was right at the moment where Europe's GDPR, which is their big privacy regulation, was coming out into the fold. And they took one look at it and they said companies are either going to build a bunch of kind of legal oriented banners, like stuff that just kind of covers their, their, you know what to just kind of create a little bit of patchwork. But these laws are just going to keep going until it gets to the actual data, and it gets to governing the data for the users, like at a code layer.

Kate (00:25:21) - And their passion, their approach, their leadership styles were just so interesting to me. And I felt that taking the jump to work with them would not only be very fulfilling from a space, because I love these types of spaces. I love these like regulatory kinds of tech spaces but also just from a kind of a match perspective, I felt like they would be awesome leaders to work for. They're so technical, but they are so high on EQ, on empathy, on just kind of building a really awesome culture that I just really wanted to be a part of that. It felt like a really awesome jump to make. So that's what brought me there, and that's what kept me there for, you know, almost four years. It's been almost four years. It's crazy.

Ariana (00:26:06) - Time flies when you're having fun with data governance. Now, I do think about the time that you've been at Transcend. How much has changed just from like even in the US market, we've gone from very little regulation to now, all these states having different regulations.

Ariana (00:26:23) - Obviously you talked about GDPR. Looking from the global lens, what do you think are the biggest challenges that we're facing from a data governance standpoint? Because like I said, I'm feeling quite overwhelmed trying to keep up with everything, but it's also when I'm building operations, in my head my question is, do I build our data practices around the most rigid requirements and then work backwards? Do I base it on where we're at and then we have to constantly adapt it? How would you recommend other operations people approaching this hurdle? Yeah, that might be changing literally every day, but I'm personally asking for my own days. How would you approach this?

Kate (00:27:10) - I love that question. You might remember I mentioned earlier that sometimes there's motion in business that can be helpful, and sometimes there's motion and business that can cause folks to kind of take a step back and say, okay, this is just motion for motion's sake. I think when it comes to data privacy for most companies, what we are seeing is that they are undergoing a transformation right now away from the motions that they've put into place.

Kate (00:27:38) - So let me be specific on that. A lot of companies approach GDPR by saying, let's create a data practice. If we operate in Europe or, you know, they waited until the first US law hit, so maybe California or another law, they said let's take this first regulation that we have to comply with. Let's set up a structure internally to comply with that law. And then the motion has been for every law since then to just keep adding more process. We are now in a time period where we're expecting the US to be a complete patchwork of state laws in which every state is trying to either model California, which is a very strict law, or set a new high watermark such as Washington, just came out with a huge healthcare related data practice regulation. So they're trying to kind of one up each other. So we're in a world now where every state is creating their own patchwork. We've got countries. And so obviously Europe continues to lead the fraud on the EU AI act, which is, you know, now very much coming to fruition.

Kate (00:28:54) - We've got South Korea, there's Japan, we've got India, like from a global operation scale. There's just incredible complexity. And we're watching companies say, okay, hold on, time out on the motion of just adding more process. This is not a place to continue to add more people. This is not a place to continue to add more Band-Aids across these scenarios. This is a time to employ all of the great operational skills that we apply in other disciplines. Things like digital transformation, automation, clear business strategy alignment for how we're going to operate. So to your point, are we going to operate off of the most stringent and have a compliance and trust-oriented angle? Are we going to operate from the ability of being the most dynamic, allowing us to have incredibly nuanced and local interpretations on a very…all of these things are possible with the right technology, with the right automation. They are nearly impossible with the ongoing motion of just adding more process in the ways that people quickly mandated against GDPR or against, you know, a California bill.

Ariana (00:30:11) - Literally getting hot thinking about it, just knowing that that constant mandating part of it is like a house of cards. At some point, it's very easy for all of that to break, but also when things also become standardized, there's a lot of undoing to be done. So you create this kind of really intricate situation for yourself that involves technology teams. It involves a lot of resources to get this done. And then something changes, like I pick up my phone and I'm like, oh my gosh, okay, how do we apply this? Okay. When is this rolling out? I have how many, you know, like, that's kind of like how my days have been, and as much as I, I love that because it keeps things interesting. It's also just exhausting. It's very tiring to do. I'm also personally passionate about data ownership for myself. Like, I do think that that is something that we should have the ability to own.

Ariana (00:31:08) - Especially, you know, as I'm getting older and thinking about photographs and things that, you know, I want to be able to remove those things or also be able to control what my online persona is as well. How do you think the bridge from the business world of data governance laps into the personal world of our data governance? And what are some personal things that we should be thinking about as individuals in this lens as well, outside of just what we do on a work level?

Kate (00:31:38) - I think here's my biggest take on the personal angle. We all use technology every day. We should have an expectation for companies as it relates to products, features, usability, UX, UI related to our data privacy in the same way we would for a company rolling out a new filter widget on their app, right? You go to some sites to try to fill out your data privacy. I encourage everyone to do it, just, you know, pick your favorite site. You know, find your data privacy little bar.

Kate (00:32:18) - It'll be right at the bottom of the homepage. Click on that. See how easy it is to exercise your rights. If it's buried under a ton of legal ease. If it involves an email address like company at privacy dot com you've got an email, that email address., it's fascinating to me the divide of kind of where we currently are between transformative, operationally focused, best-in-class teams that have single button clicks. Click here to download your data. SSO authentication like, you know, a pre-flight checks to make sure that your account balances are…like all of this stuff has been automated transformed. Obviously Transcend does all of that. But watching those companies have that transformation angle is so powerful. And then when we look at other companies that have great tech, great products, things that people love, but their data privacy practices are legacy. Are manual or outdated. As consumers, the thing that I get super passionate about is we should just continue to raise our bar and expectations.

Kate (00:33:32) - We shouldn't be okay with it. And I think it's interesting to watch a lot of these companies transform, but there needs to be more of them. And I think that to me, that's just, you know, such a clear, easy thing. And it kind of harkens back to the way our founders just went in search of their data and were stonewalled. You know, now they're not stonewalled, and now they have the rights and the regulations. Particularly living in California, we can get access to all of our data, many other states now can too, but for some companies, they just it's not there yet. The transformation, the application of great operational principles, of great usability, of clearly, you know, you can kind of see it like, okay, they must not have great processes internally that the operational rigor, you know, needs a little bit more transformation internally and so as consumers, we can see that we can kind of see those edges. And I think that's helpful for us to just continue to raise the bar on.

Ariana (00:34:23) - It's like that moment of trusting your gut. For example, I deal with a lot of, you know, insurance policies for businesses and trying to figure out insurance policies. And I'll go on to a lot of these websites and my gut immediately, like, sends up these red flags because I'm like, oh, man, this login doesn't make sense. Or how I'm getting this quote doesn't make sense. Why are they, you know, like there's not enough user experience being put at the heart of the product. That makes me comfortable and thinking, I can give you all of this very sensitive information to quote me out. And now you have all this… I feel like when I hear you talking about this, that gut feeling is almost like our modern day, sort of like protective instinct coming in. It's like. Or my dad, he got an email and he was like, hey, Amazon's emailing me. And my husband said, look at the email address. What is the email? What is that coming from? And there's this education that needs to happen that's matching your knowledge with your gut to be able to protect your privacy and your data.

Ariana (00:35:27) - And it's just so important. But we're just at the cusp of it really being able to understand it. And it is educational. Like this is something that needs to be something that we talked about in school and educate people, just like finances, just like all these other things. But there is that divide that's happening more and more and more. And I will say some of it has become quite obvious and some of it also, there's a lot of dupes out there where you think you can trust it and you can't. So I am going to take all these tips and put them in my back pocket. Thank you. But this also gets into being educated in technology, being literate in technology. And you personally have a passion for this. You know, I think even before your time at Google developing the Made With Code movement., now you are chairwoman of Technovation which is a global AI education nonprofit. So this is something at the heart of what you do and you care about.

Ariana (00:36:23) - Why did that passion start? What at what point did you say, hey, we need to be educating people and bringing people along in this technology journey.

Kate (00:36:34) - I think for me it started when I got to tech. And I looked into rooms and I said, why aren't there more women in that room? I mean, I think that was really kind of the ah-hah for me. And obviously that's a very illustrative example. Like, you know, I'm sure there wasn't one room, but it was just sort of this pervasive feeling. And obviously a lot of conversation within tech companies themselves, you know, are pipelines broken? We need to go earlier in the funnel. We don't have enough women in this sector. That sector like it was just such a topic of conversation that it made me wonder and get curious about the systematic issues. And then I think that brought me back to my happy place, which is understanding the kind of society, policies, regulation, like all of these cultural things, all of these interactions.

Kate (00:37:34) - There's so many overlapping interesting reasons why we're not where we should be in terms of participation and engagement in the workforce with technical skilling. And I was working at Google.org at the time, and a group of amazing women had come up with the idea for Made With Code and were working on the rollout of it and all of the prep, and I was able to lead the communications and public affairs for it. I ended up going and joining the marketing team to run the program, and it was just so infuriating and passion-driving to see the reasons why, you know, like cultural representations of computer science. A lack of understanding of, like, the impact that computer science can have on our world and the access to the skills and the teaching in a way that helps engage and persuade and empower people. So I think for me, that's where it really started. It probably just comes from a lifelong interest in women's empowerment. I'd never have guessed that it would have lended me to advocating for tech.

Kate (00:38:53) - I'm not a computer scientist by trade, but I think if you had asked me 20 years ago, I would say, oh, there's no way I could have ever been…And now I'm like, I'm not a computer scientist because I didn't study computer scientists. Like that's the only answer now, whereas I wouldn't have said that 20 years ago. And I want more people to have that ah-hah moment. You're not technical because you haven't studied it. You know what I mean? Like, you're not technical because you haven't found the right program to get you interested, engaged to. That is it. There's nothing else. You know, there's no deeper secret behind that. And I think that busting those myths, breaking those barriers and it's just amazing. Like working with Technovation, as you mentioned, they're a global AI computer science nonprofit. They take young women and they run them through a challenge. It's the only global challenge in the world. And they say one simple thing.

Kate (00:39:54) - They say, pick an issue in your community. And build an app to solve it. And then they give you all of the tools, all of the mentorship, all of the training. But pick an issue you care about and build an app to solve it. And watching these young women have these lightbulb moments and these incredible ideas, I mean, these apps need…many of them in the App Store now. More of them need to be in the App Store. A lot of these young women have gone on to start their own companies, to join tech companies. It's just incredible. And it's just absolutely amazing to watch them have that moment and just excited for this next trajectory. And obviously AI is the next big frontier. So that people 10, 20 years from now. Don't say, oh, I'm not an AI because I'm not this, that or the other. And it's now it's just like you're either in AI or not, because you got access to the skills and you and that's, that's the gap and that's what we're solving and that's just awesome.

Ariana (00:40:51) - Oh, my heart is bursting because so much of what you're saying is, I think an emotional struggle that I went through, I, you know, growing up, computer science, technology was not in the wheelhouse of options available to me. Not because I didn't go to grade school or there weren't those options, but the intention of getting people, especially women and girls, to understand the skill set and understand that they had the ability to really kick ass at the skill set was not a thing and years later, I realized as I was in operations, that to do my work well, I had to learn how to be a technologist. And I went to a coding bootcamp, and it was so humbling to learn JavaScript and web development and how to build these applications. And I, I think the imposter syndrome was so fierce during that time for me because it's like you just feel like you're never going to get there. You just always feel like the worst person in class again, very much surrounded by men at the time as well.

Ariana (00:42:00) - Now, looking back at that, I mean, it's close to like 8 or 9 years later. It literally that feeling just came from the fact that I was never exposed to those things early as options, not because I was lacking anything or that I was stupid. Actually, I was hustling so hard to catch up with things that I wish I would have been introduced to that I will say, like, you know, younger boys and men are just constantly involved in even video games. My husband introduced me to video games and I had that same feeling of, oh my God, I suck at this, but it's just because I wasn't exposed to it early so that that work that you're doing… It's hard not to get emotional about it because it's so important and it's only becoming more needed. And that's not just for young humans, but also older humans to humans of all ages because I will say, even with AI, I'm barely keeping up here, you know, like, I am barely holding tight.

Ariana (00:42:58) - And I have all this knowledge and education, so we need to make sure that we're bringing people along while all this technology is advancing. Otherwise that divide, like we talked about earlier, it's just going to get wider and wider. So I'm just going to say personally, on a personal level, I really appreciate the work that you're doing and making this a priority because it really matters.

Kate (00:43:19) - That's great to hear. It's and I'm so glad you took that class. There's so many things I could say, but I think I will just say very simply, one of the things that has been most incredible and inspiring to me, the way that Technovation is set up, as I mentioned, it's girls. They give them a challenge. They say find a problem, build an app. But then they also recruit mentors. So they recruit women from companies all over the world to help serve as mentors. You know, week one, do this. Week two: make your business plan.

Kate (00:43:50) - Week three build your app specs, etc. and what we uncovered in the research and innovation that has been running for decades now is that the mentorship impact is just as large as the girl impact. So we have had women who have been project managers, executive assistants, CX operators who have signed up to mentor. Through the process of mentoring young women, they have realized there is nothing holding them back from having a more technical, higher paying job. And then they have made the jumps and the leaps. So we've had project managers go to product managers, we've had CX operators go into coding boot camps and emerge as people. And so watching it even have that impact from the mentors of just saying, I'm now helping young women through it. And hey, guess what? It's not that intimidating. I can totally catch up. I just haven't been exposed to it. And I should go get that higher paying job and have a bigger impact you know, on my technology company or in what I'm curious about, you know, people launching businesses.

Kate (00:44:59) - So it's so great to hear that you had that experience and it's also not surprising to me because I think if we can just get more of that out and that's really what we're seeking to do, we will have more great companies founded by women needing great operators. And I think it will just be an awesome cycle.

Ariana (00:45:16) - Yeah, we're never done. We have to keep going. And that mentor mentee relationship, you think the mentors are going to teach everything to the mentee and usually it's equal. Yeah, we learn as much if not more. And that's also the refreshing part is just being able to bridge generational gaps, knowledge gaps I mean there's really nothing better and inspiring and exciting. Kate, this has been just such a joy. I am so grateful for your time and your knowledge and just sharing your experience. I'm taking so many pro tips away with me today. But before we go, we do need to learn about you as a human being in addition to all of the work that you've done.

Ariana (00:45:53) - So I've got some rapid fire questions to throw your way. So I'm going to shoot them to you, and you just give me your first answer off the top of your head. First question is, what is your favorite part of the day?

Kate (00:46:06) - My favorite part of the day is definitely the evening time. I'm a night owl, putting the kids to bed, you know, catching up with my husband. Everything's kind of calming down, taking stock of how the day went. That would be my answer.

Ariana (00:46:21) - What is something that makes you little-kid happy?

Kate (00:46:25) - Oh my gosh, so many things. The library, books, Pez candy, new movies, popcorn. Like, there's a lot.

Ariana (00:46:37) - Got that, like, library smell? Oh, it's so good.. What is the best purchase that you've made? Under $50.

Kate (00:46:47) - Under $50? That is a great question.

Ariana (00:46:51) - It's a toughie. This is the hardest one for all guests. Yeah.

Kate (00:46:54) - I bought a, you know, I bought a deck of cards that has, like, different lenses. I wouldn't go so far as some like motivational statements, which are sort of different perspectives, kind of different quotes. I take one and draw. I've gotten into the habit now of drawing one daily and just kind of reflecting on it. I'm looking at them, you know, right now, like I think that that's probably that's a big one. And they were under $50.

Ariana (00:47:21) - Love it. What is your favorite quote?

Kate (00:47:24) - Oh, I have a lot of favorite quotes…okay. So here's the one that just comes into my mind. “If you go big, people will wish you had gone home" is one of my favorite quotes. If you're gonna take up space.

Ariana (00:47:43) - So I love that, just like such a good reminder. Oh my God, that's hysterical. I've never…that's really, really good…sorry. I'm distracted. If you were to go back to your younger self just starting out in their career. What is something that you would tell them to help guide them through the journey?

Kate (00:48:02) - I would have told myself, less people have it figured out than you think. I spent a lot of time in my early career assuming that everybody knew exactly…there were some secret to business. I remember that so distinctly when I got to Google, I just assumed that everybody had it figured out that these were the smartest people in the world. And like, I wish I had told myself like, that's, you know, just double check that because there's room for you. There's room for your creativity and your inspiration and the things that you're bringing to the table and the stupid questions, you know, going back to what we were talking about at the beginning, there's room for that. And I think if I had that unlocked a little bit earlier, that would have been fun.

Ariana (00:48:47) - Last question, which is what do you want to be when you grow up?

Kate (00:48:54) - I feel grown up now, so let me…but I love the question because I think that I work really hard to instill in myself and in my kids a lifelong love of learning. So I hope as I grow up, I continue that. I have all sorts of skills and hobbies that are not skills that I wish were skills, and I hope that I just continue on that path. So I'm continually learning new things. I want to be that old person who's just had a lot of lives. I think that would be really fun.

Ariana (00:49:29) - Yeah. Me too. That sounds like, that sounds like a good plan. Yeah, we'll touch base and, like, you know, a couple decades.

Kate (00:49:34) - Yeah.

Ariana (00:49:37) - Last but not least, people are listening to your wisdom and your experiences. They want to know more about your journey and keep up with all the things that you're doing. Where can people find you?

Kate (00:49:47) - The best place is on LinkedIn. I love to connect with people, hear what folks are up to, what they're working on, what project. I just get so much inspiration. I know that LinkedIn has kind of a weird brand image sometimes, but I just love the…I love seeing the corporate side of people sometimes, the projects they are launching, what they're passionate about and making those connections. So that's a great place to find me.

Ariana (00:50:08) - Great. We'll also link in the description so that people can find you easily with the click of a button. Such a joy. Again, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it so much. Secret Ops listeners, thank you again for tuning in. Remember, you can find us wherever you find your podcast. We're also on YouTube as well and we will see you next time. Bye!