September 30, 2024 • 38 mins
Join us for an enlightening conversation with Francisco Bencosme, a senior advisor at USAID, as he provides a rare glimpse into the mechanisms of international development and policy leadership. Ever wondered about the intricacies of China's Belt and Road Initiative? Francisco breaks it down, sharing his day-to-day responsibilities and the pivotal role he plays in advising senior leaders on these global initiatives. Learn how his background in national security and foreign policy, coupled with personal experiences, fuels his passion for this field and shapes his approach to complex challenges.
From an intern to a key player on the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Francisco's journey is nothing short of inspiring. Discover how his strategic focus on future national security issues propelled him into specializing in the Asia-Pacific region. Hear firsthand about his experiences preparing critical materials for high-stakes decisions, such as military authorizations, and see how his time at Georgetown University's Security Studies program enriched his understanding and professional network. Francisco’s story is a testament to the value of academic pursuits, practical experiences, and the resilience required to navigate a career in public service.
Moreover, Francisco sheds light on the transformative impact of mentorship and programs like the International Career Advancement Program, which support mid-career professionals of color in national security. Gain insights into the complex negotiations of the Compact Free Association with Pacific nations and the importance of maintaining strong relations amid global power shifts. With practical advice on financial stability, mentorship, and salary negotiations in public service, this episode is packed with career hacks and inspiring stories that underscore the value of perseverance and staying true to one's values. Don't miss out on Francisco's powerful journey and the invaluable lessons he shares.
Disclaimer:
The thoughts, views, and opinions expressed on Career Cheat Code are those of the individual guests and do not necessarily reflect those of the host, affiliated organizations & employers. This podcast is intended for informational and inspirational purposes, highlighting the guests and their unique career journeys. We hope these stories inspire you to chase your purpose, define success on your own terms & take the next step in your career.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I was doing everything.
I was the guy that when youwould call, pick up the phone
and say, how can I help you, howcan we be a service provider?
And then I worked my way up.
It just so happened that amentor of mine on the committee,
his legislative assistant, leftand they offered me they were
like you work very well with him, do you want to fill in that
role, which is like kind of ajunior Asia legislative
(00:22):
assistant?
And I just said, I've just saidI'd be honored to so welcome to
Career Cheat Code.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
In this podcast, you'll hear how everyday people
impact the world through theircareers.
Learn about their journey,career hacks and obstacles along
the way.
Whether you're already havingthe impact you want or are
searching for it, this is thepodcast for you.
All right, francisco, welcometo the show.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Thanks so much for having me.
It's an honor to be here.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
It's a pleasure to reconnect with you.
We met through a fellowshipwhich you were an alumnus of and
I was just starting about ayear ago now, and we've been
connected ever since, so Iappreciate you taking the time
for this.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Absolutely, and in fact I'm actually going to the
fellowship the InternationalCareer Advancement Program in a
couple of weeks to be a mentor,and I'm super excited about it.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
That's awesome, Great .
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Hopefully we get a chance to talk about it later.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Absolutely, absolutely.
So let's dive right in, let'stell the world what it is you do
for a living.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
So I am a senior advisor at the USAID Agency for
International Development, andmy specialty or focus is the
People's Republic of China, orjust China.
As folks might know, chinalaunched what's called the Belt
and Road Initiative and reallychanged the game when it comes
to global development, and soit's my job to advise senior
(01:36):
leaders about development issueswith respect to China.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Great.
How long have you been doingthis?
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Funny, you ask because I'm actually this month
hitting my one-year mark and soit's a little bit really
serendipitous to actually thismonth hitting my one-year mark,
and so it's a little bit reallyserendipitous to be doing this
at the one-year mark.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
That's great, so tell me more about what this looks
like.
So you walk in on a Monday.
What does your job look like?
What are you preparing forfolks and how are you staying on
top of the knowledge that youneed to advise people?
Speaker 1 (02:00):
So it's not a very typical job for USA Agency for
International Development, or wesometimes say USAID for short.
A lot of my colleagues and partof the beauty of working in
such a place is that a lot of mycolleagues are development
professionals, so that meansthey're environmental scientists
or public health engineers oreconomists.
It's really their job to helpcreate programs that help
(02:23):
support development of many ofthe partners we work with
internationally.
My days are a little bitdifferent, though.
It's my job to work withvarious US government entities
the Department of State, theDepartment of Defense, the
Millennium Challenge Corporation, peace Corps a whole host of US
agencies to really helppolicymakers, help senior
leaders in my agencies.
(02:44):
Think about, you know, the PRC,which we use sort of as a short
name for China.
I'll say my day-to-day to behonest.
It's I have a lot of flexibilityon my schedule, but it's
somewhere between talking toscholars on what just happened
last week, where over 50 Africanleaders went to Beijing to talk
about global development issues, or a lot of internal meetings
(03:06):
to think about how we canshowcase our comparative
advantage when it comes todevelopment issues all over the
world.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
So it sounds like a lot of your work is really
dependent on intel gatheringfrom other agencies and from
what's happening on the ground.
You're doing this based out ofDC right.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Correct.
Yeah, but the beauty of workingin a place like USAID is that
we have offices in over 100countries all around the world
and we in many places,particularly emerging economies,
we have entire USAID missions.
So this means developmentprofessionals who are part of
the Foreign Service.
We have civil servants,servants and then Foreign
(03:45):
Service nationals, which meanslocal partners, people from
those countries who help adviseUSAID on building the
development of their countries.
We work with them every day.
We exchange information aboutwhat they're seeing on the
ground and I share them sort ofwhat the policy conversations
are here in Washington DC.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Can you share with us what's your favorite part of
your role and what's the mostchallenging part?
Speaker 1 (04:04):
Yeah, so I alluded a little bit to what part of my
favorite part.
So I come more from a foreignpolicy, national security
background, so I used to work atthe world whether it's public
health professionals,environmentalists, engineers and
then you're like let's cometogether to address one of the
(04:31):
biggest geopolitical challengesin our time, which is the
US-China relationship.
As I think, both whether it'sin the news, even as recent as
important political debates asyesterday folks know that
there's a lot of focus right nowon China, right, and so,
whether we're talking aboutsurviving a global pandemic,
China is part of every aspect ofglobal development issues.
(04:53):
It's sort of like bringing thisreally fascinating group of
people that are already reallysmart to really just connect
national security into thatworld.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
So that sounds fascinating.
So tell me more about how doesone arrive in this type of
career, right?
How do you get to a point whereyou're doing this type of work?
Speaker 1 (05:09):
I was always interested in foreign policy as
a little kid.
I was raised by a single mom,only child, and my mom always
wanted to be a flight attendant,in part because she wanted to
see the world, and so the two ofus would just take, we would
look online for cheap flights,try to travel the world, and so
at an early age, even throughvery few means, we were able to
just kind of make it work andsee the world and sort of that.
(05:30):
That interest in foreign policy,not only from my mom's
upbringing, but the fact thatmost of my family already lived
abroad, whether it's in Ecuadoror Dominican Republic, meant
that I was just surrounded byforeign policy, I like to say.
And then I also lived in Queens, new York, which I don't know
how many people know this, butit's the most diverse place in
the entire world, and so I hadliterally Tibet-like food and
(05:58):
just people and culture anddiaspora in my backyard to
Colombia and Bangladesh,literally a block away.
And so really that cocktail ofall three just made me really
fascinated in foreign policy.
Of course I didn't know how toget there, I just had a ton of
curiosity.
When I was in college and inhigh school I joined the policy
debate team.
So I was automatically thecoolest kid in high school and
spent a lot of my weekends justdebating with other really cool
(06:20):
people about policy issues.
And sometimes I pinch myselfbecause I find that some of the
things I used to debate aboutover 10 years ago are some of
the things that still come uptoday.
So, for example, we woulddebate as to whether the US
should sign the Law of the SeaTreaty, and the first Senate
Foreign Relations Committeehearing I was able to go was
when the chairman was debatingwhether the US should sign the
(06:42):
US Law of the Sea Treaty, and soit was a very cool moment.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
And so.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
I grew up spending my weekends and for a little
around 10 years just researchingand being fascinated with
policy debate and increasinglyforeign policy debate Maybe just
to make a story a little bitlonger but then I still didn't
know how to get there right.
Washington DC can kind of be alittle bit of a black box.
It's very opaque.
No one teaches you in schoolAfter the international
(07:07):
relations course no one's like,and this is how you get that job
.
I had a general sense thatWashington DC was the place to
be, but I had no idea how to getthere.
No pathway, no pipeline, andcertainly, being a
first-generation kid, my parentswere just happy to that I
graduated, but really there wasno.
You know, we were all figuringthis out together, and so I was
super fortunate that a alumnifrom my college debate program,
(07:32):
wake Forest Debate, was directorat a think tank on national
security issues, and so while Iwas debating in one of my final
rounds in my last tournament,like a national competitive
tournament, I reached out to himand I was like, look, I really
I don't know how, like I don'tknow how I'm going to make this
work, but I really would love tocome to DC and maybe intern for
you.
And what was cool was like thesethink tanks.
(07:52):
You know, I would read thesereports as like for debate
tournaments and they would belike arguments that I would use.
And so then to come to the cityand like be like, oh my God,
you're so-and-so evidence, butyou're a real person and I spent
so many weekends just talkingabout the briefing or report
that you wrote, totally nerdedout, and it was just a real cool
(08:13):
full-circle moment.
Then reality hit I had all thedreams of going to foreign
policy and really learning aboutTC.
I got an internship, luckily,which is oftentimes very hard
and really just getting yourfoot in the door is really
difficult, but I had no way topay for it, and so it's an
unpaid internship, and living inDC is extremely expensive.
Some folks probably know Ithought like, ok, I'll take all
(08:35):
my college graduation money andI'll sort of live off that.
That lasted about a month and ahalf not even the full summer
of my think tank internship andI was really at a loss for
figuring out what my next stepswere and so I started just
trying to do different side jobsto try to make ends meet.
I started coaching collegedebates to make some extra cash
(08:58):
and I was coaching a school inDC when I had to really sort of
make a decision about housingand again, unpaid internship
really wanted to be in foreignpolicy.
Didn't know how to afford it.
So I asked the debate team if Icould sleep on the floor of the
back room of the debate officeand they were like, of course,
you know, just to make ends meet.
Like, are you sure?
(09:20):
But like also, you know, wesort of talked it through.
I promised them it would betemporary.
I lasted there for six months.
I was sleeping on the floor, Iwould go to the showers at the
gym, I would eat at DCreceptions, whether think tanks
or Capitol Hill receptions,which oftentimes offer free
appetizers.
Really because I just wanted toget into foreign policy and I
(09:41):
was so lucky that I had aninternship, even if it was
unpaid, but I didn't know how totranslate that into a full job.
It was really difficult for myparents to also understand that,
in part because,first-generation kid, my dad was
suffering from cancer at thetime and he was just like what
do you mean?
They're not paying you.
That concept just didn't evenmake sense to people who are not
(10:02):
from here and frankly, itshouldn't.
It really caused some toughconversations with my parents,
but I knew I wanted to pursue mydreams.
Long story short, and we cansort of delve deeper into this.
I hustled for a really longtime.
Like I mentioned, I leveragedmy network and had a couple of
unpaid internships.
In that process I thought I wasgoing to be a permanent unpaid
intern and after a year of doinginternships I finally landed my
(10:23):
first.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
So you did a lot there.
First of all, you came in itsounds like your parents are
from Dominican Republic andEcuador.
Did I hear that right, correctyeah, about other cultures and
(10:51):
just thinking about all of that.
And then you go off and dodebate at Wake Forest and you
graduate and you decide you knowwhat, let me take my talents
down to DC and see what I can dothere.
You know, I think, even justyour story of the dedication to
say you know what?
I'm going to sleep on the floorand do this, and certainly as
somebody that has Latino parents, the concept of not getting
paid for work is foreign, whichit should be.
You know, it's probably notsomething that we should
(11:14):
encourage more, but just hearingthe way that you persevered
through it all to land thatfirst gig and just having that
determination and drive, do youknow what moment in your life
sparked that desire to doforeign relations or where did
that come from?
Speaker 1 (11:27):
It must've been some point doing like it's a
combination of like debate.
I just like, intellectually,really was fascinated with
reading a bunch of think tankreports about what the US like,
everything from what our policyshould be in the Middle East,
which you know, very relevantnow but, of course, very
academic back then to you know,like the most obscure things
like international agriculturalsubsidies and how dairy prices
(11:51):
impacted trade and foreignpolicy to really just like.
Visiting my cousins in Ecuadorand being like what drove them
and the rest of my family tocome to the United States is a
foreign policy issue.
We oftentimes frame immigrationas a domestic issue and forget
that there are really importantforeign policy elements to it.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Tell me more about kind of when you started
narrowing into your desire tolearn more about China and like
Asia overall.
Right, Like that's as someonethat grew up in New York City to
Latino parents, like that's notsomething that is the norm.
So kind of what got youinterested in that region
specifically?
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Yeah, absolutely.
It's a great question and Ithought a lot about it, in part
because in undergrad I focused alittle bit on Middle East
issues and wrote my thesis on itaround the so-called Arab
Spring.
But then, as a Latino,everyone's like you speak
Spanish, so obviously you shoulddo Latin America and Western
Hemisphere issues.
And then I was kind of like nah, I want to do something
(12:49):
different, I want to be where,like.
Someone gave me great advicewhen I was an intern that was
like you don't want to focus onwhat the hot topic is now, you
want to focus on the realnational security conversations
are going to be in 10 years fromnow.
And I was sort of like readingand learning more about national
security issues and what thedebates were happening in
Washington and more and morepeople were telling me the
(13:09):
center of gravity botheconomically happening in
Washington and more and morepeople were telling me the
center of gravity botheconomically, politically and
security-wise were shifting tothe Asia Pacific and then
eventually being called theIndo-Pacific, and China was a
big part of that.
And then while working, I wentto grad school.
I had an opportunity to take abunch of classes on Southeast
Asia and just Asia broadly and Irealized a region like
Southeast Asia is just asdiverse as my home was in Queens
(13:31):
no-transcript and increasinglyI was drawn more and more to it.
(13:59):
I'll say that when I startedworking on the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, I was doingeverything.
I was the guy that when youwould call, pick up the phone
and say how can I help you, howcan we be a service provider?
And then I worked my way up.
It just so happened that amentor of mine on the committee,
his legislative assistant, leftand they offered me they were
(14:20):
like you work very well with him, do you want to fill in that
role, which is like kind of ajunior Asia legislative
assistant, you know, and I justsaid I'd be honored to so.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
That's great, okay, so, okay.
So I appreciate you kind ofwalking us through that and just
getting first of all paidexperience right.
Then getting on the US SenateForeign Relations Committee.
That's great.
For those that don't know, whatdoes that committee do.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Great question.
It is the main committee whosejob in Congress, particularly
the Senate, to oversee andauthorize legislation with
respect to foreign policy.
One of the most importantthings that committee does is
that it authorizes and makesdecision about whether the US,
whether Congress, gives theauthority for the president to
(15:04):
go to long-term conflict,sometimes called the
authorization of use of MilitaryForce.
It also is like main committeeand oversees US accession to
treaties, so it really has ahuge role in foreign policy.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Yeah.
So this also sounds like agreat experience for you to see
how that works and how it allcomes together and then also
build your network withingovernment, I'm sure, right when
I'm sure, now that you've beenin government for a longer
period of time, that pays itsdividends, right, when you know
who's at what offices and whatthey're looking for.
So can you tell me more, alittle bit, about how you are
(15:39):
able to just continue to buildon that career from that point?
Speaker 1 (15:43):
It's a great question , I mean at this point now.
I've been working on Asiapolicy for eight to 10 years and
it started on the SenateForeign Relations Committee.
But to your point being on acommittee, particularly as a 22
or 23-year-old, you really getan opportunity to do it at a
very high level, just evenworking the phones.
We were not fully staffed andone of the first major committee
hearings we had was on theauthorization of whether to go
(16:06):
to war in Syria.
It was around the time thatObama was debating military
strikes in Syria and I rememberbeing a young staff assistant,
having to put together thebinder but then also having to
choose which think tank reportsthe chairman had to read and I
just felt like just straight outof college, maybe this was a
consequence of peace and war wasnot something I was qualified
(16:28):
to even put binders for, andsometimes the sort of imposter
syndrome goes on today.
Obviously, I've come a long waysince then.
I've both been in a lot ofdifferent conversations, both
high level but also just at theworking level, and sort of seen
many and just really read a lot,went to, got my master's
degrees and just been part ofdifferent fascinating
(16:49):
conversations and just met a tonof great people and also just
traveled a ton.
So, whether it's through workor through grad school, been
fortunate to be able to justhear from experts directly that
are in the countries that we'reworking on or working with our
foreign policy, towards which Ithink there's really no
alternative to something likethat.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Can you tell me more about your graduate programs,
and what did you do and whatwere you looking to get out of
them?
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Yeah.
So I went to GeorgetownSecurity Studies program and I
did it night class.
I did it in two years while Iwas still on the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee.
I was super happy and thrilledI got accepted to Georgetown
University and I also wanted tomaintain working at the same
time.
The entire time.
I felt like I had lost anentire year, almost kind of
being an intern.
Looking back at it, I really amthankful.
(17:37):
Obviously, the unpaid partsucked, but I'm grateful that I
was able to have such a richexperience of so many
internships and in the processmeet some great people that I'm
still friends with today.
But so I went to Georgetownnight classes.
One of the best parts about theprogram was that it gave you a
stipend to really just dowhatever you wanted with it, and
I used it for a research studyto three Southeast Asian
(17:58):
countries.
I focused my trip on maritimesecurity and, you know, I sort
of knew that if I needed to becredible and really know about
some of the countries I wasworking on, I needed to visit,
talk to experts there, build mycontacts but have that both
credibility but also just learnfrom them.
And so I just spent like anentire month.
I took four weeks of vacationfrom work to really just do that
(18:20):
, even though that certainly wasimportant for work as well.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
So it was really fruitful.
Can you tell me more about?
Well, first, was this amaster's in what exactly?
And then, two, do you feel likeyou've gotten what you wanted
out of it?
Speaker 1 (18:34):
So it was a master's in security studies under the
School of Foreign Service.
Georgetown has a couple ofdifferent programs.
This one was a little bit moredefense and intelligence focused
and I actually reallyappreciated that because, again,
a lot of my time was focusedtalking to diplomats or
development professionals.
Time was focused talking todiplomats or development
professionals, but I thinktaking classes with the focus on
defense and intelligence issuesreally made me a holistic
(18:55):
well-rounded in terms ofnational security.
Oftentimes at work now we talkabout the three Ds defense,
diplomacy and development and Ifeel a little bit conversant in
my ability to talk about allthree and I've been fortunate to
work on two of them, both inState Department and now at the
USAID.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
Outside of your master's programs, have you been
part of any other professionaldevelopment type of programs,
One of which I know of for sure?
Speaker 1 (19:21):
Yeah, absolutely so happy to start there.
One of the most catalytic andmaybe transformative fellowships
I've been able to do is theInternational Career Advancement
Program, which is a week-longprogram in Aspen, colorado.
It's organized by theUniversity of Denver, it's short
for ICAP as well, and it reallyfocuses on mid-career
professionals and advancingcommunities of color in national
(19:43):
security space.
To my knowledge, it's reallyone of the few and only
mid-career programs thatparticularly focuses issues of
equity, inclusion andrepresentation and it's but it's
just also an incredibletraining.
So skills-based, really runsthe gambits of talking to you
know experts on a whole host ofissues, but really creating you
know a culture, you knowrespectability, inclusion, just
(20:03):
really being authentic in aspace that oftentimes doesn't
have people that look like usand really helping us
collectively move to the nextsection, to the next level.
So you know I'm super excited.
There's something also aboutlike disconnecting from DC or
just from whatever your workingenvironment is and being in the
amazing mountains that are Aspen, colorado.
(20:25):
That just really makeseverything just really all the
more unique.
But maybe I'll just say that,going back a little bit to my
story, when I was an intern, oneof the organizations that I
joined and really got involvedin was the Congressional
Hispanic Staff Association.
So I was looking for an affinitygroup on the Hill, in part
because I really wanted to geton the Hill Spoiler.
I ended up on the Hill.
(20:45):
I remember talking to thepresident of that staff
association and that afternoonhe asked me to forward him my
resume because an opening showedup on the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee.
When I joined and became afull-time staffer, I also joined
officially the CongressionalHispanic Staff Association.
I ultimately worked up to bepresident myself and one of the
things we're super proud of thatour team was able to accomplish
(21:07):
was working with my roommate atthe time, but also an external
NGO called Pay Our Interns, andthey were able to mobilize
Congress to start paying theirinterns through research and
advocacy.
So really to bring it fullcircle my own story of not sort
of unpaid internships being abarrier and access to foreign
(21:28):
policy we were able to reallycause changes and eventually he
also convinced the StateDepartment and the organization
lobby of the State Department toalso pay their interns.
So Congress and the StateDepartment both started paying
their interns and really madechange one of the major barriers
to getting your foot in thedoor.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Absolutely.
And I mean and kudos to you,right, for not only going
through the unpaid internshipand what that did for you but
also thinking about ways tochange that for others, right,
you know, I think there aredifferent mentalities.
There are some folks that justaccept that unpaid internships
is a thing and everyone did it,but there are folks that
literally cannot afford to dothat and there are folks that
(22:06):
have to sleep on the floor to doso and that's not.
That is a real barrier,especially if you're thinking
about getting talented, diverserepresentation in these spaces
that bring differentperspectives.
You're literally not going toget folks just because they
cannot afford to find a floor tosleep in.
You know what I mean.
So kudos to you all to kind ofrecognizing that and recognizing
(22:29):
that it just needed to changemore broadly.
I appreciate that, and I'm suremany others do, and this is the
type of effort that I'm surethere were a lot of folks that
came together ultimately to makeit happen, kind of in the
spirit of it all, like thecontributions that we all make
are very significant.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Thank you, but to your point, it really takes a
village, it takes a communityand a lot of people came
together for those.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, absolutely so.
Let's fast track a little bit.
You end up in the SenateForeign Relations Committee.
Tell me what happens after that.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
So actually, you know , it's so interesting because I
was president of theCongressional Hispanic Staff
Association and it was avolunteer job, but I was
obviously a full-time SenateForeign Relations Committee
staffer and I was kind ofinterested in like how do I like
bring some of the work on, likeyou know, access to halls of
power, representation, inclusion, but also like find like a Asia
(23:18):
foreign policy twist.
And some of the bestconversations that I was
fortunate and privileged to bein were really with human rights
organizations and really theamazing work they did to uplift,
to find the release ofpolitical prisoners, to convince
Congress to raise human rightsissues, which oftentimes get
short shrifted in nationalsecurity conversations.
(23:39):
And so I was like I'd love todo that on the outside for a bit
.
I'd love to find what I'velearned now at five years on the
Senate Foreign RelationsCommittee, but really in a way
that like helps build more doorsfor access to these halls of
power.
I was fortunate that I wasworking on legislation that
dealt with genocide of theRohingya people, which is a
(24:01):
minority, was originally fromBurma and had been displaced to
Bangladesh, into major parts ofSoutheast Asia through ethnic
cleansing, crimes againsthumanity and genocide.
Amnesty International, usa wasmaking this legislation their
top human rights campaign andthey reached out if we knew
anyone who would be interestedin leading that advocacy
(24:22):
campaign for them and I was likeI would love to.
I wrote the legislation you'readvocating for and I know all
the players and I'd love to doso in a more grassroots,
bringing all the tools that aninternational NGO can do.
A couple iterations afterwards,and even after my time at
(24:43):
Amnesty, the legislation that wewere working on became law.
That's sort of when I made mymove to the human rights field
in NGOs and again, reallyimportant work, working on
international human rightsissues, uplifting.
You know stateless populations,that I got to visit some of the
refugee camps in Bangladesh andjust you know like kids would
(25:04):
tell you the stories about sortof fleeing.
You know persecution of themilitary and how they lost their
families in that way.
And then I would work withcommunities in DC or as part of
the diaspora so that they couldtestify before Congress or they
could go to meetings to advocatefor the plight of the Rohingya
and other human rights groups inthe halls of Congress or the
(25:27):
executive branch.
And so to me I was bringingsome of the advocacy skills I
learned both in Congress butalso even as just like
advocating for change, for paidinternships and really bringing
those skills to bring socialchange on human rights issues in
the Asia Pacific.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
And thank you for sharing that right.
Can you share any other placesthat your work has taken you to
and kind of what that experiencehas been like?
Yeah, we think about this typeof work that is, of course,
international and I know at thispoint you were not in the
government, right, but like youstill have to travel to
different places and keep upwith us and understand what's
(26:03):
going on.
So can you speak a little bitabout that?
Speaker 1 (26:05):
In this job?
I went to Bangladesh, but Itraveled to Thailand, to
Malaysia.
What In this job?
I went to Bangladesh, but Itraveled to Thailand, to
Malaysia.
What's really fascinating atthis point in my career is that
people stay in your life, rightLike every time I go to Thailand
, which I was just there acouple of weeks ago, I still
make an effort to connect withmy Amnesty Thailand office.
I couldn't meet them, but Istayed in touch with Amnesty
Indonesia when I was in Jakarta,but in part because these are
(26:27):
the people that define who youare, but also because you want
them to know that we're allstill one big part of a larger
international movement andwhether I'm in government or not
.
In government we're still agentsof change, certainly on human
rights issues.
Sometimes I'm an advocate onthe outside and sometimes I'm an
advocate on the inside.
But I've been super fortunate.
I've been able to travel todifferent parts of the Asia
(26:48):
Pacific.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
What brought you back to government?
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Somewhere in between.
There I'd worked at aphilanthropy called Open Society
Foundation and I'd reached apoint where I was really excited
about the work I was doing onthe outside.
I'd published, I was proud ofsome human rights wins we were
able to do, and obviously thework continues.
But I I realized that there'sstill a lot of change you can do
when you're in government andin the executive branch and so
(27:14):
sort of maybe filling that storyI was just sharing a bit ago.
One of the first actions theBiden-Harris administration took
was calling the Rohingya crisisa genocide, and I was fortunate
to be involved in some of thosedebates within US government.
This was certainly one of themajor actions I was advocating
(27:36):
for when I was working forvarious human rights groups.
You know, oftentimes we saythat on human rights issues or
on atrocity prevention issues,you can't really tackle them if
you don't really diagnose theproblem that we're working on,
and so being able to call it forwhat it was was really
important for many of thevictims of genocide and crimes
against humanity, and that waslike year one of my time in
(27:58):
government, and so really in thepast now almost four years that
I've been back in government,but first time in the executive
branch been super fortunate withsort of working for a
government where I've been ableto, you know, really cause
international change.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Can you share any of the large differences that
you've seen in the impact thatyou can make or in how the
impact can be tangible, workingon the executive branch versus
the legislative branch?
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Yeah, absolutely.
The legislative branch yeah,absolutely.
One of the issues that I got towork on during my time at the
Department of State was theCompact Free Association, which
sounds super wonky but I promiseyou is maybe one of the most
consequential foreign policynational security issues.
So after World War II, we hadas former territories three now
(28:50):
countries the Marshall Islands,micronesia and Palau and the
terms in which they becamefreely associated states became
these compacts, and every 20years we renegotiate them, and
it just so happened that we hadto renegotiate them in the last
couple of years.
Now this is all happening in alarger geopolitical context in
(29:14):
which the PRC is certainlymaking huge investments and huge
gains in the Pacific Islands,and so there's some public
reporting about how China didn'twant these countries to reenter
into a new compact with theUnited States and was actively
working against that.
And our relationship with thethree countries I mentioned and
(29:36):
they're called sometimes theFreely Associated States is
super important for entireleadership in the Pacific.
So our ability to project power,to access free seas, to be able
to go from California toSingapore and certainly to
Taiwan, all depends on ourability to have access to the
(29:56):
Pacific Islands, or just haveaccess to the Pacific If we were
denied that freedom ofnavigation and that freedom of
overflight, that would be hugelyconsequential to national
security issues.
I was super fortunate that Iworked on the negotiating team
and towards the end of it,became the deputy negotiator on
the team and really learned alot from both my team.
One of the issues that theMarshallese appropriately raised
(30:31):
was issues of nuclear legacyand are the consequence of
nuclear testing that we did inthe run-up to World War II, and
so these issues haveconsequences decades later and
were some of the hardest issuesto try to address in a way that
obviously supported mutualrespect and mutual interest for
(30:53):
both of our countries in thecontext of the Marshall Islands
but then ultimately for all ofthe islands that we had to
negotiate with.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Let's pretend that all of the audience is here
because they are all on thebrink of leaving their jobs to
go into internationaldevelopment or trying to become
a policy lead of some sorts.
What advice would you have tothose folks?
Speaker 1 (31:14):
Oftentimes I say that you have to think about your
three Ps.
So I think about it in terms ofpolicy, politics and process.
You can know everything aboutUS-China policy, but that still
might not land you that job youwant in the China policymaking
world.
Why?
Because you still need to knowhow government works.
(31:34):
Or if you're working on budgetissues in relation to China, you
need to know how the budgetworks.
Or I think one of the thingsthat was so consequential for me
, both in my advocacy days inthe human rights world, but
certainly when I worked on theSenate Foreign Relations
Committee, is I knew the processfor how Congress worked.
I knew how to move.
I knew how a bill gotintroduced to how it moved out
(31:56):
of committee.
So then I moved to the Senatefloor and then, hopefully, the
House also passed a similar billand then it became a law that
was sent to the president's desk.
And then the third P ispolitics.
You need to.
Who are your champions?
Who are your validators?
That also applies to yournetworks.
You can know how things becomelaw.
You can have the best law, butif the political winds are not
(32:21):
behind it, none of that matters.
And so those three P's haveguided me a lot in my different
parts of my career.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
That's great, okay.
So now they're looking to getinto this field.
One of the first questions iscan I have this amount of impact
and still not be broke?
Is this a field where folkslike how much money can folks
expect to make in this fielddoing this type of work?
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Money is always sensitive, right, but it's funny
because I started off talkingabout how broke I was,
especially early off in mycareer.
I'm super fortunate that I makesomewhere between $160,000 a
year Pretty sure I'm not thebest at math, but around
$160,000 a year and over, whichyou don't always hear in public
(33:00):
service.
I'm fortunate that I can live amiddle-income, middle-class
life here and really support myfamily through that and I work
in government, right?
Who thought that you can dothat on a public service salary
and having worked in a nonprofitor having worked in Congress,
which is known for historicallylow salaries?
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Yeah, no, I appreciate that, and I think
that's part of the reason why Iasked the question, because I
know that I worked in citygovernment in New York and I saw
what people were making.
I was like, wait, we canactually live well and do really
great work that is impactfuland that can change your city,
your state, your country andinternational, but we just don't
always think about governmentas a vehicle to have some
(33:43):
economic mobility.
Yeah, absolutely so, Iappreciate that, and I do also
appreciate that I think thefederal government also does a
really good job at salarytransparency.
So I think it's just a matterof changing the stigma that you
will be broke if you work ingovernment to flipping it to go
out and do some research.
There's actually some reallyinteresting roles that you can
have and do some good work.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
No, absolutely true, and it's all the more important
in communities that can't asktheir parents about salary
issues, or when I was in thepresident of this organization,
I got asked how do you even dosalary negotiations Actually, my
little brother is now a staffassistant in Capitol Hill and
similar conversations like whatdoes salary negotiation even
(34:25):
look like?
When do I ask my boss for araise?
How do?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I ask for a raise.
Should I ask for a?
Speaker 1 (34:31):
raise, and no one teaches us sometimes these
things growing up, and so it'sall the more reason why it's
important to have mentors, tohave sponsors, people that will
help you get from one place toanother.
I think advice should be free.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Yeah, I agree, and I think that's also why it's
important to go to things likegrad school or fellowships,
right, because now you have thisfamily of folks like ICAP right
, which we mentioned earlier,like you can lean on people and
you can get intel from peoplelike, hey, I'm in philanthropy,
this is what we're doing, thisis what we're paying Does that
sound right over there?
And you can gut check it withyour peers and really have a
(35:04):
good understanding and justpeople that can help you think
through issues.
Like you know, we have activegroup chats of, hey guys, I'm
figuring this out, I don't knowwhat to do, has anyone done
something similar?
Or hey, y'all, I'm trying tohire someone, does anyone know
anyone?
And that's how you, like youknow, kind of just create real
fellowship amongst your peersand, like, stay connected, you
know.
So, definitely, I hear you andI appreciate that.
(35:26):
Yeah, even though we alreadydid a really good ICAP
commercial, but it's neverenough, never, never enough.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
Absolutely.
Everyone should do it.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Are there any forms of media that could be books,
podcasts, debate clubs, anythingthat you have experienced, join
your local debate team.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
I mean certainly I thought I was going to be a
lawyer when I joined the highschool debate team.
Never even thought about goingto law school after I really
became interested in foreignpolicy, but it was a great
opening to it.
We didn't even get a full chanceto talk about it, but I grew up
reading comics and watchingcartoons a ton.
Growing up In terms of media,x-men was always on at my house.
(36:05):
X-men 97 just came out recentlyon TV show.
Part part of the reason.
I, you know, looking back at itthere was this motif about like
the superhero club of like thesort of outcast of society but
there were heroes and you knowwe didn't even talk about this
but I'm, you know I alsoidentify as gay and being a gay
Latino only child, first gen.
(36:25):
You know you sometimes havethese like questions about you
know whether we're really goingto make it or whether we should
make it.
I always felt like cartoonsreally got me and X-Men has this
like very subtle motif aboutthe LGBTQ community.
So really recommend it and youknow, just think that it's okay
if your kids watch a lot ofcartoons and comics.
I swear it all works out in theend.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
So that's awesome.
I will open it to say are therethings that you want to discuss
and that you want the world toknow about you?
Because this is our floor, sowe can do whatever we want with
the time.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
No, absolutely.
You know, I feel like we'vealready talked so much about
running the gambit on both mycareer.
I'll just say that, for thosewho are interested in entering
the space, a mentor once told meit doesn't seem like it, and
this was honestly when I wassleeping on the floor like
struggling to make ends meet,having tough conversations with
my dad who was fighting cancerand like wasn't sure if I was
(37:18):
ever like cut out to make it inforeign policy.
Just here to say one simplething, which is you deserve to
be here.
Your voice matters, yourcontribution, no matter how big,
how small matters.
Voice matters, your contributionno matter how big, how small
matters.
You know I in my wildest dreamsnever thought you know a single
child, gay, latino kid fromQueens, new York had anything to
(37:39):
contribute to foreign policy.
You know was super fortunateand privileged to sort of make
it after some really toughstrides that you know.
Again go back to the fact thatmy mom taught me, or instilled
in me, this sort of curiosityabout the world and I carry that
with me.
But it's a long way to say yourvalue matters and it's all
going to work out.
Just sort of continue to searchfor your dreams.
(38:01):
And just again, I never thoughtI would be where I am right now
and so just continue at it.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
That's awesome.
I think that's a great note toend on.
I really appreciate your timetoday.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
Thank you.
Thank you for doing this.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
I hope you enjoyed this episode.
If you did and believe on themission we're on, please like,
rate and subscribe to thispodcast on whatever platform
you're using, and share thispodcast with your friends and
your networks.
Make sure you follow us onInstagram and LinkedIn at Career
Cheat Code and tell us peopleor careers you would.
I was doing everything.
I was the guy that when youwould call, pick up the phone
and say, how can I help you, howcan we be a service provider?
And then I worked my way up.
It just so happened that amentor of mine on the committee,
his legislative assistant, leftand they offered me they were
like you work very well with him, do you want to fill in that
role, which is like kind of ajunior Asia legislative
(00:22):
assistant?
And I just said, I've just saidI'd be honored to so welcome to
Career Cheat Code.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
In this podcast, you'll hear how everyday people
impact the world through theircareers.
Learn about their journey,career hacks and obstacles along
the way.
Whether you're already havingthe impact you want or are
searching for it, this is thepodcast for you.
All right, francisco, welcometo the show.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Thanks so much for having me.
It's an honor to be here.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
It's a pleasure to reconnect with you.
We met through a fellowshipwhich you were an alumnus of and
I was just starting about ayear ago now, and we've been
connected ever since, so Iappreciate you taking the time
for this.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Absolutely, and in fact I'm actually going to the
fellowship the InternationalCareer Advancement Program in a
couple of weeks to be a mentor,and I'm super excited about it.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
That's awesome, Great .
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Hopefully we get a chance to talk about it later.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Absolutely, absolutely.
So let's dive right in, let'stell the world what it is you do
for a living.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
So I am a senior advisor at the USAID Agency for
International Development, andmy specialty or focus is the
People's Republic of China, orjust China.
As folks might know, chinalaunched what's called the Belt
and Road Initiative and reallychanged the game when it comes
to global development, and soit's my job to advise senior
(01:36):
leaders about development issueswith respect to China.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Great.
How long have you been doingthis?
Speaker 1 (01:40):
Funny, you ask because I'm actually this month
hitting my one-year mark and soit's a little bit really
serendipitous to actually thismonth hitting my one-year mark,
and so it's a little bit reallyserendipitous to be doing this
at the one-year mark.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
That's great, so tell me more about what this looks
like.
So you walk in on a Monday.
What does your job look like?
What are you preparing forfolks and how are you staying on
top of the knowledge that youneed to advise people?
Speaker 1 (02:00):
So it's not a very typical job for USA Agency for
International Development, or wesometimes say USAID for short.
A lot of my colleagues and partof the beauty of working in
such a place is that a lot of mycolleagues are development
professionals, so that meansthey're environmental scientists
or public health engineers oreconomists.
It's really their job to helpcreate programs that help
(02:23):
support development of many ofthe partners we work with
internationally.
My days are a little bitdifferent, though.
It's my job to work withvarious US government entities
the Department of State, theDepartment of Defense, the
Millennium Challenge Corporation, peace Corps a whole host of US
agencies to really helppolicymakers, help senior
leaders in my agencies.
(02:44):
Think about, you know, the PRC,which we use sort of as a short
name for China.
I'll say my day-to-day to behonest.
It's I have a lot of flexibilityon my schedule, but it's
somewhere between talking toscholars on what just happened
last week, where over 50 Africanleaders went to Beijing to talk
about global development issues, or a lot of internal meetings
(03:06):
to think about how we canshowcase our comparative
advantage when it comes todevelopment issues all over the
world.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
So it sounds like a lot of your work is really
dependent on intel gatheringfrom other agencies and from
what's happening on the ground.
You're doing this based out ofDC right.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Correct.
Yeah, but the beauty of workingin a place like USAID is that
we have offices in over 100countries all around the world
and we in many places,particularly emerging economies,
we have entire USAID missions.
So this means developmentprofessionals who are part of
the Foreign Service.
We have civil servants,servants and then Foreign
(03:45):
Service nationals, which meanslocal partners, people from
those countries who help adviseUSAID on building the
development of their countries.
We work with them every day.
We exchange information aboutwhat they're seeing on the
ground and I share them sort ofwhat the policy conversations
are here in Washington DC.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Can you share with us what's your favorite part of
your role and what's the mostchallenging part?
Speaker 1 (04:04):
Yeah, so I alluded a little bit to what part of my
favorite part.
So I come more from a foreignpolicy, national security
background, so I used to work atthe world whether it's public
health professionals,environmentalists, engineers and
then you're like let's cometogether to address one of the
(04:31):
biggest geopolitical challengesin our time, which is the
US-China relationship.
As I think, both whether it'sin the news, even as recent as
important political debates asyesterday folks know that
there's a lot of focus right nowon China, right, and so,
whether we're talking aboutsurviving a global pandemic,
China is part of every aspect ofglobal development issues.
(04:53):
It's sort of like bringing thisreally fascinating group of
people that are already reallysmart to really just connect
national security into thatworld.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
So that sounds fascinating.
So tell me more about how doesone arrive in this type of
career, right?
How do you get to a point whereyou're doing this type of work?
Speaker 1 (05:09):
I was always interested in foreign policy as
a little kid.
I was raised by a single mom,only child, and my mom always
wanted to be a flight attendant,in part because she wanted to
see the world, and so the two ofus would just take, we would
look online for cheap flights,try to travel the world, and so
at an early age, even throughvery few means, we were able to
just kind of make it work andsee the world and sort of that.
(05:30):
That interest in foreign policy,not only from my mom's
upbringing, but the fact thatmost of my family already lived
abroad, whether it's in Ecuadoror Dominican Republic, meant
that I was just surrounded byforeign policy, I like to say.
And then I also lived in Queens, new York, which I don't know
how many people know this, butit's the most diverse place in
the entire world, and so I hadliterally Tibet-like food and
(05:58):
just people and culture anddiaspora in my backyard to
Colombia and Bangladesh,literally a block away.
And so really that cocktail ofall three just made me really
fascinated in foreign policy.
Of course I didn't know how toget there, I just had a ton of
curiosity.
When I was in college and inhigh school I joined the policy
debate team.
So I was automatically thecoolest kid in high school and
spent a lot of my weekends justdebating with other really cool
(06:20):
people about policy issues.
And sometimes I pinch myselfbecause I find that some of the
things I used to debate aboutover 10 years ago are some of
the things that still come uptoday.
So, for example, we woulddebate as to whether the US
should sign the Law of the SeaTreaty, and the first Senate
Foreign Relations Committeehearing I was able to go was
when the chairman was debatingwhether the US should sign the
(06:42):
US Law of the Sea Treaty, and soit was a very cool moment.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
And so.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
I grew up spending my weekends and for a little
around 10 years just researchingand being fascinated with
policy debate and increasinglyforeign policy debate Maybe just
to make a story a little bitlonger but then I still didn't
know how to get there right.
Washington DC can kind of be alittle bit of a black box.
It's very opaque.
No one teaches you in schoolAfter the international
(07:07):
relations course no one's like,and this is how you get that job
.
I had a general sense thatWashington DC was the place to
be, but I had no idea how to getthere.
No pathway, no pipeline, andcertainly, being a
first-generation kid, my parentswere just happy to that I
graduated, but really there wasno.
You know, we were all figuringthis out together, and so I was
super fortunate that a alumnifrom my college debate program,
(07:32):
wake Forest Debate, was directorat a think tank on national
security issues, and so while Iwas debating in one of my final
rounds in my last tournament,like a national competitive
tournament, I reached out to himand I was like, look, I really
I don't know how, like I don'tknow how I'm going to make this
work, but I really would love tocome to DC and maybe intern for
you.
And what was cool was like thesethink tanks.
(07:52):
You know, I would read thesereports as like for debate
tournaments and they would belike arguments that I would use.
And so then to come to the cityand like be like, oh my God,
you're so-and-so evidence, butyou're a real person and I spent
so many weekends just talkingabout the briefing or report
that you wrote, totally nerdedout, and it was just a real cool
(08:13):
full-circle moment.
Then reality hit I had all thedreams of going to foreign
policy and really learning aboutTC.
I got an internship, luckily,which is oftentimes very hard
and really just getting yourfoot in the door is really
difficult, but I had no way topay for it, and so it's an
unpaid internship, and living inDC is extremely expensive.
Some folks probably know Ithought like, ok, I'll take all
(08:35):
my college graduation money andI'll sort of live off that.
That lasted about a month and ahalf not even the full summer
of my think tank internship andI was really at a loss for
figuring out what my next stepswere and so I started just
trying to do different side jobsto try to make ends meet.
I started coaching collegedebates to make some extra cash
(08:58):
and I was coaching a school inDC when I had to really sort of
make a decision about housingand again, unpaid internship
really wanted to be in foreignpolicy.
Didn't know how to afford it.
So I asked the debate team if Icould sleep on the floor of the
back room of the debate officeand they were like, of course,
you know, just to make ends meet.
Like, are you sure?
(09:20):
But like also, you know, wesort of talked it through.
I promised them it would betemporary.
I lasted there for six months.
I was sleeping on the floor, Iwould go to the showers at the
gym, I would eat at DCreceptions, whether think tanks
or Capitol Hill receptions,which oftentimes offer free
appetizers.
Really because I just wanted toget into foreign policy and I
(09:41):
was so lucky that I had aninternship, even if it was
unpaid, but I didn't know how totranslate that into a full job.
It was really difficult for myparents to also understand that,
in part because,first-generation kid, my dad was
suffering from cancer at thetime and he was just like what
do you mean?
They're not paying you.
That concept just didn't evenmake sense to people who are not
(10:02):
from here and frankly, itshouldn't.
It really caused some toughconversations with my parents,
but I knew I wanted to pursue mydreams.
Long story short, and we cansort of delve deeper into this.
I hustled for a really longtime.
Like I mentioned, I leveragedmy network and had a couple of
unpaid internships.
In that process I thought I wasgoing to be a permanent unpaid
intern and after a year of doinginternships I finally landed my
(10:23):
first.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
So you did a lot there.
First of all, you came in itsounds like your parents are
from Dominican Republic andEcuador.
Did I hear that right, correctyeah, about other cultures and
(10:51):
just thinking about all of that.
And then you go off and dodebate at Wake Forest and you
graduate and you decide you knowwhat, let me take my talents
down to DC and see what I can dothere.
You know, I think, even justyour story of the dedication to
say you know what?
I'm going to sleep on the floorand do this, and certainly as
somebody that has Latino parents, the concept of not getting
paid for work is foreign, whichit should be.
You know, it's probably notsomething that we should
(11:14):
encourage more, but just hearingthe way that you persevered
through it all to land thatfirst gig and just having that
determination and drive, do youknow what moment in your life
sparked that desire to doforeign relations or where did
that come from?
Speaker 1 (11:27):
It must've been some point doing like it's a
combination of like debate.
I just like, intellectually,really was fascinated with
reading a bunch of think tankreports about what the US like,
everything from what our policyshould be in the Middle East,
which you know, very relevantnow but, of course, very
academic back then to you know,like the most obscure things
like international agriculturalsubsidies and how dairy prices
(11:51):
impacted trade and foreignpolicy to really just like.
Visiting my cousins in Ecuadorand being like what drove them
and the rest of my family tocome to the United States is a
foreign policy issue.
We oftentimes frame immigrationas a domestic issue and forget
that there are really importantforeign policy elements to it.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Tell me more about kind of when you started
narrowing into your desire tolearn more about China and like
Asia overall.
Right, Like that's as someonethat grew up in New York City to
Latino parents, like that's notsomething that is the norm.
So kind of what got youinterested in that region
specifically?
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Yeah, absolutely.
It's a great question and Ithought a lot about it, in part
because in undergrad I focused alittle bit on Middle East
issues and wrote my thesis on itaround the so-called Arab
Spring.
But then, as a Latino,everyone's like you speak
Spanish, so obviously you shoulddo Latin America and Western
Hemisphere issues.
And then I was kind of like nah, I want to do something
(12:49):
different, I want to be where,like.
Someone gave me great advicewhen I was an intern that was
like you don't want to focus onwhat the hot topic is now, you
want to focus on the realnational security conversations
are going to be in 10 years fromnow.
And I was sort of like readingand learning more about national
security issues and what thedebates were happening in
Washington and more and morepeople were telling me the
(13:09):
center of gravity botheconomically happening in
Washington and more and morepeople were telling me the
center of gravity botheconomically, politically and
security-wise were shifting tothe Asia Pacific and then
eventually being called theIndo-Pacific, and China was a
big part of that.
And then while working, I wentto grad school.
I had an opportunity to take abunch of classes on Southeast
Asia and just Asia broadly and Irealized a region like
Southeast Asia is just asdiverse as my home was in Queens
(13:31):
no-transcript and increasinglyI was drawn more and more to it.
(13:59):
I'll say that when I startedworking on the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, I was doingeverything.
I was the guy that when youwould call, pick up the phone
and say how can I help you, howcan we be a service provider?
And then I worked my way up.
It just so happened that amentor of mine on the committee,
his legislative assistant, leftand they offered me they were
(14:20):
like you work very well with him, do you want to fill in that
role, which is like kind of ajunior Asia legislative
assistant, you know, and I justsaid I'd be honored to so.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
That's great, okay, so, okay.
So I appreciate you kind ofwalking us through that and just
getting first of all paidexperience right.
Then getting on the US SenateForeign Relations Committee.
That's great.
For those that don't know, whatdoes that committee do.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Great question.
It is the main committee whosejob in Congress, particularly
the Senate, to oversee andauthorize legislation with
respect to foreign policy.
One of the most importantthings that committee does is
that it authorizes and makesdecision about whether the US,
whether Congress, gives theauthority for the president to
(15:04):
go to long-term conflict,sometimes called the
authorization of use of MilitaryForce.
It also is like main committeeand oversees US accession to
treaties, so it really has ahuge role in foreign policy.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Yeah.
So this also sounds like agreat experience for you to see
how that works and how it allcomes together and then also
build your network withingovernment, I'm sure, right when
I'm sure, now that you've beenin government for a longer
period of time, that pays itsdividends, right, when you know
who's at what offices and whatthey're looking for.
So can you tell me more, alittle bit, about how you are
(15:39):
able to just continue to buildon that career from that point?
Speaker 1 (15:43):
It's a great question , I mean at this point now.
I've been working on Asiapolicy for eight to 10 years and
it started on the SenateForeign Relations Committee.
But to your point being on acommittee, particularly as a 22
or 23-year-old, you really getan opportunity to do it at a
very high level, just evenworking the phones.
We were not fully staffed andone of the first major committee
hearings we had was on theauthorization of whether to go
(16:06):
to war in Syria.
It was around the time thatObama was debating military
strikes in Syria and I rememberbeing a young staff assistant,
having to put together thebinder but then also having to
choose which think tank reportsthe chairman had to read and I
just felt like just straight outof college, maybe this was a
consequence of peace and war wasnot something I was qualified
(16:28):
to even put binders for, andsometimes the sort of imposter
syndrome goes on today.
Obviously, I've come a long waysince then.
I've both been in a lot ofdifferent conversations, both
high level but also just at theworking level, and sort of seen
many and just really read a lot,went to, got my master's
degrees and just been part ofdifferent fascinating
(16:49):
conversations and just met a tonof great people and also just
traveled a ton.
So, whether it's through workor through grad school, been
fortunate to be able to justhear from experts directly that
are in the countries that we'reworking on or working with our
foreign policy, towards which Ithink there's really no
alternative to something likethat.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
Can you tell me more about your graduate programs,
and what did you do and whatwere you looking to get out of
them?
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Yeah.
So I went to GeorgetownSecurity Studies program and I
did it night class.
I did it in two years while Iwas still on the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee.
I was super happy and thrilledI got accepted to Georgetown
University and I also wanted tomaintain working at the same
time.
The entire time.
I felt like I had lost anentire year, almost kind of
being an intern.
Looking back at it, I really amthankful.
(17:37):
Obviously, the unpaid partsucked, but I'm grateful that I
was able to have such a richexperience of so many
internships and in the processmeet some great people that I'm
still friends with today.
But so I went to Georgetownnight classes.
One of the best parts about theprogram was that it gave you a
stipend to really just dowhatever you wanted with it, and
I used it for a research studyto three Southeast Asian
(17:58):
countries.
I focused my trip on maritimesecurity and, you know, I sort
of knew that if I needed to becredible and really know about
some of the countries I wasworking on, I needed to visit,
talk to experts there, build mycontacts but have that both
credibility but also just learnfrom them.
And so I just spent like anentire month.
I took four weeks of vacationfrom work to really just do that
(18:20):
, even though that certainly wasimportant for work as well.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
So it was really fruitful.
Can you tell me more about?
Well, first, was this amaster's in what exactly?
And then, two, do you feel likeyou've gotten what you wanted
out of it?
Speaker 1 (18:34):
So it was a master's in security studies under the
School of Foreign Service.
Georgetown has a couple ofdifferent programs.
This one was a little bit moredefense and intelligence focused
and I actually reallyappreciated that because, again,
a lot of my time was focusedtalking to diplomats or
development professionals.
Time was focused talking todiplomats or development
professionals, but I thinktaking classes with the focus on
defense and intelligence issuesreally made me a holistic
(18:55):
well-rounded in terms ofnational security.
Oftentimes at work now we talkabout the three Ds defense,
diplomacy and development and Ifeel a little bit conversant in
my ability to talk about allthree and I've been fortunate to
work on two of them, both inState Department and now at the
USAID.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
Outside of your master's programs, have you been
part of any other professionaldevelopment type of programs,
One of which I know of for sure?
Speaker 1 (19:21):
Yeah, absolutely so happy to start there.
One of the most catalytic andmaybe transformative fellowships
I've been able to do is theInternational Career Advancement
Program, which is a week-longprogram in Aspen, colorado.
It's organized by theUniversity of Denver, it's short
for ICAP as well, and it reallyfocuses on mid-career
professionals and advancingcommunities of color in national
(19:43):
security space.
To my knowledge, it's reallyone of the few and only
mid-career programs thatparticularly focuses issues of
equity, inclusion andrepresentation and it's but it's
just also an incredibletraining.
So skills-based, really runsthe gambits of talking to you
know experts on a whole host ofissues, but really creating you
know a culture, you knowrespectability, inclusion, just
(20:03):
really being authentic in aspace that oftentimes doesn't
have people that look like usand really helping us
collectively move to the nextsection, to the next level.
So you know I'm super excited.
There's something also aboutlike disconnecting from DC or
just from whatever your workingenvironment is and being in the
amazing mountains that are Aspen, colorado.
(20:25):
That just really makeseverything just really all the
more unique.
But maybe I'll just say that,going back a little bit to my
story, when I was an intern, oneof the organizations that I
joined and really got involvedin was the Congressional
Hispanic Staff Association.
So I was looking for an affinitygroup on the Hill, in part
because I really wanted to geton the Hill Spoiler.
I ended up on the Hill.
(20:45):
I remember talking to thepresident of that staff
association and that afternoonhe asked me to forward him my
resume because an opening showedup on the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee.
When I joined and became afull-time staffer, I also joined
officially the CongressionalHispanic Staff Association.
I ultimately worked up to bepresident myself and one of the
things we're super proud of thatour team was able to accomplish
(21:07):
was working with my roommate atthe time, but also an external
NGO called Pay Our Interns, andthey were able to mobilize
Congress to start paying theirinterns through research and
advocacy.
So really to bring it fullcircle my own story of not sort
of unpaid internships being abarrier and access to foreign
(21:28):
policy we were able to reallycause changes and eventually he
also convinced the StateDepartment and the organization
lobby of the State Department toalso pay their interns.
So Congress and the StateDepartment both started paying
their interns and really madechange one of the major barriers
to getting your foot in thedoor.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Absolutely.
And I mean and kudos to you,right, for not only going
through the unpaid internshipand what that did for you but
also thinking about ways tochange that for others, right,
you know, I think there aredifferent mentalities.
There are some folks that justaccept that unpaid internships
is a thing and everyone did it,but there are folks that
literally cannot afford to dothat and there are folks that
(22:06):
have to sleep on the floor to doso and that's not.
That is a real barrier,especially if you're thinking
about getting talented, diverserepresentation in these spaces
that bring differentperspectives.
You're literally not going toget folks just because they
cannot afford to find a floor tosleep in.
You know what I mean.
So kudos to you all to kind ofrecognizing that and recognizing
(22:29):
that it just needed to changemore broadly.
I appreciate that, and I'm suremany others do, and this is the
type of effort that I'm surethere were a lot of folks that
came together ultimately to makeit happen, kind of in the
spirit of it all, like thecontributions that we all make
are very significant.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Thank you, but to your point, it really takes a
village, it takes a communityand a lot of people came
together for those.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, absolutely so.
Let's fast track a little bit.
You end up in the SenateForeign Relations Committee.
Tell me what happens after that.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
So actually, you know , it's so interesting because I
was president of theCongressional Hispanic Staff
Association and it was avolunteer job, but I was
obviously a full-time SenateForeign Relations Committee
staffer and I was kind ofinterested in like how do I like
bring some of the work on, likeyou know, access to halls of
power, representation, inclusion, but also like find like a Asia
(23:18):
foreign policy twist.
And some of the bestconversations that I was
fortunate and privileged to bein were really with human rights
organizations and really theamazing work they did to uplift,
to find the release ofpolitical prisoners, to convince
Congress to raise human rightsissues, which oftentimes get
short shrifted in nationalsecurity conversations.
(23:39):
And so I was like I'd love todo that on the outside for a bit
.
I'd love to find what I'velearned now at five years on the
Senate Foreign RelationsCommittee, but really in a way
that like helps build more doorsfor access to these halls of
power.
I was fortunate that I wasworking on legislation that
dealt with genocide of theRohingya people, which is a
(24:01):
minority, was originally fromBurma and had been displaced to
Bangladesh, into major parts ofSoutheast Asia through ethnic
cleansing, crimes againsthumanity and genocide.
Amnesty International, usa wasmaking this legislation their
top human rights campaign andthey reached out if we knew
anyone who would be interestedin leading that advocacy
(24:22):
campaign for them and I was likeI would love to.
I wrote the legislation you'readvocating for and I know all
the players and I'd love to doso in a more grassroots,
bringing all the tools that aninternational NGO can do.
A couple iterations afterwards,and even after my time at
(24:43):
Amnesty, the legislation that wewere working on became law.
That's sort of when I made mymove to the human rights field
in NGOs and again, reallyimportant work, working on
international human rightsissues, uplifting.
You know stateless populations,that I got to visit some of the
refugee camps in Bangladesh andjust you know like kids would
(25:04):
tell you the stories about sortof fleeing.
You know persecution of themilitary and how they lost their
families in that way.
And then I would work withcommunities in DC or as part of
the diaspora so that they couldtestify before Congress or they
could go to meetings to advocatefor the plight of the Rohingya
and other human rights groups inthe halls of Congress or the
(25:27):
executive branch.
And so to me I was bringingsome of the advocacy skills I
learned both in Congress butalso even as just like
advocating for change, for paidinternships and really bringing
those skills to bring socialchange on human rights issues in
the Asia Pacific.
Speaker 2 (25:42):
And thank you for sharing that right.
Can you share any other placesthat your work has taken you to
and kind of what that experiencehas been like?
Yeah, we think about this typeof work that is, of course,
international and I know at thispoint you were not in the
government, right, but like youstill have to travel to
different places and keep upwith us and understand what's
(26:03):
going on.
So can you speak a little bitabout that?
Speaker 1 (26:05):
In this job?
I went to Bangladesh, but Itraveled to Thailand, to
Malaysia.
What In this job?
I went to Bangladesh, but Itraveled to Thailand, to
Malaysia.
What's really fascinating atthis point in my career is that
people stay in your life, rightLike every time I go to Thailand
, which I was just there acouple of weeks ago, I still
make an effort to connect withmy Amnesty Thailand office.
I couldn't meet them, but Istayed in touch with Amnesty
Indonesia when I was in Jakarta,but in part because these are
(26:27):
the people that define who youare, but also because you want
them to know that we're allstill one big part of a larger
international movement andwhether I'm in government or not
.
In government we're still agentsof change, certainly on human
rights issues.
Sometimes I'm an advocate onthe outside and sometimes I'm an
advocate on the inside.
But I've been super fortunate.
I've been able to travel todifferent parts of the Asia
(26:48):
Pacific.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
What brought you back to government?
Speaker 1 (26:50):
Somewhere in between.
There I'd worked at aphilanthropy called Open Society
Foundation and I'd reached apoint where I was really excited
about the work I was doing onthe outside.
I'd published, I was proud ofsome human rights wins we were
able to do, and obviously thework continues.
But I I realized that there'sstill a lot of change you can do
when you're in government andin the executive branch and so
(27:14):
sort of maybe filling that storyI was just sharing a bit ago.
One of the first actions theBiden-Harris administration took
was calling the Rohingya crisisa genocide, and I was fortunate
to be involved in some of thosedebates within US government.
This was certainly one of themajor actions I was advocating
(27:36):
for when I was working forvarious human rights groups.
You know, oftentimes we saythat on human rights issues or
on atrocity prevention issues,you can't really tackle them if
you don't really diagnose theproblem that we're working on,
and so being able to call it forwhat it was was really
important for many of thevictims of genocide and crimes
against humanity, and that waslike year one of my time in
(27:58):
government, and so really in thepast now almost four years that
I've been back in government,but first time in the executive
branch been super fortunate withsort of working for a
government where I've been ableto, you know, really cause
international change.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Can you share any of the large differences that
you've seen in the impact thatyou can make or in how the
impact can be tangible, workingon the executive branch versus
the legislative branch?
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Yeah, absolutely.
The legislative branch yeah,absolutely.
One of the issues that I got towork on during my time at the
Department of State was theCompact Free Association, which
sounds super wonky but I promiseyou is maybe one of the most
consequential foreign policynational security issues.
So after World War II, we hadas former territories three now
(28:50):
countries the Marshall Islands,micronesia and Palau and the
terms in which they becamefreely associated states became
these compacts, and every 20years we renegotiate them, and
it just so happened that we hadto renegotiate them in the last
couple of years.
Now this is all happening in alarger geopolitical context in
(29:14):
which the PRC is certainlymaking huge investments and huge
gains in the Pacific Islands,and so there's some public
reporting about how China didn'twant these countries to reenter
into a new compact with theUnited States and was actively
working against that.
And our relationship with thethree countries I mentioned and
(29:36):
they're called sometimes theFreely Associated States is
super important for entireleadership in the Pacific.
So our ability to project power,to access free seas, to be able
to go from California toSingapore and certainly to
Taiwan, all depends on ourability to have access to the
(29:56):
Pacific Islands, or just haveaccess to the Pacific If we were
denied that freedom ofnavigation and that freedom of
overflight, that would be hugelyconsequential to national
security issues.
I was super fortunate that Iworked on the negotiating team
and towards the end of it,became the deputy negotiator on
the team and really learned alot from both my team.
One of the issues that theMarshallese appropriately raised
(30:31):
was issues of nuclear legacyand are the consequence of
nuclear testing that we did inthe run-up to World War II, and
so these issues haveconsequences decades later and
were some of the hardest issuesto try to address in a way that
obviously supported mutualrespect and mutual interest for
(30:53):
both of our countries in thecontext of the Marshall Islands
but then ultimately for all ofthe islands that we had to
negotiate with.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Let's pretend that all of the audience is here
because they are all on thebrink of leaving their jobs to
go into internationaldevelopment or trying to become
a policy lead of some sorts.
What advice would you have tothose folks?
Speaker 1 (31:14):
Oftentimes I say that you have to think about your
three Ps.
So I think about it in terms ofpolicy, politics and process.
You can know everything aboutUS-China policy, but that still
might not land you that job youwant in the China policymaking
world.
Why?
Because you still need to knowhow government works.
(31:34):
Or if you're working on budgetissues in relation to China, you
need to know how the budgetworks.
Or I think one of the thingsthat was so consequential for me
, both in my advocacy days inthe human rights world, but
certainly when I worked on theSenate Foreign Relations
Committee, is I knew the processfor how Congress worked.
I knew how to move.
I knew how a bill gotintroduced to how it moved out
(31:56):
of committee.
So then I moved to the Senatefloor and then, hopefully, the
House also passed a similar billand then it became a law that
was sent to the president's desk.
And then the third P ispolitics.
You need to.
Who are your champions?
Who are your validators?
That also applies to yournetworks.
You can know how things becomelaw.
You can have the best law, butif the political winds are not
(32:21):
behind it, none of that matters.
And so those three P's haveguided me a lot in my different
parts of my career.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
That's great, okay.
So now they're looking to getinto this field.
One of the first questions iscan I have this amount of impact
and still not be broke?
Is this a field where folkslike how much money can folks
expect to make in this fielddoing this type of work?
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Money is always sensitive, right, but it's funny
because I started off talkingabout how broke I was,
especially early off in mycareer.
I'm super fortunate that I makesomewhere between $160,000 a
year Pretty sure I'm not thebest at math, but around
$160,000 a year and over, whichyou don't always hear in public
(33:00):
service.
I'm fortunate that I can live amiddle-income, middle-class
life here and really support myfamily through that and I work
in government, right?
Who thought that you can dothat on a public service salary
and having worked in a nonprofitor having worked in Congress,
which is known for historicallylow salaries?
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Yeah, no, I appreciate that, and I think
that's part of the reason why Iasked the question, because I
know that I worked in citygovernment in New York and I saw
what people were making.
I was like, wait, we canactually live well and do really
great work that is impactfuland that can change your city,
your state, your country andinternational, but we just don't
always think about governmentas a vehicle to have some
(33:43):
economic mobility.
Yeah, absolutely so, Iappreciate that, and I do also
appreciate that I think thefederal government also does a
really good job at salarytransparency.
So I think it's just a matterof changing the stigma that you
will be broke if you work ingovernment to flipping it to go
out and do some research.
There's actually some reallyinteresting roles that you can
have and do some good work.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
No, absolutely true, and it's all the more important
in communities that can't asktheir parents about salary
issues, or when I was in thepresident of this organization,
I got asked how do you even dosalary negotiations Actually, my
little brother is now a staffassistant in Capitol Hill and
similar conversations like whatdoes salary negotiation even
(34:25):
look like?
When do I ask my boss for araise?
How do?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I ask for a raise.
Should I ask for a?
Speaker 1 (34:31):
raise, and no one teaches us sometimes these
things growing up, and so it'sall the more reason why it's
important to have mentors, tohave sponsors, people that will
help you get from one place toanother.
I think advice should be free.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
Yeah, I agree, and I think that's also why it's
important to go to things likegrad school or fellowships,
right, because now you have thisfamily of folks like ICAP right
, which we mentioned earlier,like you can lean on people and
you can get intel from peoplelike, hey, I'm in philanthropy,
this is what we're doing, thisis what we're paying Does that
sound right over there?
And you can gut check it withyour peers and really have a
(35:04):
good understanding and justpeople that can help you think
through issues.
Like you know, we have activegroup chats of, hey guys, I'm
figuring this out, I don't knowwhat to do, has anyone done
something similar?
Or hey, y'all, I'm trying tohire someone, does anyone know
anyone?
And that's how you, like youknow, kind of just create real
fellowship amongst your peersand, like, stay connected, you
know.
So, definitely, I hear you andI appreciate that.
(35:26):
Yeah, even though we alreadydid a really good ICAP
commercial, but it's neverenough, never, never enough.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
Absolutely.
Everyone should do it.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Are there any forms of media that could be books,
podcasts, debate clubs, anythingthat you have experienced, join
your local debate team.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
I mean certainly I thought I was going to be a
lawyer when I joined the highschool debate team.
Never even thought about goingto law school after I really
became interested in foreignpolicy, but it was a great
opening to it.
We didn't even get a full chanceto talk about it, but I grew up
reading comics and watchingcartoons a ton.
Growing up In terms of media,x-men was always on at my house.
(36:05):
X-men 97 just came out recentlyon TV show.
Part part of the reason.
I, you know, looking back at itthere was this motif about like
the superhero club of like thesort of outcast of society but
there were heroes and you knowwe didn't even talk about this
but I'm, you know I alsoidentify as gay and being a gay
Latino only child, first gen.
(36:25):
You know you sometimes havethese like questions about you
know whether we're really goingto make it or whether we should
make it.
I always felt like cartoonsreally got me and X-Men has this
like very subtle motif aboutthe LGBTQ community.
So really recommend it and youknow, just think that it's okay
if your kids watch a lot ofcartoons and comics.
I swear it all works out in theend.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
So that's awesome.
I will open it to say are therethings that you want to discuss
and that you want the world toknow about you?
Because this is our floor, sowe can do whatever we want with
the time.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
No, absolutely.
You know, I feel like we'vealready talked so much about
running the gambit on both mycareer.
I'll just say that, for thosewho are interested in entering
the space, a mentor once told meit doesn't seem like it, and
this was honestly when I wassleeping on the floor like
struggling to make ends meet,having tough conversations with
my dad who was fighting cancerand like wasn't sure if I was
(37:18):
ever like cut out to make it inforeign policy.
Just here to say one simplething, which is you deserve to
be here.
Your voice matters, yourcontribution, no matter how big,
how small matters.
Voice matters, your contributionno matter how big, how small
matters.
You know I in my wildest dreamsnever thought you know a single
child, gay, latino kid fromQueens, new York had anything to
(37:39):
contribute to foreign policy.
You know was super fortunateand privileged to sort of make
it after some really toughstrides that you know.
Again go back to the fact thatmy mom taught me, or instilled
in me, this sort of curiosityabout the world and I carry that
with me.
But it's a long way to say yourvalue matters and it's all
going to work out.
Just sort of continue to searchfor your dreams.
(38:01):
And just again, I never thoughtI would be where I am right now
and so just continue at it.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
That's awesome.
I think that's a great note toend on.
I really appreciate your timetoday.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
Thank you.
Thank you for doing this.
Speaker 2 (38:11):
I hope you enjoyed this episode.
If you did and believe on themission we're on, please like,
rate and subscribe to thispodcast on whatever platform
you're using, and share thispodcast with your friends and
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Make sure you follow us onInstagram and LinkedIn at Career
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I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
Ridiculous History
History is beautiful, brutal and, often, ridiculous. Join Ben Bowlin and Noel Brown as they dive into some of the weirdest stories from across the span of human civilization in Ridiculous History, a podcast by iHeartRadio.