February 3, 2025 • 48 mins
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Curious about how a fitness instructor transitions into a marketing ops powerhouse? Join us for a fascinating conversation with Jannelle Roscoe, the Associate Director of Digital Marketing and Marketing Systems at Lonza. Jannelle shares her unique journey from the world of fitness to mastering marketing operations, all while sticking to a budget. Her experience highlights the importance of customer-centric thinking, not only when engaging with external clients but also within internal teams. Her insights into customer journeys and motivations are must-hear lessons for anyone navigating the complex realm of marketing operations.
In our discussion, you'll discover the power of continuous learning and humility in professional growth. Jannelle opens up about embracing new challenges and overcoming the fear of not knowing everything, striking a perfect balance between confidence and humility. We explore the importance of creating nurturing environments where newcomers can freely ask questions, seek guidance, and grow without unnecessary struggles. This approach not only fosters personal growth but also strengthens the marketing operations community by encouraging collaboration and shared experiences.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of
OpsCast brought to you byMarketingOpscom, powered by all
those MoPros out there.
I'm your host, michael Hartman,flying solo today as we get
into another of our 2025episodes.
Joining me today is JanelleRoscoe.
She is joining me today toshare how she made her way into
marketing ops on a budget, sothis may be of interest for
(00:22):
those of you who are trying tobreak into the profession or
trying to figure out how tolearn more as you go along the
way without breaking the bank.
So Janelle is currentlyAssociate Director of Digital
Marketing and Marketing Systemsat Lonza.
Prior to that, she was aMarketing Automation Manager at
Sartorius, and prior to that,she held various roles in
general marketing and digitalmarketing.
(00:43):
So, janelle, thanks for joiningme today.
Thank you for having me, mike.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Excited to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Yeah, it'll be fun.
Not nervous, are you?
No, not at all.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
All right, we don't want you to be nervous, okay, no
, not nervous.
I think anyone in marketing ops.
If you get in 45 minutes totalk about marketing ops and
related things.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
I think that is always wonderful, so we can talk
about it forever.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, I know I could.
I have to watch myselfsometimes, so all right.
So one of the things we like todo in a lot of our episodes is
have our guests walk throughtheir career journey and how
they ended up in marketing ops.
But I think, with given thenature of what I'm anticipating
our conversation to be today, Idon't think we're going to go
(01:27):
start there directly.
But why don't we start withthis Like, how long have you
been in a marketing ops role,whether or not it was called
marketing ops, and when did youstart saying that you were in
marketing ops and why?
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Okay.
So I would say technically I'vebeen in I think you know
corporate and marketing forabout six years now and all of
the roles I've had in marketinghave had some element of what is
typically referred to asmarketing ops.
For those past six years and Ithink since when I got into
marketing it was, I would say,my first real job.
(02:05):
I would say we're you know,nine to five.
So I didn't even know marketingops was a thing because I was
new to marketing officially inthe industry.
But once I found out what youknow, once I really leaned into
all of those things that aremarketing ops and once I found
(02:26):
out that marketing ops was athing and I was like, oh yes,
this is my thing and there areothers out there like me and I
mean, I think it just kind ofopened up the world to me in
terms of my career and what Ireally wanted to do in marketing
Sure.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
So what a lot of people who have been in
marketing end up in not a lot,but there's a number of people
who end up in marketing ops.
Was there anything inparticular about the nuances of
marketing ops that attracted youinto those, like kind of taking
on those, or was it just sortof like somebody needed to solve
this problem?
So I'm going to go figure itout.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
I think it was a mix of all of those things.
Just me personally, before Igot into marketing and I would
say corporate marketing, and asa career I was a fitness
instructor.
So there was a few things thatkind of I would say, taking from
that that really, I would say,served as the background to
what's making me successful inmarketing ops, and one of those
(03:26):
is customer centricity.
I think marketing ops is likeone of the unsung heroes of the
customer journey and one of thethings that I always saw, you
know, kind of digging around andback ends of systems was wait,
these people really want to dobusiness with us as a company.
How can we get this to theright person faster?
How can we ensure that theirinterest gets there, that
(03:51):
they're to the right person?
So all of those things are likesuper important to me and I was
hypersensitive to that thingcoming from my career in fitness
, because, let's say, I'mleading a class there and you
have tons of people in yourclass.
Everyone's on a different level.
So part of that is, how do Imake sure that each person
although and I think this youknow like personal.
(04:14):
If you think personalization isa big part of marketing ops.
How do I make sure each personthat's coming to my class has a
personalized experience?
How can I design a class thatwhere each person feels like
it's designed just for them?
So I brought a lot of that intothe way I think about how I
structure and work withinmarketing ops and also it was,
(04:37):
you know, always wanting tolearn what's the newest thing on
the fitness industry.
I always wanted to learn that.
So it was always just thatquest for new things, quest of
always being on the cusp ofwhat's out there.
What do customers want more ofand how can we give them that
just ultimate customer journeyand customer experience as they
engage with us?
Speaker 1 (04:57):
I love that.
Yeah, I think you hit on acouple of elements that I think
are fairly consistent, or one islike just a curiosity.
I think what I find is peoplein marketing ops tend to be
curious by nature.
And then the other one is, youknow, essentially call it
customer-centric, but it dependson what you mean by customer,
(05:19):
and I tend to think of customersas actual customers, right?
So, whether you think of it asadvocating for customers in the
things you do as an organization, or, if you think about, as
internal customers which I can'tbelieve I'm even saying it
because one of my least favoriteterms, uh, is uh, yeah, at
least trying to understand otherpeople's motivations, right,
(05:40):
because sometimes it can getfrustrating in these roles when
you go like why are you askingme to do this or why do we do
want to do that?
Speaker 2 (05:47):
and I think when you start to understand other
people's motivations, it canhelp that no, exactly, and I
think if anyone is kind of mostaware of internal customers and
external customers right, it issomeone in marketing ops,
because you're often gettingrequests from your internal
customers and then you're alsotasked with keeping your actual
(06:09):
customers' needs, wants andmotivations, you know.
Key to all of that so it'sjuggling that requirement from
your internal customer to whatyour actual customer wants and
you know doing that with easeand using the tools to do that.
So I think just actually havingcustomers of my own who were
(06:32):
always very quick to tell me ifthey were satisfied or
dissatisfied, really, you know,just taking that into my career
has been, I think, extremelyhelpful.
And, like you said, thecuriosity you call it curiosity,
I like to call it being nosyand I would tell people all of
the time if there is somethingin a system, I'm going to look
(06:54):
at it.
How did you put this together?
How did this work?
And if there's documentationout there and if it's on a
public drive, I am going to readit.
If there's something in a filecabinet and it's shared
documenting a process or why isthe company doing this, I am
going to look at it, because allof those things are tools to
(07:15):
help me understand better.
What are the processes, whatare internal customers looking
for?
So I think everyone knows andI'll tell everyone that I work
with.
I am very nosy and I'm alwayslooking at things.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
If it's public available.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I am going to look at it, yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
I love it.
So one of the things you saidto me is that you are
self-taught, which you sort ofhinted at in some of this stuff
already it sounds like youstarted out as a marketing
assistant already it sounds likeyou started out as a marketing
assistant and can you maybeshare some examples of the kinds
of things you did when you werein that role that you were
(07:52):
doing, kind of finding your ownsources of information or how
you learned from those?
Speaker 2 (07:59):
Yeah, sure.
So the crazy thing about it wasis I was just looking for an
easy job nine to five, start,finish, simple job.
So I was just looking for aneasy job nine to five, that
start, finish, simple job.
So I think starting out as amarketing assistant it was
basics answering the phone,making samples, mailing packages
.
I mean I think when I sayassistant, true assistant, but
then I learned early on doingthat, okay, I want to do more.
(08:23):
And I think I dipped my toe intolearning Salesforce then
because it's like, okay, I wantto do more and you know, I think
I dipped my toe into learningSalesforce then because it's
like, okay, you answer the phone, then you have to put that
customer inquiry into Salesforce.
So of course I wanted to knowabout, know more about that.
So I spent time, you know,learning Salesforce because how
can I use that to better improveyou know the customer, make
sure it's assigned to the rightperson for follow up.
(08:44):
And then also, I think before Istarted kind of at this
marketing assistant, I had somepart time, I would say sales and
marketing roles where I dabbledin doing email.
So you know, constant contact,I think, some basic marketing
and email platforms doing that,so I did have experience on
building emails and doing emailmarketing for my own business.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
So I was able to kind of leverage that.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
So I did have experience on building emails
and doing email marketing for myown business, so I was able to
kind of leverage that.
I think that's kind of likeadvice.
I always tell people if thereis a door that is open, if there
is an opportunity, you know, Ithink I was just always very
quick to take it and there wasan opportunity.
I was asked just one time hey,I think I remember you on your
(09:25):
resume that you said you hadexperience doing emails before.
Can you help us out in Pardot?
So I mean I'll even throw inanother piece of advice to
people.
If you're thinking about youknow, as you're building out
your resume, if you have someexperience and things you know,
add those, because you reallynever know when adding that to
your resume is going to kind ofyou know when you need to use
(09:47):
that piece of information inyour day-to-day job.
So I think that's where itreally started.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Do you ever get in those situations where, whether
it's you volunteer for doingsomething, or someone comes to
you and says, hey, we need thisdone and it looks like you might
be able to do it.
Do you ever have any kind of Idon't know what the right term
is fear, maybe feel like youknow you're not really the right
(10:12):
person for it, like any of thatkind of stuff?
And if so, like how did youovercome that?
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Oh, great question.
I think anyone I mean I startedlate, I would say, in
developing a career, so it wasalways that feeling of, I would
say, playing catch up, ofwanting to, and then I was
always been the type of personthat wanted to be the first one
finished with the test, wantedto always have the answer.
(10:38):
You know and I'm sure you knowI hope a lot of my colleagues
don't say this know it all, sonot knowing is kind of a huge
fear.
Right, I would say so ifsomeone were to ask one day, or
if I kind of felt like it wasgoing to come up basically spend
the next few days learningwhatever I think it was.
(10:58):
Or if I'm in a meeting andthere's terminology I'm not sure
what it.
You know, marketing loves touse their acronyms in their
things and assume everyone knowsit.
I'm Googling those in the call,I'm writing those down, I'm just
making sure.
If I don't know it today, whatcan I do to know it tomorrow or
know it next week?
And I can't support it.
(11:21):
I think part of it too ishaving that humility and having
that understanding, as you'reputting your internal and
external customers first.
If I don't know it, I'm justnot going to do it as well, but
learning as much as I can to doas much as I can, right, I think
it was kind of.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
I think it's interesting, because it's like
that idea that you feel like youhave to know everything or have
an answer for anything.
I think is a very common thingfor people to have, especially
in these kinds of roles whereyou think you should have
answers to all this stuff, and Ilike that.
You used the word humility,right.
It takes some humility.
I don't think and here's mything, right.
I always tell people my goal isto be confident but humble, and
(12:01):
you know my goal, like itdoesn't.
I think a lot of people thinkthose are two opposites and I
don't think that's the case.
Right, I think you can beconfident in your capabilities
and skills and your knowledge orwhatever.
At the same time, recognizethis is where the humility comes
in is that you may not knoweverything, or you may not know
the best thing, or you may notlike what you know may not quite
apply to this particularsituation.
(12:22):
Right, and I think that's whatyou're describing is having the
humility to admit that you maynot know something.
At the same time, you can stillsay I may not know this, but
I'm going to go work my tail offto go figure out as much as I
can about it to support thebusiness or support the team, or
whatever it is you think isimportant.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Exactly, and part of that, too, is as you learn and
grow in the org, it's learningthat it's having a humility of
knowing who to ask.
So I think too, being new in arole, you're not sure of who to
ask and sometimes that causesyou to feel like you have to
know everything.
But then I think, enough timesyou learn that sometimes maybe
that's not the best thing.
And one of the things that Ithink I'm huge on when new
people start and they haveelements of marketing ops in
(13:09):
their role and I'm interfacingwith them is I'm always like
super clear.
If you don't know, if you have aquestion, if there's anything
you feel like you're strugglingand spending more time on than
you should, please ask me.
So it's not to say to create acrutch, but I think it's more so
of having come up in my roleand not having had many people
(13:32):
to ask, because I was kind of ina role and maybe there was no
one else in marketing ops who Icould ask and having to learn.
So I think I've always justkind of really made it clear to
those who I'm working with ifthere's anything about our
systems or our processes too,and it's not necessarily just
the system, sometimes it's moreof we do it this way, and even
(13:53):
if you know the system you mayknow Salesforce, you may know
Marketo, you may know HubSpotyou don't know how we do it.
So ask, and save us all plentyof time from me having to go fix
it and you spending timespinning your wheels on
something that you know.
We may have a processdocumented somewhere, right
Right, that you could easilyfind.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Yeah, it reminds me of a little bit of being a
parent, because my kids wouldcome to me and ask me like let's
take a simple one, right, dad?
How do you spell this wordRight?
I'm like I was always the onewho would go like what do you
think it is right?
Yeah, like I want you to try,right?
Um, unless I'm just superswamped and I might give you
just the answer, but I wantpeople to learn and be able to
(14:37):
at least put in some amount ofeffort before, because I think
that's the best way for peopleto learn right exactly, exactly,
yeah exactly.
I'm with you.
So, um, you started out as amarketing assistant.
I mean, to me almost what youdescribed is almost sort of a
hybrid of marketing and salesassistant, because you were
(14:58):
doing lead routing andmanagement too, like, almost
like a BDR role.
So that's interesting by itself.
I think that we might come backto how that has influenced you
a little bit.
But what were some of the like?
You mentioned something aboutconstant contact, maybe even
part of it, but what, like, whatare you know what other things
(15:18):
that did you do?
When you know you didn'tnecessarily have a marketing ops
scope of responsibility, thatyou started adding onto your
your plate and kind of took youin the direction of marketing
ops, kind of took you in thedirection of marketing ops.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
I would say so that I think there's email, but email
kind of sits in that worldbetween marketing ops, digital
marketing, and then it even hasemail marketing right.
So it's kind of a it alldepends on your org where, like,
a true email marketer sitsright Because it has those
elements of.
You know Marcom as well.
But so kind of my first I wouldsay throw me in into marketing
(15:53):
ops was list imports.
Because no one wants to do alist import, I would say to do
it.
They want someone to do it,everyone wants someone to do it,
but no one wants to do it.
(16:15):
I would say that's what it isand I, you know, as an assistant
, kind of, hey, no one else isgoing to do this, this is
perfect for you.
And I think as I've progressedI really realized how much of a
mistake that was Someone askingme.
I think now I'm glad they askedme, but I would never ask
(16:35):
someone brand new on the job hey, here's this data that's going
into our system.
You know, clean it up, importit here you have the keys to do
that.
Because I think now, as you'veanyone who's in marketing ops
and done their share of listimports.
You know all the things thatcan go wrong, right.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
Probably people listening to this right now have
the same reaction, which waslike this like shiver up the
back of my neck, yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
So then I'm like this is this is admin work.
Right, you get an Excel, youclean the list.
This is admin work.
So I think now, as I've been inmarketing ops or been in my
marketing career for about sixyears and I'm still doing list
imports, I'm like, wait a minute, I've had a few promotions here
.
I'm more, you know, seniorlevel role.
Why am I still doing listimports?
But the more I know about itand its implications, the more I
(17:23):
realize, oh, you should be atkind of a different level and
have lots of training and youknow lots of QC and processes in
place to be doing this.
So I think that's kind of how Igot in and I really just
embraced the list import right,like, how can I make this faster
?
How can I use this?
(17:43):
I use the list import to learnmore about Excel because you
know, as I said, I really didn'thave a corporate background, so
all of those tools, evenMicrosoft Office that you assume
everyone knows, I was learningthat as well.
So I used the list import tolearn Excel.
You know how can I learn moreabout it to make this process
(18:05):
faster and speed it up?
And that's I mean it was thelow, lowly basic list import.
That kind of is the foundationof my career and to this day I'm
still an expert, quite theexpert, uh, at least import.
So that's actually doing someearlier today yeah, doing all
kinds of like excel, excelgymnastics, right v lookups and
(18:26):
uh formulas and change, change,case, all those things that help
you clean your data and makesure it's consistent and that
you don't have errors, andthings like that.
Because you know I think that'swhere you know I just recently
did a training on list importswhere I was just like I
emphasize it so much Either you,you know, spend 30 extra
(18:49):
minutes here or you spend fourhours later to fix all your
errors no one has the time to do.
Nobody got that yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah, so it's funny because, um, you bring up
listing boards is a reallyinteresting one in my mind as I
think about it, because you'reright, it is.
It feels very administrative,it feels very low importance,
but if you really understandwhat the downstream implications
of it are, right in terms ofyour data and how it will either
(19:21):
make things easier or harderdown the road when you try to do
segmentation or whatever yourealize.
Actually, it's really importantto get it right.
Yep, to get it right.
And so I can totally understandthis sort of conflicting like
oh, I'm in a role where I feellike I shouldn't be doing this.
At the same time, expectingsomeone who doesn't really
(19:42):
understand all those sort ofconnections downstream yeah,
would be a potential risk.
Right, they need to learn itover time, but you don't want to
just throw them into it withoutgiving them the tools and the
knowledge about why it'simportant to do these steps.
Because, like you said,otherwise you're going to be
cleaning it up after the fact.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Exactly and even I would say learning about
customers.
I think me as being new to thisindustry I would say life
sciences industry a listemployer.
I mean it's goal to learn whoyour customer profile is right,
who's your ICP or who isn't inyour ICP.
That's in your list.
What job titles are wetargeting right?
Who are our competitors?
(20:22):
Okay, I need to be able to spotthose quickly and remove them
from the list.
I need to be able to prioritizewho's you know high quality
prospects for our sales team andyou get really, you know what
regions are most important to us.
You get that from the listimport.
I mean, as crazy as it seems,no, it's really interesting.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
I mean, there's a lot of ways that I'm a big fan of
people in marketing marketingops really understanding how,
like, sales works andunderstanding why, why they act,
behave the way they do, whetheror not you think it's the right
thing, um, and I think it's areally interesting idea again,
like there's this.
It seems like such an innocuous, boring, mundane pain in the
(21:05):
ass task right to upload a list,but there are things you can
learn from it in many differentways if you kind of open up your
mind about it.
I love that.
Yeah, actually, that'ssomething I never would have.
I'd never thought about untilyou just said that.
Like the idea that you canactually learn something about
your customer base from that,that's great, okay.
(21:25):
So another thing you, you and Ihave talked about is that you,
you took advantage and I'vealready kind of heard it, I
think at least some right.
It kind of gets back to doingthis on a budget.
You found a number of freeresources to help elevate your
learning.
So, first off, did I understandthat right?
And then, secondly, what kindsof resources did you take
(21:51):
advantage of and which oneswould you say these were?
Maybe I don't know if you wantto stack, rank them, but yeah,
ones that really maybe werebetter than others, if you want.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
Yeah, sure.
So I think, as I started it was, you know I'll move back to
that, trying to play catch up.
So it's it's marketing out.
So then it's also the digitalmarketing aspect of it and
learning how it all workstogether, because I was very
much in roles that were veryclose to digital marketing and
even now my, my role is verymuch in the middle of digital
(22:24):
marketing, marketing, ops andhow does all of that work
together?
I would say so it was.
I need to learn GA.
You know Google Analytics.
I need to learn about websites Ineed to learn about SEO, can I?
Speaker 1 (22:36):
just sorry, just for my own advocation.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
When you say digital marketing versus marketing ops
like what's the differentiationthere for you, For me, I think,
and my role in our org is justan interesting one, because my
role is just a very unique rolein our organization because it's
very much marketing ops but itis very much digital marketing
and it sits within our digitalmarketing team, but that's just
(23:02):
custom to our team.
But then we have other roles inour organization that may be
purely marketing ops in theirexecution, but mine is just
specifically that, purelymarketing ops in their execution
, but mine is just specificallythat.
But I know that I lean heavilyinto the marketing ops part of
it where it's, you know, workingwith Salesforce team, working
in Marketo, all of those things.
(23:25):
Market marketing technologyjust falls within my remit.
But then I sit within thedigital marketing team and I'm
still closely working on digitalmarketing campaigns as well, so
sorry, maybe I probably asked apoor question.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Digital marketing meaning the website, company,
website, and then maybe likepaid or organic, social or
digital advertising, Like okay,that's the way I think of it too
, but I just wanted to make surethat we were on the same page
Purely, purely like it's website.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
And then it's like, okay, we need a form on the
website or we need.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
It's all connected, it's all connected and I'm
actually surprised at how feworganizations I've seen been a
part of or observed where thewebsite and marketing ops teams
like really were not part of,even like they really wasn't a
lot of connection, and I'vealways thought that that there
was a missed opportunity.
And a lot of us talk about the,the, the importance of aligning
(24:18):
sales and marketing overall andI think aligning the digital
activities, especially thewebsite in marketing ops, what
you're doing with that is reallyreally important and
underserved in many places.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
Oh, no, I agree, and I think that's one of the things
where I really leverage that toits full potential.
It's like, okay, where are ourlike?
Because if I'm pullingreporting, it's like oh, I
actually ran these campaigns.
Right, because that is actuallypart of what I do.
I actually ran these campaigns,so I know where we need to
report on it and I know when Isee that data coming in through
(24:55):
at the back end of you know,analytics tool.
If it's, does it look right?
Because I ran those campaignsand I know you know.
So I'm kind of doing all of it.
What do we need to do to setthis up so that this flows
through our systems correctly,so that our data is correct, so
that this flows through oursystems correctly, so that our
data is correct?
So I think sometimes I tellpeople, you know, kind of one of
(25:18):
my greatest skills is doing allthe jobs.
Because when you do all thejobs and you see that full
connection of how, start tofinish on campaign execution
across all channels, then I meanthat just really helps to give
you, give you an edge thatothers may not have in their
roles.
When you're just purely doingone part of it, I'll say so yeah
, doing all the jobs.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
So that helps make each of them easier.
I would say Sorry, I took usoff a little bit, but maybe get
back to some of the freeresources that you took
advantage of.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Okay, great, so I'll say some of them.
I mean, Google has tons ofcourses and I think anyone who's
probably been in digitalmarketing has taken advantage of
all those free Google courses.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
I actually would be surprised if a lot Like I don't
know what the percentages are,but I bet it's lower than 50%.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
Really I do If they haven't, I would suggest they
holly.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
I know, I know.
This is why we're talking toyou, Janelle.
How do you?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
not?
How do you not?
It's free.
How do you not do it?
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Yeah, let's guilt everyone who hasn't done it into
doing it.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Take a free course this weekend.
If you have not taken one inthe past year, please do One of
the big ones I did, I think, cxlInstitute, which is big on like
conversion rate optimization,because that one it actually
required you to do some homeworkand I think it was brilliant
what they did in that, as partof the free course, you had to
write blog posts talking aboutyour experience in the course
(26:41):
and what you learned.
So it was like, oh, and then,as you're doing it, like oh,
they're doing that becauseyou're publishing these blog
posts, and then there's SEO thatdrives more people back to
their site.
So, and then learning that.
So that's why I really learnedabout you know a lot about just
marketing and general growthmarketing, doing some of those
free courses that they had.
Now, the youtube university, aseveryone calls it, is always a
(27:03):
fan favorite.
There's tons of um, as I waslearning marketo, tons of
resources on there about marketo, all the Marketo user groups,
marketingopscom as we talk hereI mean it's a pillar out there
as well tons of resources.
So I would say, kind of those.
(27:26):
I mean taking low cost courseswhen I could.
Sometimes I think, taking alower cost course and putting a
little more skin in the gamekind of helps keep you honest
and makes you do it more so thanthose just free free courses,
but more those low cost oneswhere you really feel like you
need to finish it at the end,gives you more incentive to
finish it.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Well, I know just so, yeah, full transparency, like
not necessarily a marketing apps, but like I have also like have
started things either free orno additional cost.
If it was, say I was like theirlinkedin stuff that I'm I pay
for a subscription and you knowthere's additional, you'd access
training and I've started itbut never not finished it right.
(28:02):
So there's like yeah, um, so Ithink I I get your point about
like there's a little bit ofskin in the game that can make a
difference.
Is there any um can you like?
Do you have any stories abouthow some of the like any of
these previous verses that thatkind of stood out, that um oh
yeah, so, um, I think, as I waslearning marquetto, there was
(28:23):
one that I stumbled across onyoutube the automation geeks, um
.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
So I just found that their learning style, the way
they presented the information.
It was just nice and clear andconcise and I really watched
those.
And then, a few years down theline, I'm working on a project
where, working on our leadlifecycle, and, lo and behold,
the consultant that getsassigned to my project is the
one and only Grace Bebner.
(28:49):
So if you're not in marketingops and if you've not watched
her videos, they're amazing onYouTube.
So I mean, even when I justheard a voice on the call, I was
like, oh my gosh, this is Grace, she's Marquette O'Royce, she
is amazing.
So it's like total fangirl.
I mean to me, and you know, Ithink one of the things about it
(29:09):
too, and I'll say this messagekind of all consultants out
there, anyone who's kind ofbuilding that, put these
resources out there, becausethis is how you solidify
yourself as a subject matterexpert.
There's people out there likeme watching them, learning from
and putting these things intopractice.
And when it comes time and Ineed an agency, who am I going
(29:32):
to look for?
Right, those people who are onLinkedIn, who are posting their
subject matter expertise, who.
I'm following those thoughtleaders because it shows me they
know what they're talking aboutand I've used what they're
doing and if I could get themone-on-one, just imagine what I
can do with their supportone-on-one Sure.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
I love that.
I'm not familiar with eitherone of those, so now I'm like in
the background scrambling to golook at, look look these up?
Um, so you started to mentionyou've done some some paid
training and courses.
Um, kind of curious.
So what were there certaintypes that you have of training
(30:19):
or topics that you would tend tolean towards paid?
And if so, how did you make?
Speaker 2 (30:25):
the decision when you were willing to pay for
something versus using, maybe, afree resource.
So I think there's two types ofpaid.
There's paid where okay, I canpay for it myself.
No problem and taking a Courseraor Udemy one of those easier
courses where it's 20 bucks orso, Because this is just
something I want to learn.
Maybe I want to do something onPower Pivots Help me excel for
(30:47):
my listing reports, right.
But then there's also thesethat are more specific, I would
say, to marketing ops, and thoseare few and far in between.
I think free resources onlearning technical parts of
marketing technology and systemsare out there everywhere, right
?
So I think anyone can learn howto use HubSpot, Marketo, Eloqua
(31:10):
from free resources.
But what you can't really learnis how do I start to talk and
communicate the projects I'mworking on to the C-suite, right
?
How do I make the CMO careabout what I'm doing?
How do I show the impact?
How do I communicate better?
Because I think one of thethings when you're in marketing
ops, you're a systems person,right?
(31:31):
So your head's down behind thescenes making sure everything
flows correctly and you oftenreally forget about how do I
show the value of what I'm doingto the organization?
How do I show that what I'mdoing is bringing revenue?
So I would say that's wherethose paid courses have come in
handy, because those are outthere on that, and I mean, of
(31:52):
course, I think they are worththat value because it's showing
how do I show my valuesinternally, right, how do I show
the value of what I'm doing andlearn to tie revenue to my
initiatives.
And those are, you know wherepeople have lived that
themselves and they're reallyprobably you know, of course
they're doing that.
(32:12):
That's part of what they wantto get paid for, Right?
So I think those are more thanworth paying for.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Were some of those oriented towards communications,
Like how do I communicate whatI'm doing, and kind of improving
that, or were some of them morelike one that I like I people
are long-term listeners knowthat I will where I probably get
to go, which being able tospeak about the financial, you
(32:39):
know, impacts of your work, sothat you can not only talk to
the CMO but talk to the CFO.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Yeah, so some of them were that.
So I've done two actually onmarketingopscom.
So two of the courses, onebeing on, I would say, practical
tactical attribution was one Ipaid for and I won't say I paid
for it but company paid for itbecause it was.
I was getting ready for thisrollout.
You know, working on MarketoMeasure, how do I really talk
(33:07):
about attribution in a way thatbrings it home, and that was one
of those courses that did thatand you just don't find that.
You find courses out there, youfind documentation on how to
set, you know, attribution toolsup, how to pull reports, but
how do I communicate on whatthis means for marketing and
communicate it from a financialstandpoint, communicate in a way
(33:30):
that shows the impact ofmarketing efforts.
And that's where a course likethat was, I would say, you know,
huge in helping me do that andI was able to really leverage
that and present on a lot of thethings I learned on that and
roll those into how I waspresenting and talking about it
internally.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Oh, that makes sense, got it?
You just also just sort ofhinted at, you know, getting
your company to pay for some ofthe you know the ones that cost
money, money, or maybe you tookyou away for a day or two or
something from the office to doit.
What kind of support did youhave from your leadership and
(34:10):
management for doing this?
Speaker 2 (34:12):
Yep, as much as I.
I mean, there's been timeswhere a realization where we
can't put all of our income backinto paying for courses.
So I think we're kind of taskedand I've always benefited from
leadership that has reallysupported those initiatives and
(34:34):
it's just part of my developmentplan.
That's part of it.
So each year I try to find atleast one course that aligns
with what's in my developmentplan, what's our goals as a
company, what are we trying todo?
And if you can find coursesthat align with that, right, If
you're finding courses thatalign with your leadership,
that's even easier to get thoseapproved.
(34:55):
And I would say a lot of thesecourses, even conferences like,
you think, Mopsa, Palooza, AdobeSummit I think the creators of
them, they know right, this is achallenge.
So they provide you even withthe materials of here's a letter
explaining the benefits of whyyou should pay for this and take
this letter, put your name onit, you know, send it to your
(35:16):
leadership.
So I think they know that andthey're including those
resources to help you get itpaid for by your leadership.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
Yeah, makes sense.
So how?
I'm curious because of thatyou've kind of gone through a
number of different iterationsor sort of steps in your career
here.
How far in advance are youplanning your development plan?
Did you have something that wasmultiple years out?
How deliberate are you aboutwhat the steps are?
(35:47):
What kind of development do youthink you're going to need for
the next step in your career?
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Oh man, that's a tough one.
So I think I stumbled into alot of the first spots in my
career and roles opened up and Iwas kind of just like easily
able to go into those roles.
So I didn't necessarily thinkabout it for the first, I would
say the first half of my career,and I was in new roles, you
know, probably every few months,but now I've been in the same
(36:15):
role for a few years now.
So now I'm really reallythinking about it and I think we
all know that as a next step,there's you know, there's always
this saying of what they tellyou and I'm I still struggle
with it myself what got you herewon't get you there Right, and
I think, as you're doing that,there's always that and I'm just
like, well, it was good enoughto get me here, so why is that?
(36:36):
So I think that's, I think I'mthinking that now and working
with my leadership and workingwith mentors and, you know, even
doing courses about that.
You know what's next.
How do I develop thatleadership skill?
Because that is the one thingyou can fast track.
Technical aptitude you canlearn how to use a marketing
(36:59):
automation platform, an emailplatform.
You can learn.
All of that.
You can learn your processes,but you cannot learn leadership
on your own on the weekend,watching webinars.
You cannot just learn how to bea leader without being a leader
.
It's those things that, as youstart to think about what's next
, how do I, you know, do I wantto manage people?
(37:21):
Is that the next step?
Are there other opportunitiesto using your technical aptitude
to solve business challengesthat you can leverage as well,
and I think the marketing opsworld is opening up to a lot of
that.
You know I find myself.
You know you see consultants.
You see a lot of those people,thought leaders that I follow on
(37:41):
LinkedIn and I'm seeing.
What you said is that you can'tlearn.
Speaker 1 (38:01):
Well, maybe the way you said it, I would agree with
it, but you can't learnleadership skills on the weekend
by yourself.
I think there are things youcan do and there's nothing like,
actually, you know, being inthe fire.
True Truth is right, but Ithink there are things you can
do.
I mean, I'm glad to hear thatyou've been kind of leveraging
(38:23):
mentors or coaches.
I think those can help you,both in terms of if you're an
individual contributor andyou're kind of trying to decide,
do I want to take the path ofleading people?
I think they can help youthrough that thought process,
leading people.
I think they can help youthrough that thought process and
then they can also help youwith that transition.
Should you?
Should you go?
Cause there there are.
(38:43):
It's not that you can't learnthose skills, and that's what I
really appreciate.
These are skills.
They're different skills, forsure.
I truly believe they can belearned.
Some people, like any otherthing, right, some people will
have a little more of a naturalsort of affinity or capability
of those skills and certain ones, but I think everyone can learn
to be almost same way.
(39:04):
If today, apply themselves, canbe, can be competent, that the
skills that are needed to be agood leader, so I so you
mentioned those.
I'm curious now.
So this is something I'm allI'm just personally interested
in.
A lot is like you mentionedmentors, like how have you gone
(39:26):
about like pursuing people to bementors?
What was that experience like?
Just curious, because I suspectthere's a lot of people out
there like yeah, these peopleonline or in, uh, in the
community, and I would love forthem to be able to like I have
them as a, as a mentor, but Idon't want to go ask right,
there's this fear of beingrejected or, um, just like, how
(39:52):
did you like, how did youapproach that?
Speaker 2 (39:54):
yeah, um, you made me think of something too, and
I'll get to that.
But I want to say great pointon saying you can't learn
leadership.
I think maybe what I mean moreis you brought it is you can't
practice it without being aleader.
Right, like you can, absolutely, it's harder.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
Well, I think you can again.
This is where I think a coachor a mentor can help you like.
Think about how do I put myselfin a position to learn the
skill that I'll need withouthaving the official role anyway?
But yeah, no, I think byyourself.
Speaker 2 (40:22):
it's no, no, I mean you.
You make you.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
Yeah, I agree with you, you can't practice it by
yourself.
Speaker 2 (40:27):
You can't practice it by yourself and I think that's
the difference that you can'tnecessarily get better at it.
So I would say, you know, reachout anyone who was in marketing
ops and anyone who's talked tome and they probably say, oh
gosh, I asked her one questionand 30 minutes later we're down
this rabbit hole on things.
Anyone who's probably inmarketing ops, anyone who's a
systems person who spent lots oftime doing this, when you find
(40:50):
someone else who's just aspassionate about it as you are,
I mean I feel like they love totalk about it and I mean you
reach out if.
If they turn down that requestor they don't want to connect,
and I mean that's just is whatit is.
But I've I've listened topeople on podcasts.
I have one example there wassomeone I was listening to on a
podcast, on a Marketing Opspodcast.
(41:11):
I mean I just reached out onLinkedIn, right, and I just
reached out and connected andhad wonderful conversations with
her.
Just because I reached out andI said you know, I heard what
you're talking about.
I see so many similarities inyour journey that are in mine.
How did you overcome those?
And I think most people arejust willing to help someone out
at those stages in their careerand share their own experiences
(41:34):
.
I mean, I know I'm more thanwilling to, if you know people,
when people reach out and havethose questions, I'm more than
willing to kind of share whatdid I do to kind of help me get
here.
And even within organizationI've always kind of participated
in mentorship programs.
So I'm working with a mentornow, working with Life Coach,
and even there it's a companybenefit to do career coaching.
(41:58):
So, and it's included and free.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
So if there's something out there, I am going
to take advantage of it and Imean, yeah, no, I think it's,
it's interesting and I'm a I'm abig fan of mentorship and
coaching, uh, whether it's amore informal or formal with you
know, compensation kind ofthing, um, and I know from my
own experience that it may.
(42:23):
Maybe this is what you did.
So when I've actively pursued,said I'd like this person to be
a mentor for me, I went into itwith um, trying to have a clear
idea of what I wanted out ofthat relationship.
And because invariably thesepeople want to know, like I, I
(42:45):
don't think I've ever hadanybody who said flat out, no, I
don't, I'm not interested.
But I, yeah, I think peoplewant to know like is like, what
do you want to get out of it?
How can I help?
So, I think, being clear aboutwhat it is you want from that,
if it's going to be an ongoingone, how like?
Even things like how often youwant to meet um, do you want to
talk about career coach, careerplans?
Do you want to talk aboutspecific issues?
(43:06):
Right, how to like?
There's different ways.
You can take advantage of that,um, and I think I'm with you,
right, um, it doesn't reallyhurt to reach out.
You may get a no I.
The other part I would say is,even when I've had somewhere
like, oh, this would work, I'vealso had a situation I call it
two different situations where,like, I had a initial
(43:27):
conversation with someone and Irealized I think we both
realized pretty quickly just notthe right fit, right like
personality wise or whatever.
It just wasn't, wasn't gonnawork, and that's okay.
The other one was those whereI've had relationships with is
men who are mentors for me.
Yeah, they kind of they have a,they do have a life right,
there's a beginning and an endand, uh, I recognized and made
(43:52):
the tough decision as much as Ivalued their, that relationship
in some cases.
Well, take one in particular.
I can think of who doescoaching that's paid.
Coaching happens to be.
A friend was doing that and Ialways felt like I was taking
away time for her to get herpaid clients and I just said I
(44:15):
don't think this is fair to you.
I'm not in a position where Iwant to be paying.
I think you should get paid.
Like, I still want to be ableto call you and I want us to
like have a good relationship.
I don't want you to feel likeyou're stuck with this and so
that's how we like, we stilllike talk to her three or four
months ago, right, and it's notlike it's an, it's the end and
(44:36):
it's just the sort of structuredpart of it is over yeah, I mean
I think that's to where I'vethe, the courses, the
documentation, the webinars.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
I mean they're always out there, right, and you can
always feel like I can learnmore, I can learn, but it does
get to a point where there'sonly so much I can learn, unless
there's something new out there.
Right, there's only so much Ican learn.
Now, how do I learn to takewhat I've learned and leverage
it even more and get to the nextlevel?
And that's where those coachesand those mentorships and those
(45:12):
kinds of relationships arecrucial for that.
So I think but I mean youraised some points they have a
life.
You have a life, but it's going.
In a way, you need to have aplan, a process, a start and a
finish as you're developingthose relationships, because you
know you can't fall into amental relationship where it's
kind of like OK, what are wedoing here, when does this
finish?
So I think you manage it, justlike you're managing, you know,
(45:35):
some of your other projects thatyou're working on have clear
goals.
What do we want to see at thestart and the finish of this and
what is, you know, how do wedefine success?
And then leaving that door openas a way out when you need to,
because all mental relationshipsare not going to work.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
No, and like your career, that person's career,
life, like they evolve, and soit's just a normal thing.
It was interesting.
I I will wrap it up here I meanI was just.
I was listening to or readingsomething just recently and I I
cannot, for the life of me,remember what it was, but it was
(46:13):
.
It was something that there'ssomething about our friendships
that changes when we kind of getin our early 20s.
Right, and one of the one ofthe.
There's a number of aspects andreasons why, but one of them is
, yeah, that just people comeand go out of our lives.
You know a lot more once youget into your, into your 20s,
(46:33):
and that holds true for thesekinds of relationships too.
Right, so it doesn't meanthey're gone forever, right,
there's still connections, andif you left, it did it well, I'm
sure that those people would behappy to help you again, and
that's really, I think, the keyis right.
Don't think about these thingsas they either have to be
forever or never, right, thoseare not.
(46:55):
You don't have to go to thoseextremes.
Speaker 2 (46:58):
Exactly, and you never know right, that person
ends up at a company.
They have an open role, they'rethinking of you, so you never
know.
I mean, that's just all part ofthe networking.
If you don't do it, if youdon't reach out, you make no
connections.
Speaker 1 (47:10):
Absolutely no, it's valuable, janelle.
I wish we had more time, butthis, I think, is going to be
really helpful for a lot of ourlisteners who have either
struggled thinking that theyhave to seriously just use only
paid, paid resources forlearning and how to think about
how to how to pitch them if theyare asking for support.
(47:30):
So thank you for that.
Appreciate it.
If folks want to connect withyou or want you to be a mentor,
you know, yeah, what's the bestway for them to connect with you
and kind of follow what you'retalking about.
Speaker 2 (47:42):
More than welcome to reach out on LinkedIn and
connect with me there, be happyto help in any way I can.
Speaker 1 (47:48):
Terrific.
I'm not even sure I should keepasking that question, because
that's always the answer.
Speaker 2 (47:52):
There's always an answer.
Speaker 1 (47:54):
Well, there's been a few exceptions, but again, thank
you, janelle.
This is great.
Thank you to our audience forcontinuing to support us.
If you have ideas for topics orguests, or you want to be a
guest, uh, feel free to reachout to naomi, mike or me uh,
either through linkedin orthrough the marketing ops
community, uh slack or whatever,and we'd be happy to talk to
(48:16):
you about it until next time.
Bye, everybody.
Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of
OpsCast brought to you byMarketingOpscom, powered by all
those MoPros out there.
I'm your host, michael Hartman,flying solo today as we get
into another of our 2025episodes.
Joining me today is JanelleRoscoe.
She is joining me today toshare how she made her way into
marketing ops on a budget, sothis may be of interest for
(00:22):
those of you who are trying tobreak into the profession or
trying to figure out how tolearn more as you go along the
way without breaking the bank.
So Janelle is currentlyAssociate Director of Digital
Marketing and Marketing Systemsat Lonza.
Prior to that, she was aMarketing Automation Manager at
Sartorius, and prior to that,she held various roles in
general marketing and digitalmarketing.
(00:43):
So, janelle, thanks for joiningme today.
Thank you for having me, mike.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Excited to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Yeah, it'll be fun.
Not nervous, are you?
No, not at all.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
All right, we don't want you to be nervous, okay, no
, not nervous.
I think anyone in marketing ops.
If you get in 45 minutes totalk about marketing ops and
related things.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
I think that is always wonderful, so we can talk
about it forever.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, I know I could.
I have to watch myselfsometimes, so all right.
So one of the things we like todo in a lot of our episodes is
have our guests walk throughtheir career journey and how
they ended up in marketing ops.
But I think, with given thenature of what I'm anticipating
our conversation to be today, Idon't think we're going to go
(01:27):
start there directly.
But why don't we start withthis Like, how long have you
been in a marketing ops role,whether or not it was called
marketing ops, and when did youstart saying that you were in
marketing ops and why?
Speaker 2 (01:44):
Okay.
So I would say technically I'vebeen in I think you know
corporate and marketing forabout six years now and all of
the roles I've had in marketinghave had some element of what is
typically referred to asmarketing ops.
For those past six years and Ithink since when I got into
marketing it was, I would say,my first real job.
(02:05):
I would say we're you know,nine to five.
So I didn't even know marketingops was a thing because I was
new to marketing officially inthe industry.
But once I found out what youknow, once I really leaned into
all of those things that aremarketing ops and once I found
(02:26):
out that marketing ops was athing and I was like, oh yes,
this is my thing and there areothers out there like me and I
mean, I think it just kind ofopened up the world to me in
terms of my career and what Ireally wanted to do in marketing
Sure.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
So what a lot of people who have been in
marketing end up in not a lot,but there's a number of people
who end up in marketing ops.
Was there anything inparticular about the nuances of
marketing ops that attracted youinto those, like kind of taking
on those, or was it just sortof like somebody needed to solve
this problem?
So I'm going to go figure itout.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
I think it was a mix of all of those things.
Just me personally, before Igot into marketing and I would
say corporate marketing, and asa career I was a fitness
instructor.
So there was a few things thatkind of I would say, taking from
that that really, I would say,served as the background to
what's making me successful inmarketing ops, and one of those
(03:26):
is customer centricity.
I think marketing ops is likeone of the unsung heroes of the
customer journey and one of thethings that I always saw, you
know, kind of digging around andback ends of systems was wait,
these people really want to dobusiness with us as a company.
How can we get this to theright person faster?
How can we ensure that theirinterest gets there, that
(03:51):
they're to the right person?
So all of those things are likesuper important to me and I was
hypersensitive to that thingcoming from my career in fitness
, because, let's say, I'mleading a class there and you
have tons of people in yourclass.
Everyone's on a different level.
So part of that is, how do Imake sure that each person
although and I think this youknow like personal.
(04:14):
If you think personalization isa big part of marketing ops.
How do I make sure each personthat's coming to my class has a
personalized experience?
How can I design a class thatwhere each person feels like
it's designed just for them?
So I brought a lot of that intothe way I think about how I
structure and work withinmarketing ops and also it was,
(04:37):
you know, always wanting tolearn what's the newest thing on
the fitness industry.
I always wanted to learn that.
So it was always just thatquest for new things, quest of
always being on the cusp ofwhat's out there.
What do customers want more ofand how can we give them that
just ultimate customer journeyand customer experience as they
engage with us?
Speaker 1 (04:57):
I love that.
Yeah, I think you hit on acouple of elements that I think
are fairly consistent, or one islike just a curiosity.
I think what I find is peoplein marketing ops tend to be
curious by nature.
And then the other one is, youknow, essentially call it
customer-centric, but it dependson what you mean by customer,
(05:19):
and I tend to think of customersas actual customers, right?
So, whether you think of it asadvocating for customers in the
things you do as an organization, or, if you think about, as
internal customers which I can'tbelieve I'm even saying it
because one of my least favoriteterms, uh, is uh, yeah, at
least trying to understand otherpeople's motivations, right,
(05:40):
because sometimes it can getfrustrating in these roles when
you go like why are you askingme to do this or why do we do
want to do that?
Speaker 2 (05:47):
and I think when you start to understand other
people's motivations, it canhelp that no, exactly, and I
think if anyone is kind of mostaware of internal customers and
external customers right, it issomeone in marketing ops,
because you're often gettingrequests from your internal
customers and then you're alsotasked with keeping your actual
(06:09):
customers' needs, wants andmotivations, you know.
Key to all of that so it'sjuggling that requirement from
your internal customer to whatyour actual customer wants and
you know doing that with easeand using the tools to do that.
So I think just actually havingcustomers of my own who were
(06:32):
always very quick to tell me ifthey were satisfied or
dissatisfied, really, you know,just taking that into my career
has been, I think, extremelyhelpful.
And, like you said, thecuriosity you call it curiosity,
I like to call it being nosyand I would tell people all of
the time if there is somethingin a system, I'm going to look
(06:54):
at it.
How did you put this together?
How did this work?
And if there's documentationout there and if it's on a
public drive, I am going to readit.
If there's something in a filecabinet and it's shared
documenting a process or why isthe company doing this, I am
going to look at it, because allof those things are tools to
(07:15):
help me understand better.
What are the processes, whatare internal customers looking
for?
So I think everyone knows andI'll tell everyone that I work
with.
I am very nosy and I'm alwayslooking at things.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
If it's public available.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I am going to look at it, yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
I love it.
So one of the things you saidto me is that you are
self-taught, which you sort ofhinted at in some of this stuff
already it sounds like youstarted out as a marketing
assistant already it sounds likeyou started out as a marketing
assistant and can you maybeshare some examples of the kinds
of things you did when you werein that role that you were
(07:52):
doing, kind of finding your ownsources of information or how
you learned from those?
Speaker 2 (07:59):
Yeah, sure.
So the crazy thing about it wasis I was just looking for an
easy job nine to five, start,finish, simple job.
So I was just looking for aneasy job nine to five, that
start, finish, simple job.
So I think starting out as amarketing assistant it was
basics answering the phone,making samples, mailing packages
.
I mean I think when I sayassistant, true assistant, but
then I learned early on doingthat, okay, I want to do more.
(08:23):
And I think I dipped my toe intolearning Salesforce then
because it's like, okay, I wantto do more and you know, I think
I dipped my toe into learningSalesforce then because it's
like, okay, you answer the phone, then you have to put that
customer inquiry into Salesforce.
So of course I wanted to knowabout, know more about that.
So I spent time, you know,learning Salesforce because how
can I use that to better improveyou know the customer, make
sure it's assigned to the rightperson for follow up.
(08:44):
And then also, I think before Istarted kind of at this
marketing assistant, I had somepart time, I would say sales and
marketing roles where I dabbledin doing email.
So you know, constant contact,I think, some basic marketing
and email platforms doing that,so I did have experience on
building emails and doing emailmarketing for my own business.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
So I was able to kind of leverage that.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
So I did have experience on building emails
and doing email marketing for myown business, so I was able to
kind of leverage that.
I think that's kind of likeadvice.
I always tell people if thereis a door that is open, if there
is an opportunity, you know, Ithink I was just always very
quick to take it and there wasan opportunity.
I was asked just one time hey,I think I remember you on your
(09:25):
resume that you said you hadexperience doing emails before.
Can you help us out in Pardot?
So I mean I'll even throw inanother piece of advice to
people.
If you're thinking about youknow, as you're building out
your resume, if you have someexperience and things you know,
add those, because you reallynever know when adding that to
your resume is going to kind ofyou know when you need to use
(09:47):
that piece of information inyour day-to-day job.
So I think that's where itreally started.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Do you ever get in those situations where, whether
it's you volunteer for doingsomething, or someone comes to
you and says, hey, we need thisdone and it looks like you might
be able to do it.
Do you ever have any kind of Idon't know what the right term
is fear, maybe feel like youknow you're not really the right
(10:12):
person for it, like any of thatkind of stuff?
And if so, like how did youovercome that?
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Oh, great question.
I think anyone I mean I startedlate, I would say, in
developing a career, so it wasalways that feeling of, I would
say, playing catch up, ofwanting to, and then I was
always been the type of personthat wanted to be the first one
finished with the test, wantedto always have the answer.
(10:38):
You know and I'm sure you knowI hope a lot of my colleagues
don't say this know it all, sonot knowing is kind of a huge
fear.
Right, I would say so ifsomeone were to ask one day, or
if I kind of felt like it wasgoing to come up basically spend
the next few days learningwhatever I think it was.
(10:58):
Or if I'm in a meeting andthere's terminology I'm not sure
what it.
You know, marketing loves touse their acronyms in their
things and assume everyone knowsit.
I'm Googling those in the call,I'm writing those down, I'm just
making sure.
If I don't know it today, whatcan I do to know it tomorrow or
know it next week?
And I can't support it.
(11:21):
I think part of it too ishaving that humility and having
that understanding, as you'reputting your internal and
external customers first.
If I don't know it, I'm justnot going to do it as well, but
learning as much as I can to doas much as I can, right, I think
it was kind of.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
I think it's interesting, because it's like
that idea that you feel like youhave to know everything or have
an answer for anything.
I think is a very common thingfor people to have, especially
in these kinds of roles whereyou think you should have
answers to all this stuff, and Ilike that.
You used the word humility,right.
It takes some humility.
I don't think and here's mything, right.
I always tell people my goal isto be confident but humble, and
(12:01):
you know my goal, like itdoesn't.
I think a lot of people thinkthose are two opposites and I
don't think that's the case.
Right, I think you can beconfident in your capabilities
and skills and your knowledge orwhatever.
At the same time, recognizethis is where the humility comes
in is that you may not knoweverything, or you may not know
the best thing, or you may notlike what you know may not quite
apply to this particularsituation.
(12:22):
Right, and I think that's whatyou're describing is having the
humility to admit that you maynot know something.
At the same time, you can stillsay I may not know this, but
I'm going to go work my tail offto go figure out as much as I
can about it to support thebusiness or support the team, or
whatever it is you think isimportant.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Exactly, and part of that, too, is as you learn and
grow in the org, it's learningthat it's having a humility of
knowing who to ask.
So I think too, being new in arole, you're not sure of who to
ask and sometimes that causesyou to feel like you have to
know everything.
But then I think, enough timesyou learn that sometimes maybe
that's not the best thing.
And one of the things that Ithink I'm huge on when new
people start and they haveelements of marketing ops in
(13:09):
their role and I'm interfacingwith them is I'm always like
super clear.
If you don't know, if you have aquestion, if there's anything
you feel like you're strugglingand spending more time on than
you should, please ask me.
So it's not to say to create acrutch, but I think it's more so
of having come up in my roleand not having had many people
(13:32):
to ask, because I was kind of ina role and maybe there was no
one else in marketing ops who Icould ask and having to learn.
So I think I've always justkind of really made it clear to
those who I'm working with ifthere's anything about our
systems or our processes too,and it's not necessarily just
the system, sometimes it's moreof we do it this way, and even
(13:53):
if you know the system you mayknow Salesforce, you may know
Marketo, you may know HubSpotyou don't know how we do it.
So ask, and save us all plentyof time from me having to go fix
it and you spending timespinning your wheels on
something that you know.
We may have a processdocumented somewhere, right
Right, that you could easilyfind.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Yeah, it reminds me of a little bit of being a
parent, because my kids wouldcome to me and ask me like let's
take a simple one, right, dad?
How do you spell this wordRight?
I'm like I was always the onewho would go like what do you
think it is right?
Yeah, like I want you to try,right?
Um, unless I'm just superswamped and I might give you
just the answer, but I wantpeople to learn and be able to
(14:37):
at least put in some amount ofeffort before, because I think
that's the best way for peopleto learn right exactly, exactly,
yeah exactly.
I'm with you.
So, um, you started out as amarketing assistant.
I mean, to me almost what youdescribed is almost sort of a
hybrid of marketing and salesassistant, because you were
(14:58):
doing lead routing andmanagement too, like, almost
like a BDR role.
So that's interesting by itself.
I think that we might come backto how that has influenced you
a little bit.
But what were some of the like?
You mentioned something aboutconstant contact, maybe even
part of it, but what, like, whatare you know what other things
(15:18):
that did you do?
When you know you didn'tnecessarily have a marketing ops
scope of responsibility, thatyou started adding onto your
your plate and kind of took youin the direction of marketing
ops, kind of took you in thedirection of marketing ops.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
I would say so that I think there's email, but email
kind of sits in that worldbetween marketing ops, digital
marketing, and then it even hasemail marketing right.
So it's kind of a it alldepends on your org where, like,
a true email marketer sitsright Because it has those
elements of.
You know Marcom as well.
But so kind of my first I wouldsay throw me in into marketing
(15:53):
ops was list imports.
Because no one wants to do alist import, I would say to do
it.
They want someone to do it,everyone wants someone to do it,
but no one wants to do it.
(16:15):
I would say that's what it isand I, you know, as an assistant
, kind of, hey, no one else isgoing to do this, this is
perfect for you.
And I think as I've progressedI really realized how much of a
mistake that was Someone askingme.
I think now I'm glad they askedme, but I would never ask
(16:35):
someone brand new on the job hey, here's this data that's going
into our system.
You know, clean it up, importit here you have the keys to do
that.
Because I think now, as you'veanyone who's in marketing ops
and done their share of listimports.
You know all the things thatcan go wrong, right.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
Probably people listening to this right now have
the same reaction, which waslike this like shiver up the
back of my neck, yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
So then I'm like this is this is admin work.
Right, you get an Excel, youclean the list.
This is admin work.
So I think now, as I've been inmarketing ops or been in my
marketing career for about sixyears and I'm still doing list
imports, I'm like, wait a minute, I've had a few promotions here
.
I'm more, you know, seniorlevel role.
Why am I still doing listimports?
But the more I know about itand its implications, the more I
(17:23):
realize, oh, you should be atkind of a different level and
have lots of training and youknow lots of QC and processes in
place to be doing this.
So I think that's kind of how Igot in and I really just
embraced the list import right,like, how can I make this faster
?
How can I use this?
(17:43):
I use the list import to learnmore about Excel because you
know, as I said, I really didn'thave a corporate background, so
all of those tools, evenMicrosoft Office that you assume
everyone knows, I was learningthat as well.
So I used the list import tolearn Excel.
You know how can I learn moreabout it to make this process
(18:05):
faster and speed it up?
And that's I mean it was thelow, lowly basic list import.
That kind of is the foundationof my career and to this day I'm
still an expert, quite theexpert, uh, at least import.
So that's actually doing someearlier today yeah, doing all
kinds of like excel, excelgymnastics, right v lookups and
(18:26):
uh formulas and change, change,case, all those things that help
you clean your data and makesure it's consistent and that
you don't have errors, andthings like that.
Because you know I think that'swhere you know I just recently
did a training on list importswhere I was just like I
emphasize it so much Either you,you know, spend 30 extra
(18:49):
minutes here or you spend fourhours later to fix all your
errors no one has the time to do.
Nobody got that yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah, so it's funny because, um, you bring up
listing boards is a reallyinteresting one in my mind as I
think about it, because you'reright, it is.
It feels very administrative,it feels very low importance,
but if you really understandwhat the downstream implications
of it are, right in terms ofyour data and how it will either
(19:21):
make things easier or harderdown the road when you try to do
segmentation or whatever yourealize.
Actually, it's really importantto get it right.
Yep, to get it right.
And so I can totally understandthis sort of conflicting like
oh, I'm in a role where I feellike I shouldn't be doing this.
At the same time, expectingsomeone who doesn't really
(19:42):
understand all those sort ofconnections downstream yeah,
would be a potential risk.
Right, they need to learn itover time, but you don't want to
just throw them into it withoutgiving them the tools and the
knowledge about why it'simportant to do these steps.
Because, like you said,otherwise you're going to be
cleaning it up after the fact.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Exactly and even I would say learning about
customers.
I think me as being new to thisindustry I would say life
sciences industry a listemployer.
I mean it's goal to learn whoyour customer profile is right,
who's your ICP or who isn't inyour ICP.
That's in your list.
What job titles are wetargeting right?
Who are our competitors?
(20:22):
Okay, I need to be able to spotthose quickly and remove them
from the list.
I need to be able to prioritizewho's you know high quality
prospects for our sales team andyou get really, you know what
regions are most important to us.
You get that from the listimport.
I mean, as crazy as it seems,no, it's really interesting.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
I mean, there's a lot of ways that I'm a big fan of
people in marketing marketingops really understanding how,
like, sales works andunderstanding why, why they act,
behave the way they do, whetheror not you think it's the right
thing, um, and I think it's areally interesting idea again,
like there's this.
It seems like such an innocuous, boring, mundane pain in the
(21:05):
ass task right to upload a list,but there are things you can
learn from it in many differentways if you kind of open up your
mind about it.
I love that.
Yeah, actually, that'ssomething I never would have.
I'd never thought about untilyou just said that.
Like the idea that you canactually learn something about
your customer base from that,that's great, okay.
(21:25):
So another thing you, you and Ihave talked about is that you,
you took advantage and I'vealready kind of heard it, I
think at least some right.
It kind of gets back to doingthis on a budget.
You found a number of freeresources to help elevate your
learning.
So, first off, did I understandthat right?
And then, secondly, what kindsof resources did you take
(21:51):
advantage of and which oneswould you say these were?
Maybe I don't know if you wantto stack, rank them, but yeah,
ones that really maybe werebetter than others, if you want.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
Yeah, sure.
So I think, as I started it was, you know I'll move back to
that, trying to play catch up.
So it's it's marketing out.
So then it's also the digitalmarketing aspect of it and
learning how it all workstogether, because I was very
much in roles that were veryclose to digital marketing and
even now my, my role is verymuch in the middle of digital
(22:24):
marketing, marketing, ops andhow does all of that work
together?
I would say so it was.
I need to learn GA.
You know Google Analytics.
I need to learn about websites Ineed to learn about SEO, can I?
Speaker 1 (22:36):
just sorry, just for my own advocation.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
When you say digital marketing versus marketing ops
like what's the differentiationthere for you, For me, I think,
and my role in our org is justan interesting one, because my
role is just a very unique rolein our organization because it's
very much marketing ops but itis very much digital marketing
and it sits within our digitalmarketing team, but that's just
(23:02):
custom to our team.
But then we have other roles inour organization that may be
purely marketing ops in theirexecution, but mine is just
specifically that, purelymarketing ops in their execution
, but mine is just specificallythat.
But I know that I lean heavilyinto the marketing ops part of
it where it's, you know, workingwith Salesforce team, working
in Marketo, all of those things.
(23:25):
Market marketing technologyjust falls within my remit.
But then I sit within thedigital marketing team and I'm
still closely working on digitalmarketing campaigns as well, so
sorry, maybe I probably asked apoor question.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Digital marketing meaning the website, company,
website, and then maybe likepaid or organic, social or
digital advertising, Like okay,that's the way I think of it too
, but I just wanted to make surethat we were on the same page
Purely, purely like it's website.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
And then it's like, okay, we need a form on the
website or we need.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
It's all connected, it's all connected and I'm
actually surprised at how feworganizations I've seen been a
part of or observed where thewebsite and marketing ops teams
like really were not part of,even like they really wasn't a
lot of connection, and I'vealways thought that that there
was a missed opportunity.
And a lot of us talk about the,the, the importance of aligning
(24:18):
sales and marketing overall andI think aligning the digital
activities, especially thewebsite in marketing ops, what
you're doing with that is reallyreally important and
underserved in many places.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
Oh, no, I agree, and I think that's one of the things
where I really leverage that toits full potential.
It's like, okay, where are ourlike?
Because if I'm pullingreporting, it's like oh, I
actually ran these campaigns.
Right, because that is actuallypart of what I do.
I actually ran these campaigns,so I know where we need to
report on it and I know when Isee that data coming in through
(24:55):
at the back end of you know,analytics tool.
If it's, does it look right?
Because I ran those campaignsand I know you know.
So I'm kind of doing all of it.
What do we need to do to setthis up so that this flows
through our systems correctly,so that our data is correct, so
that this flows through oursystems correctly, so that our
data is correct?
So I think sometimes I tellpeople, you know, kind of one of
(25:18):
my greatest skills is doing allthe jobs.
Because when you do all thejobs and you see that full
connection of how, start tofinish on campaign execution
across all channels, then I meanthat just really helps to give
you, give you an edge thatothers may not have in their
roles.
When you're just purely doingone part of it, I'll say so yeah
, doing all the jobs.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
So that helps make each of them easier.
I would say Sorry, I took usoff a little bit, but maybe get
back to some of the freeresources that you took
advantage of.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Okay, great, so I'll say some of them.
I mean, Google has tons ofcourses and I think anyone who's
probably been in digitalmarketing has taken advantage of
all those free Google courses.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
I actually would be surprised if a lot Like I don't
know what the percentages are,but I bet it's lower than 50%.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
Really I do If they haven't, I would suggest they
holly.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
I know, I know.
This is why we're talking toyou, Janelle.
How do you?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
not?
How do you not?
It's free.
How do you not do it?
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Yeah, let's guilt everyone who hasn't done it into
doing it.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Take a free course this weekend.
If you have not taken one inthe past year, please do One of
the big ones I did, I think, cxlInstitute, which is big on like
conversion rate optimization,because that one it actually
required you to do some homeworkand I think it was brilliant
what they did in that, as partof the free course, you had to
write blog posts talking aboutyour experience in the course
(26:41):
and what you learned.
So it was like, oh, and then,as you're doing it, like oh,
they're doing that becauseyou're publishing these blog
posts, and then there's SEO thatdrives more people back to
their site.
So, and then learning that.
So that's why I really learnedabout you know a lot about just
marketing and general growthmarketing, doing some of those
free courses that they had.
Now, the youtube university, aseveryone calls it, is always a
(27:03):
fan favorite.
There's tons of um, as I waslearning marketo, tons of
resources on there about marketo, all the Marketo user groups,
marketingopscom as we talk hereI mean it's a pillar out there
as well tons of resources.
So I would say, kind of those.
(27:26):
I mean taking low cost courseswhen I could.
Sometimes I think, taking alower cost course and putting a
little more skin in the gamekind of helps keep you honest
and makes you do it more so thanthose just free free courses,
but more those low cost oneswhere you really feel like you
need to finish it at the end,gives you more incentive to
finish it.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Well, I know just so, yeah, full transparency, like
not necessarily a marketing apps, but like I have also like have
started things either free orno additional cost.
If it was, say I was like theirlinkedin stuff that I'm I pay
for a subscription and you knowthere's additional, you'd access
training and I've started itbut never not finished it right.
(28:02):
So there's like yeah, um, so Ithink I I get your point about
like there's a little bit ofskin in the game that can make a
difference.
Is there any um can you like?
Do you have any stories abouthow some of the like any of
these previous verses that thatkind of stood out, that um oh
yeah, so, um, I think, as I waslearning marquetto, there was
(28:23):
one that I stumbled across onyoutube the automation geeks, um
.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
So I just found that their learning style, the way
they presented the information.
It was just nice and clear andconcise and I really watched
those.
And then, a few years down theline, I'm working on a project
where, working on our leadlifecycle, and, lo and behold,
the consultant that getsassigned to my project is the
one and only Grace Bebner.
(28:49):
So if you're not in marketingops and if you've not watched
her videos, they're amazing onYouTube.
So I mean, even when I justheard a voice on the call, I was
like, oh my gosh, this is Grace, she's Marquette O'Royce, she
is amazing.
So it's like total fangirl.
I mean to me, and you know, Ithink one of the things about it
(29:09):
too, and I'll say this messagekind of all consultants out
there, anyone who's kind ofbuilding that, put these
resources out there, becausethis is how you solidify
yourself as a subject matterexpert.
There's people out there likeme watching them, learning from
and putting these things intopractice.
And when it comes time and Ineed an agency, who am I going
(29:32):
to look for?
Right, those people who are onLinkedIn, who are posting their
subject matter expertise, who.
I'm following those thoughtleaders because it shows me they
know what they're talking aboutand I've used what they're
doing and if I could get themone-on-one, just imagine what I
can do with their supportone-on-one Sure.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
I love that.
I'm not familiar with eitherone of those, so now I'm like in
the background scrambling to golook at, look look these up?
Um, so you started to mentionyou've done some some paid
training and courses.
Um, kind of curious.
So what were there certaintypes that you have of training
(30:19):
or topics that you would tend tolean towards paid?
And if so, how did you make?
Speaker 2 (30:25):
the decision when you were willing to pay for
something versus using, maybe, afree resource.
So I think there's two types ofpaid.
There's paid where okay, I canpay for it myself.
No problem and taking a Courseraor Udemy one of those easier
courses where it's 20 bucks orso, Because this is just
something I want to learn.
Maybe I want to do something onPower Pivots Help me excel for
(30:47):
my listing reports, right.
But then there's also thesethat are more specific, I would
say, to marketing ops, and thoseare few and far in between.
I think free resources onlearning technical parts of
marketing technology and systemsare out there everywhere, right
?
So I think anyone can learn howto use HubSpot, Marketo, Eloqua
(31:10):
from free resources.
But what you can't really learnis how do I start to talk and
communicate the projects I'mworking on to the C-suite, right
?
How do I make the CMO careabout what I'm doing?
How do I show the impact?
How do I communicate better?
Because I think one of thethings when you're in marketing
ops, you're a systems person,right?
(31:31):
So your head's down behind thescenes making sure everything
flows correctly and you oftenreally forget about how do I
show the value of what I'm doingto the organization?
How do I show that what I'mdoing is bringing revenue?
So I would say that's wherethose paid courses have come in
handy, because those are outthere on that, and I mean, of
(31:52):
course, I think they are worththat value because it's showing
how do I show my valuesinternally, right, how do I show
the value of what I'm doing andlearn to tie revenue to my
initiatives.
And those are, you know wherepeople have lived that
themselves and they're reallyprobably you know, of course
they're doing that.
(32:12):
That's part of what they wantto get paid for, Right?
So I think those are more thanworth paying for.
Speaker 1 (32:18):
Were some of those oriented towards communications,
Like how do I communicate whatI'm doing, and kind of improving
that, or were some of them morelike one that I like I people
are long-term listeners knowthat I will where I probably get
to go, which being able tospeak about the financial, you
(32:39):
know, impacts of your work, sothat you can not only talk to
the CMO but talk to the CFO.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Yeah, so some of them were that.
So I've done two actually onmarketingopscom.
So two of the courses, onebeing on, I would say, practical
tactical attribution was one Ipaid for and I won't say I paid
for it but company paid for itbecause it was.
I was getting ready for thisrollout.
You know, working on MarketoMeasure, how do I really talk
(33:07):
about attribution in a way thatbrings it home, and that was one
of those courses that did thatand you just don't find that.
You find courses out there, youfind documentation on how to
set, you know, attribution toolsup, how to pull reports, but
how do I communicate on whatthis means for marketing and
communicate it from a financialstandpoint, communicate in a way
(33:30):
that shows the impact ofmarketing efforts.
And that's where a course likethat was, I would say, you know,
huge in helping me do that andI was able to really leverage
that and present on a lot of thethings I learned on that and
roll those into how I waspresenting and talking about it
internally.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Oh, that makes sense, got it?
You just also just sort ofhinted at, you know, getting
your company to pay for some ofthe you know the ones that cost
money, money, or maybe you tookyou away for a day or two or
something from the office to doit.
What kind of support did youhave from your leadership and
(34:10):
management for doing this?
Speaker 2 (34:12):
Yep, as much as I.
I mean, there's been timeswhere a realization where we
can't put all of our income backinto paying for courses.
So I think we're kind of taskedand I've always benefited from
leadership that has reallysupported those initiatives and
(34:34):
it's just part of my developmentplan.
That's part of it.
So each year I try to find atleast one course that aligns
with what's in my developmentplan, what's our goals as a
company, what are we trying todo?
And if you can find coursesthat align with that, right, If
you're finding courses thatalign with your leadership,
that's even easier to get thoseapproved.
(34:55):
And I would say a lot of thesecourses, even conferences like,
you think, Mopsa, Palooza, AdobeSummit I think the creators of
them, they know right, this is achallenge.
So they provide you even withthe materials of here's a letter
explaining the benefits of whyyou should pay for this and take
this letter, put your name onit, you know, send it to your
(35:16):
leadership.
So I think they know that andthey're including those
resources to help you get itpaid for by your leadership.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
Yeah, makes sense.
So how?
I'm curious because of thatyou've kind of gone through a
number of different iterationsor sort of steps in your career
here.
How far in advance are youplanning your development plan?
Did you have something that wasmultiple years out?
How deliberate are you aboutwhat the steps are?
(35:47):
What kind of development do youthink you're going to need for
the next step in your career?
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Oh man, that's a tough one.
So I think I stumbled into alot of the first spots in my
career and roles opened up and Iwas kind of just like easily
able to go into those roles.
So I didn't necessarily thinkabout it for the first, I would
say the first half of my career,and I was in new roles, you
know, probably every few months,but now I've been in the same
(36:15):
role for a few years now.
So now I'm really reallythinking about it and I think we
all know that as a next step,there's you know, there's always
this saying of what they tellyou and I'm I still struggle
with it myself what got you herewon't get you there Right, and
I think, as you're doing that,there's always that and I'm just
like, well, it was good enoughto get me here, so why is that?
(36:36):
So I think that's, I think I'mthinking that now and working
with my leadership and workingwith mentors and, you know, even
doing courses about that.
You know what's next.
How do I develop thatleadership skill?
Because that is the one thingyou can fast track.
Technical aptitude you canlearn how to use a marketing
(36:59):
automation platform, an emailplatform.
You can learn.
All of that.
You can learn your processes,but you cannot learn leadership
on your own on the weekend,watching webinars.
You cannot just learn how to bea leader without being a leader
.
It's those things that, as youstart to think about what's next
, how do I, you know, do I wantto manage people?
(37:21):
Is that the next step?
Are there other opportunitiesto using your technical aptitude
to solve business challengesthat you can leverage as well,
and I think the marketing opsworld is opening up to a lot of
that.
You know I find myself.
You know you see consultants.
You see a lot of those people,thought leaders that I follow on
(37:41):
LinkedIn and I'm seeing.
What you said is that you can'tlearn.
Speaker 1 (38:01):
Well, maybe the way you said it, I would agree with
it, but you can't learnleadership skills on the weekend
by yourself.
I think there are things youcan do and there's nothing like,
actually, you know, being inthe fire.
True Truth is right, but Ithink there are things you can
do.
I mean, I'm glad to hear thatyou've been kind of leveraging
(38:23):
mentors or coaches.
I think those can help you,both in terms of if you're an
individual contributor andyou're kind of trying to decide,
do I want to take the path ofleading people?
I think they can help youthrough that thought process,
leading people.
I think they can help youthrough that thought process and
then they can also help youwith that transition.
Should you?
Should you go?
Cause there there are.
(38:43):
It's not that you can't learnthose skills, and that's what I
really appreciate.
These are skills.
They're different skills, forsure.
I truly believe they can belearned.
Some people, like any otherthing, right, some people will
have a little more of a naturalsort of affinity or capability
of those skills and certain ones, but I think everyone can learn
to be almost same way.
(39:04):
If today, apply themselves, canbe, can be competent, that the
skills that are needed to be agood leader, so I so you
mentioned those.
I'm curious now.
So this is something I'm allI'm just personally interested
in.
A lot is like you mentionedmentors, like how have you gone
(39:26):
about like pursuing people to bementors?
What was that experience like?
Just curious, because I suspectthere's a lot of people out
there like yeah, these peopleonline or in, uh, in the
community, and I would love forthem to be able to like I have
them as a, as a mentor, but Idon't want to go ask right,
there's this fear of beingrejected or, um, just like, how
(39:52):
did you like, how did youapproach that?
Speaker 2 (39:54):
yeah, um, you made me think of something too, and
I'll get to that.
But I want to say great pointon saying you can't learn
leadership.
I think maybe what I mean moreis you brought it is you can't
practice it without being aleader.
Right, like you can, absolutely, it's harder.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
Well, I think you can again.
This is where I think a coachor a mentor can help you like.
Think about how do I put myselfin a position to learn the
skill that I'll need withouthaving the official role anyway?
But yeah, no, I think byyourself.
Speaker 2 (40:22):
it's no, no, I mean you.
You make you.
Speaker 1 (40:24):
Yeah, I agree with you, you can't practice it by
yourself.
Speaker 2 (40:27):
You can't practice it by yourself and I think that's
the difference that you can'tnecessarily get better at it.
So I would say, you know, reachout anyone who was in marketing
ops and anyone who's talked tome and they probably say, oh
gosh, I asked her one questionand 30 minutes later we're down
this rabbit hole on things.
Anyone who's probably inmarketing ops, anyone who's a
systems person who spent lots oftime doing this, when you find
(40:50):
someone else who's just aspassionate about it as you are,
I mean I feel like they love totalk about it and I mean you
reach out if.
If they turn down that requestor they don't want to connect,
and I mean that's just is whatit is.
But I've I've listened topeople on podcasts.
I have one example there wassomeone I was listening to on a
podcast, on a Marketing Opspodcast.
(41:11):
I mean I just reached out onLinkedIn, right, and I just
reached out and connected andhad wonderful conversations with
her.
Just because I reached out andI said you know, I heard what
you're talking about.
I see so many similarities inyour journey that are in mine.
How did you overcome those?
And I think most people arejust willing to help someone out
at those stages in their careerand share their own experiences
(41:34):
.
I mean, I know I'm more thanwilling to, if you know people,
when people reach out and havethose questions, I'm more than
willing to kind of share whatdid I do to kind of help me get
here.
And even within organizationI've always kind of participated
in mentorship programs.
So I'm working with a mentornow, working with Life Coach,
and even there it's a companybenefit to do career coaching.
(41:58):
So, and it's included and free.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
So if there's something out there, I am going
to take advantage of it and Imean, yeah, no, I think it's,
it's interesting and I'm a I'm abig fan of mentorship and
coaching, uh, whether it's amore informal or formal with you
know, compensation kind ofthing, um, and I know from my
own experience that it may.
(42:23):
Maybe this is what you did.
So when I've actively pursued,said I'd like this person to be
a mentor for me, I went into itwith um, trying to have a clear
idea of what I wanted out ofthat relationship.
And because invariably thesepeople want to know, like I, I
(42:45):
don't think I've ever hadanybody who said flat out, no, I
don't, I'm not interested.
But I, yeah, I think peoplewant to know like is like, what
do you want to get out of it?
How can I help?
So, I think, being clear aboutwhat it is you want from that,
if it's going to be an ongoingone, how like?
Even things like how often youwant to meet um, do you want to
talk about career coach, careerplans?
Do you want to talk aboutspecific issues?
(43:06):
Right, how to like?
There's different ways.
You can take advantage of that,um, and I think I'm with you,
right, um, it doesn't reallyhurt to reach out.
You may get a no I.
The other part I would say is,even when I've had somewhere
like, oh, this would work, I'vealso had a situation I call it
two different situations where,like, I had a initial
(43:27):
conversation with someone and Irealized I think we both
realized pretty quickly just notthe right fit, right like
personality wise or whatever.
It just wasn't, wasn't gonnawork, and that's okay.
The other one was those whereI've had relationships with is
men who are mentors for me.
Yeah, they kind of they have a,they do have a life right,
there's a beginning and an endand, uh, I recognized and made
(43:52):
the tough decision as much as Ivalued their, that relationship
in some cases.
Well, take one in particular.
I can think of who doescoaching that's paid.
Coaching happens to be.
A friend was doing that and Ialways felt like I was taking
away time for her to get herpaid clients and I just said I
(44:15):
don't think this is fair to you.
I'm not in a position where Iwant to be paying.
I think you should get paid.
Like, I still want to be ableto call you and I want us to
like have a good relationship.
I don't want you to feel likeyou're stuck with this and so
that's how we like, we stilllike talk to her three or four
months ago, right, and it's notlike it's an, it's the end and
(44:36):
it's just the sort of structuredpart of it is over yeah, I mean
I think that's to where I'vethe, the courses, the
documentation, the webinars.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
I mean they're always out there, right, and you can
always feel like I can learnmore, I can learn, but it does
get to a point where there'sonly so much I can learn, unless
there's something new out there.
Right, there's only so much Ican learn.
Now, how do I learn to takewhat I've learned and leverage
it even more and get to the nextlevel?
And that's where those coachesand those mentorships and those
(45:12):
kinds of relationships arecrucial for that.
So I think but I mean youraised some points they have a
life.
You have a life, but it's going.
In a way, you need to have aplan, a process, a start and a
finish as you're developingthose relationships, because you
know you can't fall into amental relationship where it's
kind of like OK, what are wedoing here, when does this
finish?
So I think you manage it, justlike you're managing, you know,
(45:35):
some of your other projects thatyou're working on have clear
goals.
What do we want to see at thestart and the finish of this and
what is, you know, how do wedefine success?
And then leaving that door openas a way out when you need to,
because all mental relationshipsare not going to work.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
No, and like your career, that person's career,
life, like they evolve, and soit's just a normal thing.
It was interesting.
I I will wrap it up here I meanI was just.
I was listening to or readingsomething just recently and I I
cannot, for the life of me,remember what it was, but it was
(46:13):
.
It was something that there'ssomething about our friendships
that changes when we kind of getin our early 20s.
Right, and one of the one ofthe.
There's a number of aspects andreasons why, but one of them is
, yeah, that just people comeand go out of our lives.
You know a lot more once youget into your, into your 20s,
(46:33):
and that holds true for thesekinds of relationships too.
Right, so it doesn't meanthey're gone forever, right,
there's still connections, andif you left, it did it well, I'm
sure that those people would behappy to help you again, and
that's really, I think, the keyis right.
Don't think about these thingsas they either have to be
forever or never, right, thoseare not.
(46:55):
You don't have to go to thoseextremes.
Speaker 2 (46:58):
Exactly, and you never know right, that person
ends up at a company.
They have an open role, they'rethinking of you, so you never
know.
I mean, that's just all part ofthe networking.
If you don't do it, if youdon't reach out, you make no
connections.
Speaker 1 (47:10):
Absolutely no, it's valuable, janelle.
I wish we had more time, butthis, I think, is going to be
really helpful for a lot of ourlisteners who have either
struggled thinking that theyhave to seriously just use only
paid, paid resources forlearning and how to think about
how to how to pitch them if theyare asking for support.
(47:30):
So thank you for that.
Appreciate it.
If folks want to connect withyou or want you to be a mentor,
you know, yeah, what's the bestway for them to connect with you
and kind of follow what you'retalking about.
Speaker 2 (47:42):
More than welcome to reach out on LinkedIn and
connect with me there, be happyto help in any way I can.
Speaker 1 (47:48):
Terrific.
I'm not even sure I should keepasking that question, because
that's always the answer.
Speaker 2 (47:52):
There's always an answer.
Speaker 1 (47:54):
Well, there's been a few exceptions, but again, thank
you, janelle.
This is great.
Thank you to our audience forcontinuing to support us.
If you have ideas for topics orguests, or you want to be a
guest, uh, feel free to reachout to naomi, mike or me uh,
either through linkedin orthrough the marketing ops
community, uh slack or whatever,and we'd be happy to talk to
(48:16):
you about it until next time.
Bye, everybody.
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