Meg Brennan has over 20 years of experience driving strategy and operations for top technology companies. She shared her unique perspective on leadership combining strategic thinking, operational excellence, and a passion for developing people.
Meg described her zig-zag career path starting in sales and working across various functions like enablement, product management, and partner marketing. A key moment was joining Riverbed as Director of Operations where she had excellent managers who saw her potential and provided opportunities to develop into a VP.
Having an executive coach helped Meg shift from being a manager focused on control to being a true leader. Her coach taught her to "step into the gap" in conversations by defining the problem and solution without taking on all the work. This helped Meg learn to think bigger about the company instead of just her own team's needs.
As an introvert, Meg gains energy from small groups and data analysis. She had to learn the confidence to make faster decisions. Meg believes leaders need both visionary extroverts and data-driven introverts to make thoughtful choices. Extroverts provide inspiration while introverts supply helpful analysis.
Meg champions bringing more women into technology even though it can be lonely as a woman leader in tech. Men need to help by taking on diversity work, checking biases, and proactively mentoring women. Meg remains optimistic that even small actions by "good guys" can drive change.
Providing clarity, through constant communication on priorities, is vital to empower teams. Eliminating conflicting goals lets people align to a shared mission. Meg emphasizes the importance of hiring different thinkers and not just people like yourself. Diversity of thought leads to better ideas and solutions.
The name of the book I could not remember during the recording is Move Fast and Fix Things
Meg recommended Quiet: The Power Of Introverts and Multipliers
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