EP25 Melody Askari Navigating the Tech Industry as Chief Customer Officer

In this next episode #25 Ready to plunge into an ocean of insights from a tech industry trailblazer? We've got Melody Askari , the Chief Customer Officer at NIICO, sharing her wisdom and experiences navigating the tech world and beyond. From the importance of customer onboarding to advocating for the use of emerging technologies , in particular intelligence automation i , Melody's insights are a goldmine for anyone looking to understand the tech industry from behind the scenes and her career journey .

We don't stop at tech, though. We delve into the challenges  faced by women in the workplace, exposing the hidden biases and exploring the need for allies. Mel's personal journey reveals the relentless effort needed to prove one's worth, adding grit to the glamour of the tech world. We probe further into work-life balance, the importance of setting boundaries, and how tech can foster a healthier work-life equilibrium.

Wrapping up the episode, we unpack the significance of evolving social circles and the undeniable value of a strong support network for personal and professional growth. We highlight the power of sharing stories to inspire and empower women in the tech industry. Brace yourselves for an episode packed with compelling conversations, valuable lessons, and thought-provoking perspectives from a tech industry maven!

0:00 Intro
0:12 The role of a CCO in Technology
9:07  Culture, Language, and Technology Interaction
19:24 Legacy Tech and Intelligent Automation
24:43 Navigating the Professional Journey
35:07  Women's Workplace Challenges
48:00 Finding Work-Life Balance and Avoiding Burnout
54:39  The Importance of Evolving Social Circles
1:02:44  Trailblazers takeaways

Follow Melody Askari 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/melody-askari/

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Transcript

The trailblazers experience: 0:12

Welcome to another episode of the Trailblazers Experience podcast and I'm really excited today to have my next guest, melody Eskari. How are you? I'm really well, thank you. How are you? Good? Good, and I know you as Mel, so we'll just stick with that. Keep it casual, keep it cool. And Mel is a Chief Customer Officer at NICCO. She's an accomplished professional whose dynamic career lies in the intersection of education and technology. She works for NICO, which is an intelligent automation startup, where she's growing and leading a team of post sales function. Recently, she was a Director of Business and Digital Consulting at Eqantis, where she addresses the technology needs of the higher education sector. I mean, I can go on and on, but your CV is extremely impressive and congratulations on your promotion to CCO Chief Customer Officer. I think it's a great accomplishment sort of like stacks up your years of experience, but amazing. So if I was just asking layman terms, what do you actually do as a Chief Customer Officer?

Melody Askari : 1:27

Yeah, it's a really good question, so, and one that we all grapple with. Chief Customer Officer roles are relatively new in industry, so it is an evolving space. But fundamentally, me and my teams we look after all of the post sales functions. So, in the context that I work in, which is technology, once we have had a contract, so the customer signed on the dotted line, it basically gets handed over to my team and that's to make sure that our customers are onboarded properly so they understand what the next three, six, 12, two, 10 years looks like. We then work with them to implement the product.

Melody Askari : 2:12

So in my case, I work with the teams also sorry, my teams work with our clients to implement automation. We then provide the maintenance and the support and the education services in and around that and the customer success function, which is really an evolution of that sort of account management role, isn't it? And now it's an account management plus it's really about holding our clients hands and making sure that they are using our product as much as they can, you know, to make sure they're getting as much value out of it as they can. So it's a really interesting space to operate in, you know, and it works really closely with the sales function as well. You need to, and we've developed a really nice methodology here where we also interact with the sales piece. So we know what's coming, we understand what's being sold and the sales team are clear about what the onboarding and the implementation and the post sales piece looks like as well. So, yeah, it's a really, really interesting, engaging role to be in. I'm excited to continue growing those teams, you know.

The trailblazers experience: 3:15

Yeah, and you talked about automation and you know, once a product has been established and teaching the teams how to use it. What I've noticed a lot with a lot of the technology tools that are coming up in the market is there's a lot of the teams having to go through universities of how to use the tool, getting themselves to certain stages. So there's a lot of learning as you go. But, yeah, I think those first steps of having an organization such as yourself handhold in a way and say this is what you need to do, this is how it works, these are the flows, these are the things you need to be aware of.

The trailblazers experience: 3:51

I think is really important as well.

Melody Askari : 3:54

Yeah, for sure. I mean, it's an interesting area that we operate in because we're in sort of what we consider to be emerging technologies, we're in intelligent automation, and you know and I often joke but there was before chat GPT and then there was after chat GPT. One day we all woke up and suddenly this incredible technology was there supporting our day to day, our day to day lives. And yet the morning before we didn't eat, most of us didn't really even know it existed.

Melody Askari : 4:20

So our job, our role, our sort of professional role, is to take these emerging technologies as they become part of our, you know, apocryle lexicon and understanding, and then create user cases, create scenarios where actually you as a customer, you as an institutional, you as an organization can use that.

Melody Askari : 4:39

So how do we translate chat GPT into something usable and then help our clients and our customers to understand what that value is for them? And you know, and sometimes there are things that are not valuable and we think, well, actually, this is not the right tool for the job, and that's part of our, that's part of our role, both in the sales piece and in the customer, in the customer success piece, is to say, well, actually, I don't think this is great, but actually this technology would actually be a much better fit to solve the challenge that you're encountering at the moment. Yeah, but it's really interesting being at the edge of it. You know we learn, we are learning as everyone else is learning. You know a couple of steps ahead, but it's exciting and it keeps. It keeps the team, you know, on their toes a little bit, keeps me on my toes a little bit. The team are great, though.

The trailblazers experience: 5:25

Yeah, I think so, especially since we know I think one of the biggest things to talk to my teams in the e-commerce world is they're just saying if this can save us time and admin, anything we can automate to answer all those questions that we nagging C suite always ask isn't it.

The trailblazers experience: 5:42

They're just keeping our board meetings, looking at the pack and saying I think we need more information, and you go back to the teams. They're having to manually data mine and pull things together. But if we can, you know, automate as much as possible, then that just helps as well, and the AI is always learning. So I think that's that's the important thing. It's scary, but it's important as well to have that.

Melody Askari : 6:07

Yeah, I mean it's interesting because we work with a number of different sectors and they're at different levels of maturity in their understanding and use of intelligent automation. So you know, for example, in the HE sector, which is my background, we're really getting on with the sort of RPA piece which is exactly as you say. It's that making sure the data is being moved from one place to another, that we're automating operational processes, that they're done in 30 seconds and not 10 minutes, you know, or easing the pressure so we don't need to bring in temporary staff to do a particular activity. For example, enrollment activities at universities, you can imagine, are very condensed, very high intensity, high staff, you know activities. So if we can use an automation to lower that burden, then that means that those staff can maybe attend to those slightly more tricky, challenging situations. Or the students or the applicants who need a slightly different, more tailored approach to navigating their university experience. So there's lots of stuff and student value add. But actually then, as you say from the sort of C-suite you're like, well, why is it taking this long? We need to improve our numbers, we have a growth strategy, you know. Actually automation is such a great tool to help support those much bigger conversations about how do we grow, how do we maintain, how do we make sure that we, you know, put our stake in the ground as a organization or as an institution. So it's a really interesting tool in that sense.

Melody Askari : 7:36

And then, as you say, ai is always learning right. So we do a lot of sentiment analysis, we work with a lot of OCR readers and they learn, they learn and they're telling me you know what grade this essay should have. And they're saying, you know the AI is saying, do you agree? And you're sort of saying, yeah, I do. Actually, you know you're almost spot on.

Melody Askari : 7:58

What it isn't doing is doing it, you know, and then sending the grades out. But what it is doing is doing some of the heavy lifting for you and then allowing you to then make the decision. So you're still doing that sort of human in the loop piece. But it's just taking that, that really heavy lifting. You know you've got hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of assessments. Actually it's just churning through them, giving you a bit of a confidence rating on each one, and then you'll say, oh, yeah, yeah, I agree, I think this is exactly the right grade, or actually this needs a tweak. But then it learns, you know, and then the next time it's better and it's more clever. So it's really interesting technology. It is slightly terrifying, but it's really interesting.

The trailblazers experience: 8:35

Yeah. So now you I mean you've just explained an amazing role lots of scope, lots to do within your, your particular sector. So that's great. This job is not going away, this job role. Let's talk about your background, who is now and how this all started. You know, at what point did you then say this is actually a sector I'd love to get into? But also, who are you, where are you from? I know you're a bit, but you know, just for the audience.

Melody Askari : 9:05

So I'm a first generation Iranian. So my mum and dad you know they came from. They came over in the mid 70s to to study, as did a lot of Iranians in the mid 70s when, you know, movement between Iran and the world was open and safe and secular. But of course, when the revolution happened and for lots and lots of reasons, my parents didn't feel they're able to go home and actually, quite, you know, a lot of the diaspora have exactly the same experience and if you sort of, if you reach out there and look at my parents generation of Iranians, they would almost all have exactly the same story. You know that they they came to study but weren't able to go back. So in that sense, you know, it was an interesting, it was interesting growing up in that, in that sort of in that diaspora, there was a. There was always this fine line between treading your cultural, you know, engaging with your cultural heritage and it was something that the community really held on to because we didn't have an awful lot else, but also wanting to fit in because, of course, I was born in Huddersfield, I grew up in England. You know my, my schooling is English, my language, my second language is English and you know. So it was quite interesting. It was quite interesting sort of growing up period and language is really important here and I talk about language quite a lot when I talk about my, my history and also about how how you as a woman or minority woman or any woman in tech or anybody, into anybody who wants to get into technology, language is such an important thing to understand.

Melody Askari : 10:45

So when I sort of hit my teens and was heading into university, I didn't have the language for graduate. I didn't know what a graduate scheme was Like. I didn't understand what that was. I didn't understand terms like the big four. I didn't understand what it meant to be picked, you know, to go on to these schemes in one of those big four. I didn't. You know all of that sort of what we now understand to be a bit of a slipstream right, it's a bit of a slipstream to successful careers, lucrative careers, quite often important careers, perceived important careers. I didn't have that language. So you know, I sort of came out of university and I and I just got a job. I got the first job that I could that somebody would give me, and I did some more study and then I moved into education, into higher education really, because I lived in Milton Keynes and the open university at the time was a, was a massive employer and it just seemed like a logical. It was just a logical job. You know, a job opening I went for.

The trailblazers experience: 11:49

It ties in with the culture aspect as well. I can so relate, doesn't it Is get an education, get a job, build self-sufficient support, support the family, if you can.

Melody Askari : 11:58

basically, yeah, I mean, it was exactly that. You know, I, I very, very early on. You know it's like get a job. You don't have time to go for a gap year. Gap years are not for people like us. You don't have time to explore you, who you are, no time for this. You need a mortgage and you need a job, you know, and they both sort of happened really quickly in my very early twenties and there is that there is a lot of pressure there, you know, and then all the all the other pressures that come with not being.

Melody Askari : 12:27

You know that come with your sort of cultural heritage as well, and education was always such an important theme. It's almost, it was almost a bit, predestined that I would spend my entire life in and around education. In the end, I never quite escaped it, despite my best efforts. But the transition to technology was was lengthy, right, I mean, I don't have I don't have that beautiful career where I interned at Google and you know they got headhunted by Netflix or, you know, work for Spotify and got jet-setted around the around the world. That's not what my career trajectories look like. It's been, it's been hard and it's been slow and for lots of reasons that I'm sure we'll get into later about sort of challenges. It's, it's, you know, it's taking its time and at the time I was very impatient. I kept thinking I can do more than this. I need more than this. This is not, you know, this is not the end for me. This is just the beginning. Why isn't it going faster?

Melody Askari : 13:29

But actually, in hindsight, actually the time, the operational roles, the not so great pay, has put me in such good stead then for these roles, because I have been frontline staff for a very long time, I've managed frontline teams for a really long time. I've worked with all of the technologies that I now help to plug gaps in. I've worked with them all. So I know, I know what these technologies look and feel like and I know the burden that they incur in operational teams. So, actually, whilst the trajectory has not been fast and you know I'm talking 20 years in the making it couldn't have been any other way, I don't think, because I wouldn't have bought that level of depth of expertise and understanding about my very niche, admittedly sector to the table. So, yeah, it's been, it's been really interesting.

Melody Askari : 14:22

But language has been such a theme all the way through. I didn't have the language to understand what those grad schemes were. I didn't have the language of technology for a very long time and then, when I thrust into it, I had to learn that language really quickly, and then I didn't have the language to communicate with C-suite, let alone operate at C-suite. Every stage there is this there is this theme about learning the language that you are speaking, you know you need to understand what people are saying to you and you need to be able to articulate that back to your clients, to your peers, to your, to your leaders as well. So, yeah, it's been an interesting journey.

The trailblazers experience: 15:03

I'm just looking at your LinkedIn and all the things that you've done and 20 years girl, be proud of your achievements. I mean, you've had exactly what is known as lived experience. It feels like you've been solving lots of problems. So which is you know? In the technology sector, problem solving is a very big skill set to have. You talked about being thrust into the technology. At what point did you actually know? Oh, actually, this is what I'm doing. This is, this is actually where I'm now in that technology space.

The trailblazers experience: 15:33

At what point did that happen? Yeah, it's a good question.

Melody Askari : 15:41

So I had an opportunity to work with a private institution for a period of time and they just bought a piece of technology that they wanted somebody to implement somebody in the team to implement, you know and I sort of put my hand up and said, oh, I can do that, partly because I knew what that needed. I knew what that software needed to do Because in my previous roles I'd actually used those systems all the time. So I knew what that particular piece of software needed to do. But I've never had any sort of implementation experience at all.

The trailblazers experience: 16:11

And I think how to implement. You were on Google how to implement, how to project manage.

Melody Askari : 16:17

How do you feel Google frantically Google things at two in the morning? How do I, how do I always Template?

The trailblazers experience: 16:26

yeah, so how do I adapt this template to my current organization? That's the trailblazer tip number one. Yeah, exactly.

Melody Askari : 16:37

Google everything template. There are templates for everything out there. So, yeah, there was a lot of sort of frantic, frantic Googling, but I loved it. I found that actually what it did is it played to my key strengths, which was to problem solve, to find solutions. I had spent about 15, well, at least a decade being really frustrated with the software I was using. So here was my opportunity to build something that didn't have those challenges. I could apply my own frustrations to building this new product and then in that time I learned that actually I really liked working with people. I really liked solving problems. I really liked working with a product that could develop and morph and evolve and solve other people's pain points. I liked that. I liked being able to help other people go. Oh, I don't need to do that 67 point work around anymore because it just does it for me. That's amazing. So that's how I sort of realized oh, technology is where I want to go.

Melody Askari : 17:47

And then I had to find a job. I wasn't headhunted into a nice consultancy role. I wasn't asked to come in to do an advisory. I looked for a role that was working with a student information system in one of the big vendors. I applied and I went through an interview process. I often hear stories of people like, oh, and then I moved into. I'm like, well, how did you move into that? Did somebody just pick you up and like, how did you get there? I had to work really hard. I had, you know, I had injections and thanks but no thanks and got to the final stages and actually it was unit four that you know finally offered me a post. I fit their needs and they fit mine. So that's how I sort of transitioned over into technology. But it was, you know, a consultancy role. Again, it wasn't, I wasn't heading into anything super senior. Every step of the way it's been, you know, a real migration of real evolution of knowledge and learning.

The trailblazers experience: 18:51

And you talk a lot about the challenges or problems that are in higher education. So what are the biggest problems that you've having worked with various technology and the stresses around it? What are the biggest things that you've been trying to solve?

Melody Askari : 19:07

Yeah, it's really, I mean the last sort of you know, six, seven years. Really, the lens through which I've been working with HHE has been technology and digital and data. So there there's. There are the bits that are there, the bits that I sort of focus on. It's been an interesting time for HHE.

Melody Askari : 19:24

There has been a lot of and I suspect this is the same for lots of other sort of public private sector organizations, but there is a lot of legacy technologies, so a lot of technology that people bought in the mid 90s that was desktop base that has been very heavily customized to suit ever more protracted processes, you know, and ever more protracted data requirements. And you know that has caused problems when you want to migrate things to the cloud or you want to tidy things up. So all of that journey is really, really difficult. And then you think about the. You think about the layout of an institution where you might have a very devolved department set up, so each department has its own budget for technology and all of a sudden you have 16 instances of Salesforce, you know, all doing their own thing. You have no central source of data. You have no way to report on that data, you don't. It's really so then when you'll see sweet or your execs like can I just get a sense of progression across, you know, across all these different schools? Really hard to bring that information to life and even if you pull it out of what you think is a central source, the numbers are not right, you know. So it's really. It's that that sort of landscape is where we're working.

Melody Askari : 20:43

So a lot of institutions have embarked on very big transformation projects and again, this is not this is not restricted to higher education. Lots of, lots of organizations have had to embark on transformation programs. But it's hard to do that when you are also administering sometimes 30, 40,000 students in a live environment. You know, with the operational requirements that come with that and a growth strategy and the fact that you don't have enough stocks, you don't really pay market levels of salary. You know those sorts of challenges.

Melody Askari : 21:15

So, interestingly, one of the reasons NICO, the Intelligent Automation Arm, was born out of Iquantas, which is which was the sort of evolution of my job role and was to service that, was because actually lots of institutions don't have time or the money or the means to rip out their legacy technology and actually for the next three to five years they need something to help plug the gaps. They need something that takes data from here and puts it there or tidies that data up so they can do that regulatory return, or gives you a bit of an early indicator that your students are not doing so well so you can intervene. You know there's there's lots of that happening in the sort of intelligent automation space, so they can put into place those other bits to then do those big transformation programs a little bit later on.

The trailblazers experience: 22:04

So, yeah.

The trailblazers experience: 22:06

I always think about the Mac architecture that comes to mind. I wish so many businesses would, just, you know, go into that. And for those who don't know, you know Mac is a set of technology principles microservice based, api, cloud, native headless and I was talking to I was on an event where she's amazing, she works for Puma and she was talking about how they just embarked on a few years ago. We are just going to revolutionize and just improve future proof our technology. And it was really about they said we're going to just move to Mac headless and we're going to create the foundation that will allow us, to your point, to plug in, update seamlessly, knowing that it was going to take time, but it was a commitment that they just said. This is what we're going to do, it's part of our growth strategy.

The trailblazers experience: 23:02

And if you think about universities. I mean I did my distance learning and when I log on to the portal which is, I mean, bless them, it's the most, yeah, and nothing's really connected. And there's an app but it's not that great when you're searching. So I can imagine the admin side of them managing students and you know the facility is a lot going on. So the fact that a you've come out of this having lived through all the challenges, but I think you were also curious, mel. You're curious, like you said, about what. Why are we, you know, having to 60 ways to skin a cat when actually you know we could have a better way of doing it and make it, make life easier for everybody?

Melody Askari : 23:52

Definitely a thing is definitely a personality trait I'm very much passive, least resistance. Why would we do it this? Why is it so difficult, when we could just make it so much easier?

The trailblazers experience: 24:03

It's always about what's easy.

Melody Askari : 24:04

What's the easiest way to do this? Yeah, yeah.

The trailblazers experience: 24:10

Let's talk about achievements, because we need to be bigging you up on this podcast. I mean, you talked about, honestly, your path, because you said you know you didn't have the traditional path of. I know people as well have had that path become a management consultant and that suddenly has opened up the door to this or they applied to the big four or they did a gap. You're working at this company and it's. I've also had a similar path to yours. Well, it's about grass in the ranks, which I think we need to normalize. That's okay too. It's it's okay, and you can still get to where you're going if you're curious. It's hard working and might not want to do the sexy jobs at the beginning, but it will lead to them in the end.

The trailblazers experience: 24:51

Yeah, I think we need to get a generation that is. It's okay to start, you know, at the basis, and maybe you have to work in the city or the town where you went for that moment. Yeah, I think it's important.

Melody Askari : 25:05

Yeah, it's really hard and I think social media really exacerbates this idea, not only in terms of, like your, your professional career, but everybody on social media is a millionaire, everybody on social media is indeed by, everybody is Living their best lives and and actually, you know, that's a very, very small proportion of people, very tiny proportion of people, and it's a very tiny proportion of people who do have that slipstream or do have the connections or do have the family. Can you know the family member who owns a tech company or owns the construction company or whatever, and steps you in somewhere? Actually, for lots of people and you know, especially for women, especially for women who are not right, there are so many invisible barriers that I didn't recognize as I was migrating through my career. I didn't even, I didn't even know what to look out for. They're so, they're so ingrained into the fabric of business that you don't, you can't even recognize and when you do, it's blatantly obvious and it's shut down.

Melody Askari : 26:06

But that's rare actually. They're all these all micro moments where I probably should have been given a promotion, I probably should have been moved into another role or another and I just wasn't. And you don't recognize it. You don't recognize that that's what's going on, but the but most people's careers are like this. Most people I know about careers where they've just found a job after school, after university, and have grafted, and some of the careers are quicker and some of them are slower. But one of the things I think I've really learned is that you can't compare yourself to anybody else's journey. You can't because you don't know. You see what you see out there, what people put on their LinkedIn. I'm delighted to you know and I'll probably have a couple of more of those in my career delighted to say that I've got this job or that job, but actually, you know, you have no idea what's going on behind closed doors and what that journey actually looks like. So, yeah, it's definitely something that I'm very aware of is that normalizing the career pathway?

The trailblazers experience: 27:15

and did you find that in your early years? I so, for me, early years like your 20s and so on, where you, when you look back now, I feel like those years were all about establishing a resilience, consistency, hard work, being willing to learn, whatever job you're in, because those are the traits that you know when you get into a C-suit role or if you've suddenly moved into another sector. It's the transferable skills that they're looking for. You know they're not specifically saying well, in job X, y and Z, this is exactly what they're looking at transferable skills that can be, you know, used in other areas and that you build over time.

Melody Askari : 27:53

Yeah, absolutely. You know there was a period in my early mid-20s where actually I was just learning how to be an adult because I had a very sheltered upbringing that was, you know, culturally very different to the real world out here in the UK. So there was a period of time where I was just figuring out who I was. And you know, and some people know, that I mean we work you and I both know people that are in their early 20s and very much know who they are and very much know where they're going, and that's incredible. I was not one of those people. You know I had some work to do there, but you're right, professionally, what I spent my time doing there was learning those traits. I'm understanding what good management and good leadership look like, also because I had both good and bad managers and good and bad leaders. So you start to get a sense of oh, I really liked, I thrived under this methodology, but I really didn't enjoy being managed in this way, so I wouldn't do that to my team. So you learn that and you're right.

Melody Askari : 28:49

You also learn those other transferable skills and some of that language. Some of that's about then being able to communicate effectively, understanding what makes something good versus what makes something not so great. So there was lots of that in my 20s and then in my 30s and I'm sure you were the same. You know, you start to sharpen those skills a little bit and then you start to sort of hone in a little bit on your own interests and your own sort of skillset okay and you start to build on those and then you head, you know you sort of head on where it seems to those not later years of your career, the prime of your career, and you know, and hopefully you've got those two skills in your pocket, those two sort of sets of skills in your pocket, and then you're flying. Then you know that's been my experience really.

The trailblazers experience: 29:37

Yeah, big lesson for me was delegating and hiring people who are better than you. That was a game changer.

Melody Askari : 29:44

Oh, my God, I love that. I mean it was on my list. It's been on my list of. Like you know, my biggest lessons learned is my role as a leader is to empower, engage, facilitate, you know, safeguard, but enable my team, who are all gonna be experts in the area that I am not. My job is just to. I'm the grease in between, you know, but then it makes no difference.

The trailblazers experience: 30:09

D40, that's what you are.

Melody Askari : 30:11

No, I am literally the WD-40 for my team. So, you know, because I trust them, they're brilliant, like I've got amazing teams of developers that do some really complex, you know, build really complex automations and really challenging circumstances. Yeah, and I've business analysis who can take the most convoluted process and chop it down and, you know, break it down and go. This is what they're doing, this is what they should be doing and this is the automation we're gonna be. I mean, that's a skill set I don't have and I will happily tell them I don't have this, but I will make sure that you have the space to do this properly, you know, and if you have a problem, you come to me and we will figure out how to solve it together and that's my role in this context. You know, delegation is key, is key to this activity. Game changer, absolutely.

The trailblazers experience: 30:59

Talk to me about things that you're proud of professionally, your biggest achievements or achievement so far to date.

Melody Askari : 31:07

Yeah, I mean my entire career feels like a. I'm really proud of my entire career. Really, every single role that I was offered, every single role that I excelled in, even the challenges, even the not so great bits, were all learning experiences, and that was one of my other really big takeaways. All steps are forward. Even if the step feels like it's backward, it's still forward because what it does is it teaches you what you don't want or what you're not willing to tolerate. So you know, I'm sort of proud of my professional career.

Melody Askari : 31:46

I've made that sort of mythical, magical C-suite. You know, that sort of C-suite role I didn't think I would necessarily get here. You know, that wasn't ever an aim of mine. It wasn't something that I was ever told I could obtain as a woman or, you know, it was not something that was considered part of my career path. So in that sense I'm seeing that you know so, individually, in those areas I've also done great work. I've made great friends, I've delivered great projects. I've solved big problems. You know, I've created technology strategies entire institutions are now using to define the next sort of 10 years of their technology road maps. And that's amazing For someone who you know, whose English is a second language and took quite a while to find themselves and a career path.

Melody Askari : 32:40

I guess the third thing is really I'm proud of how resilient I am, because actually some of these roles are difficult and you will also have had experience in this right. There are roles and you just think, oh, this might break me. Actually, this is hard. But being able to put into place those measures to keep yourself safe, that is something that not everybody can do, or not everybody knows how to do so. Actually being able to do that, being able to say no stop, actually I'm quite proud of the fact that I can do those things, because it's not easy. It's not easy to go to your boss and say I'm struggling. It's not easy to go to somebody and say this is not acceptable, I'm not willing to accept this or I can't do this. That's the other thing. I'm quite proud of the fact that if I don't know how to do something, I don't know how to do this and I'll go find it Q-Frantic2AM, googling right or phoning a friend or asking people.

The trailblazers experience: 33:39

I thought it was a strength actually, yeah, it is.

Melody Askari : 33:42

All of these things are strengths. The narrative about sort of and I have a lot of very successful business friends and this narrative you know, success and being proud of your accomplishments is oh, I've closed out a million pound deal or we did this really big thing, or we've done this massive go-life. Actually, for me, the things I'm most proud of is my own growth, like that's it, because, if I think back to me at 50, I struggled at school, didn't have a great time. I struggled at university because, you know, I wasn't ready for university. I didn't really have any choice but to go. So the fact that I'm not here and the fact that I'm here, I'm not somewhere where I'm not allowed to leave the room, without you there's an accomplishment in itself.

Melody Askari : 34:33

There's an accomplishment in itself.

The trailblazers experience: 34:34

Yeah, let's talk to me about your challenges, because obviously you're a woman. You're a woman of Iranian heritage. Talk to me about some of the challenges you've experienced as a woman, and the reason why I think it's important for us to share that and be vulnerable is to inspire. You know some young girl out there, some lady out there, who's going through the same thing, and just to show you know what these things have happened and it's made me stronger. And you know we are here as well. We've had a lot of guests appear on the show and afterwards some people have contacted them personally DM to say I'd really like to talk to you because I relate and how did you go through this? So what challenges have you experienced as a woman? Because it makes it real.

Melody Askari : 35:22

Yeah, it's a really good and it's a question I pondered on quite a lot. I've touched on a few of these in short earlier, but certainly the unseen bias has been really difficult and that's it's a bit of an insidious one, because you can't see it, because you you know, and actually my young years I didn't even really know that it existed, because I've never been saying I'm not giving you this job because you're a woman, you're not the right skin colour. Nobody says that. People say, well, you don't have quite the right skills and I'm like why don't have, why don't I have the right skills?

The trailblazers experience: 35:53

Yeah, that's the word that they will use, and then also certain. Have you not noticed that, like you said, we know a lot of C-suite women and we're suddenly now going into rooms that I didn't even know existed, or invited to meetings that we didn't know existed? And the one thing I noticed when I'm in that room, I am the only person who looks like me and I sort of think but where are the others? Where is Mel in this conversation?

Melody Askari : 36:20

Where is?

The trailblazers experience: 36:20

so-and-so in this conversation, but I didn't even know that such things existed.

Melody Askari : 36:26

Again, it's like I mean. I say language, it's a very broad thing, but this language of business you don't know, you know.

The trailblazers experience: 36:33

Yes, but they don't teach you.

Melody Askari : 36:34

Yeah, no, they don't teach you. You know, and I didn't know it existed until actually, you know, I was given an opportunity to step into a bit of a chief of staff role at Uniform just for a very small period of time and then suddenly I was thrust as an observer really, into this entire tier of business life that I just, you know people talk about the private smoking rooms and the private farms and the private jets and the oh, with me in a you know Jennifer Lopez's house to talk business, you know that sort of cause she's hiring out. I don't know, I have, no, I can't, I don't access that stuff you know, it's incredible and that's where the reason why we're mentioning it.

The trailblazers experience: 37:17

It's not because we're saying we want to get into Jennifer Lopez's house. I mean that would be nice, that would be nice. The reason why we're saying it is because those are where the decisions are being made about which women are going to be potentially put into certain roles which, unfortunately, just by sending your job application, you are not going to get into those roles. It's just a fact.

Melody Askari : 37:39

Exactly, you know, and that's a real challenge which leads me to my sort of second. You know that second thing is I didn't always have someone to advocate for me and I know I'm quite senior now but I still need someone to. You know, and I advocate for anybody that's in my team or anybody that's in my peer group or my mates, whatever. You know, I'll be your fiercest defender and I will go out there on the front line. But I didn't always have an ally and sometimes I had the active opposite. You know, and that's a real big challenge to navigate. It's easier as you get older. I think you're better at knowing what you will and won't tolerate, and then you're braver at speaking out and going this is inappropriate, I'm not willing to deal with this, so get it sorted. But actually in my 20s I didn't feel strong enough to say actually this is inappropriate or, you know, this is not working for me. Nobody's advocating for me in this space, so I'm on my own here in this relatively little, junior, disempowered position. So that was definitely something that I grappled with it. But interestingly that has informed how I lead very much, because I didn't have that consistently. I make sure that my team always feel like I am there as an ally. You know that I am there as that, I am their professional person. If there is any problem, any issue, there is a proper open door policy. You know, and they do, they do. They come to me and they tell me this or they tell me that, or they tell me there's a professional problem or there's a personal thing going on. You know that stuff, that stuff is so important.

Melody Askari : 39:17

I guess the third thing was really around. Well, a couple of things actually, and I don't know if you experienced this. I feel like I spend and actually to a point, to an extent now, I feel like I have to work twice as hard to prove my worth. And then there is an expectation that the level of output is just my work output and not the fact that I'm just working myself half to death. So there was this. Do you know what I mean? I saw other people not working as hard and getting ahead and me working doubly as hard, and then they're like oh, you're too valuable in the role that you are. You know, you're too good at what you do. I'm not going to let you be promoted or let you move on, and I don't think I ever found a solution. I don't think I found a solution to that challenge. Really, I don't know if your experience has been the same. If you found any way to sort of navigate it, I'd love to know.

The trailblazers experience: 40:13

Yeah, I mean, god, I wish I had the magic bullet, but it is relatable because I'm the oldest of eight and we are in total six girls, two boys, and my mom and my dad always said they just broke it out, really, because they've grown up in the age of colonialism, segregation. You know, there's a point when my dad was growing up where he couldn't go into certain parts of it was Rhodesia at the time, or you had to have a pass and things like that. Then that transitioned and they moved to Germany because of the education. They got a scholarship to go there. They were one of the first people of color to go there, so you were treated differently in a way. But once people get to know you in Germany, they're very lovely people as well and then it's all fine. But there's always that small minority who doesn't understand that it's just the color, it's just a different culture, but we're a whole human. But he said one thing, he always said so as a woman and as a woman of color, you're going to have to work twice as hard, three times as hard, to get as far. And you know, you just think oh, dad, you're just saying that, you know I'm fine, but you notice it. You know, I've sat in front of panels for interviews where everyone in front of me was a white male and you sort of think, wow, the bias is already there.

The trailblazers experience: 41:30

There used to be a time where questions would be asked about so what are your, your, your plans for family? Why is that important? When I had my first child and second child, I knew already I was going to be disadvantaged in terms of career progression because they'll be thinking oh well, she, you know, she's got other priorities. And you sort of think but I'm working. You know, I was the one working on the weekends, when the kids were asleep, because I thought that's the only time I could finish the projects and in the morning it would be done. And you're not rewarded for that, it's just oh, you're so hardworking, you're so valuable, exactly, yeah. And now I think the.

The trailblazers experience: 42:08

The turning point for me was a few years ago to say, actually, if I'm not valued, I should go. Yes, that's hard, yes, and I've only learned that in the last 10 years. To say, actually, if I'm not valued, I know my skillset, I know I can offer it, then I need to go to a place where I am. And if that means moving, changing them the job or the role, then maybe that's what I need to do, but that is. It's a very difficult transition because, as a woman where you know it's a good quality to have we're multitaskers, but we're also nurturers, we're also thinking of security, whereas probably our counterparts males are just. I speak to lots of guys who are like why are you wasting time here? Just go. How do you think that way?

Melody Askari : 42:54

Okay, I'll just spend one. I love that you don't have the opportunities. It's not like I've got 67,000 offers in my inbox. Yes, this is it.

The trailblazers experience: 43:04

Jennifer Lopez, like it's not. Like, yeah, we don't have a black book of connections because we didn't go to those universities. This is also another thing. If you don't have that, you can't just pick up and go. It needs to be very strategic and to your point about You're not allowed to go anywhere.

Melody Askari : 43:20

So I mean I'm not supposed to just go. I had this load. I'll just leave. Yeah, I'll just leave it where.

The trailblazers experience: 43:29

No, it's not easy at all. But, like you said, I think we then now need to help our sisters, or our brothers, coming up and say right, I am going to be very clear with you in my organization is very small and I have an amazing team and a lot of them are young and want career progression. Yes, but I've always had that open conversation with them to say this team is not suddenly going to grow, but what we can do is we can empower you, we can inspire you, we can allow you to. We won't micromanage you. I don't micromanage. Yeah, empower you to make decisions, give feedback, because these are skills that when you decide to spread your wings, they will help you elsewhere. And if that's one thing I can give a 20-year-old or 25-year-old along the way, they don't know it now, but in five or 10 years' time they will appreciate it, yeah, yeah. And to your point, it's good that we're talking about these things, because I'm sure that they're still happening now.

Melody Askari : 44:30

Oh, absolutely I'm sure that they are absolutely happening. I mean, we're growing. I'm growing my post-sales function teams and I speak with lots of women who have done some incredible things and I'm like, where are you getting the time to do all this? And they're like, well, I'm just making time for it. And then I speak about salary expectations and they tell me what salaries they're on and I'm horrified because I just think somebody is taking you for a ride. And it's so systemic and it's so endemic and it's so inherent in our business culture that nobody bats an eyelid. And it's a challenge really that I think I work really hard to make sure I address my team that you don't work twice as hard. You work just as hard. We all work hard. We all have a work-life balance. If something doesn't get done, let's have a conversation, let's figure out when we can do it. My job is to help facilitate that and make sure that that happens. And if I need to smooth some other stuff off with our clients or whatever, then that's my job.

The trailblazers experience: 45:41

And this is why representation matters. So you being in that role is already opening for you to build a team that is all about character, attitude, resilience. You're looking at people at first face value. You're very open. I think that is the reason why we need more representation in the roles itself.

Melody Askari : 46:01

Yeah, definitely, it's really important.

Melody Askari : 46:04

I wish that I'd had not if I'm saying I'm the be all and end all, but I wish I'd had somebody like me maybe six, seven years earlier. That might have helped me to do something, maneuver maybe slightly more quickly or in a slightly different way or with slightly less work the amount of work that I needed to put in to get here. So it's really important to me that, as I build my teams, I'm building a team that is representative, is diverse, is based on character, and that my job is to make sure that they come away from this role, because these roles are not for life. These roles are for two, three years, especially for the younger generations that they leave this role thinking oh, melody was a good leader, she looked out for me as a leader and she helped me to grow and because of that, I now have this other skill set that I can now take away and develop with, and that's really important to me, and I spend quite a lot of my time doing that making sure that those structures are in place.

The trailblazers experience: 47:17

That's amazing, Melody. Let's talk about work-life balance, self-care, because those are like buzzwords now, and buzzwords in a good way. Health and well-being is being embedded into a lot of businesses and cultures. What does that mean to you and how do you find the time for yourself? Because I think it's also good for us to showcase that there's no one-size-fits-all. Whatever stage you are in your life, that balance may look different or there may be no balance at that time.

Melody Askari : 47:52

Yeah, exactly that looks like for you. Yeah, that's a really interesting question. I've been doing quite a bit of work on this in the last two or three years. There have been periods of time in my career where there has been just no work-life balance, right. There has been too much to do, not enough people to do it and external deadlines, and it's like anything. That's the reality and that's the reality of the situation. So in those circumstances, I think the resilience piece we spoke about earlier is what gets you through that, and you always make a deal with yourself. If you just do this and get this out the door in some draft form, like, if nothing else, then you can have a. Then actually we'll take a week off or we'll take a break. We'll do something else that is much less stressful.

Melody Askari : 48:44

So there have been quite prolonged periods of time where I've been under quite a bit of pressure and I think, more recently, and because I don't want to return to that, I have put in place other, much harder stops. And again, I think this comes with age, I think it comes with experience, I think I'm lucky that I'm in a senior enough role where I can dictate my own hours a little bit, because there is an expectation that I'm always on call. I'm always a chief customer officer, I'm always here. But equally there's an expectation that I will be offline, maybe at half five, six because I've gone to the gym, but then I might need to come back on when I come back. But I've really tried to put into place those and they're stops. They're like work, your work days whatever half seven, eight in the morning till half five, six and that's it Stop.

Melody Askari : 49:48

Nothing good comes of frantically working every night Nothing good, unless it's a condensed project. Prolonged stress like that is detrimental to your work, is detrimental to you. It doesn't produce good results at all. Then who benefits from it? Nobody. And then you experience burnout and I've been there a couple of times. It's not pleasant and it's a long old slog back to normality. If you allow yourself to get into that cycle of I don't have time to take a walk, I don't have time to eat my lunch, I don't have time for breakfast. Today I really need the lube. I don't have time to go to the bathroom next door. It's not great. And you do that for a few months but it actually takes you a year to recover from it. It's not worth it. The trade-off is not worth it, yeah.

The trailblazers experience: 50:42

There was a McKenzie report that said employees now have the unique opportunity to move the needle on burnout and explore ways to help workers struggling with mental health, because ultimately, if you've got a workforce that is constantly running on empty, well, they will then move into alcohol, drugs, overeating, obesity, problems in their marriage, in their families and ultimately that's what results in the beyond and end all, which is death. So, creating an environment where this is why technology is really good and it just circles back to your role about automations and making life easier, that will just take away maybe a lot of the stresses. Of course, there's always crunch time in businesses, whether it's deadlines. There's crunch time in hospitals, where there are more surgeries and more cases. That is always going to be there.

The trailblazers experience: 51:38

I think where I sometimes struggle is with this myth that there's a generation that thinks there's only the four I said the four-hour day or there's this oh, I wake up and I do my exercise and then I only work for a few hours. I think we're still living in a world where there is the third world that is not developed, but people still have to wake up at 4 AM and go and sell in the market fetch water the country where I come from, a lot of people are entrepreneurs by choice, because they're lots of graduates but they're no jobs. So you're forced to be a hustler, and hustling means from morning to evening you're thinking about where your next paycheck is coming from.

The trailblazers experience: 52:22

So it's just like you said, finding those moments. I think self-care and health and wellbeing means just treating people with dignity as human beings, yeah, and as an employee At a basic level.

Melody Askari : 52:35

Yeah, absolutely. And as an employer and as somebody that has sat in fairly senior roles over the last five, six years, again, my job is to make sure that we have those things in place so that when my team is struggling, they've got a personal commitment. They're just knackered because we've done it or we haven't done something big, because life is exhausting. Life happens, basically, life happens Tiring, and I've definitely woken up some days and gone. I am really tired. I've got no real reasons. It's not like I've had a late night or particularly stressful week, but I'm just exhausted.

Melody Askari : 53:13

Giving people the freedom to wax and wane with that so that they can then work to their strengths. So it's such an important element of business resilience. If you burn your team out, they leave and then you have no team and then you have even more pressure because the people you bring on are undoubtedly loaded. So it's selfish, it's savvy business sense to make sure your team are taken care of and that you are taken care of as well, that you also take care of yourself. And I also do think that as you get older, your tolerance for those long late nights and it's a little bit of that working twice as hard for half the rule You're a bit like no, actually I've done that, I don't need to do that anymore as well.

The trailblazers experience: 54:08

So that's always helpful. Talk to me about your circle. How important is your circle to you? Your relationships, Obviously. I've met you through our gym, a lovely crossfit gym Shout out to gym club. It's interesting, isn't it, how building those external relationships are really important. Talk to me about your close circle and what drives you.

Melody Askari : 54:35

Yeah, it's really good question. Your circles change, don't they? I mean, the circle that I had in my twenties is not the circle that I have now. Some of them have come with me and loosely they're still there, but my inner team, my champions, my cheerleaders, my therapists, my shoulders, to cry on my Fidemi Tequila on a Friday all of those people it's not an understatement.

Melody Askari : 55:09

So they've probably saved my life on occasion over the last 10 years and equally me with them. I am lucky that I have a circle of very high powered women in very senior jobs doing very similar activities to me, who are also working long lay hours. Sometimes you're also a bit overwhelmed with what's going on and, frankly, sometimes we're all winging it and we just need to tell someone that we don't know what we're doing and we're winging it, and for someone to go, it's all right, I'm winging it as well. That late night Google thing isn't it. But having that circle is a game changer and there are different variations of the circle. But having those people around you is your comfort, is your padding, is the way that you make sure that you don't go insane, because it's a very lonely place when you're in these positions.

Melody Askari : 56:06

I find the higher up the hierarchy is you know the perceived hierarchy. I mean, we're all roll your sleeves up, get the job done at the end of the day. But the higher up the perceived hierarchy, the less camaraderie you have with your colleagues. I think you operate with different people who don't have time to gossip, who don't have time to decompress at the end of every day who don't have time to dissect and you know, call other than a really quick debrief or whatever. So you rely, then on your extended circle to fill that for you.

Melody Askari : 56:45

And it's interesting as you get older I found that it's more difficult to find friends to bring into that circle. So my friends tend to be that circle is their older friends. I've bought along with me, but I have accrued people from work, people that I've worked with over the years that have been fun, that have been allies, that have been confident that, that I still talk to every day and still go to with a challenge. You know, and I might not tell them my innermost personal secrets, but I will almost certainly call them if I have a professional problem or challenge that I need to navigate, you know. So they do. They serve different purposes, so different purposes like you said.

The trailblazers experience: 57:28

Yeah, I think that's it Having those. You need those sprinkles to go out for drinks with. You need those sprinkles to talk about your you know personal relationship issues. You need those sprinkles to say this is just, I had that meeting, have you had that experience as well? And that shows you know growth as well, that you are able to. They say look at your circle and it tells you a lot about you.

The trailblazers experience: 57:51

So if you got a lot of fools in your circle. You need to change that circle. So it's it's important to say that that it's not going to be the same that it's. It's going to be the same as the circle of all.

Melody Askari : 58:00

Yeah, it is about you know, and I am I'm sure you've had similar experiences. You know, you work with people or you encounter people and you look at their people and you think, oh, actually, your value, none of your values align with mine. This is not a circle that I want to be involved with, except that in a professional context I need, I need or need to be, and there's a few and far between, but it does happen. But I think that's that's a sign of growth, isn't it? And that's a sign of understanding who you are, what your values are, where you're more, where your moral guidance, your moral compasses, and then you apply that both professionally and personally. You can say, well, actually, this you guys don't really align with me, so I'll deal with you because I need to, but actually I have no interest in in collecting you as one of my it's one of my very many circles.

The trailblazers experience: 58:47

Yeah, whereas other people. What are your values, mel? What are your values? And yeah, really, good question.

Melody Askari : 58:56

Yeah, values, I mean. I think integrity is probably probably one of my biggest values. I I work with integrity. I think I administer my friendships with integrity. You know it's really key I do in my experience. If you don't work with that as a foundation, it's fail. You know, if you don't have integrity, it just it's not successful. And that could be a business transaction, it could be a personal friendship or a professional friendship. If you're not, you know, if you're not acting with integrity.

Melody Askari : 59:38

I think the second one is honesty. So I'm a real big believer in transparency. I don't believe in keeping secrets. You know, if something's not going great at work, it's better to get the team around the table and say not going great? What can we do to solve the challenge? You know more head to the bed than me by myself worrying about it. So honesty in that sort of professional context, for sure, I think they're probably my team. You know I have other sort of core, core things about making sure that I'm always sort of good natured and the sense of humor, the things that you put on. Not that I've ever had a Tinder profile, but the Tinder profile things. You know they're always there. I've never done your character, basically.

Melody Askari : 1:00:34

Exactly, exactly. What are you, what are your sort of core values?

The trailblazers experience: 1:00:39

Yeah, it's interesting, I think they've like evolved over over, over time. I think for me, definitely, integrity, honesty, loyalty yeah, I think over time, perseverance, perseverance and just showing up yeah, this has been a very big one for me and I think also being true to myself is a very big one. That's just come up with, just being being 42. I'm just. I think that really matters because I always think if I'm lying on my deathbed today, will I be thinking about these things that were bothering me this morning, and if it's not worth it, then I need to find a way to do things that add value to me as well as a person you know.

Melody Askari : 1:01:24

That's a really interesting one.

Melody Askari : 1:01:25

And actually, you know, we're similar ages and I've also been grappling with that sort of same thing. I'm not grappling with my own mortality, but that's sort of what is important, what are the important things? And then if it's not important, and then so? Then if it doesn't make the shortlist, then why am I worried about it? Sometimes work does come into that. You know, I want to make sure that we do a great job and I work very hard for both my team and our customers and our clients and our growth story and the company's you know well being in success and I will worry about it to an extent.

Melody Askari : 1:02:02

But in previous iterations of my career I've spent nights up worrying about it and I've led it make me anxious and I've led it ruin my appetite unbelievably. Like it takes so much for it to be anything to ruin my appetite, you know. But actually as I sort of move through the years, I'm a bit like, well, that's not, it's not worth it, because actually the worry is obsolete, it doesn't solve. It doesn't actually solve the problem. All it does is make you more tired and less able to tackle the issue, you know, and sometimes it's out of your hands, right? Sometimes you're worrying about something, you know I can't do it, you can't control.

The trailblazers experience: 1:02:40

Yeah, there'll be a lot of instances, I think, where whether it's personal and personal, the trying ones, especially when you have kids you, their situations, you cannot control. And that's the biggest learning you're like, yeah, you're like, oh, my God, what a lesson here that I need to learn. And sometimes you just have to let go and let the situation unfold and see what happens. But, yeah, a big one there. Trailblazer takeaways We've talked about a lot of things we've inspired. I think we've probably allowed people to question the situation we're in. But if there were three or four things you'd love to share as a takeaway tip For something that's media out there, what would it be?

Melody Askari : 1:03:21

Yeah. So again, I've been thinking about this a little bit. So I once had this really lovely phrase that said radical change requires radical action. And I loved it because for me I could apply that to full scale revolution. Or I could apply it to the micro, which was actually advocate for yourself and ask for the pay rise, because if you don't, they're not going to give it. You know they're not going to give it to you.

Melody Askari : 1:03:50

Pitch your idea to the people around you, to the investors. You know that's your radical change. If you want that radical change, if you want the pay rise, if you want the promotion, if you want the set up your own business, you have to do that radical action. And that radical action doesn't mean, you know, staging a coup. It might mean I don't ever advocate that, just so we're clear before we broadcast this out to the world. But that radical action is your version of radical action, whatever that is. So that's that you know, and I think about that a lot when I'm arming and arming about something that feels uncomfortable to me and like but if you want this change, you have to do this thing, and if you do it and it doesn't get you to where you want to be. At least that's an answer. So then it's a step forward and then you can adjust or evolve or change tact or, you know, take a left turn instead of a right. So that was my first, or first one. My second one and we've talked about this just shortly before is about finding your people so there can be inside your organization, so your professional internal allies, the people that are going to champion you, advocate for you, sometimes protect you, because that's just the nature of business. And they're also your personal, your personal people. They're the people that you know, when you're having a tough day, that you can help decompress. You know they can help you decompress or take your mind off things or give you advice. You know, find them, find them and use them and keep them, keep them close to you. They're so important.

Melody Askari : 1:05:24

The third thing was about not compromising your values for your money or for your job, because it's just, it's not worth it, because what you will end up doing is it will jar. The two things will jar against each other every day like tectonic plates. You know you'll never quite be at ease. And people really do go in for the pursuit of money and job titles. You know they really do, and I'm probably guilty of that a little bit as well. But it means sometimes you compromise your sort of moral, your morals and your values, and that's not a great. It's not sustainable. It's not a sustainable place to be.

Melody Askari : 1:06:04

And then the last one, and we talked about this earlier right, don't compare yourself to other people's journeys. It's yours. It's yours, it's your path. It's such a we're such here for such a fleeting time. If you spend your time worrying about what other people are accomplishing, achieving, it's just disheartening, because there's always somebody better than you. There's always somebody who's younger, who's done more. We have no idea how they've got there. You don't know if their parents own the company that they're working for, or you know their godparent is a A-list celebrity. You have no idea. So you know, don't compare yourself. It's just it's you, it's your journey, you do you.

The trailblazers experience: 1:06:44

I think is probably my final takeaway, and that's a very good one to end on, because that is the whole purpose of the podcast to showcase people and their journeys, women especially. Everyone's journey is different. I think it's been eye-opening. I mean, the fact that you are now in the technology sector, having had a different career path, but you're passionate about problem solving, about teams. Making change is really what has got you to where you are. So, melody, thank you so much for being a part of this podcast, where we hope to inspire young women out there, and I've learned a lot, and I need to go back to my drawing board and say, oh, thank you so much for having me.

Melody Askari : 1:07:31

It's always lovely, isn't it, to talk about these things, and I think it's really great that you're doing this because, again, I didn't have this was not available to me growing up. I didn't hear women who are not white, who are Iranian, like moving through their careers in the way that I have and or in their careers in any way, actually, because podcast, you know, none of that stuff really existed. So it's really nice. I think it's a really valuable thing that you're putting this out there, right, so women can find it and men anybody who is here is embarking on their career journey. So thank you so much for having me. It's been really fun, brilliant.

The trailblazers experience: 1:08:10

So, melody, this has been the Trailblazers Experience podcast for everyone listening. Please remember to tell another woman about the podcast, to subscribe, like, share, follow. We can only bring amazing women guests on here If we continue to tell other. You know, word of mouth is a thing, it's still a thing and looking forward to you commenting and you can DM us if you have any further questions, et cetera. We're here to empower, to inspire. Thank you, 232 00.00.