Me? Presenting for AWS Startups?😲
Preparing to speak to executives on the topic of Global Expansion
From Teaching Middle Schoolers to Chatting with CEOs
Last week as I was preparing to speak in front a room full of CEO’s for an AWS Start Up sponsored event — it dawned on me how crazy it was that I was about to do another speech in front of a large room full of smart and talented founders and executives. That goes doubly so considering not too long ago I was using puppets and stickers to teach English to pre-school and kindergartner kids in China from my room in Vancouver, Washington. And before that, I was trying to make reading literature fun to a group of middle school Korean students by making my own D&D style campaign for them. And even before that, I was teaching debate to maritime university cadets in China.
Which is all really to say that 10 years ago, I couldn’t have come close to predicting where I am today and what I’m doing now. I went from standing in front of rooms full of students — to presenting on stages to founders and executives. Call it imposter syndrome, but I found the whole prospect of getting on the stage a bit intimidating to say the least, because for most of my professional career, I was teaching — not delivering my own insights or stories.
So, when I was asked to speak for an AWS Start up event about Channel.io’s efforts to go global (and the part that I have to play in that), it isn’t surprising that I latched onto something that I felt fairly comfortable talking about: cooking. Hence, the decision to title my talk, “Customer Driven: A Global Recipe.”
The meaning behind the use of the word “recipe”
As somewhat of a self described “home cook” — I’m not ashamed to say that I rely heavily on recipes. It’s not until I read a recipe, try it out for myself, practice it again and again — that I feel comfortable attempting to cook that dish again without a recipe. However, usually — once I get the gist of it, I can start to iterate on that and make it work my way. It’s one of the great reasons that I love to cook — you have a goal, you follow some steps, you taste, adjust, and after a few failures, you (usually) get close to what you were hoping for, and sometimes you end up with a positive surprise you may not have expected, a new finding. Despite what some people say, (unlike baking) I don’t find (home) cooking to be a science and there are definitely multiple ways to cook an egg.
In that same sense, Channel.io and I are still in the middle of perfecting our recipe — it’s being tasted and tested, and we’re confident with the results, but your mileage may vary and just know what what works for us, might not be to your liking or taste. That being said, cooking often tells a story and I wanted to tell not just the “ingredients” of being Customer Driven, but also the story — and my story as well.
The process of thinking about our “recipe”, preparing for the speaking event, and actually performing it was a great opportunity for me to really sit back and think about my job, what I’m doing with the US team, and how the whole process has been so far.
My personal big finding? Not only does it take a lot of work to go global — but as one of the troops with boots on the ground, I didn’t realize how large a part alignment plays in executing our expansion strategy.
For the Channel.io team and myself, following the the “North Star” of being Customer Driven has really been paramount to knowing where we are going, why we’re going that way, and how we get there — regardless of geography.
Mise en place
I don’t speak a lick of French (minus what I learned from Dexter’s Lab), but I do know about the concept of mise en place — from watching a lot of cooking shows. For those not in the know, with a little help from Spruce Eats and the Michelin Guide, here are the basics: boiled down.
Mise en place essentially refers to having everything “in its place”. In a cooking situation, it can refer to having everything necessary ready to prepare a dish — but the goal is to be organized and focused before starting something, so that the end result is smoother and with less surprises.
In my case, what mise en place meant for speaking to AWS was to really dig deep and understand not just what I wanted to say — but to consider to whom I was speaking, why they would care, what are they going to get out of it. In itself, I ended up relying on a “customer driven” way of preparing for the speech as I gathered the appropriate anecdotes, stories, and lessons to deliver to the audience.
After 2 weeks of preparing, presenting to my co-workers & CEO, timing myself and trimming all the fat — what I came up with is something uniquely my own. One thing that I came away from after previously speaking at a similar engagement, was that no matter how good the story or lesson is — if I’m always telling someone else’s story, I’ll never be able to truly express myself in my own way — because it’s not my own experience. Rather than try to tell Josh & Red’s experience building Channel.io — I focused on trying to explain what my thoughts, feelings, and findings were as an American team member of a Korean company expanding back into the US.
I also realized that my perspective was unique, considering that unlike the other two guest speakers who are C-level co-founders of inspiring Korean start ups (CLASSUM and SMORE), I am just a regular employee. Therefore, I wanted to highlight a portion of going global that I didn’t think would be as publicly talked about — regarding the culture, team building, and strategy necessary to get others to execute the difficult and uphill battle of global expansion.
Founders have obvious more skin in the game, so sacrificing evenings, weekends, and sleep are almost part of the job description (because the pay off can also be very sweet), but to get a “run-of-the-mill” employee to do those things (and their blood, sweat, and tears are almost guaranteed necessities if you want to go global), is no small feat — and that’s what I decided to base my speech around.
You can read the contents of the speech and my final thoughts in part two of this post.
Seoul based, Pacific NW raised. US Sales @ Channel.io | Writes about Customer Experience, Authentic Communication, B2B SaaS, working at Channel.io, Life in Korea, and occasionally about TV and Movies.
