When They Go Low, We Go High
Based on an episode with Lígia Francisco 🇧🇷🏳️🌈
Welcome to Latinx in Power, a podcast aiming to help to demystify tech, the way we do that is by interviewing Latinx and Caribbean leaders all over the world to hear their perspective and insights.
We talked with Lígia Francisco (she/her) who holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Linguistics, as well as a BA in Portuguese language and literature. With fluency in Portuguese, French, Spanish, and English, she has lived in four different countries. Additionally, Ligia is an accomplished visual artist and photographer. Currently, she works as a Web Manager at DocuSign.
In this episode we’ll talk more about Ligia’s experiences and journey abroad, as well as her proudest achievements, and advice for Latinx individuals seeking their first job in the US. Ligia will also share her perspective on hope and unsolved issues.
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What are you most proud of?
There are many things in my life that I’m proud of. So, for example, some of my achievements. However, I think what I’m most proud of is that I’ve never made an effort to fit in. My part has always been in the opposite direction, to stay true to myself. That’s not exactly an achievement, but I think being very focused on my core values brings a lot of positive results in my life. For example, I’m very curious. I’m always studying. That’s something that I think it’s super difficult to do nowadays, especially here in the US, where education is so expensive.
I’m always studying, trying to learn new things, getting new certifications, and learning about things that are not exactly work-related as well. I think it all ends up making sense, and different skills come on very handy in my professional life as well. Another example is that I’m very focused on kindness and staying like a human being, because I think we’re very forced to be robotic. Never showing our feelings, never showing our vulnerabilities. There are a lot of environments where being kind can be seen as a weakness when it’s actually exactly the opposite. I think that’s what I’m most proud of.
I understand people that do that because there is a lot of pressure and I think in some ways we can benefit from doing that. Of course, there are several things we need to adjust. We need to learn exactly how to dance according to the music where we are because we’re not going to change, so far giving an example, I’m going to a job interview, there are several expectations of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable to do. We cannot be naive and ignore that, but at the same time, we can bring our whole selves to those situations.
I think that it’s very powerful when you know you can be yourself. It relates to what in business we call psychological safety. Of course, it applies to everybody, but especially for us Latinx and immigrants in general.
How was your journey abroad?
I would love to say that it’s been wonderful. A very fun ride, full of happiness, and like those birds that fly around in Disney movies when the spring starts. However, my journey has been very challenging. My first experience abroad was in Argentina. After that, I actually promised myself that I would never live in another country. It’s so funny how life happens. It’s very challenging.
I think living abroad is the most difficult thing someone can do to themselves is being in another language, in another culture. There are several situations that are, I don’t know, very difficult because sometimes we really don’t know the best way to react in a certain situation. We deal with things that people have no idea and they take for granted.
One interesting example. I have a friend that’s studying PhD and one of her professors is very sick. They have a close relationship. The professor called her for a meeting in person and told her that she’s very sick, that she thinks she doesn’t have a lot of time ahead. Then the professor said all of this, like, laughing. It’s such a weird situation to imagine because in Brazil it would never be like this. We know exactly how that situation would play out. It would be very sad, everybody would cry, they would hug and maybe they would just say something like, “Oh, man, this sucks.”
I know some stories where there is someone sick in the family and they tell everybody, “Okay, don’t tell anyone.” So, it’s kind of like, hey, it’s not like something that’s openly talked about. I think in the situation with my friend, she really didn’t know how to react because maybe it wouldn’t be appropriate for her to react like how she would like to or even like the entire situation was different. When we live abroad, we face so many situations like this and I think people have no idea. It’s kind of like we carry this very heavy luggage around.
That also makes our perspective very different on several things and that’s positive. For example, very often after work, I take time to study, to try to improve my pronunciation because it’s something that I want to do. I have my personal goals, and people have no idea. This is something that probably many of my coworkers don’t have to spend any time doing.
There are really good apps for that now. It’s so funny because you’re just repeating and saying some phrases to your phone and then seeing okay, I think I can improve the pronunciation of this word. I think it’s just so interesting. There are so many things that we have to deal with that other people really don’t. There’s people who are helping their families abroad and all the conflicts that come with that because on one hand, you want to help your family and on the other hand, you have to deal with the fact that you live in such a different reality from everybody else.
That’s all part of living abroad. However, I’m talking about just the challenges. I think it’s super interesting. It’s definitely for people that really enjoy challenges. I really like having to constantly learn and the more you learn, you realize that there are other things to learn. So, yeah, this is how my experience abroad has been.
There is a lot of pressure on us to try to catch up because for example, we don’t have public speaking classes in Brazil like people here in high school, I don’t just have one example. And there are other things that we don’t know that are different because we didn’t have the same experience, but we have other experiences. I think our problem-solving skills are very well developed. Kind of like one problem at a time, resolve a problem, then the next one.
How is your process to change your career?
I never planned to change my career. In Brazil, I worked as a teacher. I was a language consultant, worked to improve reading, translation, and I taught at the university as a professor assistant as well, for several years. I was super passionate about all of it. I did my master’s, all my education was related to it. When I moved here, I was already working in the same field, of course with several different kinds of work streams, but I was already working for more than 10 years. To be very honest, I was a little bit bored of doing something so similar. I also realized that I wouldn’t be able, for example, to do research. I did research for nine years. I couldn’t find anything that wasn’t even related.
For example, with the same theory in terms of teaching and learning languages. I knew if I would start doing research in a very different area, it wouldn’t be as interesting for me or with a very different methodology and theory. I would always try to fight that and bring something from my background. Also understood that if I wanted to keep teaching, I would have to take several certifications to spend a lot of money on something that I didn’t know if it would be exactly, it would make sense financially because studying in the US is extremely expensive. In Brazil, I did all my education for free. I was in college for nine years, got all my degrees, everything like never spent anything. So, this is kind of like why I decided to try something different. I didn’t really know at the time how my skills could be transferable to the corporate environment.
We have pretty much everybody around us looking down on us, and then it’s very difficult to have the confidence to look down at yourself, at your journey, at your past achievements because that cannot be ignored. You are not born again in another country. You bring all of that everything that you have built before, that’s part of who you are. It’s part of your thought process. It has a major impact. I think it’s super important to be very aware of that, especially, for example, in Brazilian culture, we are very humble. There is a huge difference in how we portray ourselves.
It’s super important during this career transition that a lot of immigrants go through, unless you come out from your country being transferred by your company. Pretty much everybody has huge changes, and usually you go back several steps. That was my situation as well. I took pretty much the first job I got, and I tried to make the best of that opportunity, being always very grateful for people that trust me because I know it’s not a lot of people that do that. That’s also a lot of pressure, because we feel, “Okay, I have this opportunity. I need to do my best. I cannot make any mistakes.” But I think for other people that are trying to transition in their career, it’s super important to have in mind that you need to be against people that are looking down on you.
I think that also applies to everyone. If you have a different background, a diverse background, if you are switching career paths. So, for example, once in an interview I was interviewing someone, they said that they thought it was something negative, that they had a diverse background. I said, no, that’s actually good because you’re going to find solutions that other people are not going to think about. And that applies to us. We bring a lot in terms of thinking outside the box. And it’s exactly how innovation happens with diverse teams.
What do you do now?
At the moment, for over a year I’ve been working at DocuSign. I work at the web operations team and I manage the DocuSign website. I work on several different initiatives. It’s interesting because I was so sure I wanted to work with education my entire life and now I really enjoy what I do. So, it’s super cool.
What advice would you give to someone who is looking for maybe their first job in the US?
Something very simple that I always do that I think has helped me a lot. I listen to a lot of YouTube videos from recruiters, so kind of like interview preparation videos. I remember several years ago before I started working in companies when I was first looking for my first job here, I would drive at the same time I was taking classes at the San Francisco Art Institute, taking photography classes. I would drive from South Bay to San Francisco listening to interview tips.
Of course, there are things that are very basic that you don’t need to know. So, for example, if it’s like the phone screen interview, the first interview, don’t do that in the car. Some things that are very basic. However, there are other things that are cultural that we may not think about. For example, saying, thank you for your time, it’s something that we don’t do in Brazil. It’s not part of our culture.
I found a document online as well. I do a lot of research and I try. I’m very passionate about learning about all of this because I think it’s really important for us to advance and to change our lives, to be part of places where many times we’re not expected to be. I have a document with possible questions, so every time I have an interview, I select what are the questions that I really want to know. I use that as a template for me to make this process of thinking about what are the questions I have. A job interview in Brazil, I don’t know, at least from when I was there, I wouldn’t think of that as an interview. I was interviewing the employee as well.
There are some important shifts in our mentality that we can learn a lot from. For example, just listening to those videos or doing research online. I think it’s also super important, for example, to have the help of other people. You have reviewed my resume several times and you have told me, “Hey, you need to add some data on your resume.” So, that’s also like a big difference because a resume in Brazil is completely different from a resume here. We need to sell ourselves very well. I think that’s kind of like the part where we need to dance according to the music.
Sometimes I’m afraid I’m even sounding arrogant because I’m going too far into that side of talking about myself and my accomplishments and what I can bring to the table on a job interview. Also think it’s super important, for example, to hire people because there are people whose job, they work helping other people, especially immigrants on this journey. I think it’s like for anyone that’s starting or is currently looking for a job, it’s very important not to be naive because it’s not easy, it’s not simple. And we need to make use of all the resources that we have, like a community being around people that believe in themselves.
That’s super powerful and it’s very important to have a community to know who are your allies as well. Your allies at work, your allies on your network as well. Not exactly, people that work with you.
I’m going to ask you to tell me the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear these questions. I guess like those words, a hope?
I have more time for my creative projects.
An unsolved issue?
It might be very silly, but I think about teletransportation. Can you imagine if we could just in a brink of the eyes be with our families?
The last skill you learned?
I read a book about Nonviolent Communication. I don’t know if that’s a skill I have learned yet, but I’ve been practicing and also meditation. That’s kind of like a long-time practice that I’m still learning.
A favorite book?
I don’t remember how to say it in English, so I’m going to say the title in Spanish. Cien años de soledad, Gabriel García Márquez, I think that’s one of my favorite books.
What keeps you awake at night besides your cats and your dog, I guess?
Oh yeah, the cat climbing on my pillow. The cats and dogs running around. Other than that, I think anxiety because we are constantly thinking about the gaps we have to fill. Thinking about how I can be strategic in my daily life. For example, how I can prepare for some situations, how I can defend myself well. It’s something I have learned, talking to other people and sharing some of my struggles. I realized that there is a lot that we all share, but we don’t talk about it, and we don’t think that it happens more in a systematic way. For example, being like an easy target for mistakes that other people have made. That keeps me awake at night. There is a very high cost on mental health that comes from being an immigrant.
We see ourselves in new situations where for example, I started selling my art. You have to deal with all the legal parts of doing that. The taxes, filling our taxes, it’s something so different here than in our home country. I think there will always be some new situations where you are like, “Okay, I was invited to a wedding shower, so what exactly is expected from me? What kind of gift? What is the range of the price?” And we need to do research about that. If, for example, there is no registry or if the registry, most of the items have been already bought. So, I don’t know. There are so many different things.
The main way to resolve this problem is focusing also on the things that are not just on what we lack, but everything else that we bring to the table that other people will probably never know and never have those skills. For example, because I worked as a teacher for so long, I think for me it’s very easy to talk with people that have very different backgrounds because I had to make my students comfortable talking to me, otherwise they wouldn’t feel comfortable to speak a new language and they wouldn’t learn.
It’s something that it’s positive for me now in a different career. So, it’s not all about the things that we lack, but all this amazing diverse background that we have. For example, for your background in design, it’s something super positive that I’m sure makes you work differently and find different solutions to problems that other people wouldn’t.
You need to focus on the positive as well. So, for example, our background, changing careers or dealing with all the different challenges that come with immigrating, I think that makes us better leaders because we can see things that other people might not see. For example, discrimination, bullying at work. There are several skills that we have very well developed that I want to like on our side as well. It’s just not all about lacking things.
What’s your superpower?
I used to think that my superpower was that I could speak several languages. Then I saw myself learning Italian because I wanted to learn. I was curious about it, but I realized that it was mostly because I wanted to have that other language because I thought I needed that for people to see that I’m not stupid because I think sometimes, we feel that way because we have an accent. Sometimes people talk to us differently. They ask if we are familiar with things that are very basic. So, for example, I’ve been asked if I’m familiar with time zones.
It’s so different because of all those expectations and the bias that people have toward us. It’s so opposite for me because in Brazil, I went to a very prestigious university, kind of similar to the Ivy League here. In Brazil, when I say where I studied, people look different at me, and here is exactly the opposite. I remember first when I started applying for jobs, I would just get interviews for jobs that require just high school. It was very difficult because I have a master’s. Most of my classmates are professors now.
I have several classmates that are teaching at very prestigious universities as well. I have classmates that are diplomats. I realized that I was doing things kind of like to prove myself in that way, like, with a number of languages that I spoke. I think that was just wrong because people that look down on us have already made their minds about who we are, they might change, but that’s not our place to do so. We cannot leave thinking about that to prove them wrong. It’s just distracting us from our goals. I think my superpower is actually how persistent I am and my problem-solving skills.
What does it mean to be a Latina for you?
I was hoping you wouldn’t ask me that. I was really hoping we would finish without that question because it’s so difficult. I think in Brazil, a lot of people don’t feel that they are part of the Latinx community because of the languages.
However, it’s almost like if Latin America was a big family and we have several different cousins, you meet other people from Latin America and then you just really recognize so many things that are similar. Of course, there are several differences as well. It’s not like we are all the same, even like Brazilians, we’re not all the same.
People have different backgrounds and come from different upbringings. I think being a Latina is being part of that family. When I moved here, I was kind of adopted by a Chilean community and I really felt that it was just so helpful and so positive. I feel so grateful for that. I think that’s part of being Latinx for me. Of course, all the struggles as well. Kind of like you keep learning about things that other people go through as well, that you thought it was just you and then you learn, no, this is happening to several of us.
I hope you enjoyed the podcast. We will have more interviews with amazing Latinx leaders the first Tuesday of every month. Check out our website Latinx In Power to hear more. Don’t forget to share comments and feedback, always with kindness. See you soon.
Additional Reading Mentioned in the Interview
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ligia-francisco/
https://www.instagram.com/ligiafranciscoart/
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