What I’ve Learned 1 YearWorking Abroad
Last July, I embarked on my greatest adventure. I moved to Sydney, Australia to support the growth of Salesforce’s Asia Pacific (APAC) business and to fulfill my dream to live abroad. Living and working abroad exposed me to new experiences and taught me many things.
Here are 3 things I learned from my first year living abroad:
1) Be Intentional with Your Time
“Time has a wonderful way of showing us what really matters.” ―Anonymous
My role consists of a lot of travel. By my third month living in Australia, I spent 80hrs just on airplanes. In a single month last year I traveled from Sydney to San Francisco, San Francisco to Singapore, back to Sydney then to New Zealand and Tonga. Don’t get me wrong, I love to travel more than your average person, but 80hrs on a plane is two working weeks!
The removal of that amount of time impacts what activities you can complete in the office or how you spend personal time. I had to learn how to be very protective of my time and more intentional about how I exert my energy.
I realized that I would not be able to do all the things my younger self could, like train for Ironman Triathlons. While I do miss it some days, the rewarding moments of exploring new places, meeting new people and staying in touch with family are valuable exchanges of my time.
2) You Grow and Change with Experience
“If we don’t change, we don’t grow. If we don’t grow, we aren’t really living.” ―G.Shehy
Living abroad I work with teams in Australia, Asia, Europe and the United States and am exposed to unique working cultures daily. Part of my job involves crafting business messaging for various cities and highlighting stories that are most meaningful to that audience. Having empathy for the local culture is essential. The tone of how I may tell a customer story in one country may be very different from how I may tell it in another. For example, in the United States I aspire to provide messaging that gives the audience a feeling of empowerment and sense of accomplishment. In Asia, it’s more meaningful that a feeling of connectedness, community and respect is created to win over an audience.
Learning this taught me how essential it is to take time to understand the culture of a specific place and weave in learnings into targeted presentations. Adding the personal touch allows us to connect with our audience more and helps create trust which is important no matter what country you’re in.
3) Prioritization and Collaboration are the Keys to Success
“Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much” ― Helen Keller
Working abroad I’ve seen organizations be challenged with great amounts of work but have limited resources. I’ve learned first hand that it’s essential to partner with the right teams and people to get the job done. I was the content lead for the largest event we run each year called Salesforce World Tour and had to prioritize and collaborate with teams on how we could create the best experience for our customers and attendees.
This entailed partnering with local stakeholders to align on a vision and goals, learning from teams that executed the same event across cities in the United States, and sharing insights with stakeholders and session leads to localize meaningful stories for our audience. Collaboration was embedded every step of the way.
Going through this process I learned how powerful it is to prioritize and that collaborating with teams helps you execute a vision more efficiently. The event ended up being a huge success and set a record being one of the largest events run by Salesforce in the world.
I’ve learned a lot in the past year, but my journey is not over yet. I have more goals and aspirations. I can’t wait to see what I accomplish in the coming year.
Have a vision for the life you want to live, know where you want to go. Be in the driver’s seat of your own life; live the life you’ve always imagined.
