What has been your business/work highlight of 2024 so far?

The highlight of the past year has been the successful launch of the Cisco AI Assistant, which has revolutionized the way our customers engage with their collaboration tools. By integrating advanced AI capabilities, we have given our customers an AI assistant that truly works for them because it is highly intuitive and works in the background when enabled. This lets users work more efficiently and communicate better from a single application all while enhancing productivity and streamlining workflows.

Who is your business hero and why?

My biggest business hero is Jeetu Patel. He has the remarkable gift of vision and can identify things that often go unnoticed by others. Where some might see obstacles, he sees potential. In the four years I’ve worked for him, he’s taught me many valuable lessons, including:

– The importance of design. People can fall in love with a design’s simplicity. Design goes beyond just an aesthetic and helps deliver experiences that evoke emotion and foster loyalty.

– Speed is everything in business. Without it, irrelevance is guaranteed.

– Solve problems at least ten times better than you solve them today. Anything less is not a good enough incentive for customers to choose you.

– The power of storytelling. This matters tremendously in marketing, and I’ve learned the importance and value of simplifying storytelling.

– Great products are discovered rather than marketed, so build something people love. Word-of-mouth marketing creates market pull when people love your product so much they can’t resist talking about it.

– The team behind you matters, so hire well. Decisive people who are motivated, great communicators, clear thinkers, driven, and curious are the biggest determinants of success.

Jeetu’s influence has had a tremendous impact on me. It has been instrumental in informing my own leadership philosophies, such as the idea that everything can be coached except passion—you either have it or don’t, and you can outsource everything except love. This means that important things in life are people and things you love, and the key to safeguarding them is outsourcing anything you can to free up your time to show up at your best for your loved ones and yourself.

What’s the biggest business mistake you’ve made and what did you learn from it?

Throughout my career, I have found that the greatest lessons have often stemmed from challenges and adversities. A recent example was at the onset of the pandemic in 2020. We all found ourselves at home, and I, like many others, reached a pivotal moment of recognising the importance of prioritising mental and emotional well-being. But every obstacle is an opportunity to introspect and grow. From my experience, I learned that prioritising self-care and emotional well-being is critical to individual performance and the team’s collective productivity.

This led me on a journey of empathetic leadership to foster supportive environments, encouraging and empowering my team to prioritise self-compassion, empathy, mutual support, and well-being. Doing so led to a noticeable shift in morale and performance. It’s often said that people support a business. But I learned that if we support people first, we unleash their greatest potential for innovation, collaboration, and feeling connected to our mission and vision.

What’s the most inspirational book you’ve ever read and why?

The most inspirational book I’ve ever read is Chasing Daylight by Eugene O’Kelley. In the book, the former CEO of KPMG was diagnosed with cancer and given less than six months to live. O’Kelley embarked on a final journey to say goodbye to the people in his life and honour those relationships while he was still alive. The book profoundly influenced my approach to relationships, being present, creating real connections, and gratitude across every facet of my life.

What’s the biggest challenge you face in your role in 2024?

In October of 2023, we delivered the first-ever hybrid WebexOne customer conference. We had executed the event virtually many times before, but my team is full of big dreamers who all had their sights set on a hybrid event. Event planning and execution has its challenges, and we certainly encountered many along the way. We are an incredibly small but mighty team, and we delivered the event in just eight months, receiving tremendous accolades from customers, partners, analysts, and the press alike. We overcame the challenges because our team culture is strong. This year, we are again delivering a hybrid WebexOne in the Miami area. I know that no matter the challenges or hurdles, we will overcome them because I am fortunate to lead a team full of incredibly creative, innovative, and strategic thinkers.

What technology will have the greatest impact on your business this year and why?

I believe AI will make a large impact on the future of the workplace. As employees increasingly come back to the office, there is an enormous opportunity to leverage AI to enhance productivity and deliver simplicity. AI will revolutionise the way we work, making it easier, faster, and more efficient. By automating repetitive and time-consuming tasks, it allows us to focus on more complex and creative work. Video and audio intelligence capabilities will help ensure everyone is able to participate equally when they collaborate, regardless of where or how they work. For example, solutions like noise removal and voice optimisation help workers to be clearly heard without disruptive background noise. The use and integration of AI-enhanced technologies like these will make collaboration more personalised and efficient. We are continuously finding more ways to leverage AI to improve experiences for our customers and our employees, and what we’ve done recently is just the start.