60 in 60 Project: Insights into Success #60in60project #42of60 with Thanh Cao @ UC Berkeley

#60in60project #42of60

With Thanh Cao

Check out all the 60 in 60 articles.

Recap - The objective of this project was to meet with 60 business leaders and professionals in 60 days to gain insights and perspectives into what success means for each of them. I then took that information to see what, if any, are the connections I could make to help further my own understanding of what success really is.

Networking and communication - that’s basically the foundation for everything I’ve done up until this point. There’s a lot of other work that falls into those two categories, but essentially that’s that I do. Through that, I’ve been able to connect with a wide range of people through a variety of industry both here in Ottawa and outside the city, even outside the country. I mentioned to someone the other day about the idea of quality of connections versus quantity - It’s great to obtain a following of people or grow your network, but what’s more important is the actual relationships you develop through that network and the value that they hold.

I had been introduced to Thanh through Lo Norona at Receptiv, who had graciously connected me with a few people in his network. I looked her up here on LinkedIn and found that she’d had an extensive history working in the television broadcasting industry and up until recently had worked for Netflix, so I was thrilled for the opportunity to connect.

Who is Thanh Cao? (see photo above)

Thanh Cao is currently a student at UC Berkeley, where she’s in the process of obtaining her Executive MBA from Haas School of Business.

https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/thanhcao/

Having already completed her BA for Broadcast Communication at San Francisco State University and coming from the working world, it was only recently that she’d made the transition to focus on school full time having previously worked for companies such as Indigo Films, Sony Pictures and until just recently, Netflix.

“I started my career in San Francisco, working in television production for the first 10 or so years of my life, during and after college. I produced TV shows for National Geographic Channel, Discovery Channel, The Learning Channel and Investigation Discovery; I worked on the recreations. Being a producer basically means your job is similar to that of a ‘cat herder for creative people’; making sure actors show up, making sure people know what time to show up, making sure people got paid, that they ate, etc. You’re always taking care of all of the logistics. Overall, I’ve been a project manager most of my life.”

As I’ve mentioned before, change happens for all of us. Eventually, Thanh’s boyfriend at the time (now husband) accepted a job offer in Los Angeles and with Thanh between jobs they both decided in was in their best interest and made the move to L.A just over 7 years ago now.

“I thought that it would be a good opportunity for me to transition and stay in entertainment but out of production, as anyone who’s done it will tell you that working in production is very difficult; it’s hard on the body and exhausting. I think there were months where I probably had two days off for the whole month. I absolutely loved it, but it wears on you and you realize that the balance between work and life is practically non-existent.”

Thanh was able to make that transition through a connection at Sony Pictures Television, who sent her resume into the marketing department there and she was was hired on as Creative Services Coordinator.

“I worked there for a couple years and then a recruiter reached out to me to do a similar job for Netflix; before Netflix became what it is today. A little over 5 years ago, before it had original content, it had a team and still does, that would reach out the studios for assets, such as assets on the service or in marketing and that’s what our team did. I did that for a couple of years and then moved over to the European Marketing team, where I worked on helping to project manage TV commercials as well as video ads.”

She tells me that for the last couple of years she worked with the Brand Partner Marketing team, where she was primarily involved with the development of the partnerships and the creative assets included.

As of just recently however (this past August), Thanh has made yet another career transition and has left Netflix altogether to focus her time and energy into completing her MBA at UC Berkeley.

“I’d been spending the past year and a half both working and in school and it got to the point where I was ready to transition my life into happier times. Right now, I’m focusing on school and my next career. With that I’m hoping to build something, I’m hoping to be a part of building something.”

“I’m very transparent. My life is very transparent and I’ve been very open with myself in what’s transpired over the last 6 months - when I started school, it was always to figure out what my next move was. I would get to a point where I’m done doing this, I just don’t know what’s next or what’s going on and I just wasn’t able to make a move yet. Eventually, I got to a point where I realized that this wasn’t the place for me anymore - I would go to school and feel like I could save the world or change people’s lives and then on the other end, I’d go into work and feel like the exact opposite and didn’t get the same level of fulfillment or empowerment. That coincided with a lot of other things that were happening at work and in my personal life and I got to the point where I thought, why am I spending all of my time doing something that isn’t moving the needle for me?”

Currently, Thanh and a classmate of hers are working on the early stages of developing a relationship app. They’ve been in the process of what she referred to as “discovery mode”, where they’re finding information about people’s relationships and the challenges that go into a relationship and then essentially ways to overcome those challenges.

Thanh goes on to add that with herself now being married, with a dog and living in L.A, a lot has changed in the last 10 years.

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

“I would love to see myself running my own company. Then, being able to invest in other female lead companies. I would love to lead a company that does good for the world and then invest in other companies that do the same.”

“The plan right now is to hopefully move back to the (San Francisco) Bay area. That’s where our home is; it’s where our family is, where most of our friends are and that’s where I’ve built my network at UC Berkeley.”

What would you say is your biggest accomplishment in life so far?

“My biggest accomplishment in my career would be finishing my MBA. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for over 10 years now, could have never imagined doing it but things lined up and I’m so happy that I will be finishing, hopefully in the next couple months” as she says with a laugh.

“My biggest accomplishment in life is surrounding myself with people who I totally respect, admire and make me feel like I’m not the smartest person in the room and that’s inclusive of my husband, my brothers, my sister, my parents and my closest friends.”

“And my biggest accomplishment for myself has been to be kinder to myself and get into the habit and practice of being still, being quiet and forgiving myself - those are my biggest accomplishments, but also things on which I work on constantly.”

What are your driving factors? What motivates you?

“I think that there’s just so much that other people have to teach and I want to learn it all. I know I’m never going to learn all of it but I just think there’s so many interesting things out in the world and I’d be silly to think that I’m an expert in anything but I’d also be silly to think that there’s only one thing to learn or one way of doing things, so for me it’s really being able to make impact. The more I learn the more impact I’m able to make, whether that’s with people or industry or creation; creating jobs, creating opportunities, allowing young people who are in disadvantaged situations to learn and understand that the possibilities in their lives are endless. It’s a constant.”

What does success mean for you?

“I think it goes into the last answer in being able to make impact on people’s lives. I don’t know in what shape or form that looks like - maybe it’s just to tell somebody who doesn’t believe in themselves that they can and that they should and how their success is more than just about themselves. That’s really important to me. I live my live knowing that the things that I do and the choices that I make have real impact on other people. Whether that’s buying recycled paper or choosing to be a mentor or job creation or just telling someone that I care about them, there are many ways in which I feel successful every day.”

It’s funny because I was literally just talking to someone today about how much this question and the previous question correspond or relate in how people answer these questions. We even took it a step deeper and looked at the idea that if these two answers don’t relate, why is that? Which I’ll talk about more in the conclusion of this entire project.

Insight -

When you connect with someone, which I’d been doing so much of lately, you start to see how many people have the same values as yourself and it suddenly becomes so much more clear on how to connect the dots. There were so many common patterns in Thanh’s perspectives and views that resonated so clearly with so many other people with whom I’ve spoken with. It’s truly inspiring to know that there’s so much common ground for most people if they just take the time to scratch the surface.

Another commonality was that idea of being stuck in a career you no longer find passion in and not being able to get off that edge of your career.

I think most people truly do live their life there and they don’t even realize it.

“Live your life on the edge”

Should be quickly followed with, “then jump in!” or simply “Don’t settle for the edge, explore the whole surface”.

I understand the mantra behind that expression, I just think there’s another way of looking at it. Up until I made the decision to return to school, I’d been living on the edge of my career; I’d been jumping from job to job in the hope that some amazing opportunity would eventually just present itself and in the interim, I would just work where I could. It wasn’t until I’d made that initial decision or took that leap back into a foundation on which I could build opportunity, that I’d been able to get off of that edge. Much was the same for Thanh (and many others with whom I’ve spoken to), where although she’d essentially gotten to that “dream job” of working in Hollywood, she wasn’t finding the passion anymore and had to make a choice for herself. As Thanh explained: “I felt like I’d been standing at the edge for 10 years. I was at the edge of the cliff and kept looking down but I wasn’t sure what I was looking down at.” You could go so far as to say the edge is that familiar, comfortable spot in your career where you know that more opportunities may await, but it would take a risk in order to make that happen and because of that uncertainty, some of us feel stuck on the edge whereas others just take the plunge and embrace the unknown.

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Hartley is a content marketer who has set out to meet 60 people in 60 days in order to find insights into the idea of success. If you would like to be profiled on this project, you can reach Hartley here in LinkedIn or via email: [email protected]. #60in60project