Career Spotlight | 5 questions to Roxane Barry

Roxane Barry| Senior Planner Marketing Communications, Nissan.

1)??How did you find your way to where you are today? Share a little about your professional journey.

Studying abroad, travelling, sports, business and marketing are a combination of things that brought me to where I am today. I am not one of those people who always knew what they wanted to do, which is why I enrolled in the most general field I could think of for both my bachelor and master’s degrees: global business.

One thing that really attracted my curiosity in this field was the opportunity to study abroad. For 5 years, I was able to study and work in 5 different countries and that was one of the best experiences I had. While I was doing my master, I got enrolled in a 3 months program at UVIC (University of Victoria, BC). I fell in love with the city, and when I left, I promised myself that I would come back to Canada for a longer period.

On the other hand, the automotive industry is one that attracted me for a long time; not only because it evolves all the time, but also because my dad is a big fan of Motorsport. He used to watch F1 all the time and has been volunteering for the 24h of Le Mans for 30 years now. Sports in general is something that I really enjoy. It brings people together, you go through lots of emotions, you feel alive, and to me this is the best school to learn teamwork, discipline, resilience, control and channel negative feelings in a positive way.

After my master, I secured an internship in Switzerland at INFINITI Europe as a CMM, but Canada was still in my mind. I got an opportunity at that time to enroll in this IVP program to work for Nissan Canada and to participate in the launch of a new motorsport series: The Nissan Micra Cup. I jumped on the opportunity, quit everything and landed in Toronto in May 2015 to work for Nissan Canada in Motorsport. This is how I started my professional career. The Nissan Micra Cup allowed me to manage projects from A to Z, to let my creativity out, to manage different people and to also discover my attraction for media relations, advertising, and filming days.

All of this to say that even though sometimes you might not really know where you are heading, you will always find a path at the end and it might surprise you!

2)??What was the best advice you have received? What would you tell someone starting out in their career?

“Trust your worth and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. And this starts by being yourself.”

There will be moments of doubt, moments where things are overwhelming, where you are not sure if you should take direction A or direction B. One thing to remember is to trust your worth, your voice matters, and your opinion matters. You are not in this role for nothing, you have your place at the table and if you want something, prepare and collect facts then go for it!

I would also add that if you have any dreams, follow them, set your goal, write them down on a piece of paper or keep them in your mind. We have one life and it’s not worth living with regrets. If you are interested in a particular job, for instance, do a workshop to see if this is something that you would really see yourself doing. If not, well at least you know and won’t have any regrets.

You can also evolve your interest by going outside your comfort zone. I have always been interested in cinema and the way stories are transcribed on the screen so during COVID-19, I took different workshops to understand more how producing, directing, and creating a movie worked. I was very surprised with the number of people that were in the workshop and were completely new like me to this industry. I am not sure if one day I will work in Cinema, but at least I know what it is, I have a better understanding, and it also gave me lots of tools for the job I am currently doing, so I am glad I did it.

Another piece advice that I received indirectly through a book that I highly recommend if you have not read it yet: Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead from Sheryl Sandberg.

In her book, Sandberg talks about being truthful and authentic. Being truthful and saying what we think in the workplace is something that can be difficult and feared because of the judgement or because of the hierarchy. However, she continues to explain that being truthful is key to grow a team, a company and there is way of communicating in an efficient way. I believe that and I believe that once you establish that trust and sincerity within your team then everybody will benefit from it.

3)??You were a part of so many cross-functional teams. What would your advice be to someone who wants to get more involved at Nissan and be a driving part of our culture?

Be curious and ask questions. If you are interested in something, go get it because no one is going to do it for you.

If you are interested in another department, maybe ask for a coffee chat with someone in the team to better understand what their role is and see if this is something that interests you.

A good way to get to know other people from other departments is to volunteer for the different groups that we have here at Nissan Canada: the Business Synergy Teams (BSTs), which consist of 4 different groups: Multicultural, Gay Straight Alliance, Women, and Generations. We also have the One Team Cultures, which focuses on GLINT and Great Place to Work surveys, the toastmasters to improve your public speaking, and the body shop.

I have been co-captain of the Multicultural BST since 2019 and was involved in this group since 2017. It allowed me to meet people from different departments, build relationships, get visibility, while it also allowed me to lead a team and lead few projects that I love.

Boost yourself because nobody will do it for you. Trust your worth, have a plan and do not be afraid to bother people. If you don't ask you will not know. If you ask, you have a good percentage of getting a ‘yes’ and achieving your goals.

4)??What would your advice be to someone who is afraid of failure, starting over in their careers or perhaps bouncing back from as setback like a project not going as well as they wanted or not getting next career move?

When you are scared and feel those kind of emotions, it means that you care, which is actually a good thing until it prevents you from doing something you want to do.

If and when it gets to that point, tell yourself that, without trying, you will never know. Would you rather not know your entire life or try and learn even though it means a risk to maybe not succeed the first time?

To me, there is no failure, there is only a learning curve. If you succeed everything you do the first time, life could become a bit boring. Challenges are good, reflecting on what worked and what did not work is a great way to do things even better than you would expect.

If you look at most leaders, professional players, etc … they always had challenges to get to where they are and they probably lost a lot of games before winning the championship, but loosing those games allow them to better understand what works and what doesn’t and they would have not succeed without losing them.

If a project is not going as well as you wanted, take a step back, look at what might have been the cause, don’t hesitate to seek for another pair of eyes to also look at it. Asking for support and advice is not a sign of weakness, it is a sign of strength and confidence. Surrounding yourself with people who can help you in different situations is highly valuable.

5)??What is the Nissan Way principle that speaks to you the most and which you keep top of mind every day?

All of them speak to me, but if I have to choose one, I would pick: Show facts, face reality.

This one relates to a lot of things that I have been talking about above. Being transparent about a situation and present facts.