Sara and Elena – Sales Executive, Customer Success Team Leader

For International Women’s Day, we decided to interview some women from BizAway, asking them to highlight certain aspects of their experience within the company.

Elena Tolomio has been working at BizAway, in the Barcelona’s office, for two and a half years, starting as a Sales Development Representative intern and becoming the team leader of the Customer Success team, which aims at building long-lasting relationships with customers. The Customer Success team is entirely female, has grown under her leadership, and currently has 5 members. Sara González Barreiro, from the Vigo office, is part of the sales team and started as an SDR at BizAway in 2020. She currently serves as a Sales Executive and Office Manager. Recently, she has been given the opportunity to move to the People team to take care of the Employer Branding and People Engagement aspects.

We asked Elena:

How would you describe your career at BizAway starting as an intern to Customer Success Manager? 

I joined BizAway two and a half years ago as a Sales Development Representative Intern, at that time the Customer Success team was made just by one person. I quickly realized that one was the role that really interested me, and expressed my desire to shadow the Customer success manager. Shortly after, I was offered the possibility to become a customer success manager myself and ever since we started creating a real customer success team. In this role, I had the privilege to work with many talented, brave and resilient women both within the company and between our clients and partners. From them, I draw strength and inspiration daily, and I consider mentors through my journey.  I’m extremely grateful to the company for giving me the opportunity to transition to this role, even if I didn’t have any relevant experience in it. All my managers supported me with advice and confirmation.

Anyway, the first step had to come from me, this made me realize that it is extremely important to speak out our objectives and advocate for ourselves. It’s essential to be confident in our abilities and promote them, but especially be “generous” to us and give ourselves the possibility to attempt anything we want to try. Now that I’m a team leader, I care about spreading this mindset between the team, creating space for people to be heard, maintaining an open mindset of growth and setting an example for others, encouraging them to grow and thrive.

We asked Sara:

When you started at BizAway you were the only female in the office and sales team, tell us what your experience was like in a purely male environment.

We were in the midst of a pandemic when I started working at BizAway as a Sales Development Representative. Despite the fact that I was the only woman in the Vigo team of 15 people, I never felt left out. On the contrary: I have always felt that my presence in the office has been one of the most respected and taken into account, to the point of receiving my opportunity to grow as a Sales Executive until now.

As BizAway grew, new female colleagues began to join the team, enriching our vision and improving the environment in all our offices. Habits and practices have been created among us that have helped build stronger ties throughout the team.

Recently, inspired by other women around me at BizAway, I have been proposed to continue growing professionally in the HR department, with a particular focus on employer branding and people engagement activities, and once again I have felt listened to and taken into account by my colleagues and managers. Nowadays it is difficult to make the interests of companies coincide with those of their employees. For me, BizAway is an example to follow in terms of employee well-being.

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