This episode features a Nova Chat session hosted by Nova founder and CEO Maggie Olson.
In this conversation, Maggie chats with Clara Ma, founder of Ask a Chief of Staff, as they discuss the role of a CoS and Clara’s career journey.
ABOUT CLARA
Clara Ma is the Founder and CEO of Ask a Chief of Staff – the premier resource for Chiefs of Staff looking to secure high-impact roles and drive results.
Prior to founding Ask a Chief of Staff, Clara was the Chief of Staff to the CEO of Hugging Face, a unicorn AI startup, where she helped shepherd the company from its Series A to Series B. After serving as the Chief of Staff, Clara went on to become the Program Director of On Deck’s (Series B) Chief of Staff Fellowship, growing its membership base from 80 to over 400+ Chiefs of Staff.
Clara’s background is a combination of strategy, operations, and recruitment, having held titles in each of these departments at various early stage startups. She prides herself on being an early stage operator and building from 0 to 1.
ABOUT MAGGIE
Maggie Olson is the Founder of Nova Chief of Staff, the premier destination for Chief of Staff education and development. As the first Chief of Staff to a president at a Fortune 40 company — who led a multibillion-dollar business with 5,000+ employees — Maggie built the president’s Chief of Staff model from the ground up. Maggie has 20 years’ experience leading large teams and has spent her career focused on both customer and employee experience at companies including T-Mobile, Nordstrom, and Starbucks. In addition to operating the Nova Chief of Staff Certification course, Maggie is a fractional Chief of Staff focused on helping mission-driven, for-profit startup founders scale their businesses quickly. In her spare time, Maggie loves spending time outside with her husband, their animals, and their 1-year-old, Max!
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THE LEADER ASSISTANT PODCAST IS PRESENTED BY NOVA CHIEF OF STAFF
Calling all Executive Assistants: Are you looking for a way to elevate your skills or earn that promotion you’ve been eyeing? Nova Chief of Staff’s online certification course provides you with the knowledge and confidence you need to stand out on the job. Whether you want to land your dream position or level up in your current role, Nova’s self-paced course gives you hands-on practice doing what Chiefs of Staff do every day.
Visit leaderassistant.com/nova to learn more and secure your spot!
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JOIN THE FREE COMMUNITY
Join the Leader Assistant Global Community for bonus content, job opportunities, and to network with other assistants who are committed to becoming leaders!
SUBSCRIBE
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Join my email list here if you want to get an email when a new episode goes live.
LEAVE A REVIEW
If you’re enjoying the podcast, please take 2 minutes to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Each review helps me stay motivated to keep the show going!
THE LEADER ASSISTANT BOOK
Download the first 3 chapters of The Leader Assistant: Four Pillars of Game-Changing Assistant for FREE here or buy it on Amazon and listen to the audiobook on Audible. Also, check out the companion study guide, The Leader Assistant Workbook, to dig deeper.
LEADER ASSISTANT LIVE EVENTS
Check out our constantly updated schedule of events for admins and assistants at LeaderAssistantLive.com.
JOIN THE FREE COMMUNITY
Join the Leader Assistant Global Community for bonus content, job opportunities, and to network with other assistants who are committed to becoming leaders!
SUBSCRIBE
Subscribe to The Leader Assistant Podcast so you don’t miss new episodes!
You can find the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Pandora, and Stitcher.
Join my email list here if you want to get an email when a new episode goes live.
LEAVE A REVIEW
If you’re enjoying the podcast, please take 2 minutes to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts here. Each review helps me stay motivated to keep the show going!
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
00:00:00.040 –> 00:00:03.760
JEREMY: Hey, friends, welcome to another episode of The Leader Assistant Podcast.
00:00:03.760 –> 00:00:07.920
JEREMY: It’s your host, Jeremy Burrows, and this is episode 303.
00:00:07.920 –> 00:00:10.460
JEREMY: You can check out the show notes at leaderassistant.com/303.
00:00:13.380 –> 00:00:17.320
JEREMY: I’m excited to share another Nova Chat with my friend Maggie Olson.
00:00:17.320 –> 00:00:25.700
JEREMY: And in this Nova Chat, Maggie talks with Clara Ma, founder and CEO of Ask a Chief of Staff.
00:00:25.700 –> 00:00:33.660
JEREMY: They have a great conversation about the role of the chief of staff, and Clara’s career journey and lots of fun conversations.
00:00:33.660 –> 00:00:36.020
JEREMY: So I hope you enjoy it and we’ll talk soon.
00:00:42.162 –> 00:00:49.782
<v SPEAKER_2>The Leader Assistant Podcast exists to encourage and challenge assistants to become confident, game-changing leader assistants.
00:00:59.752 –> 00:01:06.992
JEREMY: Hey, Leader Assistants, have you heard the Nova Chief of Staff Certification course is about to see a price increase?
00:01:06.992 –> 00:01:13.892
JEREMY: But don’t worry, you can enroll now, lock in the current rate, and start whenever you’re ready with lifetime access.
00:01:13.892 –> 00:01:17.932
JEREMY: Nova’s mission is to give you the ultimate student experience.
00:01:17.932 –> 00:01:31.352
JEREMY: They’ve packed the course with dozens of templates, self-paced learning, hands-on practice, multiple instructor touch points, peer engagement, and even guest-authored assignments.
00:01:31.352 –> 00:01:38.572
JEREMY: With over 500 students across 22 countries, Nova is the top spot for Chief of Staff learning and development.
00:01:38.572 –> 00:01:39.552
JEREMY: Don’t wait.
00:01:39.552 –> 00:01:42.752
JEREMY: Enroll today and join the community at leaderassistant.com/nova.
00:01:44.952 –> 00:01:47.012
MAGGIE: So happy to have Clara with us.
00:01:47.012 –> 00:01:49.812
MAGGIE: Clara and I have hit it off from the very beginning.
00:01:49.812 –> 00:01:54.792
MAGGIE: We are a true partnership from a work perspective, and I just love that.
00:01:54.792 –> 00:02:02.152
MAGGIE: So Nova Chief of Staff and the Ask a Chief of Staff community, which Clara leads and founded, we are partners.
00:02:02.152 –> 00:02:11.052
MAGGIE: And if you’re like me, you are curious and you want to learn more about all the people in our wonderful space, and that includes Clara.
00:02:11.052 –> 00:02:18.572
MAGGIE: So my goal for these Nova Chats, and if you’ve been a part of the Nova community for a little while, you’ve probably been on a few of these.
00:02:18.572 –> 00:02:22.232
MAGGIE: But our goal is to really use this opportunity to go deeper.
00:02:22.812 –> 00:02:34.652
MAGGIE: We chat about vulnerable moments and job transition, do’s and don’ts, and career alignment and misalignment, when to move on from a role, how do you know, and more.
00:02:34.652 –> 00:02:42.912
MAGGIE: What’s really cool is Clara has chief of staff experience with startups, and she created the Ask a Chief of Staff community.
00:02:42.912 –> 00:02:45.352
MAGGIE: So we’re going to dive into both of those areas.
00:02:45.352 –> 00:02:48.592
MAGGIE: But first, let me give a little bit of a background on Clara.
00:02:48.912 –> 00:02:52.832
MAGGIE: So she’s the founder and CEO of Ask a Chief of Staff.
00:02:52.832 –> 00:02:58.992
MAGGIE: Ask a Chief of Staff is the premier resource for chiefs of staff looking to secure high-impact roles and drive results.
00:02:58.992 –> 00:03:09.452
MAGGIE: Prior to founding Ask a Chief of Staff, Clara was the chief of staff to the CEO of Hugging Face, a unicorn AI startup, where she helped shepherd the company from its series A to series B.
00:03:09.452 –> 00:03:20.932
MAGGIE: After serving as the chief of staff, Clara went on to become the program director of On Deck, which was series B, Chief of Staff Fellowship Program, growing its membership base from 80 to over 400 chiefs of staff.
00:03:20.932 –> 00:03:25.852
MAGGIE: So talk about career alignment, like clearly Clara is in the place that she should be.
00:03:25.852 –> 00:03:34.232
MAGGIE: Clara’s background is a combination of strategy, operations, recruitment, and she’s held titles in each of these departments at various early stage startups.
00:03:34.232 –> 00:03:36.392
MAGGIE: So we’ll dive into all of that.
00:03:36.392 –> 00:03:42.552
MAGGIE: And Clara really prides herself on being an early stage operator and builder from zero to one.
00:03:43.592 –> 00:03:45.412
MAGGIE: So I want to get into all of that.
00:03:45.412 –> 00:03:49.672
MAGGIE: But first, Clara, we’re so happy to have you and welcome.
00:03:49.672 –> 00:03:51.212
CLARA: Thank you so much for having me, Maggie.
00:03:51.212 –> 00:03:54.392
CLARA: I know appropriate that we’re doing this on Valentine’s Day.
00:03:54.392 –> 00:04:00.832
CLARA: I feel like you and I were a match made in heaven when we came to talking about and working in the Chief of Staff space.
00:04:00.832 –> 00:04:02.072
CLARA: So excited to be here.
00:04:02.072 –> 00:04:05.592
CLARA: Thank you for having me and excited to be chatting with you today.
00:04:05.592 –> 00:04:07.092
MAGGIE: Yeah, well, so awesome.
00:04:07.092 –> 00:04:08.912
MAGGIE: You know, let’s just kind of start at the beginning.
00:04:09.572 –> 00:04:18.692
MAGGIE: I would love to hear you talk about how you found yourself in maybe pre-Chief of Staff roles that led you to Chief of Staff roles.
00:04:18.692 –> 00:04:24.292
MAGGIE: And please share all the startup relevance possible during that time.
00:04:24.292 –> 00:04:25.932
CLARA: Yeah, absolutely.
00:04:25.932 –> 00:04:37.972
CLARA: Well, I think my story will probably sound very familiar to a lot of our audience members here, where I, looking back now, feel like I can tell a story about my Chief of Staff journey and career.
00:04:38.152 –> 00:04:45.992
CLARA: But while I was going through it, it felt very windy, very messy, and I had no idea that Chief of Staff was even in my purview.
00:04:45.992 –> 00:04:57.712
CLARA: So taking it all the way back to my very first job out of school, while all of my friends were becoming consultants and engineers and having all these technical roles, I just wasn’t a technical person.
00:04:57.712 –> 00:05:01.672
CLARA: I had gone to school for liberal arts, political science and media studies.
00:05:01.672 –> 00:05:06.632
CLARA: And when it came to finding my first role out of school, I really had no idea what I could do.
00:05:07.292 –> 00:05:09.992
CLARA: But I knew that I liked talking to people.
00:05:09.992 –> 00:05:16.572
CLARA: And so what I ended up doing was applying for a small boutique recruiting agency.
00:05:16.572 –> 00:05:21.012
CLARA: And from what I was told, I was the very first application that ever went through their system.
00:05:21.012 –> 00:05:23.212
CLARA: It was a new company at the time.
00:05:23.212 –> 00:05:25.412
CLARA: And so I started my career off in recruiting.
00:05:25.412 –> 00:05:33.492
CLARA: And this was a very small, very scrappy boutique firm that the founder had come out of a larger firm and wanted to start her own thing.
00:05:33.492 –> 00:05:36.552
CLARA: And so I had the opportunity to really see it from the ground up.
00:05:37.052 –> 00:05:46.092
CLARA: And so from the very beginning, I’ve always had this background and experience at early, early stage companies where it’s been less than 10 people.
00:05:46.092 –> 00:05:50.132
CLARA: I’ve gotten to see it grow to over 20, over 50, etc.
00:05:50.132 –> 00:05:56.212
CLARA: And it wasn’t until I looked back on my career that I realized, oh, I’ve been working in startups for a very long time.
00:05:56.212 –> 00:06:02.992
CLARA: So after about a year and change of recruiting, I wanted to figure out maybe there’s something that I can do outside of this.
00:06:02.992 –> 00:06:08.292
CLARA: Had I not kind of fallen into recruiting, I wouldn’t have known that it was something that I could do.
00:06:08.292 –> 00:06:18.932
CLARA: And I had this opportunity to join a very early stage, Bollywood Dance Fitness Startup, which is probably the last thing that most people would expect.
00:06:18.932 –> 00:06:22.992
CLARA: But it was actually somewhat of a technical startup, if you will.
00:06:22.992 –> 00:06:31.572
CLARA: We built out this online platform for instructors, specifically dance fitness instructors, to learn how to teach this Bollywood Dance Fitness format.
00:06:32.112 –> 00:06:41.192
CLARA: And my role there was not only truly jack of all trades, I was teaching the format, but also actually working for the back office as well.
00:06:41.192 –> 00:06:47.752
CLARA: So working with our engineering team that was contracted and designers in building out the platform.
00:06:47.752 –> 00:06:49.672
CLARA: And it truly was this all hands on deck.
00:06:49.672 –> 00:06:51.992
CLARA: That company was four people full time.
00:06:51.992 –> 00:06:56.412
CLARA: I worked very directly with the CEO and the other founders of the company.
00:06:56.992 –> 00:07:12.912
CLARA: And we really, it was everything from marketing to sales to physically teaching the format and getting people to be excited about this new dance fitness craze that was kind of going on in the, I guess, mid-2010s, if you will.
00:07:12.912 –> 00:07:18.032
CLARA: So from there, I worked at that company for about a little over three years, I would say.
00:07:18.032 –> 00:07:26.652
CLARA: And I felt like at that point, I had kind of learned everything that I could learn and was interested in kind of really delving into this tech start-up world.
00:07:26.652 –> 00:07:29.032
CLARA: I was recruited to go work at AngelList.
00:07:29.032 –> 00:07:35.932
CLARA: I specifically worked for the branch that was in Talent Products, which meant we were building out products for recruiters and hiring.
00:07:35.932 –> 00:07:47.312
CLARA: And I really credit the head of operations there, who was my manager, to exposing me to this larger world of operations that would later lead me down the Chief of Staff route.
00:07:47.312 –> 00:07:55.972
CLARA: Her role was really about experimenting, trying different strategic initiatives, seeing what people might want and what the market was telling us.
00:07:55.972 –> 00:07:59.752
CLARA: And then we would try to build small experiments to go and test those things in the market.
00:07:59.752 –> 00:08:04.752
CLARA: And if they worked out, then we would go to the engineering team and say, hey, we should build a feature, things like that.
00:08:04.752 –> 00:08:11.692
CLARA: And she was the one who opened up my eyes to saying, you don’t have to pick a lane, you don’t have to specialize and niche down in one thing.
00:08:11.692 –> 00:08:16.152
CLARA: You can kind of continue to grow your, your career experience pretty wide.
00:08:16.152 –> 00:08:22.752
CLARA: And there is a place for you to do that within companies, whether they’re early stage startups or if I wanted to go somewhere else.
00:08:22.752 –> 00:08:31.812
CLARA: And so I would say that was a real turning point for me to understand that suddenly, this wide skill set that I had built wasn’t a hindrance, but actually a strength.
00:08:31.812 –> 00:08:35.672
CLARA: And I could turn that into something more long-term.
00:08:35.672 –> 00:08:41.252
CLARA: And from there, that kickstarted my journey into researching what the Chief of Staff role would look like.
00:08:41.252 –> 00:08:48.732
CLARA: And it really felt like the next step up for me when it came to moving into more of a leadership position or working closer with executive teams.
00:08:50.032 –> 00:08:50.812
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:08:50.812 –> 00:08:51.512
MAGGIE: Wow.
00:08:51.512 –> 00:08:53.732
MAGGIE: Amazing.
00:08:53.732 –> 00:08:55.532
MAGGIE: I personally love dance fitness.
00:08:55.532 –> 00:08:57.632
MAGGIE: It’s one of my favorite things.
00:08:57.632 –> 00:09:11.292
MAGGIE: Some of you might know on the call that I moved from Seattle, where there’s a ton of resources, like not just talking about food and beverage, but like dance and like all the things, to Lincoln, Nebraska, where there are just a few less.
00:09:11.292 –> 00:09:21.032
MAGGIE: And I finally, like literally this week, Clara found a dance class that I, you know, Zumba is fine, I will happily do Zumba, if that’s what’s offered.
00:09:21.032 –> 00:09:30.232
MAGGIE: But anyway, I found one and I love that you were doing, I mean, that’s like the standout for me, that you were doing Bollywood dance startup.
00:09:30.232 –> 00:09:30.992
MAGGIE: And it’s just so cool.
00:09:30.992 –> 00:09:41.812
MAGGIE: It shows that any company, like there are just so many different ways that people build businesses and niches and any of those things need support, right?
00:09:41.812 –> 00:09:46.892
MAGGIE: They need operation support, they need marketing support, they need technical support, they need engineers.
00:09:46.892 –> 00:09:49.792
MAGGIE: It’s just super cool to hear your background.
00:09:49.792 –> 00:09:52.152
MAGGIE: So thank you for sharing that.
00:09:53.372 –> 00:09:54.272
MAGGIE: Yeah, amazing.
00:09:54.272 –> 00:10:03.152
MAGGIE: So you talked a little bit about right at the beginning, coming out of school and nobody had told you yet that you didn’t have to specialize and you felt like everyone around you was really technical.
00:10:03.152 –> 00:10:04.432
MAGGIE: A couple of questions here.
00:10:05.632 –> 00:10:08.592
MAGGIE: What’s your educational background, undergrad, graduate school?
00:10:08.772 –> 00:10:12.192
MAGGIE: Where did you take that journey through?
00:10:12.192 –> 00:10:12.752
CLARA: Sure.
00:10:12.752 –> 00:10:13.932
CLARA: So I have an undergraduate degree.
00:10:14.232 –> 00:10:18.912
CLARA: I went to the University of California, Berkeley, a stone’s throw away from where I grew up.
00:10:18.912 –> 00:10:22.332
CLARA: So I was very much in the Bay Area for majority of my life.
00:10:22.332 –> 00:10:29.332
CLARA: And also, I like to say that my dad was part of the original Silicon Valley, where they were doing chip manufacturing and things like that.
00:10:29.332 –> 00:10:34.352
CLARA: So grew up a little bit around startup culture, had a sense of what that might look like.
00:10:34.352 –> 00:10:38.852
CLARA: And so I graduated with a degree in both political science and media studies.
00:10:38.852 –> 00:10:39.492
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:10:39.492 –> 00:10:46.592
MAGGIE: And through school and it sounds like your first several jobs, you felt the pressure to specialize and to be more technical?
00:10:47.652 –> 00:10:48.112
CLARA: A little bit.
00:10:48.112 –> 00:10:50.212
CLARA: I mean, Berkeley is a pretty big engineering school.
00:10:50.212 –> 00:10:51.992
CLARA: That’s what they’re best known for.
00:10:51.992 –> 00:10:55.432
CLARA: So I had a lot of friends who were very much on that engineering track.
00:10:55.432 –> 00:11:03.812
CLARA: And even if they weren’t in engineering, they were looking at things like, you know, investment banking, consulting, lots of Excel type things.
00:11:03.812 –> 00:11:09.892
CLARA: And so even though I was in the liberal arts program, of course, I had a lot of friends who were in political science as well.
00:11:10.552 –> 00:11:15.792
CLARA: A lot of those friends were looking at going to law school or taking on political careers, working on campaigns.
00:11:15.792 –> 00:11:19.192
CLARA: And that didn’t quite feel like what I wanted to do either.
00:11:19.192 –> 00:11:25.972
CLARA: And so I was really left with a sense of, I have no idea and I didn’t know what other jobs were out there.
00:11:25.972 –> 00:11:32.212
CLARA: And if it wasn’t more of like a vocational role, I hadn’t really heard of too many things that were out there.
00:11:32.212 –> 00:11:37.792
CLARA: Back in this time, I would say like product management wasn’t as big, then that could have been a route, maybe that could have interest me.
00:11:38.352 –> 00:11:44.372
CLARA: But it seemed like a lot of these kind of early stage start ups were all looking for technical talent and I just didn’t have that background.
00:11:44.372 –> 00:11:46.352
MAGGIE: Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
00:11:46.352 –> 00:11:59.492
MAGGIE: So thinking about your kind of journey through roles that were pre-Chief of Staff, what are the biggest takeaways you have now looking back on kind of your skill set and what you were good at during that time?
00:12:05.161 –> 00:12:06.121
MAGGIE: Have you heard?
00:12:06.121 –> 00:12:11.661
MAGGIE: The Nova Chief of Staff Certification course price is going up in January of 2025.
00:12:11.661 –> 00:12:15.461
MAGGIE: Enroll now and with lifetime access, start whenever you please.
00:12:15.461 –> 00:12:20.161
MAGGIE: Here at Nova, it’s our mission to provide the very best student experience possible.
00:12:20.161 –> 00:12:24.901
MAGGIE: Our course is chocked full of features and resources designed just for you.
00:12:24.901 –> 00:12:35.861
MAGGIE: Dozens of templates, self-paced online learning, hands-on practice, multiple instructor touchpoints, peer engagement opportunities, guest-authored assignments, the list goes on.
00:12:35.861 –> 00:12:43.041
MAGGIE: With 500 students across 22 countries, Nova is the premier destination for Chief of Staff Learning and Development.
00:12:43.041 –> 00:12:45.361
MAGGIE: Enroll today and join us.
00:12:48.961 –> 00:12:50.401
CLARA: Absolutely.
00:12:50.421 –> 00:12:55.221
CLARA: One, the first thing I want to say is that Chiefs of Staff truly can come from any background.
00:12:55.221 –> 00:13:03.121
CLARA: I mean, from my own background, I was a Bollywood Dance Fitness Instructor and somehow leveraged that into becoming a Chief of Staff.
00:13:03.121 –> 00:13:09.781
CLARA: The things that I think that really helped me eventually land a Chief of Staff role was this willingness to do anything.
00:13:09.781 –> 00:13:16.861
CLARA: It was this sense of no task is too small or I’ll take out the garbage if I needed to.
00:13:17.481 –> 00:13:27.961
CLARA: The very first, again, sense of this was when I worked at this Bollywood Dance Fitness Company, they didn’t even truly have any opening or role that was what I ended up doing.
00:13:28.761 –> 00:13:40.581
CLARA: During my time there, my title eventually became Director of Creative Solutions, which that is probably the most like Chief of Staff-y special project title that you can find yourself at that time.
00:13:40.581 –> 00:13:48.681
CLARA: But when I joined that company, a big thing that I was telling the CEO was, look, I don’t have a ton of career experience under my belt right now.
00:13:48.681 –> 00:13:55.001
CLARA: I know that I can talk to people and I think talking to people and having a high EQ can be one of the strongest skill sets that I bring to the table.
00:13:55.641 –> 00:14:05.301
CLARA: I can understand what it is that people are having issues with or problems with and figure out a way to figure those things out for them.
00:14:05.301 –> 00:14:11.081
CLARA: When I pitched myself to the CEO and the other co-founders of the company, I said, here, just consider me a resource.
00:14:11.081 –> 00:14:17.201
CLARA: Anything that you don’t want to do, I’m happy to do it so that you can focus your time on whatever it is that you’re good at.
00:14:17.201 –> 00:14:26.301
CLARA: If you can just let me in the room so I can watch or listen while you do those other things, that’s going to be worth it enough for me to continue to grow my career.
00:14:26.301 –> 00:14:42.421
CLARA: I think that it was that willingness and enthusiasm to really be the glue in any part of the organization that compelled them to hire me and then eventually gave me the opportunity to take on a whole bunch of different functions and learn a lot of those functions from scratch.
00:14:42.421 –> 00:14:42.741
MAGGIE: Yeah.
00:14:42.741 –> 00:14:43.121
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:14:44.041 –> 00:14:46.461
MAGGIE: Let’s recap those for people listening.
00:14:46.461 –> 00:14:52.641
MAGGIE: No task too small, willingness to do anything with some enthusiasm for being that glue and letting you listen in.
00:14:53.541 –> 00:14:57.061
MAGGIE: And then that emotional intelligence that I know Clara and I, we both talk about a lot.
00:14:57.341 –> 00:15:00.741
MAGGIE: It’s woven throughout the Nova Chief of Staff Certification course.
00:15:00.741 –> 00:15:06.221
MAGGIE: Clara, I think you write about EQ a lot as well, and probably talk about it with your members.
00:15:06.221 –> 00:15:13.601
MAGGIE: And I think just the ability to talk to people and clearly Director of Creative Solutions, that is a very Chief of Staff like title.
00:15:13.601 –> 00:15:21.641
MAGGIE: So I’d love for you to share a little bit more about, you were mentioning that you pitched this role to the founders.
00:15:21.761 –> 00:15:24.501
MAGGIE: So what company was that for and what role were you in?
00:15:24.501 –> 00:15:26.741
MAGGIE: And then what role were you pitching to move into?
00:15:26.741 –> 00:15:28.961
MAGGIE: And how did you navigate that?
00:15:28.961 –> 00:15:32.381
CLARA: Yeah, so this was the second job that I had at the Bollywood Dance Fitness Company.
00:15:32.381 –> 00:15:36.441
CLARA: I came in, my previous experience was in recruiting.
00:15:36.441 –> 00:15:42.421
CLARA: And at the time, I knew that they were a small team and I figured small teams could use help.
00:15:42.421 –> 00:15:48.821
CLARA: And at that time, I felt like my time in recruiting was kind of done, or at least I had learned everything that I could learn there.
00:15:49.441 –> 00:15:53.641
CLARA: And I wanted to expand my horizons a little bit, pick up some more skills.
00:15:53.641 –> 00:16:04.661
CLARA: I’ve always had a dream to be an entrepreneur or like found another company or even work on the VC side because I wanted to be at that kind of initiation stage of a lot of companies.
00:16:04.661 –> 00:16:17.921
CLARA: And so I figured if I could go to another early stage company and have the opportunity and access to try out a lot of different functions, then that’s gonna give me a better skill set moving forward in my career as well.
00:16:18.101 –> 00:16:20.861
CLARA: And at that time, it was only my second job out of school.
00:16:20.861 –> 00:16:24.101
CLARA: So there was still so much that I didn’t know about running a business, period.
00:16:24.101 –> 00:16:29.921
CLARA: And I just was willing to take kind of any experience that I could do that was outside of recruiting.
00:16:29.921 –> 00:16:32.781
CLARA: So yeah, very opportunistic.
00:16:32.781 –> 00:16:38.701
CLARA: I would say I happened to know that I had a alumni friend who worked at this company.
00:16:38.701 –> 00:16:40.441
CLARA: She was leaving to go somewhere else.
00:16:40.441 –> 00:16:43.901
CLARA: And I figured there was some sort of a vacuum that was going to be there.
00:16:44.481 –> 00:16:54.061
CLARA: And so I reached out and first, I had an informational call with one of the other employees who was working there and asked her, what are things that you’re doing right now?
00:16:54.061 –> 00:16:56.421
CLARA: How is this company looking to grow?
00:16:57.521 –> 00:17:06.561
CLARA: What are things that you’re having problems with or things that you would like to, if you could like snap your fingers, like have fixed in the next three months or whatever it was.
00:17:06.561 –> 00:17:14.661
CLARA: And after I had that call, I reached out to the CEO and asked him, you know, this is what my experience is.
00:17:14.661 –> 00:17:22.221
CLARA: I don’t have a ton of it, completely frankly, but I’m willing to learn and I’m willing to try and do a bunch of things.
00:17:22.221 –> 00:17:26.701
CLARA: If you’re willing to take a chance on me, I will try to pay it forward as much as I can.
00:17:26.861 –> 00:17:30.201
CLARA: And so he set me up with a little bit of a take home.
00:17:31.481 –> 00:17:35.261
CLARA: I pretty much remember like, I was like, I think I’m killing it.
00:17:35.261 –> 00:17:42.041
CLARA: And then I sent it in to him and he was like, okay, let’s like talk about why you decided to format it this way.
00:17:42.041 –> 00:17:46.781
CLARA: And he gave me some pretty blunt feedback on that and had me kind of resubmit it.
00:17:46.781 –> 00:17:48.501
CLARA: And after that, he was like, okay, great.
00:17:48.501 –> 00:17:57.121
CLARA: Like, it was good to see that you’re able to take this feedback and reformat your take home in a way that we actually think, like there’s a lot of learning potential here.
00:17:57.121 –> 00:18:01.301
CLARA: So, you know, we’re going to be happy to bring you on and hopefully you can grow with the company.
00:18:01.301 –> 00:18:16.981
CLARA: So it was definitely, I think luck plays a lot into, of course, your career journey, but also being persistent about talking to people in the company and really understanding what it is that they need help with and pitching yourself to help fill in those gaps.
00:18:16.981 –> 00:18:19.601
MAGGIE: Yeah, I love this.
00:18:19.601 –> 00:18:24.241
MAGGIE: And we will get to The Chief of Staff experience here in a minute, but I want to stay here for just another second.
00:18:24.241 –> 00:18:29.701
MAGGIE: So I’m hearing, Clara, and I think I hear some similarities in my story, too.
00:18:29.701 –> 00:18:32.081
MAGGIE: You know, you weren’t afraid to raise your hand.
00:18:32.081 –> 00:18:36.361
MAGGIE: You weren’t afraid to have a conversation and put yourself forward.
00:18:36.361 –> 00:18:38.561
MAGGIE: You weren’t afraid to.
00:18:38.561 –> 00:18:40.461
MAGGIE: And really, it wasn’t even probably not being afraid.
00:18:40.461 –> 00:18:52.521
MAGGIE: I’m guessing it just felt natural to you to to continue to have a network that you nurtured, to have a friend that you knew was moving from a role that’s like, you know, kind of maintaining your network and keeping it nourished.
00:18:52.521 –> 00:18:57.321
MAGGIE: And then I think, you know, another piece there is just kind of that informational interview.
00:18:57.321 –> 00:18:59.241
MAGGIE: You’re not afraid to pick up the phone and ask questions.
00:18:59.241 –> 00:19:00.181
MAGGIE: You’re persistent.
00:19:00.181 –> 00:19:12.841
MAGGIE: So where do you think that you learned or got the kind of bravery or understanding that you can just raise your hand and ask for what you want?
00:19:12.841 –> 00:19:16.641
MAGGIE: Because a lot of people don’t feel comfortable doing that.
00:19:16.641 –> 00:19:17.841
CLARA: Yeah, that’s a great question.
00:19:17.841 –> 00:19:24.101
CLARA: And I wish I could chalk it up to, you know, something that I learned or was in my life.
00:19:24.321 –> 00:19:27.741
CLARA: And part of it is, I really like talking to people.
00:19:27.741 –> 00:19:28.721
CLARA: I’m very outgoing.
00:19:28.721 –> 00:19:31.001
CLARA: I’m very extroverted, as you can probably tell.
00:19:31.001 –> 00:19:36.021
CLARA: And I really just don’t mind having a conversation with anybody and everybody.
00:19:36.021 –> 00:19:41.381
CLARA: And so it felt very natural to just be curious about what people were doing and ask those questions.
00:19:41.381 –> 00:19:49.761
CLARA: The other part of it is, I think I just had that early 20s bravado that, like, you think you know a lot more about the world than you actually do.
00:19:50.141 –> 00:19:59.061
CLARA: And I encourage people to tap back into kind of that childlike wonder and curiosity when it comes to asking people for information, right?
00:19:59.061 –> 00:20:01.341
CLARA: Like, don’t go and ask people for a job.
00:20:01.341 –> 00:20:04.401
CLARA: That’s not what my main, like, first conversations were.
00:20:04.401 –> 00:20:08.901
CLARA: It wasn’t coming in and saying, hey, like, hire me, you know, do this, do that.
00:20:08.901 –> 00:20:14.901
CLARA: It was more so coming at it from a place of curiosity to say, I’m curious about this business.
00:20:14.901 –> 00:20:18.761
CLARA: I’m curious about this dance fitness thing because I have a background in dance.
00:20:18.761 –> 00:20:19.421
CLARA: I love dancing.
00:20:19.541 –> 00:20:24.701
CLARA: So it was a very natural point of connection for me to be talking to the people who are working there.
00:20:24.701 –> 00:20:41.281
CLARA: Clearly, we both had passions for dance and coming at it with that kind of mentality makes it a lot less of an ask and like giving me something and more so a collaborative conversation between the two of us to talk about something we’re both passionate about.
00:20:41.321 –> 00:20:43.801
MAGGIE: Yeah, yeah, I absolutely love that.
00:20:43.801 –> 00:20:51.281
MAGGIE: It reminds me of a conversation I was having recently around networking and how it can feel really big and daunting and scary.
00:20:51.281 –> 00:21:00.821
MAGGIE: And personally, like the last thing that I want to do is go to like a Lincoln startup event or just a big broad networking event.
00:21:00.941 –> 00:21:03.461
MAGGIE: I have, it kind of gives me like, no, I don’t want to do it.
00:21:03.621 –> 00:21:06.421
MAGGIE: I can’t, I can’t find the time.
00:21:06.421 –> 00:21:07.961
MAGGIE: And I’ve kind of been aware of that.
00:21:08.561 –> 00:21:23.801
MAGGIE: But when it’s broken down into something or a person or a category of things that I’m really passionate about, like food and beverage or restaurant startups or, gosh, my background is in Nordstrom fashion industry.
00:21:23.801 –> 00:21:34.221
MAGGIE: Like if it’s specific enough, if it’s personal enough, if it’s the people that I want to connect with, like I think that is key to figuring out how do you put yourself out there in those ways.
00:21:34.221 –> 00:21:36.901
MAGGIE: So hearing you say, you know, I was passionate about it, I cared about it.
00:21:37.341 –> 00:21:41.921
MAGGIE: And it’s just fun to have a conversation about something that you enjoy.
00:21:41.921 –> 00:21:55.601
MAGGIE: It becomes a lot more digestible to think about putting yourself out there or, you know, driving an hour to go to a networking dinner or lunch instead of a massive event and like so super broad.
00:21:55.601 –> 00:21:56.581
CLARA: Yeah, absolutely.
00:21:56.581 –> 00:22:03.441
CLARA: And I’ll give a piece of advice, if you will, to people who know that everybody knows you should be networking, right?
00:22:03.441 –> 00:22:07.761
CLARA: Everybody knows that you should be going out there, talking to people, things like that.
00:22:07.761 –> 00:22:16.041
CLARA: If you are feeling hesitant or, you know, you’re like, oh, I’m just not super extroverted or like, I don’t know how to just pick up a conversation with people.
00:22:16.041 –> 00:22:25.081
CLARA: I was actually talking to a friend about this yesterday and she says, you know, I’m an introvert at heart, but again, I know I need to be going to these networking things or I go and support my friends.
00:22:25.081 –> 00:22:37.381
CLARA: If there’s food, if there’s a snack table or pizza, I go there and I talk to those people because I know those people are feeling just as uncomfortable or just as awkward, just as introverted as I am.
00:22:37.381 –> 00:22:43.821
CLARA: And so we go and we bond over the food and the food becomes the kind of catalyst for us to talk about something.
00:22:43.821 –> 00:22:52.421
CLARA: And so I feel like that was a really great piece of advice that, you know, you might meet someone there and talk to them, be like, oh, you’re also looking at the orders.
00:22:52.421 –> 00:22:56.681
CLARA: I’m also looking at the door, there’s like, gosh, like, isn’t this a great place for us to hang out?
00:22:56.681 –> 00:23:00.041
CLARA: And also you don’t have to feel like you need to talk to every single person.
00:23:00.041 –> 00:23:02.521
CLARA: Like she said, I try to talk to three people.
00:23:02.641 –> 00:23:09.301
CLARA: If I can talk to three people at, however many people are at this networking event, like that feels like a good number of connections to make.
00:23:09.301 –> 00:23:12.081
CLARA: And you just need one, you just need one good connection.
00:23:12.081 –> 00:23:13.681
CLARA: So three is a great place to aim.
00:23:13.681 –> 00:23:16.261
CLARA: And once you do three, you’re like, okay, I’m done.
00:23:16.261 –> 00:23:17.501
CLARA: I’m ready to go home.
00:23:17.501 –> 00:23:21.201
CLARA: Just make sure you follow up with those three people and see where that leads you.
00:23:21.201 –> 00:23:22.301
MAGGIE: Yeah, I love that.
00:23:22.301 –> 00:23:27.161
MAGGIE: And I know that we will get to this later, but I know that you run some really cool networking events with Chiefs of Staff.
00:23:27.161 –> 00:23:29.421
MAGGIE: So let’s make sure we chat about that.
00:23:29.541 –> 00:23:40.961
MAGGIE: But let’s now dive into your move from kind of close to, but not quite Chief of Staff roles at startups to then, like truly kind of moving into more of a Chief of Staff like role.
00:23:40.961 –> 00:23:43.901
MAGGIE: And how did that happen and where in your career?
00:23:43.901 –> 00:23:46.701
MAGGIE: If you want to kind of share with us about that.
00:23:46.701 –> 00:23:47.161
CLARA: Absolutely.
00:23:47.161 –> 00:23:53.121
CLARA: So post Bollywood Dance Fitness Company, I was recruited to go work at AngelList where I worked under the head of operations.
00:23:53.121 –> 00:23:56.841
CLARA: Truth be told, that head of operations was very Chief of Staff like to the CEO.
00:23:57.101 –> 00:24:04.921
CLARA: So I was almost a Deputy Chief of Staff, if you will, now that we can go back and actually give titles to these things that we were doing.
00:24:04.921 –> 00:24:11.521
CLARA: And then the head of operations ended up going on sabbatical about a year and a half after I had been there.
00:24:11.521 –> 00:24:14.021
CLARA: And so now I was kind of left without a manager.
00:24:14.021 –> 00:24:18.281
CLARA: And again, I was still very much in this floating position of filling in the gaps.
00:24:18.281 –> 00:24:23.401
CLARA: And so at that time, our team was growing pretty rapidly and we didn’t have a designated recruiter.
00:24:23.401 –> 00:24:31.021
CLARA: So this is where the story kind of like comes back full circle, where the CEO looked at me and said, well, you have a recruiting background and we build talent products.
00:24:31.021 –> 00:24:35.281
CLARA: So how would you feel about taking on the recruiting for our team?
00:24:35.281 –> 00:24:37.721
CLARA: We need to hire like 10 more engineers by the end of the year.
00:24:37.721 –> 00:24:41.681
CLARA: And given that you have a little bit of experience here, would you be willing to do that?
00:24:41.681 –> 00:24:47.721
CLARA: And I said, yes, with a caveat of, I would also like to learn more about product.
00:24:47.721 –> 00:24:52.561
CLARA: I would like to learn more about what it’s like to build product because that’s a big part of our team.
00:24:52.561 –> 00:24:55.841
CLARA: And I understand what the product is, but I want to see what goes into it.
00:24:55.981 –> 00:25:02.421
CLARA: So kind of copy-otting the yes and like, I like to use the improv like, yes, and like, yes, I’m willing to do this.
00:25:02.421 –> 00:25:04.441
CLARA: And can I learn this thing?
00:25:04.441 –> 00:25:06.241
CLARA: He was like, that sounds like a very fair trade.
00:25:06.241 –> 00:25:19.961
CLARA: So what he let me do was I was able to sit in on product meetings and start to just pick up like engineering talk and how our product managers and product designers worked with other people very much fly on the wall.
00:25:19.961 –> 00:25:25.161
CLARA: And eventually we got to a point where the CEO himself started to consider hiring a chief of staff.
00:25:25.221 –> 00:25:30.601
CLARA: And that was the first time I had ever heard of this phrase in a tech startup environment.
00:25:30.601 –> 00:25:36.301
CLARA: Of course, West Wing heard of that, have seen, you know, a variety of staff in the political world.
00:25:36.301 –> 00:25:40.861
CLARA: And funnily enough, the CEO of the company loved the West Wing.
00:25:40.861 –> 00:25:42.501
CLARA: And that’s where he got the idea from.
00:25:42.501 –> 00:25:46.141
CLARA: He like saw the other day and he’s like, what year was that?
00:25:46.141 –> 00:25:47.321
MAGGIE: What year was this?
00:25:49.341 –> 00:25:51.541
CLARA: 2018, I believe, maybe.
00:25:51.541 –> 00:25:51.981
MAGGIE: 2018?
00:25:51.981 –> 00:25:52.321
CLARA: Yeah.
00:25:52.321 –> 00:25:54.141
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:25:54.141 –> 00:25:57.981
CLARA: And so 2018, 2019, something like that.
00:25:57.981 –> 00:26:00.781
CLARA: And so he was like, I could really use like a Leo McGarry for myself.
00:26:00.781 –> 00:26:03.081
CLARA: And so I was like, what, what is that?
00:26:03.081 –> 00:26:05.221
CLARA: Like, what does this person do?
00:26:05.221 –> 00:26:08.821
CLARA: Because if you’re going to hire this person, I’m going to have to lead the chart.
00:26:08.821 –> 00:26:10.881
CLARA: I’m going to have to help you write the job description.
00:26:10.881 –> 00:26:12.441
CLARA: So I need to understand what this role is.
00:26:12.441 –> 00:26:18.941
CLARA: And the more that he described it to me, the more I was like, I think that might be something that I’m interested in.
00:26:18.941 –> 00:26:22.061
CLARA: That being said, the company at that stage, I think was Series D.
00:26:22.061 –> 00:26:24.821
CLARA: So it was a pretty later stage startup.
00:26:24.821 –> 00:26:34.161
CLARA: And one of the skill sets that he was really looking for was Excel and really being able to kind of manipulate data, use it to make decisions, things like that.
00:26:34.161 –> 00:26:36.201
CLARA: And that was just not a skill set I had.
00:26:36.201 –> 00:26:47.101
CLARA: But the scope of the role in terms of sitting by his side, helping him manage priorities and just being this right-hand person was super interesting to me.
00:26:47.101 –> 00:26:57.041
CLARA: And I figured, OK, if our CEO at a tech startup is looking for a Chief of Staff, other CEOs at other startups must be looking at Chief of Staffs as well.
00:26:57.041 –> 00:27:08.181
CLARA: And so that was kind of the impetus for me to start looking around, to see what Chief of Staff roles were out there and starting to apply to them on my own time.
00:27:08.301 –> 00:27:10.181
MAGGIE: OK, amazing.
00:27:10.181 –> 00:27:14.761
MAGGIE: Can we back up a little bit and share?
00:27:15.221 –> 00:27:20.701
MAGGIE: I’m guessing that some people on the call are very familiar with startup structures, Series A, B, C, D.
00:27:20.701 –> 00:27:26.381
MAGGIE: I am much less familiar than you are, but probably have had exposure to it and understand a bit.
00:27:26.381 –> 00:27:30.401
MAGGIE: Can you walk us through, in layman’s terms, what is a Series A?
00:27:30.401 –> 00:27:31.421
MAGGIE: What is bootstrapping?
00:27:31.421 –> 00:27:32.601
MAGGIE: What is A to B?
00:27:32.601 –> 00:27:35.501
MAGGIE: You’ve mentioned a few of these transitions and company structures.
00:27:36.041 –> 00:27:40.261
MAGGIE: What does this mean for those of us that are learning more about the startup world?
00:27:40.261 –> 00:27:40.601
CLARA: Yeah.
00:27:40.761 –> 00:27:42.661
CLARA: I’m not going to claim to be an expert here either.
00:27:44.341 –> 00:27:46.361
CLARA: I’ll tell you what I know from my experiences.
00:27:46.361 –> 00:27:46.841
MAGGIE: Yeah, that’s fine.
00:27:48.401 –> 00:27:50.381
MAGGIE: Your experience is enough.
00:27:52.161 –> 00:27:56.461
CLARA: There’s a couple stages of funding is how we refer to companies.
00:27:56.461 –> 00:27:58.621
CLARA: That’s where the letters come from.
00:27:59.621 –> 00:28:04.761
CLARA: We use that to just denote how many rounds of funding a company has gone through.
00:28:05.301 –> 00:28:18.641
CLARA: At startups, generally speaking, they don’t have any money to start, so they need some money from somewhere so that they can start to build out product or whatever it is that they want to sell down the line.
00:28:18.641 –> 00:28:27.281
CLARA: When they go to venture capital firms to raise a round of money, they’ll label that the seed stage is usually the earliest.
00:28:27.281 –> 00:28:40.081
CLARA: If you go even earlier than that, sometimes they will have what they are called angel investors, where they are individuals, like think of Ashton Kutcher, who invested very early in Spotify and Uber.
00:28:40.081 –> 00:28:57.801
CLARA: But people who have a good amount of money and they’ll come in as what they call angels and put in money to help the company start to have a stream of money to use to hire people, to buy laptops even, you can really use this money for everything and anything to get your company off the ground.
00:28:57.801 –> 00:29:11.081
CLARA: After angel round is a seed round, so it’s usually a smaller, and this is where you might go to an institution like a venture capital firm to get, can be anywhere from half a million dollars to 10 million dollars to more than that.
00:29:11.081 –> 00:29:17.721
CLARA: There’s no real cap on what you can call your seed round before moving into A, B, C, D, E, F, G.
00:29:17.721 –> 00:29:28.301
CLARA: You just keep going down the line until you decide that the company is going to go public and be NASDAQ traded, at which point you no longer have any series after that.
00:29:28.741 –> 00:29:31.961
CLARA: Or if you get acquired or whatever, it might be down the line.
00:29:31.961 –> 00:29:34.901
CLARA: So it’s a very rough kind of thing.
00:29:34.901 –> 00:29:35.981
MAGGIE: I think that’s helpful.
00:29:35.981 –> 00:29:37.781
MAGGIE: I think, yeah, I think that’s helpful.
00:29:37.781 –> 00:29:51.201
MAGGIE: So when you share, you know, you helped a company go from Series A to Series B, that is from one funding round to another, raising a significant amount of more money to fund the company.
00:29:51.201 –> 00:29:52.221
CLARA: Exactly, yes.
00:29:52.221 –> 00:29:53.661
MAGGIE: Okay, cool.
00:29:53.661 –> 00:29:57.781
MAGGIE: All right, so what did you love about being a Chief of Staff at a startup?
00:29:57.861 –> 00:30:09.881
MAGGIE: And what else can you share about that experience around just kind of Chief of Staff work and startups before we move into your next part of your journey with Ask a Chief of Staff?
00:30:09.881 –> 00:30:10.541
CLARA: Sure.
00:30:10.541 –> 00:30:19.761
CLARA: So the thing that I loved and when I joined as a Chief of Staff to the company, it was called Hugging Face, we had just raised our Series A right before I joined.
00:30:19.761 –> 00:30:24.281
CLARA: So essentially, we are very early stage in the Series A for context.
00:30:24.361 –> 00:30:27.921
CLARA: At that point, I believe our Series A was about $10 million.
00:30:27.921 –> 00:30:39.721
CLARA: The team itself was 10 people when I started, and I like to say that I was employee number 6 through 10, depending on when we walked in the door that day, four of us started all at the same time.
00:30:41.081 –> 00:30:50.461
CLARA: What I loved about being that early stage is that there’s really no precedent in terms of operations or playbooks or processes.
00:30:50.461 –> 00:30:59.041
CLARA: So you really have the lay of the land when it came to putting these things in place and really building the scaffolding of the company.
00:30:59.041 –> 00:31:09.361
CLARA: One of the stories that I like to tell is that on my second day, one of my employees or colleagues came up to me and said, my wife just had a baby, what is our parental leave policy?
00:31:09.361 –> 00:31:10.961
CLARA: And we just didn’t have one.
00:31:10.961 –> 00:31:15.681
CLARA: We were so early stage, nobody else had had a baby before at the company.
00:31:15.681 –> 00:31:26.481
CLARA: And so I basically hopped in and I was like, I don’t know, but give me till the end of the day, let me do some research, figure out what exactly we need to be able to provide that for you.
00:31:26.481 –> 00:31:30.821
CLARA: And I’ll come back with you, whatever we end up doing.
00:31:30.821 –> 00:31:32.541
CLARA: So I spent the day on Google.
00:31:32.541 –> 00:31:54.341
CLARA: I called up a lot of friends who work at a variety of different companies to kind of see what policies might look like, what insurance we needed to get, what was a good amount of time relative for people to take off or be able to take off and put together our first parental leave policy that then became kind of the standard moving forward.
00:31:54.341 –> 00:31:58.181
CLARA: And it was a really exciting time to be able to do that.
00:31:58.181 –> 00:32:02.341
CLARA: And the company was also going to be growing very rapidly with that Series A.
00:32:02.341 –> 00:32:04.781
CLARA: We were planning on hiring a ton of people.
00:32:04.781 –> 00:32:09.561
CLARA: And so we didn’t have a strong recruiting process or pipeline, but we knew we needed to hire.
00:32:09.561 –> 00:32:11.761
CLARA: So I helped build a lot of that out.
00:32:11.761 –> 00:32:19.061
CLARA: And it was just a really, I know a lot of startups use this phrase, but you know, drinking through the fire hose, there was always something to do.
00:32:19.241 –> 00:32:28.181
CLARA: And there was no right or wrong way to go about doing these things, because there simply was not a way that these things were done at this company before.
00:32:28.181 –> 00:32:38.641
MAGGIE: Yeah, that’s honestly one of the things that I think that I know I love about the Chief of Staff role, and I think draws a lot of people to the role, is that we are constantly working on new and different things.
00:32:38.641 –> 00:32:55.761
MAGGIE: And it’s this really cool blend of building and creating and then executing and then moving on and doing something else, you know, another topic or procedure policy creation or gosh, return to office or, you know, seat mapping.
00:32:55.761 –> 00:32:59.181
MAGGIE: I mean, it’s just like from the finance, like we could just go on and on.
00:32:59.181 –> 00:33:01.981
MAGGIE: There’s so many different things that Chiefs of Staff can do.
00:33:01.981 –> 00:33:10.961
MAGGIE: And within those things, it’s like a combination of the art and the science, the build, the create that, you know, I just love that about the Chief of Staff role.
00:33:10.961 –> 00:33:28.501
MAGGIE: And one other thing that makes me think about this kind of this element of the role is it’s also normal for us to want to take on a new challenge or a new role once we feel that we have set up the infrastructure and have set up the processes and systems and we tack out all the needs.
00:33:28.501 –> 00:33:31.521
MAGGIE: And we want to go do that again somewhere else or in another role or another thing.
00:33:31.521 –> 00:33:43.321
MAGGIE: And I think especially maybe generationally prior to us, there’s been this emphasis on staying in your company for years and years and decades and decades and, you know, moving around.
00:33:43.501 –> 00:33:44.401
MAGGIE: Can we talk about that?
00:33:44.401 –> 00:33:45.261
MAGGIE: Is it okay?
00:33:45.261 –> 00:33:48.141
MAGGIE: And this is just my PSA that, yes, it’s okay.
00:33:48.141 –> 00:33:59.061
MAGGIE: And Chiefs of Staff are great at what we do because we love the adventure and the problem solving and the creation and building of these things and then doing it again and again.
00:33:59.061 –> 00:34:04.981
MAGGIE: So I don’t know, Clara, if you have anything to add there, but I think it’s a fun part of the Chief of Staff role, for sure.
00:34:04.981 –> 00:34:06.081
CLARA: Yeah, absolutely.
00:34:06.081 –> 00:34:11.761
CLARA: And I know some people had mentioned, like, the startup world is not super familiar to some of you.
00:34:12.281 –> 00:34:20.961
CLARA: And so I would say Chief of Staff roles, they can be very, obviously, they can vary very differently depending on who you’re working with stage of company.
00:34:20.961 –> 00:34:26.301
CLARA: And so if you’re interested in Chief of Staff roles, it can be a variety of roles as well.
00:34:26.301 –> 00:34:40.421
CLARA: You know, a Series A company that’s very early on is going to be very different from a Series D or E or F even, where there are a lot more operations that have been established, there’s a lot more people in the team, you have department heads to work with and things like that.
00:34:40.541 –> 00:34:43.521
CLARA: So even within the startup world, it can look very different.
00:34:43.521 –> 00:34:56.321
CLARA: And so I’m happy to delve into that more as well, or if anybody has questions, I’m reading the chat, I’m happy to answer anything else that could be helpful in terms of setting context for being a Chief of Staff in this early stage startup world.
00:34:56.321 –> 00:35:07.781
MAGGIE: Yeah, so before we get to Ask a Chief of Staff, what advice do you have for people who are curious about or definitely know that they want to pursue Chief of Staff work at a startup?
00:35:09.541 –> 00:35:16.901
CLARA: Yeah, for people who are unclear or you don’t know yet, the best thing that you can do for yourself is talk to people who have done it.
00:35:16.901 –> 00:35:24.261
CLARA: I think that having informational interviews is it’s not asking for a job, so making sure that you know the distinction there.
00:35:24.261 –> 00:35:35.101
CLARA: But the best way you can find out about the role other than obviously working in the role yourself is to talk to many people who have been in the role before, and that way you can start to pattern match to understand.
00:35:35.181 –> 00:35:45.101
CLARA: Because just being an early-stage startup chief of staff can mean, like I said, a lot of different things, just like being a corporate chief of staff can mean a lot of different things.
00:35:45.101 –> 00:35:55.601
CLARA: If you’re a chief of staff at T-Mobile versus LinkedIn, those two things are going to look very different because one is a telecommunications company and one is more of a tech company.
00:35:55.761 –> 00:36:00.601
CLARA: So within startup, what kind of startup do you want to work in?
00:36:00.601 –> 00:36:01.861
CLARA: What kind of industry?
00:36:01.861 –> 00:36:02.521
CLARA: How big?
00:36:02.521 –> 00:36:03.001
CLARA: How small?
00:36:03.261 –> 00:36:04.061
CLARA: How late stage?
00:36:04.061 –> 00:36:05.641
CLARA: How early stage?
00:36:05.641 –> 00:36:11.501
CLARA: Really familiarize yourself by talking to other people and that’s going to help you hone in on that as well.
00:36:11.501 –> 00:36:14.661
CLARA: And then, sorry, your second question was around…
00:36:14.661 –> 00:36:20.641
MAGGIE: I think you hit it, like when you know you want to work in a startup, how does somebody cross that bridge and get there?
00:36:20.641 –> 00:36:23.601
MAGGIE: And you did mention having those informational interviews.
00:36:23.601 –> 00:36:25.761
MAGGIE: Anything else to add there?
00:36:25.761 –> 00:36:26.381
CLARA: Yeah.
00:36:26.381 –> 00:36:43.041
CLARA: And then the other thing I would say is looking at startup focused job boards, like things like Well-Found or Crunchbase, Y Combinator, I know I’m just throwing a bunch of names out there, but these are all companies that work in the startup space that have job boards that are specific to the startup world.
00:36:43.041 –> 00:36:50.221
CLARA: So LinkedIn, of course, also has a lot of job postings as well, and you can take a look and see how many people are at that company.
00:36:50.221 –> 00:36:57.781
CLARA: But you can always cross-reference with another website I love called Crunchbase, which will tell you what stage that company is at.
00:36:57.781 –> 00:36:58.521
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:36:58.521 –> 00:36:58.981
MAGGIE: Awesome.
00:36:58.981 –> 00:37:12.501
MAGGIE: Well, Clara, why don’t you take us from Chief of Staff’s startup world to, you know what, actually, I want to just be an advocate for Chiefs of Staff, create a membership community, bring hundreds of Chiefs of Staff together.
00:37:12.501 –> 00:37:18.441
MAGGIE: Tell us how you found yourself creating and building Ask a Chief of Staff.
00:37:18.441 –> 00:37:19.201
CLARA: Sure.
00:37:19.201 –> 00:37:28.901
CLARA: So one of the hardest things I think about the Chief of Staff role, which also makes it one of the best things, is that it really opens up your career opportunities to everything and anything else.
00:37:28.961 –> 00:37:32.881
CLARA: You can really become anything after the Chief of Staff role.
00:37:33.021 –> 00:37:41.421
CLARA: So even before taking on a Chief of Staff role, and this is something I know in hindsight now, is to think about where you want your career to be in the long term.
00:37:41.421 –> 00:37:54.041
CLARA: I wish I had given that more thought when I took on my Chief of Staff role, because after about a little over a year, I felt like I was hitting my mark in terms of, okay, I think it’s time to move on, but I have no idea what that might look like.
00:37:54.921 –> 00:38:01.581
CLARA: And so throughout my time at Huckingface, we did go through our Series B, so we did raise another round of money.
00:38:01.581 –> 00:38:07.021
CLARA: And what that meant also was that now all the operation stuff was at least in place.
00:38:07.021 –> 00:38:09.561
CLARA: We had a foundation on which to go off of.
00:38:09.561 –> 00:38:13.861
CLARA: And the next thing that we needed to think about was like, how do we grow the company to the next stage?
00:38:13.861 –> 00:38:16.281
CLARA: Did that mean monetizing a product?
00:38:16.281 –> 00:38:18.621
CLARA: Did that just mean acquiring more users?
00:38:18.621 –> 00:38:25.061
CLARA: Did that mean now it’s time to consider, like, what next thing we can build?
00:38:25.061 –> 00:38:30.561
CLARA: And so with the, with Hugging Face in particular, they were in the AI space.
00:38:30.561 –> 00:38:39.581
CLARA: And because we started to need to think about what that next stage would look like, it would really look like me needing to build more knowledge in the AI space.
00:38:39.581 –> 00:38:47.421
CLARA: In that earlier stage at Series A, I needed to know what AI stuff we were building, but I didn’t need to get as deep into it.
00:38:47.421 –> 00:38:51.081
CLARA: Once we hit our Series B, I really had to start to pick up more industry knowledge.
00:38:51.481 –> 00:38:59.821
CLARA: And that was the point where I was thinking to myself, okay, if I really build myself into this space, I’m going to start to build a career in AI.
00:38:59.821 –> 00:39:02.021
CLARA: Is that what I want?
00:39:02.021 –> 00:39:03.921
CLARA: For me, I think AI is important.
00:39:03.921 –> 00:39:10.701
CLARA: Obviously, looking at the state of the world now, we can see how prevalent it is, but it wasn’t necessarily where I needed or wanted to build my career.
00:39:10.701 –> 00:39:22.781
CLARA: What I really enjoyed doing was people, like I think this is a commonality or common thread throughout my entire career, is talking to people, helping people, building communities, bringing people together.
00:39:22.781 –> 00:39:28.561
CLARA: I had the opportunity to go to OnDeck and build out their Chief of Staff fellowship.
00:39:28.561 –> 00:39:31.541
CLARA: It was actually a fellowship that I myself had gone through.
00:39:31.541 –> 00:39:33.041
CLARA: It was an eight-week program at the time.
00:39:33.041 –> 00:39:36.261
CLARA: By the time I took it over, it became a year-long program.
00:39:36.261 –> 00:39:46.781
CLARA: It was really this opportunity to continue to build in the Chief of Staff space, and really start to provide some of the resources that I wish I had had earlier in my career.
00:39:49.381 –> 00:39:53.041
CLARA: The community space was somewhere that I knew I wanted to continue to build in.
00:39:53.041 –> 00:39:59.781
CLARA: We did have somewhat of a community within the AI space when I worked at Hugging Face, and I really enjoyed being able to interact with people there.
00:39:59.781 –> 00:40:12.821
CLARA: This opportunity at ONDEC, again, using the power of network, I knew that the founder or the program director of the fellowship was moving on to a different role within ONDEC.
00:40:12.821 –> 00:40:16.321
CLARA: I knew that there was going to be this vacuum and put myself up for that role.
00:40:16.421 –> 00:40:21.701
CLARA: I basically volunteered and said, I really enjoyed my time in this community space.
00:40:21.701 –> 00:40:31.481
CLARA: Having gone through it myself, I think that there are some things that I could bring to the table as a consumer of the product and now being on the other side to help improve it.
00:40:31.481 –> 00:40:36.741
CLARA: And I’m really passionate about the Chief of Staff role, so I would love to continue to bring people together here.
00:40:36.741 –> 00:40:42.881
CLARA: And so that was the transition from being a Chief of Staff to now building communities of Chief of Staff.
00:40:44.041 –> 00:40:44.561
MAGGIE: Amazing.
00:40:44.561 –> 00:40:57.981
MAGGIE: Okay, so tell us about Ask a Chief of Staff and what it is, what your members get, how people interact with each other, and what does the day to day look like for you as the leader of Ask a Chief of Staff?
00:40:57.981 –> 00:40:58.701
CLARA: Sure.
00:40:58.701 –> 00:41:01.521
CLARA: So here at Ask a Chief of Staff, we do have a community.
00:41:01.521 –> 00:41:04.441
CLARA: It’s an online community that’s mostly run through Slack.
00:41:04.441 –> 00:41:06.641
CLARA: We have two tiers of membership.
00:41:06.641 –> 00:41:18.481
CLARA: One is for our current Chiefs of Staff, so people who are already in the role and they’re looking to network with other Chiefs of Staff to share best practices, learn from each other, and really take your career to the next level.
00:41:18.481 –> 00:41:22.421
CLARA: One of the hardest things about being a Chief of Staff is that you just don’t know what you don’t know.
00:41:22.421 –> 00:41:30.061
CLARA: A lot of the times when you’re encountering something, it’s the first time you’ve encountered it and you’re expected to deliver at an executive level.
00:41:30.061 –> 00:41:34.441
CLARA: But the good news is that it’s not the world’s first time encountering this kind of problem.
00:41:34.441 –> 00:41:44.021
CLARA: Other people have gone through this before, so using this collective knowledge, we can help accelerate Chiefs of Staff to create more impact at their current companies.
00:41:44.021 –> 00:41:53.261
CLARA: Our second membership tier is our Aspiring Chief of Staff tier, which is great for people who are looking to either land their first or next Chief of Staff role.
00:41:53.261 –> 00:41:59.141
CLARA: There we really focus on job search, resume review, interview prep, things like that.
00:41:59.141 –> 00:42:05.881
CLARA: Again, it’s really great, I think, to have people who are in a similar career mindset or similar situation.
00:42:05.881 –> 00:42:12.441
CLARA: They’re looking for a job and bringing together this community so that you don’t feel so alone when you’re going through this job search.
00:42:12.441 –> 00:42:19.241
CLARA: The role itself is inherently a little bit lonely, so having people who get it is really helpful.
00:42:19.241 –> 00:42:43.581
CLARA: One of the things that we pride ourselves on is that we like to uncover the hidden job market and basically find opportunities that are not posted online anywhere else, and make introductions to those CEOs for our members, and so that they are able to really get in front of the people that they want to work with and put their best foot forward, instead of being one of hundreds of applications that now go through a LinkedIn ATS system.
00:42:43.581 –> 00:42:44.601
MAGGIE: Yeah, that’s amazing.
00:42:44.601 –> 00:43:01.721
MAGGIE: So if I’m in the aspiring Chief of Staff tier looking for a job, and then I find a Chief of Staff job, do I just move to the other tier, and now I’m in the tier among existing Chiefs of Staff, and I still have this great community?
00:43:01.721 –> 00:43:02.521
CLARA: Yes, absolutely.
00:43:02.521 –> 00:43:09.721
CLARA: So we would upgrade you into our current Chief of Staff tier so that you have the peers around you that are, again, at the same career level that you’re at.
00:43:09.721 –> 00:43:10.201
MAGGIE: Cool.
00:43:10.201 –> 00:43:10.781
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:43:10.781 –> 00:43:11.221
MAGGIE: Awesome.
00:43:11.221 –> 00:43:12.601
MAGGIE: And you do a lot of events.
00:43:12.601 –> 00:43:31.881
MAGGIE: So we kind of alluded to this earlier, but Clara, you’re in Chicago, you’re in New York, you’re in California, and you have Chief of Staff dinners, right, that are a way to get local Chiefs of Staff together and network, kind of how we were talking about earlier, like the little easier to network with people who you know are doing the same thing as you, and they’re looking for the same thing.
00:43:31.881 –> 00:43:34.521
MAGGIE: And you host these events, right, pretty often?
00:43:35.761 –> 00:43:36.601
CLARA: Yes, pretty often.
00:43:36.601 –> 00:43:44.381
CLARA: We try to do all the major geographies that we’re in at least once a quarter, San Francisco and New York are, of course, our biggest.
00:43:44.381 –> 00:43:47.101
CLARA: But we are, I’m going to Chicago tomorrow night.
00:43:47.101 –> 00:43:50.401
CLARA: We have a 10-person Chief of Staff dinner in Chicago.
00:43:50.401 –> 00:43:53.161
CLARA: We are going to be doing a three-day summit.
00:43:53.161 –> 00:43:55.161
CLARA: You’re hearing it here first.
00:43:55.161 –> 00:44:08.661
CLARA: If you’re not in our community already, but we’re doing a three-day Chief of Staff summit in Santa Rosa coming up in April, where we’re bringing together Chiefs of Staff to learn from each other and do a fun wine tasting as well.
00:44:08.661 –> 00:44:12.841
CLARA: And we’re also doing a lot more happy hours throughout the country as well.
00:44:12.841 –> 00:44:16.381
CLARA: So actually, let me see if I can drop this link for all of you.
00:44:16.381 –> 00:44:20.821
CLARA: But we do online workshops, we do in-person events, everything and anything.
00:44:20.821 –> 00:44:25.261
CLARA: So if you want to come join us for any of those, please feel free to sign up for any of them.
00:44:25.261 –> 00:44:28.021
CLARA: And all these events are free for our members.
00:44:28.101 –> 00:44:34.261
CLARA: So it’s a little park incentive to join, so you can meet people in person or online virtually.
00:44:34.261 –> 00:44:34.841
MAGGIE: Very cool.
00:44:34.841 –> 00:44:44.521
MAGGIE: And as a reminder, for the Nova students that are on, any student of Nova gets their first month with Ask a Chief of Staff complimentary.
00:44:44.521 –> 00:44:48.081
MAGGIE: You just have to email Clara, you can see me, we can make sure that you’re covered there.
00:44:48.081 –> 00:44:51.281
MAGGIE: But just a reminder that we have this great partnership.
00:44:51.281 –> 00:44:53.561
MAGGIE: I think that what Clara is doing is awesome.
00:44:53.561 –> 00:44:56.361
MAGGIE: I mean, it’s a lonely world sometimes out there as a Chief of Staff.
00:44:57.141 –> 00:45:06.021
MAGGIE: And having resources, like Clara said, who’ve been through these challenges before, you’re probably not the first person to approach a problem.
00:45:06.021 –> 00:45:10.681
MAGGIE: It might be a little bit different, but to have people to reach out to is so clutch.
00:45:10.681 –> 00:45:17.061
MAGGIE: And it was really important to me in my beginning of my Chief of Staff journey to have someone to say, here’s a template.
00:45:17.061 –> 00:45:20.001
MAGGIE: Oh my gosh, gold, right?
00:45:21.141 –> 00:45:27.921
MAGGIE: Okay, so if you have questions for Clara, please pop them into the Q&A portion of the chat.
00:45:27.921 –> 00:45:34.001
MAGGIE: I’m trying to see if there’s any questions yet in the chat chat area, but Q&A works best for this.
00:45:34.001 –> 00:45:36.301
MAGGIE: So feel free to pop them in.
00:45:36.301 –> 00:45:39.501
MAGGIE: Clara, what is your favorite thing about being a Chief of Staff?
00:45:39.501 –> 00:45:41.221
MAGGIE: Is it talking to people?
00:45:42.501 –> 00:45:45.081
CLARA: Talking to people is definitely, I mean, it’s a great part of it.
00:45:45.081 –> 00:45:52.921
CLARA: I think like as a Chief of Staff, you’re required to talk to people throughout the company to get a pulse of what’s going on.
00:45:52.921 –> 00:45:57.661
CLARA: For me personally, being a Chief of Staff was just the opportunity that you got.
00:45:57.661 –> 00:46:05.421
CLARA: You had such a wide array of different responsibilities, special projects, strategic initiatives.
00:46:05.421 –> 00:46:09.501
CLARA: So you would really just have a chance to work on everything and anything.
00:46:09.501 –> 00:46:19.161
CLARA: I think that breadth was what was really got me most excited about waking up every day and seeing, like, what are we going to tackle today or this week or this quarter?
00:46:19.161 –> 00:46:19.601
MAGGIE: Amazing.
00:46:19.601 –> 00:46:21.441
MAGGIE: OK, we’re going to do some rapid fire questions.
00:46:21.441 –> 00:46:24.961
MAGGIE: So what is a day in the life right now of Clara Ma?
00:46:24.961 –> 00:46:28.281
MAGGIE: And what are the tools you use each week and day?
00:46:29.321 –> 00:46:32.921
CLARA: Just to clarify, is this a day in life of my life right now or Chief of Staff stuff?
00:46:32.921 –> 00:46:33.401
MAGGIE: Your life.
00:46:33.401 –> 00:46:36.021
MAGGIE: We’re going to take Clara’s life for this one.
00:46:37.421 –> 00:46:39.321
CLARA: So I’m doing obviously a lot of community work.
00:46:39.321 –> 00:46:41.221
CLARA: So I like to time block my day.
00:46:41.221 –> 00:46:51.741
CLARA: That’s probably the biggest tool that I can recommend, is that I have a really great EA, and she knows that I take meetings from 10 to 12 every day.
00:46:51.741 –> 00:46:54.601
CLARA: And then after that, it’s like deep work time for me.
00:46:54.601 –> 00:47:01.221
CLARA: So I really try to time block, and that’s probably the best tool that I can recommend.
00:47:01.221 –> 00:47:08.841
CLARA: Otherwise, I mean, I love using ambient for all of my note-taking during my meetings, so I don’t have to take notes talking with somebody.
00:47:08.841 –> 00:47:11.361
CLARA: It can take the notes for me and summarize everything.
00:47:11.901 –> 00:47:14.681
CLARA: And then I’m a big just G Suite user.
00:47:14.881 –> 00:47:15.741
CLARA: I love Gmail.
00:47:15.741 –> 00:47:16.941
CLARA: I love Google Calendar.
00:47:16.941 –> 00:47:19.781
CLARA: I think all of them work together super well.
00:47:19.781 –> 00:47:31.381
CLARA: And the last tool I will say is I use Crisp for my Zoom meetings, and it’s great at filtering out all the background sounds and also doing noise cancellation.
00:47:31.381 –> 00:47:43.481
CLARA: So if you’re like me and you like to work from anywhere, cafes, hotel lobbies, things like that, it’s really great to clear out the ambient noise so everybody can come across crystal clear.
00:47:43.481 –> 00:47:44.081
MAGGIE: I love that.
00:47:44.081 –> 00:47:48.661
MAGGIE: I hadn’t heard of Crisp before, but it does make sense for a New Yorker for sure.
00:47:52.001 –> 00:47:52.481
MAGGIE: Yeah.
00:47:52.481 –> 00:47:52.801
MAGGIE: All right.
00:47:52.801 –> 00:47:58.381
MAGGIE: So favorite resource in terms of like books or podcasts for scaling startups.
00:47:59.721 –> 00:48:00.941
CLARA: Okay.
00:48:00.941 –> 00:48:03.081
CLARA: Zero to one is one that I can recommend.
00:48:03.081 –> 00:48:07.521
CLARA: I think most people have probably heard of it is written by Peter Thiel.
00:48:07.521 –> 00:48:09.201
CLARA: It’s all about scaling from zero to one.
00:48:10.321 –> 00:48:12.601
CLARA: Other ones that I’m trying to think of.
00:48:12.601 –> 00:48:14.441
MAGGIE: That one’s called Scaling from Zero to One.
00:48:14.441 –> 00:48:15.241
MAGGIE: Is that what you said?
00:48:15.241 –> 00:48:17.021
CLARA: It’s called Zero to One.
00:48:17.021 –> 00:48:17.681
MAGGIE: Zero to One.
00:48:17.681 –> 00:48:19.061
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:48:19.061 –> 00:48:19.981
MAGGIE: Correct.
00:48:19.981 –> 00:48:25.821
CLARA: And then podcasts wise, it’s been a little while since I’ve done the podcast.
00:48:25.821 –> 00:48:27.921
CLARA: When it comes to startup things.
00:48:27.921 –> 00:48:29.761
CLARA: Let me get back to you on that.
00:48:29.761 –> 00:48:30.021
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:48:30.021 –> 00:48:31.121
CLARA: It’s been a little while.
00:48:31.161 –> 00:48:31.361
CLARA: Yeah.
00:48:31.361 –> 00:48:33.581
CLARA: I think also take a look at Renny.
00:48:33.581 –> 00:48:36.741
CLARA: Lenny Raditzky, I think, is how you spell his name.
00:48:36.741 –> 00:48:41.181
CLARA: He does a lot of great articles on his sub-stack about product and scaling.
00:48:41.181 –> 00:48:43.481
CLARA: So that’s probably a really good one to check out as well.
00:48:43.481 –> 00:48:44.301
MAGGIE: It’s a great resource.
00:48:44.301 –> 00:48:46.821
MAGGIE: And How I Built This Podcast, I just love it.
00:48:47.341 –> 00:48:52.561
MAGGIE: It does feature massive companies now that have raised hundreds of millions of dollars.
00:48:52.561 –> 00:48:58.901
MAGGIE: But it’s so cool to hear about their journey when they were, you know, bootstrapping and working at McDonald’s.
00:48:58.961 –> 00:49:03.201
MAGGIE: And now they’re, you know, these major, major company owners.
00:49:03.201 –> 00:49:07.081
MAGGIE: Calendly, they have an episode on Calendly.
00:49:07.081 –> 00:49:09.901
MAGGIE: And the founder is from Nigeria.
00:49:09.901 –> 00:49:11.541
MAGGIE: Incredible story.
00:49:11.541 –> 00:49:13.961
MAGGIE: So if you want to start with one of them, I would start there.
00:49:13.961 –> 00:49:14.341
MAGGIE: All right.
00:49:14.341 –> 00:49:15.901
MAGGIE: So Ms.
00:49:15.901 –> 00:49:23.121
MAGGIE: Clara, with the understanding that every industry varies, what would you suggest a starting salary range for a Chief of Staff?
00:49:23.121 –> 00:49:25.361
MAGGIE: This is a hard one because it is a huge range.
00:49:26.701 –> 00:49:34.541
CLARA: Yes, it’s a range that depends on the size of the company, how much money they’ve raised, how much experience you have.
00:49:34.541 –> 00:49:36.401
CLARA: So let me redirect you.
00:49:36.401 –> 00:49:41.741
CLARA: I know this is a little self-promo, but our sub stack actually has a compensation survey.
00:49:41.741 –> 00:49:46.061
CLARA: Maggie, I’m trying to type things in the chat, but I think it’s only going to the hosts and panelists.
00:49:46.061 –> 00:50:08.161
CLARA: So if you want to follow up with everybody after, it’s I think, gosh, I don’t know what issue of it is, but if you go to askachiefofstaff.com and take a look at our blog, we do have our compensation survey there, and that will help you figure out where you are in that range.
00:50:08.161 –> 00:50:08.601
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:50:08.601 –> 00:50:11.761
MAGGIE: I am resending a couple of the things that you sent.
00:50:11.761 –> 00:50:14.921
MAGGIE: The setting might just be on your chat was to hosts and panelists.
00:50:14.921 –> 00:50:17.401
MAGGIE: So resending a couple of those.
00:50:17.401 –> 00:50:20.421
MAGGIE: But yes, Clara has some awesome resources out there for salary.
00:50:20.961 –> 00:50:29.681
MAGGIE: To throw it out there, just to give you a number, Jodi, I would say Chief of Staff minimum these days, and gosh, it’s so geographic.
00:50:29.681 –> 00:50:33.161
MAGGIE: It’s so company dependent, startup, maturity, all the things.
00:50:33.161 –> 00:50:37.541
MAGGIE: But minimum would probably be 120 to 140 with a max of 200 to 300.
00:50:37.561 –> 00:50:45.501
MAGGIE: Huge range, but you’d probably find yourself somewhere in there, and to help relate a bit to maybe EAs.
00:50:45.501 –> 00:50:55.221
MAGGIE: I would say if an EA is at around 100, a Chief of Staff, I have seen usually is probably around like a 140 from a comparison standpoint.
00:50:55.221 –> 00:51:00.021
MAGGIE: So very, very rough, but I want to give you a little bit of context there.
00:51:00.021 –> 00:51:00.441
MAGGIE: Okay.
00:51:00.441 –> 00:51:08.521
MAGGIE: So next question here, for aspiring Chiefs of Staff, long-term goal, it’s not next job, it’s my long-term goal.
00:51:08.521 –> 00:51:12.101
MAGGIE: What are some transitional rules that I should be looking for?
00:51:12.101 –> 00:51:16.461
MAGGIE: Like right now or next job, what should I be aiming for to help get me to Chief of Staff?
00:51:19.021 –> 00:51:21.541
CLARA: So depending on where you want to be a Chief of Staff, right?
00:51:21.541 –> 00:51:28.281
CLARA: So if it’s within, let’s say a larger corporation, there may be a track within that corporation that you might want to look into.
00:51:28.281 –> 00:51:36.201
CLARA: Sometimes it can be like a project manager role or like a strategic initiatives lead, it could be a variety of things.
00:51:36.361 –> 00:51:39.961
CLARA: I mean, EAs also can make that leap into a Chief of Staff role.
00:51:39.961 –> 00:52:01.861
CLARA: So if you’re working with like an executive or a head of business unit, if you are looking at early stage startups, I would say if you ever see at an early stage startup careers page, there is a title listing that says, don’t see the job that you want and want to apply anyway, that is the chance for you to build yourself into that role.
00:52:04.521 –> 00:52:12.621
CLARA: That’s very much the, I will do anything type of role and really trying to figure out, as long as I can get my foot in the door.
00:52:12.621 –> 00:52:20.001
CLARA: With startups, titles are so leading, it doesn’t necessarily mean you only do that thing.
00:52:20.001 –> 00:52:33.021
CLARA: If you can get your foot in the door with whatever functional background you have at the startup that you would like to be a Chief of Staff at down the line, that is going to be much more valuable than any specific job title that makes sense.
00:52:33.021 –> 00:52:34.041
MAGGIE: Yeah.
00:52:34.041 –> 00:52:39.541
MAGGIE: It’s always easier to move into the role you want at the company you’re already at.
00:52:39.621 –> 00:52:42.161
MAGGIE: Like Claire is saying, can you put a proposal together?
00:52:42.161 –> 00:52:43.821
MAGGIE: Can you identify what that looks like?
00:52:43.821 –> 00:53:05.521
MAGGIE: I think another thing to look for, especially, I guess internally or externally, if you’re trying to identify what is a Chief of Staff role or what is close to a Chief of Staff role, it’s roles and even just job responsibilities that are for a person more so than for a separate line of business or a separate work stream or product or whatnot.
00:53:05.521 –> 00:53:10.981
MAGGIE: So is there a person behind the computer at your all-hands event?
00:53:10.981 –> 00:53:15.721
MAGGIE: That person’s probably somewhat on this Chief of Staff team or this back office team.
00:53:15.721 –> 00:53:19.621
MAGGIE: Is there a person running around for other events doing logistics?
00:53:19.621 –> 00:53:22.101
MAGGIE: Is there a person helping ghost writing?
00:53:22.241 –> 00:53:26.261
MAGGIE: Is there like, who are the people supporting the leader?
00:53:26.261 –> 00:53:28.561
MAGGIE: Those are the back office chief of staff roles.
00:53:28.561 –> 00:53:40.881
MAGGIE: And it can sometimes help to understand that kind of visual or kind of an example when looking at job descriptions, job descriptions, especially to figure out like, what is this role?
00:53:40.881 –> 00:53:43.761
MAGGIE: Is it doing all these things for a leader to support a leader?
00:53:43.761 –> 00:53:48.201
MAGGIE: Or is it like, I’m running this product program management or whatnot?
00:53:49.241 –> 00:53:53.741
MAGGIE: So that’s probably another little thing to look for there.
00:53:53.741 –> 00:53:55.461
MAGGIE: Okay, well, that’s the end of our questions.
00:53:55.461 –> 00:53:59.601
MAGGIE: Clara, do you want to leave us with any final thoughts, how to get ahold of you, how to reach you?
00:53:59.601 –> 00:54:03.581
MAGGIE: Ask a Chief of Staff, I’m happy to post some things in the chat too.
00:54:03.581 –> 00:54:04.461
CLARA: Absolutely.
00:54:04.461 –> 00:54:06.361
CLARA: Best way to get in touch with me is on my LinkedIn.
00:54:06.361 –> 00:54:07.881
CLARA: I love connecting with all of you.
00:54:07.881 –> 00:54:11.001
CLARA: So please send me a LinkedIn request and I’m happy to accept it.
00:54:11.001 –> 00:54:22.641
CLARA: And that’s where I’m posting about the newsletters we write, and posting about different things like Maggie and I both cover EQ a lot about how that’s one of the most important things a Chief of Staff can do.
00:54:22.641 –> 00:54:27.041
CLARA: And everything that I work on, you will see it on my LinkedIn first.
00:54:27.041 –> 00:54:29.141
CLARA: So please send me a request there.
00:54:29.141 –> 00:54:34.101
CLARA: I saw a question in the chat about repeating the details for our aspiring Chief of Staff.
00:54:34.101 –> 00:54:49.081
CLARA: So yes, the aspiring Chief of Staff membership, you have access to our Slack community, you have access to our resume review, help, interview prep, job search, exclusive jobs that are not posted anywhere else, as well as mentorship.
00:54:49.081 –> 00:54:56.421
CLARA: So many of our current and former Chiefs of Staff are happy to be mentors to you as you go through your own Chief of Staff search.
00:54:56.421 –> 00:54:57.281
CLARA: So hopefully that’s helpful.
00:54:57.281 –> 00:55:02.181
CLARA: Otherwise, you can go on our website, askachiefofstaff.com, and there’s more details there.
00:55:02.181 –> 00:55:04.681
CLARA: And I think that’s pretty much everything.
00:55:04.681 –> 00:55:08.941
CLARA: I mean, I hope that this is the start of many conversations that I have with many of you.
00:55:09.641 –> 00:55:15.821
CLARA: I’m also happy to do career chat, so one-on-one 30-minute calls, if that’s something that you want to explore further.
00:55:15.821 –> 00:55:18.341
CLARA: And thank you, Maggie, for having me.
00:55:18.341 –> 00:55:21.641
CLARA: This was so wonderful to get to chat with you in this setting.
00:55:21.641 –> 00:55:22.241
MAGGIE: Absolutely.
00:55:22.241 –> 00:55:25.021
MAGGIE: It’s so fun to get to know you a little bit better and hear about your journey.
00:55:25.021 –> 00:55:30.721
MAGGIE: It’s inspiring and I think it’s really helpful to hear how you balance all the things and what you recommend looking back.
00:55:30.721 –> 00:55:32.521
MAGGIE: So thanks everyone for joining.
00:55:32.521 –> 00:55:33.721
MAGGIE: Have a wonderful night.
00:55:33.721 –> 00:55:36.241
MAGGIE: Have a great Valentine’s Day.
00:55:36.241 –> 00:55:37.601
MAGGIE: Also, Valentine’s Day is silly.
00:55:37.821 –> 00:55:39.521
MAGGIE: If it’s not for you, that’s okay too.
00:55:39.521 –> 00:55:46.361
MAGGIE: So we’ll see you back in the workspace tomorrow, everyone, and have an awesome day.
00:55:46.361 –> 00:55:48.061
MAGGIE: Thanks, Clara.
00:55:48.061 –> 00:55:49.161
CLARA: Bye, everyone.
00:55:49.161 –> 00:55:50.041
MAGGIE: Bye, everyone.
00:56:01.038 –> 00:56:03.098
<v SPEAKER_2>Please review on Apple Podcasts.
00:56:09.817 –> 00:56:11.517
<v SPEAKER_2>goburrows.com.
