More than most, Sérgio Maria’s career has been about transition and transformation. In a working daily life helping standard firms navigate the upheavals of new technological innovation, he has also rethought his have route along the way.
For a lot more than a decade, the 48-yr-previous senior digital govt, who lives in São Paulo, has labored with organisations adapting to digital disruption and innovation, very first at Google and now with Brazilian media and amusement group Rede Globo. All the even though, acquiring the competencies to set himself in others’ shoes, divine their enterprise wants and converse how he can support has been at the centre of his career.
Through 12 years at Google, Maria’s core perform was building interactions with publishers, including newspapers, broadcasters and retailers. “In 2011 in Brazil, the information industry was quite averse to Google,” he recalls. “I could not have a dialogue with a newspaper CEO — they wouldn’t even respond to my phone calls.”
The icy reception was comprehensible. At the time, digital was decimating the standard information industry. Audience have been obtaining their information on the internet, advertisers have been adhering to them and the print income product was battling.
Towards this backdrop, the Brazilian was tasked with obtaining regions in which the competitor could grow to be a collaborator. He joined Google as a strategic spouse manager and at some point rose to grow to be director of world wide partnerships for Latin The usa and Brazil throughout broadcast, information and commerce.
“Google has the advertising revenue job that competes with all the other teams for advertising budgets . . . and that is how it is likely to perform endlessly,” Maria acknowledges. “But I was in a group that was wanting at the other aspect — which is, how can we support these partners build them selves, be a lot more economical in the way they do their enterprise and also make income?”
He also labored with journalists, outlining how to mine Google details for investigative perform he taught publishers how technological innovation could support them recognize users’ conduct and he served optimise mobile products. The world wide accumulation of such perform grew into the Google News Initiative, which supports journalism in the sort of a schooling centre and an innovation fund, for example.
Following 12 years at Google, Maria was at a crossroads. If he stayed, the next move would be a transfer abroad, in a new job and lifestyle. That did not suit with his personalized plans, so he made the decision to consider a career break, shell out time with his family members — he has 3 sons — and mirror on his next transfer.
CV
2004-2005 Solution and expert services director, Oi Online
2006-2007 Solution manager, Brasil Telecom Online
2007-2011 Strategic spouse manager, Google
2011-2016 Head of strategic partnerships, Latin The usa, Google
2016-2017 Director of world wide partnerships, Latin The usa, Google
2017-2019 Director of world wide partnerships: broadcast, information and commerce, Google
2019-present Director of new enterprise growth, Rede Globo
Occupations, he suggests, are a 3-phase journey. At the starting, professionals’ competencies tend to be a lot more technological. Then they could grow to be men and women professionals, providing up considerably of the realistic perform and acquiring competencies in primary teams and building a vision. The 3rd is the govt stage, wanting at businesses strategically in the long expression.
Maria was completely ready to transition to the 3rd phase. So in 2018, even though at Google, he enrolled for the counsellors growth programme, a corporate governance training course, at Fundação Dom Cabral enterprise faculty in Brazil.
“It was correct for that second in my career,” he suggests. “It allow me devote some time to recognize the strategic job of boards far better and how to then impact the administration staff of the organisation.”
The programme, which he accomplished at FDC’s Belo Horizonte campus, prepares long term board customers. Along with educating the ideas of administration and governance, it explores how to utilize this — for example, participants put together for and direct mock conferences of administrators.
The return to formal studying was “amazing”, Maria suggests. His career break intended he was spared balancing family members, perform and analyze all through the training course, which was taught in two 7 days-long blocks a several months apart. This authorized him to interact absolutely, he provides, some thing that these considering about govt courses should really be completely ready to do.
“People should really be geared up to stay offline and connect to the men and women on the training course and connect to the training course alone,” he suggests. “It is envisioned that you take part a large amount and there is authentic benefit in bringing your practical experience. It enriches the dialogue and the realistic exercises.”
This also suggests pupils should really share any problems or regions for advancement with classmates. “Be present, be genuine and be fearless,” Maria suggests. “The a lot more you are open, the a lot more men and women will be able to support you and you will be able to support [other] men and women.”
1 of the added benefits was building a sturdy community of like-minded friends, and Maria carries on to support men and women stay in contact as a course ambassador.
The programme has served in his job as director of new enterprise growth at Globo, which he commenced past June. “It’s not the unique technological factors that I use,” he suggests, “It is considerably a lot more of a attitude alter on how to look at and technique factors in the long run, wanting at what is in the minds of executives and the board.”
Globo could be Maria’s greatest challenge yet. As part of its digital transformation, the company announced past yr that it was bringing some of its firms jointly in a person group, including broadcast and cable television businesses, its web site and online video on-desire company.
Along with the inner alter, Maria is working on building this new media technological innovation enterprise for advertisers. “The opportunity is how to integrate all these mediums,” he suggests, so that advertisers can converse their messages seamlessly throughout all of Globo’s channels. For example, he provides: “Can we look at the journey when men and women transfer out of Tv set and go to an app to continue on consuming the written content?”
This technique and information and facts would support advertisers recognize what concept works very best in which and when. It also added benefits people, he suggests, in that adverts should really really feel a lot less jarring if chosen in such a way.
“We however provide interruption,” he suggests. “But we have to have to make interruption considerably far better in a way that is connected to the written content and to what is related to men and women.”
It was the scale of the challenge that persuaded Maria to consider the job at Globo. When the chief govt introduced his vision for the enterprise, 3 elements clicked into spot: the stage of transformation a realisation that Maria could use his schooling in digital and speedy-transferring environments and obtaining some thing that he was superior at and fired up about.
“I said, ‘OK, 3 or five years later on, if I look again and we have been able to implement the stage of transformation that the vision suggests, I’m likely to be quite happy of that.’ And that is a legacy I’m likely to leave. Talking about a media group, it’s in fact a legacy that my kids are likely to know about.”