How to market your global development skills to a Silicon Valley startup

Like many of her American colleagues committed to social impact, Nov. 8, 2016 was a huge wake-up call for Leila Makarechi, now head of international government partnerships at ‎Coursera. “I had to find some way to actively address what’s happening in our country,” she told Devex. “Right around the time of the election, regardless of who you voted for, I think it’s pretty safe to say you could take a look at the country and feel like we’re not super unified, and a lot of people are in a really difficult position and really hurting, and that’s something I wanted to address in my next role.” Previously, she worked for nearly a decade with Microclinic International, a nonprofit organization that leverages human relationships to address chronic diseases including diabetes and obesity, both in the United States and internationally. Following the U.S. presidential election, she started what she calls an exploration rather than a search for a job to better understand the role of the private sector in addressing societal divisions. She talked with as many people as she could get to agree to a coffee, and ultimately chose to join Coursera, where she said she is able to leverage her background in a new and different way to advance a mission she believes in. Our conversation below has been edited for length and clarity. Even before Coursera, your work was focused both domestically and internationally. What are the connections you saw between the two? And how did this work across borders lead you to Coursera? As I took a step back from having spent more than a decade in development, and deciding on my next career move before coming to Coursera, what I was trying to think about is: What are some of the biggest challenges that affect our country and are relevant in the world? I love working internationally. I love learning about different cultures and traveling. And I wanted to find a challenge or an issue that made sense to work on both here at home in the U.S. and around the world. There are really two big themes that stood out for me. One is that people need real access to opportunity to improve their own lives and make sure they can provide for their own families. I have experience working in Eastern Kentucky and Northeastern Tennessee and I saw this firsthand in Appalachia. It’s certainly true in Oakland, where I live. It’s as true in the U.S. as it is in developing economies. Politically, what’s happening in the world right now and some of the reverberations we’re feeling in the U.S. are really strong outcries of “I need to be able to provide for my family and I will vote for whoever it is that I think is hearing me.” The challenges I saw working in Kentucky and Tennessee were very similar to the challenges I saw working with refugees in Jordan. Yes, the context is different, the politics are different, the culture, the language, the food, the dress, the religion are different. But there really truly is a universal aspect to humanity. And that’s one of the things that made Coursera attractive to me, is understanding that the company is interested in a very serious way of engaging this huge global challenge that we’re facing. Because we do have this universal aspect to our humanity, I actually felt like bringing in technology and addressing that challenge at scale made sense. I’ve been, and I continue to be, very critical of applying technology to development challenges because I think sometimes we leave out so much in thinking that the same solution can just apply at scale everywhere. But I felt like this made sense and what Coursera had to offer could truly resonate across the world. Particularly given that concern about technology and development, what drew you to the private sector, and in particular to Silicon Valley? I started my career thinking non profit or multilateral institutions were the ways to address big problems, and I think they are at the forefront of really rolling up their sleeves and doing the dirty work. But they can’t solve the problem on their own. So the reason why I came to Coursera is I believe in what they're doing, but they're also a private company. I wanted to find a way that I could bring the private and public sectors together and go after a challenge. I really am excited about that opportunity on my team, working with the public sector as we partner with governments. The biggest learnings that I can bring to Coursera are how do you get the right people around the table in a country that could be halfway across the world from where you’re based to have a serious discussion, and how do you coordinate with the government and the United Nations, and whoever else you’re working with, to produce actual results, and what are those processes and systems like outside of the U.S.? What excites me is opening up Silicon Valley to the rest of the world, particularly developing and emerging markets. Not just as this is a great investment opportunity and another way you can diversify your portfolio and increase your returns, but, in a way that there are incredibly smart and innovative and bright leaders all around the world doing huge things for their countries. And yes, at Coursera we can bring a part of the solution. But we also have this awesome opportunity to learn and see how you do development at scale when your budget is super tight. Sometimes in Silicon Valley we get this idea that we have all the solutions, and we should just go out and market it to the world. I would hope to think that part of the perspective that I bring is a little bit of humility and respect for the governments I’m talking to. It’s operationalized in very small ways like learning how to greet people in their local language or in much more complex ways like how do you navigate World Bank funding. I know a lot of our readers at Devex are making this transition from the official development assistance ecosystem to some of these new players including Silicon Valley companies. What advice do you have for them? Take a step back and think really critically about what skills you have that translate to the tech sector. The reason why I was able to have a few different options on the table is that I spent a lot of time thinking about that. Part of it is even simply how do you talk about it? No one in the private sector tech world talks like we do in the U.N. or in the nonprofit world. If you’re really good at understanding the players in a complex international organization, can you frame that as “I understand your customer, the people you want to partner with and I can do business development.” You have to think about what your strengths and your skills are, and how that translates into a new sector. Being on the opposite end — we just recruited someone new to join our team — the strongest candidates I interviewed were really thoughtful about that translation. It’s not that your experience is irrelevant. It’s very relevant and there’s a huge need for companies that are growing to tap into those kinds of skillsets. But you have to speak the same language as the person interviewing you, because they do not speak our language. I asked myself who’s doing what? What do I believe in that’s really important to me, more than just numbers and meeting the bottom line? I can do that but I will do it much better if I actually believe in why I’m doing it. I talked to a lot of different people in many different companies, but I found that Coursera has a really special understanding of this opportunity where it’s not seen as “let’s do some social impact work and do some PR around that and call it a day” or “we’ll have the foundation arm of the company deal with these people.” This work with governments is a serious, fully integrated part of our B2B business, and I think it makes sense to do it like that because it allows our team the resources and the support to do this work just as well as when we partner with our corporate clients. I don’t think that you can address the skills gap or improve labor market conditions or prepare the workforce for the future at the national level without involving the government. I obviously have a bias given my background. But I don’t see government as an obstacle that should be bulldozed over and moved aside because they’re slow. I’m genuinely excited and struck by a for-profit, venture capital-backed private company taking so seriously the needs and interests and priorities of all kinds of countries, developed or not. If anyone is excited by that, please reach out to us. Looking to make a career move? Visit our career center for expert advice on how to navigate your job search — all you need is a Devex Career Account to get started.