35 Years of Leading Transformation at a Global CPG Powerhouse: with Angela Mangiapane, President, Mars Global Services

Transcript

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Peter Crosby (00:00):

Welcome to unpacking the Digital shelf where we explore brand manufacturing in the digital age. Hey everyone. Peter Crosby here from the Digital Shelf Institute. During her 35 years at Mars, Angela Mangiapane has been a leader in the front office, the middle office, and the back office. Most recently as president of Mars Global Services. For the last nine years, she has been a witness to and a driver of the digital era. And from those experiences come great wisdom and principles that should be guides to the coming generations of digital and technology leaders as well as human beings in general. Rethink, collaboration, get your house in order, unlearn to relearn as she prepares to rewire instead of retire. Angela generously agreed to join Lauren Livak Gilbert and me to pass along some of her observations and encouragement to you. Listen up. Welcome back to the podcast. Angela, we are so delighted to have you return. Thank you so much.

Angela Mangiapane (01:12):

Thank you, Peter. It's incredible to think that it's like just yesterday that we actually were speaking, but I'm sure you're going to remind me.

Peter Crosby (01:20):

Yes. Oh, I will a lot longer.

Angela Mangiapane (01:22):

Yes.

Peter Crosby (01:22):

Well, you were guest number 26. We're about to be on 300, so that tells us a little something. And we started the podcast almost six years ago, but it was in March of 2020,

Angela Mangiapane (01:36):

I think. Wow, okay. March of 2020. I know where I was in March of 2020. That was Covid.

Peter Crosby (01:42):

Yes, we were children then.

Angela Mangiapane (01:44):

Yes, you were children. Yeah.

Peter Crosby (01:46):

But now we have the incredible opportunity to speak with you as you cap an incredible 35 year career shepherding just immense business transformation at Mars. First of all, congratulations on that. There are not many people who are at one company for a lot of their career, and it's such an achievement when you think of, we'll talk about all the places you've been, but it really is wonderful.

Angela Mangiapane (02:17):

Well, thank you, Peter. It does seem strange when you say it that way about being at the same place for 35 years. And I think that what I am feeling very fortunate about is 35 years where I've worked, should I start off in finance? But Mars has given me the opportunity to work in operations, in it, in hr. I worked across the three business segments. So snack food and sought renamed chocolate m Mars snack food. So back and forth. I worked on food and then even on the pet care business. And I'm originally from Toronto and move down to the us. But again, Mars gave me an opportunity to live and work in North America, Latin America, as well as Europe. And then just the jobs that I've been able to hold gave me an opportunity to be with teams that literally work across the globe. So I have a team in China, I have a team in India, in Poland. So I really feel very blessed that yes, one company that has been led by just such a great family, but at the same time had such a variety of roles and experiences that have led me to where I am today.

Peter Crosby (03:41):

And so Angela, at this point, I believe you said you'll be rewiring not retiring in the next few months as you take on your next adventure. I don't want you to spill any secrets about your future here necessarily, unless you want to, of course. But how are you feeling about a new adventure?

Angela Mangiapane (04:07):

The word that comes to mind is extreme gratitude and fulfillment of the work that I have done in the past 35 years. Especially when I think about the different projects and initiatives that I was able to participate in. It's always been very much about transformation, but not just transformation from a business, the typical business perspective that we think, which is, okay, did you deliver on the bottom line or did you provide the revenue growth? But it's also the growth that we've given our associates, right? So as you recall, Peter, we call our employees associates. And if I think about the past 35 years, just personally seeing the growth of so many individuals that I've been able to shepherd through, hire and promote and so forth, it's been very, very fulfilling. So that's why I really leave with just an immense sense of fulfillment and gratitude and what do I look forward next? Well, maybe to coin that Frank Sinatra song, the Best is Yet to Come.

Peter Crosby (05:14):

Love it.

Angela Mangiapane (05:16):

And for me, the rewiring, while I haven't quite say that I've got it articulated in a clear enough way, I think there's still three areas that I am focusing. First and foremost is my own family, including me. So personal health and wellbeing, my grandkids, my husband. I mean, he's still excited to be with me after I finished working, which is great. Wow. You are lucky. And the other part is just bringing some of my activities that I've done in the periphery, much more into the center. So a lot of the work that I do with nonprofit, I'm active in some nonprofits that are focusing on young women empowerment, mentoringship programs, the local theater group that I'm part of. And then the third one is something that I'm just exploring, which is around the whole digital literacy and how do we make sure that as the pace of this technological change is going at an unprecedented rate, how do we make sure that society is keeping up? And that what we don't end up doing is create this chasm of people who know how to do digital and people who do not. So still in early stages of thinking, but that's the other area that I'd like to rewire myself and understand better how I can contribute and have an impact there.

Lauren Livak Gilbert (06:49):

Can't wait to hear about that. Please keep us updated because I think that's a really strong and powerful initiative that you're working on. That's exciting to hear. Angela, you've had so many different roles. You've been in multiple different countries, you've had ownership of digital and technology in multiple different countries. How have you seen the shopping experience change over the years, especially really the move to digital and now really more digitally focused? You've had a perfect seat to watch it. So what have your observations been?

Angela Mangiapane (07:22):

Yep. It's a great question because I think what happens is, so I work in a consumer packaged goods business and industry, and sometimes we forget that we're equally the consumer of our brands and we shop at our brands. So certainly I could say that during my lifetime, and I was probably in the past five years, it has been transformative, if I can use an overused word, but it's the only word really I can think of in that it has fundamentally changed the way someone approaches their relationship with a retailer. And what does it mean when I think about a purchasing an item, purchasing a service and experience? So first of all, I'll give you a little story of, and I have to do pre 2020, post 2020. So pre 2020, I did spend a lot of time in China. So my work brought me to China probably I would say it was 10 years.

(08:22):

So starting around 2010 to 20 to 2020. And what I was always amazed was with the technology advancements, how focused they were on that consumer experience. You'd go around and you'd see everybody on their phone. And if I think about WeChat, not only was WeChat connecting them socially with each other, but it was also a place of business and it was incredible. Things would just show up, pop up and Zoom. You would see things that were available. All of a sudden somebody would mention an item and everybody then converge to it. And you'd see sales lifting. A great example of that was luck and coffee versus Starbucks. Starbucks took 10 years to create a coffee culture in China or specifically in the city. So Shanghai is the one that I'm most aware of. And here's luck. And coffee came in and I think in months ended up doing what, it took Starbucks for a decade.

(09:20):

So to me it was really powerful to see that. And I'm even embarrassed to tell you that when I went to buy something, the realization that I didn't have WeChat and that they didn't even accept credit cards, let alone cash. So you're thinking, okay, something is really different over here. So then you come into from 2020, and especially during covid, all of a sudden there was a dramatic change in what I call the retail landscape, right? You couldn't go out to the stores, the physical stores, and while yes, people were doing online shopping, online shopping became more, I would say it went from being just a transaction click. I buy something to an experience that said, I can now track what Angela likes. I can give her recommendations, I can give a recommendation with algorithm, but she can also join community groups. And then if you think about even some of the TV probes like the Bachelorette, right?

(10:19):

I mean, who would've thought watching the Bachelorette and all of a sudden getting that, oh, do you know you can buy the same bag that so-and-so is wearing or the shoes or the outfits, and you're sitting there going, okay, somebody knows I'm watching the Bachelorette and here's what they're recommending. So it's fundamentally changed to, I would say, from having an experience or a product that was going out to many to now, it is a very intimate one-to-one relationship. Now it comes with consequences. I always say every tree casts a shadow. So we have this beautiful tree that's giving me this one-to-one perspective and experience, and at the same time, well, what does that mean? Well, what it means now all of a sudden is, boy do I have a lot of choice. And there's this paradox, the paradox of choice. I think when Apple tunes you say you have now thousands and thousands of titles in which to choose.

(11:27):

And what they're noticing is that people actually really narrow it down to a small number of their favorite tunes. So here you have this huge amount to choose from and you're limiting yourself. So there is something around the paradox of choice and it can become overwhelming. And I do see it myself when I go to the store at times where I'll go online and I'm like, okay, I really just want choice A or B, I want a choice, but I want A or B. So there's a paradox of choice. Then the other part is the algorithm starts to kick in and it creates a bit of an echo chamber. So Angela likes these movies, so guess what? I'm getting a whole bunch of similar movies. And at times what happens then is this lesser sense of serendipity and of discovery of awe of something that I would not have discovered.

(12:18):

And one of the things that I try to do is anytime I go to a small town, I happen to be a Sunday drive, and you find yourself in a small town is I'll always look up and see if there's a small independent bookstore. And what I love is I'll just go to the bookstore and I'll ask the person there at the counter, what are you reading? And you know what? I'll buy the book. Look, six times out of 10, I'm like, I'm not really sure why I bought this book. This is not really interested. But you know what, four times out of 10 I'm like, wow, this was actually really good. And I'll go and explore something that I never, never would have discovered and the algorithm would never have discovered because I wasn't paying attention to that. So that's that other part of just that serendipity and how do you find things?

(13:05):

I go back to again, Steve Jobs created something which was great with the whole thing of the iPhone, and yet if you'd ask somebody, would you want your iPhone with having music on it? And all the things that we have today, the camera and so forth, we would've said, no way. So it is discovering, I call it off the beaten path. And every once in a while I think you need to go off the beaten path. And then the third part is I would say is especially with the advent of AI and generative ai, is that we do have responsibility to our consumers. It's too easy to say, buyer beware, it's up to the consumer. I do think we live in a society where we all have to have that responsibility in that yes, the consumer does need to be responsible for what they're choosing, but I think corporations also have a responsibility to ensure who are we targeting and what are we doing? It's like Mars has a marketing code with generative ai. We have to be really careful and we do. We have lots of guardrails in place to making sure that we don't end up doing something that causes harm for children and so forth. So we take that to account. So lots of opportunity and all things. We have to also have a responsibility to make sure that we are doing everything that ensures that we maintain that being a force for good in society as opposed to the unintended consequences of harming.

Lauren Livak Gilbert (14:33):

So Angela, you talked about the paradox of choice, and I'm curious your perspective on how AI agents are going to make that even more targeted, right? Because you're now giving them a set of criteria, they know something about you already and they're going to provide a recommendation. How do see that fundamentally changing how brands even Mars try to compete in a category where an AI agent's making a choice for you, not a consumer necessarily?

Angela Mangiapane (15:01):

Yeah, yeah. No, it's a great question because as we know, at least from what I understand, because I will tell you, I am not going to say here we are living in a world where it's not about the know it all. I think it's about the learn it all. And so agents, I'm certainly discovering this and I can't profess to say I'm an expert at it at all. My first inclination would be that it does feel scary because what it can do is it can decide for you, and I've gone in and looked at examples where it can scour through all of my subscriptions and tell me recommend and actually not only recommend, it'll do it for me, which will say, these are the ones that you're actually reading and utilize and these are the ones that you don't. And oh, by the way, these are the ones that you can renegotiate and I will send all the notes and confirm everything with you and do all the stuff that you need to do and you don't need to do anything. There's a part of me that goes, wow, okay, what does that mean? What am I going to do? Then there's another part that says, actually there's two things. One is it really does free up my time on the stuff that I really want to focus on. And two, it also says, you better have the data, right?

(16:19):

Because all of a sudden if it has wrong subscriptions, then I may not get what I'm looking for. I go in with this feeling of it could augment my day by doing the things that I really like and that no one can say, well, an agent's going to take away from you on that. Well, if you like doing that, you'll still continue doing that, and if anything, you can augment it. A lot of the artists, I hear people saying, well, the copyright for art and so forth, absolutely important. On the flip side, artists being now created augmented with generative ai. So that creates a whole other media if you think about it. So that's also very exciting, which it means you have new applications that can be now derived new revenue growth for a business. So that's all very exciting, but it does mean your data and the way you process work really matters.

(17:23):

And I think the role of the human still in the loop, the human being in the loop is taking that step back and going, hold on a minute, based on my years of experience, based on what I'm seeing, does this still make sense? And so I think for me it's an end to end. It is having now another tool, but we'll see. I mean, we'll see where this takes us. Maybe it is a Star Trek and I'm going to go into my little hologram and just disappear and enjoy coming up with all kinds of stories that I can participate in, and I don't have to worry about anything else. I dunno. But anyway, I think for now it is one of opportunity, but it's also going to go back to responsibility of making sure that those foundations are in place.

Peter Crosby (18:12):

Well, that was one of the most notable things that you said in your opening was when you were reflecting that the experiences that you are most proud of and grateful for at Mars are the human beings that you've met, you've learned from, you've guided. And that just continuously reminds me that we talk about people, process technology, but really you can set up the best process in the world, but if the people don't follow it or if you have great people, but you're processings like that mesh of it all to make those things work. And you've spent a lot of your career trying to attack the silos and get rid of bottlenecks and do what you can to really speed things up, but keep, like you said, the humans in the loop. And sometimes those process improvements lead to frustration on people's parts. And now with AI and tools like Celonis and SAP's new releases to sort of map those processes and identify pain points, they're all sort of wrapped around Lean six Sigma kind of thing. How did you work to do you think about all of this when you think about how to make processes that result in the right outcomes at the right time,

Angela Mangiapane (19:36):

And you talked about Lean six Sigma, and I was thinking about this going, why is it that in factories, six Sigma seem to work? So back in the nineties, there was a lot of talk about let's get our process out there, do business process, use Lean six Sigma. It didn't work. Now, partly to your point today, we have some really good tools, Celonis, and you talked about also what SAP has. They go in and they're able to take out any bias and they can do it fast. They go in and say, this is how the work is happening. And you're repeating things three times or even up to 30 times. There's inefficiencies and so forth. But why is it that it's still hard? And it goes back to the point you made around people. Even today, what seems to be the blocker for anything is the people side.

(20:30):

So even the algorithms and the tools, they represent such a small piece of the changes. It is very dependent on people. And if I think about factories, what was different? Well, in a factory, first of all, you have the team leader and you have shifts, and those people on the shifts do a range of work. So you have the person who's the packaging operator, you have the person who is responsible for the peanut room, you have the person who respons for the chocolate room, and you then have the person who's looking at the newgate that's going down the line. They're all very different aspects of the job of producing a chocolate bar. But every day, first thing, when that shift starts, what do they do? They all come together and they talk about what happened with the previous shift. So the two shifts actually, they coincide the shift that's leaving comes in, spends about 10 minutes talking the shift that's coming in, and they go over what happened. Now, when's the last time that you think about, did a sales person connect with the order taker or the person who's collecting the cash? Did they sit down every day in the morning and go, okay, so let's actually review what happened here, right?

Peter Crosby (21:44):

No,

Angela Mangiapane (21:46):

No. Right. So again, the tools allow us to do that, but you have to have this mindset that says, I have to look at the entire end-to-end. And this is a big change, right? Because it forces collaboration, collaboration across the functions as opposed to it's not just optimizing your own function. You have to optimize what is that activity of work that goes from A, B, C, D, which means you're cutting across those functional lines. So collaboration, we have to really rethink what it means, and we have to actually even change potentially how we are rewarded differently. And a good reward system and outcome of what you want to achieve can really influence people. I mean, I've seen it when I was in hr, you had a very good scorecard and how to motivate people to get the job done, and they knew, okay, this is what's at stake.

(22:42):

You got that movement, you got that change. So there is this whole aspect of really rethinking about collaboration. I think that the second piece is we went back to about data. I think that in the past everybody would give up and throw their hands up and say, data is just too hard. It's disparate, can't get it done. Again, I go back to where there has to be much more of an end to end, and you have to hold people to account that the data matters and not just data that you say, okay, I'm going to transfer this into the system, but is the data that's in the system also the data that's physically there in the warehouse? And again, I would encourage everyone is when's the last time? So for all the, if there's marketers out there listening to this, right? When's the last time you went to the warehouse and you actually measured the packaging size or you took a look at that packaging and said, does it match what I have here in my spec? Basic stuff. This is basic stuff. It's stuff that I know has been wrong and we've had to correct it. Getting your house in order and ensuring that you really pump it up to say that this is important. Lots of people focus on the sexy stuff, and it's great to focus on the sexy stuff. If you don't, again, if you don't focus on those foundations, your house structurally will fall down.

(24:09):

And then the last one, which again, I think we live in an age where you have to keep trying things because we're always continually learning. And I have this whole adage that says, when I finally stop learning, that's when I get old. So I am never going to stop learning because I could always say I'm yuck. But there is this aspect of how do we go from this? I know it all. Somebody will say to me, oh, 35 years of the business, so you must know a lot. I'm like, actually, what I'm noticing is that as one gets older, the less I know because there's just so much out there that you could start asking questions. Well, why is that? Why is that? Well, why is that? And so this whole aspect of we have to go from thinking that leaders have to know it all

(25:00):

To leaders have to create an environment that you have to have people going. It's about learning. I've got to be the learn it all. And being okay to say, I don't actually get this Gen AI agents. I am just learning that. And somewhere someone in the organization will say, okay, I'll teach you that Angela, and it can be a 24-year-old. And that's okay. It is part of the reverse mentoring that I also I love doing because I learn a lot that way. So we've got to get into this aspect of rethink how we approach collaboration, got to get those foundations in place. And then once there are in place, guess what? They may be wrong. And you got to go back and you got to learn, unlearn to relearn. Because what will stop us from growing and moving is these core limiting beliefs that we either say, oh yeah, I've done this, we've done this before. I got it. I got it covered. If you ever hear somebody say, I got this, be very wary.

Lauren Livak Gilbert (26:02):

They don't got it.

Angela Mangiapane (26:04):

They don't. Got it. That's right.

Peter Crosby (26:06):

As you were talking, I kept thinking of the word humility, and sometimes humility. People are afraid to be humble or let people know that they're not sure about something or that they don't have all the answers. And it sounds like throughout your career, I dunno, maybe you started with that level of humility, but it certainly feels like by this point with all you've done, we all learned that nobody has all the answers and we're all into one degree or another, just making it up, but let's make it up together and measure it and do all those things that then gets us to the next place. Does that resonate with you?

Angela Mangiapane (26:48):

Yes. No, it does. I know there are people that say there's a whole thing about what is it? Fake it. Fake it till you make it, I think. Yeah, something like that. I've always struggled with that because it implies that we have to have this perception to people that I know it, as opposed to, I mean, I love what you said there, Peter, which was acknowledging, I may not know this and I do need help from other people. I mean, not to get too much into what's going on in the world today, but I think that the only way we can solve today's problems is we got to get all together in a room and bring in all the greatness of each person because not one person knows it all, right? We learn from each other and we go forward. And to your point, when did I learn that? Well, I guess when you're young, young, you think you can do anything.

(27:43):

And as one gets older, hopefully one acquires a little bit more wisdom. And how do you acquire wisdom? It's because you failed a lot. And what do you do? You pick yourself up, you dust it off. And I got a lot of stories. I could tell you where I failed, but while I didn't dust it off, I always went and bought myself new article of clothing. I love that. I mean, I had one story where it was bad. I have to tell you, I missed every metric in the book. And I remember going home at night and I said to my husband, you know what? I think on Monday I may not be around that much, right? I think I'm going to be probably told that's it. And he said to me, we're going to go and buy you a wonderful suit. This was back in the day where you still wore your suit to the office and bought my high heels, and I bought a red suit, red suit, went up the stairs as in, you know what? I'm going to pick myself up. And yeah, I failed on these three deliverables, but now I know, and now I know what I will not do. Or now I know what I'll do differently.

(28:55):

And this is why I thank Mars. Mars did not let go of me. They put me in another role and they said, okay, start again.

Peter Crosby (29:09):

That's amazing.

Angela Mangiapane (29:11):

And I've carried that with me. Maybe I was fortunate enough that it was early enough in my career, and I've carried that with me for other people. When somebody will say to me, oh, this person, forget it. It's like, well, let's put them in a different role. Let's put them in a very different environment and let's see what happens. And I'll tell you, nine times out of 10, they thrive. Yes, there's always the one. This is the law of numbers too. Your Bel curve, right? You're always going to get the ones that shine no matter what. You don't even have to do anything. They just shine. And then you get the few that unfortunately just isn't going to work. But there's that middle and that middle. If you just figure out the fertilizer you need to put in there and the water every day, they got to be watered.

(29:58):

They can thrive. And this is with the whole thing with digital literacy as well. We talk about what's going on with the digital world, and this is what's intriguing me, is that we can sit there and say, you know what? I'm only going to go and pick the talent that knows how to do digital well with the demographic changes that are coming. We're going to be fighting for a very small pool of people. And then what do you do with all the people that are left? Are you going to sit there and go, well see you? And this is where I think you come back to where corporations do have a social obligation and a human obligation, which is, okay, we're going to now re-skill you as long as you want to learn. And this way we get everybody being digitally literate. If we're all digitally literate, guess what?

(30:44):

It's not in the hands of the few data is now in the hands of many. And if data's in the hands of many, then some of the decisions that we're making, you're getting the different aspects, different viewpoints, and hopefully you'll come to a better decision and people will then also be held to account. You can't just say, well, I don't know this anymore. I always say, no, you can't say you don't know. You do know. And you have a responsibility to use that talent and learn it. So to me, digital literacy is no different than people knowing how to read and write. I mean, just imagine if we still lived in an age where most people didn't read and write, there no communication. And when you have no communication, you can't build upon ideas. And if you think about science, the way it works, right?

(31:35):

Science has been built off of discoveries that happened all over the world. And then it was through the art of communication that then people found out about this knowledge. But I think the same thing with digital, and it promotes then trust because now people understand it. I mean, I hate when people say it's a big black box. We had this session one time on generative ai and a vendor who will remain nameless came in and said, and it was a tech vendor, and said, yeah, there's some stuff happens in this black box. We're not really even familiar with it. And I'm thinking, oh my God, if the tech company doesn't run, I'm like, forget it. We don't have any hope in understanding it. And to me, there shouldn't be a black box. We should know because it is too important.

Peter Crosby (32:29):

Too important, yeah. Particularly particularly with ai.

Angela Mangiapane (32:33):

Yes. Well, Angela, and we have a generation that's coming up that is digital first. That's all they see. Digital first, right? Anyway, sorry, I interrupted you, Lauren.

Lauren Livak Gilbert (32:43):

No, no, no, you're totally fine. I was just going to pull on the thread of collaboration. So you've talked a lot about connecting the dots between internal organizations and how you need to work together. And I think that applies internally and externally, right? Because you have tech partners, you have agencies, you have partners in general that are helping you, but how do you incorporate that into your culture to have that level of trust, both internally to collaborate and externally with partners or technology to help you?

Angela Mangiapane (33:11):

Right. So first off, I'm a big believer in that when people talk about the walls of an organization, they're very porous. There is no such thing as a cement wall because then you would say, I am closed to anything that's coming from the outside. Secondly, again, going back to the five principles of Mars, I think we've been very fortunate that when Forest Mars, back in a letter of 1947, wrote about mutuality and saying that a shared benefit is an enduring benefit, and he really believed in that philosophy that it was about win-win. And so it wasn't about, Hey, the supplier can give me this great price, and I'm going to feel good about that because I want that supplier who's really my partner to also thrive. Because if they're not here in five or six years time, then I don't have a relationship and I want that relationship.

(34:12):

So to your point, collaboration needs to be looked at across the overall ecosystem. And so at Mars, and also in terms of the way that I've always looked at any problem that I'm trying to solve is first of, I always look at the four capitals. So there's an economic capital. Economic capital basically says, I need to make a return. And now you have to, but then you also look across and say, what am I doing from a community perspective, which is the social capital? So by the fact that when we invest somewhere, so in Topeka, Kansas, well, what is that doing to the community and is it making it thrive? We look at human capital, which is the discussion around the whole digital literacy, which is it is our responsibility to also improve that, the development, obviously continuous development of the human being. And then there's natural capital, which is am I doing something that's going to harm the earth?

(35:11):

Now, these are hard constructs because in many cases, how do you even measure this, right? I mean, do you measure in saying, okay, I'm going to do an IQ for somebody? No, because all filled with biases as well. But I think having that sense of consciousness that says that when I look at a problem, let's first of all turn into an opportunity, and the only way I can address it as an opportunity is looking at those four types of capital and looking at the customer, looking at the consumer. Because ultimately that's who we should also be looking at is I'm doing something that's all for improving the life of that consumer. And then looking also down the supply chain that says, okay, what's in my partnerships that I have? What am I doing with them? Am I improving what they're offering? Am I improving that they're able to provide their workforce?

(36:09):

And you put it all the way down even to the cocoa where some of the stories where we're helping women that are now producing cocoa and other I'll call agricultural products because they also are gaining now an income. So you do need to look at this across again. What's exciting about the whole tech revolution now is the visibility that this can give us. And I actually believe that people can leapfrog now into doing things that only even five years ago, 10 years ago, we would've said, it's impossible to do. How do you capture that data so that I can now turn that data into actionable insights that could help me improve? And even if it's not something that's attributed to what I'm personally doing within my own scope of work, but if it's improving something for my consumer or for my vendor partner, that's going to help Mars as well.

(37:12):

So it is really always trying to find that. And again, I go back to where if everyone has the same tools and is able to have access to the data, then you're going to get now thousands of people that can help you innovate. So in the hands of the few, you now put in the hands of the many. And then we break down those barriers because again, to your point about the humility, ideas can come from any one and anywhere, and then you have the machine here that can actually then scale it up and make it quite actionable and turn it into something.

Peter Crosby (37:56):

And Angela, can you give some examples of how Mars is investing in the digital literacy of their teams To the degree you can share, what do those programs look like and how, I guess you were talking earlier about some of these things are hard to measure, but can you get a sense of where that work is taking Mars and how you're seeing it?

Angela Mangiapane (38:21):

Absolutely. Absolutely. So I'll break it down into two. First of all, I would say we've always been very strong with leadership, training and education. And so we offer all of our associates. Leadership is at all levels. So do offer all of our associates a lot of leadership training, how to resolve conflict. And we actually, conflict is not bad, but how do you then address it and talk about an issue and how do you resolve it? So I think leadership has always been there in the psyche, and we've offered that through our Mars University, and that's been something that probably going way back to even John and Forest, they always esped strong sense of the leadership training and education on the digital front there. We've done a couple of things. We've approached it from a design thinking angle first and foremost that says, let's make sure that we really understand what's the problem we're trying to solve for and how do you then approach it?

(39:23):

And again, we get people in these classes that are coming across different, I call it multidisciplinary functions, and we always put it in more in the case of what's a problem that we're trying to solve? So again, it's very tangible as opposed to getting into theoretical. So we've gone with that approach. And then on the actual getting people to understand digital, I would say for me by far, what has been the most inspiring is that the Mars leadership team, so the CEO and his direct report. So Paul weRock with his direct reports, they've all gone through digital training. And so then he comes out says, look, I've gone through these modules, and I think we had something like 16 modules,

(40:15):

If I'm not mistaken, and I think he had to do 12 of the 16 to, I'll call it, get the check mark. He went through personally with his team through the digital literacy program, and these were off the shelf. I mean, this was not something that was like, we have to make it marginalized or whatever. This was off the shelf packages and it ranged from what is quantum computing to even cybersecurity and how do you manage that to a real basic of prompt engineering? How do you ask for questions? So it was the full gamut. And once they had done that, their challenge then was to the next level down. So you now have a certain time period to do these courses, and it just ended up being cascaded down. And it was great because one is you really felt a sense of community that everyone for a period of time was focusing on this.

(41:13):

All things got a little bit competitive too. I mean, very competitive Mars. And so people would look at the scoreboard and see who had completed the most. There was a little quiz at the end, so you had to actually, I think you had to get something like 10 out of 15 questions to go to the next module or else you had to redo the module and it would show you how many times somebody did that. So you could see that people were very mindful of making sure that they did it, but it was something that was quite fun. And I think, again, it was an artifact. It was an artifact for the rest of the organization to see that this is something that was important that even the most senior levels were doing. And every year they go through a session, actually as we speak, the leadership team of Mars is actually in India and they're in somewhere in New Delhi looking at basically digital innovation with very entrepreneurial businesses.

(42:20):

And so this, again, these are artifacts that people say, okay, this is what's happening to these folks up here again, learn it all, not know it all. Then it's okay for me to go out and explore. And it gives permission for folks to say, you know what? We need to carve out time during the day to go and explore for these things. So that's a few examples. But to me, the best one is you got to experiment, you got to do it. And then as soon as you have a great idea is tell the world so we can scale it. Don't be shy because it's the scaling that gives you then the benefit knowing that you may be disrupted in days. Right? Okay. But that's okay because you've got to keep going.

Peter Crosby (43:10):

I mean, certainly having worked with a lot of people from Mars over the years in August, I'll be 10 years in this industry, and you folks just live your culture. Everyone carries that sense of pride and commitment and passion and humor. I have to say, I've just been so impressed with the human beings from Mars as people to collaborate with and people that are always looking to give back and to share what they've learned. It's a really impressive commitment. I think it speaks to who Mars is as an organization. And Angela, as we close, I would love to have this be a three hour podcast, but your time is valuable. So as we close, one of the things I've been oppressed about in this industry is just how many powerhouse women there are at all these organizations that are leading and innovating and driving change. And I was wondering, as young women at Mars come up to you and ask about how do I build a career like yours? What is the advice that you give them?

Angela Mangiapane (44:33):

So first and foremost, I would say define who you want to be. Don't let others define you, right? I find many times young women will come and say, am I expected to do this? Right? Am I expected that I need to be mobile? So the only way I can get a promotion is I have to show that I can move wherever, anywhere in the world type of thing as an example, or that I want to be able to say to my boss that I need to actually start at 10 in the morning because my child needs some special care type of thing. So I always make sure that you're really clear about who it is. You want to be set those boundaries, because when it's clear, then it's simple to figure out what's next. What makes it complicated is when it's not clear. So that's the first point, which I would say is being very, very much you define who you want to be, and then you can make decisions based on that.

(45:38):

And people then will also go, okay, I get it. I get what Angela wants to do, so now let's together figure out how we can do this together. That would be the first thing. The second part of this is you got to raise your hand. What I learned is that I had this belief, if you work hard, people will notice you. So don't be too aggressive, because women tend to be seen as aggressive if we ask for a raise or we ask for that promotion. And for me, what I learned is that, no, actually you do need to ask. And if they think you're aggressive, that's fine. You're aggressive, right? I'll interpret it as you're being assertive, but you got to raise your hand to say, do you know what? I want to do that. And if I look at all the roles that I've held, the roles that I had the most fun, the roles that gave me a lot more exposure, and I had a lot of success are all the ones that I raised my head. And some of them were ones that my colleagues would go, what are you thinking? Are you crazy? And I would say, no, I can see something here. I think I can transform it. I have a skillset that I can bring to the party as well as I have lots of opportunity to learn.

(46:59):

And so to me, it's core limiting belief. Raise your hand. And then I think the final one is, it's okay if it doesn't work. We put a lot of stress on ourselves to say, well, this all has to work. I would say it doesn't, when it doesn't work, you learn something from that and you move forward. This is what is crooked lines. I'd love to meet someone who has managed that the truth from when they were born. And it's been a straight line. We're full of flaws. We're not perfect, but that's also makes it really beautiful, right?

(47:46):

We have flaws. We're all different shapes and sizes and color, and that's great. And we go throughout life in crooked lines, and at some point we get to the other side, just everybody has their own journey to take. So that would be my advice to anyone. I mean, I think this is applicable to anyone, not just women, but absolutely. I think that for young women that so much expectation is being placed on them, and there is a lot of pressure. I always say, I don't think anybody would've hired me if when I look at today what's expected of people. I mean, I had fun in high school. I had fun in high school. I wasn't worrying about my SATs and stuff like that. It was like, I'm going to have fun. And then, yeah, we'll worry about college. And I know it's changed. It's super pressure a lot. Colleges are a lot more expensive than they were back in my day, so I recognize that.

Peter Crosby (48:42):

Yeah. Well, certainly as you think about the next bend in your crooked line, as you rewire, I'll leave you with this as you're thinking about digital literacy develops, and if the DSI can be in any way useful a thought partner of anything, it's something that I know Lauren and I personally, but also the DSI as a whole shares a passion for that project and making it as ecumenical and as openly adopted as possible. So anyway, we're just a love to have you back anytime to talk about it whenever you feel like it.

Lauren Livak Gilbert (49:26):

And Angela, you should write a book and I'll totally read it. So just throwing that out there as you rewire yourself.

Angela Mangiapane (49:33):

Thank you. No, thank you. No, and I certainly will take you up on your offer because again, look, this whole podcast leads down to possibly a very different direction. And so absolutely, I will take you up on your offer. And for those who are also listening, what I may have said may resonate with some may not resonate others, it's okay. But hey, let's have that discussion. Let's continue the conversation because conversation, it's derivative is to make change happen. So we've had this great conversation.

Peter Crosby (50:01):

Oh my gosh, yes.

Angela Mangiapane (50:01):

So let's make change happen, and it's people grassroots that make stuff happen. I'm a big, big believer of that.

Peter Crosby (50:10):

Well, Angela, we are so grateful. Lauren, I'll let you say it too. Yeah,

Lauren Livak Gilbert (50:14):

Thank you so much. This was such a great conversation, just you sharing your perspective and your insight and what you've learned, and just thank you for your time. We really appreciate

Angela Mangiapane (50:23):

It. Oh, thank you. Thank you. I really enjoyed it.

Peter Crosby (50:26):

Thanks again to Angela for her contributions to our industry and for sharing her wisdom with us. There's more of that kind of thinking when you join the DSI community at the Digital Shelf Summit in April in New Orleans. Details at digitalshelfsummit.com. Thanks for being part of our community.