Jeanne breaks open the definition of success, as we tend to see it, and explores if there are other ways of defining it. She is joined by Adi Mazor Kario, a tech power woman, to talk about what we as women define success to be. Adi gives us a few pointers on how she sees success and what has shaped her ideas of it.
Jeanne breaks open the definition of success, as we tend to see it, and explores if there are other ways of defining it. She is joined by Adi Mazor Kario, a tech power woman, to talk about what we as women define success to be. Adi gives us a few pointers on how she sees success and what has shaped her ideas of it.
Adi presents an honest picture of what it means to be a high-achieving woman in the tech industry, how that coincides with her duties as a mom, and how her view of success has changed.
EPISODE LINKS:
Adi Mazor Kario: Website | LinkedIn | Podcast
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[00:00:01.450] - Intro
Welcome, goddess, to your sacred space. This is My FIGGI Life podcast where we openly discuss life's wins and losses on our journeys to self-discovery. This is your best life. This is your FIGGI life. And now here is your host, Jeanne.
[00:00:21.010] - Jeanne
Good morning, FIGGI Goddess, and welcome to the My FIGGI Life podcast with me, Jeanne. I am happy to introduce our guest today, Adi Mazor Kario. She is joining us today from Israel, which is such an amazing place. She was just telling me in the winter because they have sunshine even though it's really cold. So I'm sitting here under blankets of clothes while doing this podcast. I'm so happy to have her here today because we're going to be talking about success and what that means to us as women, career women, moms, wives, whatever that means in your life. And she is known for her ability to take creative business ideas and turn them into massive revenue. She leverages her proven strategies to create leading edge products. She has worked with the likes of IBM, Intel, Google and Waze, along with literally hundreds of start-ups in Israel, the Start-up Nation, and she was part of the Google accelerator for seven years. She's an expert in product strategy, design and innovation. She's also married and a mom of four and a mom of a cat and dog. Welcome to the My FIGGI Life podcast.
[00:01:36.330] - Adi
You've done it so well. I should take you everywhere I go, and you'd be my PR or something.
[00:01:43.730] - Jeanne
Thank you so much. I've spoken to you before I've had the pleasure of being on your amazing podcast and I was obviously reading up on you before I went on your podcast and before I hosted you today. And even just from the summary and the bio we just gave, you really are the epitome of having it all. You're a mom of four kids, you're in the tech industry, innovations and start-ups. How do you see yourself? Do you see yourself as one of these women that has it all, that strives to have it all, or how would you define it?
[00:02:18.970] - Adi
First, I think that when we see someone from the outside, this is how we see them. It doesn't mean it's their life and this is how they experience themselves. And for me, I'm successful, but not because of the intro. I'm successful for other things that I consider being successful for. And I think that each one of us would need to really consider as they go in life and have experience in so many domains as a wife, as a kid of our parents, as a parent, ourselves, and as a businesswoman or an employee, doesn't matter our career. And we need to consider what is important for us and how do we see that. I can say one thing, I really love doing things. As you can see, I do lots of things and I get lots of enjoyment of doing things. And then you could see it in my bio, in what I do. Right. I have four kids, like two is not enough, I need four, right? Yeah. But it doesn't mean anything about the definition of success. And as I grew up, I see that it's fluid and it's changing and it's different between people.
[00:03:34.720] - Adi
And what is success? Actually, I think when we grow up and I see my kids, I have like two teens and the way they perceive the world is very strict. Like, this is success. Yeah, success equals money. Success equals that you are known, and you've done stuff. And as you grow up, you start to develop your own sense of what is success and what I want to do with my time and with my talents and skills and my luck. What can I do with this story?
[00:04:04.670] - Jeanne
The industry that you're in, especially in start-ups and innovation nation, how did you get into that? Did you always know this was something that you wanted to pursue?
[00:04:15.270] - Adi
No, I think the best thing in life are chance. It's pure luck. So you need to do things and to play like, upon the world, you need to do things, but things happen and it could be pure serendipity. This is how I see it. So, my first degree was in design, and I didn't know exactly what I'm going to do. And then I got to a place that after I finished my first degree, there was this small ad on the wall. You remember there were ads on walls in the past on the wall of the college that I studied in and they were looking for people to do UX. So they just needed more people to do that and they wanted some students and I went there and it was the first time I really got to know design and software design and just to go into this world was the first time and it was my first step, right? And from there I went to more and more places and one of the things that happened, I went to go into an agency and I learned how to do what I do afterwards, I went into a start-up and I have to tell you, I didn't understand this.
[00:05:32.490] - Adi
To start up, I just saw a very small company doing something which is a software. I didn't really perceive what that means. I was clueless, I didn't know anything. And I learned so much while doing what I do there. So I learned how to do a tech product and how to do design and how to work in general with people. What are the parts of the company, how do they collaborate? And then when I had my second son, they fired me, and it was like a big shock. Like, when I think about my career, I always think about this point which is a junction there. So I can tell you do you want to hear the story? How they did it?
[00:06:15.580] - Jeanne
Yes, please tell us. I'm so sorry you had to go through that.
[00:06:22.410] - Adi
So, I'll tell you what, the whole story. So, what happened? I was in maternity leave with my baby and they told me to come to speak with the CEO. And I didn't know, but it didn't sound really good, but I took my baby and I placed it in my baby carrier and I went to talk to him. And then I don't remember anything that he told me as a young mother, as a young designer, but I really remember that the baby started to cry because he felt my heart pounding so fast against his chest in carrier and he just fired me and I was in total shock. You're in maternity leave, so after a month and a half, it's legal in Israel to fire you because you're on maternity leave. No, you cannot be fired on maternity leave, but after a month and a half you could be fired. So just take more time, okay?
[00:07:20.590] - Jeanne
Yeah.
[00:07:21.300] - Adi
And I came back, and I have two small babies. One is like two years old and one is like two months or three months old. And I was in shock. I didn't know what I would do. I need to pay bills. I didn't know what I could do. Then a friend of mine, as I told everything is luck. He called me and he said, there is this company and they need help. Could you be an advisor? Just do an outside work, freelancing work. And this is the beginning of my career, of my business, and today I'm a business owner. I didn't think about it back then. I said OKAY. I'll be a freelancer. I can get a salary here, so I give an invoice here. So, for me, it didn't really matter. And from there I had more and more work. And it was the point that I got to understand that I'm a business owner. But I didn't think about it before and it was perfect for me. So sometimes things that look like a crisis is something that you're growing so much from. And it's so much better for me to be a business owner and self-employed and not working within a group in a very structured way and not working on one product with one team.
[00:08:38.330] - Adi
Because for me, it's so interesting to do so many other things and learn other stuff. And that's why I work with so many start-ups, not only the first one that I had, and I learned so much from that. So sometimes we have experience, and they take us through life and life is unfolding and we're doing what we can do.
[00:08:57.870] - Jeanne
Thank you for sharing that with us because I think many people or many of the Goddesses listening today can relate to these types of difficult stories. I don't have not as bad as that, but in South Africa, we also very much have the mindset of you work, okay? You get up, you go to work. You work until you die. And that's your life. Yeah. You always have to be better. You always have to offer more than somebody else. And when I was pregnant with my little girl, I had to have a C section, and I was on maternity leave for three weeks. And even just the three weeks I took, you know, when I came back, people had difficulty hiring my consultation again because they would say things like, oh, we're so sorry to have lost you, and you were always so great at what you did, and now you're a mom. Like, you know, because I'm a mom, something significant changed in my brain cells. Or I don't know, but it's weird how that translates.
[00:10:03.670] - Break
You're listening to the My FIGGI Life podcast.
[00:10:07.490] - Jeanne
You were saying that in the beginning, you have to think about what success means to you and what it looks like to you and to you. The success isn't necessarily the bio that we went through. So if you had to define it for yourself, what did success look like for you? Or did it even maybe it changed.
[00:10:24.050] - Adi
It changed, yeah. I think that in the past, I looked at success as most people would look at meaning. Do I have enough clients? Do I have enough work? Am I successful in what I'm doing? Each time a product that I helped create was successful, I felt so happy and proud. It's, I think, a very specific point of view. What is success? Because you could measure it. And I'm working most of the time from my head. I'm very rational person, so it was very clear for me, because there is this bottom line, it's a number, so it's so clear and it's easy. But as I grow, I think about my life, and I think that you grow in so many ways other than being older, you grow as a person, and you have more colours in the way that you define the world. And now when I think about, yeah, I'm so happy that I do have a successful business, but I'm so happy that I could be with my kids because I'm so flexible. So when they come home, I can tell them, hey, how is cool. And another thing that I wouldn't say, like, in any other podcast, in general, maybe on your podcast, is that I breastfed all my kids.
[00:11:42.960] - Adi
So total, I was about 13 years breastfeeding. I know it sounds left, but that is something that you, but you were. Able to do it. Yeah, because I give that love and nourishment.
[00:11:56.730] - Adi
Yeah, and I enjoyed it so much. I have, I would say, older kids. Right now, my young one is nine years old, so he's not that young. Right. So, when they are so small, you cannot have these talks with them, and you don't have this communication that you could okay, I'll do it over the mobile phone and we'd have a small discussion in the middle of the day just to keep in touch. There is something that you need to be present, and in general, I think you need to be present. So, this allowed me to be very flexible. So sometimes I've done work in the morning and then after they go to bed, I have, like, two more hours, three more hours. And sometimes I work with the US. So it's good for me in any way. So in any case, I had this flexibility to take more projects, less projects as I go through the world. So, on one side, I didn't put it all aside and say, okay, I'm full time mother right now for these years, because it's lots of years. When you have lots of kids, you have more and more years.
[00:12:51.740] - Adi
And on the other side, I still felt very good with me as a mother. One of my kids was 13, and in Israel we have Ballista. Everybody's Jewish. You know that which is like this ceremony that you take the kids and usually what you do, you go through the pictures and you have this small video for the family with all the pictures that he was a small baby and now he's grown up and it's really sweet. So what happened, it was like two months ago, and I went through all the pictures and the videos, and what I did for the first time is that I listened to me, the cameraman. I'm taking all these pictures, right? Like, nobody's doing that other than me in the family. And I listened to myself. And then it really touched me, and I said, okay, I was the mother that I wanted to be to these kids. I was so happy to be with them, and I laughed from them, and I was very fully into what they're doing, and I really enjoyed the current moment with them. So, I'm so happy that I had this opportunity and not being worried.
[00:14:03.070] - Adi
I was worried. Sometimes it's worry and sometimes I need to I had deadlines, of course, it's not like I'm fully with them all the time, but there were these moments that I know that they felt that I was present.
[00:14:17.090] - Jeanne
And that's important.
[00:14:18.440] - Adi
It is for me, not only for them. I'm not saying about their mental stability and how they perceived it. I'm talking about myself, that I was that mother. This is what I wanted to be, and I was that. So, this is success for me.
[00:14:35.060] - Jeanne
I feel like as women, we are constantly confronted with this concept of all having it all and striving to have it all. But I really sometimes wonder if this is something that for me, for sure, as an individual, I've wondered many times, is this something I really want or is this something that society is telling me defines what is seen to be successful as a woman? Because for me, all is extremely overwhelming trying to be all every day, being at the soccer game plus doing your best in the meeting and having the perfect dinner prepared and packing the lunch. It's just a lot. Would you say you had it all or would you say that you enjoyed kind of different moments in life for what they were?
[00:15:24.710] - Adi
I don't think anyone could have it all. Nobody could have it all because your mind is only one mind and you have only one battery of energy and you divide it as you need. So I'm saying I didn't have it all, I had it what I wanted to have, which is the best I could be at that moment. It's not like I was not a perfect mother, nobody could be that. And expecting yourself to be a perfect mother or the best lawyer or the best in your I think we should take our lives more likely sometimes and be a better judgment of yourself, not being that critical all the time. And sometimes mothers go into this point I see that in lots of time in the motherhood that they're saying I was not that good, I didn't do enough, I should have done this, I should have done that. It's like too much tension on the motherhood. So I really believe that kids mainly need you to love them and you're doing your best and you're not perfect and that's it. That's it. I can tell you about school and grades and all of that.
[00:16:39.620] - Adi
I don't do it; I don't do it. And sometimes they are not as good as other kids but I don't want to go into the teacher position, whatever. Somebody could say I don't want to go to the driver position or I don't want to go to whatever position and taking care of their health and taking care of their time to go to sleep. And there are so many positions and so many tasks you have as a mother so sometimes it could be overwhelming. So you need to define what is important for you as a person and then just take choose your battle and that's it.
[00:17:22.270] - Jeanne
And I think sometimes well, in my experience I've worked with a lot of female professionals and mentorship and coaching but also my personal experience, a lot of this pressure oftentimes I perceive it to come from other women which is so sad because instead of supporting each other, we really do drag each other down sometimes. And even when I had my baby, most of the pressures that I felt of being pulled in all these different directions were from women in my life. Women expecting me to be a better mom, be more present, be home, others expecting me to how can you have kids? Why don't you have a nanny? Are you just going to throw away your career? There's all of these different ways that they are projecting and portraying to you what it means to be a successful woman. And it's hard, it's hard to keep it all together sometimes. And sometimes you just need to be and to have support in whatever way you define your success for yourself to be.
[00:18:28.960] - Adi
I think that because women are under pressure in so many ways in our society, sometimes everything triggers them. So, when you're taking the time and doing something, maybe they feel the pressure to do it too. Or maybe they feel blame for not doing it, or maybe they're feeling that you're doing more than them. Whatever, it triggers them and then they relate to each other like wolves, right? One against the other. And it comes from being really under pressure. I don't think that they want to hurt you or I think they know that they are not sure about their own decision so let alone they could not decide for you. So when I think about the best advice I would have to women is in general, just be very connected to yourself. So you don't need to get so many advice from so many people. And sometimes you need to be very focused and say, okay, what do I really want? How do I manage this challenge right now in my life? And other people could give you advice, but it's from their own character, from their own experience in life, from their own values. And we define our own values and goals and what we want to do with this.
[00:19:50.580] - Adi
We have one book, and we write page after page, and we decide how we want to do it.
[00:19:56.110] - Jeanne
Well, that's so well said. That's very well said. Thank you so much. The entire premise of the FIGGI Life community and the My FIGGI Life podcast is that we always say, you know, there are no secrets to happiness. Life always happens. And this is the space where you can come to not to be preached to or told to be more positive or do this differently or do that, but rather a space where it's okay not to be okay and it's no judgment. We all go through hard times in life. It happens. We don't need to sweep it under the rug. You're so successful and you've done so well as a mom, as a business professional, as a woman in tech and innovation, can you maybe share with our audience one or two examples of failures that occurred or that you perceived to be failures in your professional career and how that impacted you and how you dealt with that?
[00:20:55.520] - Adi
Yeah. So after my third child first thank for the opportunity to talk about failures. I think it's very important. So after my third child, most of my time was like three days a week. I went to intel in Haifa. So, I went there each like three times a week. I drove them. It was not remote in any sense. I drove on the car. And I really love it because the way to Haifa, if anyone was in Israel is next to the sea. So all the way up, you see the sea on your right. So I think that I was there, and I was really into that. I worked through one of the I don't know, it was a group within intel. And then I went on maternity leave with my third kid, and then they closed the group, and I didn't have like, they called me and they said, okay, we closed the group. We're not working with external consultants anymore. And that's it. And more than that, because it's like, intel, they wouldn't give me a recommendation because it's, like, considered they have these laws of like, I couldn't recommend someone that I cannot be sure that he is a good person, whatever.
[00:22:09.050] - Adi
So, like, all the legal stuff I know, maybe you know it better than I found myself again in point one, because I worked there for so long, I didn't do marketing, and I didn't think about the next step because I said, okay, I have enough work. I have a few projects more than that. And this is my main client, and it's enough. And when they left, it was like, I'm still on maternity leave. I didn't know what to do. I really did not want to know what to do because sometimes people go and they start as a freelancer, and they don't understand that they have a business. They think about, okay, it's okay. It's easy. I get work. And it was a really good start for me as a business owner because it was easy for me to get work. And then it got to a point that I put all my eggs in one place, right? So there is a saying in Hebrew that you put all your eggs in one nest.
[00:23:07.670] - Jeanne
In one basket.
[00:23:08.770] - Adi
Yeah, in one basket. Okay. And I was really in shock. And I remember one of the talks with my best friend, and I have two best friends that I talk to them each day since, like, for 20 years. And then she told me, you know, you don't have to work, and you need money, so maybe you go and work in a kindergarten. And when she told me that, I said, okay, I got to the bottom. It's not for me. I cannot work in a kindergarten. So I decided it was like a shock. Like, why did you say it to me? I'm professional. I know what I'm doing. And then I decided to go to a marketing course. He said this man it was a man who was the teacher there, and he said the words money like, a thousand times. And I was in shock because I didn't think about money that much. Right? I didn't think that we were talking about money that much. I thought about my professional abilities, about my experience, what can I offer, how good I am and what I'm doing. But I think that women have more hard time relating to money and getting paid for what you're doing, right.
[00:24:19.410] - Jeanne
And talking and asking for your worth.
[00:24:21.520] - Adi
Yeah, it's hard. So when I talked about money, when you have a group of people and you're within a company and you have this service and you're one of many, I could talk about money, but when I sell myself and my own services, it's not the same, right? And he said money so much that I felt like, okay, so I can do it, I can do it. And I felt at the beginning it's going to be that hard to go and to do marketing, to sales calls and all of that. And I said, okay, it could be overwhelming, I wouldn't do it. And then I started doing it and it was not that hard. It's not that hard when you get like there is a game and you just need to understand the rules. Like they need you and you need them and you get paid as long as you are worth it and you're worth it and that's it, right? Like the song worth it. And it was a turning point for me because I did not understand it before he said the word money so much. It was so many times.
[00:25:29.370] - Jeanne
It's incredible. If you look back now to where you were and where you are, how do you feel? Do you feel happy, elated, content? Or do you feel there's more you want to do and more that ...
[00:25:44.500] - Adi
Wish I would be content. I didn't get to the stage of content. No. I always feel that I could do more. It's not like I could do better, or I could have more money. It's like I have so many things I want to experience in life and sometimes it's related to my career and sometimes it's related to other stuff that I'm doing. For example, I always learn, I always go in and go and learn something. For example, I learned positive psychology and mindfulness, and now I'm learning Zen Buddhism and I learned Barry and Katie, if you know that. I learned so many other things and I'm growing as a person. And of course, I'm learning so much for my kids and for my life in general as they grow. And now some of them are, as I said, like teens. And my oldest one is 19. And in Israel it's mandatory to go to the army. So in one year she'd go to the army. Usually it's like 18, but for her it's like a bit later and you understand that you're always growing, always finding yourself and always redefining what you want to do.
[00:26:56.200] - Adi
What is success? It's not like you get to a point and then you have this draft, and you say, okay, now I know what success is. From now on, I have this compass in my life. It doesn't work. It doesn't work.
[00:27:07.590] - Jeanne
Thank you for saying that. FIGGI Goddess this is what we're always saying. Life happens. Life always happens. There is no way that you can set things down for yourself. And there are definitely, I think, stages in life where you go through and you feel like, okay, I've been there, I've done that, but now what's next?
[00:27:29.810] - Adi
I would say one thing that I do find which is easier in my age, I'm 48. Another thing that I wouldn't say, maybe in other podcasts, is that you get softer. I mean, that you're softer to yourself and you're not judging yourself as harsh as you were. That's one thing. And you get softer with other people. For example, we talked about these women when they are pushing you to go back to work or you should do that. And in Israel it's like you go back to the jeans you had before you gave birth.
[00:28:10.330] - Jeanne
Pre mom jeans. The pre mom, prewaist band.
[00:28:14.430] - Adi
Yeah, these jeans. And it's like so much pressure. You have this pressure all the time. You need to look good; you need to be nice. You need to have that. You need to have a career, you need to make money. So many shoes. Now, I understand that when I was younger, I was much harsher on myself and on others because I saw everything black and white, right? You should do that. This is how things are done. This is how you should be in your career. This is how you should be a woman in your life. And no, now I don't think so. Now I know that there are so many other colours than black and white, and you need to relate to others and to yourself in so much more compassion. Because we all go through things in life and we all have our understanding or our pretty judgments that we go through in life. And sometimes we get to a point and we need to change them. And it's so hard to change. It's really hard to change what you think and how do you perceive yourself and how do you perceive life. And only through these junctions, these crisis, you could do that because when you're comfortable, you would never change, right?
[00:29:33.080] - Adi
Because you're happy and content and everybody has his own path, and they might get to this point or not. If let's say about this young woman that would tell you should go back to work and why don't you have a nanny or whatever? And she's so sure of herself and it works for her, for her two kids. And then she discovered that it's not as she thought, because something happened to her relationship with the kid, because something changed with her friend, because she found out that she did not do exactly what she thought she would do. And only by going through these experiences in life, you're becoming more flexible. I don't think people would change, no way, if nothing happened to them. If you're sitting very comfortably watching Netflix, why. Would you go somewhere else? You're just comfortable, right? I heard something, I don't know where, not long ago that when your heart is broken, it's like, broken open, and then things could happen, and things could go through your heart.
[00:30:42.850] - Jeanne
Wow. That's a wonderful way of seeing it.
[00:30:46.510] - Adi
I really do believe that I could say that I found that in my personal life and in my professional life, that this is how you change, and this is how you grow, actually.
[00:30:57.430] - Jeanne
You have shared so many amazing things with us today. I'm so happy that you came onto the podcast. Is there any last words of wisdom you would like to share with our audience and listeners today?
[00:31:11.190] - Adi
I would say to women, trust yourself more and don't hesitate that much. You don't have to be the perfect lecturer, the perfect professional, the perfect mother, the perfect whatever spouse. You need to be yourself. And it's enough, and it's enough, and it's good as is, and maybe you'd have more experience in a year or two and you'd be better, and maybe not. And that's okay. And don't listen too much to people.
[00:31:43.410] - Jeanne
That's wonderful.
[00:31:44.440] - Adi
And don't judge yourself too much.
[00:31:46.020] - Jeanne
Thank you so much. Look, if our listeners want to get in touch with you or they want to read more about you or what you do, where can they go? Where can they find you?
[00:31:56.790] - Adi
I actually live on LinkedIn. I'm not in Israel, I'm on LinkedIn. That's the name. And I have a few websites or a few businesses that I own. So, one is invincible innovation. It's a business that I own, but I have other things that I do, and I would be so happy if you just contact me on LinkedIn and feel free.
[00:32:19.210] - Jeanne
Thank you so much. And for those of you who are driving or who didn't catch that, I'm going to put a full link in the description of this episode. So, it's just easy clickable for you to find a deal on LinkedIn or on her website. Thank you so much for coming onto the My FIGGI Life podcast.
[00:32:34.140] - Adi
It was such fun. I really enjoyed it. Thank you. Thank you for inviting me.
[00:32:38.470] - Jeanne
Remember FIGGI goddess. Everyone deserves to celebrate the goddess within. I wish you love and light for this week and we will see you again on the My FIGGI Life podcast next week.
[00:32:51.810] - Intro
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