We asked some of the women who work for Mirriad to share their journey with the company, their career and what inspires them!
Regional Operation Lead, Mumbai Office
I’m from Mumbai in India. I was born in Chennai, lived in Rajasthan for 2-3 years, and then came to Mumbai in 2000.
It’s been 10 years and 6 months!
Before I started at Mirriad I was doing a course, then I got hired as a Compositor. I really wanted to work and do the course at the same time and I thought it would be interesting to work for Mirriad and to gain more knowledge while I studied. Then I moved on to being a Team Leader to Content Analyst, then Client Services (currently Regional Operation Lead). I have worked in many roles to learn more skills, that’s what’s kept me hooked to Mirriad.
Yes, but it can be very challenging for women. Here, women have to work, handle the household from getting married, take care of their children- everything! But fortunately, in Mirriad, we have women who can leave early if they need to and handover their work to someone else to pick up for the day.
I like reading novels, scrapbooking and cycling! Because of the lockdown, I’ve been cycling more and been able to explore new places nearby. My longest cycle was 72km, it took 4 and a half hours!
I also love to travel; I’m even travelling next weekend to a nice property with my family to celebrate Valentine’s day.
Principal Developer, London Office
I’m from Blackburn in Lancashire.
Two Years.
I would advise them to just go for it. Don’t worry if you don’t meet all the requirements, just be honest and come and talk to us, we may find there’s a place for you.
Don’t sell yourself short, you’re probably a lot more capable than you give yourself credit for. Focus on your achievements and the things you do well rather than what you haven’t done yet.
Not throughout my career directly. I’ve never had someone senior to me that was a woman.
The CTO of ThoughtWorks, Rebecca Parsons is an amazing role model for women in tech. She is CTO of a large software consultancy firm that is extremely forward-thinking in their ideas, the diversity of the workforce and the technology that they use. It’s very impressive. She’s a strong advocate for diversity and inclusion in the tech industry and is empowering to hear speak.
It sounds soppy, but it would be my mum – I remember her working extremely hard to pass numerous exams to further herself and give us opportunities when I was younger. She encouraged us to make the most of the chances they gave us and instilled in us the knowledge that if we applied ourselves we could learn and understand anything we wanted. This is particularly useful in an industry which is changing rapidly; a new technology isn’t a blocker or a worry, it’s just something I haven’t set my mind to learning yet.
Head of Recruitment, London Office
I’m originally from the Midlands in the UK, I grew up there, but I was born in RAF Halton in Buckinghamshire. I’ve moved around a lot; moved up North and lived on a sheep farm for a while, moved to London and now live in Bracknell near Reading!
As I had already joined as a consultant 6 years ago, I had a choice of the clients that I was allocated to. I had worked in tech before and have always been interested in getting inside of technology and learning how to talk about it. I’m not a tech expert, but I do understand exposure and can explain what the basic business premise is when sharing it with other people. I was really excited about being able to “sell” Mirriad to people who were interested in looking for roles.
If you want to work for a big company where your role is very defined, that can be a great opportunity. But if that’s what you really want, it’s probably not the time for you to come to Mirriad. We’re “paving the road as we’re walking on it”, so it helps to be open-minded and to be able to shoulder that little bit more than you expected. If you want to work for Mirriad, take what you’ve learnt from the opportunities you’ve been given over the years but then be prepared to bundle and expand on them.
Yes, I love a role model and a mentor. I’m still not the “full deal” and I’m learning all the time.
The leader who worked for the consultancy I had joined when I started working for Mirriad was called Leslie and she was absolutely great. She was all about delivery and impact and I don’t think I’d ever worked so hard before that time. I understood that she had very high standards and she expected you to work to those standards. You came to her with solutions rather than questions but she was still like family and wanted you to work in the best way possible that suited you. I took a whole lot from her and was able to bring that to Mirriad.
(laughs) I’m not sure streaming and downloading content can be considered a hobby!
I like to watch things, I’ve got an interesting mix of things I like; I love Tudor history, I read Tudor history books; I read every day and read loads of other things too! I like watching documentaries about forensics and nature and I’ve watched every single season of “RuPaul’s Drag Race”- it’s one of my favourite things!
I love listening to music, drinking wine, and eating very very very spicy food as well as looking after my two Dachshunds who are highly opinionated and wilful little women!
VP Strategic Partnerships, New York Office
I’m from New York. I grew up in Westchester (which is an hour north of Manhattan) and now I live in the city.
I’ve worked at Mirriad for 4 years.
There are many aspects that I truly enjoy and I’m so lucky to love the job that I do. I am part of a company where I get to have my hands in many aspects of the business. I started out as an account manager, became account director, then my role shifted to encompass managing Operation for the Americas and strategic partnership specifically around unlocking and onboarding supply partners.
I get to be involved in core aspects of the day-to-day, am able to feedback to product being a voice that helps shape the platform to better suit our needs – ranging from a process standpoint, as an operational tool, and to help envision the future to make a platform that’s more useable and exciting for our partners and brand partners to experience. It’s awesome. It’s being able to wear many hats, in short.
Another big reason why I truly enjoy my job is that I feel valued. I feel like my opinion matters. I’m very grateful to be in a work environment that has that culture. It has helped me grow as a person, to be more confident in myself because of the work respect that I’ve been able to build.
I would say that they need to be able to roll up their sleeves. This is very much a team environment and we grow as a team to help each other achieve the same goals. They need to keep in mind the long-term vision of what the platform and the company is. We make so many decisions every day about campaigns and specific little nuances, but it’s also important to make sure that all the changes and the things that we feedback into serve our long-term vision and goal. Be nimble and ready to problem solve!
Maria Teresa Hernandez (VP, Sales & Brand Partnerships) is an inspiration to me. She’s so amazing – fantastic at her job, always taking on more, and giving back. Seeing Maria, as well as my other friends and co-workers who have young kids and still are exceeding at their jobs during this crazy Covid time is really inspiring.
Global Chief Marketing Officer, London Office
I’m from the North of England, I’m very proud of my Northern roots! I’m originally from Chester, well, on the border of England and Wales. Most of my family are still there, I was the only one who left to do the “big career in the big smoke”. But I’ve never lost my accent which I’m really proud of, even though I’ve lived in London longer than when I was up North!
It’s coming up to a year! I started in the first national lockdown.
I equally like and don’t like this; how fast we move. So, literally I could be writing something that says, ‘this is who we are, this is what we do, this is our proposition, this is the content, the tech and how it works’ and two weeks later I’ll talk Stephan (Stephan Beringer, CEO) through it and we’ll end up saying ‘no, it’s evolved since then, the content canvas has got bigger, the tech has improved etc’. The fact is, we are moving and evolving so fast that we’re never at a stand-still. There are challenges in that because by the time we’ve got one story out there, we’re on to the next thing! But I love it because, it’s keeps you interested and on your toes!
I have, I’ve worked with some awesome women who have taught me a lot for global giants such as Sony, Nokia & Three . I’ve been really lucky to have had quite a few female bosses as I’ve come up the ranks in my career. Most of the women I worked for in these companies were inspirational, I particularly enjoyed working for women who were calm, grounded and knew their own power.
Maya Angelou, she’s very inspiring! I read her book; she suffered a trauma at a very young age, she spoke out about who had done it and he went to prison and was eventually killed. Because she spoke out about it, she felt her voice had killed a man and had stopped talking for seven years. In that time she read tonnes of books and became the amazing poet she was. Her poem “Still I Rise” is just amazing, also a quote of hers is one of my favourites; “people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but they will never forget how you made them feel” and I always apply that to my job.
Executive Assistant, London Office
Originally I’m from Aberdeen in Scotland, however I’ve been in London and surrounding areas for 23 years! I was going to say I’m more English than I am Scottish at this point, but my family might have something to say about that…
I moved down to London when I was 10 and went to school, college and uni all in London so my accent has softened. But if you catch me on the phone to my mum, you would definitely hear it come back!
Two and a half years – the time has flown past! I remember my first day at Mirriad as if it was yesterday but at the same time so much has happened between now and then.
I was looking to get into something more tech or agency focussed and something a bit more fun, new and vibrant! I went on the company website (and I know it sounds silly) but it was really bright and colourful, the tech was really new and cutting edge, not like anything I’d ever seen before. It just sparked something where I thought ‘this could be really quite exciting’.
There’s lots of ladies, but there’s one in particular that sticks out. I’m not sure she would even know that she has been an inspiration for me. One of my very first roles there was an EA and she just had this lovely way about her. She was highly experienced and very together (or so it appeared) and she had this air of calm about her. Madness could be going on around her and she just had a calm influence and confidence, you just knew everything was going to be ok if she was involved in it. I guess that’s where I wanted to get to and I hope I’m achieving it.
Is this where I bring up the ducks?!
I’ve got 2 ducks from our wonderful trip on a Bank Holiday Monday to Sainsbury’s (supermarket), where we picked up some duck eggs. We hand-reared two ducklings to now nearly fully grown ducks! That takes up a lot of our time. We spend a good period of time in the morning and the evening with them. They’re so CUTE! I They have their own little personalities! Everything from their quacks to their personalities suggest they are two girls (although we haven’t confirmed it yet) but we’ll see if they start laying eggs!
On the weekends, I also sew. Last year, I got a sewing machine for my birthday. I mainly sew Corona masks, I find them quite easy to make and I love shopping for the different fabrics!
I also occasionally play the guitar…..quite badly. I’ve been learning for a good few years, but I’m not very good!
Creative Team Lead, London Office
I’m from London, born and grew up in North-West London. And now live with my family in Sutton. My parents are originally from the Philippines, so I count myself as British-Filipino.
It’s coming up to 9 years! I started in 2012.
I would say working with my team. I work closely with Liz (Liz Clarke, VP of Customer Operations) who I enjoy working collaboratively with! I work with Lammie (Lammie Veracruz, Creative Specialist) who is my dear friend who I’ve known since birth. I also work closely with Vejay (Vejay Forrester, Technical Content Manager), who I’ve also worked with since I started. He has a similar work and family life to mine and I can relate to him a lot. The great thing about Mirriad is there are a lot of staff who have families and it’s great that the company are very supportive and flexible with that.
There are more women in the world of Visual Effects and Digital Media now than ever before! When I joined Mirriad I was the second woman to join the UK office. The whole tech team and creative team were men back then and I was the only woman in my team. I was intimidated but looking back I actually should’ve been proud of myself!
Liz joined Client Services shortly after me and now she’s my manager! Mirriad has definitely expanded and now have more women of different ages and backgrounds in all departments; this has certainly changed the workplace dynamic
I like to paint, traditionally and digitally. It’s always good to go back to basics. I love designing, I do logo designs and made my own bespoke wedding invitations!
I love portrait photography. I recently did a pregnancy photoshoot for my friend; capturing her glow was incredible!
I also have a passion for nature. Since getting ill last year I found it really important to take time for myself to rejuvenate and breathe; nature has helped with that.
I do a lot of home cooking, which I get from my Dad, I really miss my Dad’s cooking. But I always have to take that Instagram snap first and then I eat, I have to capture every moment!
On top of that I love spending quality time with my family & friends, travelling and treasuring each moment.
Junior Developer, London Office
I’m from Romania. I was born and raised there but I moved to the UK when I was 19. It was initially to study in London, but I fell in love with the city, so I just stayed!
I really enjoyed my time at University (The University of Greenwich), and I really like London because of the diversity. You can meet anybody, from anywhere! I would say that you don’t have to go to any country from here, the country comes to you. If you want African food or any food, you can find it all in one city.
It’s been over a year. It’s gone by so quickly!
The first thing I noticed was the technology. It’s something new to the market and I haven’t seen any other company do this kind of post-production advertising. It’s really nice and future-proof because everyone is tired of being interrupted by ads when watching videos.
When I went in for my interview (at Mirriad), I really liked the fact that they tried to make me feel comfortable. I was anxious, but they did their best to make me feel at ease so that I could answer their questions and prove myself. I think a company is successful when it acknowledges the fact that its employees need to be happy to get good performance. The happier their employees, the better they work for the company. I got this impression from the very beginning when I received the call from Melanie Bradbury-Lane (HR) to tell me that I’d got the job. The way she described this to me was really nice.
The first is Laura Smith. I really look up to her. I don’t know if I’ve told her enough, but I really do appreciate her. She really pushes for equality and it’s nice to be in a team that is half-half (men and women). I like the fact that she pushes me to get better work and to develop. It’s a win-win for the company and myself.
I like to get inspired by the people around me. I don’t really have any VIP’s that I could name. It’s my friends and the surrounding people that inspire me. Even my mum, the way she’s worked during her life, to grow, get better, and overcome her situation in general, is inspiring.
I like to talk. I like to talk about politics and what’s happening around the world. I like to talk to people from around the globe, try different foods, new things, and learn about different cultures. I also like horse riding, it’s pretty nice. I’m crazy about horses and took some lessons during high school. Now, whenever I’m back in Romania, I go riding. I like reading about psychology too.
VP of Customer Operations, London Office
I’m a home counties gal! I’m from Esher in Surrey. I now live near to where I grew up; I’ve lived in London in the past (Southfields, Maida Vale / Crouch End) and when my children came along. I went back to my roots.
Mirriad seemed like a really innovative company.
My background was in post-production having worked for Technicolor and Deluxe. A recruiter found me and put me forward for the role of Client Services Director. When I saw what Mirriad did, I thought ‘this is interesting. Wait, how do they do that?!’.
The whole concept was appealing; where Mirriad was aiming to get to, the people, the innovation. It’s moved so much over the past 8 years and even more quickly in the past 2 years than it had in the previous 6 years.
Come with an open mind and be flexible. Think outside the box and think on your feet! Sometimes things don’t go how they should and you have to keep things smoothed over. Having a sense of humour helps and being prepared to work as part of a team as well as using your own initiative – gosh that sounds like a job description doesn’t it?! Managing expectations is key.
Yes, in Mirriad and in my career in general. With my background in post-production and tech, women have been few and far between, so those that are there, are strong, good mentors and motivators. We do need more women at Mirriad though….
I was thinking about this the other day actually – Martha Lane Fox, she set up Lastminute.com and I saw her speak at a conference. I knew of her, but I didn’t know her background and her story, then I read up on her and was like ‘wow, respect!’. She’s also a great ambassador for sustainability and opportunities for women. She went through an absolutely horrific accident and spent over a year in recovery. She had two children, is a businesswoman (Twitter, Channel 4 plus a handful of charities) – she’s just incredibly entrepreneurial and sits in the House of Lords.
Creative Support, Shanghai Office
I’m from Wuhan city in China. It’s often known for the “Great Tower”, but worldwide it is most known for Coronavirus. Now I live in Shanghai, I’ve lived here for over 15 years – since I graduated.
For almost 5 years. I think I’m the third employee that started in the Shanghai office, so pretty much from the beginning.
Mainly the tech, it’s really impressive!
I’m also very proud to work for Mirriad. When I first joined, I didn’t know much about our tech, so I was flown to the Mumbai office for training and I was really impressed with how my team leader gave me very detailed training. We have our own technology here, we not only offer an advertising service, but we also have our own R&D (Research & Development) in the London office, which I think extends our capabilities.
Not really, there aren’t enough, but hopefully that will change soon. However, in Shanghai nowadays there are a lot more women working than in the past.
I like to check out what is new in the world! I like to travel and visit places where I know other people have been – I have a huge curiosity!
I also like playing the role-playing games. We actually played one as a company last year called “Script kill”. It involves 8-10 people and you receive the pre-prepared script. People then pick the role they want to play and each person has a storyline which you have to memorise. There is a “killer” within the group and the purpose of the game is to find out who the “killer” is but not “dying” yourself. Normally the game lasts 3-4 hours! It’s very fun because you get to practice your acting and expression skills and it tests your logic. We like to dress up in costumes too!
QA Engineer, London Office
Originally, I am from Crimea, which was Ukraine but is now Russia. I have also lived in Kyiv for a few years (Ukraine) but now I live in the UK. I have been here for 7 years and I’ve just received my citizenship this year.
My first impression of Mirriad was very good. I looked on the website and saw its in-video advertising and thought it was amazing. I thought to myself, I have to try out for this job! I saw the specification and assumed I wasn’t fit for the position because I had never worked with video or had all the knowledge they had listed. When I spoke with Pete (Peter Dixon, Senior Java Developer), who was team lead at the time, he said it wasn’t an issue. He told me to start out with some research, try to find the correct tools for our workflow, and feel free to try out different things. It was really nice to hear a manager say “It’s Ok! Not a problem. We can do this together!”
I would advise them to visit our website, it is amazing. It will give them an idea about what we are doing and what companies we collaborate with. Be open to new technologies, new tools, and feel free to ask any questions!
In our technology team, we have women who are really good developers. When I see them write code in Java. it makes me think, well maybe I can do that too, why not? If I compare this to Ukraine, there are not a lot of women in technology at all. You may find some as QAs, but never developers if I’m honest. I don’t know a lot of women in Ukraine who could have a position as a developer, it’s usually as a business analyst or tester, but usually a manual tester and not automation. Here, it’s really good to see women who can write code, be a developer and be a team lead.
Our clients inspire me. I’m pleased to see clients use our platform. I am a technical person and see things from a certain of view, but it’s interesting to see how people who are not technical use our platform. When clients ask us questions, it’s great because it shows us that they are really interested in using our platform.
Outside of work, my 11-year-old daughter inspires me all the time by the things she does and the way she speaks English. There are times when I struggle to find the right words or articulate my thoughts, but she speaks with such ease and intelligence.
VP of Commercial Development, London office
I’m a bit of a melting pot! My Mum is from Puglia in Italy and my Dad is from the Midlands in the UK. They both met in Lyon in France and that’s where I was born. I’ve also lived in Spain and Portugal because of my Dad’s work. I guess I would consider myself European!
That the hierarchy is flattened, so you have a lot more access to the people at the top. I love working closely with our CEO and I’ve learnt so much from that. I also like that my role is so varied.
Be adaptable. Mirriad have the luxury of being quite nimble and it’s not necessarily about just ‘selling a specific product’. Our product is relevant to different businesses in different ways being able to adapt your approach and positioning is important.
You also need to be ready to work hard at changing mindsets. A lot of the people we speak to initially look at what we do as ‘product placement’ and have got closed views on what that means. So, part of it is being able to show people that being in-content is something that is a lot more exciting. I guess it’s about finding the right partners to build the narrative of how powerful the format can be.
Generally in media, yes! It’s an industry where gender doesn’t make a remote difference. At Mirriad there’s not that many women, especially at a senior level, but I would say it’s coincidental as we are such a small company so there are less roles available.
I love to eat, it’s one of the reason’s I’m not finding lockdown that painful. I love to cook. I think that’s down to my mix of cultures when I was young. I love shopping for food too, so if you find me in a Farmer’s Market or Wholefoods, you won’t be able to get me out of there!
I also enjoy walking; I’m part of a charity called the Cinnamon Trust which helps elderly people who can no longer walk their dogs. So every weekend I walk a really sweet cockapoo dog called Benjie—we walk about 2-3 hours each time!
VP, Sales and Brand Partnerships, New York Office
I was born in Chicago, and raised between Spain and the US. I now reside in Bergen county, which is a suburb of New Jersey, right outside of Manhattan..
I like that we are pioneering an innovative technology that radicalizes branded integration. By enabling brands scale, creative control, and the ability to go live within weeks in upcoming programming, we’re turning traditional product placement on its head. And that’s exciting!
I have, but not enough women who look like me. Sadly there’s a huge gap in the advertising industry when it comes to not only gender but diversity overall. Women of color are grossly underrepresented (less than 10%), and that drastically declines at the VP level and above. So, there is still a lot of work to be done. Since we also intersect the tech industry, underrepresentation is even worse. So really, I’m straddling these two worlds where I really am a unicorn. I work really hard to get involved in industry organizations where I serve as a mentor to emerging Black and Brown talent, and an advocate of not only D&I but fair equity and representation in professional spaces.
I would say, my ancestors. In my culture, we are big on our ancestors. My lineage comes from Mexico and Spain, which thankfully have done a great job of archiving birth, death, and marriage records; so I’ve been able to trace the stories and adversity my ancestors overcame. For example, my grandmother was orphaned at a young age, and immigrated to the US as young girl. Yet despite not speaking the language, she grew into a strong, powerful woman. As a first-generation immigrant, she built an amazing foundation for us, raising her children to go to college. Anyone who overcomes adversity like this is an inspiration and she’s especially mine.
You’ve made the right decision to apply! Mirriad is an amazing company, with co-workers who become family.
Financial Analyst, London Office
I’m British-Pakistani. I’m third generation, so my grandparents were born in Kashmir, Pakistan and both my parents were born in the UK. I’ve always lived in West London.
Oh, it’s been just over 6 months now!
I was looking for a role that gave me more responsibility and Mirriad could provide that. Being a smaller company, it meant that I would be the only person involved in the commercial side of things. The two previous places I worked were massive companies so I wasn’t able to do this. In Mirriad I work directly for the CFO and work closely with the CEO. .
Yes, there have been quite a few, I’ve been very lucky as in my two previous jobs there were finance managers who were women and who I aspire to be. They have worked very hard to get to where they are. They both have children, one of them recently did a Masters and are actually the breadwinners in their households. They are proof that if you really want it, you can do it all.
My parents, they both work so hard and they always take risks and encourage their children to do what makes them happy. I don’t think I could do anything without them! Even when I applied for my job at Mirriad; I applied at the start of the pandemic and it was a really scary time. When I got the call saying I got the job I was nervous, I mean, we were in the middle of a pandemic! But my mum just said “what’s the worst that can happen?”. My parents believe you can always strive for more, they both don’t have degrees, but they worked really hard and have very good jobs now! They wouldn’t have achieved that without determination and growth. If I can be half the people they are then I’ve won at life!
