What I’d say to me back then - Coupa CEO Leagh Turner on avoiding overzealous mentors and turning to podcasts instead

When it comes to describing her long career in technology, Coupa CEO Leagh Turner dubs it the ‘Forrest Gump of careers’. This is certainly not implying that Turner has any issues with her IQ score; more the ongoing good fortune she continues to experience.

Turner came into technology through sales, starting out at Xerox, before moving on after five years to Oracle. After five years there, she served more than 10 years at SAP, then a further five years at Ceridian (now Dayforce). After a number of years in sales management roles, Turner got the opportunity to move to a revenue line Chief Operating Officer role at SAP, allowing her to expand her skills. While at SAP, she took on global roles and was lucky enough to work all around the world, in Canada - where she resides - the US, EMEA and Asia. She notes:

I started to get this portfolio of deep sales experience and sales leadership experience, operating experience, global experience. I got very lucky, I just continued to run into good fortune. I love technology companies, they have a unique ability to make the world better, faster, and with greater ease; they replace the mundane and allow people to be more innovative.

Looking back

The tech sector looks very different now to how it did when Turner joined it in the 1990s. When she was pregnant with her first child in Canada, Turner was called into her female boss’s office. Even though there was a one-year maternity leave policy in place, Turner was told that if she wanted to retain her job, she needed to come back after just eight weeks - otherwise that job wouldn't be available to her. Turner adds:

She didn't say it in front of HR, but those were the practises in those days. I wanted to continue to earn a living. I felt it was important for my family. So I found myself back at work after eight weeks, even though I was entitled to a full year of maternity leave.

In retrospect, Turner views this as perhaps one of the biggest mistakes she has made in her career:

But there was a lot of pressure in those days.

Having gone through that experience, Turner is a firm believer in organizations having active programming to allow people to take a sabbatical when they need it; globally rotational programs that let people move to other parts of the world to be able to service their family's needs; and creating programs that enable people to service their own mental health as they support people in their lives that may be moving through difficult journeys. She says:

Do organizations get to be the beneficiary of all of that? Yes, because their people become experientially richer and the broader a person can be, the more they can bring to work.

Diverse

Turner feels the tech industry has thankfully changed since her initial maternity leave experience, and it’s now more reflective of the kaleidoscope of a world we live in, leading to greater innovation. She argues: 

The more diverse an organization is, the greater its ability to innovate. Diverse opinions, given the opportunity to air themselves out, create more organic friction of ideas, and it's at that friction point that real innovation is born. Absent that, you can get a lot of homogeneous thinking.

Technology companies have become more innovative as a result of their desire to be more inclusive, according to Turner. This has been achieved through a broad recognition that inclusivity equals greater innovation, better training for leaders on how to hire and cultivate inclusivity in their environments, and a greater focus on wellbeing.

The pandemic was an accelerant to diversity in many ways, Turner maintains. As people realized you didn't have to be in an office and watched over to do your job, more people in a multitude of different places with different lifestyles, managing different things in their day-to-day, could continue to stay in their jobs and do great work. She says:

Companies became more flexible in the way that they allowed people to do that. That has largely sustained, particularly in the technology industry.

CEO 

Turner joined spend management specialist Coupa as CEO last November. In this role, Turner is in a relatively rare position as there still aren’t many female tech CEOs around. By the middle of her career, she was still largely in the minority as a woman in tech, but organizations were starting to wake up to the fact that a more diverse team was a good idea. This meant being in the minority brought some advantages, as well as disadvantages, she suggests: 

The recognition that a more diverse team was good for business meant those who were seen to be diverse, got support. I got lots of coaching, lots of proactive mentorship, meaning people reaching out to try and help support me.

While some of that support was amazing, Turner realizes in retrospect some was less helpful, noting: 

People really wanted you to show up looking more like them than they did like you in some cases.  I learned the hard way, it took some time, that the single most important thing you can do is to show up exactly as you are. Human beings have a great antenna for inauthenticity. To be able to lead people, you’ve got to be honest and straightforward and kind. I got coached within an inch of myself and then realized that it was much more important to be me.

While mentorship is important, Turner advises people to look outside the traditional routes, stating: 

It's more available today than it's ever been. You can listen to a podcast every minute of every day with people talking about what's going on in the world at large, how to lead, how companies are performing, that is all mentorship. It all helps you figure out how to be a better you, how to adapt and grow, how to cultivate what you will be. The mentorship you want is out there if you open up your ears, close your mouth and spend time listening.

If Turner could give her younger self advice, the key message would be show up as you are, don't get coached within an inch of your existence, and stay super humble. She concludes: 

The best companies are built on a sense of humility, and that is as a result of having people who are humble, who have an open world view, who believe that brilliance comes in all shapes, sizes and a kaleidoscope of colors. They believe that the answers to what the business will be don't yet exist, and they recognize that in order to find them, they have to really listen.