Life At Cisco

This post was written by Cisco marketing intern Sang Le. On my first day at Cisco, I could tell I was different. As the first and only female Marketing Intern for Cisco Cloud Security – I stuck out like a sore thumb alongside the 100+ software engineers I worked with in Vancouver, Canada. I thought…

Twenty years ago, I was an underdog professional. A 30-something-year-old Latina woman (one of the few female electronic technicians at the time) who hadn’t graduated from an Ivy League university and had failed her first certification exams. But I didn’t let my ‘not-so-stellar’ background prevent m…

After another great summer of working with our AMAZING Global Sales Interns, my first thought was, “Where did all of our time go?” It felt like we just had orientation, and now they were prepping for their final presentations and planning out the rest of their summers before returning to school in t…

Upon hearing the words ‘Corporate America’ – your thoughts are probably filled with suits, ties, and briefcases. Which isn’t necessarily the case today, and especially not at Cisco. Upon hearing words like ‘volunteer’, ‘give back’, and ‘Corporate Social Responsibility’ – Corporate America might be…

When I started my career at Cisco as a Customer Support Engineer in Belgium in 2006, my mission was to become the best engineer to support our customers as possible. And, after achieving my CCIE and investing in my education with Cisco’s support, I took a new role in the company and relocated to the…

Do you make your bed in the morning? You may want to start! In a 2014 commencement speech at University of Texas at Austin, Naval Admiral William McRaven, a commander of U.S. Special Operations gave one of the most profound and motivational speeches. Just about all of us have heard some form of Admi…

Filling an open role can be tough, and as a Senior Director in HR, there are many things I look for and consider in a candidate. Will the candidate influence others? Will they pursue learning opportunities to grow within Cisco? Are they able to work independently? And, of course, are they a cultural…

You might’ve heard a rumor that Cisco encourages us to pursue our passions, and it’s true! Yes, by day I’m a Recruitment Marketing Manager for Cisco’s Talent Brand team (my dream job!) – but, by night I’m an avid home baker who’s always up for a new challenge. What do these two things have in commo…

Sometimes, things just don’t happen as planned. On the night before I was due to fly to the United States for my favorite event of the year, Cisco IMPACT (our annual Sales kick off), I dropped my laptop on my foot. It hurt – A LOT.  But overcome with excitement, and assuming it was just bruised, I l…