#MonkTalk with Maxine Penney, Culture Manager: "I strive to bring creative diversity to the industry so that everyone can have a bigger viewpoint."

Have you ever met someone who always fills the room with contagious laughter and colorful energy? For us, that was Maxine, our 15th guest of #MonkTalk, who recently joined the monastery as a Culture Manager. From a small town in the U.K where she was binging on metal music to Amsterdam, a city she fell in love with the community and culture, her trajectory has been filled with dynamic and rich experiences. In this interview, Maxine shares pearls of wisdom in creating a more inclusive culture as well as crucial mindsets that will take you so much further than you can imagine. 🌈 🐉

Maxine, welcome to the MonkTalk and the MediaMonks Woop Woop! ✨✨ When we first met you at the WoMMen In Tech meeting, we got instantly intrigued to get to know you more because the role you have is something special that we’ve never seen before. And partly, since both of us hailed from non-EU countries, topics such as diversity and inclusion are something that we want to share with a broad audience.

Thank you, happy to be here! While I was looking through your questions, I started writing my answers down as if I was writing a biography haha.

We prepared tons of questions but let’s start with the basics. Please tell us about yourself and what you’ve been doing before joining MediaMonks.

My name is Maxine Penney and I’m the Culture Manager at MediaMonks - Diversity, Equity & Inclusion EMEA & APAC. I grew up in a small town just outside of London then I went to live in Crete, Greece, first and found that I had a passion for living in different places. I came to Amsterdam for 6 months with the plan to live in Barcelona, Berlin & New York, however, I ended up living here for 12 years because I fell in love with the city and my community so much.

I have a diverse business background including being an Executive Assistant, Literature Assistant, Recruiter, and then Business Owner! For the last three years, I’ve been running my own business called FreshhhConnections and I’m so glad that I can get to use all my skills in this new role. I’m very excited to see what I can bring to the table. 🥳

Wow, discovering a city where you never want to leave is one of the exciting things that can happen in life! We'd love to get to dive deeper into what it means to be a culture manager. Can you elaborate on it for those who never heard of this position? 

Sure! Let me tell you how it all started. One day, Victor called me and said, “We need someone like you in the company, but we don't know what you should be doing. However, we love your experiences and we believe that you can bring something valuable to the company.” So I spoke to about eight people, then they created this role for me which can include my recruitment background, business knowledge, and my experiences in moderating at plenty of diversity and inclusion events and workshops for agencies. For me, it was an important process to bake all tidbits into this new role in order to unleash my superpowers to the fullest. 

As a Culture Manager, I believe that the core of my role is to create a safe space for everyone who works for the company. We spend most of our lives at work, so we have to enjoy it, feel like we belong, and that we're united in a vision for what we're working for. And I think every company needs this role. I know some people think of it as a failure to have someone like me in the company because they really hope that everyone treats each other in a kind and fair manner. However, we are humans with unique life experiences which can sometimes create unconscious bias and that doesn't mean anyone is right or wrong. But there's a platinum rule which I’d love to share.

It says, ‘Instead of treating everyone how you would like to be treated, treat everyone how they would like to be treated.’ That means everyone has a job to do and it’s really important for me to keep people motivated and get the conversation going. 

For sure, especially in this diverse company where so many people from different nationalities and cultural backgrounds are working together. Maxine, do you spot any movements in terms of diversity and inclusion in our industry, and what’s your take on it? 

As you guys know, in 2020, Covid happened and Black Lives Matter happened, and now more and more people realize that they actually have a voice and we’re witnessing the importance of showing up and speaking up. And I think the current movement, to be industry-specific, is that people are hiring positions like me. Some people still think it's a token gesture but I don't think that's right at all because I believe that we need radical changes, and we need them now. We’ve already had the same conversations for the last 20 years and if not now, when?

On a smaller scale, there are monthly creative jam sessions that I moderate where everyone is welcome to join and express themselves. And you know what? It's the first time I've seen a group of POC together in Amsterdam in this kind of context because I've worked in the advertising industry in the Netherlands for like nine years, and at the big events and festivals such as the Cannes Lions, I probably was the only person of color and often one of the only female people of color. 

With that said, I do see lots of changes and there are so many great initiatives, education programs, communities that are thriving right now like CJS, MyOmek, PlusPlusOne, and more that are starting up who demonstrates that there are opportunities to go into media and advertising to open up the conversation and make an impact. I wish I'd had that knowledge a little bit younger but again, your path brings you where you need to be, and without my experience in my history, I wouldn't be where I am right now.

It feels like we’re in the middle of this momentum and would love to be part of it using our superpowers! What do you think we can do to create a safe and inclusive workplace both on an individual and organizational level?

The first thing that comes to my mind is to have empathy. On an individual level, you can build this empathy muscle through checking in with your colleagues and be each other’s ally. They might not always agree with you nor have the right answer, but I truly believe that If everyone adopts a buddy in the organization, it’ll help enormously for all of us to feel validated and strong, especially during this weird time. 

It can be such a simple routine but maybe we just need a reminder to really put it into practice. 

Yeah, and think that's why education is so important on the organizational level and we have to keep on learning and getting new perspectives. You're not going to change everyone's mind but as long as you have the knowledge, that's your power to start making difference. 

At Hyper Island, we learned how to foster emotional intelligence when you work with different people in a team, how to embrace the difference and find a common ground and harmony within the team.

How exciting is that to have different viewpoints, right? That's why we want diverse teams! I've always been fighting for creative diversity so that everyone can have a bigger viewpoint. Of course, that's quite a hippy thing to say because you've got to run a business as well. However, I believe that just being open to other people's perspectives can build a magnificent creative process.  

What do you find the most challenging and fascinating about your job? 

First of all, I love talking to people and that’s a big chunk of my job. When I did an exercise called ‘Find your life purpose in five minutes’ it became more obvious what my passion was. This exercise lets you write down what you like to do, why you like to do it, who do you do it for, and what feeling you get when you do it, and mine was clearly bringing people together.💡💡

I had an epiphany moment that whatever job I've done, it has always been about connecting people and bringing people together. There’s something fascinating about it, and you can learn so much from it, even about yourself. 

The challenging part is that not everyone wants to open up and has the same ideals as you. So you need to make lots of effort to really connect to them, step into their shoes, and stay authentic and respectful. However, at the end of the day, I feel that most people are intrinsically kind and respectful, but we just have different life experiences and perceptions so the question would be how will I bridge these gaps? 

Right, despite the challenges, we honestly believe that your fresh perspective and warm energy is so valuable for all of us, and will be exhilarating to see what will happen in 2021!🔮 

Yeah, I'm so excited about this journey and I'm glad that MediaMonks saw this as an opportunity. We can move forward together and make some important changes that’ll be beneficial for everyone.

Maxine, let us bring our secret Time-Turner and travel back through the history of you. What are the three milestones throughout your life that are close to your heart, and that let you grow as a person?

There’s a milestone slash, a big lesson that changed my life. I laugh at it now however it was one of those moments, and I was really young - I was a Literature Assistant at the Southbank Centre/Royal Festival Hall in London meeting poets, authors, reading so many beautiful stories and one of my roles was to inform the new Poet Laureate that he was going to get knighted by the QUEEN OF ENGLAND. So I sent him a letter and didn’t think anything about it. Then my boss, a few months later, is at the Palace waiting for this guy to turn up to get knighted and he doesn’t show up. So she calls me in a panic and I was like, ‘Well, I sent him the letter.’ and she was like, ‘Is that it?’. She was so mad and I felt awful. When she came back into the office, she asked me a simple question - “Do you think you did enough?” That’s the question that changed my life because I hadn’t. I hadn’t called and checked, I hadn’t told her that he hadn’t replied, I didn’t check to see whether he even got the letter, and from that day on, I’m always checking and asking myself - ‘Have I done enough?’. You might think sometimes that you’re being too much by double, triple checking but it's not annoying, it’s more annoying when you end up screwing something very important. So this was a big life lesson that really shaped my vision as a professional. 

The second life-changing career moment happened when I was working for a big company and by that time I was trying too much to please everyone. I was being nice and everyone was asking me if I could help out and in the end, I got so stressed out and my boss said to me, “Well, Maxine you're not doing your actual job.” Oh my god, that was huge learning that everyone can love you but if you're not doing your actual job, then you know you're going to run into issues. You can always have your passion projects on the side but you need to make sure that you're doing the work that you can be proud of. 

We can resonate so much with this story because you want to connect to people and do lots of things. But maybe we just need to learn how to draw a line difference between spreading ourselves too thin and being kind and helpful.

Exactly. Last but not the least, one of the huge learnings that I can think of as a milestone is having the gut to try things that your heart tells you. When I was growing up, I knew that I was good at many things but not fantastic at one thing so I had to do some experiments to figure out what my biggest strength was. For example, I went and studied fashion styling and journalism in my personal time then I got a job as a fashion stylist, whilst having three other jobs when I lived in London. These kinds of experiences have been quite helpful for me to clarify my top skills and interests so that I could devote my energy and passion to work that I could add more value to.

So, try everything and don't stay anywhere too long if that doesn't bring you energy or joy. Back in my days, It would look bad on your CV if you moved between many companies but I don't really view it as that. It's fantastic to have all kinds of experiences and to bring that all together. I wouldn't be here if I didn't have all of my previous learning experience.

Experimental spirit shall always stay! Do you have a mentor who inspired you? What’s special about this person?

Sure, when I first moved to Amsterdam I met a woman called Teresa whom I worked together in HR. She was an HR director and she was able to see the good in me that I didn't it see for myself at the time since I was just busy working hard, trying to adapt to a new environment. After about two years of working in HR, one day she said to me “This isn't the right place for you, so I'm going to help you for you to be where you can flourish.” I sort of knew this and all I needed was someone to guide me. She helped me to reshape my CV and pull out my top three attributes such as communicating skills, Project Management, etc. That really helped me to make a shift in my career and get my next job at Nike, and I used that career advice for people to shift their perspectives because those little tweaks from an external point of view can really add something. 

So much power in receiving this small push, cause then you fly by yourself. 

Exactly. I’ve always wanted someone to give me the opportunity and support, and some amazing people I met along the way did, so I want to pay it forward.

Talking about the future, how do you see yourself in five years, and what do you want to be doing?  

This is a really hard question because the thing is, when I was living and working in London, I never thought that I'd be living in Amsterdam for such a long time. I came for six months and just never left. I always wanted to live in New York when I’m 40, and I turned 40 last month, and I was like, ‘Wow, I'm not in New York, I'm still here.’ But I'm happily surprised where I am in life. I would never have jumped to have this opportunity to work in this role otherwise. I’m a person who always focuses on my immediate goals, learning, educating myself, and just pushing myself forward so I don't always know where I'm going, but I'm always happy where I am. So I’m ready to be positively surprised in 5 years! 

For sure! We had this conversation the other day asking each other if we ever imagined that we would be here and experiencing all these together a year ago. But I think it's about making the small leaps and then one day you see a gigantic shift just because you were doing something every day. 

Totally, keep pushing and it will all come back to you.

Maxine, now we know that you're such a creative person who loves fashion and working with people. But what are the other things that inspire you in life?

I think music really inspires me. I had such a musical journey throughout life, I used to play classical piano for seven years when I was younger, my mom was always playing records and just my whole family is really into music. When I grew up in this small town in the U.K., I was into the metal culture and listened to lots of rock and punk music. And when I moved to London, my friend was like ‘Oh my god what's wrong with you?’ Then she opened my eyes to R&B and Hip Hop which I fell in love with instantly. Then I was fascinated by techno and house music when I moved to Amsterdam. I just love music so much haha! There’s an artist called Erykah Badu who’s my idol, she's a singer, an artist, and a creative. She is always gorgeous and wise, and of course, she helped me to get through the 90s and 2000s with her music. 

We’ll definitely check her out, it feels like getting to know one brilliant artist can really expand your views and inject fresh philosophy on life. Maxine, it’s hard to believe but this is the last question for you! What would be your golden advice for young people who just started their career? 

Good one but a tough one! Once I worked at a company and I threw myself in it and worked really, really hard but my boss kept on getting on me. If I was five minutes late into the office, she would always call me out. I would see colleagues coming in at like 11.30, and she wouldn't say anything to them. I was quite frustrated so I spoke to my sister, and actually, it's advice from her, she said ‘Stop looking at other people, if you want to get in early, do it because it makes you less stressed.’

Then I realized I should do things because I want to and I’m excited to do it. As soon as I changed my mindset and did things for myself, my boss said “I don't know what's happened but I've seen a change in you, and you became the leader that I always knew that you would be.“ You don’t need to please anyone or prove anything. Do things that you believe bring you joy. 

#MonkTalk is a series of interviews with diverse talents in senior positions within MediaMonks that share different edges of the industry for young creatives who just embarked on their journey ✨✨✨