5QW with Carolyn Miles, professor and former CEO of Save the Children

This week we are back for our third episode of 5QW with Carolyn Miles, Professor of Practice at UVA Darden School of Business and former CEO of Save the Children. After speaking with her about her construction of the sustainability curriculum at Darden for our recent piece on sustainability, we asked Miles if she would be interested in diving deeper into her own journey, what has driven her decisions along the way and more. She shared what drove her to pursue her MBA, and ultimately what made her pivot from the private sector post-MBA, into a new adventure in the nonprofit, INGO space — the adventure would last decades, and allow her to support millions of children around the world.

The idea of the Five Questions with… or 5QW podcast series is to bring you quick conversations with MBA women who have reached the C-suite and upper echelons of leadership. We know and are inspired by their many achievements, their resumes and book of work, the accolades they’ve received… what this series aims to deliver is an inside look, a pulling-back-of-the-curtain to find out what drives them, how they lead, what they believe has been key to their success, and, of course, what the investment in the MBA meant to them, now that they’re on the other side.

Carolyn Miles, Professor & Former CEO, Save the Children

In this episode, we discuss Carolyn’s MBA and professional journey, the importance of building a supportive network across the various stages and phases of your life, and why you should aim to plan out the next three or five years of your life and career, keeping yourself open to opportunities for impact, learning and growth (where the “magic” happens). We also discuss what took her from marketing in financial services, to entrepreneurship and eventually the international nonprofit stage. Truly enjoyed this conversation and believe you will, too.

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Carolyn Miles, Professor & Former CEO, Save the Children

Carolyn’s Bio

Carolyn Miles is the former Chief Executive Officer of Save the Children, an organization that gives children in the United States and around the world a healthy start, the opportunity to learn and protection from harm. The global Save the Children movement serves over 155 million children in the US and in 120 countries. As a global organization, Save the Children has committed to driving down the numbers of preventable deaths of children under 5, ensuring every child gets a high-quality basic education and protecting all children from harm.

Carolyn came back to Darden in the spring of 2021 as a Professor of Practice and Special Advisor to the Dean. In addition to teaching a new SY elective called “Sustainability from the Inside Out,” she is also teaching the CEO Leadership course in J-term and Quarter 3 with Dean Scott Beardsley. Added to her teaching responsibilities, Miles is focused on bringing more women and diverse students to Darden through development of specific programming, increasing scholarship opportunities, and developing new events at Darden for women and diverse students.

Miles joined Save the Children in 1998, was COO from 2004-2011, and served as President and CEO from September 2011 until December 31, 2019. Under her senior leadership, the organization has more the doubled the number of children it reaches with nutrition, health, education and other programs. Resources were over $860m in 2019. Miles’ signature issues include hunger, learning outcomes, and ending preventable child deaths. Her championing of women’s and girls’ issues is also well known in the INGO community.

Prior to Save the Children, she worked in the private sector in Hong Kong for American Express and as an entrepreneur. While in Asia, she confronted the deprivation of the region’s children, which motivated her to dedicate her life to their welfare.

Miles has served on numerous boards, including Doerr Institute, Blackbaud, InterAction, USGLC, MFAN, Academy of Education, Arts and Sciences, FSG and the University of Darden’s School of Business, where she received her MBA. In addition to her current service on the Darden Board, she was the Co-Chair of the US Global Leadership Coalition (USGLC) and Chaired InterAction, the largest coalition of US-based NGOs. In 2015, Miles was named one of the 50 World’s Greatest Leaders by Fortune magazine and inducted into the CT Women’s Hall of Fame. In 2017 she received the Distinguished Alumna Award from the Maxine Platzer Lynn Women’s Center at the University of Virginia. In 2019, Miles received the Jonathan M. Daniels Humanitarian Award from Virginia Military Institute. Miles has 3 children.

Transcript

Carolyn Miles:

As you chart your course, I would say don’t try to chart your course for the next 30 years, by the way. I think that is… You could chart your course for maybe the next five and say, what are the key important things that I want to do in the next five years from a career standpoint? But then just be super open to opportunities.

Jeneta Hot:

Hello, everyone, and thank you for tuning in. Welcome to Five Questions With, our series of quick interviews with industry leaders, change makers, and those who inspire our community. We’re talking professional journeys and about investing in your education, career and self with those who have once been in our shoes. I’m Jeneta Hot, founder of MBAchic, a platform and community for MBAs and professionals around the world. We help navigate business school, careers and more with the goal of propelling more women into the C-Suite. Speaking of the C-Suite, I’m here today with Carolyn Miles, former President and Chief Executive Officer of Save the Children and Professor of Practice and Special Advisor to the dean at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business. Today, she teaches and is building the sustainability curriculum at Darden, while also focusing on bringing in and supporting more women and underrepresented individuals to Darden for their graduate studies.

Prior to that, she was at Save the Children, an organization that gives children a healthy start, the opportunity to learn and protection from harm. The global movement has served over 155 million children in the U.S. and in 120 countries. Joining in 1998, then serving as a Chief Operating Officer from 2004 to 2011, and ultimately leading as President and CEO from 2011 to 2019, she led the organization in doubling the number of children served around the world. She championed issues like hunger, learning outcomes and ending preventable child deaths with a focus on women’s and girls issues. In 2015, she was named one of the 50 World’s Greatest Leaders by Fortune Magazine and was inducted into the Connecticut Women’s Hall of Fame. She’s served on numerous boards including the Doerr Institute, Blackbaud and the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business where she received her MBA. Thank you for being here, Carolyn. I’m really looking forward to this conversation.

Carolyn Miles:

Well, thank you. It’s great to be here.

Jeneta Hot:

Thank you so much. All right, so this is MBAchic, so it makes sense to get to this right away. What drew you to the MBA and what did the MBA mean to you, the investment in yourself and your career, now that you’re on the other side and now that you’re also back at Darden in this new capacity?

Carolyn Miles:

Well, I think for me, it came at a time in my life, I was in my mid twenties, and I had had a degree in animal behavior in undergrad. So I did not have a lot of business, but I found myself in a sales job coming out of college, which was great, which I really enjoyed, but I really wanted to do marketing. So actually, very luckily, I had a great boss who was one of my first mentors and I had really not thought about going back to business school. He said, “This is a way to really think about making a pivot in your career. You could stay here and do that over many years, or you could go back to business school and be able to make that pivot.”

That’s one of the things that I think is so important that business school allows you to do. For me, it was getting the foundational pieces of business education and it was making that pivot into marketing, which is what I really, really wanted to do, or thought I wanted to do, and gave me a chance to figure that out. So it was a great move and I see so much of that pivot piece still happening today with my students. That’s a really big part of why people think about business school.

Jeneta Hot:

Absolutely. And it can be such an unlock, right? It’s great to see sort of now on the other side of that, seeing students follow and helping them pursue. So as you mentioned, you went from business school to the private sector and then you found your way into non-profit and the INGO space, and you spent over twenty years at Save the Children. And by the way, you were their first female CEO, I should add. Did you always have this sort of path in mind and what’s driven you as a leader or perhaps serves as your leadership philosophy?

Carolyn Miles:

I have to say I had never had pretty much any of the pivots that I made in my career in mind. I think that’s something to keep at the back of our minds as you think about your future and your career. I think for me, it was doing things that I was really… Three things I think about. One is, can I learn something in the next thing that I’m going to do? Two is, can I add value? And three is, is there something in there that I’m passionate about? I would say from my first pivot from the business world when I was living in Hong Kong actually, and went from American Express to a startup coffee company that I did with a classmate from Darden actually, and that was all about, this is something I know I will learn a ton about. I know I will learn a lot in this particular next piece of my career.

It was never about will I make more money or will I climb the ladder in terms of the decisions that I made. It was always about, is this something that I think I can add some value? I have something that I can add value to. I know I’m going to learn something and there’s a piece of this that I’m really passionate about. Small business I was passionate about and so that led to that piece. The real big pivot that happened in Hong Kong was my understanding of the impacts of poverty on children. We traveled an awful lot with our kids while we were there, and just those differences that my kids had versus the kids that I met was just a really big wake up call. I thought there’s got to be something I could do. I’ve got some skills or there must be something that I could do. So when we came back from Hong Kong, I really wanted to go into the nonprofit space and I really wanted to do it with a company, an organization that focused on children.

And then it was another Darden connection that got me into that role at Save the Children, that first role. I thought I’d only stay for a couple years and after 22 years, I did finally retire from Save the Children. But it was a fantastic pivot.

Jeneta Hot:

Wow, what a ride. Yeah, of course. And just being open to that, the network and the magic that happens, going in with the goal and being open to being inspired to do something new. That’s great.

Carolyn Miles:

And that’s absolutely how I got to Darden. It was another opportunity to make a pivot. But I never in a million years could I have laid all this out and said, “Yep, that’s what I’m going to do and there’s how I’m going to do it.” I always say to students, “You have to keep yourself totally open to these opportunities because that’s where the magic happens,” as you said.

Jeneta Hot:

That’s so true. It can be overwhelming, but there’s so much to just giving yourself that percentage of your time, just really being open. Oh, fantastic. Okay, so this next question, we’ve shared a bit you’re figuring out, can I learn, can I value. What do you think has been key to your success and who inspires you or have you had anyone serve as a mentor or a sponsor along the way?

Carolyn Miles:

So I have been lucky enough to have some great mentors. I mentioned my first real boss as one of those people. When I was at American Express, I had a boss that really helped me think through the work-life balance piece because I didn’t have children yet, but I knew I wanted to and I really was struggling with how to do that. She was very good at setting boundaries and saying, “Here’s when I’m in the office. Here’s what I’m not. And when I’m not in the office, I’m not in the office. I’m taking care of my kids.” She was a great role model, I think, from that standpoint. And then I guess my biggest inspiration has come from my work at Save the Children.

When I see how people with so little, and especially young people with so little and so many things maybe stacked against them, above those odds, they are able to be successful. They’re able to really get to a new place in terms of getting out of poverty, having opportunities, moving their lives forward for their families, for themselves. That has been totally inspirational because whenever I think, oh my gosh, I have so much to do and I have so many things I’m struggling with, yada, yada, I think my life compared to many of the people that I met is really easy in comparison. That was a huge inspiration for me always.

Jeneta Hot:

Wow, absolutely. And such perspective it brings to everything. Right? Wow, what a gift. Okay, so this is sort of a multi-part, but let’s give this a go. We’ve kind of talked about this, right? What are you most proud of during your career through Save the Children, Darden, private sector beforehand? What’s been the most challenging and what’s been the most surprising and why? We’ve got a minute, so…

Carolyn Miles:

I would say proud of, there’s maybe a couple of things. One is I have always been proud of being able to have friendships throughout my career that are not connected to my work, that are really external friendships that I really have leaned on. I have a network of women from college, from Darden, from even high school, from my work at Save the Children, these little networks of women that I have continued to stay in touch with and be able to lean on when I need them. I think that is super important and we really do, I think, all need that. I guess on the proud of piece, I’m really proud of being able to multiply the impact for kids that Save the Children had. During the 22 years that I was there, it’s more than doubled. Last year Save the Children reached about 183 million children. So just to be able to see that number go up and up and up.

And there’s a lot of huge amounts of work, obviously, that goes behind that, A lot of it, growth of revenue, et cetera, but the money part is only to make the impact happen. So what I’m really proud of is the impact that we’ve been able to make happen at Save the Children. Challenges, I think, certainly early on in my career, there were a lot of challenges just being a woman in the workforce. So just overcoming those, I always found that you just had to do the absolute best job that you could do. Oftentimes if you’re a woman, that might have meant working harder, frankly, and working smarter. But it was just always doing the absolute best I could and calling out where maybe things were a little off kilter. I was lucky enough to work for organizations that actually, I think, were quite progressive in terms of equity in the workplace.

I think that was probably a little easier given the choices that I made. But you do have to make those choices, I think. Those were some of the challenges. And surprising, I guess what’s surprising to me is that I’ve been able to come into different positions and take those skills that I had from the last place, even if the last place was totally different than the next place. You can always bring along those things. I think about when I went from Pacific Coffee Company, which was a little startup in Asia, and came to Save the Children, there were still things that I brought from that experience that I was able to put to work in that new experience. So not thinking that you have to learn everything over again. I think I figured that out over time, but I think at first, I thought, oh no, nothing here is relevant to that other thing, but it always is.

Jeneta Hot:

Oh, absolutely. That’s so true. Oh, these are great. But yeah, on your point about just recognizing the transferable skills and that network that you’ve built over the years. You drag your relationships with you and you problem solve together, so that’s really… And yes, especially if you’re in an MBA program, that the all important first post MBA job is there’s a lot of pressure to nail it and love it. There are times where it’s not what you expected and you do pivot a bit sooner, and it’s absolutely fine. It’s all part of the book that you’re writing,

Carolyn Miles:

But having people to talk about who are not at your workplace, I think, who you have a lot in common with, et cetera, but having people to talk with about those things. And then just having networks of people that personally you really love and depend on, I think that’s also super important.

Jeneta Hot:

Absolutely. Oh my gosh, we’re on the last question, which is hard to leave. We zipped through, but this is great. Again, on the topic of that pressure to have things sorted and figured out early on, really to everyone listening and to those embarking on ambitious career paths and really setting big goals, what words of advice would you offer to them? To us?

Carolyn Miles:

So I guess a couple things, and I talk to students a lot at Darden about this and about facing these next challenges. I think one thing is really try to stay true to what you are at the core of your beliefs and your values. So if one of the things that’s really important to you is I want to be there for my family, I want to be there a lot of my time, then don’t take a role that’s not going to allow you to do that. You really have to… If on the other hand you think what I really want to do is see the world, I really, really want to understand and immerse myself in global cultures, then go in that direction. But try to really get down to what are the things that are important to you and try to take that into consideration, as you decide what that next role is.

And that changes over time, by the way, a lot. So always check in with yourself and say, “Okay, I’m going to check in and see if that’s still true, because maybe things have changed. Maybe I no longer want to travel the globe and do those things and I really want to stay put in one place and be closer to my extended family,” or whatever it is. So I think try to keep those core things there and important, but check in on them often because they do sometimes shift. So another piece of advice I might offer is that if you decide that you do want to go forward in your life with a partner, being really clear on picking that partner and making a good choice. That doesn’t mean it’s somebody that is always going to say yes to you, but it is somebody that’s always going to be there for you.

They might say no, they might say yes, but somebody that you know can depend on, and that is a really important decision in your life. So don’t just rush into that. I think that’s super important. I guess another final piece of advice, and I talked about this earlier, is to decide… As you chart your course, I would say don’t try to chart your course for the next 30 years, by the way. I think that you could chart your course for maybe the next five and say, “What are the key important things that I want to do in the next five years from a career standpoint?” But then just be super open to opportunities.

I think I’m a great example of making all sorts of twists and turns, but having a base that I said, “Why would I pick this next thing?” and being clear in those choices, in terms of how I make those choices. But I always tell students, figuring out your life for the next 30 or 40 years, I think, is probably not a good idea and it may preclude you from doing some really awesome things that you would really love to do. So if you want to be a doctor, obviously that might be a different thing. But if you want to be in business, I think there are so many different ways you can go.

Jeneta Hot:

Oh my goodness. Absolutely. That’s so great. Thank you for sharing that. That’s a really great way to tie this up. I think being open to the magic, open to the pivots, and really staying true to who you are, excellent advice. Thank you so much. But we do have a bit of time left. This is a quick interview, but we do love to end these with some rapid fires. So shall we move on to those?

Carolyn Miles:

Yep.

Jeneta Hot:

All right. So what was your first job?

Carolyn Miles:

I was a lifeguard and a swim instructor. I was a swimmer and well, from the age of eight to 18, a competitive swimmer, so I guess I was a natural one.

Jeneta Hot:

That’s it. Yeah, that’s built in. That’s great. What is the best book you read or podcast you heard in the last 12 months?

Carolyn Miles:

So I heard a really interesting podcast. I think I listened to it last year. It’s called American Radical, and it is about someone who was at the January 6th events at the Capital, and it traced her history as to how she got radicalized to arrive there. She never was political before that and how she ended up there and it was about her family. It was super interesting and gave me a perspective that I guess I’d never really thought about because my political leanings are the other way. So it really opened my eyes to how somebody could have ended up, found themselves there.

Jeneta Hot:

Wow. Yeah, absolutely. Fantastic. I want to check it out. If you weren’t in your current role, what do you think you’d be doing?

Carolyn Miles:

I would probably be a veterinarian.

Jeneta Hot:

Okay. Yeah.

Carolyn Miles:

Totally different way to go, so there you go. That just goes to show you just never know what you’re going to do.

Jeneta Hot:

You never know. It’s back to your undergrad roots. Right? That’s a throwback. I love that. Okay, do you have a secret talent or hobby that people might be surprised to hear about?

Carolyn Miles:

I love to cook. That’s not such a surprising talent, I guess, but I love to cook. But I really love to cook Asian food. I think that’s because of my time in Hong Kong, which requires a huge amount of chopping.

Jeneta Hot:

Yeah, absolutely.

Carolyn Miles:

When I cook Asian food, it’s a day of chopping.

Jeneta Hot:

Yeah.

Carolyn Miles:

But that’s okay. I find chopping very therapeutic.

Jeneta Hot:

Right? Oh, that’s awesome. That’s fantastic. Okay, and then the last one. What song or album is currently playing on loop for you?

Carolyn Miles:

So I just watched the new Elvis movie with my 21 year old daughter two nights ago. So now it’s all Elvis, all the time, so You Ain’t Nothing but a Hound Dog, Tutti Frutti, and all sorts of Elvis, Blue Suede Shoes, all the Elvis classics.

Jeneta Hot:

Wow, that’s great.

Carolyn Miles:

It was a fun movie.

Jeneta Hot:

Yeah. Oh, this was so great. Thank you for playing. That’s always a fun way to wrap things up. But this was such a great conversation. It flew. It really flew. But thank you so much for sharing with us and offering a view into your journey and your advice for those of us following in your shoes.

Carolyn Miles:

Thank you, Jeneta. I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed being here.