What was it like joining
corporate America coming out of a 10-year career in the United States Air Force?
I've learned how to become softer.
You had that military precision about you?
Very much so.
Hi, everyone!
Mike Sievert here.
Welcome to Sidekicks Conversations.
This is a new series where I sit down with interesting people to connect
and listen and learn from each other's lived experiences.
And what a better place to do that than right here at Sidekicks,
our wildly-popular Bellevue headquarters pub; named, of course, after the iconic
T-Mobile Sidekick, one of the coolest smartphones of all time.
The Sidekick was actually America's first smartphone
launched by T-Mobile way back in 2002.
And beyond that, it's a little nod in the name to the cool people
we hang out with here at the pub.
Today I'm joined by one of our colleagues who's incredibly impressive:
Kendra Lord is the Director of Geospatial Engineering
and Analytics at T-Mobile, and has been with us since 2018.
She's a 10-year
veteran of the United States Air Force, where she was a Senior Mission Analyst.
Not to spoil all the details of what we'll chat about, but we're filming this
on the heels of a recent Uncarrier Move around broadband: Internet Freedom.
And Kendra's work is vital for all of the growth of our high speed
Internet business. So, Kendra, welcome.
Thank you!
So when did you join this team?
You've been at this a while, right?
Yeah, I joined in August of 2018.
So where was home Internet?
It was a twinkle in our eye back then, wasn't it?
Yeah, it was a whisper for sure.
I was employee number six.
I was the only employee of Geospatial.
It was outside of our network team and yeah, it was
this thing that, you know, we definitely had to swim upstream
at that point in time to make more than a twinkle.
What was it like being on a team in its infancy like that?
We're this great big giant company, most of the people watching
are either followers of our company, or employees of our company.
You know,
we have tens of billions of dollars, 110 million customers - we're used to big.
You were starting out on something in 2018 that was really small,
what was that like?
I would say it was the right thing for me because arguably I just stepped
out of the Air Force less than two weeks before my first day at T-Mobile.
And I was honestly like,
Oh good Lord, can I be the right fit for corporate America?
And I think that small team, that startup mentality,
that in the trenches, of sorts, team was why it worked.
And so it was like almost an instant fit for me personally.
What was it like joining
corporate America coming out of a 10-year career in the United States Air Force?
I did a lot of "fake 'til you make it" kind of thing,
if I'm being completely honest, because I was terrified internally, but
really excited to take on a new challenge and have new experiences.
In the Air Force, I made a lot of really, really great friends.
I loved the people I worked with, the work I did was obviously interesting
and I was ready for something new.
And that transition for me was easy because of the team that I joined, I think.
And you know, I've learned how to become softer.
I hear stories about myself my first couple of weeks here
and I'm like, Oh god, how did I not get fired?
You had that military precision about you?
Very much so.
What is a Mission Analyst?
That's one of the roles you had in the Air Force.
Yeah, that was my last title.
So when I was a Mission Analyst, I was a Geospatial Intelligence Analyst
for Air Force Special Operations Command, and I was stationed in Florida.
Not a bad place to be.
And what we did as Geospatial Intel was I worked for a unit that
supported UAVs
- so unmanned aircraft. We were considered deployed in place.
So we were working anywhere and upwards to twenty-two AOR's.
You know, you're constantly in a war zone of sorts,
but as part of ISR: so Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance
but as a Geospatial Intelligence Analyst, it means you're doing
fundamentally what we are today: which is you take geospatial data,
take human intelligence and you tie them together to drive military tactics.
And you were able to do all that work from Florida.
Yes.
OK. So sort of in a base
or in an office-like setting?
It's called a Skiff.
I was excited when I joined T-Mobile
because I'm like, I get a real window for the first time!
I can see actually outside!
Director of Geospatial Engineering and Analytics?
I'm asking for a friend, of course.
But what is that?
It's a mouthful of a title, isn't it?
We're the brains of the Internet product, is the way that we refer to it.
We leverage network data, partnering with our network partners
to identify households that we believe will have
not only a consistent experience, but are going to want a product.
So we consider
competitive data and information such as that to drive the business forward.
So explain that to everybody.
So we serve 40 million households with home Internet,
but by serving 40 million households, that doesn't necessarily
mean that all 40 million of them could use it simultaneously.
So how does it work?
How do we determine who's in and who's out?
If somebody comes to our website and they want to put in their home address
- 40 million people if they did it today - are there addresses
that would be approved? How do we decide that?
Well, we decide that in heavy partnership with our network team
and capacity planning.
So what we do is we manage and, we're the enforcers
is the best way I can put it.
We join geospatial data and non-geospatial data together to drive analytics.
We built, fundamentally, the back end that is our "yes/no" of sorts, where it's
not only the households that we believe could get it,
but how many within a given sector we could say "yes" to.
Well right now the Net Promoter Scores
on the product are amazing, so you're obviously making great decisions.
And if people come in
and they put in their address and they get a positive answer,
and then they sign up, what you're saying is that means that
we've looked at the throughput and capacity of the sector that they're on
and we've forecasted out into the future as to whether or not the capacity
will still be there in the future.
And if it looks like it will be, then we say "yes"?
Yes. That's the core belief and it's considered monthly, right?
Humans are humans and we can't -
we can't anticipate how they're going to behave, which is why we have to reconsider it
every month. Because, you know, Joe next door could be
bittorrenting and it's going to impact
how many people we can actually sell to that next month.
So what if over a couple-month period,
dozens of people in the same neighborhood wanted to sign up?
It caught wildfire in the neighborhood, would we after, a certain period of time,
like the number of people
that signed up, would the nth person get a "no" then or how would it work?
It's first come, first serve. Right?
And so it's near real-time: where we're updating as the sale occurs, it's
taking one away.
We call them available slots.
Rick likes to call them "seats on the plane".
And it's instantaneous.
But every month we're opening up more because 2.5 build is happening
and the network is obviously growing and evolving.
And every month we can be growing and driving our leads for marketing
because we've collected that information from the website
that then enables marketing reach out and go, "Hey,
I know we said no last month, but now do you still want to join?
Because we can take you."
I love it.
So that's going the other direction, whereas
somebody applied a couple of months back and we're adding capacity
and once we add the capacity, we reach back out to them?
Exactly.
I love that.
Tell me about joining that team in its infancy.
You were talking about what it was like
in a big company like ours and especially coming out of the military.
But what, through the 3 or 4 year journey we've had in home Internet,
especially for your team in Geospatial, what started to click?
Was there a particular time when you knew -
Ok, this is happening now and it's really working.
And, you know, you start to see the size of the prize.
Oh, yeah.
I think that one was definitely an evolution.
But the first point was when we got the pilot approved, really.
And I remember when we did our first, it was our soft launch
in March of 2019 where I remember identifying 50 people
that we had on an Excel spreadsheet that are like,
these are the prime houses that we want to target for this product.
Fifty!
We have like well over a million now.
Exactly!
Yeah, it was fifty on an Excel spreadsheet that I typed in manually.
I'll never forget it.
And I remember thinking - we had post-it notes on a wall
about our customer journey and you'd sit here watching, waiting for it to launch.
It was one that worked, frankly, because you're just taking a risk
and hoping this is the right journey, and everybody's extremely passionate.
That team was the magic sauce, I really think.
All of our personalities were very tenacious.
None of us were hesitant to swim upstream, and we got used to hearing "no" a lot,
but we challenged it, which I know you heard plenty about.
Yeah.
And why do you think there were some "no's"?
Why were people hesitant?
Well, the capacity usage that an Internet product has on a mobile network is scary.
You know, the
network had not been - a mobile network had not been optimized for fixed devices.
And we are a completely different product with very different customers
that we're still learning a ton about.
An awful lot of people
that transition from the military are in technology.
Do you think that's a coincidence?
Or do you think that's sort of a natural place given the kind of skill sets
and approaches that military careers build?
There's a nuance to that:
I think the skills that translate well into corporate America
tend to be relatively technical.
The best skill, and what makes you be able to be successful in a really stressful
high-activity environment in technology
is the soft skills that you're given in the military - any branch.
Leadership skills, people skills.
Exactly.
Your ability to survive under pressure.
Change frequently.
I remember when I first started,
people were looking at me like, Why aren't you more stressed?
You've had like three different bosses.
And I'm like, well, you know, military is not that different.
A new commander comes in and everything changes every year.
Interesting.
Have you been able to find common ground with other people that have had military
careers here at the company or elsewhere in your professional career since leaving?
Yeah.
VAN, obviously - our Allies Network for Veterans - has been wonderful.
I've met some really special people with far more interesting stories
than mine, I would say.
And, you know, I've created friendships there.
Tell me about your involvement with VAN, what kinds of things
have you been able to be involved with or people you've met.
Quite a few friends that are kind of around the enterprise,
frankly, a lot of them in the network side, but just a lot of the gatherings
in the time that you get to spend with other veterans is special because,
no offense against civilians, but it's just never quite the same
and other people can't quite get you like another veteran can.
It's interesting.
You've been working with Lead Magenta Next to help that support,
and can you tell us about Lead Magenta Next and your work with the group?
Lead Magenta Next is really impressive because it's focusing on
groups of individuals or different groups around the DE&I and trying to get people
into more managerial positions to help grow our executive ranks.
I'm working with an individual because this
go around with Lead Magenta Next, which just completed, was focused on VAN
so I got to work with a veteran of 32 years and help him
grow his career. And acting as a sponsor it's about helping them
grow their network and getting them in
front of the right people around the enterprise.
This is all about supporting other people and you know it's interesting
the journey you've been on.
You're a leader, you have a team - tell me about your team.
My team is - they're the glue.
They are why I'm happy to be here if I'm being honest.
I've got a lot of very smart young talent
and we are tackling
challenges day in and day out.
And those creative brains is what has helped us,
I really think it's the driving force to get us to 1 million.
OK, Speed Round.
If I can put you on the spot:
if you could have a conversation with anyone,
who would it be and what would it be about?
Oh, geez, I'm going to have to go sentimental on you here,
it would be my dad and it would be about just about anything.
Yeah.
I assume you lost him?
I did, last year.
OK, so relatively recently.
Yeah.
Well, I get that - my wife
Suzanne and I have only one living parent of the four parents.
And, you know, that's something that in adulthood,
if things happen in the right order, you know, we all wind up facing.
Absolutely.
And it's not easy.
No, no.
But I will tell you that T-Mobile was amazing throughout all of it,
if I'm being frank,
because it was in the middle of Covid and things were crazy,
and Dow at the time was phenomenal, as was
Rick and my leadership.
So T-Mobile: it's a good place to be.
Thank you for playing a big role in the community and for building this million-person
Internet business with all of your great work.
We could have never gotten this far unless we were so smart
about who would have a great experience, and you and your team
should be so proud of what you're doing.
Thank you.
Thanks for sharing your story with us, Kendra.
Yeah, thank you for having me!
Cheers!