In this keynote-style talk, Kerri Pollard shares personal stories—from her teenage daughter's reaction to her karaoke sessions at home, to the surprising office karaoke moments that reveal hidden personalities like "Joe from Accounting." She argues that vulnerability, exemplified by karaoke, creates authentic connections that improve collaboration. Pollard recounts her early career at BeFree, where she entered as an entry‑level account manager with no affiliate‑marketing knowledge but leveraged openness and relationship‑building to survive the dot‑com boom and bust. She describes a low point under a fear‑based manager, and how a female executive, Lisa, encouraged her to speak up, reigniting her confidence. Pollard highlights gender disparities in executive roles and stresses the need for women to use their voices and support each other. She narrates her promotion to President of Commission Junction (2007‑2015), attributing the decision to her willingness to learn, admit gaps, and build connections. Throughout, she weaves humor, anecdotes, and a call for more karaoke, mentorship, and collaboration.
Chapters
Good evening. So good to be here. So this past weekend, my teenage daughter yells at me from across the house, "Mom, put down the microphone, step away, you're scaring us." And I would love to tell all of you that I was practicing for this evening's event, but no, instead I was alone alone in our living room playing Glee for Wii. Woo! Anybody else play this fantastic in-home karaoke game? Any brave souls willing to raise their hands? All right, a few, a few. And I'm not sure why I'm obsessed with karaoke, because I suck. Like, I'm really, really bad. Like, really bad. I've had friends, family members, perfect strangers actually inform me how much I suck. But I love it. "Jessie's—" Okay, I'll stop. Go-to song: "Jessie's Girl." But yes, I'm absolutely obsessed with karaoke. And so the crazy part is that my favorite way to do karaoke is with work colleagues. Now, I know a lot of you are thinking, "What?" Are you nuts? Making an ass out of myself in front of people that I have to work with day in, day out? NFW. Not going to happen. But the reason I love it is for those Joe from Accounting moments. We all know Joe. Joe is that quiet, shy guy that sits in the corner of the office Headphones on, mesmerized by spreadsheets, doesn't interact with anybody else, eats lunch at his desk. So we're all surprised when Joe accepts the invite for karaoke. And not only does Joe show up, Joe puts up. Grabs the mic, and from the top of his lung belts out "Sweet Child O' Mine" by Guns N' Roses. Our jaws are on the floor. Who is this man? Any perceptions that we had about Joe are completely obliterated. But the best part is when you return to work that next day. All of a sudden, the headphones are off. Joe's actually talking to people. Interactions ensue. Collaboration begins. Because we saw Joe for Joe. And if you think about karaoke, it is probably one of our most vulnerable moments, right? Especially for us sucky singers. And this word "vulnerability" has gotten such a bad rap over the last couple years as being weak, being taken advantage of. But vulnerability is what creates connections. Karaoke, vulnerability, connections. And especially now with social media, where there is so much posturing. Everything is perfect. Look at all my family and friends and the beautiful vacations that I take, when we know it's not. And I share this story because when I look back at my 20, 25-year career, vulnerability was absolutely a key characteristic in my own success. When I started as an entry-level account manager back in 1999, I'm sure many of you were still, I don't know where, I don't wanna know, at BeFree, I knew nothing about internet marketing. I knew nothing about affiliate marketing. And BeFree proceeded to give me their largest account at the time. Now who's crazy? You're giving me the largest revenue generator, and I know nothing about this space? And I had my wits about me, I don't know how or why, to take a step back and figure out what did I know? And whether it was my journalistic instinct, or I had a successful sales stint prior to, I knew I could make connections. So that's what I did for those first 3 to 6 months, is I tried to get to know everybody and anybody that could help me. Me. Admit in terms of what I did know and what I didn't know, because I knew that mistakes would be made. I knew that I would absolutely eff up, but if I had strong connections with the client and with my colleagues, I knew that we could work together through any of those challenges, and that we did. We survived the dot-com boom, the dot-com bust, and not only did I never get kicked off the barnesandnoble.com account. Remember these guys? Still trying to compete with Amazon. But I got more accounts, and I eventually got more people in which to help me manage those accounts. And that really began my own leadership and stepping stone on a go-forward basis. A couple years later at BeFree, though, I definitely hit somewhat of a low point. I was working for one of these management by fear bosses. Anybody else ever work for one of these? Yeah, lots of fun, huh? Definitely lots of yelling. Heaven forbid you challenge him or her in a group setting. I dreaded weekly staff meetings, didn't feel inspired at all, and felt instead felt very demoralized, but it was also that same time that BFree was actually getting ready to integrate with our closest competitor at the time, which was Commission Junction. And we actually had a lot of combined leadership meetings talking about people and process and technology. And it was in one of these meetings, and I was still working for that boss, that it was the BFree leadership team on one side of the table and the Commission Junction one on the other side, talking about a variety of different concepts. And I kind of sat back, was fairly quiet, because again, didn't have much conviction or confidence at that point in time. And after the meeting, one of the female executives pulled me aside. Her name was Lisa. And she said, "I've talked to you before. I know that you know more about some of these concepts than anybody else in this room. Why didn't you say anything?" You need to speak up. We need your voice. In order for this integration to be successful, we need a diversity of thought. We need different perspectives. And I will tell you, this one conversation gave me back that confidence, gave me back that conviction, and I started challenging that fear by management. Boss, because I knew that Lisa was in my corner. I knew that she had my back. And I know we've all heard the stats. We make up, women, half the workforce, but only 25% of us actually possess an executive-level position. Only 6% of the S&P 500 actually has female CEO. So as you get higher, we become fewer. We must use our voices. We must support one another. Yes, we can protest for equality, but it's even the smallest of things. That nod to another in a meeting, the shaking of the head, the congratulatory comment after someone gets done with a presentation. It's those little things that make the difference. Do not compete. But collaborate. So because of this vulnerability and these connections, I not only had amazing women throughout the course of my career, but I also had a few good men. And I wish it was Jack Nicholson and Tom Cruise, but that's besides the point. I did have a few good men actually emerge, and I know there hasn't been many as of late when we think about the Weinsteins of the world and the Bill O'Reillys who have done disgusting and deplorable things. But we cannot stereotype them all. In 2007, the president position opened up for Commission Junction, and the position was based on the West Coast. I was currently living in Boston, and I was VP of the East Coast. And as I said, the position opened up, and it was myself and one of my peers that was also very much interested in the position. He was male. He was much closer to the position on the West Coast. He had more experience than I did. He had more more revenue responsibility than I did, and we both demonstrated very similar results. And our CEO was responsible for making the decision, and his name was Jim. And many would categorize Jim as an old white guy, 'cause he was 60-plus years old at the time, he was white, and, well, he was a guy. But at the end of the day, Jim chose me. Because he didn't see gender, he didn't see male versus female. Instead, what he saw was the role and the requirements for success. And yes, somebody that could demonstrate results, but also had that drive, had that ability to make connections. And when I talked to Jim after the fact, I said, "Why?" He said, "Your willingness to learn." Admitting what you do and do not know, that growth potential, that vulnerability. And I was president from 2007 through 2015, where I grew that company double-digit year-over-year growth, 14 offices, 400 employees. It was a great, great run. So I'll leave you with this: we need more Lisas. We need more gyms, and we all need more karaoke in our lives. Thank you very much.
