Corsearch Celebrates International Women’s Day 2020

Across all the arms of the Corsearch family we recognize the value of our people and are committed to providing equal opportunities for all. The Corsearch culture is one of tolerance and openness because we believe that our people are individuals not categories. What’s most important to us is that the people who work with us are passionate about trademarks and brand protection! Our people join us in order to be challenged, developed, supported, and valued, but they give a huge amount back to the company, to each other, to our clients, and to the industry in general.

However, from initiatives such as the UN’s International Women’s Day, we know that this kind of equality does not exist universally. In recognition of International Women’s Day 2020 and its theme “I am Generation Equality: Realizing Women’s Rights”, we have spoken with three outstanding female colleagues from across the group. It’s our hope that shining a spotlight on these exceptional characters may provide some insight not just into who they are, but into how their careers could be a future roadmap for girls and women of all generations who may not have otherwise considered working in the trademarks and brand protection fields.

Linda Silberg, Global Head of Operations – Yellow Brand Protection

What does your role entail?

In my role as Global Head of Operations I focus on developing, securing, and following up our work with the aim of increasing customer satisfaction, strengthening our brand, and developing the organization’s results. I’m also responsible for providing a safe and secure working environment for all our operational centers and supporting the regional Operations Managers too.

Why did you choose your career path?

In Swedish we would say that I slipped in on a banana peel! I have worked as a team leader and manager of people for my whole career, but after 20 years in the travel industry I wanted to try another line of business. I saw Online Brand Protection as a way of continuing to work closely with people but also to do something new and challenging. I was lucky enough to be headhunted for an Operations Manager role at Yellow BP in 2013 and seven years later I’m very happy that I joined. It has been fantastic to participate in the magnificent growth and success we have had so far.

What’s the most rewarding part of your job?

I really love it when customers and employees tell me that they are happy and satisfied with what we are doing, it makes me feel we’re moving in the right direction. Another thing I’m passionate about is collaborating with our tech team to find better, smoother solutions for our daily work and then following through on that process to introduce exciting new features for clients.

What advice would you give to young women who may be considering pursuing your role?

My best advice is to learn as many parts of the job as possible including the basics. If you don’t know the full picture you will have a hard time becoming a good leader. Be diligent in solving problems and challenges along the way. Finally, careers don’t have genders. Be whatever you want to be and trust your gut.

What’s your big industry tip for 2020?

Protect your trademarks! Run a comprehensive trademark search before developing your brand. Register your brand for a trademark to ensure countrywide protection. And, obviously, hire us to make sure nobody is taking advantages of your brand online!

Malia Ladd, Chief Product Officer – Corsearch

What does your role entail?

As Corsearch’s Chief Product Officer it’s my job to establish the product vision and direction for the company. From a product perspective it’s been an exciting couple of years at Corsearch because we’ve gone from having a 100% focus on trademark clearance, screening, and watching tools to expanding our vision to include online brand protection. This means we’re now able to support our customers across the whole brand lifecycle, from establishment to enforcement.
The product team is very much a hub of cross-collaborative work. We listen closely to the voices of all our stakeholders, both internal and external, and use them to inform how we develop our strategy and new services. It’s through working closely with our teams that we can really continue to drive innovation in the industry and help our customers solve problems in new, more efficient ways. In that sense, it’s a balance of being proactive but also remaining responsive to customer needs.

Why did you choose your career path?

This is a question I’ve answered several times in the past few years because I have teenage children who are contemplating their careers. In truth, I don’t feel like I chose my career path, I feel like it chose me! I have a business degree but was always interested in the legal area, so I took a job doing research at a law firm more than 20 years ago. My first foray into intellectual property was doing preliminary trademark screening for one of the IP attorneys in the firm. Then, as my career moved on, I worked in the startup space and had the opportunity to take up research, sales, and management positions within the trademark and online brand protection fields.

For the greater part of the last decade though, I’ve worked in the product area on the development of tools to help our customers establish and protect their brands. While I didn’t choose this career path, I have chosen to stay with it because I’m passionate about the industry and helping brand holders protect their assets. One of my favorite quotes is ‘choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life’.

What does it take to succeed in your role?

In one word, tenacity. Creating a product-centric organization isn’t always the easiest task because there are a huge number of stakeholders who need to be satisfied. We want to create products that serve our customers’ needs, but which also take account of the resources and practices of everyone across the business. It takes tenacity, determination, and strong collaborative teamwork to achieve that, and to make sure that everyone from our external customers to our operations staff, technology teams, and sales members all feel their voices are heard and included as part of the process.

What’s the most rewarding part of your job?

I love it when cross-functional teams work together on difficult projects and execute them seamlessly. It might sound a little bit trite, but I think that seeing a team of people aligning and then achieving a common goal is a complete adrenaline rush! Knowing that we have the power to deliver on our vision, create new tools, and help our customers with the ever-changing landscape of protecting their brands is so much fun too. It’s a lot of responsibility but working with people who are just as passionate about the industry as I am makes it a really great journey.

What advice would you give to young women who may be considering pursuing your role?

I think I may be a bit old school here, but I’m a big believer in just doing your best whatever your role. Always look to add value wherever your skillset will allow you to do so, and I would encourage women not to focus on titles, roles, or salary, but to focus on goals and results. I’m not saying those things aren’t important (because they are!), I’m just saying that if you follow this then the rest (like titles and roles) will come in time. Don’t be afraid to pursue your dreams or try something different. That’s how you find out where you excel and where you need help. My last piece of advice is to know and acknowledge your flat sides. If you know your flat sides, you can 1. work on them, and 2. build your teams around the skillsets that will complement you and create a very successful group.

What’s your big industry tip for 2020?

My tip is to sleep with one eye open and never be complacent! There is so much happening in this space, whether that be changes in the trademark clearance landscape or new eCommerce channels and areas of risk for brand holders. Stay up to date, seek advice from industry experts, and continue to look for new ways to provide the comprehensive level of service to your customers as the landscape continues to morph and change. The clearance and brand protection process today is vastly different than when I started in this industry 20+ years ago, and I know the next 20 will be just as exciting.

Hue Anh Ta, Head of Intelligence – Pointer Brand Protection

What does your role entail?

I’m responsible for the Intelligence department, which includes teams for investigations and distribution management, but we also have people working on data science, project coordination, product management, and administration. Everything about the department is diverse, from the work to the department members’ backgrounds, nationalities, disciplines, and personalities. That makes my job both challenging and fascinating. My role requires me to establish a full partnership with the teams, they’re like family.

There’s often an assumption that intelligence is limited to open-source intelligence (OSINT – using publicly-available data only) and social-media intelligence (SOCMINT), but the teams deal with everything from data modelling, product lifecycle, and data scraping to source code analysis, and a huge amount besides. As their work is challenging and fast moving, it’s my job to ensure the department runs smoothly and to guarantee that everything we do is of the highest quality. For me, transparency and trust within the department and with our clients are crucial. To sum up, my role entails working collaboratively with my colleagues and clients to discover new possibilities within intelligence. Whether it’s a software, distribution, or investigations service, intelligence can be applied to various analytics.

Why did you choose your career path?

I’ve always been interested in details and finding new ways to solve problems, but I wasn’t one of those kids who already knew at the age of five what I wanted to be. I did always have an affinity with solving crimes though, and even at a young age one of my favourite hobbies was binge watching TV shows like NCIS, Bones, and CSI. I never thought they were real, but I did learn from watching them that everything is hidden in the details. Eventually I became involved with IP infringement and investigations when, during an internship in Beijing through my legal firm, I was given the opportunity to look into cold IP cases and suggest new ideas for solving them. I actually left brand protection and IP law for a time in pursuit of more entrepreneurial ideas, but then after several years I started missing solving complex cases and so I went back into brand protection and (offline) investigations.

What does it take to succeed in your role?

All the steps I’ve made in my career have happened through a combination of my own determination plus my fortunate discovery of people willing to give me opportunities because they believed in my competence. That’s important because it reinforces my belief that life is like karma and that when we’re nice to others, they will be nice to us. If we give others an opportunity, we will be given opportunity in return. At the same time, opportunity must be realized through determination, transparency and the ability to meet expectations. In addition, education is important but less than discipline. Discipline can show others a lot about your character.

In terms of skills, my experience extends to online IP infringement monitoring, notice and takedown processes, cease and desist procedures, and the structuring of IP rights. Additionally, leading investigations into manufacturers of counterfeits, analyzing in-house business intelligence and distribution information to create big data, and then using that for data mining, clustering, pattern recognition, network infiltration, and product comparison are also important skills. In the Intelligence department we encourage the sharing of knowledge on all these areas, and that togetherness makes us successful.

What’s the most rewarding part of your job?

Whether I’m dealing with data, keeping pace with fast-moving technologies, or managing, my job presents me with continual challenges, and this is its own reward. I love being tested and being able to test my fellow colleagues in return. Perhaps the most rewarding part of my job though is working with the people in my department in a sort of ‘start-up culture’. We recognise each other’s needs and that there is no real hierarchy. There’s so much trust between us that even when we have robust discussions, they’re like ones you’d have with your family. It’s also rewarding to receive acknowledgment from happy clients who see the value in what we do. It’s great to be recognized for the creation of actionable collaboration, whether this happens in-house or with external partners such as local investigators or law enforcement agents. This all feeds into an energy where we believe each other, strengthens the work the Intelligence department delivers, and creates an environment where work is more than just work.

What advice would you give to young women who may be considering pursuing your role?

Stay true to yourself and work to improve what you have rather than focusing on what you don’t. You might feel like you don’t have the right education, funding, or even the mindset for further study, but none of that means you won’t make it. Those without an academic background can still find success in an environment dependent on being ‘smart’. Accept your weaknesses and ask for help when it’s needed. Primarily, focus on growing horizontally by finding suitable challenges and opportunities that compliment your strengths. Vertical growth will come in time if that’s your desire. Ultimately, try to stay positive, don’t be hateful, stay humble, be determined, have discipline, do get frustrated, do cry, do be vulnerable; allowing yourself all the elements you feel will mean you stay an independent thinker.

What’s your big industry tip for 2020?

Spend time building active collaborations, but also work on your ability to understand dissimilar datasets relative to each other so that you can draw actionable conclusions.
The biggest thing for me going forward is finding effective ways to collaborate. No one can do this job alone, we need actionable partnerships which exploit the available data, technologies, and resources; that’s the only way to keep up with the new digital age. Sometimes these partnerships will be between different departments of a business, and/or between the public and private sectors. Working in this way allows you to create the biggest and most insightful networks. Only then can we take online-offline actions that result in great outcomes for consumers and clients.

Discover more about Corsearch culture and career opportunities.