Jacqueline de Rojas (notes from a BBC interview)

In this post, there are notes so that you can understand the BBC radio 4 Desert Island Discs interview with Jaqueline de Rojas. She is the president of techUK, the body that represents 900 companies in the technology sector. Aggie and I are currently creating a podcast and it will be launched on 11th October!

You can listen to the BBC interview here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0003jnr

Influential woman in digital sector

→ titan of tech

President of TechUK which represents hundreds of companies in the tech industry

Received CBE!

Tech = vital economic organ

Opening up opportunity in tech to all → boundaries no longer exist “tech can be the great equaliser”

2:14 Prolific (country in terms of digital adoption)

2:31 Surely we can (also create as constructors of technology and innovation)

2:40 Diversity and Inclusion (are your favourite subjects)

the action or state of including or of being included within a group or structure

2:52 Gender gap (huge gender gap in technology)

3:23 The domain of men (in tech) repeated at 3:56

3:34 Advent of the first personal computer (male thing to have a PC)

the arrival of a notable person or thing

4:11 Scout at age 5 (for football we’d do it this young but in tech we expect people to be fully formed at age 18+)

4:35 I’m not great at acknowledging compliments (referring to Alicia Keys song)

4:45 Even the playing field (in her field of tech)

4:50 My girl anthem → (fun can hear them singing in the background!)

5:29 Diversity Deficit (in tech)

6:03 Do we need quotas for diversity

ECONOMICS an amount of something that someone is officially allowed to have or do

6:29 If there’s a mismatch it’s pretty obvious (when she takes mental photographs of teams at top/bottom)

6:57 We have a mobile and flexible workforce

7:18 Domestic talent pipeline (regarding borders closing due to Brexit, and access to talent is important)

A pipeline is a long pipe typically underground. However this means when talent is being developed

8:47 Brought up (above her father’s Chinese shop)

8:52 Punch bag (what his mother was to her father)

9:16 Build up (a resilience around herself)

9:59 Not very fatherly (her stepfather)

10:32 Are you trying to show me up (what her stepfather said to her about her GCSE results)

expose someone or something as being bad or faulty or to embarrass/humiliate someone

10:39 Fork in the road

10:45 How much potential I can unlock

10:51 Pretty isolated (Lauren Laverne to Jacqueline de Rojas about her childhood)

10:55 Flew into the arms

11:17 Get rid of (her surname)

11:28 “Oi you”

11:34 White noise (the bullying)

12:10 Radical ways (how David Bowie has reinvented himself so many times)

12:53 Dabbling with a punk look

13:48 A major opportunity (for Jacqueline to go to study European business)

14:16 In what way (how was the university experience different in Germany to what she had expected)

14:38 Entirely in German (all her lectures)

14:58 Life was coming together very quickly (she got married and her first job in Tech etc)

15:07 Newscaster (she wanted to be a newscaster on the BBC when she returned to London)

15:12 They didn’t come knocking (the BBC)

15:15 Maybe today’s the day! (Lauren Laverne to Jacqueline)

15:25 Grasped it with both hands (her job as a tech recruiter)

17:06 Troubleshooting (what she was good at)

17:20 Stripped it all away and boiled it all down (when thinking about what she’s good at)

17:42 Give people space (to remove friction in conversation)

17:51 I’m so grateful I branded myself that way

18:06 You were turned down (from the leadership team)

18”17 We simply don’t have women (on the leadership team)

18:29 A miracle if you look hard enough

18:37 Banging my head against the glass ceiling

18:40 Would have been distraught (if she’d been left working there for another 5 years with no progression to leadership)

18:48 Imposter syndrome (she doesn’t know what a managing director does, when she got a job as managing director somewhere else)

19:31 It served me well (being more consultative, asking questions when people came in to ask her for decisions)

21:10 Salsaing our way through the 90s (her and her second husband - a Columbian)

21:23 Probably people out there who wish they hadn’t worked for me (when she was manager)

21:29 In order to make it (thought she had to be aggressive and act like a man to succeed)

21:54 Softer edges may serve me better (learning that she didn’t need to be so aggressive)

22:15 What actually happens behind the scenes (of her calm and prepared exterior)

22:24 Does it ever hamper you (Lauren asking of her fear of failure)

22:42 Hand in hand with my resilience (the resilience and the fear of failing)

22:50 Reframe it as a learning (if she ever does make a mistake)

22:51 It never really manifests itself into failure

22:56 I worship at the altar of efficiency

22:27 Religious proclivity (what do her family react/think of her obsession with efficiency)

25:10 Algorithms (control so much of life e.g. university, getting a mortgag
22:17 Who regulates (who says if algortihms are safe)

25:39 All our voices at the table (to properly regulate to do the right thing for everybody not just government)

26:14 Digital gangsters

26:39 Shine a light (on companies e.g. facebook controlling how they use data)

27:00 Platform providers (regulation with both tech and these platform providers)

27:45 Technology to shield audiences

27:52 Things morph and change online so quickly (what makes it difficult to control)

29:02 Taking you back (Lauren to Jacqueline ‘taking you back to your third and final wedding’)

29:22 We’re all role models whether we want to be or not

29:39 Revealing vulnerabilities (ability to ask for help)

29:59 Network with the industry (how to get into tech as a young girl)

30:18 Introduced some STEM badges (she works with girl guiding closely)

32:33 A book of extremes (describing Rebecca her book of choice)

32:26 Glint (off the saxophone)