Chief Change Officer
#187 Mary Shea PhD: From Classical Music to Closing Deals—The Art of Reinventing Your Career – Part One
Wed, 19 Feb 2025
Mary Shea’s career is proof that you don’t have to stick to one soundtrack. From a classical musician to a leading voice in sales leadership, she’s taken some bold risks—and in this first episode of a three-part series, she’s sharing the lessons she learned along the way. As General Manager of Hire Quotient and former co-CEO of Mediafly, Mary is on a mission to amplify underrepresented voices and reshape sales leadership. With insights from her time at Forrester, she also dives into the digital transformation of sales and how creativity plays a bigger role in business than you might think. Key Highlights of Our Interview: From Music to Business “I started as a classical musician, playing with the Mexico City Philharmonic and Guadalajara Symphony. But when the career palette felt too small, I took a leap into business, changing my life forever.” Sales: The Great Equalizer “Sales is one of the few fields where hard work and skill can lead to financial independence, regardless of where you start. That independence allows you to make meaningful changes in your life and others’.” Playing Catch-Up with Purpose “Coming into the business world with a PhD put me 10 years behind my peers, but it also ignited a fire. I moved quickly, knowing every opportunity was critical to closing that gap.” Creating the Playbook “I’m not just about managing to a playbook—I love creating it. The intellectual stimulation of building strategies with teams and seeing them succeed is what drives me.” _________________________ Connect with us: Host: Vince Chan | Guest: Mary Shea PhD --Chief Change Officer-- Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself. Open a World of Deep Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives, Visionary Underdogs, Transformation Gurus & Bold Hearts. 6 Million+ All-Time Downloads. Reaching 80+ Countries Daily. Global Top 3% Podcast. Top 10 US Business. Top 1 US Careers. >>>100,000+ subscribers are outgrowing. Act Today.<<< --Chief Change Officer--Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself.Open a World of Expansive Human Intelligencefor Transformation Gurus, Black Sheep,Unsung Visionaries & Bold Hearts.12 Million+ All-Time Downloads.Reaching 80+ Countries Daily.Global Top 3% Podcast.Top 10 US Business.Top 1 US Careers.>>>140,000+ are outgrowing. Act Today.<<<
Chapter 1: Who is Mary Shea and what is her career background?
Hi, everyone. Welcome to our show, Chief Change Officer. I'm Vince Chan, your ambitious human host. Our show is a modernist community for change progressives in organizational and human transformation from around the world. In this episode, I'm thrilled to welcome Mary Hsieh, the co-CEO of Mediafly, a leading revenue enablement company that raised $80 million in capital to turbocharge its growth.
Mary's story is downright inspiring. Mary, a proud LGBT community member and women's empowerment advocate, has taken a path less troubled. Imagine going from a classical musician with a PhD to an entry-level sales job, from playing music to playing a key role in sales, then rising to become a CEO after working as a forester analyst.
If I had to capture Mary's journey in just two words, it would be beyond boundaries. We are our worst enemies, scared of failure or what others might think. But in Mary's case, instead of being paralyzed by the weight of her background as a well-educated musician, a mantle that could have been seen as baggage in her new arena. She chose to reinvent herself. This wasn't about giving up.
It was about moving forward, unburdened. is a powerful reminder of the resilience it takes to truly embrace change and chase success on one's own terms. I'd come to know Mary before I even met her in person. A common friend, so to speak, is her partner, Waverly Deutsch, who was my former professor of entrepreneurship at Chicago Booth.
After I heard all the wonderful things about Mary's business success in the sales space, I finally got to sit down with her over dinner when both of them came to Hong Kong before COVID. Other than good food and wine, fun conversation, I was impressed by all the changes she has led, building herself up with so much resilience and intelligence.
As I was putting together the guest list for the podcast, I thought of her right away. I emailed her directly. Within eight minutes, I got her reply. There, she said, I would love to be on your podcast. Please send over details. Our team will take a look to make sure it's a good fit for me and Mediafly, which I already assume it is. You bet, Mary. Here we go.
Thank you for having me. I'm thrilled to reconnect with you. It's been quite some time, hasn't it?
Yes, a couple of years, a lot of changes. This podcast is about change. You are the perfect person to talk about that.
Now, let's start with your own change. I don't mean just a resume type of introduction, but more about milestones that you've experienced.
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Chapter 2: How did Mary transition from classical music to the business world?
Start with something brief and then we'll dive into specific details. Sure. Happy to share that with your listeners and with your audience. I do love change. And if you think about me, I've been in the business world and walking the world for a while here now. I'm also a Gemini, which means I constantly like being challenged. I'm intellectually curious.
I sometimes am impatient and like to take on new things. So my professional journey is wrought with lots of risk and lots of change. And I'll share with you that the biggest risks I've taken have resulted in the biggest upsides, whether it's professional, personal growth or economics or typical roles that you might think about. I started out my career as a classical musician. I was an oboist.
So for those of you who don't know, oboe is a double reed instrument like bassoon. And it's one of the most difficult orchestral instruments there are. I started playing the oboe when I was 12. My whole life was really geared to being a professional classical musician. I played in a number of youth orchestras. I went to college and earned degrees in music performance.
And then I went to Mexico and played in the Mexico City Philharmonic and the Guadalajara Symphony Orchestra. I really lived my dream when I was in my very, very early 20s. which is wonderful because I didn't have to have a midlife crisis then. So I got to do what I wanted from day one.
And I came back to the States after making a name for myself in Mexico and thought, well, you know, if I want to support myself as a working musician, classical musician, I should get a PhD so I can teach and have some stability in my income. And I did that. I got a PhD in musicology, which is the study of Western art music or music that's written down.
And also the degree was in ethnomusicology, which is musics of the world or more likely music that's passed down an oral tradition. It was a wonderful experience. As I came to the end of my Ph.D. time, I felt like the palette was a little bit too small for what I saw in my professional career path. how I saw my professional career taking shape.
And serendipitously, I met some people from Forrester who recruited me to come join the company and start in sales there. And I took a big, big leap of faith. And that was probably the single most... transformational moment in my professional and personal life.
It changed the trajectory of my life, both from my spouse to the business role, to the economics that I was able to make and to the impact I was able to have on things that I'm passionate about, Vince. One of the big passions is really leading, inspiring and motivating global teams.
At Forrester, you were the analyst. You analyze things.
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Chapter 3: What were the major turning points in Mary Shea's career?
You analyze businesses.
There's really two sides of my Forrester career. I was at Forrester for a decade, and I was what George Colony, who's the CEO and founder there, calls a boomerang. So I started out my sales career at Forrester in the mid to late 90s as an SDR. So one of those folks that actually... is front of the cycle rep that sets meetings, that drives interest and demand.
And I worked for a number of folks who were very, very well versed in the world of B2B sales and they were very generous. I learned a lot from them. Forrester was on a trajectory at that time where I got promoted almost every six to 12 months. It actually kind of spoiled me because that's not really the way of the world when you think of it. But I had a great run there.
I was there for about five years in a range of different individual contributor roles in sales, sales management, and also sales leadership. I ended up opening up the first satellite office for Forrester in Chicago. Then I left for a range of different reasons to go out and make a name for myself globally and take on a role as a general manager and chief revenue officer, which was my dream.
But subsequently, I went back to Forrester. Around 2015, I was on the product side. And what I did as an analyst was really looked at the changing buying and selling dynamics in the business world. So things were changing rapidly with the digitization of the sales process, sales, digital transformation. I looked at the emergent sales tech industry.
landscape and then a passion of mine also is really diversity equity inclusion what does it take to get more females into the sales role because i see high level sales as one of the key paths to the c-suite and specifically the ceo and i personally have a passion for seeing more and more women folks who identify women in CEO positions at Fortune 100 companies.
And I think sales is one of the best directions to get there. So that was really my platform as a poster analyst. But I did start, to be fair, at an entry-level sales position and worked my way up the chain there.
Now that you look back, if you analyze your career life, do you see any common threads or themes or factors or drivers of motivation? What would that be?
are a couple of different themes or threads that were big motivators for me when you think about sales sales is a great equalizer because if you're really really good at it you work really hard at it you can make a lot of money and so making money wasn't a primary focus for me in sort of my career decisions it was my passion and what i loved in life but once i started making a lot of money
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Chapter 4: Why is sales considered a great equalizer according to Mary Shea?
That's really how I see my role. I feel pretty confident in what I've accomplished since. To see others be successful is almost more motivating to me than my own personal trajectory. When everyone else is successful, you're successful as a CEO.
I like that term, mini CEO. You and Carson, the official co-CEO of Mediafly, you got a lot of mini CEOs on their own in their own space. They all have their own potential to grow, if I can summarize this way.
Yes, I think that's right. The other thing is that they have very deep and expansive subject matter expertise, whether that's in product, whether that's in customer. They bring a great breadth and depth of experience and expertise in those areas.
Other than sales, business, and tech, I know you are a passionate champion in driving diversity issues forward. especially with respect to women and LGBT communities. Tell us a bit more about your work there.
Yeah, it's a topic that's near and dear to my heart. And yeah, I am a proud member of the LGBTQIA community. And I think it's important to put myself out there because there's lots of people who are struggling. In terms of... Women, specifically, right now, the research that I've done shows that about a third of sellers in B2B sales are women. And obviously, we're at least 50% of the population.
So I'd love to see selling organizations be more representative of the world around them. not just talking about white women. So how do I and how do others empower folks who have black or brown skin? Like, how do we get more diversity writ large across the organization and the selling organization? That's something that I really want to do more of. So what do I do?
I certainly amplify the voices of diverse voices across the board whenever I can. If I have speaking engagements that I can't do, I try to pass them on to others. I am encouraging. I'm a coach and mentor. I do as much as I can to help folks who are generally part of underrepresented groups be really successful in sales. And this goes back to, I didn't grow up with a silver spoon.
My dad actually was a child of the depression. His family lost all of their money and he had to stand in bread lines. to get food for our family, his family, because his parents were too embarrassed to do so. If anyone has a parent who's gone through that great depression or any other economic challenges globally or worldwide, you never lose that.
I came from a modest background and I worked really, really hard. And I think sales is a great equalizer where people can get social equity and economic equity very quickly if they can be successful. And I want to help folks do that.
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Chapter 5: How did Mary Shea's role at Forrester shape her career?
So you got a whole suite of tech-enabled solutions blended with human services. Yes. So how does the AI technology impact your space, especially in the context of human and machine interaction?
Yeah, I'll give you my perspective on a couple of different personas, right?
Next time, Mary is going to break down how AI technology is not just a buzzword, but a game changer for sales teams and their revenue goals. Plus, we are tackling a topic that is a bit out of the ordinary, the co-CEO governance model. Ever wonder how having two captains during the ship compares to the solo CEO journey? How do they make it work?
And what's the secret to balancing the benefits and the risks of sharing the leadership? Until next time, take care.