In honor of Women’s History Month, Platinum Rule Advisors is celebrating a few of our favorite women leaders currently making history and paving the way for others. Throughout the month, our founder, Leonora Williamson, is leading candid conversations with these women and discussing topics ranging from career trajectory to sustainability and inspirational female history makers.
In our second installment of the series, we chatted with Esi Seng, General Manager at Tom’s of Maine. Esi began her career as a copywriter in advertising but quickly shifted to media buying. Her passion to uncover the “why” behind marketing led her to attend grad school at NYU before beginning work at L’Oreal in brand management. She then crossed the street, quite literally, to join the Colgate team where her 14-year journey at the company began. Esi has had the pleasure of working in many roles across the globe in countries like Switzerland, Malaysia and Brazil before settling into her current role at Tom’s of Maine.
In this conversation, Esi shares her insights on the following questions:
- How did you get where you are today?
- Tell us about your 14-year journey with Colgate.
- What was it like for you and your family to share this experience?
- What qualities do you possess that made Colgate choose you to send to different countries?
- What is your role at Tom’s of Maine, and what projects you are working on?
- What type of tensions came about with transferring from Colgate to Tom’s of Maine, which has a more sustainable brand focus?
- What are consumers asking of Tom’s in today’s world?
- Can you tell us about the process of getting B Corp Certified?
- What do you think about top-down vs. bottom-up decision making?
- Who is a female history maker that you admire?
- Was treating boys and girls the same unique to your mom or part of her culture?
- What advice would you give to your 21-year-old self?