‘I Endured the Spiral Dive with My Boss – the Plane Engine Failed Twice and I Had More Respect for Her’

Teiffyon Parry is Chief Strategy Officer at independent adtech giant Equativ, which has more than 550 employees in 16 offices in 12 countries. Parry first joined Equativ in 2021 as Executive Vice President of Global Demand and has since used his diverse insights and relationships to drive the development of Equativ's media buying tools.

I must admit I was quite scared when I was invited into a propeller plane by my boss, Julia Bowen, who was teaching herself aerobatics over Sydney's Blue Mountains.

In 2000, I joined Julia's team at Cable & Wireless Optus as an analyst. She was general program director and I almost immediately became her chief of staff.

She is a very impressive person. She had a military background and was also one of the first female rugby referees in the world. It's fair to say that Julia loved new challenges and she always encouraged her team not to be afraid of what they hadn't done before and to be brave in everything they did.

Read more: My first boss: Karren Brady, vice-chairman of West Ham United

High in the sky, Julia told me about all the tasks she was going to perform before and during her maneuvers. We were soon climbing and climbing until the engine failed, the plane pitched nose down and started spinning around. But Julia's gentle communication was very reassuring and I knew she was in control every step of the way.

As we spiraled and looped, it was very peaceful. Julia talked herself through the restart mechanics. The propeller ticked over but failed and so we went back into the spin and through the same steps. The engine then failed to backpedal a second time before starting on the third time he asked.

I was still relatively calm, considering we had had two false engine starts. It wasn't until we landed that Julia told me we had dropped below altitude for a safe return. If the engine hadn't been started a third time, that could have been it, she said.

The story continues

Still, the whole experience made me respect her even more for her cool, calm and collected nature under pressure.

Back on the ground she was always focused on what she was doing, always with a smile and a strong character.

Read more: 'I was 21, I thought that as CEO I knew everything'

She was also exceptional at aligning people around a strategic vision. She approached the programs she oversaw from the broader business perspective, not the program perspective.

Julia looked for definitions of success that aligned with the key stakeholders who would measure the program. She forged a creative, coherent view of what needed to be delivered and divided it into a series of workflows, rather than taking a bottom-up product approach. That was enlightening and has influenced me enormously during my career.

She understood the strengths and weaknesses of her colleagues, but her most impressive trait was her ability to delegate comfortably and build on this by empowering those under her.

Julia believed in meritocracy and there was always strong, open communication in the team. I never felt like she had to be the most dominant in the room. No one felt superior to the other and she fostered a "we're in this together" spirit. When we failed, we failed fast and moved on.

She adhered to the Japanese mantra "Genchi Genbutsu," which meant "going to the problem." She urged us not to hear about problems secondhand or to understand something without seeing it for ourselves. She would always like to embellish statistics with the color behind a business reason, goal or customer needs.

I learned all this during a year-long secondment at Cable & Wireless before returning to the UK to work for Accenture. Fast forward to September 2023, I became CSO at Equativ, where we provide a global marketplace for programmatic advertising.

We help the largest brands and buy-side agencies, with the largest digital broadcasters, publishers or app owners in the world, manage ad inventory and ultimately help advertisers maximize their media investments.

Where we lead the market is in innovating in emerging, high-impact channels such as connected TV (CTV), retail media and gaming, and bringing buyers and sellers as close as possible. We do this in a very direct, transparent and fair model, which stimulates Equativ's growth.

Read more: How my British diplomat boss taught me the value of kindness

The battle for eyeballs has become increasingly competitive in today's market. There has been much more concerted effort over the last eighteen months to remember that the customer and consumer are at the heart of what we do.

Watch: Elon Musk on micromanaging: 'Attention to detail is essential'

It's about nuanced support in how we value that moment when someone is on a media site and make the most of it in a way that's not intrusive to the consumer and valuable to the advertiser. That seems to have had a renaissance after the years of focusing on scale at all costs.

If a publisher stays true to their core DNA - a consumer who regularly returns to their media - and maintains that focus, they will find there are more platforms of their choice, which companies like Equativ can help them access to generate revenue with their audience in the right way. One that delivers relevant ads, without leaking data or affecting the user experience.

Being exposed to the different levels of management on large projects at a young age, combined with Julia's strengths in team building and leadership, has helped me advance in my career and get to where I am today.