Secrets of my success: Etsy's UK boss Annette Picardo

Etsy's UK chief Annette Picardo shares the secrets of her success, including embracing less traditional paths and getting a break through bikram.

What do you do?

I lead Etsy’s team in the UK and what we’re doing to build the brand here and grow our community of buyers and sellers.

A typical week starts with us looking at the week before, the highlights and the lowlights. Then we meet as a whole team to look forward, share upcoming projects and the things we’re hearing or trends we’re seeing.

A big part of it is linking up with the broader Etsy team, including the other international markets and those in the headquarters in Brooklyn, New York City.

What do you like about it?

Having worked in engineering for Rolls-Royce, I saw the purely technical route was not my cup of tea. In this role, I love that I can combine my creative side with my more analytical and technical side. At Etsy, we are really creating something new, a platform for entrepreneurs who may have not been able to work this way before.

A few weekends ago we met sellers and heard stories of how Etsy has helped them grow their business. That’s why we get out of bed. The dream is to find something you love and believe in what the company’s about.

Is there anything you dislike?

A big challenge for us, though an interesting one, is prioritising. There are so many things we can do and we are always working to improve the platform and build tools for sellers. But the community is so large, at 1.7 million sellers across the world, that it’s hard to fulfil 100% of the needs of 100% of sellers. We need to prioritise things that have the biggest impact overall.

What was your biggest break?

In terms of my career, it was getting this role. It didn’t happen in a very straightforward way. I worked out through the power of online stalking that there wasn’t a UK country manager at Etsy, which I thought would be my dream job. So I hunted down my now-boss Nicole [Vanderbilt, international head of Etsy] and managed to get a meeting with her.

She explained that I didn’t have the experience to be a country manager, so I started at Etsy in a different role, using past experience in consulting and working at notonthehighstreet.com to look at strategy. I loved the role and it played to my strengths.

We recruited for a UK managing director but didn’t find anyone, and Nicole suggested I take on elements of the role. It went from there. She invested in me and believed in me.

What was your biggest setback and how did you overcome it?

I was working in consulting but realised that in the long term it wasn’t for me. I had written off doing an MBA but decided it would be a good opportunity to take time to figure out what to do next. But when I graduated, I didn’t have a job to go to. I’d made a clean break but I still didn’t know what I wanted to do. It was quite scary.

I ended up freelancing and worked on an e-commerce start-up with a friend from business school. We weren’t paying ourselves a salary and would have weekly or sometimes daily meetings about the “cash runway”, our way of saying there was no more money left! Some of my friends were working in big consulting firms and being taken out for dinners and flying business class. I’d meet them for dinner but arrive after the food and have a glass of water. It was still a fantastic experience and my first in e-commerce, and I realised this was where I wanted to be.

The phrase I always have in my head is “what’s the worst that could happen?”. It’s my way of taking a big step back and getting perspective.

How do you manage your work-life balance?

I like to take myself away from things I do at work. I love DIY and doing house renovations, and take great pleasure in connecting with family and friends.

My husband works in the online world, so we are strict with ourselves so that we don’t end up talking about work. We love to travel and went to Japan recently.

I’ve been trying bikram yoga and have found that I’m so focused on what I’m doing that I can’t be thinking about anything else. It’s a real break.

Any tips?

Give it a go and take risks. I’m always inspired by my mum, who changed careers in her forties and retrained. Risk-taking is something to embrace all the way through a career. Don’t feel too constrained by what may seem like traditional paths.