Today's guest is another Double Bear! John Dio is a product manager and business professional with experience helping scale venture-backed EV and ed-tech startups. At Haas, John has been part of the Consortium for Graduate Study of Management, The Graduate Assembly, Haas Consulting Club, and Q@Haas. 

John is originally from the Philippines. When he immigrated to the US, he faced plenty of challenges, including culture shock, bullying, and coping with being an undocumented student. It wasn't an easy journey, but he overcame them all.

In this episode, John shared his early beginnings, experiences as an undocumented immigrant, and attending college and pursuing an MBA. He also talked about his career in recruitment and pivoting into product management post-MBA. Finally, he shared insights on a couple of things he is passionate about - childcare shortage and women's reproductive rights.

Episode Quotes:

On standing up to bullies

"Every time they'd retort, I'd be like, so what? Whatever. And that took the power away from it. Once I didn't care, they no longer thought it was fun. If you take away the bully's power to affect you in that way, it's no longer fun for them."

On pivoting into product management

"Product management stood out to me because there is the aspect of delighting customers when solving their problems."

His biggest takeaway at Haas

"It's all about how you want to set your journey at Haas because you could do a lot of things and everything. However, it's really up to you to manage your time and what you want to get the most out of it. I wanted to work and apply what I'm learning in the startup setting and then build a community where I can focus on the few people, if not some people, that were going to add a lot of value to my Haas experience versus trying to meet everyone. And there has to be that intentionality that needs to be there to make it all work."

Show Links:

• LinkedIn
• Q@Haas

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