Alicia Lopez is a true embodiment of Cisco's core belief in “One Company, Many Careers” and the principle that “An Individual Owns Their Career.” Lopez holds the position of head of learning and careers at Cisco, but her journey within the company began in 1996 as an operations manager. Over the years, she has taken on various roles, including chief of staff, manager of business operation and director of operations leadership and intelligence.

The software development company has a four pronged approach in its learning and development efforts, all focused on how people’s personal brands, networks, expertise, and experience apply to a career mindset. “Your career shouldn’t just be something when you’re looking for a new job, but it should be something intentional and nurturing,” Lopez told journalist Kelly Bourdet during the closing fireside chat at From Day One’s April Virtual conference.

Personal brand is the first line of action. When one thinks about personal brands, it’s easy to associate it with something outwardly facing, such as LinkedIn and Twitter. But it’s more than that.

“It’s important that you’re known in your team, but it’s also your legacy: what do you want to create, what do you want people to know you did?” said Lopez.

Learning and development also places a lot of emphasis on career exploration. The exploratory phase is one of the five mindsets that Lopez discussed during the fireside chat. “We always want to make sure you’re running towards something, not running away,” she said. To that, internal mobility is highly promoted: for the first 60 to 90 days, open positions are solely advertised internally. After exploration comes the establishing phase. “For the best role, you shouldn’t go to the role where you have 100% the skill,” Lopez said. “You always have to move and learn something different.”

Once someone establishes themselves, the next mindset is achievement mode. This one is focused on upskilling opportunities. The following step focuses on giving back, and after that, there is reinvention, especially in light of recent technological developments like Chat GPT. “Reinventing is an important space. How do you want to show up and create a different soundtrack?” said Lopez. “How do you want to ensure [that your skills] stay relevant?”

This approach also actively helps people interview and optimize their resume “We give a lot of support, which is sometimes met with resistance—part of the pushback was ‘you’re gonna train them to leave us,’” said Lopez. But, “it’s our job to nurture them.” Lopez said.

“What we need to acknowledge is that there’s a war on talent, especially in skillsets that haven’t been created,” said Lopez. “One of the things we’re testing is how we can do some reskilling. A lot of places can do upskilling, but how can we help you reinvent yourself when we know what leaders are going to say you need”

For now, they utilize something that Lopez calls self-driven reskilling. “We’re offering a variety of learning opportunities, similar to a master’s program,” she explains. “From a cost perspective it’s a break even, but we get loyalty and following, and that’s priceless.”

At Cisco, learning is at the forefront and reskilling is rapid. Recently, Cisco started Cisco Illuminate, a quarterly event for all employees. The company takes employees offline for these events. Past speakers include Oprah Winfrey, Michelle Obama, Robin Arzon. The last Illuminate event attracted 45% of the workforce. “What we found is that employees are canceling meetings and saying we’re going. Leaders are moving meetings,” said Lopez. The next Illuminate event will focus on teams in a hybrid workforce. “What we’re finding is that we still need connection when it’s relevant. We’re starting to see studies where career is impacted,” said Lopez. “We’re just paying attention, we don’t want to pull people together to have coffee together, we want it to be purposeful.”

Angelica Frey is a writer and a translator based in Boston and Milan.