How Jeanette Dorazio, CEO of Leadpages, elevates her team by illuminating their strengths and building cohesion

Jeanette is a strategic, analytical, and evolving leader who has built her strengths on the back of her weaknesses, growing her expertise with every step of her career. On a mission to make her way, Jeanette took a Political Science degree and soon found her way into the business world. She may have started on a traditional school path, but where her life led her next is anything but ordinary. Jeanette is a true testament to creating your own destiny, and her hard work, open-mindedness, and innate leadership skills have brought her to where she is today.

Jeanette’s career climb to leadership

Jeanette began her career journey working at a Target warehouse, where she quickly began to understand their operations, find new learning opportunities, and carve the way for her career. Soon, others started to notice Jeanette’s talent, and she was promoted to the Target headquarters in Minneapolis to work with their supply chain and logistics team. Before intricate operational systems existed to manage supply chains, Jeanette had to analyze and monitor every step of the process with model accuracy. During her time at Target, Jeanette grew her expertise and received extensive education from Target’s leadership training classes. She then moved into her first significant leadership role: supervising the transportation routing division, where she recognized her innate talent for motivating others and inspiring innovative strategies.

Jeanette eventually moved into the technology realm, spearheading product management for a retail software company. Jeanette was thrown into the deep end, knowing very little about the position, but her unique experience at Target equipped her with invaluable problem-solving skills. She was captivated by the innovative nature of technology and excited to build a product never seen before, which is precisely what she did. Jeanette went on to help build one of the first inventory scanners to launch in grocery stores, amongst a talented developer team and led by her operational expertise. Throughout this journey, she discovered what it meant to be a leader and learned how to motivate others to succeed.

“I learned how to build a strategy, how to go to market, motivate a team, and build efficiencies, all while having fun and getting to be creative and innovative.”

Jeanette continued her journey in technology and stepped into a senior management role, where she led a global team. Surrounded by incredibly talented people who illuminated her blind spots, Jeanette took this opportunity to learn more about the tech sector. Jeanette moved around a lot in her career — always looking for the next learning opportunity — and filtered through multiple tech companies, really honing her leadership skills. Jeanette has always approached new opportunities with a willingness to learn and grow, which has transcended into her leadership style.

How Jeannette leads a team of innovators at Leadpages

Jeannette was recruited to be CEO of Leadpages and took this opportunity by storm, reinventing innovation and inspiring her team to build a company aligned with high moral values. Her greatest asset is identifying the strengths of others and personalizing positions to increase employee engagement and accelerate performance. Jeanette’s career path was a windy road but ultimately led her to where she needed to be: leading an impactful team of innovators.

“My job is to coach and mentor, remove the blockers, and move us forward successfully. I have a passion for developing high-performing teams and coaching people in the next step of their careers.”

How Jeanette Dorazio acts as a servant leader, empowering others to take the stage by illuminating their strengths

Jeanette has taken inspiration from those who inspired her. As a student-athlete for most of her life, Jeanette learned from impactful coaches and derived her leadership strategy based on shared success, collaboration, and compassion.

“The best coaches were very much servant leaders; they spent time helping you be successful and bring your best self to the game.”

Through her life experiences, Jeanette has learned that not everybody’s gears move in the same way, and you have to play to individual strengths to motivate others successfully. The true beauty of being a leader is seeing your team excel and do extraordinary work, which Jeanette realized growing up prioritizing shared success in her sport.

How Jeanette leads a remote team to expansive growth

Jeanette Dorazio leads her team through collaboration, creativity, and an open dialogue of feedback. As a leader with an incredible growth mindset, Jeanette is always looking for ways to become better and asking her team for valuable feedback. Her routes in problem-solving are indispensable to Leadpages, and she approaches her work with a high degree of strategic thinking. She creates the vision and looks to everyone's strengths to bring those ideas to fruition, and leans on her team to manage explosive growth. Jeanette notes that as a woman in tech, it is imperative to stay ahead of the curve; whether that’s new leadership methodologies or disruptive technologies, the learning never stops. She always tries to shine a light on her blind spots and learn from experts to turn her weaknesses into strengths.

Jeanette’s workflow and productivity tips

Jeanette uses Shift “daily, hourly, 24/7” to streamline her workflow and avoid browser mayhem. As an avid note-taker, Jeanette uses Evernote to keep track of her thoughts and Trello to bring her ideas to fruition in an organized manner. When it comes to software development, her team regularly uses JIRA, and Confluence. Additionally, Leadpages has implemented deep work Thursdays to nail down focus and concentrate on making meaningful progress, meeting free.