808. Relating to and Understanding People

Cameron Cegala

“And where I really thrive is in establishing and building strategic relationships. That’s what I really love. I love people. I love relating to people, understanding people, really understanding differences between people and getting people to work well together. Both internally and externally–internally managing my team and also managing the relationships with other functions within the company, both in the U S and in Germany, but then externally managing all those high level relationships with our clients was just really a dream for me at the time. I absolutely loved it.”

Cameron Cegala is co-founder of AdKaddy, a mobile app that helps you manage all the brands you love by giving you a new email address and platform to use for all your consumer needs. AdKaddy creates a personalized and hyper-organized inbox for you, where you can direct email communications from your favorite brands. The app automatically sorts your incoming emails, helping you keep promo emails, receipts, and shipping notifications separate and organized. Prior to AdKaddy, Cameron spent her corporate career working in sales and client management at Procter & Gamble and two smaller CPG companies.

The Most Impactful Turning Point?

“My dream was to work for The Coca Cola Company, but I discovered that I had to have a master’s degree and two years of experience to apply for the role I wanted. They suggested I apply to Procter and Gamble because it was the main company from which they recruited. The interview process was arduous—over 9 months of phone interviews, online tests and in-person interviews. I was one of 30 to be selected from many thousands of applicants. I did my internship between my junior and senior years at the University of South Carolina and loved it. At the end of the internship I gave a presentation to an executive board on what I had learned and what my vision was going forward. To my delight I was offered a full-time position. So I returned to college for my senior year with a job already lined up with one of the most respected and successful companies in the country.”

The Most Powerful Lessons Learned?

1. A strong role model can be instrumental, if you are as lucky as I was: My father was a CPA for Ernst & Young for 38 years, loved the work he did and was instrumental in keeping me focused on excelling in school from the get-go.

2. Be on the lookout for mentors in your life: I had myriad mentors at different stages of my life—people who cared about me, saw my potential and encouraged me to exercise that potential.

3. Learn self-discipline: I jumped around in sports a lot but did a lot of karate when I was quite young and was influenced by a great coach, who taught me much about self-discipline, setting my own personal goals and of course physical discipline.

4. By broadening your experiences, unexpected opportunities can present themselves: My experiences working for the Student Success Center while at USC were very helpful. I was a certified tutor teaching entry level Spanish, which one of my degrees is in. One summer I studied abroad in Argentina and in the final summer I interned at Procter and Gamble.