Kesi Johnson is Senior Vice President, Client Success at Levin – forerunners in specialist recruitment for the FinTech, HealthTech, GreenTech, RetailTech, and EdTech sectors.
Kesi passionately leads the charge on honing Levin’s suite of services towards DEI Strategy, Board Analysis, and bespoke R&D, in addition to founding pivotal gender-equity network Parity – dedicated to driving inclusion in the boardroom, spotlighting women in leadership, and championing intersectionality.
Brimming with positive energy, Kesi is a high-achiever who ‘thrives in chaos and can roll with the punches’, all while sharing some brilliant insight on developing a progressive working culture and outlining his objectives for the year ahead - read on for the full interview:
"A positive working culture is where everyone is working hard because they are intrinsically and personally motivated to do so. The revenue and rewards are the by-product of everyone being a true team."
M.INT –What does a ‘positive working culture’ look like in your organisation?
KJ –Positive working culture, to me, means everyone having their own personal tie to the mission. That commitment is where resilience comes from and varies person to person. The diversity of motivations around the room with the same end goal in mind is how organizations can really drive towards success. At Levin, our values are Honesty, Performance, Responsibility, and there are so many ways they manifest in day-to-day work across the organization.
We encourage everyone to create their own personal WHY; why are they invested in contributing to solving client problems in the Tech industry? Our clients are solving contemporary issues and simultaneously the problems of the future through improving equality in healthcare, increasing access to financial services products, and creating innovative solutions to the climate crisis. I think a positive working culture is inclusive, and where everyone is working hard because they are intrinsically and personally motivated to do so. The revenue and rewards are the by-product of everyone being a true team. You need teammates who are aligned to one common goal and have a platform to challenge the status quo as well as ask for support. I struggled asking for help in my early career and had to actively work to reframe it from a weakness to a skill. Leaders have a responsibility to create a culture that facilitates asking for support when needed.
M.INT –What are you looking forward to in 2024?
KJ –I’m excited about so many things this year. Levin are continuously honing our suite of services dedicated to delivering outstanding customer experience. I’m thrilled to be leading this new venture. I’m deeply passionate about technology and how it continues to shape the world around us, so it means a lot to have been part of developing solutions that help leaders in our network get closer to their mission, faster, and in turn make the world better.
I also run a global gender-equity network called Parity and following our successes year-on-year since inception in 2022, I’m optimistic that 2024 is going to be our biggest year for impact in the tech industry yet. Our mission is to champion board representation for women, providing toolkits for leaders and creating an ecosystem of support across Tech sectors and the VC landscape. You can follow us on LinkedIn to see upcoming events in New York, London, and beyond!
M.INT –What are you currently reading or listening to?
KJ –Any given day, I am listening to Taylor Swift. I’ve always been a fan, and I find her work ethic and endless creativity inspiring, even if you’re not into her music.
I recently finished reading ‘Chasing the Scream’, by Johann Hari. It challenges everything we think we know about drugs and addiction. It opened my eyes to the deep importance of community, critical thinking and how we need to be curious about biases and exclusion in science and history. I read on a fiction/non-fiction cycle, so up next will be something fictional which is where my heart truly lies.
M.INT –What is the most rewarding aspect of your current role?
KJ –What I am truly passionate about forms a huge chunk of my work and that’s a huge privilege; I love driving change, within my organization and outside of it. Whenever one of our consultants seeks me out to let me know they’ve discovered an incredible female-founded business that they can’t wait to work with, or that the candidate they are about to place in a C-level role is from a traditionally underrepresented background, I can see my personal values being reflected at me. Similarly, when a partner from our client network refers us to a peer and says that our values and efforts on inclusion were a direct reason as to why were a chosen recruitment partner, I know the work I’m doing is impactful.
M.INT –Looking back on 2023, what challenge did you find most trying and/or rewarding?
KJ –Last year, I was most proud of how we transformed our commercial function into a global Client Success team.
It was a huge undertaking that meant challenging some core structures that got us to where we are today, but we took the leap to stay true to putting our clients at the heart of what we do. I’ve recognized a shift in myself from neurotic perfectionist closer to being someone who thrives in the chaos of a scale-up and can roll with the punches, and it’s my journey at Levin so far has taught me that. I’m excited to be leading the charge on continuously improving our services.
