Successful leaders often point back to mentors early in life that helped guide them towards success.  As part of National Women’s History Month, I wanted to share my perspective on the importance of mentoring in the lives of young women.  Rackspace provides plenty of opportunities to participate in the way we give back to communities, helping young girls (and boys!) reach their goals.

One of the many initiatives in which we participate is through a partnership with the City of San Antonio’s Mentoring Matters Program and the Big Brother/Big Sisters of South Texas. A good sized group of Rackers volunteer their time to be Big Brothers and Big Sisters to kids from a couple of local schools. Every other month, we visit them at their school for lunch. And on the months in between, they come visit us at the Rackspace Castle.

My “ little” is a very bright 7^th grader. She gets straight A’s.  She likes math. She is imaginative, does Karate (about to test for her next belt!), desires to be a veterinarian when she grows up, is easily bored and has a cat.

Last week, she came to visit me at work. We ate pizza and chatted for a bit before she asked me “How does Rackspace make money?” This little question turned into a conversation around economics and technology. She fired questions at me, pushing me to come up with answers that made sense and were accurate and digestible for my audience. We discussed websites and hosting and e-commerce. It was amazing!

Then, she wanted to know where I fit into the whole scheme of things. I explained my job as a corporate recruiter and how we need to hire a lot of really smart people to provide support to our customers and that it’s the task of me and the whole recruiting team to go out and find the right folks for Rackspace.

Shortly after our conversation, my little and I were approached by a reporter from Texas Public Radio who was onsite talking to folks about the BB/BS program at Rackspace. He asked her what she wants to be when she grows up and I was surprised to hear that in addition to her dream of being a veterinarian, she is now considering a career in technology. We could totally use a smart cookie like her! I was really happy to be able to have a conversation that opened her mind up to another possibility especially in a field where we could sure use some more gals.

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