Her Story
About Karina
Karina Chiqui is a Product Marketing Manager specializing in marketing tech, with a focus on smart home products such as smart thermostats at Google. She brings four years of experience in the field, having transitioned from consumer packaged goods where she spent two years as a senior brand manager on the Always brand, launching new products and executing full 360-degree marketing campaigns including TV, social, gaming, and audio assets. Karina earned her Bachelor's of Business Administration in marketing management from Baruch College, a CUNY school in New York City, through the Macaulay Honors College on a merit scholarship. She is currently a trustee at the Baruch College Fund, a nonprofit that fundraises for the public city school, and she has demonstrated leadership by pitching and securing funding for a New York City Marathon program that she expanded from three to five runners, with each participant raising funds to support a student for a full year. Karina attributes her success to remaining grounded in her values and roots, using marketing as a force for good and growth while fostering transparency and mutual respect in both her professional and personal life. She is passionate about mentoring early graduates and creating spaces for diverse voices in the workforce.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Karina
01What do you attribute your success to?
I would say I still have a lot more goals to achieve but I feel like being very grounded in my values and my roots have supported me a lot from entering spaces that are new or spaces like tech which moves very fast. I feel like I need to stay grounded in my goals. I remember what got me started in marketing which is using it for good being a force for growth and then rooting into my personal and community values.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
I would encourage her to sit down with herself in a private space and figure out her non-negotiables. And understand that that doesn't have to be permanent they can evolve over time or change but what helped me a lot is figuring out what I do not want. And that got me closer to what I wanted and then being okay with that changing like forgiving yourself or giving yourself permission to want something else that you thought you didn't want. And constantly doing that audit of yourself at least yearly.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
One of the opportunities I see is creating spaces for new or diverse voices to join and that's also what I mentioned earlier how I've delivered results to create more space. And that I think is just part of the changing demographics of the workforce and it's been very awesome to see kind of society changing like more work-life balance and seeing different generations enter and leave the workforce.
04What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
For me it's transparency and respect. I like to think that we all come from a place of good intention so communicating with open transparency is important and that goes to the same thing with like mutual respect. We can always disagree or agree or challenge folks but it's never like on a personal level it's always at a place of mutual respect and admiration I would even say.
Join Influential Women and start making an impact. Register now.