Her Story
About Suzy
Suzy Aivazian serves as Associate Vice President of Media on the internet business at AT&T. In this role for the past four years, she manages all internet products including go-to-market strategy, planning, execution, and analytics, with a priority on optimizing every marketing dollar to drive sales results through close partnership with the sales organization and agency partners. She brings over two decades of experience in media, having built her foundation on the agency side in strategy and planning across industries such as CPG, auto, and sports before moving to the client side at Nestle, where she led media go-to-market for the ice cream, coffee, and pizza businesses. Suzy has been at AT&T for eight years, advancing from director to her current position. She is the first in her family to earn a college degree and an MBA, attributes her strong work ethic to her background as the daughter of immigrants who fled war, and draws motivation from setting an example for her sisters. She is a member of the ANA Media and analytics team and speaks four languages, having learned English as an adult after moving to the United States in her senior year of high school.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Suzy
01What do you attribute your success to?
I'm a daughter of immigrants who moved to this country fleeing a war. I was a senior in high school seeing the challenges my parents had to go through. Failure was not an option. The work ethic that they ingrained in us. I'm the first one in my family to go to college and get an MBA. I had this obligation to make sure my sisters saw a good example. Where we grew up, how we grew up, and the opportunities that we're able to have. I fell into advertising and media but loved every minute of it.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Find advocates very quickly. Pinpoint the leaders in your organization that are open to advocating you and supporting you. Force yourself to network, go to networking events, and really very quickly try to start helping people that are coming after you. The more you help people coming after you, you'll also start kind of other people will take notice.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
As our industry evolves, to be able to figure out how best to use the new technology that's available to us, and how do we implement AI within our day-to-day to make our work faster, more accurate, to have more visibility to the right data. Keeping up with it but also trying to find the right pros versus mute the noise and really figure out what makes the most sense.
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