Graduating with a degree in psychology in 1997, Julie Slattery had no idea what was in store for her. But Bell Atlantic was looking to hire some “college kids,” and having recently graduated, she fit the bill.
“I was fortunate enough to have an opportunity to do that and I took to it,” she said.
After a career wearing many hats and heavily focused on operations, she was promoted last summer to senior vice president of Core Engineering & Operations at Verizon. That means she leads the team of technicians who build and operate Verizon's network – all 7,000 employees strong.
All of her previous roles – in international, domestic, wireline, wireless, field operations and more – prepared her for the current position.
“I’ve had a lot of different roles with a lot of different parts of our business,” she said. “It gave me a broad perspective. I have a good understanding of how all the different parts of our organization and our network come together.”
Supporting diversity is a strong and important part of Verizon’s culture, she said, and that’s something she is passionate about. “I do believe deeply that diversity is critical to driving the best outcomes,” she said. “That’s really the bottom line. We need an environment where we can take those different perspectives and safely challenge each other. That’s the way we make the best decisions.”
She makes it a priority to get to know people across the organization where she can foster opportunities for up-and-coming talent. A lot of women are underrepresented in the field, and she’s now in a position where she can give back and provide support for women in STEM.
“I’ve had tremendous opportunities in my career that I’ve been able to take advantage of,” she said. “I really feel a responsibility to support the women in our industry and in our business and at Verizon specifically because I think it will make us better and stronger.”
Virtualization & resiliency
Asked about the migration to network virtualization and the impact it has on jobs, she doesn’t necessarily view virtualization as leading to the elimination of jobs. “It’s changing what our jobs are” and morphing the types of skill sets and jobs that are needed, she said.
“It’s absolutely critical to our strategy,” she said, enabling new capabilities that don’t exist on a physical network, leading to new products, offerings and revenue streams. “Virtualization improves the resiliency and reliability of our network, beyond what we have today. We already have an amazing, fantastic, industry-leading, reliable network, but virtualization takes it to the next level because it enables new architectures” and new redundancy models that are superior to a physical network.
A self-described “Jersey girl all the way,” she’s moved out of state a couple of times for her career but for the most part, she’s stayed in New Jersey and she’s currently based out of the Basking Ridge campus. This past fall, she shared on LinkedIn how she just sent off her twin boys to their last year of high school.
Her entire 26-year career has been with the one company, since Bell Atlantic merged with GTE to become Verizon Communications in 2000.
Who would have known? “I tell people all the time, I think my psychology degree has come in very handy in leading people. It’s all about understanding people and behavior and motivation and inspiration,” she said. “I’ve loved the journey along the way.”