PROFILE
academies, Ownerversity has lessons in exercising functional skills, such as sales and marketing, as well as academies on leadership and methodology training for its entire global workforce. One of Bassey’s areas of focus as the company’s CLO is developing the framework for new academies in Ownerversity. She and Alteri are also bringing their teams together to build out the company’s diversity and inclusion agenda. In the United States, they recently launched new Ownerversity learning sessions on both inclusive — Lisa Alteri, chief people officer leadership and identifying for U.S. and Canada, Kraft Heinz unconscious bias. Alteri, who worked for Kraft Foods nearly two decades before it merged with Heinz, said Bassey’s “by example” leadership style works well in the company’s fast-paced environment. “As leaders, of course we’re all time-crunched, but we still need to make time for learning,” Alteri said. “And it starts with the leaders. She’s been doing an amazing job setting the tone with simple reads and courses available on our Ownerversity platform. She shows people how they can incorporate them into their daily commute on the train or [while] sitting in an airport.”
“What she’s done for us in the short amount of time she’s been here is really bring the outside in.”
An Unconventional Background Bassey has used her background in computer science to her advantage. But she is also a trained comedian and improviser through The Second City Conservatory program in Chicago, and she feels strongly that it gives her an advantage at her job. While she doesn’t perform as much anymore, Bassey said she remains close with the people she met through the program and brought many of the lessons she learned during training with her to a professional setting, especially the power of laughter. “Comedy is my first love. When I was in college, I wanted to be a stand-up comedian,” Bassey said. “I still process things through comedy, and I think laughter is a superpower. 40 Chief Learning Officer • September 2019 • ChiefLearningOfficer.com
That is actually something I bring to my role every day. When you are someone who is constantly at the front of the room for an instructor-led training, or if you’re creating a digital learning experience, being able to make people laugh is always a good thing.” Bassey also has her own passion project surrounding cultural and interfaith diversity, which she based off a year of traveling to different places of worship in North America, Mexico, Nigeria, South Africa and the United Kingdom in 2010 after experiencing a series of personal losses in 2009. Bassey called the project “My 52 Weeks of Worship” and released a book about the experience. In 2018, she was invited to give a TED Talk about her journey. “It’s amazing to me how relevant it is [to my life] even though initially you might not think it is,” Bassey said. “It’s the gift that keeps on giving, even nearly 10 years later.” Selena Cuffe, an entrepreneur, co-founder of Heritage Wines and strategic developer for Oh My Green, met Bassey in 1997 through their sorority at Stanford, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc., when Cuffe was finishing up her last year of undergrad. A year or two later, when they both ended up in Chicago for their jobs, the two women shared a peerto-peer mentorship and became close friends. “While we never worked together, we did develop a mutual mentorship where she would mentor me at my job at United, and vice versa for her at Curious Networks,” Cuffe said, referring to Bassey’s then posi-
Pamay Bassey, chief learning officer at Kraft Heinz, understands that comedy, variety and diversity all complement learning.