In her role with Cirion, Tatiana Fonseca is responsible for architecture, planning, engineering, and network deployment functions as well as customer service, delivery, and operations.
Fonseca has worked in the telecommunications sector for over 23 years, where she has led digital transformation projects, organizational restructuring in merger processes, and the development and implementation of new business models, systems, and critical processes for organizations like Oi, Claro, TIM, and Lumen Technologies. She is known for her motivational management style and the application of positive coaching to encourage the best results in others.
Fonseca holds a bachelor’s degree in electronic and telecommunications engineering from PUC Minas and an MBA from Fundação Dom Cabral.
You joined Cirion in 2022. What was the biggest challenge you faced, and how have you been able to overcome it?
The biggest challenge was managing different cultures across the twenty Latin American countries where my team resides. Over the last twenty years, I’ve worked in three of four big telco companies in Brazil, where I led strategic transformation projects and thousands of employees. So, when it comes to business strategy and execution, I felt pretty comfortable, but I had never managed a transformation in different languages and cultures simultaneously. The first step was being honest and transparent about our challenges to avoid misunderstandings or delays in delivering objectives. The second was keeping an open dialogue in order to get feedback and evaluate ways to improve. Last but not least was sharing my intention for how we could grow together.
There are so many ways someone can make their way into the digital infrastructure industry. Tell us a bit about your journey, what led you down this path, and how you got to where you are now.
My journey began while I was studying electronic and telecommunications engineering at university. I started working very young; at 20, I became an electronic technician at one of the biggest Brazilian companies before telecommunication privatization.
Within a year of graduation, at 24, I was promoted and started leading a team of 90 professionals. One year later, it was up to 300 professionals, and by 28, I was leading more than 3,000 professionals. After that, I continued working for big companies and leading teams, digital transformation projects, organizational restructuring, and the development and implementation of new business models, critical systems, and processes while also ensuring the delivery of complex challenges involving operations, engineering, IT, customer relations, marketing, and sales until I reached my current position at Cirion.
