Brilliant and bold, Arabella Santiago is the fifth profile in the “Women of Innovation” series, and she is a woman of astonishing depth and charm. She is Director of Marketing and Communications for Scoop.it, the largest and most connected curation publishing platform for professionals.
Arabella came to the United States from the Philippines as a young girl and quickly learned to focus on her family as a source of strength, promise, and inspiration. Traveling back and forth between the Philippines and the U.S. while she was 5, 6, and 7 years of age, Arabella learned from both cultures.
With her loving family as examples of innovation, Arabella went to Rutgers, fascinated with political science and English. However, a new goal surfaced quickly. Having joined a sorority, Arabella became a connector, innovator, and helper through working with her sorority sisters to help children with medical problems. She also learned of the barriers and stigmatizing stereotypes facing sorority members and led others to grow beyond these obstacles.
Inspired by how Rutgers reacted to her letter about sororities, Arabella led a movement to increase women’s rights to privacy and safety on campus, while simultaneously increasing respect for women in sororities. She became a member of Rutgers Panhellenic Governing Board of Sororities, serving as Vice President of Recruitment from 2001 to 2002 and President from 2002 to 2003.
These lessons in connecting and leading became Arabella’s new focus and led to her work in bringing traditional journalism online and positions at various corporations, including MediaGuns, Techweek, StartupLive, and her current position with Scoop.it.
Arabella’s Sources and Secrets of Success
Arabella credits the following for her success:
- Her family
- Her sorority sisters
- Rutgers leaders www.rutgers.edu
- Guillaume Decugis, CEO & Co-founder at Scoop.it
She also shares her own secrets and tips for business success:
- If you go to school, learn to understand your strengths and weaknesses through extra-curricular activities.
- Take time to step back from mistakes and regain balance and grace.
- Look within yourself for calm, strength, and confidence, as well as to others you respect.
- Put authenticity first:
- You don’t have to worry about choices if you are authentic.
- Being truly authentic acts as a shield to external barriers and challenges.
- To develop depth and strong moral fiber, practice being authentic, especially when tempted to be dishonest.
- Be humble and rely on friends with strong moral values for objectivity and insight.
- Make exceptions to working independently if you can work with and learn from a genius like Guillaume.
You can find Arabella on LinkedIn and Twitter (@arabellatv).
Jim Nico
Jim Nico is CEO and Founder of SNI the parent company of The Social Network Show®, and The Social Network Station® which presents cutting edge, actionable information for social network owners and managers and is a one stop source for social networkers worldwide. SNI provides a quick reference guide on its website by featuring over 500 social networks on parade. Jim believes the future is niche social networks and he continues with strategic partners to catalyze core principles and best practices of Service, Safety, and Sustainability as guidelines for social networks world wide. He can be reached via email at [email protected].
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