Women @ RopesTalk: Conversation with Katy Motiey, Extreme Networks

On this episode of Women @ RopesTalk hosted by health care and data partner Christine Moundas, IP transactions and licensing partner Megan Baca is joined by Katy Motiey, the chief legal, administrative and sustainability officer at Extreme Networks. Katy shares her inspiring journey from her early life experiences during the Iranian Revolution to her multifaceted career in the legal industry. She discusses her new book, Imperfect, which is based on her mother's quest for equality and their family's struggles against the patriarchal customs of Iran. Katy also delves into her role in driving corporate social responsibility and sustainability initiatives at Extreme, offering valuable insights for aspiring leaders and authors.

Transcript:

Christine Moundas: Hi, everyone. Welcome back to Women @ RopesTalk, a podcast series brought to you by the Women’s Forum at Ropes & Gray. I’m Christine Moundas, a health care partner at Ropes & Gray based in New York and co-head of the firm’s digital health initiative. On this episode, I’m once again joined by my co-host of this series, Megan Baca, who’s based in Silicon Valley. Hi, Megan—before we get into the details about your guest, could you please reintroduce yourself?

Megan Baca: Hi, Christine—thanks so much for having me. I’m excited to be on the podcast again in this role. I am, as you mentioned, based in Silicon Valley, and my practice is in life sciences and technology licensing. I co-lead our IP transactions and licensing team, and I also manage our Silicon Valley office. The other thing that you and I work together closely on, of course, is leading our firm’s digital health initiative.

Christine Moundas: Great. Who’s the guest that you’ll be interviewing on this episode?

Megan Baca: My guest today—I’m really excited about—is Katy Motiey. She is the chief legal administrative and sustainability officer at Extreme Networks, which is a market-leading cloud networking company in the Bay Area.

Christine Moundas: How’d you two meet?

Megan Baca: We’ve known each other for a really long time. She used to be based in the Bay Area. She has been really generous with her time—in the past, we had her host with us some roundtable events advising younger lawyers on their career paths as they transition from law firms to in-house. And let me tell you—she’s just totally full of insights for young lawyers, which is how I first got to know her. She’s also worked with Ropes & Gray quite a lot over the years with our IP litigation team, working on some really notable cases in the past.

Christine Moundas: What would you say is most notable about Katy’s background?

Megan Baca: One of the reasons we’re having her on the podcast is that she recently wrote a book, and that’s actually what we talk about on the podcast. But, more than that, she’s been in the legal industry for 25 years and had so many different roles encompassing corporate governance, M&A, debt restructuring, IP matters, IP litigation and IPO process—she’s really done it all. On top of that, though, in her roles, she has really gone above and beyond to further really important internal initiatives for Extreme Networks and others. She built the Extreme Women’s Leadership Council. She worked on a partnership with the American India Foundation, which is a non-profit organization working on accelerating social and economic change in India. She added social responsibility to Extreme’s corporate governance. And this is just the tip of the iceberg—honestly, she’s done so much, both at Extreme and her other roles, to really bring in multiple layers of insight, social responsibility and DE&I thoughtfulness into the work that she has done.

The book she’s written is really fascinating—it’s called Imperfect. As you’ll hear in the podcast, it’s written as a fiction book, but it’s really based very heavily and directly on her child experiences in Iran during the Iranian Revolution and her mother’s quest for equality, which then you can see how that flows into her career and her other accomplishments outside of her new role as author. So, I hope it’s a really interesting listen.

Christine Moundas: Yes, this sounds like it should be a great episode. With that, I’ll turn it over to you and Katy.

Megan Baca: Welcome, Katy. I’m so glad you could join us on our podcast today. Could you start by introducing yourself to our listeners?

Katy Motiey: Yes. Thank you for having me—I really appreciate it, Megan. My name is Katy Motiey. I am the chief legal administrative and sustainability officer at Extreme as well as the corporate secretary to the board.

Megan Baca: One of the reasons why I was really excited to talk to you on this podcast is because this year, in addition to all the other fantastic achievements in your career, you have added author to your resume. I just finished your book a few weeks ago, and honestly, it is fantastic. It is called Imperfect and although it’s a novel, I understand it’s very much based on your specific experience and your mom’s experience raising you and your brother after your father died. I honestly couldn’t put it down. The backdrop, which I found really fascinating, is the Iranian revolution and your mom, as a single mom, fighting for her freedom and control over her children. It’s just an incredible story—amid patriarchal traditions and political unrest, it really has it all. But you’re a lawyer by training. You’re a busy person. You have a full-time career and then some. So, I’d love to hear your story. How did this come about—the background that inspired you to write the novel?

Katy Motiey: Thank you. The book came out on Mother’s Day last year based on some true-life events that happened to my mom. Of course, if you ask her, she would say, “Why did you change the names? It’s very true to what happened.” The real story of what happened is that my father was a physician working in the U.S. He had had brain cancer when my mom was pregnant with me, but we had moved back to the U.S., and then he got really sick. For the final time, when I was three, they moved back to Iran, my mother, older brother, myself, and my father. Then, when he passed away, she was served with custody papers, and that launches the story into what happened. This was in 1971, so during the Shah’s regime. During that time, patriarchal laws and rules—it’s a lot worse now—were not very favorable to women back then. And so, she was launched into a custody battle and lawsuit, and was forced to get a job—and that’s where the story takes off. I had not heard about any of these challenges until I was in college, when I heard her tell somebody else the story from start to finish. I had heard bits and pieces, but when I heard her say it, it really stayed with me and weighed on me—I had it in the back of my mind to write about it. I should also mention that my thought process throughout my life has been to journal and to write. I was never the book worm, an English major or anything like that, but writing has always been a part of my brain process, just to write things down and get it out of my head. I have journals going back to when we left Iran when I was 10 years old.

All of that said, in 2001, my work was slowing down, and I thought, “You know what? I should take a writing class.” So, I took a writing class and learned that I know nothing about writing. Journaling is very different. I wrote some short stories. And one of the short stories, toward the end of the class, after I got the hang of what I needed to do, was one of the chapters in the book, which is the day my mother and I left Iran. The readers in the class and my writing instructor at the time, Ellen Sussman, were very encouraging that I should write this story. Again, I put it aside. In 2009, I had the opportunity to sit down and write it, so I wrote the first draft, and it launched me into this journey, which took 15 years, ultimately, to get it done. There were a lot of start and stops. The first year, it was over 450 pages. The following year, I edited. In 2012, I think, I started working with a writing group, which was many of the students I had met in Ellen’s class in 2001, and these were all either published authors or aspiring published authors. I started trickling in chapter by chapter to them and got comments over a few years. I had it reviewed by a professional editor at one point. In 2015, I left a job—I had some time, so I worked on it. Then, I put it aside. In 2018, I had someone read it, I took their comments. Put it aside. Years would go by, and I wouldn’t do anything with it… until a year ago, I just decided that I would give birth to my story, and I started working with a hybrid publisher. My goal was always to get it out on Mother’s Day, so I was excited to post it on Mother’s Day of last year.

Megan Baca: That’s fantastic. It is so central to your mom. I bet that that’s a nice, poetic piece of the story here. So, why is it called Imperfect?

Katy Motiey: The word “imperfect” came to me a long time ago and it was really just to say my mom’s life was far, far from perfect. There were so many challenges during that time, and so, it’s really meant to characterize how imperfect her life was during that time period in the 1970s.

Megan Baca: That makes sense. It also, to me, struck with respect to other characters as well and the nuances between family. It seems like that some of the story hinges on the dynamic between your mom and your dad’s side of the family, obviously. And the people involved, no one was perfect, although, there’s shades of good and loving behavior and quite the opposite in some cases, so I think it highlights multiple folks in the book have that theme.

Katy Motiey: Yes, for sure.

Megan Baca: This is really a labor of love over these couple of decades of work, which, by the way, is so admirable. I think it goes to show that what you do a little bit at a time over long periods of time matters much more than short, heroic efforts. This was a heroic effort in the making. Tell me about the writing process and what challenges you faced in writing and publishing once you got your story out there. How difficult or easy was it to get it actually out into the world?

Katy Motiey: I think the biggest challenge was finding time. So, if I had a professional editor review it, then I had to spend the time incorporating their comments. When I signed up with Manuscripts LLC, they told me that it would be about seven to 10 hours of work a week, and it felt to me like a lot more than that because the book went through many iterations and levels of edits. Then, I had to read it out loud probably six or seven times just to get through their process, and that was a challenge for me because I have a very demanding full-time job. The publishing process has totally changed during this time period from when I started to now. When I started, I naively thought, “I’ll write the book and I’ll get some query letters out. Somebody will pick it up and we’ll continue editing, and I’ll get it published the traditional way.” In 2011, after I had written the first draft and gotten some comments, I naively sent out like 20 query letters, and I heard back from a handful of the agents. Some wanted to read a few chapters. One of them wanted to read the whole manuscript. None of them, ultimately, picked it up, and it was crushing at the time. Anyway, in 2023, when I decided I wanted to get the book out, I had that in my muscle memory and I didn’t know if I should try to go out again to try to find an agent or just do hybrid publishing, which basically is self-publishing, but with a lot of horsepower behind you to get the proper edits—I’d still own all the rights like I would in self-publishing. All of that said, I think the challenges for me were the time and also figuring out how to get it done and how to get it posted.

As part of the publishing process, I needed to raise some funds for the publisher. The pre-sale campaign was very well-received. I had 140 people from all different periods of my life—childhood friends from Iran, family friends, relatives, high school friends, college, law school, work colleagues that were really interested in the story and the book. I feel very fortunate that the book has been very well-received. Family members: a few people have talked to me about it—just personalizing it, like, “Why did you make your grandmother look like this? She wasn’t like that.” The book is fiction—it’s not all true. The main storyline is true, but there’s a lot of liberties I had to take as an author and also after working with editors. Much of it is fictionalized. Characters are combined, because there’s way too many people in our real life to be able to capture all of it, so that’s why it’s fiction, if you will. But I would say it’s been very well-received and I’m very touched. I get a lot of amazing feedback from all kinds of people, which I really appreciate.

Megan Baca: That’s great—I’m not surprised at all. One last question on the book itself: Did you consider writing it as a purely biographical/autobiographical book, and what made you decide to take this hybrid fictionalized approach?

Katy Motiey: When I first started working on the book, I tried and played around with putting it in the first person from my mother’s perspective, putting it in the first person from my perspective, making it more a memoir. Ultimately, it’s her story and it’s the things that happened to her, and it was difficult for me to write it from her perspective because it’s her story and I wasn’t there for a lot of it, or I was very little, so that’s why it was in the third person. Now, in terms of fiction versus nonfiction, I wasn’t there for a lot of it and—you’re a lawyer, you know how we think—I felt like I’m not 100% sure of what happened, “I’m going to call this fiction.” Having interviewed my mother’s lawyer at the time and I’ve talked to her friends, I know that these things happened, but the details of what happened had to be fictional.

Megan Baca: Right—I love that approach. Shifting gears slightly to your career, which, of course, ties together with your background, in 2008, you received a lifetime achievement award by the Silicon Valley Business Journal and the San Francisco Business Times. The title of the article that they published was “A Strong Sense of Right and Wrong,” and knowing you, that rings very true to me. Also, in your book, now knowing your background better, it also makes sense. You said that the injustices that your mother went through really helped instill that black and white sense of right and wrong. I’d be curious how that has played into your career in becoming a lawyer and the kind of lawyer you are today.

Katy Motiey: We had moved to the U.S. ahead of many of our family members, and when I was in high school, I thought, “I will become an immigration lawyer and move my entire family to the U.S.” So, that was kind of my driving factor initially, but when I did hear the story, I think that it was a big part of driving me to go to law school. Ultimately, I decided not to be an immigration lawyer because it’s very personal to be a lawyer like that where you’re dealing with human issues, and it felt easier to me, if you will, to go with corporations versus humans. But I would say that my mother, what happened to her, the situation in Iran, growing up very quickly and being aware of all these issues, for sure, had everything to do with me wanting to be a lawyer.

Megan Baca: Now, you are chief legal officer at Extreme Networks, which is a big, big job. You also, on top of that, lead the administration and sustainability function. So, a couple of questions: What drove you to take on or create this multifaceted role? And how do you do it—how do you balance all those responsibilities?

Katy Motiey: At this point, I have worked for three public companies, a number of private companies, and seven CEOs. When I came to Extreme, I told my boss, when I was interviewing, that as much as I love being the general counsel, I really wanted to branch out and do different things, to be a part of the company, and be a part of a team driving the business. In some ways, as a general counsel, it’s a little bit harder than being in a functional role. Opportunities arose—the company was a complete turnaround when I first joined. I had the opportunity to take on HR for a few years. I took on real estate facilities the first few months I was there. And then, in 2017, the company was on a shopping spree. We did a number of acquisitions very successfully, and we realized that in that process, we just had more men than women and it was really hard to retain the women and put women in leadership. I met a woman on a plane who had been a consultant at GE. She’s fabulous—Dr. Patty Ann Tublin. I introduced her to my boss, and she and my boss started the Women’s Leadership Council. That was our first employee resource group (“ERG”). From there, when I had HR, we started the Extreme culture teams in a lot of different locations that we had. We call them the “excite teams” and these groups would be out doing philanthropic activities and also just being the cheerleaders of the offices. In the course of acquisitions, we decided we needed to be more thoughtful about energy usage in the San Jose area, so we brought in alternative energy. So, all of these things were kind of going on at the company.

In 2020, I went to my boss and suggested that we formalize all of these efforts into, at the time, the Corporate Social Responsibility Council, and that’s how I ended up with the sustainability piece on my title. That is something that I’m very, very proud of because it’s all organic. We have hundreds of people in the company involved in our environmental efforts, our people in philanthropy efforts, as well as our governance and data privacy efforts. But that was something that I just raised my hand to my boss and said, “I think this is something we need to do.” And then, from there, we changed the charter of the nom/gov committee to give them oversight, put goals in place, and continued to improve on all of that work. After a couple years, when we doubled the size of our employee base, my boss took HR back because it just made sense to have it report to him. So, now, I have legal, facilities and real estate, and then all of our sustainability efforts as part of the Corporate Responsibility Council.

Megan Baca: It sounds incredibly rewarding, and I’m sure there are lots of listeners who would be excited to work on similar initiatives at their companies. What advice would you give to others looking to do the same, and if you have any insights on how you’ve grown these initiatives?

Katy Motiey: First off, I would say to do it organically, because there are a lot of people that are passionate about these issues, whether it’s from a diversity perspective or an environmental perspective. The younger generation likes working for a company that has purpose. So, my recommendation is for companies to do this organically. Now, that said, the landscape of sustainability is changing because there are lots of regulations that are being imposed on companies. The SEC has been looking at it for a while, but in Europe, they’ve been much more proactive with regulations like the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (“CSRD”) coming down, amongst others that are country specific. Now, there’s an element that you need to work with counsel. We have brought in an external consulting firm to advise us. So, there is a little bit more need than just having employees come together and do good things and be thoughtful and mindful of our planet.

Megan Baca: It sounds like you really need both—you need the organic and passion-driven side of things, and nowadays, you also need the expertise to do it right.

Katy Motiey: Exactly. Absolutely.

Megan Baca: I’ve heard also about the partnership with the American India Foundation. How did that come about, and how has it impacted Extreme?

Katy Motiey: We have a large number of employees in India, and laws have been passed that require companies to give a certain percentage of their profit to social activities. When I came to Extreme, our employees in India sent me a spreadsheet with a whole bunch of line items of where they were sending bits and pieces of money just to meet this requirement. I thought it made sense to just have one partnership, so in 2016, I happened to know the fabulous, amazing person who started the American India Foundation, Lata Krishnan. I connected with her, and we decided to partner with them and have our funds go to one place. We have adopted a couple schools in India, Bangalore and Shinai, and it’s been very rewarding working with them and really giving our employees there a sense of purpose. So, that’s been a really great partnership for us, and it’s been going since 2016.

Megan Baca: Shifting gears slightly, I just want to wrap up with a few additional questions that I know our listeners continue to be interested in. One is mentorship. I’d love to hear what role mentorship has played in your career. I know you are personally involved in mentoring the next generation of leaders as well, so I’d love to hear about both sides of that coin from your perspective.

Katy Motiey: I think it’s huge to have people to look to. Call it “mentor,” sometimes I call it my “personal board of directors,” but as I have gone through my career at different jobs, it might have been a peer, it might have been a board member, it might have been a boss, I have this small committee of people that I’ll go to if I have questions, and people that I just stay in touch with. It doesn’t have to be every week or every month but staying in touch and keeping people apprised of what’s going on in your career can be hugely valuable and rewarding. And then similarly, I mentor a number of people, both at the company and outside of the company. A lot of younger people who are looking to go to law school—I talk with several of those types of people. I really believe in giving back and sharing your experience, but similarly, I have my own committee of people that I’ll go to with my questions. It doesn’t have to be anything formal to go up to someone and say, “Hey, will you be my mentor?” It’s just a relationship that grows over time, and as you nurture it, it becomes hugely valuable.

Megan Baca: It does seem that mentorship is something to think about how it shifts over time as you’re a very junior person in your career to more senior. It’s not that we ever stop needing mentors or guidance—I love the personal board of directors concept as well. And so, reflecting on your career, I’d love if you share one or two lessons you’ve learned and how it’s shaped your approach to leadership and innovation.

Katy Motiey: My sister-in-law told me something years ago that stayed with me, which was just keep your nose to the grindstone and get really good at what you do. And that, to me, has been a huge lesson because the better you are at what you do, the more confidence you have and the louder your voice can be, because it will be genuine and authentic because you have confidence. If you don’t know what you’re talking about, a lot of times that comes through—you don’t have confidence and people around you will pick up on that. My approach to leadership is giving people latitude and giving people opportunities. We have a lot of people in our group who did not start out in real estate and facilities or in the legal department even. I’m really big on giving people a chance to show themselves and what they’re able to do. I don’t micromanage people, but I like to lead and teach, and give people an opportunity to show what they can do.

Megan Baca: Any final advice you would give to aspiring authors, myself included—who knows, one day—who also have demanding careers and interesting lives? What would you say to all those aspiring authors out there?

Katy Motiey: I think writing is a very personal process. Especially if you have a job, it becomes really hard to juggle. The process of writing a first draft is very different than editing. A first draft is much more creative—it’s much more just getting it all down on paper. Editing is more structured. I would say don’t be hard on yourself—give yourself time. It takes time to write a book, a story, a chapter or an article. And then, find people who can help and advise you. I connected with an incredible author, Ellen Sussman, years ago. She has become a New York Times best-selling author a few times over. Since then, I met people through her that I have connected with, and I’ve learned from them a lot—people who were in my writing group. I think just looking to learn from other people and also giving yourself time to write and be organized with your time, if you have another job or if you have a professional career, because it is very demanding to have a job and to do anything on the side. You have to be super organized with your time.

Megan Baca: It’s clear that you have been, and the result has been fantastic. Honestly, I think any first-time writer would die to have a book that’s such quality and really reflecting your own life and values in such a beautiful way. Thank you so much, Katy, for joining us today. It’s been great hearing about your career and your book. Thanks again.

Katy Motiey: Thank you so much. I really appreciate the opportunity. It’s been great chatting with you, Megan.

Christine Moundas: Megan and Katy, thank you both so much for that insightful discussion. And as always, thanks to our listeners. For more information about Ropes & Gray and our Women’s Forum, please visit www.ropesgray.com/women. You can also subscribe to this series wherever you typically listen to podcasts, including on Apple and Spotify. Thanks again for listening.