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I read books multiple times per week
Connor Regan
4,725
Bold Points12x
Nominee1x
Finalist![user profile avatar](https://static.bold.org/profilePictures/1606723216258.webp)
Connor Regan
4,725
Bold Points12x
Nominee1x
FinalistBio
I'm Connor. I'm a curious and ambitious person with a strong belief in technology's potential to affect meaningful societal change at unprecedented scale. I work on global policy topics at YouTube, with a focus on helping realize our mission to give everyone a voice and show them the world.
Previously, I worked on consumer and retail marketing for Google Nest in Northern Europe, focused on retail advocacy, creative strategy and special projects. Before that, I helped create and launch Google's Be Internet Awesome program, which encourages youngsters to be safe, confident explorers online through gaming and a robust standards-aligned classroom curriculum. I've worked on a diverse set of topics at Google including acquisition analytics / quant marketing for Google Ads, brand architecture, and internal and executive global comms. Before that, I studied, researched, and built a few (small) startups at Northwestern, in way-too-cold Chicago.
My work has been featured in print/digital (CNN, Engadget, Fortune, Entrepreneur), broadcast television (CBS, FOX, ABC), radio, and beyond. It has also been included in academic literature by researchers at Princeton University and the University of Maryland and has been studied for foundation grant making innovation. I've had the honor and privilege of speaking for organizations including Consumer Electronics Show (CES), United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), International Society for Technology in Education, American Library Association, and more.
Education
Stanford University
Master's degree programMajors:
- Business Administration and Management, General
Northwestern University
Master's degree programMajors:
- Marketing/Marketing Management, General
Northwestern University
Bachelor's degree programMajors:
- Industrial and Organizational Psychology
- Business Administration and Management, General
- Entrepreneurship/Entrepreneurial Studies
- Economics, General
Minors:
- Economics, General
Miscellaneous
Desired degree level:
Graduate schools of interest:
Transfer schools of interest:
Majors of interest:
Career
Dream career field:
Computer Software
Dream career goals:
technology
Barista
Bee Coffee Roasters2016 – 2016CEO
Project Cookie2013 – 20141 yearMentor, LGBTQ+ & First-Generation Students
QuestBride2015 – Present9 yearsAdvisor
Brewbike2018 – Present6 yearsProduct & Marketing Lead, Kids & Families
Google2016 – 20182 yearsHead of Retail Marketing, Northern Europe
Google Nest2018 – 20191 yearSenior Analyst, Product Policy & Operations
YouTube2019 – Present5 years
Sports
Swimming
Varsity2008 – 20124 years
Swimming
Club2006 – 20126 years
Research
Marketing Research
Medill School, Northwestern University — Sponsored Research2014
Arts
- Photography2016 – Present
Public services
Volunteering
Out in Tech — Product Manager, Digital Corps2019 – PresentVolunteering
Best Buddies — Board Member, California // Speech Coach // prev. Int'l Young Leaders Council2008 – Present
Future Interests
Advocacy
Politics
Volunteering
Philanthropy
Entrepreneurship
Angelica Song Rejection is Redirection Scholarship
Sometimes the influences that most fundamentally shape us are nearly impossible to recognize in the moment. Only time can elucidate why seemingly benign memories stay with us as we grow and shape who we become. For me, many of these formative memories were rooted in feelings of shame and fear about my gender and sexual identity.
From an early age, I learned to self-censor to avoid gentle corrections about how I spoke, who I made friends with, how I stood and even how I held my hands. A series of commandments which, once internalized, became my very own feedback loop of gender correction: “hands in pockets, not on your hips,” “don’t be so excitable,” “hang out with the boys, not the girls.”
Throughout my childhood, I had no elaborate or robust taxonomy for the signals I was picking up on; I just knew they communicated error. As puberty kicked in, conversations about gender and sexuality progressed from implied commandments to clearer structures of right and wrong. One memory in particular stands out. As a freshman in high school, I went to In-N-Out with my dad to grab a burger and we happened to sit at a booth across from a gay couple. As we ate, my dad mocked and disparaged them for their sexuality. I played along for fear of being found out, but the dissonance I experienced – sitting there thinking that I too might be deserving of that ridicule – has replayed in my head regularly over the last decade.
I was taught to be ashamed of my gender, my sexuality and thus myself. I thought of myself as perverted or abnormal. An eye-opening college experience, made meaningful by people from all different walks of life, was the single greatest contributor to my unlearning this shame. While this is an ongoing process, these years of radical growth pushed me to critique the influences I’d assumed were absolute and transformed feelings that were once oppressive into a tool I now wield to effect change.
A pivotal moment occurred last June, as queer people around the world celebrated Pride. A hate speech incident took place on YouTube that the company took little action against. As a Googler I was, quite frankly, furious. I felt guilty, like my company’s (in)action made me complicit in harming my own people. I had two options: add fuel to the raging fire or leverage my privileged position to drive tangible change. I chose the latter and within a quarter I had transferred internally to the product policy team at YouTube.
Over the last year, I’ve become recognized for my advocacy. I wrote the first-ever LGBTQ policy, codifying principles of inclusion and ensuring that the economic incentives to create content online are accessible and equitable for queer people. I also drove the implementation of a process called ablation, ensuring that using terms like “transgender” in a title would never result in a video being demonetized. Further, I lobbied for a Google-wide limitation on advertisers’ ability to exclude groups like LGBTQ folks or ethnic minorities, a project that reached the highest level of the company’s leadership and was ultimately successful. I was met with resistance at times, but my heart was in the driver’s seat and I persisted, ultimately winning a YouTube North Star Award for my work.
Visibility is a powerful mechanism for driving understanding and inclusion of queer people; I’m proud that my work directly magnifies that visibility. The influences in my life that once had me questioning how I presented myself became the catalyst I needed to see how powerful my once-secret identity is.