Michele Karakas-Alarcón - Nominee for Career Catalyst Award

Michele is a Manager, Global Emerging Talent Program at eBay. In her role at eBay, Michele has successfully implemented program strategy, program branding, and program implementation of eBay’s Emerging Talent programs, globally managing programmatic elements and branding for AMER, EMEA, and APAC. Michele’s background is in advertising/marketing and she has experience in traditional advertising and experiential marketing as an Account Manager and managing a portfolio of tech clients. Michele is passionate about giving first-generation students opportunities within the Tech sector. As a first-generation individual herself, she feels empowered when she can open the door to others of similar backgrounds, and finds it rewarding to see when first-generation students create change, impact, and empower others within her organization.

Career Highlight

"eBay has had DEI as a driving force for all Emerging Talent efforts, and I expanded our Emerging Talent programs into high school. This year, we have created high school experiences with local high schools within San Jose, CA, to increase brand recognition and provide career insight for underrepresented students. With these schools, we hosted events that included Spanish Bi-lingual panels, career talks, and hack-a-thons. Having events for high school students allows them to get the career insights they need to stay on the college track. We hope all the high school students participating in these events return to be an intern or recent grad at eBay!"