Episode #76: Darren McKellin, Area Director Large Enterprise North Asia, Zscaler

Darren McKellin shared great insight into how he became a leader through his journey to mindful leadership. Mr. McKellin’s choice to come to Japan was both one of economic strategy and love for international affairs after studying in both Mexico and Sweden during college. After college, Mr. McKellin joined the Japanese air cargo company Kintestsu located in Chicago. Through the directors’ brother, he was able to move to Japan as an English teacher in Yamanashi. After a year he moved to Omotesando to work at his old boss’s brothers’ company in Minami Aoyama where he worked for four years.

This was the beginning of his 30-year long career in Japan. At this company, Mr. McKellin learnt about sales and selling products to a Japanese consumer. When he left this company after four years, he had one failing venture at Chrysler Japan but that did not stop him from persevering through a difficult time with macho management and a harsh environment to thrive him. Afterwards, he moved to sell ads for a computing magazine known as Japan Inc.

Through Japan Inc he was able to gain connections with various tech companies both large companies and small start-up companies. Through this opportunity selling ad space for the Japan Inc magazine, he learnt more about systems interrogation type of work. Through the gaining rise of technology and his gaining interest in the IT market, this would eventually be his last job outside the IT world. After Japan Inc. He would later join the tech company called Techno Box. This company was the first cloud serving within Japan which allowed him to learn more about managing a team of people. After this, he would move to World Com but they went bankrupt two years later.

After this stressful time, he gained a job at Vodafone. He did this through the power of intention which was an important part of his success. Mr. McKellin has gained an appreciation for intention and mindfulness when he read the book “Think and Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill as a young child at his grandfather’s house. The idea of mindfulness had become an integral part of Mr. McKellin’s life and the reason for his success.

At and after his time at Vodafone, he began to grow as a leader managing large teams of people at Oracle and later NetSuite. As a leader, he learnt how to use harmony, and patience as a way to motivate and lead his team to great success. Through his use of mindfulness and gaining inspiration from Google’s ‘search inside yourself’ program, he co-founded the Mindfulness Project at Oracle which helped improve the lives and mental health of employees. After his time at these two companies, he became the regional head of Zscaler.

Currently, through his ideals, he has helped the team at Zscaler grow at a tremendous speed. He has helped develop the team from five people to sixty. Which has also helped Zscaler become a top leading IT company which now has a $40 billion market cap. Not only has he helped Zscaler become a leading company he also wrote a book to help others.

His book ‘Mind Over Sales’ is a revolutionary book that helps readers gain knowledge about how they should use mindfulness to develop a more fulfilling life and successful career. Mr. McKellin strives at helping other gain knowledge about seeking self-awareness, intention, and harmonization to gain effortless success in their life.