How Julia Phillips Brought Two Passions Into One Career at Audible

Throughout her career, Julia Phillips has turned big-picture storytelling into actionable strategy, a skill rooted in her training as both an engineer and a performer — a rare combination, and one that has defined her path through international growth roles and into her work at Audible. She joined our strategy team in 2020, after serving as a vice president of strategy and operations in film and TV production, and later became a strategic advisor to our Chief Financial Officer and Growth Officer, Cynthia Chu, in what Phillips calls “a role similar to Chief of Staff, with strategic initiative responsibilities.”

Now, as Marketing Strategy and Operations Lead, she helps Audible’s many different marketing teams decide what to prioritize, then builds the operating systems and tools that let those teams do their best work. It’s a wide purview, or as Phillips puts it, “If there’s an operational or strategic solution that can help multiple marketing teams reach our business objectives, we step in to connect those dots.”

While much of this work happens behind the scenes, it enables our marketing teams to work more effectively and deliver more relevant, delightful experiences for our customers. Phillips has seen that work evolve alongside Audible: when she joined, her team was focused on distribution pathways that reach customers where they like to listen and inking our first content deals in Brazil. Those initiatives have since become a robust in-car listening experience, collaborations that reach new audiences, and a new country of Audible lovers. “I've watched our recently launched Standard membership grow from an idea into a real value proposition for customers,” she says. "It's exciting to see the business evolve into a service more and more customers around the globe truly love.”

Read how Phillips went from performing on stage to helping Audible’s marketing teams perform their best — for an audience of millions.

How would you describe your approach to or philosophy of leadership?

My job is to create the conditions where my team can do their best thinking and grow into the next phase of their careers. I want to point people in the right direction, give them a solid foundation to work from, and then get out of the way so they can innovate. The key to this growth is cultivating an environment of trust so my team can brainstorm openly and collaboratively, with me and with each other. I learn the most about my colleagues (and myself) when I watch them work through problems from their unique perspective.

My hope is that my team can confidently dive deep to make sense of complex, ambiguous challenges and drive improvements for the rest of the business. As an operator myself, I want to model how to solve problems, but then let them show me how to do it even better.

What have you found most helpful for balancing a leadership role with your personal life?

As a new mom (my son turned one this week), I won't pretend to have it all figured out, but mandatory breakfasts in the morning and playtime after work have forced me to draw stricter boundaries around my working windows. I keep my calendar clear for heads-down work, pressure test whether meeting topics can be resolved via email, and delegate more to my team. It’s also taught me to be extremely intentional about the time I spend working: if I choose to attend a meeting, I want to be present and learn, by listening instead of multitasking on email or Slack. And this intentionality has, I think, made me a better collaborator and colleague.

What are some left turns you took on your career journey?

Most people are surprised to learn that when I graduated college, I moved to the city to become an actor. At Princeton, I majored in operations research and financial engineering and minored in musical theater.

After graduation, I had to pick one. I knew I'd regret not trying my hand at theater, so I followed my passion for performance and got a part-time job as a tutor to pay the bills. But my side gig at the education company quickly became where I was having the most fun, and I found myself helping to build their growth strategy and led expansion of their operations in Brazil and Miami.

I wanted to eventually return to my storytelling roots, so I took another left turn to a film and television production company as a vice president of strategy and operations, where I led their expansion into audio, before landing at Audible.

If you could have any superpower what would it be?

As someone who loves traveling abroad, but is terrible at learning new languages — I took Latin in school because it was the only one students didn't have to speak — I'd love to be fluent in all of them. This would also come in handy as we scale Audible globally!

Who would you invite to your dinner party of your dreams?

Patti LuPone, Liza Minnelli, Bernadette Peters, and Elaine Stritch. Can you imagine the star power — and the after-dinner karaoke?

Lightning round

• Coffee or tea? Coffee.
• Morning person or night owl? Night owl by nature, though my one-year-old is turning me into a morning person against my will!
• Where are you working from currently? Our Newark headquarters.
• How long have you been with Audible? Six years.
• Who is your biggest inspiration, career-wise? My mom. She's reinvented her career multiple times, pivoting from consultant to in-house organizational psychologist to CEO and founder. I really admire her skills as a manager and how deeply she cares about her team.
• Dine in or take out? Take out. Preferably Thai.
• Favorite hobby? Going to the theater.
• Favorite Audible listen, go. Harry Potter: The Full-Cast Audio Editions.