And This is Why Leslie Berland, Twitter CMO, Holds Most of Her Meetings in Public

Leslie Berland, Twitter Chief Marketing Officer often grabs a few minutes with an employee outside in the morning or at one of the San Francisco office’s many open areas.

The first thing that Leslie Berland does when she gets to Twitter’s San Francisco office on the south side of Market Street is actually spend a few minutes outside the building. “I will ask a member of my team if they want to grab coffee or go for a stroll before we walk in,” says the longtime New Yorker, who remains bicoastal but has spent most of her time in the Bay Area since joining Twitterearlier this year.

The former American Express exec has adjusted to her new company’s office-less ethos and meets with her team at one of the building’s many public spaces (for private calls with outside contacts, there’s an old-style phone booth). “I did have an office in my previous life, but I have always very much been somebody who is out and about on the move, always with my team,” says Berland, who was with AmEx for almost 11 years.

She says she particularly loves the outdoor roof area at the 1937 Market Square building where Twitter occupies more than 800,000 square feet. The $12 billion company moved into the former wholesale furniture market in 2012 and today has more than 3,000 employees across 35-plus offices, including New York, London, Dubai and Paris. “I love experiencing the energy and the culture in difference offices,” says Berland, who as a part of her new job recently visited several of the international offices.

But back in San Francisco, Berland has a few personal touches on her desk, including a photo of her husband and kids and a framed collage of tweets from her former AmEx boss, Ed Gilligan, who died in 2015. The memento, a gift from Twitter, is something she often references during the work day. Says Berland, “It means a lot to me to hear his voice in the way that only Twitter was able to capture.”