Javi is from Chile and has lived in Minnesota, USA since 2011. She joined Cargill in May of 2019 as the Global Business Leader for the Power Systems Business which includes Dielectric and Cooling Solutions. She started her career in P&G, followed by 14 years at 3M Company. Through her career, she has served in several roles including Sales, Supply Chain, Marketing, and Business Management at local, regional, and global levels.
Javi is originally a civil hydraulics engineer, and later earned an MPA and MBA from University of Minnesota. She also is Six Sigma Green Belt certified and a SCRUM Master. Her languages include English, Spanish, and Portuguese.
Through a more personal lens, she is a mother to Jack (8 years old), Board Member of Feed My Starving Children since 2019 and the president of the Twin Cities Hispanic Coalition, in addition to Advisory Board Member at CWIEME Berlin 2025. Javi’s interests include Global Economic Development, Public Policy, DE&I, and Sustainability. She also enjoys volleyball, singing, and dancing.
The Right Place, The Right Value
Imagine a bottle of water, sitting in a large pack at a wholesaler store, its value is measurable in a few cents. This same bottle of water, in a vending machine, goes up to $1 to $2 dollars. At a concert or large sports event, it can easily reach $5 or $8 dollars. And just to prove a point and make this extreme, if you were to find a billionaire that has been lost in the desert for days, how much do you think they would pay for that same bottle of water?
This is a simple analogy we can use to see ourselves and our careers as water, that needs to be at the right place, at the right time, to be truly valued. I wish I could give proper credit to this analogy, but I can’t quite remember where I heard it, but I found it so clear that it stuck to me.
This very simple way to measure “value”, in this case as the price we are willing to pay for the exact same thing, but in very different situations, really helped me open my eyes to how I measure my own value at work.
As all of us do, I have faced many challenges at work, and some of them lead me to doubt my value. Even though questioning and challenging yourself can be a good, healthy exercise, it takes a wrong turn once we start to hear a voice in our head saying, “Maybe I am not as good as I think I am”, “Maybe I just got lucky until now”, “Maybe only this one leader saw my potential”.
YOUR CAPACITY, SKILLSET, PERSONALITY TRAITS, LEADERSHIP STYLE, ETC. OF COURSE CAN ALWAYS BE IMPROVED, BUT SHOULD NEVER BE UNDERSTATED, UNDERVALUED, OR TAKEN FOR GRANTED.
Never Undervalue Yourself
I am writing this because after I heard this water analogy, it has been fast and easier for me to immediately shut down those thoughts and move to the admission… that I might just not be in the right place. I hope this simple idea can help anyone reading this.
Your capacity, skillset, personality traits, leadership style etc. of course can always be improved, but should never be understated, undervalued or taken for granted.
The essence of who you are, your experience, what you bring to the table for a company can be extremely valuable to another (and I do not mean unethical information sharing with competitors of course), and most importantly, can make you realize that you can always continue to add tremendous value, feel appreciated, excited and happy about your job.
Guard Your Worth
Do I advise you then to jump ship immediately? Absolutely not. Companies go through phases, tough cost-cutting times, market shifts, and even hurtful layoffs, and this doesn’t mean it is not a good place to work. But also, do not let years and years pass leaving your worth, your career aspirations, and goals in the wrong hands.
What I advise is to look at bigger signals such as: What is being valued/rewarded? Do you trust the capacity and character of your leadership? How does leadership face and share good/bad news? Can you see a path, that you believe in, to get out of hard times? Is there accountability for actions? Among others.
The least of the things I want is to imply that this is an easy process; doubt and frustration are normal, fear of change and making the right next move is also normal.
All I want you to realize when these challenges come, as fast as possible, is that self-doubt is toxic, and as women we do it disproportionately. It can eat your soul and energy very fast and usually leads to no progress.
I hope you quickly remember this bottle of water, that your value cannot be taken away from you, and put yourself in the right place.
WHAT IS BEING VALUED/REWARDED?
DO YOU TRUST THE CAPACITY AND
CHARACTER OF YOUR LEADERSHIP?
HOW DOES LEADERSHIP FACE AND
SHARE GOOD/BAD NEWS?
CAN YOU SEE A PATH, THAT YOU BELIEVE IN,
TO GET OUT OF HARD TIMES?
IS THERE ACCOUNTABILITY FOR ACTIONS?
This article was originally published in the September 2025 issue of the Women in Power Systems magazine, which you can access here.
