Celebrating the Winners of Hi Marley’s Core Values Awards 2025

In January 2024, Hi Marley launched the Core Values Awards to recognize those who shape Hi Marley’s positive culture and help us stay connected to our values— to be humble, to maximize courage and to live by Ubuntu—as we scale.

This year, Hi Marley colleagues submitted 80 nominations across three categories, for more than 30 people who exemplify our three core values in the way they work and interact with others every day:

• Be Humble: We lead with appreciation and promote a culture of humility, compassion and openness to learn from anyone, anywhere.
• Max Courage: We encourage our team, our customers, and their customers to dream big, try new ideas and maximize impact by taking calculated risks.
• Ubuntu: True success is achieved by aligning our individual aims behind a shared purpose bigger than any single individual or company.

“The Core Values Awards allow us to stop, reflect and celebrate the people who truly embody our core values, which are the cornerstone of who we are,” said Stefanie Bishop, Chief People Officer at Hi Marley. “While selecting only four winners was challenging, we’re excited to highlight these individuals for serving as role models and making a positive impact on their teams and the whole organization.”

Be Humble: Jennelle Brosseau, Director, GTM Operations

Jennelle has been an integral part of Hi Marley for over four years. As Director of Go-to-Market Operations, Jennelle connects different groups inside Hi Marley, ensuring we stay aligned and accomplish our goals.

“Jennelle makes everyone around her better,” said Dan Keenan, Chief Growth Officer. “She impacts every part of the organization and does it in a thousand different ways. But she doesn’t do it for recognition. She doesn’t seek attention or want accolades. She leads by example and always thinks about what’s best for the team.”

“Jennelle’s openness to learn and her willingness to support others make her a true embodiment of this value,” said Lauren McCollem, Chief Operating Officer at Hi Marley. “Jennelle acts as the glue for the GTM teams and generously offers her skills, brain and time to provide visibility into the business and ensure we’re making a measurable impact. She transformed our GTM operations. And she does this all without asking for anything in return; she just wants to help and see the business succeed.”

Max Courage: Dylan Cheung, Senior Software Engineer

Dylan joined Hi Marley in June 2019. Throughout his time at the company, he embraced several complex projects, such as implementing SSO for the first time, developing our number pooling capabilities, and making it possible to have multiple conversations simultaneously. Most recently, Dylan has been instrumental in advancing Hi Marley’s mobile strategy; his approach, advocacy, and initiative will serve multiple use cases going forward.

“Dylan’s five-and-a-half years at Hi Marley have been marked by a fearless approach to tackling tough challenges and advocating for meaningful change across the organization,” said Dave Wingert, VP, Engineering at Hi Marley. “He embodies Max Courage, both at Hi Marley and his personal life. His willingness to step up and solve hard problems has shaped key aspects of our product and engineering strategies.”

Ubuntu: Akshay Wani, Senior Software Engineer I, SRE

Since Akshay joined Hi Marley in November 2020, he has exemplified Ubuntu with a collaborative spirit and willingness to always support others. Akshay consistently goes above and beyond to help his colleagues, creating a culture of trust and teamwork.

“On my first day, Akshay said, ‘If you need anything, I’m here to help’,” said Gabor Tokaji, VP of Security & CloudOps at Hi Marley. “And that’s real; he’s super collaborative and always ready to help anybody and everybody. If you need support, guidance, or help figuring something out, Akshay is always available and someone you can count on. We wouldn’t be where we are today without Akshay.”

Founders’ Award: Michelle Brooks, VP, Architect

The Founders’ Award honors an individual who consistently embodies all three core values. Michelle Brooks joined the company in June 2021 and has led the team through some of the most challenging moments at Hi Marley, demonstrating Ubuntu. They embody Max Courage by balancing big, bold decisions with pragmatic choices and resolutions. They also show humility by welcoming and always listening to others’ ideas and opinions.

“In the world, there are a lot of different people in different ‘leadership positions’, but when I think of a true leader, it’s someone that exhibits the behaviors that we should all follow,” said Mike Greene, Founder and CEO at Hi Marley. “Whether it’s enhancing our mission, improving our product, leading solutions for critical customer demands, or upholding our culture standards – Michelle demonstrates all of these things in an incredibly positive way.”

Mike continued, “I often personally look to Michelle for guidance. They’re not just a leader on their team but a role model of what a leader looks like inside and outside Hi Marley. They set a standard for our community and also for generations to come.”

Congratulations to this year’s Core Value Awards recipients! The winners each received a prestigious award, cash prize and equity grant.