Ada Maria Allende: Lead With Empathy

In her role as director of meetings & events at Inspire Brands, Ada Maria Allende is responsible for both the strategy and the execution of five large-scale conventions across all of Inspire’s brands, including well-known chains such as Arby’s, SONIC, and Dunkin’.

It’s an all-encompassing role, yet she still takes the time to focus on what really matters in people’s lives and to treat them with kindness and empathy.

Skift Meetings had a chance to sit down with Allende, a member of our 2026 Advisory Council, to learn more about her views on leadership.

Skift Meetings: Tell us about your role managing multiple brands and teams.

Ada Allende: Yes, it’s a very complex matrix organization because each of our five brands has five different brand presidents, five different chief marketing officers, in some their own chief operations officers, plus a whole support team that is deployed to support their conventions. So I’m managing three internal people on my team, plus managing the strategy and the work for each of these brands.

Plus, I also manage a planning agency, because obviously three people cannot support five conventions on a yearly basis. The agency might bring eight to 10 people, plus there are production partners and DMCs. And so when you look at it, each convention could easily have a team of 25 people who need to be aligned within the strategy that you're trying to set for the event.

It all comes down to trust, clarity, empathy, and communication. For many stakeholders, events aren’t their day-to-day work. They come at it with a lot of enthusiasm and a fresh eye and fresh perspective, but it's not always rooted in best practices. It's my job to help them understand the “why” behind the decisions.

Q: How do you define this concept of empathy in leadership?

A: Empathy is about caring deeply about results while also caring about the people doing the work. It’s creating space for others to contribute, asking good questions, and still being able to make tough decisions. It also means having empathy for yourself, because leadership can be challenging — especially when you’re managing both up and down.

Q: How has your leadership style evolved over time?

A: After being in similar roles for over almost 20 years, I’m a completely different leader now. Early in my career, I was tentative, perfection-driven, and not very empathetic. I put a lot of pressure on myself and focused more on how I showed up rather than on how I could support others.

Over time, I’ve come to realize that success is about how the team shows up together, and that’s a reflection of you. You’re not doing this alone.

Q: What advice would you give to aspiring leaders?

A: Slow down, take a breath, and don’t rush past the learning phase. So many aspiring young leaders are so busy looking for their next opportunity that they're missing out on learning the fundamentals: understanding how the business works, learning how to communicate effectively, asking for feedback, and paying attention to how the leaders they admire show up.

Be observant and pay attention to who can help you find the answers. Be willing to learn and adapt, and to be supported. A lot of young professionals are terrified of constructive feedback. It’s not about you trying to put them down — it's exactly the opposite. It's you trying to show them their blind spot so they can become aware of it and do something about it.

Q: Did you have a mentor who influenced your leadership journey?

A: I was lucky enough to work for Tammy (Kockaya) Moore for about five years while I was at KPMG. She is now the vice president of professional learning and development at PCMA, and she continues to be a mentor and a friend. She is the person who, without me knowing it, really pushed me to see what was on the other side. She was a firm leader, she always provided clarity, and she was hard, but not mean — just very direct. I see her at industry events and she's always someone who I know I can text or call and she's going to give it to me straight, but with a lot of care and compassion.

Q: What’s the most important leadership lesson you’ve learned?

A: Most challenges don’t come from bad intentions — they come from unclear expectations or assumptions. I don't ever want people to feel confused or have any level of ambiguity in terms of where we're going and what we need to accomplish.