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Home Blogs 4 women, 4 paths: How female talent grows into leadership at OLX 4 min. read INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY 4 women, 4 paths: How female talent grows into leadership at OLX From 28 years and 4 career phases to 2 years and 3 countries. From Software Engineer to VP. From Finance to Cybersecurity. Here’s what happens when you stop self-excluding — and start stepping up. There’s no single path to leadership. Especially not for women in tech. Some go deep in one domain and rise to VP. Others pivot across functions. Some relocate across continents while switching disciplines. Others build legacy over decades. What do they have in common? They didn’t wait for permission. They didn’t self-exclude. And they found a company that gave them freedom to shape their own paths. For International Women’s Day, we’re sharing the stories of four women at OLX who did exactly that. Aniela Crisan Software Engineer → VP of Motors | Portugal | 13 years at OLX Aniela was OLX Portugal’s first international hire in 2012. She joined as a Software Engineer from Romania. Today, she’s VP of Motors — leading the business that represents the majority of OLX’s EBITDA. What kept her here? “What’s kept me here isn’t tenure. It’s scope.” The problems she works on keep getting bigger, more complex, and more consequential. When her team needed a career development framework, she didn’t wait for HR — she built a competency matrix that was later adopted company-wide. Over 13 years, she’s led Motors, scaled into Real Estate, and returned to Motors with a mandate to lead OLX’s highest-impact business at its most ambitious stage. “OLX gives you freedom to shape things beyond your immediate role. The scope kept expanding because the opportunities kept appearing, and I kept saying yes to the harder ones.” What she’s most proud of: The people she’s developed. “So many of them are still growing within the company, leading their own teams, taking on bigger problems.” Patrícia Cardoso Head of Finance → Global Compliance and Fraud Lead | Portugal | 9 years at OLX After 4.5 years in Finance, Patrícia had a choice: Finance Director (the obvious next step) or move into Cybersecurity. “I’ll admit I had doubts. I kept asking myself: Am I technical enough for this?” Four years later as Global Compliance and Fraud Lead, she has her answer: “You don’t need a purely technical background to make an impact in cybersecurity. Business insight, critical thinking, and the ability to ask the right questions are incredibly valuable.” Her finance and audit background — especially her work on risk, controls, and compliance — became her superpower, not a limitation. “Don’t self-exclude. We often think we’re not ‘technical enough’ when in reality, diverse experiences are a huge strength.” Patrícia is nearly 9 years at OLX now, across two very different roles. Proof that “staying in your lane” is optional.