Tae Yoo

The steward of Cisco’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) vision, Tae Yoo leads the company’s social investment programs in education, healthcare, critical human needs, and economic development. Yoo drives a strategy that engages public-private partnerships and leverages Cisco’s business, technical, and financial assets for sustainable social impact in communities around the world. In addition, she sits on several internal boards and councils at Cisco that help set the company’s strategy including the Emerging Countries Council, Global Public Sector Board, and Healthcare Board, for which she serves as cochair.

As a 20-year veteran of Cisco, Yoo’s insight and business acumen have enabled Cisco to collaborate across government, business, and non-governmental organization (NGO) sectors for tangible social benefit. Her leadership has helped make Cisco Networking Academy one of the largest education programs in the world, recognized globally for its innovative approach to providing ICT skills education. Today, Networking Academy engages more than 1 million concurrent students in over 165 countries.

Other programs under Yoo’s leadership include the Jordan Education Initiative, which the World Economic Forum called “one of the world’s largest successful working models of collaborative public-private sector partnership in education”; Connecting Sichuan, focused on strengthening education and healthcare systems in the Sichuan Province of China after the devastating 2008 earthquake; and our 21st Century Schools Initiative, designed to help transform communities in the United States through education.

The impact from these initiatives has earned broad recognition over the years, among them the State Department’s Award for Corporate Excellence, the Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy’s Annual Excellence in Corporate Philanthropy Award, and the International Community Service Award given by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Business Civic Leadership Center.

Previously at Cisco, Yoo was influential in creating new markets for Cisco by co-founding the Business Development group, where she was responsible for growing partnerships with other technology companies for joint product and market development. She also provided leadership to Cisco’s European based Global Distribution Channels.

Yoo is a trustee of the Cisco Foundation, sits on the board of Business for Social Responsibility, and is Co-Chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Education Systems. She has also served on the City Year National board and the Smithsonian National Museum of American History board, as well as the advisory boards of the Global Philanthropy Forum and the Women’s Technology Cluster.

Yoo holds a degree in communications from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.