Sopheap Im
Sopheap Im started at Digital Divide Data as an associate in 2004 after her second try at the interview, when candidates still needed basic computer skills and English rather than pre-employment training. Within a year or two, she became a project leader for a ten-person afternoon shift team, then general manager of the Battambang branch office in western Cambodia. She worked full-time during the day while earning a bachelor's degree in the evenings through a full DDD scholarship, graduating in 2009. In 2011, she left for graduate school at Portland State University in Oregon, and now serves as Chief People Officer overseeing global people operations, HR functions, social impact, and fundraising across more than 1,000 employees in three countries.
The biggest change she's seen is generational. Twenty years ago, Cambodia had only two paved roads in its capital city and expensive, unreliable internet. Now there's more access to technology and learning, but the gap between finishing high school and being ready for work remains. DDD's investment in job coaching from day one—before people become productive—makes it unique in Cambodia and Laos. The hardest part of her role is balancing global culture with local context, ensuring a thousand employees across three regions embrace shared values while taking ownership of what success looks like in their own countries. She's most proud that after 25 years, DDD survives and sustains as a business in uncommon BPO locations while staying true to its social mission. "Our end goal is to make people's lives better than they were when they started," she says. Her advice on hiring: look beyond tangible skills like typing speed, which anyone can learn in two weeks, and assess whether candidates have the internal drive to be better and simply lack opportunity. Her favorite success story is a former associate with a disability who used DDD's English e-learning platform so extensively that he took on a support role, left to direct a nonprofit, and still reaches out offering references and support to current employees.
