As an intern for Nashville SC, I recently had the opportunity to sit down for a Zoom interview with the club’s VP of Communications, Cristina Maillo Belda. Before coming to the Music City club, she held numerous communications positions with Major League Soccer itself, teams like Chivas USA and Philadelphia Union, corporations such as Nike and Adidas, and helped provide vital information and content for recent Olympic Games and FIFA Women’s World Cup games.
Sydney Kohne: When you first started in communications, what was the first indicator or the light bulb that went off that this is what I want to do?
Cristina Maillo Belda: Yeah, it’s actually a funny question. A great question because again, we tend to forget or at the beginning sometimes you get caught up in action. I studied, just like you. I actually was doing my Master’s in linguistics at the University of Maryland and the program wasn’t fulfilling enough so one of my friends, again, I was always in athletics and helping around, and one of my friends from the athletic department was a game day operations staffer for DC United. And, and he’s like, “You love soccer, why don’t you come along and volunteer for them, you get to watch the game and all that,” and that was my first connection to MLS. I started collaborating with the communications department with doing the media checking and all that and I got to know a couple of the staff members there and ultimately they offered me an internship and that’s how I got to realize, “Hey, they could be a job here for me,” and I was incredibly passionate about it. So again, they gave me the opportunity. And then one thing, that internship led into another internship with Major League Soccer. So I moved to New York after I completed my master’s, and I interned for the league for about a year. And then that gave me an opportunity to get my first full time job with Philadelphia Union as a coordinator that time So it’s crazy how one connection can again, change everything or change your entire life.
SK: What does your day to day look like with the club? And how has that changed? what was it like before the pandemic and quarantine and everything else and then even now with being asked to leave the tournament. What does that look like for you on your end? I’m sure it’s incredibly hectic and stressful, but what does that look like?
CMB: So I joined the team in June 2018. So last year, so the past year, I must say it’s been a unique roller coaster. I was very fortunate, when I joined Philadelphia union back in 2010, I went through the expansion journey with them because they were coming into the league so I got to see what it was to feel the team for the first time. But to answer your question, it’s, again, we created that amazing momentum coming into February 29th and we got 60,000 people in the stadium and then and I remember like looking around, I was fascinated but I was exhausted. I think we were on a three hour average sleep for like weeks. And I just remember having this massive hangover even though I had no drinks. I got home I think it was like 1am or something like that from work because again, after the game for the media, dealing with media and locker room access etc., the PR people usually [for] an average game you’re lucky if you’ve left the stadium within two hours after the final whistle. I remember getting to work on Monday and I’m just chatting with everybody and they everybody has such a hype and we were the same. We’re like we had the biggest hangover still on Monday and we were exhausted but everybody was so happy. And we needed to switch into we’re going to Portland on the weekend. So we’re planning for that etc. And then unfortunately that evening the tornado came through and devastated our city and affected our colleagues, affected some of the players, and all of a sudden you are switching from happiness and celebration into responding to a crisis, and not just a crisis that involves the team but a major crisis that affected human beings unfortunately. Through our team, I also oversee community, broadcasting and fan engagement so with Brandon Hill who oversees for this community we like, are they okay, there’s a bit of a plan what we can raise some funds to support again, the crisis etc. And it’s funny by looking in retrospect, so somebody at the time emailed me from Houston because they’ve gone through a crisis like, through a weather or climate crisis because of the flooding I think two, three years ago and I said to them, like if you have any, any feedback or any scoop into how we should approach it or things like that, and he said to me, “We’re dealing with COVID and blah blah,” and in our world, COVID it was nothing like COVID was as like, something that they were talking in the Today Show, but nothing like to me was like, Oh, it’s gonna go away. I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that he was worried about COVID. Fast forward a week and we’re shutting down operations. All of a sudden our lives completely change. And we’ve gone from crisis to crisis since that March 2. They so you continue to fast forward and again, you’re getting to a new rhythm or working on a new routine with your team to work in and doing what we’re doing right now with chatting remotely and helping at the same time down your colleagues to find a way of working remotely and still have a vision without necessarily knowing where we’re going, or what the angle is. I think that will be probably the most challenging through it, but we finally get a vision to them and it’s happening. And we’re preparing and working. Again, everybody’s excited. Everybody’s back to doing their job with it all in mind, which is pretty, pretty important. So we put all this work into motion and, and we’re prepared for it and finally get down there. And, unfortunately, life throws you curveballs and this was another one and I was down there with the team. And we were in our homes for four days without being able to leave our hotel room so people would be delivering food and you wouldn’t be able to see anybody. I joke around with one of my colleagues like, I went running in the room. Like I literally paced back and forth and just running the room for the sake of getting some exercise. But anyhow, throughout the past few months it has been a constant crisis. And I remember when Black Lives Matter conversations happen. And then we had something else that took place. And I remember chatting with Matthew within our comms teams, and I said yeah, I was like, usually you have a crisis [sporadically] you prepare for that and you respond accordingly. That day we have three crises in our hands, we have Black Lives Matter, we had COVID-19. Each one of those moments is a crisis in itself and on the same day we experienced them together. That’s unprecedented. So I think more and more obviously with social media etc. you gotta be ahead of the game a little more. It’s funny, I find myself doing exercises that I never use. So, again, for crises, you’re always gonna think in a worst case scenario. And you’ve got to prepare for all of that in case you need it.
SK: If you were coming into this industry now, would you do anything differently?
CMB: Yeah, a couple of advice that I’ve given people in the past is that diversifying is very important. So diversify, nurture your relationships My intern partner of who he and I shared chairs back to back. So back to back in. I’m in an office in New York City In Major League Soccer. He’s the VP for LA Galaxy for content marketing. So again, like, you never know what people are going to go or going to end up, and having those relationships be meaningful and caring for people. I think you can learn a lot about different ways of approaching things, different views, different ways of working, and then they can open a door. And the other thing, I think, when we are in our twenties, we tend to think that when invincible and the world is ours and that we know everything and as you grow old, and I don’t want to school you, but as you grow older you realize how little you know and even right now is how little I know, and continue to to learn and work hard and put your head head down. I can’t highlight it enough, having a humble approach to things. Having an attitude will be detrimental in your career. So work hard but don’t expect that you’re gonna be running a team when you’re 25. I mean that can happen but the odds are very, very small, you’re gonna have to work really hard and put your head down for many years in order to get to that final piece of the cake that you want to have. So I will say that was something that I will change when I wasn’t making money, I thought I knew the world, and I made things perhaps more difficult and that may have been a reason that cost me a job or an opportunity here and there. So I will say that be biggest learning, like not acting like I know it all, I don’t.
Sydney Kohne 
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