Stepping into Ambiguity for Career Growth

Funny thing about summer. Many people believe business stops. They think that decision-makers go dark till September. Either people tell them nothing real can happen right now, so why bother... or they fool themselves into thinking it's true. Summer is definitely a great time to recharge, to enjoy the summer vibe and all the good that comes with it. But here's the thing I keep noticing with our clients. The ones actually working their business right now, the smart, strategic stuff, are having a really good summer business-wise. Why? Partially because everyone else stepped away, it's actually easier to get through to people. Less noise. Less competing for attention. So yeah, take the time off. Enjoy it. Just don't buy into the idea that growth is on pause till fall. It's not. I've found that some of the best openings show up exactly when everyone assumes there aren't any.

One year ago felt like the biggest failure yet in my career. I was sitting in my one year review and told the new venture product we were creating was being shut down, and my role was no longer needed. While there were potential opportunities for a different role in the company, I knew it was time to move on. I spent that year wearing every hat, sales, product marketer, GTM strategist, and more, building a go-to-market plan for our AI MVP and building the plane as we flew it. We were trying to sell higher education on a product when the market wasn’t ready and schools were strapped for extra spending money. But small teams teach you more by failing than almost anywhere else. Was it hard to experience my first layoff? Yes, both mentally and financially. But was it a year wasted? No. It emphasized that a new product needs real marketing and genuine demand before you rush to sell it, the time to find product-market fit, and company-wide support to succeed. Without all three, even a good idea struggles. Today I’m seeing the payoff of that setback. Three months after the layoff of searching, interviewing, and networking, and I landed the role I’m loving today. I’m using everything that failure taught me to help build what comes next. Fail fast, try it out. But don’t miss what you learned along the way. Also, if you’ve been recently laid off, please reach out and use your network to help! #Failfast #highereducation #edtech #educationtechnology #failure #learning

"Why can't it be done this month?" I asked a founder this during one of our full days. He was stepping out of the CEO role. His head of ops would step in, he'd move into growth, and the company would stop depending on him to hold every moving piece. So I asked, "When?" "In 12 months." Which sounded safe. Adult. So I asked, "Why can't it be done this month?" "It feels fast." "I'm not sure that's possible." "It feels less safe." All fair. Then we stripped the words out. Fast. Unreasonable. Less safe. What would actually exist in 12 months that makes the decision better? A new hire? A number? A skill she doesn't have yet? What is it, actually? And you could see him searching for the reason. The good-sounding one. The one that lets 12 months stay on the table. Then he stopped. "There's no real reason this can't happen in the next three months." So they did it. Three months. New CEO in the seat. He's full time on growth. This is where founders lose a year. They call it waiting for clarity. But ask, "What specific new information are you waiting for?" and there's no answer. No new information is coming. Just the same choice, with more months around it. So. What's the decision you keep pushing out? Ask yourself: what would need to be true for it to happen this month? Then deal with that. Not the feeling. The thing. And if you're reading this with three or four of those decisions stacked up, not one, a pile, that's not a clarity problem. You're not waiting. You're choosing not to decide. If that's you, my DMs are open. Bring the pile.

most people chase linear growth. more clients. more hours. more content. Sam Altman's advice is different: Chase compounding instead. build skills that make every future hour more valuable. build a brand that brings opportunities without asking. build systems that keep working while you sleep. build relationships that open doors years later. the biggest careers don't grow in straight lines. they grow exponentially. that's why the best founders think in decades, not quarters.

Career transitions can be hard, but they also reveal the kind of growth you don’t get when everything stays comfortable. This will be my fifth large career transition between navigating the shifts between military service and adjusting to three corporate layoffs. Every Transition has taught me something different about how to navigate complexity, uncertainty, and change. What I’ve learned is that the fundamentals don’t change, no matter the industry, the workplace, or the corporate structure: -Clarity beats speed -Systems thinking beats short-term fixes -Alignment beats assumptions -Consistency beats intensity These principles apply equally in supply chain planning, data analytics, and career development. Every transition forces you to step back, evaluate what you’ve built, and double down on the core skills that create stability: clear communication, planning, cross-functional alignment, and the ability to bring order to moving parts. Growth isn’t always comfortable, but it’s always instructive. If you’ve navigated major professional pivots, what principle has guided you the most?

A client asked last year why growth had stalled despite a strong new hire in business development. Six months in, pipeline was flat. The hire wasn't the problem. Nobody had asked what that person was walking into. There's a sequence most founders skip past without noticing: strategy and positioning, offer and pricing, marketing, business development, operations, team and incentives. Business development sits fourth. Most companies bring it in first, because it's the stage that visibly touches revenue, and revenue is what everyone's watching. But a business development hire can only convert what the first three stages have already made convertible. If positioning is unclear, they're selling something the market can't place. If pricing hasn't been tested, they're negotiating against a number nobody's actually validated. If marketing hasn't built any pipeline to work, they're cold-starting from zero with a title that implies they shouldn't have to. None of that is a hiring problem. It's a sequencing problem, and it's expensive precisely because it looks like a people problem until someone checks. The founders who get this right aren't smarter. They're just willing to ask, before they hire, what structure that person is actually stepping into. The ones who skip that question end up hiring the same role two or three times, each time convinced the last person just wasn't good enough. #growthstrategy #founderinsight #businessdevelopment #architectsofgrowth

A VP hired me to build his strategy. I started by breaking his org apart. His business was thriving. Three teams, each excellent in its own vertical, none accountable to the others. He wanted one strategy for the whole thing, which sounds reasonable until you notice there was no "whole thing" yet. Before any strategy design, I just talked to people. One leader at a time, no audience. Every conversation made the same claim. "We hit our numbers. We have an understanding with the others. You stay out of our way, we'll stay out of yours." What none of them knew was that the President was thinking about his legacy. Retirement was closer than they imagined, and he was ready to dramatically put the team ahead of himself. My whole job became one thing. Make it safe to say out loud what everyone was already thinking alone. That was the unlock. Not a deck. A space where the unspoken truth could finally be said without anyone losing face. Once it was safe, they built the answer themselves. The first move was subtraction. Two of the three teams belonged elsewhere, so they moved there. The org shrank and the President didn't flinch, because he was building something meant to outlast him. What remained could finally breathe. In time, churn came down. Acquisition costs down. Growth up double digits. The President came to me for a strategy. What he needed first was a team that could hold one. If your strategy keeps stalling, the problem might not be the strategy. Let's find out.

If you would’ve asked me a few years ago what I’d be doing today, I don’t think “shopping for strangers” would’ve made the list. 😂 Life has a funny way of rewriting the plans we make. Over the years, I’ve worn a lot of different hats. I’ve worked in healthcare, emergency dispatch, and recruiting. Today, I run my small business and work for Shipt and Instacart. I spend my days balancing entrepreneurship, motherhood, and whatever this beautifully messy season of life is. For a while, I felt like I needed to explain that. Like I had to justify why my career path didn’t look as polished or straightforward as everyone else’s on LinkedIn. But the more people I talk to, the more I realize… very few careers actually follow a straight line. Every chapter has taught me something I couldn’t have learned anywhere else. Recruiting taught me how hiring really works. Emergency dispatch taught me how to stay calm when everything around me isn’t. Running a small business has taught me resilience, patience, and that success is usually built in the quiet moments no one else sees. Contract work has reminded me that every job deserves respect, and every dollar earned has a story behind it. So I’ve stopped waiting for the “perfect” title to share what I’ve learned, and I’m open to whatever opportunities align with that next chapter. This space is going to be for honest conversations about work, careers, entrepreneurship, hiring, side hustles, career pivots, and all the unexpected turns that shape us along the way. If you’re building something, starting over, juggling multiple hats, or simply trying to figure out what’s next.. you’re in good company.♡ I’d love to hear your story. Has your career gone the way you thought it would? 💭

Talent is the hardest part of US expansion. Not the market. Not the product. We say it to every founder we work with and Stephan Dietrich (Neolane → Adobe) lived it. He landed in the US as the underdog, with a budget that couldn't compete with the incumbents. Here's the playbook he ran instead: 1. Location as leverage: he picked Boston, not the Valley, for one reason: the deepest talent pool in the country (Harvard, MIT, Cornell). 2. Proximity as strategy: he set up two miles from the US market leader. 3. Mercenaries with an expiration date: he hired their best people, knowing they wouldn't stay forever. 4. Build the bench: he had those hires train the young talent who would carry the company long-term. "Outsmart, don't outspend." This is exactly the kind of deliberate, on-the-ground thinking that separates founders who scale in the US from those who stall. The full episode with Stephan is coming soon, but this is the work we help founders get right from day one at US Expansion Partners. Expanding to the US? Tell us where you'd plant your first office. 👇 #USExpansion #Founders #GoToMarket #Hiring #SaaS #USXP

Over the last several years, I’ve had the opportunity to build a platform, launch new capabilities, and grow lines of business. One thing I’ve learned is that none of it happens without the right people. The most successful teams I’ve been part of weren’t assembled by chasing resumes or titles. They were built by identifying people with character, curiosity, humility, and the desire to improve every day. Technical knowledge matters, but integrity, accountability, and the willingness to take ownership are much harder to teach. Building and overseeing a business line is no different. Strategy, processes, and technology all matter, but those things only create opportunity. People determine whether that opportunity becomes something meaningful and sustainable long-term. Throughout my career, one of the things I’ve enjoyed most has been identifying talent, investing in their development, and watching them become trusted advisors and leaders in their own right. Hire well, provide guidance, and get out of their way. There is no greater measure of success than seeing someone grow in their career and achieve more than they thought possible. The platforms we’ve built will eventually evolve, processes will (and do) change, and systems will be replaced, but the people you invest in become the foundation for everything that comes next.