From Design Student to CEO

What a Nonlinear Career Taught Me About Growth, Reinvention, and Purpose

I’ve been a design student.
A fund accountant.
A consultant.
A fractional CFO.
A startup CEO.

On paper, those might seem like wildly disconnected roles. And they are, in title. But each one has layered into the next, shaping how I think, how I work, and how I lead.

Some pivots were by choice. Others by necessity. A few were made with confidence. Many were made in the fog of uncertainty. But none of them were wasted.

Looking back, the common thread wasn’t a job title, it was pattern recognition. Learning how to connect dots across disciplines. Spotting what worked in one field and translating it into another. Trusting that authenticity and originality are more valuable than following someone else’s playbook.

Here’s what my nonlinear career has taught me:

You don’t need a five-year plan. You need to know how to move through uncertainty.
There’s a lot of pressure, especially early in your career, to have a clear, bulletproof plan. But the truth is, the path rarely unfolds in a straight line. Life throws curveballs. Industries evolve. Opportunities emerge where you least expect them.

What matters more than having a “plan” is knowing how to move through fog to take the next right step even when the full picture isn’t clear. Learning to trust yourself in uncertainty is a superpower. It’s how I found my way from finance to tech, and eventually into healthcare innovation. Not because I had a blueprint, but because I learned how to navigate when the map didn’t exist.

The skills you pick up in one role will serve you in the next, even when it doesn’t make sense yet.
Every chapter in my career has given me tools that I didn’t fully appreciate until later. Design school taught me the power of systems thinking, empathy, and storytelling. Accounting taught me structure, discipline, and how to speak the language of money. Consulting showed me how to ask the right questions and manage complexity. Leading a startup has pulled all of that together and forced me to learn even more.

Sometimes you don't see the value of a skill until years later. But it’s all stacking. I’ve learned to trust that.

Curiosity is more valuable than certainty.
If I had only followed what seemed “safe,” I’d have missed most of the experiences that shaped me. What’s made the biggest difference in my career hasn’t been having all the answers, it’s been staying curious. Asking better questions. Getting obsessed with a problem and following it all the way down.

Curiosity makes you teachable. It invites creativity. It helps you see patterns that others miss. And in a world that changes as quickly as ours, staying curious is often the only way to stay relevant.

Growth often looks like a step sideways before it moves forward.
Some of my most important growth moments came not from promotions, but from reinventions — lateral moves, bold leaps, or what looked from the outside like steps “back.” But those moves gave me space to rebuild, reimagine, and realign.

It’s easy to view career success as a ladder. But I’ve come to think of it more as a jungle gym — full of swings, stretches, and unexpected climbs. When you stop measuring success only by upward movement, you create space for something more expansive: a career built on alignment, not just achievement.

Reinvention is not failure. It’s capacity.
Too often we see career pivots as a sign that someone is lost or indecisive. But what if we reframed reinvention as a sign of capacity, the ability to stretch, evolve, and carry forward what you’ve learned into something new?

I didn’t always have the language for it, but I now know that one of my core skills is pattern recognition. I connect dots others don’t yet see. And more importantly I act on them. I find what works in one space and apply it to a completely different one. That’s how I’ve built clinical operations from scratch, built products from insight instead of theory, and navigated some of the most complex, high-stakes moments in my career.

Authenticity has been a quiet force behind all of it. Not the performative kind, but the kind rooted in knowing who you are, what you value, and what you're willing to experiment with. When you build from that place, you stop trying to fit in and start building things that actually stand out.

I don’t have a “traditional” resume. But I have a deeply lived one. One that’s been shaped by reinvention, grounded in purpose, and made richer by every chapter, even the hard ones.

If you're in a season of change or questioning whether your winding path is leading anywhere at all I hope this reminds you: You’re not behind. You’re building range. You’re collecting patterns. And one day, they’ll snap into place in a way that makes complete sense even if it doesn’t yet.

Keep going.

Coming Soon
If this resonated with you, I’ve written two short, powerful e-books to help you navigate change, grow through discomfort, and move forward with more clarity:

📘 The Grit & Growth Blueprint
A 17-page guide to overcoming setbacks and building inner momentum. It includes my personal GROW framework, daily practices, and stories from the entrepreneurial trenches — for anyone looking to turn challenge into capacity.

📘 It’s Not About You
A reframing toolkit for anyone struggling with criticism, self-doubt, or emotional burnout. Built around real-life stories, this book explores how not taking things personally can transform your leadership, your relationships, and your confidence.

If you're navigating uncertainty or reimagining what’s next, these books are for you.

Launching soon