When I started my first role in Human Resources as an Office Assistant, I couldn’t have predicted that I’d still be in this field over a decade later. If you asked me what my career aspirations were back then, I might have told you I was destined to be a music producer and songwriter or maybe a vocal coach! While music remains a big part of my identity, my HR career unveiled a passion for empowering managers and executives to reach their full potential. Yet, being a younger HR professional and holding leaders accountable always presented a unique challenge I faced head-on.

At first, my instinct was to suppress my personality and create a bland version of myself for the workplace, thinking that would help me fit in better. That’s not what happened. Instead, I began to feel stifled and unsure of how to advocate for myself and the teams I supported. I had to shed the preconceived notions I felt that people had of me and do some intentional work to understand my values and what my long-term goals were. I quickly learned that by having an understanding of who I was, within and beyond the workplace, I grew in my strategic thinking, made decisions more efficiently, gained influence, and was able to lean into difficult conversations like never before!

here's my story