Before the Title

When people look at my career today, they often see the highlights.

They see the executive roles, the coaching work, the consulting business, the workshops, and the years spent helping leaders and teams grow.

What they don’t always see are the experiences that came before all of that.

I have been working since I was 13 years old. Not because I had a carefully crafted career plan, but because I wanted to earn my own money. My parents worked incredibly hard and made sure my brother and I had everything we needed. We weren’t deprived, but we also weren’t spoiled. If I wanted the latest clothes, sports equipment, music lessons, or other opportunities beyond the essentials, I was expected to help make them happen. Looking back, that was one of the greatest gifts my parents gave me. It taught me responsibility, independence, and the satisfaction that comes from working toward something you value. Long before I thought about a profession or a title, work had already become part of who I was.

At 18, I was driving a forklift through a lumber yard and talking with contractors who had forgotten more about construction than I knew. I was often the youngest person around and certainly not who people expected to see climbing off a forklift.

After college graduation, I had a short stint as a bridal consultant before heading to Alaska to work on the “slime line” at a fishery on the Bering Sea. Imagine trying to explain the transition from “Bridal Consultant” to “Fish Slimer” in an interview. Somehow, I turned that experience into a career in commercial real estate sales and property management before eventually finding my way into healthcare administration, where I spent most of the next three decades.

For years, I saw those jobs as disconnected stops along the way. My career path wasn’t exactly a straight line. Unless there is a well-established leadership pipeline that starts with forklifts, bridal gowns, and fish processing in Alaska. But each one left its mark and shaped who I am. Each one contributed to the impact I hope to have today.

The lumber yard taught me the value of hard work. Not the kind of hard work that gets posted on social media. The real kind that requires showing up, doing your part, and learning from those with more experience than you.

The fishery in Alaska taught me resilience. The work was demanding and the conditions weren’t glamorous. There were moments standing on that slime line when I questioned every decision that had brought me there. It wasn’t where I expected a college graduate to land, but it taught me more about grit than any classroom ever could.

Commercial real estate taught me the importance of relationships. Success wasn’t just about transactions. It was about trust, listening, and understanding what mattered to people. It taught me helping people solve problems wasn’t just good for them, but it was good for me too.

Healthcare taught me service. Over the course of thirty years, I had the privilege of working alongside extraordinary people who dedicated their lives to caring for others. It reinforced something I continue to believe today: the work we do matters most when it positively impacts the lives of others.

At the time, none of these experiences seemed connected. But looking back, I can see that each one was preparing me in ways I didn’t yet understand.

Over the years, I have worked with contractors, fishermen, physicians, executives, frontline employees, board members, volunteers, and entrepreneurs. The settings were different and the challenges certainly were too, but the people were remarkably similar. Most people want to contribute. They want to be respected. They want to feel valued and know that what they do matters.

Some of the experiences that shaped me most weren’t jobs at all. They were the responsibilities, challenges, and hardships that arrived without an invitation.

Over the years, I became the person family members called when life got hard. Caring for my parents, as many people do, was challenging. But no one could have prepared me for the joy, the heartbreak, and everything in between that came with walking alongside my older brother after he was diagnosed with an aggressive form of MS at just 30 years old. Walking through the loss of people I loved, navigating my own cancer, and surviving a life-threatening illness that left me in an ICU bed wondering what came next changed my perspective in ways no professional accomplishment ever could.

Some lessons simply can’t be learned in a classroom, workshop, or leadership book. These experiences taught me empathy and what it means to be grateful. Having experiences like these reminded me that every person I encounter is carrying a story I may know nothing about.

One of the great gifts of getting older is perspective. When you’re living through an experience, it often feels random or disconnected. Sometimes even unfair. It’s only later that you begin to see how the pieces fit together.

The difficult boss who taught you resilience. An unexpected job that opened a new door. Sometimes it’s the setback that forced you to grow. Then there’s the challenge that revealed strengths you didn’t know you had. It might even be the experience you never would have chosen that ultimately changed the direction of your life. The dots rarely connect looking forward, but they often make perfect sense looking back.

The title, position, or job may be what people see, but it is rarely where the story begins. The real story is found in everything that came before it. The jobs no one remembers. The challenges you didn’t choose. The people who shaped you. The lessons you learned along the way.

Looking back, I don’t believe any of those experiences were wasted. Every one of them contributed to the impact I have today. And perhaps that’s the lesson: we don’t build meaningful lives through a single role, title, or accomplishment. We build them one experience at a time.