Being the proverbial new kid at work is a great equalizer. Whether someone is managing a massive team or joining as an independent contributor, they must survive first-day jitters, learning new systems and the risk of making rookie mistakes. The experience is humbling and exciting all at once.
The upside is that new hires bring a fresh perspective to their teams and help generate new ideas. They may offer novel strategies to tackle old problems, or have a skill set that fills out a previously vexing knowledge gap. For new hires, every hurdle is an opportunity.
Built In touched base with recently hired leaders who are overcoming these new-kid challenges and building momentum toward big goals. Without further ado, meet the freshest local leaders on the scene — and maybe join their teams, because they are also hiring.
Sketchy is an online digital learning platform.
Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I’m the chief product officer at Sketchy, where I lead product and design for the company. Over the last 20 years, I’ve been lucky to have been part of the journey and growth stories of some amazing companies.
My career started at Microsoft where, right out of college, I got a chance to build products that were used by hundreds of millions of people every day such as the Xbox 360 console, Hotmail and Windows 10.
After Microsoft, I helped make communities safer through my work on police body cameras at Axon. I joined Russell Wilson, the Seattle Seahawks quarterback, at his startup TraceMe to build a new kind of social network to bring celebrities and artists closer to their fans. Our work at TraceMe got on the radar of Nike, and we became one of only 10 startups they’ve acquired in their more than 50-year history. Following the acquisition, I led product for the workout experience in Nike Run Club and Nike Training Club.
When the chance to join Sketchy presented itself, I couldn’t have asked for a more ideal opportunity. A mission-driven company, amazing team and product adored by its customers: What else could a product nerd like myself ask for?
What’s your first order of business in your new role? What are you excited to work on?
We’ve historically focused on medical students and have helped more than 300,000 of them become doctors. This past summer, we brought the Sketchy method to students through new physician’s assistant, pharmacy and medical college admissions test programs. I want to keep building upon this momentum and widening our aperture to help more students across a wider variety of subjects.
What I’m most excited about is building more visual learning experiences that bring students together in real-time and community-driven ways. I want to push past the boundaries of how students experience and expect visual learning to be so we can continue to fundamentally transform how they learn. We have so many exciting things in the hopper, we can’t wait to show you what’s next!
What I’m most excited about is building more visual learning experiences that bring students together in real-time and community-driven ways.”
Medely is a digital marketplace for health-related jobs.
Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I am thrilled to be joining Medely as their SVP of small and medium-sized business sales and account management. The mission of Medely is simple but also critical in the world of healthcare staffing: to create a more transparent and cost-effective staffing marketplace for healthcare companies, while empowering healthcare professionals with more flexibility and employment options. Along with Medely’s founding team and amazing employees, I am incredibly excited to take part in this mission and to reshape the industry!
I believe strongly in running an organization that lives and breathes transparency, growth and accountability.”
How would you describe your leadership style, and how do you hope to apply this in your new role?
I believe strongly in running an organization that lives and breathes transparency, growth and accountability. Transparency is sharing the “why” behind what you do, which oftentimes can be even more impactful than the “what.”
Growth for me is about personal growth, as well as growth of individuals on the team. Learning never stops. Recognizing this and listening to the perspectives of others is an important way that I grow. For my team, I see the role of a leader as someone who doesn’t tell others how or when to grow, but lets individuals determine their next step and then provides amazing coaching on how to get from point A to point B in one’s career. And finally, as leaders, we should provide our teams the coaching, resources and environment to be wildly successful. But we should also allow people to be empowered and accountable for creating amazing outcomes.
I am excited to see how we can accelerate the adoption of Medely with more facilities. The team has done fantastic work to bring Medely to more than 50 markets and I’d love to see us expand with scalable processes and creative initiatives. I’m also excited to explore how we can provide even resources and products to the market.
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