You want a career with greater meaning and impactÂ
I can help you get there. As the Founder of Career Narratives, it’s been my mission to help MBAs craft, share and advance their personal narratives so they can advance to and thrive in senior leadership roles.
Many of the people I work with are in consumer products, financial services, healthcare or tech. And they all aspire to make the world a better place through their work.
Work with Doug >I was drawn to coaching MBAs early in my careerÂ
When I was working my way up from marketing manager to executive director at Neutrogena (that’s Johnson & Johnson, now Kenvue), I knew leading MBA recruiting was the right fit for me.
Recruiting at J&J was a chance to get out of the office, meet new people, and be a part of helping them move ahead in life. I also counseled junior employees and offered perspective as they navigated the early stages of their careers. Some of my colleagues thought this was a burden. I thought it was a privilege.
Being a good coach was part of my role as a recruiter
It’s a long story, but after graduating from Yale, working for non-profits in New York City, getting an MBA from Wharton, and then spending 10 years as a marketer and hiring manager in consumer products and healthcare, I ultimately landed in a top executive search firm.
Being an executive recruiter provided an opportunity to meet interesting, accomplished people, take a deep dive into their personal narratives, and help them achieve their most aspirational career and life goals. Again, it was a privilege.
Facilitating positive change for people and society is core to my personal values
The executive search firm I joined — Isaacson, Miller — exclusively serves mission-driven organizations. Not only was I helping individual people and their families, but I was also helping to support positive change in the world through the firm’s clients.Â
I felt I had the most impact when I was helping candidates decide whether or not an opportunity was the right one for them. There were so many important considerations. What types of challenges, activities and culture were the best fit? Would the new role make sense in the overall trajectory of their career? Would the role’s requirements be compatible with the obligations they already had or anticipated they'd have in their personal lives?Â
Given that I was typically working with senior leaders, I also helped the candidates in my searches evaluate a role as a means of creating a legacy that would help fulfill their personal aspirations and goals.Â
I loved these conversations. And I was gratified to facilitate them. Now, conversations like these are the focus of my work.
Work with Doug >AÂ shelter dog named Annie...
In 2004, my husband and I adopted a dog from Georgia named Annie. The Friends of Plymouth Pound had rescued her from a high-kill shelter after she was found on the side of the road an hour south of Atlanta.Â
After welcoming Annie into our home, we started visiting the then unofficial dog run in the South End of Boston's Peters Park. Given my background in development for non-profits, I ended up being one of the co-founders of Boston's first legal dog park, and I led a $360K capital campaign to build it.Â
Through that work and my early morning visits to the dog park, I got to know a member of the Career & Professional Development staff at the Harvard Business School. I frequently heard my new friend talk about her work as a coach to the students at the School. She talked about helping them find meaning in their work and lives, network effectively, present well in interviews and everything else a coach to ambitious MBAs might do. It sounded like everything I had enjoyed about working with MBAs at J&J and senior leaders as an executive recruiter.
...was my connection to working as a coach to MBAs
One thing led to another, and I was introduced to the inspiring people who run the coaching program at Harvard Business School. I started coaching students in 2009 and alumni not too long after that. And I've been working an a career and executive coach with MBAs and MBA alumni ever since.
As soon as I started working at HBS, I realized that coaching was the right job for me. It was everything I had naturally gravitated to throughout my career. And all of a sudden, I was getting paid to have deep, interesting conversations with smart, ambitious people. What could be better?
Work With Doug >Through Career Narratives, I work one-on-one with MBAs and ambitious professionals looking to craft, share and advance personal narratives aligned with their interests, values and aspirations.
Â
I've also designed and lead the executive coaching program for the corporate strategy group of a Fortune 100 company in Boston.
And when I’m not helping MBAs advance their careers...
I might be recording a podcast episode about communicating your personal narrative effectively or writing blog posts about self-assessment, networking, interviewing, leadership or personal productivity.
People who know me well know that I've:
- Performed with an orchestra twice as a piano concerto soloist when I was a kid (check out the clipping with me and my best friend from 1977)
- Worked as an eighth-grade school teacher in St. Petersburg, Russia just as the Soviet Union was dissolving
- Spent a summer traveling around Siberia for Estée Lauder, really
- Moved across the country twice as a trailing spouse (I’m married to a physician — other people married to doctors know what I'm talking about)
- Set ridiculously high standards for myself when entertaining, but I've gotten more realistic about this one lately
- Spend far too much time listening to podcasts about politics, pop culture and productivity — the three Ps, right?
That's probably enough about me! I'm interested in learning more about you and your personal narrative.
Work with Doug >
