Client Intake — Client Brain

Step 1 of 5

About You

Your background, credentials, and what led you to do what you do.

Full name

Credentials or titleDegrees, certifications, professional titles

Business name

LocationCity, State/Country

Website

Tell us about yourselfYour background, experience, what led you to do what you do. Write naturally — we'll use this to understand your voice.

I spent the first decade of my career watching organizations reward the wrong signals. I did two years at McKinsey out of Stanford — useful training, particularly in how to structure a problem — then eight years as VP of People Strategy at a B2B SaaS company that went from Series C to IPO. I built the org design, ran the executive development programs, owned the succession planning process. I was told for 18 months I was on track for SVP. They hired externally without telling me until the Slack announcement went out. That was the moment I stopped studying what organizations said they rewarded and started studying what they actually rewarded. Two years as Chief People Officer at a mid-stage fintech. Independent practice since 2022. My PhD work focused on the performance dynamics of high-status groups — specifically how organizations signal legitimacy and how individual actors misread those signals in ways that are structurally predictable and personally costly. That research is the foundation of everything I teach. My book, The Quiet Authority, was published by HarperBusiness in 2024. WSJ bestseller, week one. The practice is called Quiet Authority.