Ashley Kekula-Byrd, MSLD

I think my faith and my family has kept me grounded majority of my life and has made me become successful the way I am. I've crossed a lot of goals off my list, and I definitely attribute that to just having support from my family, my upbringing, my faith, and trying to remain true to what I believe in, and honoring God and everything. I go to God about everything to really just make sure that I'm aligned with what He wants me to do in my life, because I think that's really important. That's when I really realized what my purpose was, when it was aligning what I feel like God had for me to do. I really wouldn't have any of this if it wasn't for God, if it wasn't for my family's support, my husband's support, and just everything I want to do. My family knows I'm very ambitious when it comes to my career and personal life. If I say I'm going to do something, they know it's coming. And I come up with something to do about every year. it seems like, so having their support is very important. My success is really due to God's favor and my family's support at the end of the day.

I think the best career advice I've ever received is never settle. Hearing that early on was very helpful because it's easy sometimes to get complacent in a field or in a job, especially if you're doing a good job, you don't really have any issues, or you're okay with the pay. It's easy to get complacent, but there's so much more out here and there's so much more you can do. Hearing that early on has helped me keep going, to just kind of push myself a little more, even when something seems a little challenging. Even in my current role, finding opportunities for me to stretch myself a little bit more, like with public speaking and things like that. Never settling is important to me. So that was good advice because it's kind of pushed me every year to do a little bit more in my role.

Honestly, I would say it's not about you. No conversation you have will be about you, so don't take anything said to you to heart. A lot of times I have conversations, and when you're having conversations about the health field, it's hard because of the world that we live in right now. There is so much mistrust in that, and there's a lot of conversations where I get attacked for my view and things like that, but I have to remember that it's not about me. What I'm doing is educating so people can have a better understanding and so people can have positive experiences in the future. So what you're doing, it's not about you, so don't take anything to heart. Remember that you're truly here to serve. The healthcare world, whether it's public relations, whether it's nursing, whatever it is, it is a service field. You're there to serve, so let the ego go, let the pride go. It's not about that at all. You're there to serve, whether it be educating so they can have a better experience in the future, whether it's taking care of someone in that moment, whether I'm having a conversation with a donor family while they're grieving or with a transplant recipient and their family, about to receive that gift of life. It's never about me. So, remember it's not about you, remember to let go of your pride, let go of your ego, remember that you're there to serve. This is a position of service and stewardship.

One of the biggest opportunities in my field is the ability to expand access and engagement across diverse communities, particularly by leveraging hospitals and media platforms to improve outreach and education. At the same time, a key challenge is addressing existing mistrust, which can impact how effectively information is received and how services are utilized.

Work-life balance is important, for sure. It's not always been a priority of mine or something that I really valued, and I think just because I've always just kind of been a workaholic, but I have learned that it is really important, especially for my mental capacity. Mental health, I think, is important, and just not getting burnt out with work or anything really. Having a good work environment is super important to me. Being able to work with people who share missions and values, having that integrity in the workspace is really important to me because I feel like you're with your coworkers sometimes more than you are with your family. I don't want to feel like the people that I work with, I have to be on tippy toes or have to silence myself at work. I still want to be able to be my genuine self and allow you to be your genuine self, and we all kind of work in some harmony. I know it's not a perfect world and we may not all agree on everything every time, but we can be respectful with everything. My team is very small, we're a team of five, and we're always traveling together. You don't want bad travel buddies because that can ruin the whole trip! I love that my whole team really just gets along with each other. I value that because I travel a lot for work, so I would like to get along with everyone that I'm traveling with and not have to feel like I'm rushing home just to get away from you people.