Her Story
About Bridget
My career journey has been quite diverse, spanning over 20 years across education, healthcare, and travel industries. For many years, I didn't actually have a college education - I didn't go to college until much later in life. After getting passed up for promotions, I realized they wanted both hands-on experience and education, so I went back to school in 2010, starting with my associates degree. I literally just graduated this last year with my EdS degree, going full circle and all the way to the end of the line in terms of getting that education. Along the way, I've continued to grow through hands-on experience, raising my hand for projects that had nothing to do with my line of work just to extend myself. I spent 20-plus years in the education space leading field marketing teams, primarily working with early education and preschool. I've also been doing travel work on the side for the past 4 years. Currently, I'm coming up on my one-year anniversary at Allidate, the largest network of independent primary care practices. As an individual contributor, I wear many different hats - focusing on regional trade shows and conferences, hosting executive roundtables and dinners for 10 to 15 physicians to help our sales team have intimate conversations and convert them, stepping into digital marketing by running email campaigns and creating landing pages (which are very new to me), and analyzing competitors in the healthcare space. I love getting into the trenches to understand what's successful and what's not, and how I can bring my skills and experience to improve processes and make work flow easier and better.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Bridget
01What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Looking back on my younger self, I think when entering the market, it's really important that you have hands-on experience, but also the education. For many years, I was kind of stalled in my progress because I just had the hands-on. I noticed that with getting an education, with every degree, I was able to increase my salary and increase my own internal confidence and competence. Hands-on can only get you so much, so when you have both, it definitely helps to increase your own confidence as you're moving forward. I think also just the patience and the grace with ourselves - not getting nervous, having that patience and the grace to say it's okay, everything is going to come in due time. I think women think that we have to have it all figured out - we're moms, we're sisters, we're daughters, we've got to have it all figured out - and you know what? You don't. It's gonna come.
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