Her Story
About Clare
Clare Healy serves as Chief of Staff at empire (stylized lowercase), a principles-based company working to ensure artificial intelligence does not eat democracy by embedding pro-democracy principles into AI systems. In this role, she supports the founder and CEO in operationalizing strategic vision across business functions including partner development, finance, and strategy for climate action and other social impact organizations. Her path to this position began with an undergraduate degree in leadership and management and business communications from the University of St. Thomas Opus College of Business in 2015. She spent six years at Partners in Food Solutions, an international development NGO partnering with corporate food companies on skills-based volunteering in Africa, followed by several years at Angaza, a for-profit social enterprise providing financing for life-changing technologies in emerging markets. After a challenging year of job searching while pregnant, she joined empire. Key milestones include becoming a certified Salesforce administrator, which opened doors to technology, and completing the Global Social Impact Fellowship Program through the Moving Worlds Institute, which deepened her expertise in human-centered design and social enterprise. Clare credits her success to meaningful relationships with mentors and peers, a learner's mindset marked by curiosity and willingness to experiment and learn from failure, and a guiding value that with great privilege comes great responsibility to use her talents to advance business as a force for good.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Clare
01What do you attribute your success to?
Relationships are so important to me and have been such a large contributor to where I am now. My network, the people who've supported me, my mentors, and peers in my fellowship program and in all the organizations I've worked in have taught me so much and really helped me grow. Having a learner's mindset is invaluable, especially in this age of AI where things are changing so rapidly. Curiosity and interest in experimenting, not being afraid to fail and learn from that failure, and being tenacious in achieving my career goals has really helped me recover from things that haven't worked.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
Embrace the unexpected zigzags of a career. Lateral moves and opportunities that you wouldn't have necessarily sought out can often be the best opportunities. My Salesforce certification is a perfect example - I was reticent to take it on but it opened the door to technology and I can trace a direct path from that to where I am now.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
Working at the intersection of AI and social impact comes with all the layered challenges AI currently faces. AI is a new technology emerging and developing so quickly -people are righly skeptical about environmental impact, AI safety, and regulation. But AI hasn't just "arrived" in it's final form; every interaction with Claude or ChatGPT shapes how the technology evolves and there is no better opportunity to participate in how it grows and develops. Focusing on extending human capability and judgement, embedding principles and ethics, and crafting it as an evolving technology will ensure the technology grows to extend human ability, rather than replace it.
04What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
With great power comes great responsibility. With great privilege comes great responsibility. I had the opportunity to get an education at an amazing school and a network in the Twin Cities, so if I'm going to be working a third of my life, it should be something that does some good in the world for humanity. I am highly competent with high emotional intelligence, so my career success should advance the good of humanity.
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