Her Story
About Laura
My career journey has taken me from management consulting, where I worked on strategy and operations for Fortune 100 companies, to the world of venture capital and startups. I found myself wanting to work at the inverse - helping small companies with big problems rather than working on small problems for huge companies. In consulting, I helped underrepresented founders with storytelling workshops and preparing for investment and go-to-market strategy. This passion led me to VC, where I had the opportunity to support multiple portfolio companies across cybersecurity, vertical AI, fintech, and supply chain, helping with go-to-market strategy, operations, business development, and partnerships. I got to experience both the investor perspective and what it's like to have skin in the game within a startup. After a stint at a health tech fintech startup working on strategy, operations, and partnerships, I found my way to Structify, where I'm now Chief of Staff at this 9-person early-stage company. What drew me here was experiencing firsthand the problem we're solving - empowering non-technical folks to have autonomy over gathering data and context within their organizations. I'm passionate about working with people who are super bright and have tunnel vision on what they want to do. My role allows me to get exposure across the entire company, juggling multiple functions from marketing to sales to product, translating strategic goals into tangible action across channels. I see myself as a sponge who learns very quickly and executes almost as fast, with strengths in relationship management, relationship building, and pattern recognition.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Laura
01What do you attribute your success to?
I have to remind myself that my parents were immigrants, and my father is a doctor. As a doctor, it's definitely a vocation, and I would see his relentless work ethic - being gone on the weekends and working late. He had such a strong work ethic that was ingrained in us, but he also made it very clear that it was something he loved to do, and that it was a vocation. He also taught us that we're allowed to be working in whatever it is that makes us happy. I grew up knowing that if there wasn't something out there that exactly matched what I wanted to do, there is space and opportunity to be creating it. That's where I am right now, in this space of learning. It's this love of learning that keeps me going and moving forward, and also being adamant to not conform to mediocrity, and wanting to always be 1% better each day.
02What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
I think the biggest challenges are standing out in a time where everyone essentially sounds the same. A lot of that is due to AI and the barriers being so low for people to be building and starting something, so there's an element of speed. We're seeing it across product marketing - the challenge is expressing what you're doing without sounding too generic, because if it applies to everyone, it applies to none. It also comes down to being remembered and getting in front of people when they're just being bombarded by so many messages. Even looking at go-to-market, it's very different than what it was before. What we're really leveraging right now is being in person, going to conferences, meeting people where they are, because what used to happen before with emails and outreach is reaching an all-time high of saturation - overflowed inboxes. It's really caused companies to have to look for their competitive edge and find their wedge to meet people faster and learn from their industry expertise.
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