Maegan Hicks

Building What Comes Next

I have built my career around a principle that has become increasingly important to me as my responsibilities have grown: leave the business, the process, and the people stronger than you found them.

Today, I am Director of Supply Chain for Flotek Industries' Energy Chemistry Technologies division, leading client fulfillment, procurement, inventory, and planning across domestic and international operations.

I didn't begin my career with a perfectly mapped path to executive leadership. Much of my growth came from being willing to step into complicated situations, learn the details, ask difficult questions, and take ownership of problems that did not always fit neatly within the boundaries of my role.

Earlier in my career, I became very good at solving problems.

If something was broken, I wanted to understand why. If a process wasn't working, I wanted to fix it. If there was a gap in ownership, I was willing to step into it.

That approach created opportunities for me, but eventually I realized something important: being the person who can fix everything is not the same thing as being a great leader.

The question I started asking changed from "How do I fix this?" to:

"Why does this keep happening, and what do we need to build so we don't have to keep fixing it?"

That shift fundamentally changed the way I lead.

From Problem-Solver to Organization Builder

As my responsibilities grew, my focus expanded from individual operational issues into process improvement, organizational design, succession planning, risk mitigation, audit readiness, executive communication, and cross-functional leadership.

There have been measurable results along the way.

My work has contributed to reducing approximately $4 million in outstanding inventory-related balances to less than $200,000, cutting rejected invoices by approximately 50%, improving inventory turns and accuracy, and strengthening processes and controls supporting audit readiness.

I am proud of those numbers.

But some of the accomplishments that mean the most to me aren't easily captured on a scorecard.

• They are the people who have grown into larger roles.
• The processes that no longer require constant intervention.
• The responsibilities I can confidently hand to someone else.
• The organization continuing to perform when I'm not in the room.

Earlier in my career, I sometimes viewed being needed as evidence that I was valuable. As I have grown as a leader, I have learned almost the opposite.

The measure of a leader is not how indispensable they make themselves, but how capable they make the organization around them.

That belief has changed the way I develop people. I don't want to simply tell someone what to do. I want them to understand why we're doing it, how their decision affects the broader business, and eventually how to make that decision confidently without me.

Ironically, one of the experiences that has challenged me to live that philosophy most fully happened outside the office.

Becoming a Mother

In October 2025, I became a mother.

Long before that, I believed strongly that women should not feel they have to choose between having a family and continuing to pursue ambitious careers.

One of the books that influenced me early in my career was Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In. I connected with the idea that women sometimes begin limiting their professional opportunities in anticipation of a family long before those limitations actually exist.

I didn't want to do that.

I wanted a family, but I also wanted a meaningful career. I believed I could be a good mother and continue growing professionally.

I still believe that.

But becoming a mother taught me something I couldn't have fully understood from the outside:

This is hard.

Before becoming a mother, I believed women could do both. Becoming a mother made me understand why so many women question whether they can.

There are days when I feel like I'm doing both well. There are others when giving more to one part of my life makes me wonder whether I'm giving enough to the other.

There are sleepless nights followed by important decisions the next morning. There are competing priorities and unavoidable tradeoffs. There are moments when professional responsibilities and motherhood don't fit neatly together, no matter how organized or driven you are.

And for the first time, I truly understand why talented, ambitious women sometimes reconsider their careers after becoming mothers.

That understanding hasn't made me think they should simply push through.

It has made me more empathetic.

It has also made my decision to continue pursuing my own career much more intentional.

I Still Want the Career

Becoming a mother didn't make my ambition disappear.

I still want the career.

What changed was my understanding of what pursuing that career can ask of a woman-and what good leadership can do to make that pursuit sustainable.

I don't believe the answer is telling women they can "have it all" if they simply work hard enough or manage their time better. Women are already working incredibly hard.

I think the better conversation is about creating organizations where high performance and humanity can coexist.

Motherhood has made me more intentional with my time. It has reinforced the importance of developing people instead of becoming indispensable to them. It has made me think more deeply about flexibility, accountability, organizational culture, and how we evaluate performance.

It has also forced me to live my own leadership philosophy.

When I stepped away for maternity leave, the organization I had helped build continued operating.

Earlier in my career, I might have interpreted that as evidence that I wasn't needed.

Today, I see it very differently.

That's what successful leadership is supposed to look like.

If everything falls apart the moment a leader leaves the room, we haven't built an organization. We've built dependency.

That lesson is influencing not only how I lead today, but the executive I hope to become.

The COO I Hope to Become

My long-term career aspiration is to become a Chief Operating Officer.

There is something particularly meaningful to me now about the fact that Lean In was written by a woman who served as COO of one of the world's most influential companies.

I originally read it as an ambitious woman thinking about the career she wanted.

Today, I understand its questions as a mother actively building that career.

And the experiences I'm having now are shaping not only whether I reach that COO seat, but what kind of leader I want to be when I get there.

• I want to build organizations where flexibility and accountability are not treated as opposing ideas.
• Where high standards remain high, but leaders understand that talented people move through different seasons of life.
• Where we evaluate people based on their contribution and results rather than confusing visibility with value.
• Where leaders develop successors rather than protecting their own indispensability.
• Where people are expected to perform, improve, and take ownership-but are also treated like human beings.
• And where becoming a mother does not automatically create an assumption that a woman has become less ambitious or less capable of leading.

If I eventually reach the COO seat, I hope I arrive there not despite the difficult experiences that shaped me along the way, but as a better executive because of them.

What I Hope My Daughter Sees

Becoming a mother has also changed how I think about what success looks like personally.

I don't want to prove that I can be an exceptional executive and exceptional mother every minute of every day.

I don't think that's a realistic standard for anyone.

Some days my career will require more of me. Some days my family will. Different seasons of life will require different choices.

I am learning that balance doesn't necessarily mean giving everything equal attention every day. Sometimes balance is something you can only recognize across a much longer period of time.

There is one person I particularly hope understands that someday: my daughter.

I don't need her to grow up believing her mother never struggled.

I would rather she know that I loved being her mother deeply, that I also cared about the work I was doing, and that sometimes pursuing both was difficult.

I want her to know there were days when I questioned myself.

What I don't want her to see is a mother who interpreted those difficult days as evidence that she needed to make herself smaller.

Becoming her mother never required me to stop becoming myself.

And if someday she finds herself pursuing something she loves while also building a family she loves, I hope my example gives her permission to believe she doesn't automatically have to choose between them.

Building What Comes Next

My career is still being written.

I still have things to learn. I will make mistakes. My leadership will continue evolving as my responsibilities increase and life changes around me.

But my understanding of influence has become much clearer.

• Influence isn't having the loudest voice in the room.
• It isn't being the person everyone depends on.
• And it isn't measured solely by title.

Influence is what remains stronger because you were there.

• A better process.
• A stronger organization.
• Someone who became a leader because you invested in them.
• A business that makes better decisions because you helped build the systems and people behind those decisions.
• And perhaps someday, a daughter who enters adulthood believing she doesn't have to make herself smaller to build a life that matters to her.

That is the kind of influence I hope to leave behind.