Discover how to take calculated risks by understanding probability, severity, and the hidden costs of inaction. Learn a framework for managing failure, building resilience, and jumping knowingly instead of blindly.
Her Story
About Pearl
Pearl is an accomplished engineering and operations leader who has built a distinguished career at Dow, where she currently serves as a Turnaround Leader in Freeport, Texas. With a background in mechanical engineering and nearly two decades of experience in the chemical manufacturing industry, Pearl specializes in turnaround management, maintenance productivity, and operational excellence. Throughout her career, she has been recognized for her ability to lead complex projects, improve performance, and develop innovative solutions that enhance safety, efficiency, and return on investment across large-scale industrial operations.
Since joining Dow, Pearl has held a variety of leadership and technical roles spanning manufacturing, process improvement, maintenance, and project management. Her experience includes serving as a Manufacturing Representative on Dow’s solar startup initiative, leading planning and scheduling teams, managing dozens of annual turnarounds, and advancing to the company’s global Turnaround Technology Center. In that role, she worked with teams around the world to implement best practices, improve productivity, and foster collaboration across geographic and organizational boundaries. One of her most notable achievements was the creation of the Turnaround Excellence Academy, a global training program designed to connect professionals from multiple countries while strengthening technical expertise and leadership capabilities.
Beyond her operational accomplishments, Pearl is passionate about developing people and creating opportunities for future leaders. She is known for her influential leadership style, commitment to mentoring, and dedication to building transparent, repeatable processes that drive sustainable results. An active supporter of Dow’s Women’s Network, she works to encourage and advance women in engineering and industrial leadership roles. Through her focus on collaboration, continuous improvement, and talent development, Pearl continues to make a lasting impact on both her organization and the broader manufacturing community.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Pearl
01What do you attribute your success to?
I attribute my success to a combination of curiosity, a willingness to embrace new challenges, and the guidance of influential people who encouraged me to explore opportunities beyond my comfort zone. My career began in mechanical engineering and evolved through roles in production, process improvement, startup projects, and turnaround management, each of which taught me the value of continuous learning, adaptability, and innovation. I have consistently been willing to take on stretch assignments, including opportunities that initially felt intimidating, because I believe meaningful growth often comes from stepping into the unknown. Along the way, I learned the importance of collaboration, influential leadership, and creating environments where people can share knowledge and achieve success together. Much of my curiosity and openness to new experiences stems from my mother, who encouraged me to see the world from a broader perspective, while supportive mentors throughout my career reinforced the importance of asking questions, exploring ideas, and pursuing opportunities with confidence. Together, these influences shaped my commitment to lifelong learning, leadership, and helping others grow while continuously seeking new ways to create value and drive positive change.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
One of the most valuable pieces of career advice I received came through the mentorship of Marlon Bell, a respected leader in Dow’s supply chain technology organization. He taught me the importance of curiosity, critical thinking, and learning through experience by asking thoughtful questions rather than providing direct answers. His encouragement gave me the confidence to explore new opportunities, embrace challenges, and view setbacks as valuable learning experiences rather than failures. That experience shaped not only my approach to personal and professional growth but also my leadership philosophy. I believe effective leadership is built on trust, influence, and empowerment, and I strive to create environments where people feel respected, supported, and inspired to contribute their best work.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
My advice to young women entering this industry is to embrace opportunities that challenge you, even when you feel uncertain or not fully prepared. Some of the most meaningful growth in my career has come from stepping outside my comfort zone and taking on roles that initially felt intimidating. I have learned that waiting until you feel completely ready can sometimes mean missing valuable opportunities for development. I also believe it is important to surround yourself with people who believe in you and encourage your growth. Throughout my journey, the support of trusted individuals has given me the confidence to pursue opportunities that may have otherwise seemed out of reach. While technical expertise is essential, strong relationships, a willingness to take thoughtful risks, and a reliable support system are often the foundation of long-term personal and professional success.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
One of the biggest challenges in my field is managing the complexity and intensity of large-scale turnaround operations, where months or even years of planning must be executed successfully within a short, highly coordinated timeframe. These environments require strong technical expertise, effective communication, and the ability to collaborate across diverse teams, regions, and organizational functions while adapting quickly to changing conditions. At the same time, these challenges create significant opportunities to drive operational excellence, strengthen organizational culture, and foster greater collaboration through shared learning and best practices. I am particularly passionate about developing people and creating pathways for future leaders, especially in areas where greater diversity and inclusion can strengthen the industry. For me, one of the most rewarding opportunities is not only solving complex operational challenges but also helping others grow, succeed, and realize their full potential along the way.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
The values that are most important to me in both my work and personal life are kindness, encouragement, curiosity, and a willingness to embrace growth. I believe that taking thoughtful risks and viewing challenges as opportunities to learn has been essential to my personal and professional development. I also value experiences that broaden my perspective, whether through travel, learning from others, or pursuing creative interests such as quilting, which has been a meaningful part of my life since childhood. As a leader, I strive to create environments where people feel respected, supported, and empowered to succeed. Over the years, I have learned that small acts of kindness and genuine encouragement can have a profound impact, especially during difficult times. For me, true leadership is not defined solely by accomplishments or expertise, but by the ability to build trust, foster meaningful connections, and make a positive difference in the lives of others.
Her Content Hub
Articles by Pearl
I Don’t Jump Blindly. I Jump Knowingly
Understanding how to calculate, manage, and navigate risk with confidence and purpose.
Jumping Knowingly
I love taking risks. I find them fun, exciting, and fulfilling. And before you ask... yes, I find them scary too. But I don't let fear drive me. Instead, I let it become part of the risk analysis equation I use to balance my creative and analytical sides.
I don't jump blindly.
I jump knowingly.
The Framework
Here's how I came to think this way. Before I get into the stories that shaped me, it helps to start with the framework I use today.
We often talk about the cost of risk using a simple equation, measuring whether the risk itself is worth taking.
Risk = Probability × Severity
Let's apply that framework to a simple example:
I want to try skydiving.
Is it worth it?
Is the risk worth the potential consequences?
We tend to focus on the worst possible outcome rather than the most likely one. Different risks have different probabilities and different levels of severity. How do we decide which risks deserve the most attention? Are there multiple risks that need to be managed? If so, do they all require the same level of preparation?
Once we recognize that more than one risk may exist at a time, another important question emerges.
The Other Side of Risk
Every risk has another side.
What happens if I don't take it?
If I choose not to skydive, I'll probably remain perfectly healthy—and perhaps perfectly sensible, depending on your opinion of jumping out of a perfectly good airplane.
But there is another potential cost.
Regret.
A limit I've placed on myself.
Experiences I'll never have.
If I'm not aware of those hidden costs, they can quietly become ingrained as limiting beliefs or unconscious biases.
We rarely calculate the cost of not taking a risk.
Yet it's just as real.
Risk Tolerance
We all have different thresholds for risk.
Think of your risk tolerance as a waterline. The line between the water and the air represents the point above which you're willing to take a risk.
That line isn't fixed.
A bad experience may raise it, making the next risk feel harder to take. A positive experience may lower it, making future risks feel more manageable—or even encouraging you to take bigger ones.
If my first skydive had gone badly, how likely would I have been to jump again?
The risk of skydiving wouldn't have changed.
My willingness to accept that risk probably would have.
Understanding that threshold matters because it helps us understand both ourselves and others. Someone else's tolerance for risk may look very different from our own, and even our own threshold shifts over time based on our experiences.
To understand why, we need to look more closely at what we call failure.
Managing Failure
One of the biggest risks we're really managing is failure: what happens if something goes wrong?
In skydiving, an obvious example is a parachute that doesn't fully deploy.
That risk has a low probability but high severity.
Parachute fails to fully deploy = Low Probability × High Severity
Mitigation
- A reserve parachute
- An automatic activation device (AAD) that deploys the reserve at a predetermined altitude
- Training to resolve parachute malfunctions or perform a cutaway if necessary
Notice what changes—and what doesn't.
The probability remains largely the same because preparation doesn't significantly reduce the likelihood of a malfunction.
The severity, however, decreases dramatically because you have backup systems and the knowledge to respond effectively.
Preparation doesn't eliminate risk.
It changes your relationship with it.
That's where theory became real for me.
For 27 jumps, everything went exactly as planned.
Then, on one jump, my parachute lines became twisted.
After a brief "Oh, shit" moment, I grabbed the risers, scissor-kicked my legs in the opposite direction of the twist, untangled the lines, and landed safely.
That single jump taught me more than the previous 27 combined.
I learned that I could handle it.
Failing Forward
I learned the same lesson outside of skydiving.
I still remember crying one afternoon after a manufacturing experiment failed.
My mentor walked over and asked what was wrong.
When I told him, he laughed.
I couldn't believe it—the audacity of him laughing.
Then he asked whether I'd learned anything I hadn't known before.
I immediately listed several things: one variable I hadn't considered because I thought it didn't matter, and another discovery I hadn't expected.
Then he asked a simple question.
Had I really failed?
If I kept repeating the exact same experiment without changing anything, then yes—that would be failure.
But if I changed the experiment based on what I'd learned, then it wasn't failure at all.
It was progress.
That's why the way we define failure shapes the way we approach risk.
To take more risks, we often need to redefine failure itself—not as defeat, but as learning faster, failing forward, or whatever mindset helps us keep moving.
A Little Help from Our Friends
Mindset isn't the only thing that helps us take risks.
Support matters too.
Whether someone is taking the leap alongside you or cheering from the sidelines, encouragement can have an outsized impact. It influences not only the risks we're willing to take but also how we navigate them and how we recover afterward.
My sister is one of the clearest examples of that support in my life.
She's one of my biggest champions—always encouraging me, pushing me, and believing in me when I struggle to believe in myself.
She gave me a sign that reads:
"If your dreams don't scare you, they're not big enough."
Whenever I begin to hesitate, I look at that sign and borrow a little of my sister's faith while I rebuild my own.
She may not understand every detail of the risk I'm taking.
But she understands me.
Sometimes, that's enough to tip the scale.
Jumping Knowingly
Risk will always involve uncertainty.
That's what makes it risk.
But when we understand the potential costs, recognize the cost of not trying, redefine failure as learning, and allow the right people to support us, risk becomes less about jumping blindly and more about jumping knowingly.
Sometimes, the risks that scare us the most are the very ones that teach us who we are, what we're capable of, and how far we're willing to grow.
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