Tiffany Steen

I attribute much of my success to a combination of curiosity, resilience, and a willingness to run toward difficult problems. Throughout my career, I have rarely stayed neatly inside the boundaries of my job description. I ask questions. I want to understand how the business works, how the technology works, what the customer actually needs, why something isn’t working, and what could be possible instead. That curiosity has allowed me to move across functions and industries within healthcare and connect dots that might otherwise remain disconnected. I also believe success comes from being willing to reinvent yourself. There have been moments in my career when the safest choice would have been to stay exactly where I was. Some of the most important decisions I have made came from recognizing that being successful at something does not mean you are obligated to keep doing it forever. I have learned to define success less by title and more by impact and whether I am doing work that matters.

Some of the best advice I have received is don't wait until you feel completely ready. Women, in particular, can become incredibly good at preparing. We earn another credential, gain another year of experience, perfect another presentation, or wait for someone else to validate that we are qualified for the opportunity in front of us. But many of the biggest opportunities in my career required me to step into something I had never done before. I have learned that readiness often comes after you say yes. You do not need to know everything. You need to know enough to begin, have the humility to keep learning, and trust your ability to figure out what comes next. That mindset ultimately became important when I started my own company as well. There will never be a moment when every variable is known and every risk disappears. At some point, you have to bet on yourself!

I encourage young women entering the healthcare industry to be clear about their values and stay true to them in how they show up at work, especially as their responsibilities and influence grow. Build a reputation for being someone who is thoughtful, dependable, curious, and willing to take on difficult problems. Technical knowledge and industry expertise matter, but so do judgment, relationships, and the ability to communicate clearly and bring people with you. Surround yourself with great mentors and sponsors, both women and men, who will challenge you, advocate for you, and open doors you may not yet know exist. And be intentional about building those relationships throughout your career, not only when you need something. I would also encourage women not to wait until they feel completely ready before pursuing an opportunity. Some of the most meaningful growth in my career came from stepping into roles where I still had things to learn. Confidence often comes after you take the leap, not before. Finally, learn the business beyond the boundaries of your own role. The more you understand how strategy, operations, finance, technology, customers, and people connect, the more valuable your perspective becomes. Your career does not have to follow a perfectly linear path as every experience can become part of the toolkit you bring to the next opportunity.

I believe artificial intelligence represents both the biggest opportunity and one of the biggest challenges facing healthcare today. The technology is advancing incredibly quickly, creating opportunities to rethink how healthcare organizations operate, how clinicians and administrative teams spend their time, how patients interact with the healthcare system, and how new products and services are developed. We are moving beyond using technology simply to automate individual tasks toward the possibility of redesigning entire workflows and operating models around AI. The challenge is turning that potential into meaningful, measurable impact. Healthcare is an extraordinarily complex industry, with fragmented technology, legacy systems, regulatory requirements, sensitive data, and workflows that have often been built over decades. Organizations can easily end up with dozens of AI pilots or point solutions without fundamentally changing how the business operates. I believe the organizations that will lead the next era of healthcare will be those that move beyond asking, “Where can we add AI?” and instead ask, “If we were designing this business, product, or workflow today with the technology now available to us, how would we build it differently?” That requires more than technology. It requires strong leadership, thoughtful governance, cross-functional collaboration, new operating models, and the ability to connect innovation to measurable business and patient outcomes. That intersection between what technology makes possible and what healthcare organizations can actually implement is where I see one of the greatest opportunities in the industry today.

The values that matter most to me are integrity, curiosity, courage, kindness, and impact. Integrity is foundational. I believe trust is built by being honest, following through on commitments, and being willing to say what you truly believe, even when it is not the easiest answer. Curiosity has shaped much of my career. I am always asking questions, trying to understand how things work, and looking for better ways to solve problems. I never want experience to become a reason to stop learning. Courage has also become increasingly important to me. Some of the most meaningful decisions in both my career and personal life have required stepping into uncertainty, taking a risk, or choosing a path that was not the most obvious one. Kindness matters because success means very little if it comes at the expense of how you treat people. I believe you can be ambitious, direct, and results-oriented while still leading with empathy and respect. And finally, impact. I want the work I do to matter. Professionally, that means helping organizations and leaders create meaningful change. Personally, it means investing in the people and relationships that matter most and building a life that feels meaningful, not just successful on paper.