Why did you decide to become a mentor?
I became a mentor largely because I recognized the underrepresentation of female product managers, especially in gaming. By mentoring, I hope to contribute to changing that landscape. Additionally, I never had a formal mentor when navigating my own career pivots and growth—an absence I felt acutely.
While there's plenty of advice on landing that first PM role, there's far less guidance on what to do, unique to your company and organizational culture after securing the role. Product frameworks only get you so far in the real world of stakeholder management, influencing without authority, and prioritization challenges. With product management being so competitive, I wanted to ensure that APMs and new PMs are equipped with the practical guidance I wish I'd had, helping them avoid unnecessary trial and error and maximizing their impact and value for customers.
How did you get your career start?
My journey began in HR consulting at Korn Ferry, where I spent three years developing storytelling and logical thinking skills, and presenting to executives, working on strategic workforce projects across diverse industries. Seeking technical expertise, I pursued graduate studies focusing on data analytics while teaching myself SQL.
With prior consulting experience, at Slalom, I transitioned into data & analytics consulting. I was involved in product-oriented projects, facilitating requirements gathering and development for compliance tools across 100+ digital properties, primarily serving media and entertainment clients. While consulting built excellent stakeholder skills, I wanted sustained impact rather than constantly moving between projects.
This led me to join BIGO LIVE shortly after their North American launch. As one of the first 45 employees, I naturally transitioned into product work, leading creator onboarding features, driving adoption, and measuring impact. These experiences demonstrated my ability to identify user pain points, implement solutions, and measure impact - core product management skills that facilitated my transition into formal product roles at Twitter and eventually Activision.
What do mentees usually come to you for?
I specialize in helping product managers develop critical skills across the product lifecycle: shipping features from concept to completion, creating measurable success metrics, and navigating cross-functional collaboration to avoid roadblocks.
My mentees typically face challenges such as how to structure their first 30/60/90 days in a PM role, creating early impact, conducting effective product discovery and prioritization with limited resources, developing sustainable customer feedback loops, and navigating the unique challenges of being one of the first PMs at a startup.
What sets my mentorship apart is my commitment to providing practical, unfiltered guidance - not just what you want to hear, but actionable feedback that drives growth. Having mentored multiple PMs, I understand early-career challenges from building confidence to influencing without authority.
What's been your favourite mentorship success story so far?
I mentored an early-career PM at a startup who had recently transitioned from a data analyst to product manager. This individual was navigating a pivotal career moment while experiencing burnout as a product manager at a startup.
Over a quarter, I helped them identify their unique strengths and improvement areas as a product manager, recommending approaches to deliver sustainable impact without burning out. We explored how to leverage their experience as a differentiator while building essential PM skills.
They successfully landed an AI product manager role in a challenging hiring market by strategically positioning their existing PM experience alongside their HR industry knowledge and network connections. This outcome was particularly rewarding as it represented not just a job change, but one that aligned with their strengths and interests.
What are you getting out of being a mentor?
Mentoring offers me valuable insights beyond my current role as a senior IC without direct reports. Mentoring helps me develop leadership and people management skills. It exposes me to diverse industries, products, and company sizes, providing fresh perspectives outside my gaming experience at Activision.
The reciprocal learning process keeps my product thinking sharp. Explaining concepts to others and customizing them for specific circumstances reinforces my own understanding, while mentees' questions often challenge my assumptions and expand my thinking. This continuous exchange helps me grow alongside those I mentor.
Additionally, mentoring has increased my empathy toward other professionals, improving cross-functional collaboration. I believe that effective mentorship creates a virtuous cycle that elevates the entire product community. By helping others navigate challenges I've faced, I'm not just advancing individual careers but contributing to raising the quality of product management as a practice.