firsthand Health Inc Career Growth & Development

What new skill or role did you want to learn? Why was this important to you?
As a former nurse who had spent years in clinical tech/ops, I was eager to grow into a product role. While I had deep experience implementing and supporting tools for clinicians, I wanted to move upstream — to shape the tools themselves. I saw firsthand how much impact thoughtful product design could have on clinician workflow and patient care, and I wanted to be the one making those decisions. Transitioning into product meant learning how to lead cross-functional teams, define user needs and prioritize features — not just from a clinical lens but from a strategic and operational one. It was important to me to make a broader impact and ensure the tools we built truly served those on the front lines.

How did your employer help support this time of learning and professional development?
As I transitioned to the tech team, my manager played a key role in supporting my growth. He worked closely with me to explore what aspects of the product team I was most drawn to and helped map out a clear development path. Together, we identified my existing strengths, the gaps I needed to fill and concrete goals to work toward. Since my background was atypical for a new product manager, we had to spend time thoughtfully connecting my experience to the demands of the role. Additionally, the company brought in an experienced product consultant to coach me and my product counterpart. We met weekly, and those sessions were invaluable — they provided practical frameworks, feedback on real work and helped accelerate my understanding of product strategy and execution.

What was the outcome of this experience? How did it impact your future growth in your profession?
I’m not sure I would have ended up in the product team at all without this support, but it turned out to be the best fit I’ve found after a career full of transitions. The guidance I received helped me not only grow into the role but also gain clarity and confidence in my path forward. Just as importantly, the experience gave me a lasting sense of what a supportive, growth-oriented culture looks like. Knowing that I was in an environment that invested in both the team and the individual made all the difference. While I’m still early in my product journey, I now have the foundation I need to continue growing and making a meaningful impact.

What makes promotion criteria feel fair and clear — and what evidence supports that?

At firsthand, we have a promotion committee that regularly meets and calibrates to ensure we are rewarding high performance. Managers present a rubric of performance to the committee, which includes members of our leadership team. Then, when we celebrate promotions widely, we explain what contributed to the decision. Team members at all levels at firsthand can see what they need to do and celebrate others, knowing that their promotions are well-deserved and fairly won.

Promotion criteria is most impactful when team members clearly know what it is and can directly see the business impact. When goals for promotion are clearly laid out and aligned with what our firsthand business is trying to do, it is more motivating, empowering and easy for team members to hop on board. 

In some places where I’ve worked, promotion criteria, if laid out at all, felt like a lot of hoops to jump through. Meeting the expectations didn’t actually impact my work product or quality but felt like boxes to check that were only examined during the review cycle.

Which program changed your capability — with what measurable result?

At firsthand, our business is all about interaction. Our team members are an extra layer of support for individuals who traditionally feel disconnected with the healthcare system. Since so much of our work revolves around conversation, we knew that we had to develop a program that helped team members dive in quickly and understand what quality looks like but still feel empowered to adjust their practice based on the individual need. 

We spent a lot of time with successful team members and leaders, observing and naming the skills and qualities that made them successful. Then, we incorporated that knowledge into a robust onboarding program, complete with detailed rubrics and rigorous assessments that get team members practicing early and often. We wanted to make sure that new team members could learn from those that came before them, so they could level firsthand up even faster. This updated onboarding has led to some of our most successful new market launches and encouraged team members to truly stop and reflect on their own skills.

What coaching habit consistently moves careers forward?

While the first thing that comes to mind is always feedback, I think that some of the most impactful feedback I’ve seen is when mentors, supervisors or peers help someone zoom out and consider the bigger picture. Oftentimes, we get really focused on our own metrics, performance and perception. We can stop thinking about how our actions impact the greater team and business. 

When individual contributors are directly asked to consider a situation from a different lens, they can be pushed into a type of growth that asks them to move beyond their own performance and create value for the team as a whole. Careers move forward when people become invaluable members of a team, the type of person who everyone would want to work with again.