Is taking a career detour the same as failure? Our guest today certainly doesn’t think so.

Lena is a physician-turned-marketer with over 20 years of leadership experience across startups and established health-tech companies. She has a proven track record of scaling successful brands and defining new categories that set disruptive companies apart from the healthcare status quo. She’s currently the co-founder of Best Friend Jack, a boutique marketing and branding agency serving health-tech companies.

Lena’s transition from clinical medicine to marketing serves as the backdrop for a bold career, one that has allowed her to serve healthcare in a much bigger way than one patient at a time. In this conversation, she talks about how she decided to make this shift, what she thinks are still challenges for women in leadership, and how she got involved in investing in women-led businesses herself.

Throughout her career, Courtney Tate has often had to deal with being the “only” in the room, but that has never stopped her. She is a proven healthcare leader with more than 20 years experience in the diagnostic laboratory industry. Following completion of the Masters in Genetic Counseling Program at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine, Courtney initially accepted a clinical based genetic counseling position but quickly stepped out of the traditional 'box', and took a new role in sales with Myriad Genetics, becoming one of the first genetic counselors to work in an industry setting. Later, Courtney continued to expand the box, pursuing an MBA from the Executive MBA program at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Courtney's functional roles have included Sales, Medical Affairs/Clinical Specialist, Marketing and Managed Care/Payor Access. For those who may be familiar with the series, "Scandal", Courtney is often thought of as the "Olivia Pope" within organizations because of her ability to assess a situation, understand the contributing factors, work cross-functionally to develop solutions, and execute and produce results.

In this interview, we dive into how this Diagnostic Guru made the jump from Clinical Genetic Counseling to Sales to Marketing, the “good and bad” of her experiences in leadership roles, and what advice she has for the next generation of women in science. Courtney leaves us with her superpower, a unique skill that is a lot harder than it sounds.