Most health professionals spend years building toward a role they're told is the destination. What happens when you get there and realise you're still evolving?

Kristen Hicks-Roof is a registered dietitian and PhD researcher who built a full academic career - tenure, grants, research agendas, and chose to leave it to lead human nutrition at the US National Pork Board, a role that didn't exist before she took it.

This conversation gets into what it's like to be a high performer navigating competitive dynamics, the identity reckoning that happens when your career and your motherhood collide on the same timeline, and what it actually looks like to take clinical skills into an industry most dietitians are taught to distrust. If you've ever felt like you outgrew a role you genuinely valued, or wondered whether the skills you built in practice could belong somewhere completely different, this one will sit with you.

• The fight to prove nutrition's value and why it follows you no matter what setting you're in
• What happens when your drive and the culture around you aren't well matched
• The identity shift from "mother scholar" to something with no established name
• How a 2am LinkedIn scroll during maternity leave became a career turning point
• What dietitians and clinicians misunderstand about working in the food industry

Chapters

• 00:00 Unexpected Career Paths
• 06:31 The Role of Nutrition Professionals
• 17:08 Academia and Career Transition
• 28:26 The Decision to Leave Academia
• 34:01 Navigating Tension in Academia
• 42:46 The Impact of Motherhood on Career
• 49:29 Role in Nutrition Research
• 59:12 Building Connections and Following Passions

Kristen Hicks-Roof PhD, RD is the Director of Human Nutrition at the US National Pork Board, where she oversees research investment and science communication across stakeholder groups from farmers to federal policymakers. A former associate professor with promotion and tenure, her academic research focused on integrating nutrition across healthcare teams and the lived experience of mother scholars in academia. She also hosts the Nutrition Connection podcast.

• LinkedIn: Kristen Hicks-Roof
• Podcast: Nutrition Connection

Wondering where your clinical skills could actually take you? The StreamAhead Assessment helps you map what you've built and where it could go next. 👉 Take the StreamAhead Assessment

Have you ever been in a role where your drive worked against you? Tell us about it. Find us on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Emily Kelly chose physical therapy because a torn ACL at 14 showed her what one-on-one care could do. She found her dream clinic, treated patients for an hour each, and loved the work. Then a new grad started questioning what she believed about pain, and the clinical identity she had spent years building started to come apart.

Emily is now a product manager at Prompt, a health tech company building software for rehabilitation providers in the US.

This conversation covers what it actually took to get from one to the other. A pay structure that punished the qualification it demanded. The emotional cost of being the clinician who takes everything home. A healthcare innovation conference that lit something up. And a series of deliberate, unglamorous decisions that most career transition stories skip over entirely. If you are a health professional who knows something needs to shift but cannot see the steps from where you are, this episode lays them out honestly.

We explore:

• What pain science does to a clinician's sense of who they are in the room
• The emotional cost of clinical empathy that no one talks about at university
• A pay structure that punishes the qualification it demands
• What hiring managers actually notice when a clinician interviews for a non-clinical role
• The unglamorous middle of moving from physical therapy to health tech product management

About Emily Kelly

Emily Kelly is a physical therapist and product manager at Prompt, a health tech company building practice management software for rehabilitation providers. Based in Denver, Colorado, she spent eight years in outpatient physical therapy before moving through customer success and leadership into product.

• LinkedIn: Emily Kelly
• Mentioned: Meredith Caston / The Non-Clinical PT, Lorimer Moseley (pain science researcher), Peter O'Sullivan, Adriaan Louw

Career Cliniq Resources

If this episode has you wondering where else your clinical expertise could take you, the StreamAhead Assessment maps your interests across eight healthcare work streams and shows you options you might not have considered yet.

Take StreamAhead HERE!

Connect with Ruth

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drruthvo/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drruthvo/

The boxes we're handed in healthcare are well-meaning. Your title, your scope, your place in the hierarchy - they exist for good reasons. But they can also become the edges of what you think is possible.

Melissa Gunstone is a Canadian Registered Kinesiologist who graduated, hit the wall most new grads hit, and built her way out of it - not by leaving healthcare, but by refusing to stay inside the box it handed her. What followed is a ground-level account of private practice niching, a team to lead, and a product invented because it didn't exist.

If you're a health professional navigating the gap between your training and what's actually possible - this conversation covers territory your degree never did.

We Explore

• The gap between your credential and what the world does with it
• Why your professional title can work against you
• What more schooling won't give you
• Operating on the periphery of the healthcare system
• Finding your real market by listening, not assuming
• The cost of building a team when you're the only one who cares as much as you do
• Whether your business success can open doors for others in your profession
• How entrepreneurship can arrive before you're ready for the word

About Melissa Gunstone

Melissa Gunstone is a registered kinesiologist based in Ontario, Canada. She is the founder of Home Stretch (in-home kinesiology for seniors) and creator of Sturdey Fall Prevention Tools. She also employs and mentors kinesiologists through her business - making career development as much a part of her mission as client care.

Connect with Melissa

Home Stretch - In-Home Kinesiology for Seniors: https://www.homestretch4seniors.ca

Sturdey Fall Prevention Tools: https://sturdey.com/collections/tools-to-stay-sturdy YouTube - The Fall Prevention Coach: https://youtube.com/@melissathefallpreventioncoach Melissa's marketing guy, Miles at Wondering Concierge: https://wonderingconcierge.com/

Career Cliniq Resources

Wondering which direction your healthcare career could take? The StreamAhead Assessment helps you identify which work streams align with your strengths right now.

👉 https://careercliniq.com/streamahead

What does it take to look at a broken system and decide you're going to fix it—one patient, one program, one bold ask at a time?

Dr. Katherine Sylvester is a physical therapist whose career has been shaped by a single question: what if we refused to accept that nothing more can be done? From watching her grandmother receive inadequate stroke care as a child, to building a minority mentorship program that's supported over 170 PT students, to founding Operation Mist—a maternal health monitoring program that puts data directly in women's hands—Kat's journey is about challenging the defaults that healthcare hands us.

In this conversation, we explore how she transformed hospital neuro care by simply asking for what patients needed, how scar massage became a gateway to postpartum recovery, and why she walked away from a job she loved to build something that aligned with both her clinical values and her life as a mum. This isn't a story about work-life balance. It's about building a career that serves the change you want to see, even when that means doing things no one else is doing yet.

If you've ever wondered what it looks like to turn professional frustration into meaningful change, this one's for you.

We Explore

• The courage to ask for what doesn't exist yet in your workplace—and why that single act can reshape your entire career trajectory

• Where do the resources and support for your next career move really come from?
• When you notice the gap between what the system allows and what patients actually need—and what that tension means for your career path
• Testing whether your idea has legs before you leave the security of your job
• The moment when loving your role isn't enough to keep you there anymore
• How one competition and $15,000 became permission to leap
• Building a practice that puts your knowledge in clients' hands instead of keeping them dependent on you
• The fear that thinking bigger means losing control of your life
• When you realise you're no longer building a job—you're building a movement

About

Dr. Katherine Sylvester is a physical therapist specialising in neurological rehabilitation and women's health. She founded Operation Mist, a maternal health monitoring program that uses wearable technology to catch postpartum complications before they become life-threatening. Kat also created a minority mentorship program that has supported over 170 physical therapy students through graduation, and teaches scar physiology and women's health to PT students and professionals across the United States. She maintains a private practice in Macon, Georgia, where she treats patients with neurological injuries and supports women through pregnancy and postpartum recovery.

Connect with Dr. Kat

• Website - Operation M.I.S.T - Mommy Monitor
• YouTube Video - How Mommy Monitor Works
• LinkedIn
• Instagram

Career Cliniq Resources

Ready to explore what's possible beyond your current clinical role? The StreamAhead Assessment helps health professionals identify which career pathways align with their interests and expertise right now. Sometimes the first step toward change is simply understanding what options exist.

Take the StreamAhead Assessment: https://careercliniq.com/streamahead

Connect with Ruth:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drruthvo/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drruthvo/

When someone says "you need to network," what's your gut reaction? If it's dread mixed with a side of ick, Kaylee Johnson gets it. She's an occupational therapist who's worked across clinical care, health tech, and leadership roles in the US, and we sat down to unpack what networking actually looks like when you're an introvert who'd rather do anything else. We also had some fun comparing Australian and US takes on networking.

This conversation cuts through the schmoozing stereotype to explore networking as something more human: leading with curiosity, asking questions because you genuinely want to know, and figuring out how you can help someone solve a problem. Kaylee shares how she flopped hard in early attempts but eventually landed roles through authentic connections and why LinkedIn doesn't have to feel like performing.

If you've been avoiding networking because it feels transactional, or you're job hunting but worried about word getting back to your current workplace, this episode offers practical reframes and the courage you'll need to step outside your healthcare bubble.

We Explore

• Why networking conversations feel transactional and how to reframe them
• The courage required to network outside your professional comfort zone
• Cultural differences in networking expectations between Australia and the US
• Strategic use of LinkedIn without the performance anxiety
• How to de-risk job search networking when you're worried about your current employer finding out
• How networking plays a role in preventing career and performance stagnation

About Kaylee Johnson

Kaylee Johnson is an Occupational Therapist with 15 years of experience across clinical practice, health tech, and leadership roles in the northeast United States. As a self-described introvert, Kaylee has navigated multiple career transitions and now brings insights about authentic networking, cross-functional collaboration, and career evolution for healthcare professionals who want to explore beyond traditional clinical pathways.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kaylee-m-johnson/

Career Cliniq Resources

If this conversation has you thinking about what else might be possible in your healthcare career, the StreamAhead Assessment can help you identify which work streams align with your current interests and strengths. Sometimes clarity starts with simply knowing what's out there.

Access the StreamAhead Assessment: https://careercliniq.com/streamahead

What's your biggest networking challenge right now? Drop me a message and let me know.

Connect with me:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drruthvo/

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drruthvo/

What You'll Learn From This Episode

Professional Identity & Purpose

• "Am I still a PT if I'm not practicing clinically?" - How Raji separates credentials from identity
• Redefining what impact looks like beyond direct patient care
• Why your clinical background is actually your competitive advantage in health tech

The Real Work of Career Transition

• Why your clinical resume won't work for non-clinical roles (and what to do instead)
• The exact LinkedIn strategies that opened doors for Raji
• How to handle rejection, pay cuts, and the humbling reality of starting over
• The networking approach that gets results without seeming desperate

Turning Challenges Into Fuel

• How Raji transformed workplace discrimination into career clarity
• Managing visa restrictions while building a new professional path
• Why COVID-19 became the catalyst she needed to make her move

Chapters

00:43 Raji Introduction01:34 Starting out & Transitioning into Product Management03:09 Journey from Clinical to Non-Clinical Roles05:49 Navigating Challenges in Healthcare08:43 The Impact of COVID-19 on Healthcare11:14 Building Leadership Skills in Outpatient Care14:11 Work-Life Balance and Career Growth16:34 The Importance of Networking and Mentorship19:10 Overcoming Rejection and Learning from Mistakes21:46 Defining Success Beyond Clinical Roles24:33 The Role of Curiosity in Professional Growth27:16 Finding Belonging in a New Professional Identity29:43 Embracing Change and New Opportunities32:14 The Future of Healthcare and Product ManagementKeywords

Product management, healthcare career transition, digital health, clinical leadership, strategic networking, health tech, work-life balance, professional growth, career evolution, physical therapy

Find Raji on LinkedIn:

Ready to Navigate Your Own Career Evolution?

If this conversation sparked something for you, you're not alone. Many healthcare professionals feel stuck or wonder what else might be possible beyond their current role.

Get Started with Career Cliniq:

• Visit Career Cliniq
• Connect with Ruth on LinkedIn or Instagram

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