Story Time
how it all began...
As the daughter of a U.S. Air Force pilot, I travelled the world and changed schools every two years until I landed at The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. I graduated with a BS in Economics; concentrations were in finance and Management Information Systems. I also completed a minor in East Asian Languages and Civilizations.
At UPenn, I was a member of the professional business fraternity Delta Sigma Pi (yes fraternity -- not sorority; we called each other brothers) where I held a number of elected positions as an undergraduate. I spent a couple of years representing the Chinese Students' Association on the United Minorities Council. I was also a member of the Alpha Phi sorority.
My interest in tech had an unexpected beginning at UPenn. One morning, as I was cleaning off the tables at Stouffer Dining Hall for my work-study job, the Daily Pennsylvanian was open on one of the tables. I saw ads for programming jobs that paid double what I was getting paid to clean/mop floors and prep food. I had no idea what Object Oriented Programming or HTML meant -- but I decided I would figure it out over Christmas break and work on qualifying for those jobs.
I stopped by the campus bookstore and bought HTML for Dummies and a similar book for JavaScript. When I returned from Christmas break, I added Management Information Systems to my finance concentration and dove headfirst into learning programming languages. A few months later, I got my first programming work-study job on campus. Over the next few years as an undergraduate, I would get more work -- from designing and implementing The Wharton School's website (MBA, Management division) to helping a client create a fan page for The Spice Girls.
After graduating from UPenn, I worked in the finance industry. Even in the fast-paced world of NYC finance as an investment banker (leveraged buyouts), I found my background in tech to be helpful. During the moments of downtime between working on deals, roadshows or pitches, I utilized my programming skills developed as a freelancer in college to write apps. I designed, developed and executed a program that unified comparable analysis spreadsheets into a connected database. The program increased our efficiency (and eliminated the all-nighters we had to pull when faced with a sudden onslaught of comp analysis demands).
Working in leveraged buyouts and private equity investments taught me the importance of keeping an eye on ROI and decision making informed by quantitative data analysis. As a digital strategist, I keep these metrics in mind when I work with brands and individuals to help them develop a strong brand story and communicate it effectively through social media, digital advertising, websites, emails, and other platforms.
I love helping brands and individuals create and implement digital content that results in measurable improvements in KPIs.
My professional work experience and resume can be found on LinkedIn.
My academic background and coursework at Harvard can be found on the Academics page.
What I care about
Giving back through community service is important to me. I enjoy helping non-profits with digital marketing help. If you are a 501(c)(3) organization and would like free digital marketing help, read more about how I can help you on the Community Service page.