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A career path rooted in lifelong learning and intentional proximity

Updated: May 20, 2024



Lifelong Learning and Intentional Proximity: These two phrases capture the essence of my career path to date. As an experiential learner, the tapestry of my career is made up of intentional moves driven by what I want to learn, experience, and contribute to next.

With each intentional move, I have learned that proximity is the pathway to understanding and growth. Some career highlights are below.


1.     Peace Corps: After my first few years as a classroom teacher in the U.S., I pursued a lifelong dream to join the Peace Corps and teach English as a Foreign Language to all grade levels in rural Ukraine. This 27-month experience challenged me beyond my imagination. I lived with a host family in a rural village and took intensive Ukrainian language training for several hours a day over the course of 3 months before moving to a town in southwestern Ukraine to teach English at a local village school for 2 years. I learned to live and work independently in a community where I was the only American and native English speaker, with limited ability to communicate in the local language. I developed new muscles in self-motivation, adaptability, resilience, cross-cultural understanding, gratitude, resourcefulness, patience, and humility. Most importantly, I learned that an experience is what you make of it, and I am incredibly proud of mine.


2.     Education Policy: After 5 years of teaching in the U.S. and abroad, I grew more curious about education policy and its intersection with practice. Choosing a graduate program in education policy deepened my understanding of macro-level education topics, from international education policy to domestic school reform, and provided me with opportunities to connect with and learn from classmates from all over the world.


3.     Education Technology: In 2007, I sought something new and challenging in my career. Always interested in the intersection of education and technology, I set my sights on Blackboard. I accepted an entry-level product marketing job after a few informational interviews and job applications. This intentional move dramatically changed my career trajectory from a former teacher to an EdTech executive in less than 10 years.


4.     From Product Marketing to Sales: Over the course of 6 years of career growth in Product Marketing, I yearned to understand more about the reach and impact of the great work my team and I spent our days, weeks, and months on. I knew our primary objectives were to enable the sales organization to engage and retain our customer base. Yet, I couldn’t answer the important question: “Are we creating value, and if so, how much?” Although I was on a successful trajectory in leadership and management, I followed my instincts when I was recruited into an Account Management role by Sales leadership. This intentional move into Sales gave me the broader perspective and experience I sought, opening up more growth and career opportunities across the go-to-market continuum.


5.     Experience Across Market Categories: Over the next decade, each intentional move allowed me to specialize in different areas of the go-to-market continuum while deepening my knowledge of market categories that were gaining significant traction (Online Program Management, Digital Credentialing & Badging, and Analytics to name a few). I led, built, and executed against go-to-market strategies and plans, bringing technology and services offerings to higher education, K12, associations, and corporate markets. I gained executive leadership experience marketing and selling complex and long-term partnerships to higher education institutions and learned how to build and leverage repeatable processes and playbooks for both internal and external value.


6.     Starting my own consulting business: Motherhood changed my perspective and priorities, leading me to step away from my role as an executive and pursue a path as an independent consultant. I learned how to apply my sales and marketing experience and knowledge to my own portfolio of services and run a successful business for 4 years.


7.     Focus on K12 EdTech: When schools closed in 2020, my oldest daughter was in kindergarten, and my youngest was in preschool. Watching the massive disruption of learning continuity for all ages was heartbreaking. Experiencing the impact first-hand left me yearning to get more proximate to K12 learning technology that learners like my own children could use to enrich or intervene based on their needs. I intentionally sought an opportunity to work at a company that offered math and reading products for K12 students. Following my instincts and desire to get proximate to K12 EdTech exceeded my expectations. While building out a new Product Marketing organization and introducing new frameworks for integrated planning and execution, I was able to deepen my understanding of our products and how they worked while watching my oldest daughter use them at home. I gained new insights into how students learn at the elementary level and, more importantly, how to identify learning challenges early so that I could intervene and advocate for my own children. Bringing a new PreK-2 foundational reading offering to market provided me with a once-in-a-lifetime proximity opportunity to learn the importance of structured literacy in developing skilled readers. While my daughters (kindergarten and 3rd grade at the time) were user testers providing feedback to product designers via Zoom, I learned how to ask questions about what literacy programs their schools were using and ensure phonics and decoding were part of the curriculum. I reflected on this in 2023 here Phonics is the best way to teach reading and celebrated the launch of DreamBox Reading Park here.


8.     Kelleher Consulting Group: Enter 2024 and the relaunch of my consulting business. The Kelleher Consulting Group is on a mission to help organizations bring great products and services to market and keep them there. Our market-first, product-forward approach helps companies elevate their view of the market and propel their products and services forward through customized services along the go-to-market continuum. Our clients benefit from experienced EdTech veterans with deep knowledge of the education markets, their decision makers, influencers, funding, and decision processes to help inform and optimize their go-to-market motions. 


If you or anyone in your network is ready to take a market-first approach to propel your products and services forward, let’s connect to explore potential paths to a prosperous partnership.


Let's Connect: LinkedIn or Email

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