I always struggle with an answer when someone asks what I do.

The truth is, it's taken me years to figure out how to explain it—because I'm not who you'd expect to be working in retail employee experience and performance.

I'm not a career retailer. I've never even managed a store.

I'm a creative. A brand strategist and designer who somehow found herself facing one of retail's biggest challenges.

Six years ago, a major retailer asked me to help with their employer brand and employee experience.

We dove deep. Carved out their positioning. Articulated their EVP. Created a beautiful strategy deck. Designed compelling communications. Got the corporate stakeholders onboard.

But as we dug deeper, I realized I was missing something—huge.

Quite frankly, we were creating solutions for a world we didn't truly understand. We were designing for break rooms when teams lived on the sales floor. We were writing for screens when their reality was customers, not computers. Because... that was the ask.

(And to be honest, looking back, I think I felt like we had to stay in that lane. We were hired to develop the creative strategy. Everything else—operational policies and practices—were better left to the client's internal teams, or even other consultants.)

So I did what any good creative does when they don't understand their new audience—I got obsessed with learning.

I spent hundreds of hours personally interviewing, studying, listening to Field Leaders.

I found Matthew Copeland, a Store Leader with decades of experience who was generous enough to share the unfiltered truth about store life. Through him, I discovered that most well-intentioned corporate initiatives die on the sales floor—not from lack of caring, but from lack of context.

Then realizing that brand and comms work alone wouldn't get the outcome my clients were after, I partnered with James Schofield and W. Coby Milne from Roman3, who understood the deeper psychology of workplace engagement and could fill the gaps in my HR knowledge.

Together, we developed what we call Operational Engagement.

Here's what that means: Yes, we still create meaningful employer brands and design beautiful communications. But more importantly, we help ensure those promises actually show up in stores—not as posters or apps, but woven into the daily work itself.

We work directly with your internal teams to ensure they can sustain progress long after our engagement ends. Our goal is to embed operational engagement principles into your organization's everyday practices.

So no, I can't tell you the best visual merchandising strategy, but I can help you see how your current policies might be undermining the engagement you're trying to build.

I won't pretend to know your optimal loss prevention plan, but I can uncover whether it's accidentally telling your teams you don't trust them—right after your EVP promised you do.

Because this is what I truly believe: The disconnect between corporate intentions and store reality isn't anyone's fault. It's structural. Corporate works in one world, stores operate in another. Both sides want the same thing—thriving stores, happy teams, great customer experiences.

My role? Being translator. Bridge-builder. The person who helps good intentions become daily realities. And yea—that means getting creative.

Because so many of retail's challenges—honestly, so many of the world's challenges—come from working in silos. Brand over here. Operations over there.

In 2025, you can't divide and conquer anymore. When each department creates their own "solution" to engagement, stores end up with a Frankenstein experience—pieces that might be individually brilliant but together create a monster no one can manage.

This is why I've built the team I believe is truly needed to impact the day-to-day of store teams in a meaningful, sustainable way:

  • A creative who obsesses over understanding audiences (Hi. It's me.)
  • Store operations experts who know the reality (Matt)
  • Workplace development experts who understand how HR impacts performance (James & Coby)
  • An incredible Admin Manager who keeps these massive initiatives moving when everyone's already stretched thin (shoutout Casey O'Shea)
  • A senior designer who can bring it all together—because having an in-house design studio means we can be agile and responsive, not stuck in revision cycles (shoutout Hayley Ng)
  • All working as one (CATO)

There's something else I've learned: Being an outsider—a neutral third party—actually helps. Corporate stakeholders seem relieved to have someone who can see the full picture without internal politics. Store leaders open up more honestly when they know I'm not there to evaluate them, just to understand them.

Because at the end of the day, everyone wants the same thing. They just need help connecting the dots to reveal a clear, differentiated, and true narrative, without creating more noise.