I studied Public Affairs at Baruch College and, as an undergrad, had the opportunity to work in Albany as the Legislative Aide to House Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins. From handling daily constituent relations to calls with lobbying organizations to bill drafting, I was struck by the breath of work public service offered in addition to the proximity to impact. Now I have been in the economic development industry for around three years at nonpartisan quasi-governmental organizations. Today, I am a Senior Project Manager with the Business Development team at NYCEDC, and my responsibilities range from Tech and Venture Capital industry development to business attraction, retention, and expansion under the Choose NYC campaign and as an Operations Lead maximizing our team’s internal systems and processes for efficiency. I would say being a generalist with a curiosity towards building systems and pursuing new ideas has played a big role in getting me to where I am today.

I’m incredibly proud to have been a part of the NYCEDC team that helped bring the World Cup to all New Yorkers this summer. As part of that effort, I led the organization of the Choose NYC Summit – an international business conference that welcomed 350+ attendees from over 50 countries for a full day of programming, featuring a fireside chat with Mayor Mamdani and Chobani CEO Hamdi Ulukaya, alongside 30+ additional speakers and panelists. Just a year ago, I led the pilot version of this event with 100 attendees. Scaling this project in the past few months has been a masterclass in event production, cross-functional communication, and team management. I am so deeply grateful to my supervisors for trusting me to lead this piece of the broader World Cup effort.

Much of your early career as a project manager and operations lead is in the engine room where you learn and develop skills needed to support each piece of the wider operation. It is worth being a systems thinker and learning to take a step back from every problem you are solving to how does this supports the wider mission of my organization.

Also, prioritize building relationships across your organization and industry through coffee chats, happy hours (I sometimes organize my own!), and networking events.

I have been here almost my whole life, so it’s less of a single lightning bolt moment and more something I notice when I travel to other places. I spent a year post-grad in Saarbrücken, Germany and that’s the longest I’ve lived away from the city. I love the pace of things here; my family has lived in South Brooklyn for 25 years now so there’s a strong sense of community I feel in my old neighborhood. Most of all, I love all the little quirks of city life that make New York special – be it a parade, music festival or celebrity-sighting!