How I’ve Gained Multiple Diverse Career Experiences in One Place and How You Can Too

I’ve been with Cardinal Health, a global healthcare services and products company, for more than 20 years. I’m not sure that would be the case had I not had the opportunity to take on several diverse roles. Making this possible is a two-way street. As employees, we need to have the curiosity and confidence to venture out of our comfort zones. As leaders, we need to nudge our employees out of the “nest.”   

As leaders, it’s our job to encourage people excelling in their current roles, and where they likely feel “at home,” to map the experiences they need to get them where they want to be – even if they don’t know where that is yet. This can sometimes be uncomfortable, but as leaders, we need to give a nudge that is in the employee’s best interest.

We should help our team members reach their potential and grow future leaders who can bring their skills to other parts of the business – areas that may need them even more. 

For individuals, that often means making your interest known when a role you are interested in opens up – either lateral or vertical. My colleague, Annlea Rumfola, talks about how she actually took a step back in her career to get the skills she needed to get her to her current role, and how the path to success is rarely straight. 

For leaders, it means encouraging that interest.

I started in application development at Cardinal Health and led a team of developers. I enjoyed seeing the output of that work and how teams used it. We operated as an internal consulting firm, and Mike Kaufmann, now our CEO, was one of my first “clients.” Mike’s another great example of the value of diverse experiences within a company, as he has had several himself on the way to our top role.

Both of us have been lucky that Cardinal Health supports employees who raise their hands, even if they don’t have the exact experience needed for a new role. The company is willing to rely on adjacent experiences going a long way toward success, along with mentorship and teamwork to fill in the gaps. Talent development and job satisfaction are worth the effort.

After several years, I wanted to get closer to the businesses that IT served, so I took a new role that would let me do that. Just then, the Sarbanes-Oxley act, with its new focus on IT general controls, turned my role into one of global compliance, which helped me develop global management skills. 

Then, after leading our first large SAP implementation, I wanted to expand my strategy skills and pursued a role in enterprise architecture to do so. 

Next, I got my own push out of the nest when I was encouraged to take an infrastructure-focused role managing a team that led middleware and business-to-business platforms. After being in that role for a few years, my team merged with two other teams to become a new department focused on infrastructure platforms. I leveraged the experience I had gained to interview for the VP role of this newly created department and was promoted into that role.

After being in that role for three years, I was interested in a lateral role to focus on a different area of the business. When the VP, Information Security and Technology Risk Management role opened, it intrigued me, but I didn’t check all the boxes so I initially ignored it.

During a regular touch base, my Senior VP at the time really encouraged me to explore the role.

I’m still grateful for the confidence he had in me. This experience has been an exciting new challenge and has taught me many things and confirmed a few others:

• Be confident in the fact that nobody knows it all. Virtually no one checks every qualification box for every position they take. Don’t hold yourself to that standard before raising your hand. If now is not the right time for a new opportunity, at least you’ll know what’s needed to get there.
• Don’t hide your interest in a competency or area you are interested in. Make it known. Attend relevant events, ask questions, follow up. 
• If needed, find a way – outside your current role – to show skills needed for the next role. Maybe that’s through volunteering or involvement with an employee resource group. Show you can lead people that don’t report to you.
• The more you venture outside your comfort zone, the more comfortable it will become. 
• Don’t fear failure. Without it, you won’t grow.

Variety hasn’t been the only factor behind my longtime job satisfaction at Cardinal Health. All of my experiences, from directing an ERP implementation project to leading information security for the enterprise, have been connected to a greater good. Cardinal Health strives to be healthcare’s most trusted partner. 

As a two-time cancer survivor, I saw first-hand the role Cardinal Health’s products and services played in my care. From when I watched a Cardinal Health employee deliver the nuclear medicine for my treatment to when another Cardinal Health employee worked on creating the dose, my own experience confirmed for me that the work we do every day is vital to healthcare. 

For me, the combination of building skills through a variety of experiences and a constant sense of purpose has made for a fulfilling, decades-long career – all in one place. And we are always looking for new team members. To learn more about information technology opportunities at Cardinal Health, visit our careers page.