We are super fortunate here at Elate to meet with some incredible Strategy and Operations leaders. We’ve sat down with leaders who have led $100M+ rounds of funding, taken companies public, and navigated through the chaos that ensues with 300%+ year-over-year growth. Yet one thing that continues to amaze me is just how few of these leaders actually set out to be in Strategy and Operations. 

For these leaders, their journeys can start from anywhere: sales, customer success, marketing, finance, the list goes on and on. And while each leader’s background may be different and their paths unique, there is one thing that I have come to find with the best leaders we meet with: intentionality.

That’s why I couldn't be more excited to kickoff Season Two of Aspiring Ops than with our first guest, Kelsey Cohen. Kelsey is the current Senior Revenue Operations Manager at PetDesk and former Chief of Staff at Bloomscape. While Kelsey has found her home in operations, it didn’t happen by accident. 

Armed with a Fine Arts Degree in Painting and a short stint in graphic design, Kelsey’s path ultimately led to her joining Bloomscape as the third employee, playing a foundational role in scaling the company to 150 employees and helping to raise over $24M in funding.

On this episode of Aspiring Ops, Kelsey shares how her willingness to step through open doors and take on new opportunities led to her unlikely journey from graphic designer to operations leader at one of the fastest growing companies in the midwest. 
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Our Takeaway‍

Can you connect the dots? Strategy and Operations leaders have more visibility into every area of the business than anyone else at the company. And with that visibility comes a need to understand how everything is connected and working together. 

Kelsey referenced early in the podcast her fascination with ecosystems and organizational behavior, which for her manifested in the real-world application of building structure and unlocking opportunities within high-growth companies. 

As Kelsey shares, Strategy and Operations leaders can unlock so much opportunity within a business. They are often deep generalists who aren’t just interested in one area of the business, but more importantly, how all areas are connected. 

So as Strategy and Operations leaders it’s important to remember that it isn’t always just about adding process, creating reports, or standing up dashboards. Operations done well should flex between removing friction, adding structure, and uncovering insights that might be missed in the day-to-day minutia of the business. 

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Interested in learning more about PetDesk? Check out their site here. 

Looking for a way to freshen up your new home office? Bloomscape has you covered.

Interested in learning more about Elate? Take a sneak peek behind the solution used by today’s leading Strategy and Operations leaders.