I learned early that money problems don’t stay in the finance office.
When I served in the United States Air Force, our unit was responsible for pay and benefits for 5k active-duty and 6.5k reserve members. My flight chief once told me that money problems lead to disastrous outcomes when someone can’t focus on the mission.
What happens when someone taking apart a bomb is worried about the roof over his family’s head? Or a pilot gets a worried call right before operating an aircraft at mach speed? Bad things. Avoidable things.
From that moment, I grew as an airman and as a person. My give-a-damn runs deeper than most. If I engage with you and promise I can deliver clean results and sound consulting, I mean it.
In the Air Force I worked 7-15s — seven days a week, fifteen hours a day — when the work required it, because when we welcomed home 500 troops after a long deployment, they deserved to have one less thing to worry about. That same standard got me hand-selected to lead one of only nine bases nationwide piloting the Defense Travel System, a rollout that freed up 3 to 5 finance positions at every base that came online. It is also part of why I was named Airman of the Quarter, selected from 60k eligible Airmen across Air Combat Command.
You can take the woman out of the USAF, but you’ll never take the USAF out of the woman.
That is exactly what I have brought to the last decade of company turnarounds. I still operate from the same place: see the risk early, call it clearly, and leave the work better than I found it.