From clinical treatment to guiding AI development

What was your path to health tech?

My path to tech was anything but linear. As someone who clung to an ancient phone well into the smartphone era and spent my undergraduate years poring over ancient Greek and Latin texts, I was perhaps an unlikely candidate for a career in digital health innovation.

My foundational training was in classical languages and literatures, where I studied how archaic texts captured timeless, universal human experiences and emotional struggles. I was drawn to exploring the psychological narratives encapsulated in these works. Engaging with the intricacies of language as a profound vehicle for human expression and connection would later prove instrumental for me in architecting AI-enabled therapeutic conversations that authentically resonate with users in their moments of need.

After transitioning to clinical psychology and completing my doctoral training at the Stanford-PGSP PsyD Consortium in Silicon Valley, I found my passion for supervising multidisciplinary teams to deliver CBT and exposure therapy in intensive treatment settings for obsessive-compulsive and anxiety-related disorders. However, I was troubled by how many patients had experienced years of ineffective treatments prior to finding appropriate psychological services. The stark reality was that many, especially those from underrepresented communities, never accessed effective treatment at all.

Health tech was already on my radar: Many of the first wave of clinical leaders to venture into tech were alumnae of my grad program—trailblazers like Megan Jones Bell (former chief strategy and science officer at Headspace; current clinical director, consumer and mental health at Google), Clare Kennedy Purvis (former vice president, clinical product and content development at Headspace), Sarah Adler (founder/CEO at Wave), and Julia Hoffman (former vice president and head of mental health strategy at Teladoc Health and Livongo) who demonstrated that responsible innovation could scale impact while maintaining high clinical standards. Their work made me realize that my divergent expertise in psychology and philology could serve a synergistic, transformative purpose in health care technology.

A decisive moment arrived when I received an offer to serve as founding director of therapy at Brightside Health, collaborating closely with product, design, engineering, and operations teams. At companies like Woebot and Lark Health, just as I had mentored multidisciplinary clinical teams, I could now guide cross-functional, nonclinical tech teams in preserving essential therapeutic mechanisms while fostering the creative autonomy necessary to drive meaningful user engagement and behavior change in digital contexts. This hands-on, embedded leadership approach allowed me to advance new frameworks for balancing clinical rigor with user-centered design—much as I had helped clinical teams tailor empirically supported protocols through individualized case conceptualization and treatment planning.

The transition from a clinical setting was daunting. Leaving the structured environment of traditional health care for the rapid, iterative environment of tech startups required a leap of faith. Surveying the landscape, I understood that mental health technology beckoned for strong clinical science leadership to guide ethical AI development, particularly for those with underrepresented identities.

Beyond expanding access, it was about creating carefully designed tools that maintain clinical excellence and helping users access and benefit from key therapeutic ingredients. Just as important was building healthy organizational cultures and establishing ethical guardrails for responsible AI deployment that promote both team well-being and user safety.

Now, as I lead mental wellness strategy and development for AI-powered solutions at Wayhaven, a health tech company that supports college students’ well-being, I can appreciate how my background in ancient languages and contemporary evidence-based psychology drives innovation. Just as classical poetry and drama helped people make sense of their lived experiences thousands of years ago, I am now pioneering the thoughtful application of generative AI to create supportive dialogues that strive to speak to the human experience in all its complexity.

While technology continues to evolve, the core mission endures: revolutionizing mental well-being through scientifically validated, engaging experiences that empower people to thrive. This work strategically translates proven therapeutic principles into accessible digital formats, preserving the essential mechanisms of change while reimagining how people can interact with mental wellness support.