Hi, I’m Katie.
I've been in the digital agency world for 15 years — the last five spent as a fractional COO, in the room, making the hard calls. I’ve built the ops, restructured the teams, implemented the systems, and sat in more leadership meetings than I can count. I’ve helped agencies navigate AI adoption, compensation redesigns, and the kind of organizational growing pains that make or break a shop.
I’m also an aerospace engineer by training. That background taught me how to think — logic, critical thinking, problem solving, working across disciplines and cultures, and above all, risk management: how to identify the risks that actually matter and manage those. It also made me constitutionally incapable of accepting “that’s just how it’s done” as an answer.
Why I stopped doing everything else
I’ve come to realize that the part of my work I love isn’t the implementation. It’s the conversation. Sitting across from a founder, hearing about the real problem underneath the surface problem, and helping them think through it until the answer becomes obvious.
I am good at building systems. But I was made for the conversation that happens before you decide what to build.
So I stopped doing everything else. No more fractional COO work. No more implementation projects. No more 60-page playbooks. Just the part that matters most: being the thinking partner agency leaders didn’t know they needed.
Wondering how a thinking partner is different from a coach or a consultant? I wrote a guide to help you decide.
Outside the advisory room
I live in Vancouver, BC with my husband and two kids. When I’m not advising agency leaders, I’m making art, strumming my ukulele (badly but enthusiastically), playing in the mountains and ocean, and practicing what I preach — designing my life first and letting the business serve it.
Curious to know more about my philosophy? Check out my newsletter.
If you’re an agency leader looking for a different kind of conversation, I’d love to hear what’s on your mind.