A big week

liz

Happy Monday. Last week had a couple of major events for me. On Tuesday, I passed (!!!) my dissertation proposal defense. The proposal defense is a key step in the PhD process and indicates my committee’s approval of my topic, theoretical framework and understanding of the existing literature, and design of my research study. From here, it’s a question of collecting and analyzing my data and completing my dissertation. I’m relieved to have this hurdle behind me and also excited because it brings the completion of my degree that much closer.

The day after my proposal defense, I had a call to discuss returning to my firm and resuming my career in January. My therapist and psychiatrist are supporting of that timing and I feel like I am getting to a place where I will be ready to come back. Although I had a lot of trepidation before the conversation, I feel confident and assured now. It took me a moment to recognize the emotion as enthusiasm for the future. For a long time, the thought of the future has filled me with dread because it felt so uncertain and ambiguous. Although I do not have a prescription for my future, I do feel like I have agency in charting my course. It’s a good feeling.

This coming week, I am doing something I haven’t in almost a year. I will be a guest on Living Corporate’s new web series The Access Point (TAP) tomorrow night (Tuesday, 7pm Central). TAP is a new initiative of Living Corporate aimed at bringing valuable insight to underrepresented early career professionals. On this episode, I’ll be debuting a new framework for understanding workplace supporters, digging into the issue of power, and (I hope) offering some useful tools and concepts for building a coalition of support on the job. You can register here (it’s free). If there are people in your network who you think might benefit from it, please share it with them.

The last seven days have been busy, but good. I’m looking forward to seeing what this week has in store. Be well, my friends.

Unknown's avatar

Published by liz

From history major, with side quests in Medieval Studies and chemical engineering, to nonprofit finance leader, Big 4 tax partner, technologist, researcher, and now co-founder of Divine, nothing about my career has been linear. The throughline has always been systems: financial systems, organizational systems, technological systems, and human systems. I have an MBA in Operations and Supply Chain Management and a PhD in Organizational Leadership Psychology, and I’ve spent my career trying to understand how complex systems shape people’s choices, opportunities, wellbeing, and sense of belonging. Today, my work sits at the intersection of psychology, technology, human-centered design, and digital trust. I am co-founder of Divine, an open-source, decentralized social video app built to put creativity back in human hands and replace doomscrolling with joyscrolling. Divine is part of a bigger question I care deeply about: how do we create online spaces that support safety, creativity, identity, and belonging without defaulting to surveillance, extraction, or control? At Divine, I wear a lot of hats across engineering, finance, operations, and strategy, while helping shape the app’s trust, safety, and values work. I focus especially on teen online safety, human-generated content, participatory design, and healthier relationships with technology. I am a postdoctoral alum of Vanderbilt University’s Department of Computer Science, where I worked with Dr. Pam Wisniewski’s Socio-Technical Interaction Research Lab. I continue to write, speak, and research at the intersection of online safety, digital trust, decentralized technology, and youth wellbeing. I was named a Distinguished Fellow at the Institute for Data Integrity in 2023. In 2025, I had the honor of serving as President of Division 13 of the American Psychological Association, the Society of Consulting Psychology. I also live with major depressive disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder. In 2020, I took a leave from PwC to focus on my mental wellness, and I now speak and write openly about mental health, especially in the workplace and in relation to digital wellbeing. This blog, Seriously Jerk Brain, chronicles much of that journey.

4 Comments

  4. Lizzie,

    Heartfelt congratulations on your dissertation approval! Also, in looking forward to resuming your career in the new year.

    You have been a guidepost and a thoughtful sharer of your journey. You are an inspiration and an amazing beautiful brilliant woman.

    I look forward to your presentation tomorrow!

    Sincerely yours,

    ~ Cynthia

    Like

    Reply

Leave a comment