Not that kind of doctor, pt. 2

lizAugust 23, 2021August 23, 2021Uncategorized

When someone lives with capital-D depression, sometimes the cliché that no news is good news doesn’t apply. I’m happy to say that in this case, my lack of blogging over the last few months has been indicative of good news on the mental health and wellness front.

So, what have I been up to? Back in April, I defended my dissertation and passed without revisions. Although I am now technically Dr. Sweigart, it still doesn’t quite feel real. Maybe it will when my thesis is discoverable in the online database, or the bound hard copy arrives, or I receive my diploma. However, that hasn’t stopped me from changing my LinkedIn and Twitter profiles to include PhD after my name. Last week, I published an article in strategy+business magazine that translated my work into practical terms for those who might benefit from my observations and conclusions but do not want to read all 357 pages. I’m proud of this work and of the positive feedback I’ve received so far.

Starting in May, I also took an eight-week creative writing class over Zoom with Ann Dowsett-Johnston. It was my first memoir course since my senior year at Rice, when I studied with Marsha Recknagel. I enjoyed it very much and will be taking the follow up seminar this fall (also over Zoom). As a result of the class, I am working on a book proposal. It is going slowly, but I am finding great satisfaction in the process. Very few books are published commercially compared to the number of aspiring authors so I have high hopes but low expectations. Regardless, I am loving the writing for its own sake.

Overall, I’m well and happy. And that’s good.

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. View all posts by liz