My first year at Apollo

Earlier this month, I celebrated my 1-year service anniversary at Apollo Global Management, Inc. as the Head of ESG & Operating Partner for Private Equity.?I honestly can’t believe how fast time has flown, and I can’t remember when I have learned as much or had so much fun in my career.?As I reflect on this past year, I wanted to start by sharing why I decided to leave Amazon as a tenured executive and pivot to the alternatives industry.?It wasn’t obvious to many, and still isn’t, but I hope this post will help you better understand.

I led a large team at Amazon, at one point it included more than 17,000 people, including contractors, across 21 countries.?I enjoyed building technology, processes, and teams that solved hard problems and created world class programs for customer and employees.?As the company grew and the organization I led grew, we began to move some of the teams into different organizations. In turn, I began to oversee new work and teams.?Then Covid happened.?

About a year into the pandemic, I began to reflect on what I wanted to do and whether I should make a change.?All the warning signs were there, and I knew I was heading toward burn-out.?My family was pointing it out, so it was impossible to ignore.?I had to prioritize time to think about what to do next.?I took daily walks in the park, regardless of the weather. I had pretty much decided to step off the corporate job train and look for board opportunities while working on some philanthropic endeavors when I got a call about an ESG role at Apollo.?I didn’t know anything about the Firm and not much about private equity, but it sounded interesting, and I decided there was no harm in learning more.?I am grateful I decided to go one step further.?

I remember my first conversation with Aaron Miller, the head of the PE operations team called APPS.?He had such a big personality and was transparent about the role and the company. I talked to several people in many different roles at the company and I was struck by how smart and knowledgeable they were, the appetite there was to do more in the ESG space, and how passionate they were about Apollo.?I realized during these conversations how much I missed leading the sustainability function, how passionate I am about sustainability, DEI and safety, and how much I thrive in environments where I had to work on new things and challenge myself to learn quickly in order to have impact.?After a lot of tough discussions, I made the decision to join Apollo.?I am thankful every day that I made this move and took this risk late in my career.?

I could have stayed at Amazon; it would have been the comfortable decision. But easy can be the path to complacency and unhappiness. Doing something radically different is scary but it is also exhilarating, so I chose to embrace the learning curve and step outside of my comfort zone.?While I miss my team at Amazon, I am loving my Apollo team.??