Propose Solutions to Business Problems That Expand Your Role

Claire Vo believes that career growth comes from taking agency over your path and bending the universe to your will. Rather than waiting for opportunities, she actively shapes her environment by identifying organizational needs and proposing solutions that simultaneously solve business problems and advance her career.

When Claire sees a gap in an organization, she doesn't just point it out—she develops a comprehensive solution with herself as part of it. For example, when her company's head of marketing left, she spent half a day creating an org chart with herself at the top, then presented a complete plan showing how this structure would benefit the business. This approach of making it easy for leaders to say "yes" has helped her progress from copywriter to Chief Product and Technology Officer.

The key is focusing on what your organization needs rather than what you personally want. Instead of saying "I want to be promoted because I deserve it," frame it as "You have a span of control challenge with nine direct reports; I have credibility with this part of the organization and could provide leverage if I took on this role." This solves a problem for the company rather than just addressing your career growth.

Claire also emphasizes being clear about your career goals but not making them the center of your interactions. Only about 0.005% of her conversations with her boss are about her career progression. The rest of the time, she lets her work speak for itself. She believes high-performing people get promoted as fast as the organization can support—pushing for faster promotion rarely works out well.

For those looking to expand their scope, Claire suggests looking "left and right" beyond your current role. Her first director position included marketing responsibilities, which built a foundation for broader leadership. She views organizations as fluid systems that can be reshaped around talented, motivated individuals—the universe is bendable to your will if you approach it with the right mindset and demonstrate how your expanded role benefits the business.

Setting a Fast Pace in Larger Organizations

Claire is often hired into later-stage companies not to teach them how to operate like big companies, but to remind them they can operate like startups. She sets expectations that her leaders should bring the clock speed "one click faster"—if something needs to be done this year, it should be done this half; if this half, then this quarter.

She avoids letting an organization's pace degrade to the cadence of recurring meetings. When someone says "we'll discuss this in the next meeting," she pushes to discuss it now or decide tomorrow. This prevents artificial timelines introduced by calendar systems from slowing progress.

Claire also maintains a fast personal service-level agreement, ensuring she's never the bottleneck. As a leader in decision-making positions, she strives to be responsive with both a high rate of decisions and quick turnaround times.

Maintaining High Quality Standards

Claire balances speed with quality by defining clear, measurable standards for performance. For talent, she creates specific, measurable career ladders rather than vague criteria. She normalizes direct feedback, believing that conflict-avoidant cultures degrade talent standards. When people aren't meeting expectations, she addresses it quickly and directly.

In one instance, she called two leaders who couldn't work together and told them plainly: "The way you are operating is not meeting our leadership expectations. If you do not change, you cannot be part of this organization anymore." This clarity led to significant improvement, with one becoming one of the most effective managers on the team.

Claire's philosophy of "fast beats right" guides her approach—she consistently finds that making a decision and executing with conviction outperforms endless deliberation in search of the perfect solution.