How Pivoting Shaped My Career Path
My career journey so far and why I’m starting this Substack.
Hi there!
I’m Merry Chin - welcome to my Substack, where I’ll focus on all things careers.
After 10 years in the workforce post-college, I’ve learned that most career journeys are anything but clear and linear. My experiences so far have shaped this perspective - I’ve designed career development programs to help employees grow in their roles, mentored young professionals to help them gain clarity in their careers, and navigated multiple career transitions myself. My journey has taken me across different fields, from operations management to learning & development (L&D) to product management, with companies including Amazon, Wayfair, and TikTok.
Each pivot and experience has strengthened my expertise in career development. It’s also reinforced what I’ve long believed since my time in L&D; growth isn’t necessarily about following a straight path, but about continuous learning, leveraging skills in new ways, and embracing career shifts.
What you can expect here
In this Substack, I’ll share insights to navigating the workplace, stories from professionals across industries, practical tools, and actionable advice - especially for those who are in the early stages of their career.
If you’re figuring out your next step, thinking about a career change, or just want to be more intentional about how you approach your job, you’re in the right place!
How it all started
Originally from Boston, MA, I moved to Los Angeles for undergrad to attend the University of Southern California (Fight on!). I chose Business Administration as my major because, honestly, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do after college. Business felt like a practical choice, offering broad job opportunities without locking me into a specific path too early.
By my junior year, I still wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, but I felt myself drawn to operations and supply chain because I did well in those classes. Wanting to understand the field further, I explored job opportunities that would give me hands-on experience. Once I earned my B.S. degree, I kicked off my career in operations management with Amazon. I led teams of up to 50 associates at a fulfillment center to get customers’ packages delivered on time while ensuring our operation was hitting productivity goals. I soon realized that while I was gaining valuable experience, I wasn’t truly passionate about the work. But, I stayed in the role because I believed that having a strong foundation of experience was important for my career growth.
While I was on the Operations team, I gained exposure to the L&D function, a department focused on getting new hires up to speed on their job as quickly as possible. This was a department I collaborated with often because they were responsible for training new hires who were joining my team. I was struck by the impact that this role could have - helping people succeed in their current jobs and then equipping them with the skills to move to the next role or level. I eventually left Amazon for Wayfair to join their Operations Excellence team and there I also collaborated with the L&D function, learning about how they were scaling training to Wayfair delivery teams all across the country.
Going back to school
The more time I spent with L&D teams in my operations roles, the more I learned about the day-to-day of designing learning programs. I also saw firsthand how these learning opportunities positively impacted the employees I was leading - when they applied what they learned to their role and as we had career conversations about their growth. That’s when I realized that helping people learn and grow was what energized me at work.
Soon after, I made the decision to get my master’s degree to gain a deeper understanding of the education space and grow my expertise in the field. I ultimately enrolled at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), specifically the Technology, Innovation, and Education program (now known as the Learning Design, Innovation, and Technology program). There, I examined how people learn, how technology and instructional design can improve workplace education, and how to design learning experiences that stick.
One of the best parts of my time at HGSE was being surrounded by people who were just as excited about education as I was. I learned from professors who had shaped the field of learning and engaged in discussions with fellow classmates who had worked in K-12, higher education, school administration, or corporate learning. Every conversation was an opportunity to build my understanding of the education space as a whole.
Formally stepping into L&D
There were a lot of different career paths within education that I could have gone down after graduation, but I knew that I wanted to start off in the workforce education space on an L&D team. L&D was where I could bridge learning design and business strategy to create meaningful experiences for individuals while driving company goals.
So, after grad school, I returned to LA to work at TikTok as one of the first hires on the L&D team for North America. We built onboarding programs, leadership initiatives, and business unit-specific workshops and trainings for thousands of employees. We even organized a global Learning Week, collaborating closely with our teams in Singapore and London. Designing L&D programming at TikTok was incredibly rewarding, allowing me to tinker with structuring live learning sessions alongside asynchronous digital learning tools to deliver effective learning paths for our employees.
Making the pivot to product management
Eventually, I started working with our tech teams to enhance internal HR tools geared towards learning and development. I worked with our product managers to translate L&D goals into technical realities; this experience deepened my understanding of how to build technologies to improve learning in the workplace. I also learned that these product managers sat at the intersection of technology and business, which sparked my interest in pivoting to product management. That curiosity led me to take action. I reached out to more PMs to learn about their day-to-day work, completed a LinkedIn course, read multiple books on product management, and mapped out the transferable skills I could bring to the role. This process gave me the knowledge and confidence to make the change to product.
I’m now a Product Manager in the workforce education space, at a company that helps organizations solve workforce challenges through education programs. In my role, I build and refine features on our learning platform, in partnership with our tech and design teams, that make it easier for working adults to discover and access education. This pivot has been an exciting and fulfilling journey for me; I’m blending my three interests in education, technology, and business strategy in a way that drives broader social impact.
What’s next
Through my experiences, I’ve come to appreciate that careers can be unpredictable. I certainly don’t know everything there is to know about careers. There’s no right answer or right approach for navigating a career, and understanding how to advance in a career can be challenging. But through this Substack, I hope to foster a community focused on developing our professional selves while creating the space to reflect on our career paths.
Merry