Browse experts
Natalya T.
🔥 MBA
Midwest gal at heart but spent the last decade and counting on both coasts. I have varied interests and professional experiences, and I refuse to be defined by one thing. Your 20s are such a formative time, and I can’t wait to empower people to enjoy the process of being in that phase of life, instead of trying to get to certain outcomes.
Brian H.
📈 Marketing, sales, & business
I've had a weird career. I’m a Computer Engineering college dropout, turned Recording Engineer in a music studio. I absolutely loved working in music, but was a bit scared that my entire personality was based around it, so after 8 years in the industry, I made the terrifying decision to leave my comfort zone and try something new. I picked up my life, moved to NYC, and switched industries. Since then, I’ve worked my way up to VP of Operations at a fashion technology startup, and I’ve absolutely loved the journey.
One day my goal is to open up a series of music venues, but for now, I’m continuing to learn the ins-and-outs of starting and scaling a business.
I pride myself on being a generalist, and love learning a lot about a lot. My favorite things to do are:
The fun (professional) highlights:
Outside of work, I enjoy pretty much anything to do with creating/working with my hands. My biggest passion is making music & helping others do the same. I also love gardening, woodworking, and am currently teaching myself to sew & work with metal. I knew nothing about fashion before joining up with my current company, CALA, but have absolutely loved digging into the industry and now I browse around fashion brands for fun.
Mihir P.
🎉 Entrepreneurship
Hey Mentees, I grew up in Chicago and currently live here. I also lived in Salt Lake, Utah area, and most recently in Austin, Texas. I love exploring cities and local culture. My wife and I share an 8 month old son name Liam who we dearly love. And we have a very needy dog Leo who also we dearly love. Life on the home front is fun and never gets boring.
I studied Finance and Accounting, but didn’t pursue the field right away. Instead, I worked on other people’s startup ideas which eventually led to my own Humble Pen. This is when I got the product bug. I couldn’t scale the idea, so I moved on, and learned how to write web applications. I got my first job at Morningstar in their engineering rotational program. I rotated through several teams back-end, front-end, cyber security team, AWS team and finally design system team. I got a design bug while being on Morningstar’s Design System team. I made a switch back into Product Management. Today I am at Charles Schwab helping them rebuild their robo advisor offering. Product Management is many things but I like to use design lens to solve product problems. That is core part of my skill.
I also like building side projects. My most recently one was Wise Charlie which I sold in 2021. Currently I am building Big Imposter which is about imposter syndrome.
Outside of work, I like to read a lot and write a lot. When I am under-thinking, I read. And, when I am overthinking, I write. I also run a quarterly newsletter called mihirchronicles. It is nothing but a play zone for me. I also like to make art. Love the outdoors (bike and hike), exercising, playing basketball and tennis.
My 20s were all about exploration and my 30s are all about executing. This occurred to me while reflecting back on my career. My core belief is using your 20s to explore as much as you can. I have lived this and despite of having a few setbacks, life worked out great. I want to share this with others and help them do the same. This is my primary motivation to give back.
I am thrilled to talk to anyone who would like to have a conversation.
Mihir
Mariano S.
💸 VC & investing
I’m originally from Argentina, and moved to Florida as a kid. I studied CS at Stanford (2016), and there I made many friends, learned about engineering and Bitcoin, and changed my mindset.
I worked at a fintech company (Token) for a few years, and at a crypto company (Chia) building the blockchain and crypto protocols for 4 years. That entire time I was doing engineering and engineering management.
Last year, I started a VC job and had a significant shift in my career (although still in the crypto space). I am using the skills I learned before, to invest in companies and analyze the crypto industry. I’m super excited about the potential of crypto to enable the whole world to transact freely. Of course I’m very intrigued by AI as well.
I have always loved teaching coding and technical subjects to peers in college or at work. I enjoy helping other people, but I haven't had too many opportunities to do this.
Looking forward to meeting!
Mishaal N.
📈 Marketing, sales, & business
Lawyer by education, entrepreneur by nature. Co-founded a creative agency, worked in D2C, and in early-stage Venture Capital. Excited to be mentoring on Twenty to help people through some of the decisions I was always confused by!
Jackson F.
🔥 MBA
I grew up in Foster City, California with my mom Laura, dad Jack and sister Shannon. I have always loved singing, and participated in musical theater, choruses, and an a cappella group along the way. I hold my own at guitar if you give me some easy chords to play. I also grew up playing baseball (1B/OF), soccer (Goalkeeper), and swimming. I still occasionally play in rec leagues around the Bay Area.
I grew up fascinated by psychology, sciences, and arts, and studied Bioengineering at the University of Pennsylvania. There I grew my appreciation for biological sciences, but became more and more interested with the business side of operating life science companies. I joined ZS Associates, a consulting firm with a focus in the life sciences industry. There I was privileged to be able to focus on building customer engagement strategy for oncology medicine manufacturers, learn core concepts in data-driven strategic decision making, and build operational skills. A call to entrepreneurship led me to UCLA Anderson’s School of Management to pursue my MBA.
The next step is to create products. My goal is to build products by developing Edily in the education space, creating experiences for customers that will change the way that education is shared in the world and improving access, comprehension, and the skills that make learning a valuable pursuit in our lives.
Jena D.
🎤 Public speaking
My tagline says it all - I crave adventure, adrenaline, and anything that pushes me outside of my comfort zone.
Professionally, I've spent over a decade navigating the complex world of digital solutions in academic research and industry-sponsored clinical trials. My focus has been on bringing disruptive change to legacy standards. As the 6th hire to a health tech startup, which reached a 2.1B valuation, I have been fortunate to be part of a very unique professional journey. Utilizing my expertise in UXR and truly understanding our end-users’ lived experiences (patients and caregivers), I established a department solely focused on engaging and measuring the success of these key stakeholders in an innovative way. By empowering these patient and caregiver advocates, they now have a direct role in shaping our company’s product development, streamlining study workflows, and improving the overall trial experience thereby creating patient-focused solutions that matter.
Prior to working at a startup, I made significant contributions as a Clinical Research Manager at both Harvard Medical School and Stanford University School of Medicine where I co-authored over 30 peer-reviewed publications, each focusing on harnessing machine learning, artificial intelligence, and remote patient monitoring for early autism spectrum disorder intervention.
Additionally, I am a fitness professional and teach a heated HIIT class at boutique and exclusive yoga studios and fitness centers.
Beyond my professional career, I've led Birthright trips to Israel, organized volunteer expeditions, and lent a hand to Big Brothers Big Sisters. I’m an avid horseback rider, mountaineer, and cyclist (🚴♀️ & 🏍️). I’ve delivered my best friend’s two babies (the first at-home delivery was not planned 😅), am one of less than 400 women who have skied to the South Pole, and have gone skydiving over 25 times. I sleep better in a tent than I do in my bed and my days always include exercising my border collie, Emma, and my horse, Taya.
Let's chat, connect, and find your path together!
Slater M.
🎉 Entrepreneurship
Hey, I’m Slater. When many people our age hear the word “entrepreneur”, they often picture the Silicon Valley, VC-based startup founder. In my world, the word “entrepreneur” conjures a picture of my dad (running his construction business) or my uncle (starting his restaurant and brewery). Since I was young, I have been drawn to the highs and lows of building things. After finishing my senior year as a student-athlete at Stanford, I applied to and joined Venture For America to pursue this particular passion. Fast forward six years, I’ve now built ops functions and teams at two pre-IPO companies (BARK and DoorDash) and am currently running marketplace operations at a web3 startup, Braintrust. During this journey, I’ve found that I get most excited when I get the opportunity to unlock the people around me. Mentoring is one form of this. I view the mentor / mentee relationship as a two-way street where each person learns as much as the other in the relationship. I’m looking forward to sharing more and learning about you soon!
Viren S.
I'm a serial entrepreneur who is building my 4th startup. I dropped out of my undergrad to build my last company. I'm excited to be a mentor on Twenty because I love helping others and I'm super passionate about this space - my first startup was a mentorship platform :)
Jake F.
My career path has been challenging, unexpected, and rewarding. I’ve served as a founder, a consultant, an advisor, and a Board of Directors member. I’ve founded both an unsuccessful business venture and a successful non-profit, worked in massive multi-national corporations and early- and growth-stage VC-backed startups. I've been laid off, low-balled, and have had to navigate toxic workplace politics. I chose an untraditional path for post-graduate education, learned what fuels me professionally, and have both slogged away doing menial admin tasks and been in the room with some of the most powerful people in my industry. And I’m still figuring out what I want to do when I "grow up".
A bit about my background, I graduated with a degree in marketing and global management, thinking I would go into the hospitality industry as a brand manager. It turns out I didn't actually like marketing in practice. So, with no educational background in healthcare or technology, I was thrown into the deep end of health tech when I became an implementations consultant working on the front lines in hospitals right next to doctors and nurses. I took everything that came my way as a learning experience and was promoted quickly until I got to an executive level IT strategy consulting role at a large corporation. The career plateau that came next was one of the largest struggles I had to face in my young career, and I think that a lot of people in their early- to mid-twenties may be experiencing this. I decided to pursue my education and, while still working full-time, got a masters degree from Penn School of Medicine in Healthcare Innovation. During this degree program, I moved to a venture-backed startup which doubled in size in my first year there. Dealing with the realities of what this meant not just for the business but for the job I was doing was another massive challenge, and I ended up leaving to start my next adventure. I am currently in the very early stages of building a business, while taking a much-needed break from the working world.
I get a tremendous amount of satisfaction mentoring young people through my university’s post-grad programs, as well as my own family members and other young professionals. I think a big reason for this is that a lot of the “influencers” giving advice are impractical for a professional environment (corporate and startup), and interviews with successful people such as Fortune 500 CEOs rarely give insight into actionable steps for young people to take in their careers. My approach is to be transparent and honest, and lean on my own experience to give examples of how you might want to (or not want to) approach certain topics. I hope to be able to create a space for college students and early career professionals to feel comfortable in uncertainty and in exploring their interests.
I also have a great network who are looking for bright folks to help bring new perspectives, and I’m always happy to make the connection.
Amelia W.
When I scroll through Instagram or LinkedIn, it can be easy to fill in the gaps with stories about other people: “Their career has been smooth sailing!”; “Their relationship looks so easy”; “How are all of my friends somehow in Italy right now?!” However, when we create space for authentic and genuine conversations, we quickly uncover that all of us are having imperfect and sometimes frustrating moments in our personal and professional lives; leveraging some combination of skills, luck, and privilege to navigate our careers and personal lives; and simply doing our best to grow and succeed in a challenging world.
When I left Teach for America as a transitioning teacher, I felt unsure how to land a job at a top startup or how to apply my leadership skills in a new industry. Through the support of mentors and networking, I was able to land a great role in Customer Success at a really exciting EdTech start up. After my successful transition into EdTech, I found that many teachers were eager to do the same, and I started offering pro bono mentoring sessions to provide advice on how to navigate the transition and set yourself up for success. After supporting 20+ mentees, I have learned that sometimes the most impactful tool a mentor can offer is to believe in the mentee and just nudge them along the path they are already building for themselves.
I am eager to help early career leaders (especially young women) harness their greatness, see their potential, and take bold steps toward the life they want to create. Mentors have been critical to my personal and professional growth, and I am eager to pay it forward.
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Jackie H.
Hey! My name is Jackie Y. HU, born and raised in the city of Shanghai and had my first college dropout experience in Shanghai (ask me more!). At the age of 19, I moved to the U.S. with my parents and started college at UC Berkeley.
I wandered quite a bit in college and explored different aspects of college life before committing to taking Economics and East Asian Studies as my majors. I still remember how my college advisor wanted to dissuade me from doing two majors by saying ‘unless the other major is the first thing you want to do waking up Sunday morning’😅.
I still can’t wake up on Sunday mornings, BUT I am so happy that I wasn’t discouraged! Taking the East Asian Studies major and becoming involved in writing and conscious critical thinking really lifted me up spiritually, and that level of motivation made everything fall into places.
I LOVED social science and humanity so much so I decided to attend Oxford University for a master program that focused on contemporary China. The reason why I picked a UK school instead of a U.S. school (which is supposedly the strongest in the field) is that I just … loved a vegetarian buffet place in London so would want to always go back! Sadly by the time I attended Oxford, the restaurant was permanently closed down due to rising rent and I literally cried for 3 days and lost the sense of purpose going there.
At Oxford, I focused my research on a youth community in mainland China and did an interesting virtual ethnographic study about it (ask me more!).
I now work as a Data Science Manager at a dating company, leveraging data to spread love. I feel so loved by having the privilege to working with a group of super authentic, logical, reasonable, and open-minded people. My company has a very unique culture of bringing everyone close together while working and it exemplifies so many American ideals that attracted me to move to this country at the first place. I feel very proud of my work and fulfilled, and I am ready to invest in my mentees and to give back to the community that cultivated me!
At Twenty, being able to give authentic talk excites me! I love being explorative, real, and grounded with my mentees instead of coming to be prescriptive or pedagogical. Being authentic also helps us to learn from EACH OTHER — this would be a great opportunity for me to grow so I am looking forward to our conversations!! 😃
Christal W.
I’m a little bit of everything. From solo backpacking to permaculture farming (during the pandemic) to raising VC $ & running a startup to consulting to social impact… I’m happy to talk about it all. What strings across it all is my values & why I do what I do:
Life is not just about achievement & busy-ness. Life also isn’t about living for other people & their perceptions of you. That’s why I think it’s super important to know what is important to you and build a life that celebrates that. F everyone else 😇
Julia O.
Hi there! I’m Julia, a mid-westerner who has spent my adult life in CA (Stanford for 4 years + 3 years in SF) and Austin, TX (past 2 years). I’m a former innovation consultant at a Management Consulting firm, and recently took 6 months away from the career hamster wheel to travel, read a lot, noodle on ideas, and spend time with family and friends. My next adventure is in the land of startups, where I recently joined a small 12-person team working to help athletes achieve their performance nutrition goals. While my whole career has been in the product space, I’ve jumped around a bit between design, innovation, and Product Management roles.
Outside of work, I stay busy with my 2-year old dog, Hazel, lots of outdoor adventures, racket sports, and exploring the live music and taco scene in Austin.
Why am I here? Mentoring is something that gives me a ton of energy, and I am where I am today because of my “village” of career mentors, close friends, family, and therapists helping me navigate my 20s. “The Defining Decade” is an accurate name for your 20’s - it’s when we start to build our careers, figure out our passions, and cultivate meaningful relationships. I believe each person needs that village of support to help them navigate this tricky decade and I would be honored to be part of someone’s circle of mentorship.
Kevin V.
I have a strong interest in driving value for visionary leaders and ambitious, mission driven organizations seeking to make a meaningful impact. Given the various industries and companies I’ve been a part of, I like to think I have a diverse and grounded perspective. At my core is the unwavering belief in servant leadership - placing the needs and well-being of others at the forefront of my actions.
I started my career in investment banking, both on the equity research and M&A side. Then I spent some time doing venture capital and private equity. Currently, exploring the “operator” side of me at a beverage company called Guayaki Yerba Mate and have done a few stints at startups (with Chief of Staff and finance-related responsibilities). On a personal note, I moved to Los Angeles from Texas (grew up in Austin, TX, went to college at Texas A&M, and lived in Houston for a few years) at the beginning of 2019. I am currently engaged and have a puppy Golden Retriever named Goose. When I’m not going on long walks and exploring new places with my fiancee, Tara, and Goose, you’ll catch me playing pickleball or golfing. On his lazier days, Kevin loves to watch any sports events on TV (and sometimes catches himself watching reality TV shows with Tara).
Shivani M.
I'm a design strategist and management consultant with a background in sociology. I started my career as an entrepreneur and switched to corporate consulting. I’m now on track to start my own consultancy! I’m action-oriented and a big picture thinker. I love learning from real situations and hence, I’m an opportunist. I actively seek out ways to help others and grow myself at the same time!
