I build structures that hold,
so people can carry what matters
Organizational Systems • People Operations • Experience Design
I work with people on the systems that shape how they operate—how roles connect, how decisions move, where clarity breaks down. I pay attention to what seems to hold things together, and what only appears to.
I'm often brought in when something that used to work doesn't anymore. A group has outgrown its structure. A process everyone relies on is quietly failing. A leadership shift has left the team running on assumptions no one has named out loud. Sometimes the foresight exists and the call comes before the breakdown. Those cost the least and change the most.
My work is to find those patterns and reshape what's there into a foundation people can rely on: grounded in shared understanding, moving toward a clear vision.
“There is nothing new under the sun, but there are new suns.”
How I got here
At Steep Ravine Cabins on Mt. Tam, where the forest meets the ocean, snacking on Pacific Coast trail mix from the local grocery bulk bins. Photo by Dani Nomura.
I'm Phoebe. I've spent my career helping purpose-driven teams build their operations in contexts as varied as venture-backed startups, a bootstrapped B-Corp, a multi-entity shared services organization, a self-sufficient estate with its own fire department, a hospitality retreat reimagined from a corporate campus, and an emerging museum.
I've worked with distributed and hybrid teams since 2010, before it was the default. Geography has been one of my greatest teachers: it accelerates what breaks and reveals whether a system actually holds. I came up through exposure and opportunity, through being trusted to solve real problems in very different environments. I learned to design for what's actually there.
Systems either hold or they don't. The difference is rarely headcount or funding. It's whether someone was paying attention to both the structure and the people inside it, and whether those things are designed to meet.
That's where I build: operations for teams through growth and change. Sometimes that's designing what isn't there yet; sometimes it's tending fractures in what's already in place; sometimes it's building the programs that hold a team together through change. The challenges shift; the underlying thinking stays the same.
That same care runs through every part of my life: in how I enable teams with an ambitious mission, how I raise a child who's curious about the world, and how I center equity where I show up.
Working together, thinking together, or simply being in community—however you got here, I'm glad you arrived.