Team Stories at ghSMART: Jennifer De Witte on Learning, Leading, and Taking the Leap

Jennifer De Witte’s path to ghSMART started, somewhat unexpectedly, with a chance encounter at the Phoenix airport.

Jen wasn’t even there.

At the time, Jen was working at McKinsey. A friend and former colleague happened to meet someone from ghSMART during a layover and thought Jen might be interested in an opportunity at the firm. Her friend wasn’t interested in making a move, but she knew Jen might be. She passed along the opportunity; Jen sent over her resume, and a series of conversations followed.

The opportunity intrigued her, but taking it wasn’t an obvious decision.

Moving from an established firm to a company she had never heard of came with real questions. Would the company succeed? Was the flexibility it offered really possible? Was she willing to take a leap into something unfamiliar?

At first, Jen admits, the motivation was partly about leaving what she knew. But the more people she met at ghSMART, the more that changed.

“I just kept thinking, ‘these people are amazing,” she says. “Why wouldn’t I?”

She took the leap. That willingness to step into something new would become a recurring theme throughout Jen’s experience at ghSMART.

Taking Initiative and Learning to Lead

One of the biggest changes Jen sees in herself is the confidence to trust her instincts, take initiative, and act on an idea, even when no one has asked her to.

When Jen joined ghSMART, many of the firm’s processes looked very different than they do today. As project work expanded, she found herself using a project workbook that didn’t quite make sense to her. “There has to be a better way,” she remembers thinking.

So she built one.

No one asked her to redesign it. She simply saw an opportunity to make the process more logical and efficient, created something new, and shared it with others. Years later, versions of that workbook are still being used across the firm.

For Jen, the accomplishment matters not only because the tool stuck, but because of what creating it represented.

“I would have never done that at McKinsey,” she says. “I would have just kept doing what I needed to do.”

At ghSMART, she found something different: permission to try.

“You can always make something better,” Jen says. “You can always find a way to collaborate with people to make a process better or come up with a training or something like that if you want to.”

That mindset reflects an idea familiar across ghSMART: when in doubt, lead. Jen has become increasingly comfortable putting it into practice, whether that means improving a process without being asked or stepping into an unfamiliar area of the business and trusting herself to figure it out.

“I think I’ve learned to take the lead more,” she says. “If I see something that needs to be done, I just do it.”

Stepping into the Unfamiliar

That willingness to jump in has taken Jen well beyond the responsibilities she knew when she started.

Her background wasn’t in finance. She learned it.

It wasn’t in contracting either. She learned that, too.

At one point, departures on the team left a significant gap in contracting support. Jen stepped in to take on the work for nearly a year. She describes the experience as one of the biggest growth points of her tenure.

“I was kind of thrown into it,” she says. “And I survived it.” Then, with a laugh, she adds, “And thrived, hopefully.”

She has also helped train new Executive Business Partners, supported evolving project-management work, partnered across finance and contracting, and contributed to new processes as the firm has grown.

Rather than seeing that evolution as disruption, Jen has come to see it as one of the reasons the work remains interesting.

The People Behind the Growth

Along the way, the people Jen has learned from and worked alongside have become an equally important part of her experience.

Early in her ghSMART career, she developed an informal mentoring relationship with Melissa McMahan, who helped her navigate the learning curve of being a new EBP.

“She was always there to support and just be a calming influence for me,” Jen says.

Other relationships shaped different chapters. Working closely with former firm leaders gave her opportunities to learn more about finance. And her years supporting Dina Wang grew into the kind of partnership where very little needed to be explained.

“We didn’t have to have a call. I knew what she needed,” Jen says. “To have that kind of relationship was amazing.”

It extended well beyond the logistics of work. When Dina had her daughter, Jen flew to Boston to meet her.

Those relationships have become some of the most meaningful parts of Jen’s ghSMART experience. Roles changed. Responsibilities expanded. People moved into new chapters. But many of the relationships built through the work grew into something far more personal.

Freedom to Shape a Career With Purpose

Jen’s experience at ghSMART has evolved alongside her life outside of work, including a move across continents twice. For her, one of the things that has made those changes possible is having the autonomy to shape how she works while staying accountable to what her role requires.

That distinction is important to Jen, particularly as an EBP. Supporting others often means working around their schedules and priorities, so the day-to-day experience may look different than it does for someone in another role.

“If I want to work from a coffee shop down the road, another state, or even another country, I can,” Jen explains. “And if I need to step away from my computer for an afternoon to take care of something personal, I have the freedom to do that, knowing I’ll come back and get the work done.”

For Jen, that freedom comes with ownership. It’s not about working whenever or however you want, but having the trust and autonomy within your role to shape a career and a way of working that can evolve with you.

Challenge Creates Opportunity

That autonomy doesn’t mean the work is easy, and Jen is candid about the challenge that comes with it.

But that, she says, is also part of what makes it worthwhile.

“If you want to be challenged, if you want to challenge yourself, this is the firm for you,” she says.

For Jen, that challenge is also part of what creates opportunity. There are always new problems to solve, different areas of the business to learn, and chances to stretch beyond what you already know.

Her own path at ghSMART has taken her into areas she never expected, from building new processes to learning entirely new parts of the business. Along the way, she’s become more comfortable stepping into unfamiliar territory and trusting herself to figure it out.

“This place gives you an opportunity to grow and learn so much if you’re willing to take the risk and just try.”

Curious where taking that next step could lead you? Explore careers at ghSMART and learn more about what it’s like to grow your career here.