“The past year has been one of challenge and growth, both personally and professionally. As a wife and a mother to three young daughters, balancing career and life is essential and I work quite hard to ensure that both deadlines and bedtimes are met with my full attention. My experience in the past 12 months has shaped the way that I work with my clients, bringing additional levels of thought leadership to their overall benefit offerings.

Providing recommendations based on utilization and analytics to support employees and their families with physical, emotional and mental well-being extends beyond what I do for a living, but is shaping the core of who I am. By crafting parental leave policies, putting in maternity and infertility management programs, and providing offerings for members to control and even reverse chronic conditions, I am proud to report that over $10M in value has been credibly calculated for my clients.”

Esther Cardenas Pipoly, Loss of Life Advocates, LOLA

“I enjoyed being an account manager for employee benefits. I loved my career; but then something personal happened to me that changed how I looked at benefits and account management.

In 2014, I suffered the loss of my father and husband 63 days apart. It was fast, and there was no time to even think. I learned that there are a lot of things that individuals and families go through during the last months and weeks of a loved one's life, as well as afterwards.

When I returned to my account management job, I realized there was something missing: someone to guide and talk to during these processes. I took everything I had learned during my account management career and put it into a new passion to help people.

I learned a lot of lessons during my experiences. Here were a few mistakes I made:

• I didn't take Guaranteed Issue on life insurance for my husband
• I didn't fully understand how the Family Medical Leave Act worked
• I forgot about my short-term disability

Although I realized these issues too late for myself, I now share my own story to emphasize how crucial benefits are. Also, to remind others to stop, breathe and listen.”

If any of you plan to be down in Austin for the WIFS Conference, please look me up! And as always, if you know of great women in the field who are working hard to make this this industry event better, send me an email introduction at [email protected]. I'd love to connect!