We recently connected with Ashley Brasovan and have shared our conversation below.

Ashley, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

When I was coming out of college, I had to decide between two different location for job offers and two very unique positions. On offer was in North Carolina where everything was familiar and I had lived the last 6yrs (undergrad + grad school) or moving out to Colorado. It was actually a higher financial offer but the job was slightly less appealing and seemed to offer less space for personal and career growth. My other offer was starting as a Junior Account Executive in Golden, CO which was 1000+ miles away from anything or anyone I knew but seemed slightly more appealing. The company, McKinstry, had promised more of a “trial period” initially but with more room to grow and develop with the company long-term. After several weeks, I decided to head out to Colorado. I packed up my car and drove across the county with no one I knew in the area, no housing, and a job that I was a little bit nervous about.

This was probably one of the scariest but also most exciting turning points in my life. That was back in 2015. Fast forward to today, I am still with McKinstry in a similar Account Executive rolling selling, managing, and implementing sustainability and resiliency projects in Colorado to municipal clients. Last year in 2021, I was one of the top Account Executives in the entire 2000+ person company booking the second most $$ in energy projects. I now have a home in Golden, a fiancé, and alot of room for personal and career growth. One of the riskiest moves that I have made in my life is going to shape the rest of my career – in a very positive way!

Ashley, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

For my day job, I choose to go into the environmental field in high school. I grew up in Florida and have been scuba diving since the age of 10 (my dad wanted some company!). I majored in Oceanography and Geology at Duke University but slowly realized through research opportunities that I didn’t want to go into academia, politics, or research. Instead after Undergrad, I choose to stay at Duke University and get a Masters in Energy Management – a bit faster paced, more impactful with the climate crisis to me, and opportunities to go into the business/consulting side of the world. Out of graduate school, I was offered a few positions and choose the one at McKinstry and moved out to Colorado to start my career in Energy Efficiency, Water Efficiency, Resiliency, and Renewable Energy in a sustainability-leading state. At the same time, I got a contract to continue running at a professional level on the mountains and trails with Hoka in 2018 and became a property manager on the side as well in 2020.

I am most proud of being able to balance all of my hobbies and careers while contributing in a positive way to the climate crisis. Any company or brand I partner with has sustainability and climate change in mind and works with me on a personal and professional level to communicate that messaging to clients and the community.

We’d love to hear about how you keep in touch with clients.

I am a true believer in long-term partnerships within my personal and professional brands. The world has really lost alot of personal touch and “doing the little things” with the emergence of social media and a virtual world. To continue client and friend loyalty, I do alot of hand written notes – especially over the holidays as a “thank you” to everyone that helped me throughout the year. There aren’t alot of folks that do hand-written and mailed notes anymore so that is a special touch that has positive feedback. The other thing I do that has had positive reception is to bake muffins and hand deliver them when people are going through a hard time or send them a dozen cookies from one of my favorite local Denver bakeries. I find it is the little things that you go out of your way to do that help with client retention – especially since we live in a world where the personal touch and quality of service are quickly declining.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

During my running career at Duke University and as a Professional for Hoka, I have faced several health issues that has made me a stronger, more resilient human in the rest of my life. At 18 years old during my first year of college, I was diagnosed with osteoporosis and was told that I may be able to never live a normal life again. As a result of this, I fractured the largest bone in my body – the femur – 6 times during the subsequent 10 years. This was challenging to go from being on top in high school including winning 3 national championships and being on a full ride scholarship in college to not even being able to run a step for almost 3 years. I worked with a variety of medical specialists, bone doctors, nutritionists and therapists for nearly 8 years to reverse the disease. I was never going to give up and simply wanted long term health, the ability to have kids, the ability to run and to live a normal life without breaking bone while walking.

Twelve years later and through alot of hard ship (and frankly not fun conversations), I have full health back, can run several marathons every year, am a sponsored athlete and have had normal bone health for several years. I remember how hard and long that journey was BUT how every step of the way was worth the end result.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: Ashley_brasovan
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleybrasovan/
• Twitter: ashley_brasovan

Image Credits
Picture labels have the credit names: Pike Peak Marathon, Xterra, Alicia/Honey Stinger, reach out with any other questions on that!