Leading 62 People at 25 — Then Starting Over: Cecilia Hebling on Leadership, Reinvention & Thinking

What happens when you go from leading 62 people at 25 to starting over in a completely new country and industry? In this episode, I sit down with Cecilia Hebling, a senior strategic operations leader whose career has taken her from chemical engineering and manufacturing in Brazil to tech in the U.S. At 25, Cecilia was already leading a team of 62 operators in a high-pressure factory environment, where many people on her team had far more experience than she did. She had to learn quickly how to earn trust, build credibility, and lead without pretending to know everything. Later, she made an even bigger leap: leaving behind the career, network, and reputation she had built in Brazil to move to the U.S. and start again in a new industry. We talk about why starting over doesn’t mean starting from zero, how her engineering mindset still shapes the way she solves problems today, and how being international can become a competitive advantage rather than something you have to overcome. Cecilia also shares how her definition of success has changed over time — from chasing titles and moving up quickly to valuing trust, meaningful work, and having enough time and space to actually enjoy life. In this conversation, we explore: how to lead when people don’t take you seriously yet building trust through humility, curiosity, and results taking an engineering mindset across industries rebuilding your career in a new country turning a different background into an advantage redefining ambition and success If you’ve ever had to prove yourself in a new room, reinvent your career, or wonder whether everything you’ve learned still matters when you change paths, this episode is for you.