Alyssa Birnbaum initially pursued a career in marketing. She spent several years working as a strategy consultant, focusing primarily on new product ideation for a handful of Bayer Healthcare’s brands, such as Aspirin, Citracal, Midol, Alka Seltzer, Alka Seltzer Plus and TruBiotics. She then pivoted out of healthcare and joined a technology innovation startup that specialized in AI-driven, gamified e-commerce products.

After 7 years of marketing in NYC, Alyssa realized that while she still loved business and psychology, she wasn’t interested in selling products; she wanted to make a difference in people’s lives and focus on employee engagement, healthy work-life balance, and burnout prevention. To that end, she quit her job as Director of Product Marketing, traveled through Asia and Europe for four months, and started anew at Claremont Graduate University.

Alyssa is currently pursuing her PhD in Positive Organizational Psychology. Her research projects focus on leadership development, viewpoint diversity in the workplace, and the contagion of burnout.