For most of my career, I’ve had the privilege worked among the giants of the tech industry, helping their big ideas take shape and scale. Over the years, I got really good at taking just the tiniest kernel of something fresh and blowing it up into something real. I perfected this craft as a fractional operator, where I moved between startups, venture firms, nonprofits, and even crypto foundations, adding fuel to other people’s visions from the inside out.

Along the way, I always quietly wondered if I could ever build something of my own. But I told myself the same story as many of my “non-technical” peers: My value was in making things run, not in making things new.

This past year shattered that belief. The rise of no-code AI building flipped the old rules about who gets to build, and how it’s build. All year long, I’ve thrown myself headfirst into this movement, making dozens of mini-apps (and a few real ones, too), often with the frenetic enthusiasm of a teenager discovering the internet for the first time.

This series, Female Founder Mode is my field log of what came next. It’s a reflection on what it takes to unlearn polished professionalism, reclaim creative agency, and trust yourself enough to build from scratch. And it’s also an invitation to get out there and build something yourself, too.

Like it or not, whether nature or nurture, certain things just start to happen.

Maybe you’re the first to notice that the office sink is filling up all the time. Congratulations, you’ve made yourself the office manager. Or maybe you’re always the quickest to draw with pen and paper in meetings. Welcome to a lifelong career as a note-taker. Think the office could use a little more camaraderie? Great idea, why don’t you take on all of that “people stuff” and run all office events and culture? And don’t even think about breathing the word, community around a startup – that is, unless you’d like to get permanently fixed as “the community builder” for the rest of your career.

It’s a gross over-simplification, but I’ve noticed that’s how the promotions begin for many of us. The more capacity to manage chaos you show off, the more responsibility you receive on the operational side of the business. That’s how, before you know it, you’re trusted with so much responsibility that you’re taking on Chief of Staff or COO style functions. You’re the one who makes things happen, the one who holds it all together, keeping all that crazy startup mode energy at bay. Contained. Polished. Professional.

People start to say things like, “She’s the one who gets shit done.” And maybe you even catch yourself saying things like, “I love being behind the scenes,” or, “I’m a great number two.”

And I’m not alone: McKinsey’s Women in the Workplace report found that while women hold 48% of entry level jobs in tech, they remain significantly underrepresented in engineering and product roles. Even worse, even the ones who do make it into technical tracks are promoted only about half as often as their male counterparts.

And that’s how it happens, a whole career built on making someone else’s big idea into a reality.

In other words: If you can code, you’re a creator. If you can’t, your job is to enable and empower the people who can.

Maybe this is why — even today — women account for only 25-35% of the tech industry and only 13.2% of startup founders, the lowest percent of women representation since Carta started tracking this data in 2018.

For many years, that’s where I saw my place, too.

While I aspired for greater leadership, I didn’t know how to get there without first learning the in’s and out’s of literally every other piece of how companies work. The most likely path seemed to be the one most of my high-achieving female friends seemed destined to follow: The COO-turned-CEO.

So I made it my job to learn just enough about every other operating area to be a little dangerous, taking myself on a CEO-in-training “tour of duty” through half-a-dozen startups, non-profits, and VC firms, leveling up in each just enough for me to start getting those reclusive job offers: The professional CEO, the one who comes in to get things nice and neat and organized, to really scale things up to the next level.

After all, that’s what I prepared for.

For most of my career, I’d studied the inner lives of hyper-creative people up close. I’ve noticed that it’s not just their wardrobe choices (though most did have a signature look). It’s their posture toward the world – how they tuck themselves away to build, how they disappear into headphones, how they speak in certainties about futures no one else could see, and, most of all, how they aren’t afraid to insert themselves and their work directly into the story.

I’ve always envied this creative freedom, but I never thought I could afford that kind of “tinker time.” (It’s hard to chase creative flow when you’re busy making sure the CRM is updated, the RSVP list is full, and the funnel never runs dry.) But then, this year, I quit my job. And I made the time.

When I built my first app in January, it felt like crossing an invisible line I’d been circling for fifteen years. I’d spent my entire career orbiting other people’s creations, editing their pitch decks, operationalizing their product launches, and catalyzing their growth plans. And then, one weekend, I built something that was mine.

It was disorienting and thrilling. For the first time, I could feel what my engineer friends must have felt all along, that quiet jolt of power that comes from making something out of nothing. It was the biggest paradigm shift of my career, not because I’d learned a new tool, but because I’d finally realized I didn’t need permission.

For women in tech, that shift can feel almost radical. We’ve been conditioned to smooth the rough edges, organize the chaos, and polish someone else’s vision until it shines. But building demands the opposite. It rewards mess, momentum, and self-belief. Less perfection. More play.

Maybe that’s why the shift from operator to creator has felt so earth-shattering for me. The question is: If you were given the chance to sit in that space, what would you build?

Ten months later, I’ve launched two apps on the iOS App Store and built an AI training business to help others do the same. Yes, I’ve left behind a trail of half-baked ideas and broken apps. And yes, somehow, it feels like I’m just getting started.

Think about it:

• If you don’t need to code to create software, then anyone with an idea can turn a thought into a product.

• If you don’t need a big team to get from zero to MVP, you can move faster and spend less.

• If you can move faster with less capital, you don’t have to chase venture-scale outcomes.

• If you don’t need venture-scale outcomes, you expand the definition of success.

• And if success itself gets redefined, suddenly the gates to entrepreneurship swing wide open.

AI invites us to redraw the boundaries of what counts as “professional.” But that only works if more of us are willing to step into the maker’s role and trust our own creative process.

What surprises me most about teaching AI no-code building is how fast disbelief turns into creation during the moment someone realizes they can build something real. After just one first example, I’ve noticed non-engineers are quick to admit (if only in a whisper), “Well yes, you know I’ve always wanted to build this one app…”

I believe the next generation of builders are the ones who’ve been waiting in the wings, the people already living closest to the problems they want to solve. They’re the resident experts, embedded in the communities they serve. Once they become AI-native, the game changes. Product-market fit won’t be something we search for; it’ll be something we start with.

The next professional revolution won’t start in a boardroom. It’ll start with those who decide to Build First.

In part two of this series, I’ll share what happens when you stop running the playbook and start writing your own. By the way, if you’re excited to step up and learn how to build something too, check out my AI workshops on Build First.