Hey, I’m Mara.
I’ve spent more than 20 years in operations and supply chain, helping turn ideas into physical products and getting those products into the hands of the people buying them.
Along the way, I’ve worked across just about every part of the process: product development and commercialization, S&OP and demand planning, purchasing, inventory, manufacturing, logistics, warehousing and distribution, omnichannel eCommerce fulfillment, B2B and B2C customer service, and more ERP and EDI systems than I care to count. I’ve also managed the operational complexities of working with major retailers, from vendor compliance and routing requirements to EDI, OTIF performance, chargebacks, labeling, packaging, and the countless details involved in getting orders out the door correctly and on time.
I’m also very familiar with being the one-person operations department. I’ve stepped into growing businesses where operations needed to be built from the ground up, figured out what needed to happen first, and then built the systems, processes, and eventually the team around it. That includes identifying when and where additional support is needed, defining roles and responsibilities, vetting and interviewing candidates, hiring, onboarding, training, managing, and developing people as the business grows.
I thrive in the chaos. I’m used to wearing multiple hats, rolling up my sleeves, and figuring out what needs to happen next. I’ve worked with people at every level of an organization, from teams on the warehouse floor to executive leadership and the C-suite. I’m equally comfortable getting into the weeds with the people doing the work, building a deck and presenting a strategy, or working through a complex problem with senior leadership.
After years of leading operations inside growing companies, consulting gives me the opportunity to get back to the part of the work I love most: being in the trenches. I love coming into a business, understanding how all the pieces fit together, finding what isn’t working, and building the practical systems, structure, and teams needed to support where the company wants to go next.
I’m a strategist, but I’m an operator at heart. I can see the big picture without losing sight of what actually has to happen on Monday morning. Give me a messy process, an inventory problem, a complicated 3PL situation, a retailer compliance headache, a team that needs structure, or a supply chain puzzle, and I’m in my element. I genuinely don’t think I’ll ever get bored of talking about the weird complexities of getting products where they need to go.
I also know firsthand that great operations don’t require everyone to be sitting in the same building. I spent years working fully remotely, growing from manager to director while building and leading a remote team through significant growth and change. That experience shapes how I work today. My consulting services are fully remote, including fractional leadership and people management. I can step into a team, identify gaps, establish ownership and accountability, help build the right roles, onboard and ramp new hires, coach and develop people, and keep things moving without needing to be physically in the room.
Most importantly, I care about the people behind the processes. The best systems in the world don’t work without the right people, clear ownership, and a team that understands how their work fits into the bigger picture. Growth is hard enough without your operations making it harder. I bring a calm, practical, and genuinely collaborative approach to solving problems, building what’s needed, and figuring it out together.
No worries. I got your back.