Sarah Clarkson is a FinTech product leader who has cultivated a rigorous research process throughout her career, validating her learnings & choices along her professional journey. Today she is the Staff Innovation Product Manager at FinTech growth company Vestmark.
Growing up locally, Sarah was an avid tennis player, picked up ice hockey, and was an accomplished student. Sarah decided to attend Wellesley College after a chance visit during her sophomore year of high school, where she was captivated by the culture and its focus on empowering ‘women who will.’ Majoring in Biology and minoring in Art History, Sarah planned to attend medical school. She got deep into the sciences, shadowing different positions during her undergraduate studies & internships. After her graduation, she became a researcher at Brigham & Women’s to prepare for medical school.
Ever the researcher, Sarah explored the day-to-day of a medical profession while at Brigham and Women’s, and ultimately decided her interest lay outside of practicing medicine. Seeing how labs were run, on the other hand, piqued her interest on the business side of healthcare. She joined a clinical research center called the Baim Institute for Clinical Research on their Business Development team helping bring in new partners.
Next, she went to Reify Health for her first “for profit” experience. Reify built software for clinical trial pre-screening to help hospitals organize their datasets for patients they wanted to screen that was previously done using spreadsheets & sticky notes.
Looking to advance her career through graduate studies, Sarah explored various paths by speaking with professionals holding PhDs, MPHs, and MBAs. Ultimately, she chose to pursue an MBA, recognizing that its focus on management and business would equip her with the skills needed to unlock future opportunities in the next phase of her career.
At an MIT Sloan prospective students event for women, Sarah felt an immediate sense of belonging and alignment with the school’s commitment to fostering inclusive, forward-thinking leaders. She was thrilled with the opportunity to attend the following fall. Eager to explore new opportunities, she spent her summer as a Product Management intern at EverQuote, where she discovered her interest in product development and accepted a return offer for after graduation. From there, Sarah joined Cogo Labs, a Cambridge-based incubator, where she worked on the launch of a FinTech product and led an early-stage team developing a blockchain product.
Sarah then transitioned, with a team of colleagues from Cogo, to join Vestmark. Sarah is responsible for launching new products for Vestmark, a well established late stage growth financial technology company. Her team works on incubating new products to diversify Vestmark’s product portfolio and increase market share.
Research = Door Knocking
Throughout her career, Sarah has learned that knocking on doors and connecting with different people allows for an informed decision making process for her future.
With each ‘coffee chat’ Sarah learned that to make the connection stress-free the key was to focus on the questions she would like to better understand as the target outcome. At every career junction, she spoke with people in the industry about their experiences – doctors before medical school, alums from graduate school programs, and folks at potential companies. Using a consistent format, she tweaked her questions, took notes, and built on each conversation.
For research and relationship building, she’s built a diligent process. And if you’re out there thinking about the next step in your career, Sarah is always happy to pay it forward when someone reaches out.
3 Career Insights / Learnings
Learning Drives Momentum – “Learning is a big driver for me, both personally and professionally. Always staying curious and not being afraid to ask questions to help follow that curiosity has helped career transitions and professional growth.”
Team Trust – “I’ve learned to value strong relationships with mutual respect over the course of my career. Whether it’s comfort sharing feedback on ideas, or knowing each member is accountable, a team that has established trust produces amazing results.”
Navigating Ambiguity – “Being comfortable in ambiguous situations but also being able to eliminate ambiguity for members of your team is an important balance. You have to balance ambiguity for team agility with creating a shared reality for target execution.”
Sarah wants to continue building things with awesome teams. When she thinks about the long term, she wants to continue to grow her product career and strives to be in a position to foster and drive DEI impact. Until then, she’ll continue to hold the door open behind her and give opportunities where she can through volunteering and non-profit work.If you want to learn more about Sarah you can find her playing racket sports around Boston, walking her dog along the Charles with her partner, or on LinkedIn. Thanks for sharing. We’re excited to see all of the relationships, research, and products you build in the coming years!