With roots in graphic design, creative direction, and information architecture, Rachael learned early how to shape ideas visually and make complexity easier to navigate. That foundation grew into broader work in customer experience, innovation, consulting, and executive transformation, where she has helped organizations rethink how they engage customers, design emerging technology, and bring new experiences to life.
Her work sits at the crossroads of customer experience, business strategy, technology, and design. She has helped organizations imagine new services, rethink key moments in the customer journey, and build experiences that connect brand promise with operational reality. She’s also one of those rare people who genuinely enjoys digging through customer data, finding patterns, and translating insight into better experiences.
Rachael has led global teams, built new methods and practices, contributed to patentable innovations, and developed transformation approaches that helped companies navigate everything from digital reinvention to AI adoption. She’s known for turning fuzzy ambition into something people can see, discuss, align around, and build. In other words: she likes making the abstract useful.
A New Yorker by origin and a Silicon Valley transplant, she moved west after her work caught the attention of Cisco’s customer innovation team. She has been chasing the edge of what’s possible ever since.
Off the clock, Rachael is usually immersed in her garden or a DIY project that usually involves spray paint.
Her work has been recognized in a few different ways over the years: patents, published thought leadership, industry recognition, and one memorable stop on Time Magazine’s Best Invention List.
Text by Rachael McBrearty