After a long-term marketing career, Ksenia German successfully pivoted to healthcare by leveraging her family roots and professional resilience to pursue a human-centered career in nursing.
Carrie Varoquiers
Chief Impact Officer
Workday
Ksenia German spent over 15 years building a successful marketing career in the tech industry.
But when she found herself at a crossroads, she made a radical choice: to switch gears entirely, trade algorithms for anatomy, and dedicate herself to investing in humanity by pursuing a new career in nursing.
“I wanted to hold my profession in my hands, and physically help others,” she explains.
Once she had identified her calling, everything fell into place. “I believe if we’re moving in the right direction,” German says, “the universe will help us.”
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Nursing may seem like a dramatic departure from the world of tech, but German was no stranger to the medical field. Both of her parents are doctors in her home country, Russia. And although she admired their work, the prospect of attending medical school after high school felt daunting. Instead, she enrolled at St. Petersburg State University, where she earned a master’s degree in marketing.
After graduate school, German launched her career in marketing, sales, and operations within enterprise environments. She steadily advanced into a leadership role and jetted off to Paris, Berlin, and London to work with fashion and beauty brands.
“I was a panel speaker at conferences, in stilettos and suits,” she recalls. “From the outside, I had it all.”
In 2018, seeking a new challenge, German co-founded an AI visual recognition startup with two partners. “It was early days, and investor interest in AI was high,” she says. The company secured some funding, and German relocated from Russia to the United States to lead sales efforts with clients such as Hearst and Condé Nast.
Like many startups, however, the company struggled to gain lasting traction. When funding dried up, the startup went down. German took a role in tech sales to stay afloat. The work provided little financial stability or fulfillment, and over time she grew increasingly disillusioned with the aggressive nature of sales culture.
Still, she relied on the income and had no backup plan when she was abruptly laid off in 2023.
The moment proved pivotal. “All of a sudden, I realized I’m replaceable. The work I had been doing could be replaced by technology. I felt it was time to get in touch with my personal value, as a human,”German reflects.
She realized she craved genuine human connection and wanted to hone skills that had nothing to do with screens. Nursing appealed for precisely those reasons, and she felt that the care and empathy she could provide as a nurse was irreplaceable. But before she could apply to nursing school, she needed to complete several prerequisite courses.
German enrolled at her local community college to meet the requirements and began looking for work to support herself. Around the same time, she received an employment opportunity email from San Francisco’s Office of Workforce Development. One listing stood out: a clinical medical assistant training program at Jewish Vocational Service (JVS).
“I applied for the program in September 2023, just one month after I was laid off,” she recounts. “At the end of December, just before Christmas, I received confirmation that I’d been accepted. It was meant to be.”
The program began in January 2024. By April, German secured an externship in the department of otolaryngology - head and neck surgery at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). One month later, she was offered a paid position on staff and transitioned into a full-time medical assistant role after completing her program at JVS.
The gravity of the accomplishment isn’t lost on her. “It’s incredible,” she emphasizes. “Getting into a major medical facility like UCSF is very difficult and competitive.”
“All of a sudden, I realized I’m replaceable. The work I had been doing could be replaced by technology. I felt it was time to get in touch with my personal value, as a human.” - Ksenia German
This past October, German took her next step, enrolling in a one-year accelerated nursing program at Samuel Merritt University in Oakland, Calif. She resigned from her position at UCSF, with hopes of returning one day as a registered nurse.
To keep pace with the program’s rigorous demands, she uses AI as a “study buddy,” relying on it to help organize her notes. While she’s mindful of the risks of overdependence, she believes the technology holds great promise, particularly in its potential to make healthcare more affordable and give doctors more time with patients.
For now, she feels grounded and aligned in her decision. “I’m finally using both my brain and my heart,” she says. “I wasn’t able to do that for many years.”
Initially drawn to the physical aspects of patient care, German has also come to appreciate the emphasis nursing places on critical thinking. “When I moved to the United States, I thought I had fully adapted and assimilated,” she reflects. “But nursing is rebuilding the way I think. I’m sure that in a year, I’ll process information and communicate very differently.”
Once German completes her nursing program, she’ll take the National Council Licensing Examination (NCLEX) to obtain her license and begin paying off her student loans. She plans to approach those milestones the same way she’s navigated her career pivot so far: one step at a time.
The most important thing, she says, is to dream big and not let fear of change stand in the way. “Everything is possible, if you want it to be.”
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