I Was One of the Brilliant Ones Burning Out
I didn’t come to AI as an observer.
I came to it from inside the pressure.
Before founding AI NOVALUME, I worked in biotech within high-stakes, compliance-driven environments using platforms like Veeva Systems—where data integrity, validation, audit readiness, and regulatory accuracy are non-negotiable. I was one of the capable, intelligent professionals expected to perform flawlessly while navigating systems that quietly drained time, focus, and cognitive bandwidth.
The burnout didn’t come from the science or the talent.
It came from system friction.
Manual document reviews. Endless approval loops. SOPs that existed but didn’t guide behavior. Version control confusion. Repetitive, error-prone tasks demanding constant vigilance. The kind of invisible labor that never shows up on a performance review—but steadily erodes performance anyway.
I lived it.
I watched brilliant people—including myself—spend more time managing processes than applying expertise. Not because we lacked discipline or intelligence, but because the systems weren’t designed to augment human cognition.
That frustration became my turning point.
Instead of accepting burnout as the cost of excellence, I started asking better questions:
Why are humans doing work better suited for automation and pattern recognition?
Why is expert judgment being wasted on low-value, repeatable tasks?
Why are we exhausting people to protect systems—rather than redesigning systems to protect people?
That curiosity pulled me deep into AI—not hype or novelty tools, but operational AI:
- Cognitive load reduction
- Process automation with human oversight
- Risk detection and anomaly flagging
- Decision-support systems built on probabilistic reasoning
AI didn’t remove accountability.
It removed unnecessary strain.
Becoming a certified AI consultant wasn’t about switching careers—it was about transforming lived experience into leverage. Today, through AI NOVALUME, I help organizations stop playing with AI and start beating the competition with it—by embedding AI into workflows in ways that save time, reduce errors, and prevent burnout before it becomes attrition.
I don’t sell AI as magic.
I design it as infrastructure.
Because I know what it feels like to be capable, committed, and quietly overwhelmed.
And I know what’s possible when systems finally work as hard as the people inside them.