Leading Through Continuous Change

Laura Demuth, NP-BC, EMBA — SVP People and Patients, Curology

Strategy is often seen as the most important part of organizational leadership. It is important but there’s another skill leaders must have – knowing how to lead through change. Organizational leaders need to know how to anticipate and initiate change. They must explain the reason for the change and help the team embrace the new reality so they can all move forward together.

Laura Demuth, Senior Vice President of People and Patients at Curology, has seen the company from its early days to now $200M in revenue. Guiding a company through so many iterations, Laura has learned how to lean into change.

In our conversation we talked about:

• Her experience as a clinician helps her as an organizational leader at Curology

• The importance of continuous learning

• How cross-functional empathy and building relationships with leaders from different disciplines foster collaboration and innovation

• How she went from change averse to seeing it as an opportunity

• The importance of understanding the impact of change and why effective communication is critical

We met through TroopHR so we don’t know each other well. Can you introduce yourself?

My name is Laura Demuth, and I am a nurse practitioner and now an executive leader with a diverse background in healthcare and leadership. I began my career in bedside nursing, working with incarcerated individuals in New York State as well as in inpatient hematology-oncology, caring for patients with cancer. Driven to expand my impact, I pursued a master’s degree to become a nurse practitioner and transitioned into primary care and internal medicine, seeking a more traditional role. However, I quickly became disillusioned with the limitations of the modern healthcare system and the challenges of making a meaningful impact within the constraints of a traditional exam room.

Life eventually took me from the East Coast to the West Coast, where I was introduced to the world of startups and digital health. In 2015, I joined Pocketderm—a telehealth dermatology startup that later rebranded as Curology—as employee number 12. I was inspired by the mission and the ability to leverage technology to provide high-quality care to patients across the country with just a few keystrokes.

In addition to my work in healthcare, I co-host the Mighty as a Mother podcast, where we explore the intersection of motherhood and career, and pursuing passions while raising kids.

You have such a fascinating history from being a practitioner to employee number 12 at a startup but I bet you use that knowledge in your current role.

Absolutely, my current role is at Curology where I’m the Senior Vice President of People and Patients. I oversee our people and culture team as well as our medical, licensing, and customer success functions. Blending a healthcare background with a head of people role gives Curology a great ability to care for our patients and our employees in a similar way, and to rally our organization around our Northstar. It was a huge pivot to hang up my lab coat and stethoscope, especially ten years ago during a time when telehealth was not quite as mainstream or accepted.

When I made the leap to digital health, I faced skepticism—questions like, “What are you doing? You’re just going to sit at a computer all day?” But I knew I would always have my licenses and clinical skills to fall back on if needed. More importantly, I saw this as the future of healthcare.

In Curology’s early days, our mission was simple: to make effective skincare accessible. Since then, we’ve expanded significantly—we now operate pharmacies and provide custom-compounded topical medications for common skincare concerns shipped directly to patients. Beyond telehealth, our dermatologist-designed OTC and cosmetic products are also on the shelves at major retailers like Target and CVS, bringing our solutions to people nationwide.

As a clinician, it’s incredibly rewarding to be part of something with such scale and impact. I just happened to take the leap a little earlier than most.

What was the company like when you started as employee number 12?

It was a blast! I was so drawn to the mission and the people, but at the time, I didn’t fully grasp what it meant to join a startup—or the risk I was taking by leaving the stability of the mainstream healthcare system. It was an exciting but challenging journey—demanding hard work, yet deeply meaningful.

Working at Curology has allowed me to engage both sides of my brain. In clinical medicine, everything is rooted in evidence and science. But at Curology, I also had the chance to be creative, flex my strengths, and grow as a leader. In the early days, we did it all—mixing and compounding creams, boxing up products, and even personally bringing them to the post office to ship to patients.

Fast forward nearly a decade, and we now have multiple facilities, hundreds of employees, and have treated millions of patients. Looking back, it’s truly incredible to see how far we’ve come, and so exciting to see where else we can go.

What was that leap into a leadership role like? Was that something that you had planned, or expected? How was that?

It wasn’t something I had planned or expected, but it felt completely natural. I quickly realized that leadership in digital health aligned with me—it energized me, fueled my passion, and gave me a new sense of purpose. Stepping into this role allowed me to shift away from direct patient care and focus on leading, building, and scaling something bigger.

We were growing at an incredible pace, onboarding and scaling rapidly, and it was exciting to be part of that momentum. One of the most rewarding aspects was bringing other clinicians into this new world—showing them firsthand how impactful and fulfilling digital health could be.

Was there anything that you had to shift about your mindset or behavior?

In the early days of my career, I imagined my path would be straightforward—I’d be a clinician or maybe a supervisor. I never could have predicted ending up where I am today, and it’s incredibly exciting.

I didn’t go to business school in the traditional sense, so stepping into this world came with a steep learning curve. I was managing a P&L before I even knew what “P&L” stood for, which meant a lot of learning on the fly and getting scrappy. But as a clinician, continuous learning is second nature, so I applied that same mindset to understanding the business side of healthcare.

Traditional medicine can be rigid and hierarchical, but in a digital health startup—especially in the early stages—you strip a lot of that away. Instead of rigid structures, you have a roundtable where diverse perspectives and backgrounds shape decisions. It was refreshing to break free from those traditional models and work in an environment where collaboration and shared learning were at the core of what we built and what we continue to foster at Curology.

As an org leader, it’s so important to understand not just your function but the business and the other functions. I know you talked with other leaders to learn more about the business. Were they pretty open to sitting down with you?

Absolutely. In an early-stage startup, everyone is essentially sitting at the same table. When the team dynamic is strong and there’s psychological safety, you feel comfortable raising your hand and saying, I don’t know this—but I want to learn. That openness creates an environment where growth happens quickly, and you can model this way for others.

I am so fortunate to work alongside incredible partners at Curology over the past decade up until present day who played a huge role in my development. Their willingness to share knowledge helped shape my understanding of the business, and I’ve made it a priority to pay that forward—supporting others in their own growth and leadership journeys.

So smart. Asking others about their area of expertise builds your knowledge and relationships in one. I bet they all were happy to talk to you.

Absolutely. That’s something I still live by today. Many of our clinical team members are teachers at heart, so we really appreciate when someone asks us to explain the science behind what we’re doing. We even built that into our company onboarding process. It not only helps individuals grow in their roles, but it also enriches our entire knowledge base, making everyone stronger as a team and creating an employee base that are also brand ambassadors in their own personal lives and communities.

Cultivating a culture of collaboration—especially in remote environments—is crucial. Reaching across the table, sharing expertise, and learning from each other is what makes a team truly thrive.

Adopting a coaching mindset as a senior leader is also key to this process—helping others in all functions learn, grow, and find solutions for themselves rather than just providing answers.

It’s brilliant. We can get stuck in our functional expertise, forgetting that we all have to work together. When this happens we can get into fights about what’s most important. We have to understand why someone is fighting for something. If I don’t understand your function or how that work plays into the business, I might not be as open to you.

That happens in a lot of organizations. You put that well.

I describe it to my leaders as generating cross-functional empathy. Know why that other person is coming to you with this emergency. Before you get into defensive mode and say, We've always done it this way and the evidence says we have to do it this way. Take a beat, take a beat, and just do a little bit of understanding.

It’s essential for clinicians to play a role in shaping the culture of healthcare and healthcare-adjacent organizations because the skills we use in the exam room are directly transferable. When a patient is upset, it’s our job to dig deeper—recognizing that there may be a question behind the question or an issue beneath the surface. We’re trained to uncover the root cause and address it appropriately. The same mindset applies in a startup or corporate environment. It’s about understanding the underlying dynamics, diagnosing challenges, and finding the right solutions to create a healthy, productive culture.

I describe it to my leaders as generating cross-functional empathy. Know why that other person is coming to you with this emergency. Before you get into defensive mode and say, We've always done it this way and the evidence says we have to do it this way. Take a beat, take a beat, and just do a little bit of understanding.

I love that you bring so many things from being a clinician into leadership. I’d like to talk more about your role now. What do you oversee and how big is the company?

Yes, absolutely. I’m the Senior Vice President of People and Patients at Curology. About 20 years ago, as a nurse’s aide, I never could have imagined that I’d be leading a people or full medical team or impacting organizational culture in the way I do today. It’s not what I envisioned for my career path, but I’m grateful for it, and I’m genuinely excited by the journey and want to do this forever!

I oversee our people, medical, licensing, and customer success functions. At Curology, we strive to work as one cohesive team with a shared set of goals and a unified purpose—to serve our consumers and patients. It's powerful and unifying. My career at Curology began by managing our medical organization and in-house licensing team. Since we’re a telehealth company, it’s critical that our clinicians are licensed in the states where our patients are receiving their care, so all of our providers are multi-state licensed. They are deeply passionate about their work and the impact they can have in ways that traditional healthcare settings often didn’t allow. It’s a privilege to lead this diverse group of nurse practitioners, PAs, physicians, and others, in a highly collaborative, academic environment centered on continuous learning and teamwork.

As for our business, we’ve treated over 6 million patients in the past 10+ years, which is remarkable. I still have patients who’ve been with me since 2015, and it’s truly fulfilling to see the tangible impact we’ve made. Our revenue has grown to over $200 million—we started from just a very small fraction of that when I joined. It’s been an incredible journey, evolving from one prescription product to a broad portfolio of prescription and non-prescription items, a strong online and retail presence, and substantial growth in both direct-to-consumer and other channels. We have a powerhouse team of executives and leaders, as well as dynamite teams that are so motivated to shape they way we serve our patients and consumers.

My sweet spot is continuous change and helping organizations move and navigate through different chapters of their story.

How many people are in your org that you oversee?

About 150.

You’ve seen the business make a lot of changes. Not a lot of people go from 12 to Series D in a leadership role. I'm curious about how you navigated those changes.

I’m increasingly aware of how much of a dinosaur I am at Curology. I love change, though I know it’s not for everyone. When I was leading a lot of hiring early on, one of the first things I’d mention to candidates was, Are you okay with a company that feels like a different company every three to six months? In the 10 years I’ve been here, we’ve probably been 50 different companies. Our culture has shifted countless times.

In the past, the culture was centered around perks—ping pong tables, beer in the fridge—but not necessarily about how we worked together. After the pandemic, we had to intentionally build and nurture a strong culture, especially since we no longer have as many physical office spaces like we did before. The pandemic created a fascinating shift, not just for our business and culture, but for society at large.

For telehealth businesses like Curology, the pandemic actually worked in our favor. We sit at a unique intersection of beauty, tech, and healthcare—offering products that treat both skin care conditions and cosmetic concerns served to patients in a high-tech way. The pandemic sparked a surge in interest around skincare, which gave our business a significant boost. We saw some truly amazing gains during that time. It’s been quite the adventure.

There are probably people like me who thrive in navigating constant change. Then there are others I’ve spoken to in the industry who prefer to stay within specific stages—like, "I only do Series B." They move from Series B to Series C, and once that stage is over, they step away and join another Series B. That’s their sweet spot.

My sweet spot is continuous change and helping organizations move and navigate through different chapters of their story.

I love what you talked about continuous change. Were you aware that you loved and were good at it before you came to Curology?

No, I wasn’t. If you’re sitting here thinking, “I’m so change-averse and I thrive on stability,” — you might surprise yourself if you take a chance on a new role that feels unfamiliar or different. Let me back up a bit—I made a 3,000-mile move across the country on my own, coupled with some big personal changes, and it completely changed my life. That was a pivotal moment in my adult life where change became essential, and I leaned into it. I wasn’t afraid of it; I embraced it, and it’s helped me in my professional life as well.

I’d say I was pretty risk-averse as a child, a student, and even in my early professional years. But once I started embracing change in my career, I truly came alive. As a leader, it’s energizing to see change as an opportunity to steer the ship in the right direction. There are always people who struggle with transitions, and as a leader, you can either coach them through the shift or help them find a new path if they’re not able to adapt.

Change is just a necessity in life. It's going to happen to us personally, it's going to happen to us professionally. So I see it as an opportunity to harness and embrace that and in turn, help others harness and embrace it.

The work I do is really about change. It’s an undercurrent we don’t talk about enough so I love that we are. Was there an a-ha moment about embracing change or did it evolve more slowly?

In the early days, I didn’t recognize it for what it was—I was just in the trenches, getting things done, adapting quickly. When things move so fast, there’s little time to reflect. It wasn’t until I started working with an executive coach that I really took a step back and realized how much change we had actually driven through the system. It was a process of looking back, reflecting on those experiences, and then using those lessons to inform the future. So I looked back and said, Hey, we survived that. And we didn't just survive, we thrived. How can I apply those learnings to the next phase of change that we have going on in Curology?

When interviewing, how do you find out whether someone can handle an organization that is changing?

Much of the interviewing and hiring I’ve done has focused on the clinical side, so I’ll use that as an example. A clinician with 5 or 10 years of experience in the same practice or hospital has likely encountered some level of change, but in many cases, those organizations are slow-moving with significant red tape. Even if you identify as a change-maker, you often don’t have the opportunity to drive much transformation in larger, more traditional healthcare systems.

In interviews, I often explain that at Curology, we’re essentially a new company every three to six months. We embrace change quickly and frequently. For clinicians, this means evolving protocols. Many are used to operating within a well-defined set of guidelines, especially in larger organizations where those protocols can remain unchanged for years, and updating them can be a Herculean task.

In a startup environment, we might be practicing one way today and a completely different way tomorrow. Clinicians sometimes don’t realize how challenging that can be. So, I ask them about their experiences with policy and protocol changes—how they’ve navigated and adapted to shifts in their practice and how they integrated new approaches into patient care.

Change is just a necessity in life. It's going to happen to us personally, it's going to happen to us professionally. So I see it as an opportunity to harness and embrace that and in turn, help others harness and embrace it.

When you’re introducing change, how do you help get the team on board? What are some of the things you’ve learned?

That’s a biggie. Introducing change can be challenging, especially because, as comfortable as I am with change, it doesn’t matter if the people around me aren’t on board. If the team is resistant, it’s hard to make a meaningful impact. So, I approach it with the mindset we discussed earlier—how we can excel by understanding and empathizing with the person across from them. I approach this by helping others understand the reason behind the change, and if possible, generate some empathy for the situation.

We’ve experienced some reorganization in recent years, and that’s never easy. As leaders, it’s crucial to first put ourselves in the shoes of those affected and truly understand how the changes will impact them. One of the key elements of successfully communicating change is addressing the “why.” When people understand the purpose behind the change, they’re more likely to buy into it. Of course, not everyone will embrace the change right away—and that’s okay. It’s unrealistic to expect a 100% success rate in getting everyone to pivot seamlessly. Some will move with you, and others won’t.

Yeah, I think we spend a lot of time on the what of change and less time on the why and getting people on board. It’s true we can’t always get 100% but if we don’t get the majority on board will cause problems.

Absolutely.

Is there anything else about your journey that we haven’t covered yet?

Doing a little bit of professional development and personal development on change is really, really beneficial.

It’s ok to pivot and do different things. If it feels uncomfortable, that’s where growth happens.

Throughout my journey, I’ve embraced roles that, on paper, might make someone question, "Why is she doing that?" I encourage others to take a similar approach, even if it feels like a departure from the traditional career path you’re expected to follow. That playbook no longer holds true. Career journeys are personal, and in today’s world, it’s crucial to lean into your strengths and passions, especially when they don’t align with conventional expectations. Life is too short to dislike what you do professionally, so ensure that you are doing something that you love!

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Navigating change with all the uncertainty and complexity can be a real challenge for leaders. If you’re a leader looking for support, I can help. Learn more or schedule a call to see if we’re a fit.