From Founder to CEO: Leadership Lessons from Mercedes Aycinena

In honor of Women's History Month, this series features women leaders who are shaping organizations, driving impact, and redefining what leadership looks like.

In this conversation: Mercedes Aycinena — a global healthcare executive with more than 20 years of experience across pharma, medical device, pharmacy, supply chain, med tech, and dental — shares how she grew from executing directives to setting them, why she believes leadership is assumed through accountability rather than granted, and the hard decisions that taught her that values only matter when they cost you something.

Key leadership takeaways:

• Integrity outlasts performance. Protecting culture through hard calls builds trust that outlives any short-term revenue hit. 
• Leadership is assumed, not granted. Stop waiting for permission; set the direction, own the rationale and the risks, and position asks as alignment rather than pleading. 
• You build results by building people. Culture and profit rise together when teams are genuinely cared for. 
• Calm is power. Being calm and kind is strength, not softness — and emotional intelligence at the top is not optional. 
• Nobody is going to crown you. Raise your hand, state your case, and ask for the seat.

Amy: In celebration of Women's History Month, I'm excited to have you with me, Mercedes Aycinena, to share your leadership journey — one I find fascinating, since you grew up in Spain and started your education there, then moved to the U.S. to continue it. So let's start with: tell me about yourself.

Mercedes: Thank you, Amy, for inviting me. I'm from Madrid, Spain — born and raised — but I've lived in Europe, Latin America, and the U.S. for most of my career. I have about 20-plus years of experience, always in healthcare. That's my passion. That's what gets me going in the morning.

I've worked in pharma, medical device, pharmacy, supply chain, med tech, and dental, mostly in commercial functions — marketing, product management — and then I ended up as a CEO. Now I help founders scale their startups. I also have three teenagers at home, so I go to work to relax.

Amy: That's a whole different level of work.

Mercedes: They're good kids — just not at the same time.

Amy: When you look at your career, what moment or decision shaped you into the leader you are today?

Mercedes: It wasn't a single moment — it was a shift. The bigger my teams got and the more responsibility I had, the more I realized that the more impact you have, the less it's about you. I'm not in love with the term "servant leader," but I do believe leaders have to set the direction and the strategy, and then build the systems, the structure, and the support to empower their teams to execute. Their success becomes your success.

But there was one moment that shaped the type of leader I aspire to be, and it was a hard one. I had to let go of two top performers for ethical reasons. At the time, I knew it was going to hurt — but I also knew that if I didn't act, I'd be signaling that performance mattered more than integrity.

And it did hurt. Revenue in that region took a hit. But the culture didn't. As I watched trust deepen across the organization afterward, I realized that's the kind of leader I wanted to be — especially during hard times. Leadership isn't tested during easy times. And values only matter when they cost you something.

Amy: Was there a point when you had to stop waiting for permission to fully own a seat at the table?

Mercedes: As you take on more responsibility and accountability over a business or a team, the less you can afford to wait for permission. Earlier in my career, I'd wait for direction, execute beautifully, and wait for approval. But at some point leadership expects you to say: "This is the direction. This is what we're doing and why. Here's the rationale, here are the risks, here's the mitigation plan — and we're moving."

So when I did need approval, I positioned it as alignment, not pleading. And more often than not, I didn't get much pushback — not because I was perfect or aggressive, but because I was accountable.

That shift, from waiting for direction to setting the direction, is how people's perception of you changes. It's also how you start to see yourself as a leader. Leadership isn't granted — it's assumed through accountability.

Amy: How do you think about your responsibility as a leader when it comes to building people, in addition to results? Results matter, but —

Mercedes: That's a good one, because to me, building people is how you build results. They're not two separate conversations. I'm very aligned with Richard Branson's philosophy: when you take care of your employees first, they'll take care of your customers.

As a leader, it's important to me to create an environment where high performance feels fair and sustainable — but that's on you to build the systems for. When I was CEO in my last role, we reduced turnover dramatically. Not through slogans on a wall or slide decks, but by taking real action to be more employee-centric.

We stopped and listened to our people's needs and concerns, and then we adjusted. We revisited salaries. We created career paths. We invested in tools and development. We implemented work-life balance. And we made some genuinely hard decisions to protect the culture. Because culture and profit rise together when you take care of the team.

Amy: And that was during an interesting time, when everyone was trying to figure out what work would even look like — back to the office, hybrid — and you'd just built a new office.

Mercedes: Yes, those were tricky times. But like I said: you have to take good care of your teams if you really want results. Without the team, you can't get results.

Amy: What belief about leadership did you hold early in your career that you've since had to unlearn?

Mercedes: I used to think that being calm and kind — which is different from "nice" — would be perceived as soft. And I thought strong leaders knew everything, dominated the room, and had all the answers. I was wrong.

Calm is power. During a crisis, it steadies the room and creates space for resolution. During growth, it builds trust. You can be ambitious and empathetic — those aren't opposites. You can be supportive and make very tough calls. And you certainly don't need to know everything; you need to surround yourself with people who do, keep learning, and ask for help when you need it.

Leaders have to be resilient and motivate people, yes — but it's okay to be vulnerable, to recognize when you're not at your best, and to admit when you're wrong. Imagine that. Stubborn, close-minded leadership is unhealthy for the business and for everyone around it. Psychological safety isn't built by perfection — it's built by humility. Strong leadership doesn't have to be loud, but emotional intelligence at the top is not optional.

Amy: As you look ahead, what does meaningful success look like for you now — beyond title, beyond achievement?

Mercedes: My vision for a company goes beyond a revenue or EBITDA number — though those matter. To me, it's about building a workplace where people want to come to work every day, or almost every day, without the Sunday scaries.

Years ago, title and scope meant success. Now it means: Did I build something sustainable? Did I elevate people? Did I stay aligned to my values? If I can look back and see that the teams are stronger, more capable, and happier because I was there — that's success for me.

Amy: What's one piece of advice you wish someone had given you ten years earlier?

Mercedes: Challenge the status quo early and often — not to be contrarian, but to improve things. I've worked in a lot of systems that were less than ideal, and the people with the most impact are the ones who don't protect the default settings. They challenge them, take calculated risks, and innovate. I wish I'd trusted that curiosity earlier, and trusted that challenging wasn't disrespectful. It was leadership.

Amy: I hear that a lot, and some of it comes with maturity. But how do you help someone reach that maturity sooner in their career? I think about that often, especially with the women here at AccruePartners.

Mercedes: Leaders have to establish psychological safety — where people feel comfortable speaking up about what's not working, but also feel safe to try ideas and to be okay with failing. Unless you fail, you don't learn from it. So it takes leaders, it takes good mentorship, and it takes your own courage to try new things.

Amy: Last one: what's one bold move that changed your career trajectory?

Mercedes: Probably the first time I raised my hand for a bigger executive role — after the president at the time had said there was no internal talent for it. Everyone got offended, and so did I, but not for long. I thought, "He barely knows me, let alone what I can do." So I built a plan, asked for feedback, secured internal support, and threw my hat in the ring against eight external candidates. And I got the job. That shift changed how I saw myself and what I believed I could do.

That pattern repeated years later when I applied for the CEO role. I didn't check all the traditional boxes, but I knew the business, I knew the people, and I knew what good could look like. Nobody tapped me on the shoulder. At some point you have to realize that nobody is going to crown you. You have to raise your hand, state your case, and ask for the seat.

I recently heard Barbara Corcoran — one of the Sharks — say that playing the victim in an unfair situation is just handing out your power. Nobody takes my power away, and I agree with her. Focus on what you can influence, and speak up. Confidence doesn't come from knowing you're perfect or that you know everything — it comes from knowing you'll figure it out. But you have to be bold enough to step up and go for it.

Amy: You've got to be your own biggest fan. Nobody else is going to be there to do it for you.

Mercedes: No, no.

Amy: Mercedes, thank you for sharing more about your career journey and the pivotal moments that have gotten you where you are today.

Mercedes: Thank you, Amy. It was great chatting with you.