We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Joi Morgan, MD, MHA, MS a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Joi, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. If you had a defining moment that you feel really changed the trajectory of your career, we’d love to hear the story and details.

The most defining moment in my life that changed the trajectory was being fired from my job a week after my father’s funeral. I was working for a company and was the only black female doctor in which I was a good employee according to my boss on the job site. I would go in early and stay late. Before my father passed I informed my boss that my father was going to hospice on that Tuesday and we were told he would pass by the weekend. I asked to be off because he lived about an hour away to go see him. During that time I was called several times by my job because they were promoting me, as my siblings and I were in the mist of something unimaginable. So a promotion seemed good although I wasn’t up for celebrating.