Spotlight on Success: Dayna Wolfe

Dr. Dayna Wolfe is a physician who specializes in physical medicine and rehabilitation. She has been hard of hearing since birth, has scoliosis, spina bifida, and advanced degenerative joint disease. She wears hearing aids in both ears, and communicates in both English and sign language. She has had several joint reconstructive surgeries, a spinal fusion, and was a wheelchair user for community mobility and sports until 2003, when she became the recipient of a Medtronic spinal neurostimulator implant.

During the 1990s Wolfe had set her sights on a career working with pediatric amputees, but complications from her spina bifida resulted in the need to select a course of study which would be less physically demanding. This was a great disappointment, but she found other activities which at least partially fulfilled her career aspirations. After completing training she entered part time private medical practice and consulting. She then became the Director of Community Medical Services for Axis Healthcare.

In 2004 she was selected to be a University of Minnesota Human Rights Center, Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellow. Her project (hosted jointly by Hesperian Foundation and Cross-Cultural Solutions, Tanzania) took her to the region of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. "My role there was to guide community leaders and local villagers with disabilities to develop and run a sustainable workshop where they could craft assistive devices which could enhance their mobility. I also trained able-bodied lay health workers to support the health and social welfare of the workers and their families. During the fellowship year, I was also one of the medical editors for a book just published last month by Hesperian Foundation, titled A Health Manual for Women With Disabilities."

Wolfe’s professional success overseas signified a post-implant return in some physical functions she had previously lost after the complicated spine surgeries, so when she returned from Africa, she decided not to reopen her medical practice but to elicit the support of Rehabilitation Services at the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development. She worked with the state’s Vocational Rehabilitation program for nearly two years, receiving career guidance, job placement services, assistive technology and other services.

She wanted to change the direction of her career in a way she believed would more accurately match her current interests and abilities. To prepare for this transition, Rehabilitation Services helped her to enter the Medtronic ABLED Mentorship Program in March 2006. A Fortune 500 company, Medtronic is currently the world leader in the medical device industry. ABLED is one of many Medtronic-sponsored employee diversity special interest groups (ABLED stands for "Awareness Benefiting Leadership and Employees with Disabilities"). The mentoring program matches Medtronic employees with young adults in the community who are interested in careers related to the medical device industry.

Wolfe asked to be matched with a successful Medtronic executive, many of whom are rarely accessible for guidance through traditional networking means. She trusted few others than a leader in a world-renowned organization to guide her during this critical crossroads in her career. 

She was matched with Sr. Talent Development Specialist Marlene Gravlin, from Medtronic Talent Development Solutions, part of the Global Business Solutions Division. Before meeting Gravlin, Wolfe searched, for a year without success, through a multitude of popular job search methods, to find gainful employment with a new career direction. 

She felt that being a physician was a liability in her job search for positions which did not involve direct patient care. Employers would see her credentials and assume she would be either too expensive to employ, or that she would not stick around for long. Gravlin guided her through a "talent marketing make-over," and she was hired by Medtronic within five months. 

She is now one of two Principal Clinical Educators in the Learning and Performance Development Division of Medtronic Neurological. Medtronic aims to be a global leader in the employment of talented people with disabilities.

"I am a poster child for the company, because the Medtronic implantable products I received as a patient (the Synergy Dorsal Column Spinal Cord Neurostimulator, and the Sofamor Danek spinal fusion rods) helped restore multiple physical functions, salvage my medical career, and significantly improve the quality of my life. I have a passion for the company mission and products, and hope that the work I do for them will exemplify this as well."

Wolfe had to think seriously before making a commitment to work in a corporation. There is not much flexibility in how you accomplish certain tasks when working for a corporation, a potential barrier to success. It took Wolfe several years of rehabilitation to reach a point where she felt she could commit to reliably meeting the work responsibilities for a world class employer such as Medtronic.

 "I am struggling so much more with my physical limitations than I did while in business for myself, where I could select any schedule which suited me," she says. On the positive side, working for an employer provides more economic security than she had while self-employed.

Wolfe’s primary career aspiration is to make a sustainable contribution to the world that will ease the suffering of humanity. She is also currently working on a series of books which aim to foster self-pride and guide the social integration of youth with disabilities with able-bodied kids.

Wolfe advises people with disabilities who are looking for jobs, "If you want to be successful in life, you must learn to be resilient to rapid change. Avoid habitual patterns of responding in ways which support escaping from anything which makes you uncomfortable. Take courage in honestly assessing your weaknesses (certainly not all at once!), then develop an agenda for improving upon them, by working with someone you trust and will hold you accountable. When you meet people who may behave in ways which demonstrate a lack of knowledge or sensitivity towards people with disabilities, treat them as though you are an appointed eloquent ambassador of the global disability community. By doing this you will exponentially spread good will through them to the many others which they will then meet, on behalf of all people with disabilities."