30 Conversations | Conversation #8 | Your Career Is Bigger Than You

What if the path you had to figure out alone could become the roadmap someone else gets to follow?

This week, I had the privilege of sitting down with Ximena Espana, LL.M., Legal Counsel at Cenovus Energy, as part of my 30 Conversations project—a personal research initiative exploring the intersection of finance, strategy, commercial law, venture capital, innovation, and leadership.

A special thank you to Yvonne E.L. (Gorski) Silver for making the introduction.

I was particularly excited for this conversation because Ximena brings a unique perspective to commercial law. Alongside her corporate legal experience, she has used her own journey as an internationally trained lawyer to help create pathways for others navigating the Canadian legal profession.

A little about Ximena

Ximena guides her career with a simple philosophy:

“Where one eats, everyone can eat.”

She began her legal career in tax law in Colombia, where she quickly noticed how competitive and relationship-driven the profession could be. Her curiosity pushed her to look beyond the work itself and understand the industries she was advising, eventually leading her to pursue a Master of Natural Resources, Energy and Environmental Law at the University of Calgary..

Today, she combines her experience in law, energy, and international career transitions to help create greater access for internationally trained lawyers through Global Lawyers of Canada.

Her journey reminded me that your career story doesn’t have to end with you—it can become a pathway for someone else.

Three ideas that challenged my thinking

💡 1. Legal is the nervous system of a business.

I had never thought about legal this way before.

Like the nervous system, legal teams are constantly detecting potential risks, sending signals across the organization, and helping determine whether the business should pause, proceed, or change course.

But what stood out to me was how interconnected that function is with everything else happening inside a business.

A contract isn’t just a contract. It connects finance, operations, sales, strategy, risk, customers, employees, and ultimately the organization’s ability to create value.

Reflection: Peel back the layers of a profession and ask: What is this function actually in service of, and how does it connect to the rest of the business?

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💡 2. How do you create value instead of simply avoiding cost?

Legal is often viewed as a cost centre: necessary, important, but not directly responsible for generating revenue.

Ximena challenged that framing.

A commercial lawyer has a unique vantage point because they sit across so many parts of the business. The opportunity is to move beyond simply reviewing documents and start understanding the business problem the document is trying to solve.

The difference between a lawyer who executes and a lawyer who becomes a trusted business partner can come down to one thing:

Are you only answering the question you’re given, or are you helping the business ask better questions?

Reflection: Your job description defines your responsibilities. It doesn’t have to define the full extent of your value.

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💡 3. Your industry needs you too.

If law is ultimately about serving people, shouldn’t access to the profession—and the expertise within it—be broader?

Ximena shared her perspective on the barriers internationally trained lawyers can face when trying to establish themselves in Canada. Her response hasn’t simply been to navigate those barriers for herself, but to help change the pathway for others.

Through her work with Global Lawyers of Canada, she is helping create greater opportunities for internationally trained and globally minded lawyers.

That made me think beyond individual careers.

Every industry has its own networks, barriers, gatekeepers, and unwritten rules. Once we understand them, we have a choice: use that knowledge only to advance ourselves, or use it to make the path a little easier for the person coming next.

Reflection: Don’t just learn how to navigate your industry. Ask how you can help make it better.

My biggest takeaway

Every conversation in this project has reinforced that careers are rarely linear, but they can be intentional.

The lesson I’ll be taking from this conversation is:

“Your story isn’t just yours.”

Ximena shared how having family members who were already doctors in Canada could have made navigating a professional path much easier. Instead, choosing law meant stepping into unfamiliar territory without an obvious roadmap.

She didn’t have all the answers. She learned by doing, committed to becoming excellent at her craft, and built her own path.

Now, that path is helping others find theirs.

It made me rethink what it means to build a career. Maybe success isn’t only about how far we go. It’s also about whether the path we create makes it easier for someone else to go further.

How I’m applying this

Learning only matters if it changes how we think or act.

Because of this conversation, I’m going to:

• Look beyond my job description and understand how different functions connect across an organization.
• Ask how I can create value beyond completing the task in front of me.
• Pay closer attention to the barriers within the industries I’m entering—and think about how my experiences could help make those pathways more accessible to others.

I’m excited to see how these small changes shape my own career journey.

A thank you

Thank you, Ximena, for your generosity, openness, and willingness to share your experiences. I truly appreciate your time and the wisdom you shared.

Conversations like these remind me that sometimes the most meaningful thing we can do with what we’ve learned is leave the door a little more open than we found it.

Help me reach 30 conversations

This is Conversation #8 of 30.

My goal is to speak with professionals across:

• M&A and Commercial Law
• Venture Capital
• Investment Banking
• Corporate, Economic, Industry and Development
• Corporate Strategy
• Innovation & Entrepreneurship
• Family Offices
• Economic Development
• Luxury and Consumer Strategy
• Fashion Business
• Media, Entertainment and Tourism Business

If you work in one of these areas or know someone whose perspective would add to this project, I would love an introduction.

Every conversation is helping me better understand how organizations create value through capital, strategy, governance, and innovation, and I hope these reflections provide value to others exploring similar career questions.

Who do you think I should speak with next?

Eight conversations down. Twenty-two more opportunities to learn.

#30Conversations #CareerDevelopment #Leadership #CommercialLaw #MandA #VentureCapital #CorporateStrategy #Finance #Innovation #Mentorship