"This has to be the right fit for you too."

A few days before the interview that would launch my communications career, my dad sent me a long email full of advice.

“This has to be the right fit for you too,” is the line that stayed with me.

At 21, I understood the words.

Living them took another decade.

Behind The Résumé

Our careers are never only about work.

I came out at 15 in a small Ohio town. I grew up navigating changing family relationships and evolving definitions of what home and family could look like.

I have moved across the country, started over in new cities, rebuilt community, changed jobs, questioned old definitions of success, and learned that life rarely waits until everything feels perfectly clear.

Those experiences taught me how much courage it can take to say what is true. To acknowledge that something no longer fits. To ask for what you need. And to move forward before you can see the entire path.

They also taught me that career, identity, confidence, family, relationships, ambition, and belonging do not exist in separate boxes. They all enter the room with us.

That is why my work takes the whole person into account.

The Back Story

I spent more than 10 years helping people make sense of important moments.

My career took me through corporate affairs, executive communications, crisis and issues management, employee communications, organizational change, and agency life.

I supported leaders and organizations through moments when the message mattered, the pressure was high, and the path forward was not always obvious.

Along the way, I moved across the country, earned my MBA, stepped into larger roles, worked with incredibly talented people, and built a career I am deeply proud of.

I also became very good at pursuing the next opportunity.

We are talking research documents, interview preparation, handwritten thank-you notes, follow-ups, leave-behinds, and fully developed plans before anyone had officially hired me.

That preparation helped me grow. It sharpened my instincts, strengthened my confidence, and taught me how to understand an audience, find the real story, and turn complexity into a clear next step.

Eventually, though, I began asking a different question:

Was I building the next impressive chapter—or the next chapter that genuinely fit?

Finding My Superpower Through the Process

Some of the most meaningful work I have done never appeared in a job description.

Throughout my career, people came to me for help.

Sometimes they needed to prepare for an interview. Sometimes they needed help understanding their strengths or explaining their experience. Sometimes they were trying to decide whether to stay, leave, start over, speak up, or take a chance.

Those conversations never felt like extra work. They gave me energy.

A college connection once asked me for help finding a new role. They got the job, but when it did not turn out to be the dream, we kept talking. About work. Life. Whether to stay. When to leave. What they wanted next. Those conversations eventually helped them move toward a career and life that fit them better.

Another person once sent me a LinkedIn message with questions about one of my jobs. I took the call, helped them understand the opportunity, and prepared them for the interview. They got the job. Years later, they told me they still remembered that conversation and believed it had changed their life.

I had no idea.

What stayed with me was not the idea that I had given either person the perfect answer. It was that I had helped create enough clarity for them to find their own.

I loved listening closely, finding the thread, and helping someone move from:

"I should…"

to "I can…"

and eventually, "I could."

That was the beginning of By J.

Background and Training

Jonathan Hill, MBA, CCMP

Experience

  • More than 10 years of communications experience

  • Executive and leadership communications

  • Corporate affairs

  • Crisis and issues communications

  • Employee and organizational change communications

  • Career storytelling and interview preparation

Education and Credentials