Catherine Palmisano, 38

The path Catherine Palmisano took to become a senior audit manager of a large accounting firm — where her department’s revenue has grown threefold under her leadership — before turning 40 was nontraditional. 

It started when she graduated high school, with a newborn baby in tow. She worked retail jobs, including a as cashier for Eckerd drug stores, where she recalls the salary barely covered child care for her baby daughter, Marqasia. Then she learned about the Gladiolus Learning and Development Center in Fort Myers, a nonprofit that provides child care for working adults who can’t afford it. “When you have a child, and you’re not really sure where else to go, you need a place like this,” Palmisano says. "It allowed me to go to college.”

Palmisano made the most of the opportunity. While continuing to work in retail, she attended Florida Gulf Coast University in Fort Myers and graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in accounting as a member of the Golden Key International Honor Society. She got a job at Hughes, Snell & Co., one of more established Fort Myers accounting firms, after graduation. Palmisano started as a staff accountant, earned her masters at FGCU while working — and while her daughter was a toddler — and later developed the firm’s audit and accounting internship programs.