Meet Kinta Gates: Turning Experience Into a Career Map That Works
Understanding how systems work, and where you fit within them, is what allows you to move through your career with confidence instead of guesswork. And Kinta Gates, Vice President, Supply Chain & Operations at Glossier, Inc., has built her career by doing exactly that.
Kinta will be leading the STEM Career Mapping session in the 2026 AdaMarie Career Accelerator, drawing on more than 25 years of experience across industrial and systems engineering, supply chain, operations, and planning. Over the course of her career, she’s worked across nearly every function she now oversees, developing a rare, end-to-end perspective on how careers actually evolve inside complex organizations.
In her Accelerator session, Kinta will help participants navigate career pivots, recognize patterns across their experiences, and make informed decisions about what comes next, especially for those whose paths don’t follow a straight line.
If you’re joining the Accelerator, you’ll learn directly from her. And if you’re curious how systems thinking, self-mastery, and lived experience shape long-term success in STEM, keep reading.
Meet Kinta Gates!
Getting to Know You:
Major & Minor – If you went to college!: B.S. Industrial and Systems Engineering, B.S. Legal Studies, Masters in Strategic Communications
Field of Work: Supply Chain and Operations
Expertise In: I've accumulated a ton of expertise in my 25+ year career...not to mention life! If I had to sum it all up, I would say systems thinking is one of the deepest benches that I have. I'm also a SME in supply chain, operations, planning and oh yes - I'm also a certified life coach!
Current Company: Glossier
Job Title: VP, Supply Chain and Operations
One-liner About What You’re Working On: Bringing order to chaos, everywhere!
Currently geeking out over: Trade policy and all things AI!
STEM Hero: Mrs. Gladys Mae West, the brilliant "hidden figure" responsible for the math behind satellite modeling which eventually became the GPS systems we use today.
Tell us about your professional journey – how did you get where you are now?
My career path wasn't intentional until it was. Upon graduating with my BS in Industrial and Systems Engineering, I was initially doing traditional IE work, which I found to be boring (for me). I needed something a little more dynamic. While working on a cross-functional project, I engaged with the supply chain team and it was instant magic! As fate would have it, three years post grad I was part of a massive layoff. The next role I landed as a demand planner was also my introduction to the beauty industry. From there, I transitioned into an operations management and reporting role, followed by roles in procurement, inventory management, supply planning, logistics...are you seeing the trend?
The realization that I was consolidating key functions of the end-to-end supply chain into my experience motivated me to complete this goal. As a result, I have now performed 9 out of the 10 functions that fall under my current oversight. Along this journey, being a lifelong learner, I also picked up two additional degrees that, on paper, don't make sense, but actually deepens my career moat.
We’re also curious to know your personal story and upbringing. What has made you “you”?
I grew up in rural eastern North Carolina in the small waterfront town of Elizabeth City. This is also the home of Elizabeth City State University, an HBCU that both of my parents and most of my family on both sides attended. My Mom is not only an ECSU graduate but also worked there for over 30 years. I started my education there at the laboratory school at the young age of three. Dad taught Math in the local school system for well over 30 years as well.
My very foundation is rooted in the rich culture of historically Black universities, and as such, the norm for me was excellence at the highest levels. My neighbors were Black female Ph.D. professors, medical professionals who broke the color barrier in our region, and not to mention, my Godfather, who was the regional counsel for the NAACP and who just retired as the Secretary of the Treasury for North Carolina.
Limits were never put on anything that I desired to achieve.
Before I was ten years old, I was in conversation with the likes of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr's eldest daughter, Yolanda, Alex Haley, the esteemed author of Roots, and countless other dignitaries. From elementary school forward, I was enrolled in Academically Gifted programs, and in my junior year of high school, I was selected as one of the top 800 students to attend the NC Governor's School, a prestigious honor normally reserved for seniors.
My parents intentionally instilled in me the belief that I was not better than anyone, but that I could be the best at everything I did. That translated into sports as well, having been a scholar 3-sport all-conference athlete, unanimously selected as Female Athlete of the Year my senior year in high school.
I'm eternally grateful for the value system my parents shared with me, rooted in strong work ethic, cultural awareness, integrity, and discipline. All of which continues to serve me well, even at the 26-year mark of my career.
You work in a performance-driven industry. Where do you find balance?
I put myself on my calendar before anyone else, son and husband included. Kinta has to be priority #1; otherwise, I am of no worth to anyone else. Too many times earlier in life, I broke my own rules. That led to burnout, anxiety, and a few trips to the ER, where I was afraid I was suffering from a heart attack. Now, travel, spa days with my girls, and intentionally planned days off from work help me to maintain harmony.
Work-life balance is a myth. Harmony should be the goal!
You choose one: if you were a part of the human body, outer space, or a scientific process, what would you be and why?
Dark Matter. It holds galaxies together but still remains unmeasurable by conventional means and cannot be precisely defined. That's me!
We would love to feature your work. How can we spread the word about what you’re doing?
I'm a featured speaker at Manifest: The Future of Supply Chain and Logistics, in February in Las Vegas, NV. I've recorded a few episodes on the eCom Logistics Podcast. And I'll be speaking in March at the Black Beauty STEMinist Summit in partnership with Spelman College in Atlanta, GA.
Do you have a favorite motivational quote or song?
"The function of freedom is to free someone else." - Toni Morrison
Any final advice for early-career STEM professionals?
Your degree will get you in the room, but self-mastery and integrity will keep you there.
Join a 2026 Accelerator Cohort to learn from Kinta!
Kinta will be leading the Week 3: STEM Career Mapping session in the AdaMarie Career Accelerator, focused on helping participants make sense of their experiences, navigate career pivots, and identify patterns that point toward their next move.
If you’d like to learn from her in a live, small-cohort setting, registration for the Career Accelerator is now open. Participants gain access to expert-led sessions, guided conversation, and the broader AdaMarie community throughout the program.
