Colin Darretta is a "reformed investment banker," serial entrepreneur, investor, and a journalist for Forbes, Inc, TechCrunch, plus other major media. He is the CEO and co-founder of Innovation Department, which spurs the brands of the future. Colin also co-founded FINN, which recently celebrated its 10-year anniversary. He lamented all the virtue signaling out there where "hustle culture" is a straight path to burnout for entrepreneurs who should be seeking health, wellness, and balance - in addition to moving their startups forward. 

Christine Spang, founder & CTO of Nylas, has evolved over the last decade growing her software company which is essentially like "the plumbing for the internet" connecting code. She talks about how the highs are super high and the lows are super low but that foundation at MIT prepared her for the mental fortitude that she was going to need to lead her team on this journey. "Leadership is work and you have to work at leadership," is a lesson that she learned along the way.  Along the way, she's discovered the power of yoga and rock climbing to challenge her mind as well as calm it.

Christina Richards is the CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) of Virtana - a software company specializing in cloud services. She took the road less traveled. Indeed, Christina calls it the "dark side" where she took a deep dive into engineering then evolved into marketing. With her role today, she has the opportunity to influence rising professionals in STEM and has a message (or two) for aspiring techies and marketers which can be distilled down to, "You don't know where life will take you - keep learning." She shares how mistakes can be fuel for better things ahead. Tune in for some words of wisdom!

Dr. Deborah Jonas is the director of SRI's Center for Education Research & Innovation. Yes, she has access to astronauts and researchers of the highest caliber in the world - but she focuses her efforts on community learning. Deborah shared her thoughts on how we can better support students to "fail productively" and essentially to fail forward so that our next generation of leaders learn how to learn by working through problems versus being given the answers. She had some insights into how colleges are challenged by the breadth of the diversity and needs of the students they need to support today - and she surprised me with her shoe choice!

What a breath of fresh air! It's so easy to feel intimidated, especially when it comes to things like interior design, "Will my home meet your standard?" But Jeanelle Ditto, founder of Blush Interior Designs, is one of the most fun, accessible, down-to-Earth, and overall joyous people that you'll ever meet. No judgment! She offers listeners great advice on how ups & downs are part of an entrepreneur's journey and encourages everyone to STICK WITH IT. Jeanelle also shared some interior design tips that we can all benefit from.

Lorrie Thomas Ross is a breath of fresh air. She's The Marketing Therapist(R) and founder of Wild Web Women and Web Marketing Therapy. She understands the value of relationships and follows the mantra, "to lead with love." Her best advice for other female founders out there is to, "Always do what you do best and let others do the rest."

John Glowacki, CEO of Combat Control Foundation, shares some deeply personal insights on life, loss, and leadership. He served our country in the role of combat control - for those unfamiliar with the role, it's like air traffic control but in a military application. Next year, a move feature a fallen combat control veteran will be released starring Jake Gyllenhaal and it will put this important but not well known military function and rising foundation on the map!

For something a little different, Loralyn Mears recorded this podcast live from Collision Conference in Toronto. She highlighted some of the key insights around the downward trend of venture capital investment and spotlighted some key innovations. WebSummit does an incredible job organizing this event and, as usual, they were spectacular and made the media, sponsors, startups, and attendees all feel like royalty. 

Chris Beck is the VP of the Family Law division of Soberlink. Their mobile sobriety technology helps document sobriety in real-time to ensure that a child is being co-parented by a sober guardian. Think of it like a breatholyzer on demand, all to keep children safe. This is especially important when parents are divorcing and fighting for custody of their child when one, or both parents, have alcohol usage disorder. Soberlink also provides treatment services with access to professional counselors. Chris has been passionate about fostering children impacted by addiction. He works on treatment solutions to enable the future reunification of the biological parent with their child. And he's also adopted several children in need who have been affected by addiction.

Josh York, founder of GYMGUYZ, the global leader in personal fitness. He's elevated in-home training to a new level. But he had a rocky start and he openly shares how he's tapped into his unstoppable mindset, honed through fitness, to make the magic happen. Josh will challenge you to stop making excuses - and to just get it done. "Easy never pays well - you've got to do the work."