WiseTalk Mariposa Leadership

Sue hosts futurist and cyborg anthropologist MJ Petroni. MJ specializes in helping others understand the mental models necessary to navigate digital opportunities. As a cyborg anthropologist, MJ studied shows like Star Trek at university, but not (just) for fun. Their field of study addresses the complex relationships between humans and machines, exploring how we shape technology and how it is reshaping us. They help organizations increase their Digital Fluency in preparation for future technologies, attending not just to tools but also the thinking, skills, data, and business models that comprise new value creation.The author of Causeit’s digitalfluency.guide, MJ’s work focuses on raising the lowest common denominator of Digital Fluency for individuals, teams, and entire organizations. Since founding Causeit, Inc. in 2006, MJ has shifted thinking for hundreds of global enterprises, including NTT, Accenture, Volkswagen, the Gates Foundation, SWIFT, and several major financial and media companies, raising Digital Fluency among hundreds of thousands of professionals.MJ is an alumnus of Lewis & Clark College, sits on the Accenture Tech Vision Advisory Board, and is a faculty member at Singularity University.Sue and MJ discuss:What it means to be digitally fluentHow to unlock new potential for yourself and your organization and raise your digital fluencyHow to manage the balance between old and new digital transformation

Sue Bethanis hosts Founder of Machine Learning Week, former Columbia professor, and bestselling author, Eric Siegel, Ph.D. Eric is a leading consultant and former Columbia University professor who helps companies deploy machine learning. He is the founder of the long-running Machine Learning Week conference series and its new sister, Generative AI World, the instructor of the acclaimed online course “Machine Learning Leadership and Practice – End-to-End Mastery,” executive editor of The Machine Learning Times, and a frequent keynote speaker. He wrote the bestselling Predictive Analytics: The Power to Predict Who Will Click, Buy, Lie, or Die, which has been used in courses at hundreds of universities, as well as his newest book, The AI Playbook: Mastering the Rare Art of Machine Learning Deployment.Eric’s interdisciplinary work bridges the stubborn technology/business gap. At Columbia, he won the Distinguished Faculty award when teaching graduate computer science courses in ML and AI. Later, he served as a business school professor at UVA Darden. Eric also publishes op-eds on analytics and social justice. He has appeared on numerous media channels, including Bloomberg, National Geographic, and NPR, and has published in Fast Company, Forbes, HBR, Newsweek, The New York Times, WSJ, and more.Sue and Eric dig into his new book, The AI Playbook, and uncover the most vital use cases of machine learning, those designed to improve a wide range of business operations.

In this episode of WiseTalk, CEO and Executive Leadership Coach Sue Bethanis hosts New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling author Rich Horwath to discuss his new book, STRATEGIC: The Skill to Set Direction, Create Advantage, and Achieve Executive Excellence.Rich Horwath is the Founder and CEO of the Strategic Thinking Institute, where he serves leadership teams as a strategy workshop facilitator, executive coach, and strategic advisor. His work has been featured in publications including Fast Company, Forbes, and the Harvard Business Review. Chief Executive Magazine has introduced him as “the world’s foremost expert on strategic thinking.”As a former chief strategy officer and professor of strategy at the graduate level, he brings a practical, real-world approach based on strong foundational principles to help executives develop their strategic capabilities. Rich has appeared on ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX TV to share his perspectives on current business strategy issues. In addition to his work facilitating strategy workshops for leadership teams and providing executive coaching services and strategic counsel, he is a highly sought-after keynote speaker for groups ranging from 10 to 10,000.Rich earned an MBA with Distinction from the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business at DePaul University and has completed postgraduate courses in strategy at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and the Tuck School of Business Administration at Dartmouth College.

Sue Bethanis hosts consultant, coach, personal development expert, and author Ashish Kothari to discuss his new book, Hardwired for Happiness: 9 Proven Practices to Overcome Stress and Live Your Best Life.Ashish Kothari is the Founder of Happiness Squad, a company focused on helping individuals and organizations unleash the power of happiness to achieve their full potential. As a partner in McKinsey’s Leadership Practice, Ashish served as the Co-Dean for the Centered Leadership and Adaptability & Resilience programs. He combines over two decades of consulting experience with formal training as an Ontological Coach and has helped thousands of leaders and their organizations succeed by developing new mindsets and capabilities. His transformational approach is interdisciplinary and integrates wisdom from the worlds of science and spirituality.A lifelong student of human thriving, Ashish has read over 450 books and studied the teachings of world-renowned experts in the fields of spirituality, philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience. His purpose in life is to help individuals, organizations, and communities achieve their full potential through the power of happiness.Sue and Ashish discuss:The pervasiveness of the burnout problemHow to “Build a Supportive Community”Practical tips for leading a happier lifeSelf-awareness as the base for the nine powerful practices that can rewire your brain for happiness

Sue Bethanis hosts consumer and marketplace product and technology executive, and author, Yue Zhao.Yue was the first product manager and Head of Professionals at Thumbtack Inc. for 5 years, where she worked alongside the founders to build and scale a technology leader valued at $3.2B in 2021 with investment from Sequoia, Tiger Global, Capital G, QIA, and more. Then, at Fuzzy Pet Health, she was the Chief Product & Technology officer, helping the team find PMF for its telehealth offering and reach EBITDA positive within 6 months. Previously, she co-founded a wine e-commerce startup called FirstCrush. She spent 4 years at Meta working on Instagram Feed and Profile, Messenger Web and Desktop, and SMB Advertising.Yue is currently a Venture Partner at LifeX Ventures, a $100M fund actively deploying capital in healthtech, climatech, and the AI space. Her network in the product space, in particular, adds a new dimension to LifeX’s team of ex-founders and operators.As a seasoned executive career coach and advisor, Yue is passionate about coaching mid-career minority executives and helping the next generation of CEOs and founders hone in on the real pain points to solve for their customers.She holds a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.Sue and Yue discuss her new book, The Uncommon Executive: Breakthrough to the C-Suite as a Minority, and:How to adopt an executive mindset and develop skills that are critical for successWays to demonstrate executive potential and land stretch assignmentsThe challenges minorities face — overcoming biases and stereotypes, finding role models, and discovering superpowersHow to influence luck and create opportunities with sponsorship, networking, and making smart job changes

Sue Bethanis hosts productivity expert, automation enthusiast, and bestselling author Aytekin Tank to discuss his new book, Automate Your Busywork: Do Less, Achieve More, and Save Your Brain for the Big Stuff.Aytekin’s entrepreneurial passion and firm belief in creating tools to make organizations more productive led him to build Jotform, a bootstrapped global SaaS company that provides powerful online forms to tens of millions of users.In addition to serving as the CEO of Jotform since 2006, Aytekin frequently contributes to Fast Company and Entrepreneur. A developer by trade but a storyteller by heart, he writes about his journey as an entrepreneur, shares advice for other startups, and provides insights on leadership, productivity, and using SaaS technology within workflows.Sue and Aytekin discuss:Why the future of business is no-code, and how you can use an automation-first mindset to unlock your productivity potentialHow to move from busywork to less work and finally have the time you need to accomplish your most important workHow you can use delegation and automation to achieve “timefulness,” the state of having enough time