Leadership Recalibrated™

Lori Lalonde
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A Leadership Series from Her Executive Ascent Inc. Leadership Recalibrated™ is a new lens on leadership for the modern era. It challenges outdated leadership advice and explores how women are uniquely positioned to lead in environments shaped by complexity, power dynamics, and artificial intelligence. Forget the recycled “be confident, lean in” playbook. This show gets tactical about what actually works. Each episode explores how leaders are recalibrating around three critical capabilities: Executive Judgment - Making clear, strategic decisions in complex environments.Strategic Influence - Navigating power, visibility, and decision pathways inside organizations.AI Leadership - Shaping how artificial intelligence informs strategy, governance, and leadership. Hosted by Lori Lalonde, founder of Her Executive Ascent Inc., the show features conversations with women who have learned how to operate differently and the decisions that changed the trajectory of their leadership. Leadership Recalibrated™ explores the ideas. Her Executive Ascent™ is where leaders strengthen the judgment, strategic influence, and AI leadership authority required to operate at the executive level. This is leadership for women who are done waiting for permission and ready to rewrite the rules. New episodes drop weekly.

  1. Jul 13

    Not Technical Enough, Not Strategic Enough: Dinah Davis on Building Code Like a Girl

    Dinah Davis spent eight years at BlackBerry, first as a software developer, then leading the team that built cryptographic protocols nobody had built before. She has a master's degree in cryptography and the patents to prove it. None of that stopped her from being told, at different points in her career, that she wasn't technical enough. Or, from different people, that she wasn't strategic enough. Same person, two opposite verdicts, and a pattern more women in tech will recognize than most companies would like to admit. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated™, Dinah traces her path from the bleeding edge of mobile security to founding Code Like a Girl, and talks candidly about the parts of corporate leadership she never got good at, and why she's not sorry about it. This is a conversation about the standards that get invented after the fact, the cost of caring too much in a system that doesn't reward it, and what happens when you stop trying to win a game you never agreed to play.   About Our Guest: Dinah Davis spent 20 years in tech, from writing cryptographic protocols at BlackBerry to leading engineering teams as a VP, most recently at Arctic Wolf. She holds a master's in cryptography and multiple patents. In 2016, she founded Code Like a Girl, a publication amplifying women's voices in tech, which she now runs full-time. She writes about careers, leadership, and the parts of the industry nobody puts in the recruiting brochure. Connect with Dinah: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dinahdavis/ Subscribe to Code Like A Girl: https://substack.com/@codelikeagirl Subscribe to She Writes AI: https://substack.com/@shewritesai

    Not Technical Enough, Not Strategic Enough: Dinah Davis on Building Code Like a Girl

  2. Jul 3

    The Menopause Mindshift: Reclaiming Your Power When Everything Feels Like It Is Falling Apart

    Most women navigate menopause the same way they were taught to navigate everything else — quietly, alone, and without complaining. Our mothers did not talk about it. Our grandmothers did not talk about it. And so when the symptoms arrived, we pushed through, wore the mask, and told ourselves it was just part of getting older. Lisa R. Triggs did that too. For years. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated™, I sit down with Lisa, known as The Menopause Queen, to talk about what happens when you stop letting menopause control you and start making choices that change everything. Lisa managed her own journey without medication — using visualization, meditation, journaling, and a mindset shift that she now teaches through her coaching practice, bestselling book, and speaking work. What she has to say is going to reframe the way you think about this chapter of life entirely. We get into why the story we have been told about menopause is the thing making it harder, how the hormonal changes of midlife bring buried things back to the surface and what to do when that happens, why the strength that women in leadership wear as armor is often a mask for the vulnerability underneath, what it looks like to grieve who you used to be while building someone even better, and the one rule Lisa wants retired from the old playbook about what women are capable of at this stage of life. This one is for every woman who has ever felt like she was disappearing inside her own body and needed someone to tell her that the other side of this is worth fighting for. About Our Guest The Menopause Queen, Lisa R. Triggs is a certified menopause coach, motivational speaker, best selling author and podcast host.  With a deep love for personal growth, Lisa has spent nearly 20 years navigating the rollercoaster of menopause; an experience that ultimately transformed her life. In her bestselling book, The Menopause Mindshift: How I Unleashed My Inner Queen, And You Can Too!, Lisa shares her story to inspire other women to take back control, prioritize their well-being, and step into their power. Today, she stands as a voice of hope, showing women that menopause doesn’t have to be a struggle—it can be a powerful awakening. Her mission is to help others awaken their inner Queen, embrace self-love, and redefine what it means to thrive in this life phase. Connect with Lisa Website: https://themenopausemindshift.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisartriggs Buy her book: https://www.amazon.ca/Menopause-Mindshift-Unleashed-Inner-Queen-ebook/dp/B0DJG47FS8

    The Menopause Mindshift: Reclaiming Your Power When Everything Feels Like It Is Falling Apart

  3. Jun 21

    Inclusion Starts With I: How Women Can Shape The AI Era Before It Shapes Them

    Most of the technology shaping our world right now was not built with women in mind. The algorithms deciding who gets hired, who gets promoted, and whose ideas get amplified were built largely without us, trained largely without us, and are now being deployed at a scale that is moving faster than most of us can keep up with. The numbers are sobering. 86% of jobs most exposed to AI automation are held by women. Women make up less than 25% of the workforce actually building AI. And the World Economic Forum estimates it will take 123 years to close the gender parity gap worldwide. In 2026, women are still making 83 to 86 cents for every dollar a man earns for the same work. But today's guest is not here to talk about the problem. She is here to talk about what we do about it. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated™, I sit down with Miri Rodriguez, Founder and CEO of Empressa.ai, the groundbreaking AI platform built on women's lived experiences, trained on women's knowledge, and designed to close the very gaps the technology industry has spent decades widening. After 13 years at Microsoft, where she became one of the company's most recognized storytellers and published the award-winning bestseller Brand Storytelling, Miri left one of the most powerful platforms in the world to build something the industry had never seen before. We get into why AI is either the most powerful tool women have ever had access to or the fastest way to permanently hard-code today's gaps into tomorrow's opportunities at scale, what it actually means for an AI to be built on women's lived experiences and why that changes everything about how it responds, the Empressa Imperial Council and the model that pays women royalties for the knowledge they contribute, how to start closing the gap today, and the rule Miri wants every woman to rewrite before she walks into her next room. This one will fire you up. And it is supposed to. About Our Guest Miri Rodriguez is the Founder and CEO of Empressa.ai, a groundbreaking AI company reshaping the future of work for women. With 13 years at Microsoft, where she evolved from communications and marketing into one of the company's most recognized storytellers, Miri built and led work that changes how organizations connect with people. That body of work became her bestselling book, Brand Storytelling, published by Kogan Page, translated into four languages, and recognized with multiple awards worldwide. Now she is channeling everything she built at Microsoft into something the market has never seen before. Empressa is an AI platform built on women's lived experiences, trained on women's knowledge, and designed to close the very gaps the technology industry has spent decades widening. She is also the author of the book The Women of Microsoft, an advisor to Ragan's Center for AI Strategy, and one of the clearest, most urgent voices on what it is going to take for women to stop adapting to systems that were never built for them and start building the ones that are. Connect with Miri LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/mirirod Website: https://empressa.ai

    Inclusion Starts With I: How Women Can Shape The AI Era Before It Shapes Them

  4. Jun 14

    AI Is Not A Strategy: What Leaders Get Wrong About AI Adoption and What to Do Instead

    Every leadership team is talking about AI right now. The slide decks are full of it. The board presentations reference it. The press releases announce it. And on the ground, the people actually responsible for building and delivering are quietly panicking because nobody gave them the time, the tools, or the training to actually do it. That gap has a name. And it has a cost. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated™, I sit down with Heather Gawel, founder of Momentum Product Co. and former VP of Product and Design, to talk about what AI adoption actually looks like inside organizations right now versus how leadership is talking about it. Heather has spent the better part of two decades leading product teams managing portfolios of over $100 million and earlier this year left the corporate seat to go deeper — building an enablement practice specifically around the AI gap she kept running into everywhere she turned. What she is seeing is not what most leaders think is happening on their teams. There is a bell curve playing out inside most organizations right now. At the top, urgency is high. In the middle, leadership is building slide decks and attending demos. And at the IC level, people are on their own time trying to piece together a skill set their organization demanded but never equipped them for. This is a conversation for anyone in leadership who has announced an AI strategy without building the conditions for their people to actually execute on it. And for anyone on the ground who is tired of being told to learn AI without being given the time or support to do it. About Our Guest Heather Gawel is the founder of Momentum Product Co. and a practitioner at the intersection of AI, product, and execution. She started her career in mechanical engineering, moved into product management, and spent the better part of two decades leading product teams across hardware, software, and B2B SaaS — most recently as VP of Product and Design at a San Francisco-based scale-up managing a portfolio of over $100 million. Earlier this year Heather made the move from the corporate seat to consulting, co-founding Momentum Product Co. to fill the AI enablement gap she kept running into — first inside her own organizations and then in every discovery call she took when launching the business. Through Momentum, she runs hands-on AI workshops and enablement sessions for product managers, founders, and cross-functional teams across Waterloo, Toronto, and the US. What makes her perspective different is straightforward — these are not frameworks she read about. These are workflows she uses every day. She is passionate about creating on-ramps for people who want to build with AI, especially women who are new to the AI community. Connect with Heather: Website: momentumproductco.com LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/heathergawel Build With AI: Tech Worker Edition Heather is running an in-person, hands-on Build with AI workshop in partnership with Communitech on Thursday June 18th in Kitchener, Ontario. Register here: luma.com/08m5ihzdUse promo code RECALIBRATED at checkout to get $50 off of registration.

    AI Is Not A Strategy: What Leaders Get Wrong About AI Adoption and What to Do Instead

  5. Jun 7

    Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Rewriting the Rules of Leadership for a Changing World

    Sustainability is not just about the environment. It never was. At the heart of every climate policy, every economic model, every sustainability report is a deeper question — whose voice is centered, whose leadership is legitimized, and whose values are prioritized. And right now, in 2026, the answers to those questions are moving in the wrong direction. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated™, I sit down with Supriya Verma, Founder of Sustainability X Magazine and author of the newly released book Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Leadership Lessons in an Age of Resistance. Supriya has spent a decade at the intersection of sustainability, women's leadership, and systems change — building a platform that brings together the conversations most people keep in separate rooms, and shining a light on the women who are leading through some of the most complex and consequential challenges of our time. This book arrived at exactly the right moment. As DEI commitments are being rolled back, climate accountability is being deprioritized, and a generation of young women is entering a workforce that feels more hostile than the one that came before it, Supriya chose not to be quiet about it. And that decision changed everything about what this book became. This is a conversation for anyone who has felt defeated by how quickly progress can be reversed. And for anyone who needs a reminder that the women who came before us faced resistance too and kept going anyway. About Our Guest Supriya Verma is the Founder of Sustainability X Magazine, a platform she launched in 2016 to bring together environment, economy, society, and politics through dialogue and storytelling. What began as a digital sustainability magazine evolved into a broader space for visibility and recognition, most notably through the Global 50 Women in Sustainability Awards, now celebrating its fifth annual cycle as Sustainability X marks its 10th anniversary. Over a decade of listening to extraordinary women across climate, governance, finance, advocacy, science, policy, and social justice, Supriya began to see patterns that demanded more than celebration. They demanded documentation. The result is her debut book, Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Leadership Lessons in an Age of Resistance, published in March 2026 during Women's Month and available worldwide wherever books are sold. She is one of the most urgent and necessary voices on what bold, sustainable, and human-centered leadership actually looks like in a world that is actively resisting it. Get Involved: The SustainabilityX® Magazine - sustainabilityx.coBuy the book on Amazon, Indigo, Friesenpress & 50,000+ global retailers.Subscribe to the newsletter for book and tour updates

    Bold Women, Sustainable Futures: Rewriting the Rules of Leadership for a Changing World

  6. May 31

    Nothing's Written Down and No One's Talking: Why Most Business Transformations Are Set Up to Fail

    Most business transformations fail. Not because the strategy was wrong. Not because the budget ran out. Because nobody wrote anything down and nobody was talking to each other. That is not a dramatic oversimplification. That is what Jessica Caresse White walks into every single time. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated™, I sit down with Jessica, CEO & Managing Director of her own transformation consulting practice and a woman who built her career inside some of the most demanding organizations in the world — starting with McKinsey, where she learned what it means to be obsessive about the details everyone else dismisses, and continuing through Cisco, Hitachi, and beyond. What makes Jessica different from every other consultant in the room is that she has never been interested in transforming the business alone. She is in the business of transforming hearts and minds. And she has spent her entire career proving that you cannot have one without the other. Jessica does not sugarcoat what transformation actually requires — the people decisions, the AI reality, and the corporate habits that quietly sabotage even the best-laid plans. She has seen it all from the inside and she is not holding back. This is a conversation for anyone leading a team through change right now who suspects the problem is not the roadmap. It is the people. And what happens when no one is paying attention to them. About Our Guest Jessica Caresse is a visionary leader, transformational coach, and the driving force behind J.Caresse & Company, a consulting firm that not only transforms businesses but also transforms hearts & minds. With a wealth of experience across industries, Jessica has built a career on the principles of integrity, innovation, and unwavering determination. Her work at industry giants like Cisco Systems, Hitachi Solutions, and McKinsey & Company was marked by her ability to turn challenges into opportunities and lead teams through complex, high-stakes projects. She is a master at streamlining operations, driving strategic change, and creating environments where both businesses and people can thrive. Connect with Jessica: Website: www.jcaresse.comLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessica-caresseConnecting The Dots Podcast: https://www.jcaresse.com/podcastBook a call: https://calendly.com/jcaresse/connect-with-jessica-caresse

    Nothing's Written Down and No One's Talking: Why Most Business Transformations Are Set Up to Fail

  7. May 24

    The Hiring Gaps Nobody Wants to Talk About: Women, Work, and What Needs to Change

    The hiring process is sending signals to women long before the first interview. In the job posting. In whether the salary is listed or conspicuously absent. In how flexibility is framed or not mentioned at all. Women are reading every one of those signals and making decisions based on what they find. Or more often, what they don't. And the data backs it up. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated, I sit down with Alexandra Tillo, Senior Talent Marketing Consultant at Indeed Canada, who has spent nearly a decade sitting at the intersection of employers and job seekers translating labour market research into insights that the people making hiring decisions need to hear. What she is seeing right now when it comes to women in the Canadian workforce is equal parts progress and friction. And the friction is persistent. This is a conversation for every woman navigating the job market right now, for every leader who wants to understand what their hiring process is actually communicating, and for anyone who believes the only way to change outcomes is to change the system creating them. About Our Guest Alexandra Tillo is a Senior Talent Marketing Consultant at Indeed Canada, where she has spent nearly a decade working at the intersection of employers and job seekers. In her current role, she serves as Indeed Canada's market-facing voice — speaking at industry conferences, executive briefings, and events, and translating labour market data and talent trends into actionable insights for HR and talent acquisition leaders across the country. Before stepping into thought leadership, Alexandra built her career on the front lines of enterprise sales managing national accounts at Indeed with some of Canada's largest employers including Walmart, McDonald's, and Gordon Food Service, and earlier at Oracle where she led bilingual account management across enterprise and mid-market segments in Eastern Canada. Alexandra brings a global perspective to the Canadian hiring market and a clear-eyed ability to connect what the data says with what employers and job seekers are actually experiencing on the ground. She is one of the most informed voices on what the labour market data says about women in the workforce right now. And in this episode, she is not holding back. Connect with Alexandra LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandra-tillo/Indeed: https://www.indeed.com/Indeed article: https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/news/women-flexible-work-benefits-gap

    The Hiring Gaps Nobody Wants to Talk About: Women, Work, and What Needs to Change

  8. May 17

    Stop Surviving The Room: How High-Achieving Women Reclaim Their Voice, Their Time, and Their Power

    You have been in the room. You have done the work. You have delivered the results. And somehow you still walk out of meetings feeling like you left something on the table. That is not a you problem. That is what happens when high-achieving women are handed a leadership playbook that was never written for them. In this episode of Leadership Recalibrated™, I sit down with Lynsey Mulder — keynote speaker, certified coach, and former SVP at a Fortune 100 company — who spent over two decades inside corporate America before leaving to do something about the leadership advice gap that keeps so many women stuck. Lynsey does not do recycled. She does not do watered down. She comes with frameworks, data, and the kind of honest conversation that most leadership training skips entirely. We get into the invisible work tax that women absorb without even realizing it is happening, why only 20% of people actually know their superpower and what it costs when you are not one of them, the BANK framework and how cracking your own communication code changes everything about how you lead and how you are heard, why no is not a problem to manage but a strategy to master, and what it actually takes to stop conforming to a mold that was never built for you and start leading in a way that is fully, unapologetically yours. This is a conversation for women who are done surviving the room and ready to own it. About Our Guest Lynsey Mulder spent over two decades rising through corporate America to reach the level of Senior Vice President at a Fortune 100 company, and what she learned along the way is that most leadership advice handed to women is either recycled, watered down, or written by people who've never actually been in the room. So she left to change that. Today, Lynsey runs multiple businesses. Her favorite being working with high-achieving women, business owners, and executives who are ready to lead on their own terms. She is a keynote speaker, certified coach, podcast host, and the person your leadership team calls when they need real talk, not a motivational poster. Her frameworks help leaders get clear on what they stand for, how they communicate, and what they refuse to compromise, so they can stop surviving the room and start owning it. Connect With Lynsey Website: https://lynseymulder.com Lead With Spark Podcast: https://lynseymulder.com/podcast

    Stop Surviving The Room: How High-Achieving Women Reclaim Their Voice, Their Time, and Their Power
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About

A Leadership Series from Her Executive Ascent Inc. Leadership Recalibrated™ is a new lens on leadership for the modern era. It challenges outdated leadership advice and explores how women are uniquely positioned to lead in environments shaped by complexity, power dynamics, and artificial intelligence. Forget the recycled “be confident, lean in” playbook. This show gets tactical about what actually works. Each episode explores how leaders are recalibrating around three critical capabilities: Executive Judgment - Making clear, strategic decisions in complex environments.Strategic Influence - Navigating power, visibility, and decision pathways inside organizations.AI Leadership - Shaping how artificial intelligence informs strategy, governance, and leadership. Hosted by Lori Lalonde, founder of Her Executive Ascent Inc., the show features conversations with women who have learned how to operate differently and the decisions that changed the trajectory of their leadership. Leadership Recalibrated™ explores the ideas. Her Executive Ascent™ is where leaders strengthen the judgment, strategic influence, and AI leadership authority required to operate at the executive level. This is leadership for women who are done waiting for permission and ready to rewrite the rules. New episodes drop weekly.

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