Next Wave Leadership Podcast

Jutta Miquelino is a Partner and the CEO of and dos Santos GmbH. The collective helps mid-size to massive companies innovate and expand. Some of their noteworthy clients have included Coca-Cola, L'Oréal, and Olympus, among many others. Jutta got her start at Procter & Gamble, where she was a Customer Marketing Manager for over a decade. From there, she went on to work for Storck and Sony Electroni...

Allison Byers is the Founder and CEO of Scroobious, which offers human-first fundraising for diverse entrepreneurs. As an experienced guide in venture capital, she has grown her own businesses to great success and helped others do the same. She continues to serve as a mentor, advisor, and angel investor for several companies such as Techstars, femmebought, BonBillo, HerSuiteSpot, and Vitalize Vent...

Cody Hall is the CEO and Founder of Octiva Healthcare which offers 24-hour healthcare support and emergency care. He started the company in 2020 with his experience as a Chief Compliance Officer and Head of Human Resources at Titanium Healthcare. Cody has had a diverse and successful career, including times in the military, healthcare, and business. Cody served for over a decade in the United Stat...

Neeraj Mehta is the CEO at DigniFi, which offers quick and flexible financing for all kinds of vehicles. As an incredibly experienced leader, he has served at an executive level for multiple global brands such as GE and Synchrony. He was also the interim President and CEO for United Way. Neeraj is an expert in finance, operations, risk, and sales performance, just to name a few. He is a member of...

Jennifer Paxton is the VP of People at Smile.io, a company that creates effective loyalty programs for smaller businesses. With an extensive background in tech startups, she is a prominent leader in the world of HR and recruiting. Alongside her position at Smile.io, she sits on the board for the Cultural Alliance of Medfield. She has previously worked as a director of talent for other leading comp...

Cara Shortsleeve is an accomplished leader and the CEO of The Leadership Consortium. The organization works with some of the world's leading brands to help develop and cultivate the next generation of leaders. She has personally worked for multiple renowned brands herself, spending over a decade at Google and YouTube before taking on her current role. Throughout her career, she's developed her spe...

Monte Lee-Wen is the Founder and Chairman of the Casoro Group, which is a minority-owned commercial real estate investment firm. He is a leader within the global real estate community, having sharpened his expertise in multi-family real estate throughout his career. He continues to work as the Principal of Upside Avenue and CLEAR Property Management.  Along with his work in real estate, Monte is a...

Kim Alexis Newton is an entrepreneur, executive, and artist that defies simple categorization. She is a respected leader with a track record in consumer marketing, currently sitting on the Board of Directors for Big Lots and helming leadership programs for Netflix. One of her major roles was at Hallmark, spending almost two decades with the brand and working up to their Senior Vice President of Cu...

Valerie Alexander is a renowned speaker with expertise on topics such as advancement for women and workplace happiness. Her brand, Speak Happiness, has brought her to lead workshops and keynotes on these principles. Some of her most notable engagements include Coca-Cola, NASA, GE Capital, and even a TED Talk. Valerie has also channeled her ideas into multiple books, including Happiness...as a Seco...

Ana Álvarez is a serial entrepreneur, consultant, mentor to startups across the globe, and the Founder and CEO of Migrapreneur. Migrapreneur supports the dreams and businesses of entrepreneurial migrants. She is also the Principal Owner of Migration Hub, which also seeks to provide opportunities for all. Across her career, Ana has accumulated over 15 years of experience in government, private, and...

Wendy Bronfin is the Co-founder and CEO of BRIGHT, a health technology company that uses leading research to prevent Alzheimer's disease and fight cognitive decline. She is an accomplished entrepreneur focusing on product innovation and team building. She also serves as the President of Wen + Y, consulting and developing strategies for high-profile businesses such as Mattel, Barnes & Noble, and Fi...

Rajesh Setty is a serial entrepreneur, having served on the founding team of 10 companies. His current focus is on Audvisor, a streaming app for micro-podcasts that sources relevant content from leading experts. He is also a prolific author, with 18 titles to his name since 1983 that range from fiction to business to mathematics and more. Among his other projects, Rajesh continues to work closely...

Dr. Elizabeth Ruzzo is an expert in genetics, an innovator in the birth control field, and is the Founder of Adyn. The company aims to match people with the most suitable birth control for their unique biology. Her scientific background includes a doctorate from Duke University in genome sciences and postdoctoral research at UCLA. While there, her findings helped illuminate the genetic etiology of...

As a technology leader with a focus on people, Tracie Hlavka enjoys the process of enabling a team while also developing her company's tech. She is the EVP of Engineering at Flyhomes, which makes home buying and selling easier. The majority of her career was spent at Blue Nile and Porch, serving on all levels of both company's technological engineering teams. For her education, she received her ba...

Maril Gagen MacDonald is an awarded leader in PR and a pioneer for disciplines that promote corporate collaboration and employee engagement. She is the Founder and CEO of Gagen MacDonald, a strategy execution firm that is intent on connecting the corporate office to frontline employees. Since its foundation in 1998, they have become an award-winning firm that's worked with notable names such as AD...

Over 30 years ago, Jennifer Harris co-founded Technology Management Concepts (TMC). Since then, she's held many positions at TMC, from creating and leading Professional Services to her current job as CEO and President. She continues to serve as a Gold Microsoft Partner, which helps with Microsoft applications and cloud infrastructures for their clients. Jennifer has gone through three different tr...

Mike Dannheim is the Founder of Sensie, a health, wellness, and fitness company. Combining his roles as a wellness advocate and technology entrepreneur, Mike Dannheim created a holistic company that uses sensors in smartphones to diagnose any issues you might have. From there, users are offered coaching procedures to address them. Outside of Sensie, he continues to work as an Investor and Advisor...

Alexa Binns is an investor with an eye for consumer trends and new technology. She is a Partner at Halogen Ventures, an early-stage venture capital fund that focuses on women-led businesses. She has an extensive background in startups, working as a Sr. Associate at Maven Ventures and a Partner at Borden Binns. Her earlier work was in business development and digital media. She helped launch the Ch...

Katrina Noelle is a speaker, mentor, and the President of KNow Research. It is a full-service consultancy that offers comprehensive research from a female-driven staff. She started the service in 2003 with a methodology that blends in-person research and mobile approaches. More recently, Katrina co-founded Scoot Insights, which helps decision-makers choose the right direction. She is a mentor at W...

Sandra Sokoloff is an expert in communications and the Senior Director of Global Public Relations at Alvarez & Marsal (A&M). A&M is renowned for their work in performance and turnaround management for notable businesses. Specifically, she works hands-on with executives to further their goals and improve their place in the marketplace. Sandra previously worked for the public relations firm Porter N...

Bill Flanagan is an experienced leader in higher education, currently serving as the President and Vice-Chancellor at the University of Alberta. He joined the university in 2020 and started a five-year plan of academic and administrative reconfiguration. He developed his expertise at Queen's University Faculty of Law, where he worked for nearly 30 years. While there, he oversaw the creation of the...

Satyen Raja is the Founder and CEO of WarriorSage, where leadership trainings are offered based on universal principles. Since 1999, Satyen has been helping business leaders reach and transform their fullest potential. His philosophies extend to spiritual, mental, and financial evolution, working with individuals as well as businesses. Satyen works with his wife, Suzanne, to lead some of their ret...

Lorna Borenstein is the Founder and CEO of Grokker, a business that improves health engagement and employee well-being for other companies. Some of their notable clients include Target, General Electric, and CVS Health. She founded her company after a multi-year sabbatical around the world, seeing the need for well-being solutions everywhere she went. Before Grokker, Lorna worked as the President...

David (Dave) Yawman is a leader, legal expert, and Partner at Cresco Partners, Inc. Cresco is a management consulting firm that helps both leaders and teams grow through mentorship and strategy with their brand of leadership development. Before Cresco, Dave worked for PepsiCo for over 20 years, where he developed his expertise in global markets and public policy. While there, he filled multiple cr...

Gabrielle Kluck is the Director of Ombudsman and Mediation Services at the United Nations (UN) World Food Programme. Gabrielle has had a robust and storied career in both the public and private sectors, serving in several roles at the UN, including Regional Ombudsman and Field Administration Officer. Before the UN, she worked for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and t...