Risky Conversations with Jamie Lee

Just in 2025, nearly half a million women left the workforce. 23% of all new businesses were started by women, and 50% of all solopreneurs are women. Perhaps a part of you knows you need to leave. Maybe the job is toxic. Maybe you're underpaid. Maybe you're just done. But here's what's keeping you stuck: you don't know how to exit without burning bridges, tanking your fina...

Women are asking to be paid better and promoted but we’re also getting "no" more often than men. What gives? The problem isn't that women can't negotiate. The problem is that we're negotiating the wrong way—playing by rules that were never built for us. So what's the right way? Surprisingly, it starts with an internal orientation rather than an external one. Today, I&...

Ever felt anxious about negotiating your pay? Wondered why it feels so risky when you already know you’re beyond pulling your weight at work? Here’s the truth I see as a coach for marginalized leaders who don’t like office politics: We've been taught that asking for what we want is risky. Greedy. Aggressive. Ungracious. But here's the thing. Women and minorities aren't bad negotiato...

What happens when the pressures of work intensify AND parenting intensifies at the same time? Senior-level mothers are caught in a two-way trap—and many are quietly burning out, believing it's a personal failure rather than a systemic one. In this episode, I talk with Shalene Gupta, staff editor at Fast Company, about her groundbreaking investigation into how senior-level women are coping wit...

Everything worthwhile is on the other side of a risky conversation—especially when it comes to women’s health, birth, and career. In this episode, I sit down with professional investor–turned–hypnobirthing educator Maria Lernerman to talk about how hypnosis, birth preparation, and self-advocacy can transform one of life’s most intense experiences into a joyful, empowering memory. Maria shares how...

In this episode, I sat down with leadership coach and former HR leader Ashley Paré to pull back the curtain on the "risky conversation" that cost her a corporate role but won her ultimate freedom and self-respect. We dive into how that experience became the catalyst for her mission: helping women navigate the complex systems of corporate power to advocate for their worth—without the burn...

In this episode of Risky Conversations, I sit down with global storytelling expert Gabrielle Dolan , author of Story Intelligence: The craft of authentic storytelling made smarter with AI . Gabrielle shares how one risky career conversation led her to leave a secure executive role at a major bank to build a global storytelling practice, eventually training leaders at the Obama Foundation. Together...

Informational interviews, job interviews, and offer negotiations: these are the "risky" conversations that stand between you and a career you actually love. But what if you could de-risk these moments and catapult yourself into a new dimension of success? That is exactly what my client, Sarah-Neel Smith, PhD, did. In this episode, Sarah-Neel pulls back the curtain on her journey from fee...

Many people think I'm a negotiation coach, but I'm really a practitioner of change working at the intersection of ancient Eastern philosophy and modern Western neuroscience. The Science: Quantum physicists like David Bohm and Zen masters in the mountains agree: Everything you think is "solid" (your desk, your body, your obstacles) is actually 99.9999999% empty space. Similarly,...

When I sat down to record this conversation with M. Cristina Alcalde, Ph. D., ACC , last December, institutional biases hadn't yet turned as blatantly fatal as they have in the aftermath of Operation Metro Surge. But truth be told, systemic exclusion leading to institutional violence has never been news for BIPOC and immigrants. The endlessly "moving goalposts" is just one of many w...

Have you felt the crushing weight of otherization as the only woman or person of color in the room? Or maybe you've been told you’re "too intense," "not assertive enough," or some other maddening combination of subjective, conflicting feedback at work? In this episode of Risky Conversations with Jamie Lee , we dive into why these experiences are not personal failings, but...

Earlier today on January 13, 2026, LinkedIn published an article The 2026 job market: What to know about hiring, confidence and opportunity .  The data is mixed: U.S. job growth is sluggish and many job seekers are feeling stuck where they are but not prepared for the job hunt.  Plus, with a bulk of the growth in the economy happening in the AI infrastructure space, a forward-thinking professional...

Are you a high-performance leader feeling "allergic" to the slow, constrained pace of your current office? In this episode, I share the "Ferrari on a Golf Course" metaphor—a perspective shift that has been a game-changer for my 1:1 executive coaching clients.  As we enter the Year of the Fire Horse in 2026, it’s time to stop trying to "fix" your engine and start findi...

In this episode, I talk with Neelam Patel, who left a 22-year tech executive career to follow her passions for poetry, dance, and performance. We dive into the risks and rewards of creative self-advocacy, how joy and anger can guide personal transformation, and what it really means to rebuild a life around authenticity. If you’ve ever felt the pull between convention and creativity, this conversat...

For many women of color, excellence became a survival strategy long before leadership did. So when a board, team, or decision-maker starts tugging on the rope—questioning, nitpicking, shifting expectations—it feels almost impossible to let go. In this episode, we explore what happens in your body during these moments, how your nervous system tries to keep you safe by pulling harder, and the subtle...

In this quick episode, I guide you through a 10-minute Boundary Reset designed to help you protect your energy from office drama and difficult coworkers — without shutting down or over-functioning. As an executive coach for high-achieving women, I know how draining it is to deal with demanding personalities, rapid-fire requests, or sometimes-subtle, sometimes-in-your-face workplace tension. This s...

Jamie Lee is an executive coach who helps women and marginalized leaders get promoted and better paid—without playing politics or throwing anyone under the bus. Risky Conversations is about the messy, brave, and brain-based side of leadership growth. -- In this episode of Risky Conversations, I sit down with Dr. SD Shanti—pediatric dentist, clinical psychologist, and founder of the World Love Foru...

Jamie Lee is an executive coach who helps women and marginalized leaders get promoted and better paid—without playing politics or throwing anyone under the bus. Risky Conversations is about the messy, brave, and brain-based side of leadership growth. -- In this episode of Risky Conversations, I sit down with Tara May, CEO of Aspiritech, to talk about inclusion, neurodiversity, and what it really m...

As an executive coach for women working in male-dominated industries, I often coach on the topics of money, wealth, and self-trust.  In this episode of Risky Conversations, I sit down with Andrea Liebross—results-driven business coach, podcast host, and author of “She Thinks Big.”  Andrea shares her journey from corporate director to entrepreneur, and together we unpack what it really means to tak...

Glue work is the invisible, unrewarded labor that keeps teams running—but too often holds women and people of color back from promotions and pay raises.  In this episode, I share the research, the myths that keep us stuck, and a practical framework to say no with clarity, calm, and confidence. ⏱️ Timestamps: 0:00 – Why glue work matters (and why saying no feels risky) 8:30 – The research on non-pr...

Welcome to Part 6 of The Promotion Playbook Series for Smart Women in Male-Dominated Industries. In this final episode, I coach a professional navigating one of the most common — and least talked about — challenges in career growth: ageism and making a career pivot later in your journey. You’ll hear a candid coaching conversation about: Why arbitrary “years of experience” requirements may not refl...

Welcome to Part 5 of The Promotion Playbook Series for Smart Women in Male-Dominated Industries. In this episode, I coach a client through one of the biggest challenges women face after leaving a draining job: how to return to work without falling back into the same patterns that caused burnout. You’ll hear a real coaching conversation about: Why career breaks and sabbaticals are acts of courage,...

Welcome to Part 4 of The Promotion Playbook Series for Smart Women in Male-Dominated Industries . In this episode, I walk an aspiring life coach through one of the toughest questions every new coach faces: “How do I price myself?” We unpack the fears that come with putting a dollar value on your work, the difference between pricing yourself vs. pricing your services, and why your presence and coac...

Welcome to Part 3 of The Promotion Playbook Series for Smart Women in Male-Dominated Industries. In this episode, you’ll hear from Karen — a smart, experienced professional who never paid me a dime, but who did pay attention. She attended my free workshops, listened to the podcast, and put the tools into practice. The result? She reframed “bragging” into “informing” and landed a role that increase...

Welcome to Part 2 of The Promotion Playbook Series for Smart Women in Male-Dominated Industries. In the first episode, we uncovered three myths that hold women back: Tiara Syndrome, Comfort Fallacy, and the Perfectionist Fantasy. In this episode, we move from awareness to action. I'm walking you through my Three Votes Framework — a simple, repeatable system for taking control of your career g...