Shameless Leadership

Going back to school after 40 is not for the faint of heart. Dr. Vrnda 'V' Boykin knows this well returning to school in 2017 and obtaining her BS in Marketing Management, MS in Management and Leadership, Master of Business Administration, and Doctorate of Business Administration in Organizational Leadership. Dr. V’s expertise is in creating equitable work experiences for women. Dr. V established...

You know that voice in your head that makes you doubt yourself, says nasty things to yourself, beats yourself up, compares you to others, and tells you you are not enough? That’s your inner critic. She can be a real nightmare! If you’re anything like most women I know, you probably give her way too much airplay. You hear her as she clears her throat to step up to the mic and then you listen intent...

Maria Ross is a speaker, leadership trainer, author, and empathy advocate who believes cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive. She’s spent decades helping forward-thinking leaders and teams connect and engage through empathy to accelerate growth and impact. Maria has authored multiple books, including her most recent, The Empathy Edge, and hosts The Empathy Edge podcast....

In no universe am I a time management expert. However, it is something I get asked about all the time. While I am not a time management expert, I have had to learn to manage time in very strategic ways for my brain to maximize all I want to get done in a day (without feeling like I’m in constant chaos). I get better and better with time management every year that I am a business owner and a mom. B...

Tracy Crowley is an author and entrepreneur who is passionate about helping stay-at-home moms. As a former stay-at-home mom with a side hustle, she knows the day-to-day challenges stay-at-home-moms face when they think about returning to work. After returning to work she realized she had gone through a process others could follow, so she started writing. The result was her Growing Back to Work wor...

Over the last few years, I have heard the discourse on rest evolve dramatically. More and more books are coming out on the importance of rest. Doctors, therapists, and thought leaders are addressing the ways our chronic hustling has harmed us as individuals and as a society. This is great and necessary progress.   It is very hard to reprogram a society that was built on devaluing rest, even going...

Diana Fryc is a Shameless Mom and stepmom who was raised by immigrant refugee parents. Her father is a holocaust survivor. Professionally, she is a marketing executive with 20 years of experience advising brands from Fortune 50 companies to start-ups on how to address their toughest growth challenges. As partner and CMO of branding firm Retail Voodoo, Diana uses her expertise in brand development,...

Looking forward can be exciting. It can also be very scary. It’s easy to put off our future lives because the uncertainty can feel too great, the stakes too high.   As I’ve been working with clients and teams over the last few years, it has been so thrilling to see how we can shift what we see as possible when we take some intentional time to look back and find evidence of what we are capable in o...

Dr. Catherine McCarthy, Dr. Heather Tedesco, and Jennifer Weaver are all mental health professionals who jointly co-authored RAISING A KID WHO CAN, a simple but comprehensive how-to parenting manual designed for the post-pandemic world. They were able to recognize that most parents' depleted attention and energy is in constant conflict with their desire to be guided by the most current, evidence-b...

As I’ve kicked off the year with my business consulting clients and corporate clients, the topic of expanding visibility keeps coming up. It’s an important topic for anyone entering a new year!   As you think about what you want to make happen for yourself as a mother, an employee, a team member, a community member, a business owner, a partner, or a friend, how do you want to expand upon who you a...

Stefanie Wilder-Taylor is a past guest of the SMA, one of my very favorite podcasters, my beloved pandemic memoir writing teacher, and author of Drunkish: A Memoir of Loving and Leaving Alcohol - coming out January 16th In addition to all these roles, Stephanie is a TV personality, and cohost of the popular podcast For Crying Out Loud. She co-created and hosted the late-night comedy parenting show...

As you welcome in a new year, perhaps you’re giving some consideration to changes you want to make. I want to invite you to be gentle with yourself as you enter this year. Sometimes we try to make so many changes to kick off a year that we are almost immediately too overwhelmed to follow through on any of them for the long haul.   I always encourage moms to give themselves the entire month of Janu...

A new year is always a good time to reflect on the state of your current relationships. As I considered which past guests could bring the most value to you as you kick off 2024, I immediately thought of Kat Vellos, who specializes in helping people develop meaningful friendships in adulthood. Sometimes it can feel like a dirty little secret in adulthood, “I don’t have many friends.” So, we keep it...

When I was considering which episodes of the SMA I wanted to bring back for you this week, I went to see what my most downloaded episodes of the last couple of years have been. This interview with Aubrey Gordon was my most downloaded episode of this year. I think (and hope!) this is because you are all huge Aubrey fans AND I hope this episode's popularity is a reflection of this community’s openne...

Are you rethinking your relationship with alcohol as you approach 2024? Casey McGuire Davidson has been a guest on the SMA multiple times and she is my go-to referral partner when it comes to connecting women who are sober curious to sober coaches and communities. I chose Casey for this Best Of episode because I see so many women reevaluating their relationships with alcohol and I want you to make...

Tanmeet Sethi is one of my favorite people I met in 2023. We immediately hit it off and found the sweetest friendship that feels like we have known each other forever. I have had the opportunity to listen to my dear friend Tanmeet talk about joy as a form of resistance multiple times this year. Every time my capacity for joy - especially in hard seasons - expands exponentially. I chose this episod...

Chantal is a mom, physical therapist, and author of SETTLED: How to Find Calm in a Stress-Inducing World. She is also the founder of the wellness company Body Insight Inc. She holds degrees in psychology and kinesiology from Occidental College and a master’s in physical therapy from Mount Saint Mary’s College in Los Angeles. Chantal is certified in Pilates, a practitioner of the Safe and Sound Pro...

Giving yourself permission to release a few unconventional things might just make motherhood more manageable in 2024.  And, when one area of your life is more manageable, all areas of your life start to feel more manageable.   Society rewards moms for aiming high, hustling hard, and achieving at every turn. I’m going to invite you to get a little unconventional in 2024. Allow yourself to be averag...

Megan Flatt is a business growth strategist on a mission to make entrepreneurship easier. She believes you can have a thriving business, a community, and a life — and you don’t need more time, you need more focus. She’s the founder of Focus Sessions and the author of Focused: Reclaim Your Time, Ditch Overwhelm, and Do Less Better.  Besides helping women and business owners focus, Megan is obsessed...

Are you the kind of mother who keeps adding more and more things to your plate without giving any consideration to moving certain things OFF the plate to make space for the new stuff?  Do you just keep piling and piling and piling until things start to fall off the plate, causing you great anxiety, or the entire plate breaks from the pressure and weight of too many things? Ahhh, the overwhelm of m...

Laura has been involved in the entertainment industry for over 30 years as a writer, Producer, and entrepreneur.  She is the author of over 60 books and a staggering 21 New York Times bestsellers.  Most recently, Laura co-directed, produced, and wrote the award-winning documentary, Anxious Nation, her first feature, focused on the crisis of anxiety in America, especially its impact on our youth an...

I’ve been very aware over the last few years how tempting it is to dub each year as a “dumpster fire”. I definitely don’t want to negate or bypass all the incredibly difficult things we have all been through collectively and individually over the last few years. But, I do think we do ourselves a disservice when we embrace an entire year as being awful.   In our house, it has been one of our most t...

Author and memoirist, Nefertiti Austin writes about the erasure of diverse voices in motherhood in the #1 Amazon bestseller Motherhood So White: A Memoir of Race, Gender and Parenting in America. Nefertiti's work around this topic has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, The Nation, Romper, Adoptive Families magazine, Parents Magazine, SheMedia and countless others. She has appeared on...

Practicing gratitude is not intended to be another chore on your list. It is intended to bring you emotional ease, even joy, as you navigate any given day. It is intended to be a reliable support as you navigate tough moments or tough seasons. And, it’s intended to help you see what is possible if you’re paying attention. I have had gratitude practices that felt a little chore-ish in nature. They...

Julie Ciardi is a business & mindset coach for women. Julie helps overwhelmed entrepreneurs create a plan to become CEOs and design their dream businesses. Julie is uniquely positioned to help women start or grow businesses. Julie spent 20 years in a Fortune 50 company as a sales and marketing vice-president. She has also started & grown her own successful businesses. Julie opened a brick & mortar...