“We did not have a roadmap. We had a $250 rental space, a few favors, and a lot of late nights. We kept our day jobs, reinvested every dollar, and built a business people actually wanted to work for. That is how Jump Ahead was born. Not with funding or flash. With grit, trust, and a vision we refused to let go of.” — Brittany Smith and Janki Patel, Co-Founders of Jump Ahead Pediatrics

Christiana Marouchos and Becky Tasker are VPs at StackAdapt. Christiana leads brand and communications. Becky leads growth marketing. Together, they’ve helped shape the company’s marketing strategy, scale its team, and build a culture rooted in clarity, accountability, and equity.

In this episode, they talk about what it means to lead inside a fast-moving tech company. Christiana shares how storytelling has become the core of her approach to marketing. Becky breaks down how data and systems thinking helped her step into leadership. They both talk about imposter syndrome, learning to trust your voice, and what they’ve learned about building and managing teams that deliver.

This is a conversation about doing the work, leading with intention, and staying grounded when things move fast.

What if the key to healing was already in your body and it sounded like your own voice?

This question sits at the heart of Julia Williamson and Maddy Monticelli’s work. Together, they lead Sing to Thrive, an Australian-based platform that blends music, sound healing, and practical neuroscience to help people reconnect with themselves. Their approach is not about perfect pitch or polished performance. It is about reclaiming the voice as a tool for emotional release, self-awareness, and everyday healing.

Their story is both deeply personal and widely relatable. Julia grew up in a family that both loved music and struggled with dysfunction. Singing was her escape. It gave her comfort when everything else felt uncertain. But like so many women, Julia internalized limiting beliefs early. She believed she needed to be perfect to be worthy. She learned to stay quiet, to not ask for anything, to keep the peace.

When Dr Ishnella Azad enters a room something shifts. Conversation sharpens, posture straightens, and you sense that every obstacle just shrank a size. She talks fast because her story is sprinting. She has been a scientist, a neuro‑psychiatrist, a commercial real‑estate mogul, a data‑center pioneer, and a walking billboard for resilience. Plenty of high achievers look impressive on paper. Ish’s power lives in the space between bullet points, where setbacks meet stubborn determination.

This long‑form piece unpacks the full arc behind our recent episode of Badass Women in Business. It is the behind‑the‑mic look at how a woman with three science degrees, an amputated leg, and an unyielding belief in everyday investors is racing toward a ten‑billion‑dollar empire while lifting others along the way.

In this episode of the Badass Women in Business Podcast, Gunjan takes us deep into her story, sharing how she pivoted from a celebrated media career in India to co-founding a growing tech company, Codebase, alongside her husband John Bradshaw. It is a story of love, grit, sacrifice, and soaring ambition. It is a story about what it really means to lead with intuition, courage, and perseverance when the stakes are personal and the learning curve is vertical.

Jayla Siciliano knows what it feels like to chase the dream, hit burnout, and completely rebuild. After raising half a million dollars without connections, surviving a product launch disaster, and landing a Shark Tank deal with Mark Cuban, she walked away from it all to create something that actually supports her life. Today, she runs a bi-coastal luxury short term rental company and hosts the Seed Money Podcast to help early stage founders get funded and stay sane.

In this episode, Jayla gets real about the pressure of raising capital, the reality of burning out on your own dream, and how she rebuilt her business and lifestyle from the ground up. If you're questioning what success really means or wondering how to fund your big idea, this one is a must-listen.

In this deeply moving and inspiring episode, Aggie and Cristy sit down with Blair Pietrini, co-founder of Pietrini Pizza Napoletana and longtime community advocate, for a conversation that goes far beyond business. Blair shares her powerful story of launching a dream with her husband, losing him just ten months after opening their restaurant, and continuing to honor his legacy through family, faith, and fire-forged perseverance.

From founding a nonprofit that served tens of thousands annually to building a thriving restaurant with no prior industry experience, Blair’s journey is one of unwavering values, radical authenticity, and a refusal to let tragedy define her future. You’ll walk away with lessons on leadership, grief, guts, and how to build a business that’s truly an extension of who you are.

“Your fear of speaking is not a flaw. It’s a message. And when you finally listen to what it’s trying to tell you, you stop white-knuckling your way through visibility—and start showing up with real joy.”

In this episode of Badass Women in Business, Linda Ugelow reminds us that confidence isn’t something you fake. It’s something you build from the inside out by untangling the beliefs that told you it wasn’t safe to be seen. If you’ve ever cringed watching yourself on video, avoided the mic, or held back your voice in a room—you’re not alone. And you don’t have to stay stuck.

Lakeisha is the founder of Chief of Minds, an organizational development and HR consulting firm now in its 11th year. But her story started much earlier. She has been building businesses since childhood, when she was handing out leaf-raking contracts to neighbors using carbon paper and grit.

Her path hasn’t been linear, but it has been deeply intentional. Here are a few of the takeaways that stood out from her episode.