Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Heidi Ridley
Co-Founder and CEO, RadiantESG Global Investors LLC
Danville, CA, USA
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
RadiantESG is a new company in a start-up situation, so roles are less defined and tend to be more broad. In my capacity as CEO, my main focuses are defining the vision and strategy for RadiantESG and to motivate and engage our team to successfully execute on our strategic plan. It’s also important that I lead our discussions with all key constituents, most notably the clients we serve. Finally, there is a strong advocacy role to play as a leader within my industry on key topics such as the role of investments in driving positive change on environmental, social and governance issues, diversity and inclusion.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
The best part of my job is co-creating this new company with a group of incredibly talented people, whom I admire and respect. We worked together on average 15 years and I was truly honored that they decided to join me on this journey. I am really enjoying building something from the ground up, motivating by creating an organization that is really different and inspires others.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
A real sense of purpose and a strong desire to have a lasting positive impact on the financial services industry–both in terms of championing the important role capital markets can play in driving progress on environmental, social and governance issues and in helping to bring about a more inclusive mindset toward women and other underrepresented groups.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
Sometimes you have to take a leap of faith and grow your wings on the way down.
What does generosity mean to you?
When you do something for which you are not the beneficiary.
How do you feel businesses can play a larger role in solving today’s biggest challenges? Do you have any specific stories or examples from your work or colleagues you can share?
The world’s biggest challenges need focused alignment between governments, businesses, and individuals. Private companies are often at the nexus of these three groups, benefitting from evolving priorities in government spending and acting as a conduit for buy-in from the public generally. In this way, private businesses have a unique role to play in transformational change. A good current example would be the emergence of smaller companies that will be key in driving a transition to a greener energy grid. To be sure, not every one of them will be a good investment, but as a group they help push technology forward, attract capital to where it is needed most, and influence individual preferences.
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Determined. If I set my mind to something, I cannot be deterred. I genuinely believe that there is no challenge that can’t be overcome. I am willing to put in the work and my resilience knows no bounds.
If you could pick a song to guide you through 2022, which song would it be?
Footprints On The Moon by Gabby Barrett
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
On a professional level, I’m very excited about being able to meet with clients face to face again and look forward to what I hope will be a successful launch year for our firm.
On a personal level, the big development is preparing to be empty nesters. Our two older boys were married last year, our third son will be starting senior year at CU Boulder and our youngest son is graduating high school and will be off to college in the summer.
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Katrina Julia
Creator + CEO, FIT Life Creation
Nomad currently – since end of 2020 – will be based again in Atlanta, GA this year
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
I am a Multi-passionate entrepreneur who helps entrepreneurs and brands create + scale a life and business they love. This is done as the Creator and CEO of FIT Life Creation, all in one lifestyle brand with tips, tools and tech in wellness, business, marketing and travel. Think Amazon and Airbnb have a family.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
The purpose, the growth, the learning, the challenge. I love it all!
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
Passion, Purpose, People, Persistence. Faith + Focus drive me.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
You may be and do anything you want in this life- mom.
What does generosity mean to you?
Giving from an overflow because when you focus on gratitude there is always overflow.
Giving from your heart limitlessly even and especially when it is not convenient.
How do you feel businesses can play a larger role in solving today’s biggest challenges? Do you have any specific stories or examples from your work or colleagues you can share?
Yes, I absolutely AGREE!
Here is an article where I wrote Transformation is Required and solving problems like wellness, monetizing, ending homelessness, ending cancer, helping vets and battered women.
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Limitless – there is no box – that is how I live my life.
If you could pick a song to guide you through 2022, which song would it be?
Jireh – Maverick City – helps keep me focused and grateful and aligned.
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
YES! Travel this year to Colombia and Panama right now and projects in Panama, next Portugal, The Cru, launches with influencer marketing, our mastermind with Creation Club + Lifestyle Brand Academy, CREATEIT Summit later this year and more!
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Donna Litt
COO, Uvaro
Waterloo, ON, Canada
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
Responsible for ensuring we have the systems and data practices in place to align, enable, and resource our team, so that we may deliver on our company goals.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
Working collaboratively to help team members work through new challenges.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
Mindset. I have 24 hrs in the day to do 6 things: Move my body, eat good food, move my business forward, move my personal life forward, be good to my people, get a good sleep.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
All you ever need to do is the next one thing.
What does generosity mean to you?
The more you receive the more you have to give.
How do you feel businesses can play a larger role in solving today’s biggest challenges? Do you have any specific stories or examples from your work or colleagues you can share?
Businesses align and mobilize groups of people– employees and customers, primarily. Businesses are also in a position to dedicate significant resources to solving the problems their employees and customers care about. By being customer-centric and value-creation driven, businesses learn what their customers and employees care about, and can dedicate resources accordingly.
Uvaro got to where it is today by listening to our customers. We started as a technology company selling efficiency software to sales teams. In a few short years we’ve become the only community dedicated to our customer’s career success, from their first job to their last, and have helped hundreds of people gain confidence and find new success in the workplace.
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Stubborn.
If you could pick a song to guide you through 2022, which song would it be?
Marie Davidson, Work It
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
Helping our team realize more of their potential.
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Angela Wilson
Founder, CEO, & Chief Vision Officer, Exploryst
Denver, Colorado, USA
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
I am responsible for setting the mission and vision, assembling a diverse team, driving profitability, and managing the company’s overall operations.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
It is knowing that I am solving a problem that has not been addressed for over a billion people with disabilities worldwide.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
As the parent of a child with disabilities, this is a problem that my family and I will be facing for years to come and it has not been solved to our satisfaction.
Individuals and families should not be restricted from the transformational activities that become part of your soul when you experience new things and visit new places.
I want to share the world with my family, with all families.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
Go slow to go fast.
What does generosity mean to you?
I have been generous by supporting and donating to causes and people beyond my comfort zone. It helps me grow and allows others the opportunity to grow.
How do you feel businesses can play a larger role in solving today’s biggest challenges? Do you have any specific stories or examples from your work or colleagues you can share?
Hiring for diversity is not only better for business outcomes, but it is also better for the workers and their communities as well.
“A Study Finds That Diverse Companies Produce 19% More Revenue”
Exploryst has instituted policies for diverse hiring – age, race, religion, color, sex (including breastfeeding and conditions related to breastfeeding), gender (including gender identity and gender expression), national origin, ancestry, family status, medical condition, sexual orientation, genetic characteristics and information, physical or mental disability, and military or veteran status.
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Resilient. Starting a tourism industry business right before a global pandemic and sticking with it over the past two years is definitely resilience.
If you could pick a song to guide you through 2022, which song would it be?
Don’t Stop by Fleetwood Mac.
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
Professionally, my goals are to successfully fund raise for our seed round and begin to expand into other metropolitan areas around the country and the world.
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Angel Rich
CEO, The Wealth Factory
Washington DC, USA
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
I am the founder and CEO of The Wealth Factory. The Wealth Factory is a conglomeration of brands including WealthyLife, CreditRich, and CreditStacker. WealthyLife provides financial literacy education technology through games, curriculum, courses, and other FinTech products that walk users from birth to retirement in 12 interactive modules to exceed the personal finance common core standards. CreditRich rounds up account holders’ spare change to pay your bills intelligently and improve your credit score by using our machine learning, proprietary algorithm to optimize your debt payments, customize financial education, and get you more loans approved. CreditStacker allows users to swap credit pieces to pay debt, achieve a high credit score, and learn from the multiple choice questions. I am also an author of 2 books: History of the Black Dollar and Black Woman Politics. I do a lot of public speaking as well regarding diversity, black history, fintech, and a variety of other topics.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
I love knowing that I am making a difference in my community and in the world. With my app CreditRich, I became the first Black American to partner with a major credit bureau. By making history this way, I am breaking down barriers for future generations to come behind me and do great things. Additionally, my business focuses on financial literacy because I want to be able to help people get the financial education they need to become more financially free.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
There have definitely been times that it has been tough, but I am a very resilient person. When I was young, I had a vision from God who laid out my whole life ahead of me. This vision, and knowing that I have God on my side, have helped keep pushing me forward. I have an amazing network of people who help me keep going every day, and that guide me through my challenges. I know that at the end of the day I am making a difference in the world and the work that I am doing matters, so no matter how hard things get I have to keep pushing and stay motivated to accomplish my goals.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
“Angel, there is no doubt in my mind you will be successful. But if you want to go fast go alone, if you want to go far go together.” This advice honestly changed my life because it shifted my entire approach. It helped me understand the importance of using my network and taking things slow to ensure that I am doing it right. I want to go together and work as a team to go as far as possible.
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
One thing that I had really been looking forward to is getting married! I got married on February 2nd in Washington DC on Black Lives Matter Plaza at the St Regis hotel. It was so beautiful and definitely one of the best days of my life. With work, I am really looking forward to some of the things we have coming with my app CreditRich. Unfortunately, I can’t talk about a lot of it yet, but we have some really exciting things coming that I am definitely looking forward to sharing with the world.
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Mani Anand
Founder and CEO at Apphienz
San Diego, California, United States
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
My role in the organization entails overlooking the entire business, engaging with clients, learning about their challenges, and troubleshooting their pain points, along with managing my global team. My team and I help companies and nonprofit organizations with their Salesforce instance and solve all Salesforce-related queries.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
The most cherished part of my job is interacting with my existing and potential clients. Solving their biggest, smallest and most significant problems stimulates me. I work solely for the joy of satisfaction that I get at the end of the day knowing that I’ve been able to make some difference in my client’s business or a Nonprofit organization. Working with various nonprofits fuels my soul.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
The past two years have been nothing short of a tragedy for the entire world, the remnants of which will be witnessed by the upcoming generations. That said, what kept me going is my family, my work, my purpose which I strongly believe in, and my supporting group of close-knit friends. Moreover, being a small business owner myself, the amount of agility and resilience shown by small businesses during these times pushes me to keep going.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
The best piece of advice I ever received is to focus on the positive qualities of people. They might be going through their fair share of struggles and challenges we never know about. The best we can do, not judge them in the first instance and focus on their negative qualities.
What does generosity mean to you?
To me, generosity is being sensitive to others’ situations and helping them overcome hardships with my knowledge and skills.
How do you feel businesses can play a larger role in solving today’s biggest challenges? Do you have any specific stories or examples from your work or colleagues you can share?
There are a plethora of small and big challenges that are being faced by the world today anywhere from hunger to poverty, from lack of sanitation facilities to child marriages, etc. We tackle these one at a time if every business comes together and does its bit to make the world a better place. At our level, we have been working with several nonprofit organizations during the pandemic to help them raise funds for their organization. We take up projects to catch a fire or do pro bono projects to support some great nonprofits working to make our world a better place. We want to make sure we help as many organizations as we can.
We supported an LA-based Nonprofit on a Pro Bono basis which generated significant differences in their organization like streamlining the processes that helped them raise more funds and gave them 360-degree visibility of their data. This gave them more time to focus on doing what they do best, making the world a better place rather than focusing and worrying about the data.
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Passionate. Whatever I have done in my life so far has always been with the utmost amount of passion and devotion. Growing up, there have been many challenges like juggling between work and home. Taking care of two kids who were 1.5 years apart in age is a task in itself. It was only my passion to start my own company and to make this world a better place that keeps me thriving.
If you could pick a song to guide you through 2022, which song would it be?
Lights will guide you home – Coldplay
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
Professionally, there is a profusion of exciting projects in the pipeline that I am most excited about. Partnering with several nonprofits around the world. Personally, I’m looking forward to traveling with my family and spending quality time with them. Pandemic was a difficult time for all of us and we did not get a chance to travel so a nice getaway is something I’m really looking forward to.
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Ishveen Jolly
CEO + Founder, OpenSponsorship
London, UK (But the company is in the US and I was pre-pandemic based in NYC)
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
I am the CEO of OpenSponsorship, the world’s largest two-sided marketplace connecting brands and athletes for digital marketing campaigns.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
I love our company mission and seeing my team get behind this mission and bringing it to life. Watching the team that you have brought in, perform and deliver is the most enjoyable thing.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
As above, I love our mission. Making sponsorship accessible to all – seeing brands be able to leverage athletes and sports in their marketing campaigns. Also, for athletes sponsorship can be the difference between being able to enter a competition or training vs. playing. We love sponsorship so bringing innovation to the industry is amazing.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
The entrepreneurship journey is hard, so enjoy the little wins, celebrate them and move quickly on from the failures – learn from them but don’t dwell.
What does generosity mean to you?
It means giving to others who need it – financially, time, advice, opportunity – anything counts.
How do you feel businesses can play a larger role in solving today’s biggest challenges? Do you have any specific stories or examples from your work or colleagues you can share?
Sponsorship is essentially the way that one entity can leverage the influence of an athlete to drive home key messaging. We have worked on some really important campaigns e.g. with the likes of Texas and Florida Government during COVID to promote safety and vaccines; we have worked with companies on using athletes to promote financial literacy and many more important campaigns. As we grow we think about how we can support more CSR initiatives.
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Resilient – I have the ability to keep going, despite the odds.
If you could pick a song to guide you through 2022, which song would it be?
Something without lyrics so I could play it in the background and keep working
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
We just raised a growth round, so it’s an exciting year for us hiring, growing, building more processes and delivering our investors and team results.
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Karen Lee
Senior Director, Saberpoint
New York, NY
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
Head of Salesforce Practice at Saberpoint. I am responsible for presales activities, implementing solutions, recruiting, training, and partnering with vendors to meet clients’ delivery needs and scalability.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
My clients. I truly enjoy the industry of small to medium businesses and how I can service that sector with my technology and data expertise. It’s challenging and fun to work in this sector in evaluating a full technical stack and identifying the solutions that meet the business needs, budget and scalability.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
My CEO, my team, my daughter, my friends – They always remind me how much brighter things truly are.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. Never Fear.
What does generosity mean to you?
Generosity is generosity of the heart. Empathy and action oriented care for society as a whole.
How do you feel businesses can play a larger role in solving today’s biggest challenges? Do you have any specific stories or examples from your work or colleagues you can share?
Businesses can play a strong impacting role. I think many have already and can definitely do more. Every person can also contribute in many ways that will help in the overall cause for betterment of society. Businesses can better support monetarily than an individual can, but individuals can share time, ideas and empathy which is the action. We need both of these to be complementary.
Saberpoint as an organization that supports many causes monetarily. I will progress with a series of actions as an individual and/or team to push forward these causes.
– I volunteer as an adjunct professor at Pace University to mentor and teach the younger generation.
– I am an advocate of inclusion by supporting young women and minority group in their path to career success.
– My team and I volunteer for non profit project with organizations such as taproot.org or catchafire.org
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Nice. I know, it sounds bland. When I have year-end reviews since I started my career, my feedback from all my managers is “You are too nice.” They made it seem like it was a negative, but I was who I was and I didn’t know how to change that. As I matured and learned to embrace this feedback, my response back is “I got here because of my personality and there is no such thing as too nice.”
If you could pick a song to guide you through 2022, which song would it be?
This is a funny question, “Work from Home” by Fifth Harmony
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
My goal every year is the same. Maximize my learning to be used to assist others.
Pledge 1%’s #WomenWhoLead series celebrates female leaders who are paving the way for the next generation. While our featured leaders come from a variety of backgrounds and industries, they are united in their efforts to promote equality for all women in the workplace. We’ve asked them to share a bit about their journey to success, as well as lessons they’ve learned along the way.
Mousumi Behari
Digital Transformation Lead, Avionos
Chicago, IL, USA
What is your current role? Briefly describe in 1-2 sentences.
I lead the Digital Transformation practice at Avionos where I’m responsible for Strategy and Change Management for several Fortune 100 companies. Additionally I founded AWLN, which is our women’s leadership network where our mission is to support women in professional and personal growth.
What’s the best part of your job? What do you enjoy the most?
I enjoy problem solving. Often companies will have complex issues to solve, whether it’s their lack of technology, inconsistent processes, or it may even be not knowing what to do next. Coming up with an actionable strategy, working with bright minds in various industries, and then seeing their successes is what makes my job exciting.
We’ve all faced personal and professional challenges these past two years – what motivates you to keep going?
During the pandemic I started a practice to feed my mind, body and soul before I begin the day. An hour of working out, meditation and prayer really helps me to focus on what are usually jam packed and challenging days.
What’s the best piece of advice you ever received?
To be authentic.
What does generosity mean to you?
I really value the idea of paying it forward and lending mentorship and time to those who it would help.
If you could describe yourself in one word what would that be and why?
Multi-faceted. I have a lot of varied interests and like to explore and learn new things.
What are you looking forward to this year? Are there any goals (personal or professional), activities, or experiences you are excited about?
I concepted the idea of Little CEO’s a few years ago, which is a virtual summer camp to help girls ages 7-12 come up with a business idea, logo and share and present it. It was a great success, and this year will be our 3rd year. I hope every year it continues to gain traction and we have alums come back and talk about their successes.
Is there anything else you’d like to share?
Last year I co-founded a podcast called Overworked which is about the intersection of women and business. It’s available on Spotify and Apple and speaks to the struggles and successes women tend to have.