For most of my career, I believed security came from achievement. I also believed achievement would bring validation, that if I worked hard enough, earned enough, and accomplished enough, I would finally feel certain of my place and my future.

The next promotion.

The next title.

The next seat at the table.

As one of the few women, and often the only woman, in executive leadership rooms, I worked hard to earn every opportunity. I led large-scale transformations, managed billion-dollar budgets, and sat in rooms where decisions shaped organizations and people’s lives.

Like many leaders, I assumed those accomplishments created security.

What I eventually learned is that titles create access. They do not create security.

Ownership does.

When I stepped away from the traditional corporate path and began building what many call a portfolio life, I was met with more than a few questioning looks. To some, it appeared I was stepping away from ambition.

The reality was exactly the opposite.

I wasn’t retiring from leadership. I was expanding how I lead, how I create value, and how I define success in this season of my life.

One lesson I share in The Only Woman in the Room is that many leaders, especially women, spend years building excellence inside systems they do not fully control.

We become identified with the title, the company, the role, or the institution.

Then one day the organization changes.

Leadership changes.

The market changes.

Or life changes.

Suddenly, we discover that what felt permanent was actually borrowed.

That realization can be unsettling. It can also be the beginning of building real agency.

Building Agency Before You Need It

A portfolio career is often misunderstood.

It is not doing a collection of random things.

It is not chasing side hustles.

And it is certainly not about staying busy.

It is a deliberate strategy to diversify how you create value, how you earn, how you contribute, and how you lead.

Because in today’s economy, even the safest roles can disappear overnight.

The definition of stability has changed.

Research from MBO Partners found that 72.7 million Americans participated in independent work arrangements in 2024, representing approximately 43% of the workforce. The number of independent professionals earning more than $100,000 continues to grow.

This shift is not happening in a vacuum.

Professionals are recognizing that a single employer, a single title, or a single source of income no longer provides the certainty it once did.

For women, the stakes can be even higher.

Career pauses, caregiving responsibilities, relocation, health challenges, and systemic barriers often create disruptions that are absorbed quietly and personally.

Building optionality becomes more than a financial strategy. It becomes a leadership strategy.

Because optionality is not a personality trait.

It is something you build intentionally, over time, until your next decision is driven by purpose rather than panic.

What a Portfolio Life Has Given Me

Power

Not power over people.

Power over choices.

When you have options, you negotiate differently. You ask for what you need. You walk away from misalignment. You make decisions from clarity rather than fear.

Authenticity

You stop shaping your identity around what an institution needs you to be.

Your work becomes a reflection of your values, strengths, and priorities rather than a job description.

Impact

You gain the ability to apply your expertise where it can create the greatest value.

You stop waiting to be chosen and become intentional about where you contribute.

Resilience

No single organization determines your future.

When one opportunity changes, your entire life doesn’t stop with it.

Peace

Perhaps the most unexpected gift.

The confidence that your identity is larger than any title you hold.

For me, a portfolio life has not meant focusing on just one thing. It has meant creating space for several different pursuits that I genuinely enjoy and choosing how I spend my time based on my interests, values, and goals.

Some seasons have included writing, speaking, consulting, mentoring, and learning new skills. Each experience has contributed something meaningful, and together they have created a richer and more fulfilling professional life.

The freedom to make those choices has been one of the greatest benefits of building agency. Rather than being defined by a single role, I have been able to explore multiple interests and make decisions that reflect who I am and what matters most to me.

The Freedom to Define Success on Your Own Terms

Last year I lived this firsthand.

I launched a book.

Started writing regularly.

Expanded my speaking work.

Built a consulting practice.

And I learned something quickly:

There is no single right way to build a portfolio life.

What made the difference was not following someone else’s formula, it was being intentional about what mattered most to me and making choices that aligned with my goals, values, and energy.

When I was launching The Only Woman in the Room, I wasn’t simultaneously trying to optimize every aspect of speaking, consulting, writing, and business development.

A Few Lessons That Helped Me

1. Work in Seasons

Identify the one thing that deserves your creative and strategic energy right now.

Allow other priorities to operate at a maintenance level until their season arrives.

2. Accept Help Earlier

Many high achievers wait too long to ask for support.

Whether it’s professional assistance, family support, or help from trusted colleagues, people often want to contribute.

They simply need to know what you’re building.

3. Ask Clearly

One of the most underutilized leadership skills is making specific requests.

“Can you review this?”

“Can you make an introduction?”

“What are your thoughts on this idea?”

People are far more likely to help when they understand exactly how.

4. Protect Your Calendar

Every yes has an operational cost.

Treat your time the way you would treat a balance sheet.

Invest it intentionally.

The Bigger Lesson

Many exceptional leaders struggle with reinvention because they built excellence inside a structure that was never designed to fully belong to them.

They mistake the title for the source of their value.

But the title was never the value.

The value was always the person.

The skills.

The relationships.

The judgment.

The leadership.

The ability to create impact.

A title may open a door.

But ownership creates freedom.

In this season of rapid change, the leaders who thrive will not be the ones with the most impressive business card.

They will be the ones who have built the greatest capacity to adapt, contribute, and create value beyond any single role.

That is what a portfolio life represents to me.

Not more work.

More agency.

And in a world where stability is increasingly rented, agency may be the most valuable asset we can build.

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What are you building in this season of your life?

And what is one thing you need to say no to in order to make space for it?

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Titles expire, roles change, and power moves on.

But the systems you strengthened remain. The leaders you elevated keep leading. And the standards you set continue shaping the room long after you’ve left it.

In the end your title will not define you.

What will define you is what is better because you were here.

In the final chapter of The Only Woman in the Room, this excerpt brings everything I’ve been circling in my career into focus in a way that feels almost uncomfortably simple: impact is what remains when your authority is gone.

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Titles expire. Roles change. Power shifts hands. That’s not the exception—that’s the system. And yet, so much of how we’re conditioned to measure ourselves is tied to exactly those things: the job we hold, the seat we sit in, the influence we can directly exert. This chapter cuts through that illusion of permanence.

Because the truth is, authority is temporary scaffolding. It lets you build, it gives you reach, it creates momentum, but it was never the structure itself. Impact is what gets embedded into the structure. It’s what holds after you step away.

And I think that’s the real test that most people don’t talk about. When you’re no longer in the room, what still holds? What still works? What still gets done differently because you were once there? It’s easy to confuse presence with influence, but they are not the same thing. Presence ends the moment you leave. Influence is what lingers in decisions, in behavior, in standards that quietly become the default.

This chapter also reveals an honesty about leadership that isn’t always comfortable. If a system only works while you are actively holding it together, then it isn’t actually a system: it’s dependency. Real leadership shows up in what continues without you. In the leaders who don’t just execute your vision, but expand beyond it. In the teams who don’t need you to interpret every moment because you’ve already taught them how to think, not just what to do.

And maybe most importantly, it removes the ego from the equation. There’s something grounding in the idea that your legacy isn’t measured by how central you were, but by how unnecessary your constant presence becomes over time. That’s not diminishment—that’s maturation of impact. It means you did the work well enough that it no longer depends on you.

That final line lands because it strips everything back: what defines you is not what you held, but what is better because you were here. Not what you controlled. Not what you were credited for in the moment. But what actually improved in a lasting way—systems, people, standards, outcomes—that outlive your formal authority.

And if I’m honest, that’s a harder standard, but it’s also a clearer one. Because it forces you to stop asking, “What did I achieve while I was in the room?” and start asking, “What keeps working after I’ve left it?”

My final takeaways are simple:

• Impact is the delta you create, not the title you hold. Titles give access. Impact shows change. If nothing is measurably better because you were there, the title doesn’t matter.

• Impact grows when you let yourself evolve. Growth isn’t linear—some of the biggest moves look sideways. Don’t confuse upward with forward. Choose stretch over status.

• A portfolio career expands your influence. When impact isn’t tied to one role, it spreads across systems. You don’t just operate inside a structure—you shape them.

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for purchase.

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Energy, attention, and emotional bandwidth are finite. Once I understood that, everything became clearer. When you start protecting those resources as fiercely as you protect your earning potential, you become far more intentional about where your time goes.

This excerpt from my chapter on wealth sits on an idea that people are quick to dismiss: that not all wealth shows up in your bank account. It can sound naïve, or like something only said once financial pressure is off the table. And I understand that reaction—money absolutely matters. It creates safety, expands choice, and protects you from decisions made under constraint. I’ve never believed otherwise.

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But having lived deeply inside both definitions of success, where money and title were the primary scorecard, and where I began to question what they were actually costing me, I’ve come to understand that some of the most meaningful forms of wealth don’t show up on a paycheck. And that absence is often felt long before it can be explained.

For a long time, I optimized for the visible markers of wealth: scope, compensation, advancement, impact as defined by scale. I paid attention to all of it, negotiated for it, and in many ways, built a career around it. But over time, I started noticing something harder to measure. The work was still high-functioning on paper, but the internal equation was shifting. Energy wasn’t as steady. Attention felt more fragmented. Emotional bandwidth was thinner than it used to be. Nothing was “wrong” in the traditional sense, but something was being spent.

What I came to understand is that those resources don’t behave like money. You don’t replenish them at the same rate you earn them. And unlike financial capital, they don’t compound when mismanaged. They degrade. When energy, attention, and emotional capacity are consistently overdrawn, everything built on top of them eventually starts to wobble: judgment, creativity, relationships, even long-term performance.

That realization reframed everything for me. I stopped asking only what something paid and started thinking about what it actually took to keep up. Not just the hours, but the energy and stress in the background. Once you see it that way, the trade-offs get clearer. Some opportunities that look like growth can slowly wear you down. And some environments that seem successful come with costs you don’t notice until later.

None of this made ambition smaller. It made it more precise. Because the goal isn’t to withdraw from ambition—it’s to make sure ambition isn’t paid for with the very things that make it sustainable.

Money gives you options. But energy, attention, and emotional bandwidth determine whether you’re actually able to use them without losing yourself in the process.

That’s the part of wealth no one can deposit for you.

Here are the key things I believe everyone should understand about wealth:

• Wealth is leverage, not just income. Money isn’t the whole story, but it creates options. Financial security lets you walk away from misalignment, choose mission over prestige, and act from power rather than fear. Wealth is expanded choice.

• Ruthless prioritization is essential. You can’t have everything at once, but you can choose what matters most and allocate your time, energy, and money accordingly. Real wealth is staying aligned with your values, even when tradeoffs are inevitable. Drift is optional.

• Negotiation is a professional responsibility. Compensation reflects how organizations assign value. Expanded scope should come with expanded pay. The first offer reflects constraints, not worth. Without self-advocacy, value is often under-recognized.

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for purchase.

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Some conversations stay with you—ones that challenge how we lead, who gets to lead, and what we’re building toward.

In my recent conversation with Dan Turchin on his podcast, AI and The Future of Work, we explored leading with both conviction and care. For me, leadership is rooted in authenticity: being clear, honest, and invested in people, while still driving outcomes. Empathy and performance aren’t at odds. They’re what build trust, and trust is what drives results.

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But leadership doesn’t happen in a vacuum. For many women, it still means navigating unspoken rules just to be seen as credible. And the data is stark: women’s representation in STEM has fallen from 34% in the 1980s to 22% today. That’s not just a workforce issue—it’s a threat to the future of AI. Because the real risk isn’t the technology. It’s who is shaping it.

We also talked about systems that weren’t designed for women to thrive, from early education pipelines to how leadership traits are judged. And when women do reach senior roles, they’re often asked to conform rather than change the system.

At the same time, AI is too often used to explain layoffs that are really about leadership decisions—not technology. That narrative needs to be challenged. I see AI as an amplifier of human potential, but only if we lead it that way. It’s always about people, culture, and the choices behind both.

If something resonates, I hope you’ll listen, share, or start a conversation.

Grateful to my friend Dan Turchin for having me on—such a thoughtful, wide-ranging conversation and a real pleasure to join you.

Listen to the full interview: https://www.buzzsprout.com/520474/episodes/18909236

And if you haven’t purchased my new book, The Only Woman in the Room, we unpack these topics, and so much more. Grab your copy today.

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I knew how to push. I knew how to endure. What I didn’t know, what no one had taught me, was how to stop before my body stopped me.

I didn’t know how to rest. And it almost killed me.

This realization, from the chapter on rest in my new book The Only Woman in the Room, didn’t come from a vague sense of burnout or a tough quarter at work—it came after open heart surgery, a direct result of a condition I was born with, but one that had been dangerously exacerbated by years of chronic stress.

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What I didn’t fully appreciate at the time is how disorienting that realization actually was. Losing the illusion of invincibility isn’t a clean, empowering moment—it’s destabilizing. For most of my life, my identity had been built on being the one who could handle more, push further, recover faster. Endurance wasn’t just a skill; it was proof of my value. So when I say I learned I wasn’t infallible, what I really mean is that a core part of how I understood myself stopped working.

And that’s a hard thing to sit with.

Because if you can’t rely on sheer force of will to carry you through, then what do you rely on? If pushing harder isn’t the answer, then you’re forced to confront a question most high performers spend their lives avoiding: what is enough, enough?

No one had ever taught me that stopping early, before the body forces your hand, is a skill. In fact, in most environments, it feels like you’re breaking an unspoken rule. You’re supposed to keep going. You’re supposed to prove you can handle it.

So even after surgery, even after the fear, even after knowing that things had to change, there was still a part of me that wanted to default back to what I knew: push, perform, deliver. That’s the real rewiring. Not the moment you realize something has to change, but the slow, uncomfortable process of actually changing it.

Learning how to rest wasn’t about bubble baths or taking a random day off. It was about developing a completely different relationship with myself—one where I paid attention earlier, where I responded instead of reacted, where I didn’t wait for pain to justify slowing down.

And if I’m honest, that didn’t happen all at once. It still doesn’t. There are moments where the old instincts creep back in, where I feel that pull to override the signals, to push just a little harder, to prove I still can. But now I know where that road leads.

And once you’ve had your chest cracked open—literally or metaphorically—you don’t get to unknow that.

If you take one thing away, let it be this:

• Rest is operational discipline, not indulgence. Exhaustion is a warning, not commitment. Build recovery in—don’t delay it.

• Leaders create the permission structure. Your behavior sets the standard. If you don’t rest, no one else will.

• Burnout is a systems failure, not a character flaw. Chronic stress without recovery leads to breakdown. Fix the system, not yourself.

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for purchase.

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A lot has happened since you subscribed. The Only Woman in the Room launched on March 31 and hit Amazon bestseller. The response has been overwhelming in the best possible way — readers reaching out, conversations starting, and stories being shared that remi…

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Strength is the foundation that makes everything else possible.

This passage is from the chapter on strength in my newly launched book, The Only Woman in the Room. And when I say strength is the foundation that makes everything else possible, I mean it in a very real, lived way.

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Grit gets a lot of attention—and for good reason. It’s what pushes you to say yes, to take the risk, to begin something uncertain. It’s the voice that tells you to keep going, even when you’re not sure how it will turn out. But grit isn’t what sustains you. Because at some point, wanting something badly enough stops being enough. When you’re in an environment that tests you day after day—where nothing feels stable, where you’re being questioned, where the ground keeps shifting—you can’t rely on willpower alone. Grit burns fast. Strength endures.

What carries you in those moments isn’t intensity, it’s steadiness. The ability to stay grounded when everything around you feels uncertain. To listen instead of react. To learn instead of prove. To keep showing up without letting the environment define you.

Most days, it doesn’t feel like strength. It feels like discipline. Like restraint. Like choosing, over and over again, not to take things personally—even when they feel personal. That’s the part people don’t see. Rather, they see what comes later: the confidence, the clarity, the leadership. But underneath all of it is something quieter—the internal capacity to absorb pressure, adapt, and keep moving without losing yourself in the process.

Grit gets you started. Strength is what allows you to stay long enough to become who the moment requires.

Consider this:

• Strength is trained, not summoned. You don’t rise to the moment—you fall back on what you’ve built. Routines, discipline, and boundaries do the work before pressure ever hits. Ask yourself: What am I building now that will hold me later?

• Strength is steadiness, not force. When things get hard, it’s not about pushing harder—it’s about staying grounded. Strength lets you respond with clarity instead of reacting emotionally. Ask yourself: Do I escalate, or do I steady?

• Strength chooses growth over ego. When plans fall apart, strength doesn’t get defensive—it adapts. Leadership is defined less by what you win and more by how you respond when you don’t. Ask yourself: Do I shrink, or do I evolve?

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for purchase.

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There’s a particular kind of clarity that only comes with distance. Not the kind that softens things—but the kind that sharpens the truth. The kind that lets you finally see what was really happening, even when you didn’t have the right words for it at the time.

Today, as The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men officially launches, I’ve been thinking about that clarity—what it took to arrive at it, and why it felt so important to put it into words now.

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Writing this book was not a retrospective. It was a reframing.

It meant going back to moments I had long since moved past: rooms where I had to find my voice without a clear invitation, decisions that carried more weight than they should have, and environments where the rules were never fully visible but always fully enforced.

What surprised me most wasn’t the difficulty of those moments. It was the clarity I now have about them—what was systemic versus what felt personal, and how much energy I spent navigating systems that were never designed with me in mind.

But this story isn’t one of isolation.

Alongside those moments were people who changed the trajectory of my career—some who believed in me before I had fully proven myself, others who challenged me in ways that made me sharper and more certain of who I am. Both men and women—leaders who used their position to create space, to listen, and to back my judgment. Their allyship wasn’t performative. It showed up in decisions: who was given the floor, who was trusted, and who was advanced.

What became clear to me throughout this process is that these experiences weren’t isolated. They were structural. And more importantly, they are navigable.

For a long time, like many high-performing women, I assumed that when something felt harder, it must be personal. But often, it’s not. And what is structural can be understood—and changed.

That is why I wrote this book.

Because this isn’t just about being “the only woman in the room.” It’s about what those rooms reveal—about power, decision-making, and how leadership is defined.

If one thing stays with you after you put this book down, I hope it’s this: you don’t need to become someone else to succeed—but you do need to stop waiting.

Stop waiting to be chosen.

Stop waiting to feel ready.

Stop waiting for permission.

No one is going to tap you on the shoulder and tell you it’s your turn. And no system—especially one that wasn’t designed with you in mind—is going to suddenly reorganize itself to make your path easier. You have more agency than you think. And it’s up to you to use it.

If I could hand a copy to a younger version of myself, she would have spoken sooner, built advocates more intentionally, and understood that excellence without visibility gets you nowhere. She would have known that self-doubt isn’t proof of inadequacy—it’s part of the terrain.

In this book, I share nine principles that shaped my leadership and sustained my career: Authenticity, Belief, Rest, Grit, Power, Connection, Strength, Wealth, and Impact. The takeaway? You don’t need to embrace them all at once—just the one that matters most for the challenge you’re facing right now.

And as this book goes out into the world today, I want to make it as accessible as possible. For launch week, starting today, March 31, the Kindle ebook will be available on Amazon for 99 cents.

Read it, share it, pass it along—because the goal isn’t just to succeed in the room as it exists. It’s to change the room itself.

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Investing in your relationships takes intention. It requires time and consistency. It means following up with the person you met last night at the networking dinner; it means reaching out to the colleague in another department to ask how their project landed. It means keeping notes on people so that you remember who’s dealing with a big launch or who has a parent in the hospital. Investment says: I see you, and I care enough to remember.

Investment is also where the relationship becomes reciprocal. You start offering help before you need any. You ask people about their goals. You share information that might support their work. You make introductions. You cheer them on publicly. You support their promotions and push for their inclusion in big projects. When you invest in people, you’re building relational equity. Not in a transactional way, but in a genuinely human way.

As Maya Angelou once said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

When you’re busy, investing in people is the first thing to go. It’s also the most expensive thing to neglect.

When the calendar is full and expectations are high, it’s easy to focus only on deliverables. Follow-ups get pushed. Check-ins get skipped. Conversations become transactional. I used to think that was just the cost of being focused. It’s not.

The relationships you don’t invest in today are the ones you’ll wish you had built later.

Because over time, those small moments compound.

It looks simple on the surface:

• Following up after a meeting

• Reaching out with no agenda

• Remembering what someone is carrying—not just what they’re delivering

But that consistency is what builds trust. You start showing up differently. You offer help before it’s asked for. You make introductions that don’t benefit you. You advocate for someone in a room they’re not in.

That’s not about being transactional. That’s how you build relational equity—the kind that shows up when you’re not there.

And it only works when it’s real.

As Maya Angelou said,

“People will never forget how you made them feel.”

That’s what people carry forward.

Not your deliverables.

Not your title.

How you showed up.

Looking back, the relationships that shaped my career weren’t built in big moments. They were built in the second conversation. The third check-in. The follow-through when there was nothing in it for me. That’s what signaled it wasn’t transactional. That’s what made it last.

Here’s what most people get wrong:

• Results get you noticed. Relationships get you remembered.

• Trust is built in moments where there’s nothing to gain.

• The smallest investments are the ones that compound the most over time.

You can succeed alone. But you can’t endure alone.

The strongest leaders don’t just have networks. They have a personal board—people who challenge them, ground them, and advocate for them when they’re not in the room.

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for pre-order.

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This post is part of a series. Each week, I am sharing a preview from my upcoming book, The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a World (Still!) Built for Men. Coming March 31, 2026.

Here’s a nugget of wisdom from Eleanor Roosevelt I wish I had come across far earlier in life. If I had, I probably would have had it tattooed on me.

What other people think of me is none of my business.

It took me decades to not just understand that, and even longer to live it. And I’ll be honest, I didn’t wake up one morning suddenly immune to what people thought of me. I spent years trying to be the right version of myself in every room. Polished, measured, agreeable. I thought if I calibrated it just right, I’d stay safe. Respected. Included.

That calibration is exhausting.

Looking back, I can see how much that habit of calibrating myself distracted me from the work of actually leading.

What I’ve come to understand is that belief in yourself doesn’t arrive all at once. It’s built slowly, through experience, execution, and sometimes through moments that test you more than you’d like. Whether it was confronting unfair dynamics in the workplace, navigating imposter syndrome, or leaving organizations that no longer fit, each chapter of my career added another layer of evidence that I could trust myself. Belief, for me, became less about confidence and more about remembering—and embodying—what I had already proven to myself that I could handle.

None of this means I’ve mastered it now. Imposter syndrome still shows up from time to time, as it does for all of us. I’ve learned that it’s often a sign that you’re stretching into something new rather than a signal that you don’t belong. What quiets that voice isn’t pretending it doesn’t exist, it’s anchoring yourself to the facts you know to be true: the work you’ve done, the challenges you’ve navigated, and the results you’ve delivered.

If there’s one idea I hope readers take from this chapter, it’s that belief is a practice. You build it by doing the work, by speaking up even when it’s uncomfortable, and by refusing to shrink yourself to make other people comfortable. Over time, that internal voice becomes stronger than the noise around you. And when that happens, you realize something important: the only opinion that truly determines your path forward is your own.

Pause and think about this:

Stand steady under pressure. You don’t need to out-shout intimidation—just out-steady it. Anchor in facts and refuse to shrink. Ask yourself: Am I contracting, or holding steady?

Ground belief in evidence. Imposter syndrome runs on emotion; counter it with proof. Track results, solved problems, and hard wins. Ask yourself: Am I trusting my track record or my fear?

Lead with clarity, not likability. Stop replaying every interaction. You can’t control perception, only your clarity and conviction. Ask yourself: Was I clear, or trying to be liked?

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for pre-order.

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This post is part of a series. Each week, I am sharing a preview from my upcoming book, The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a World (Still!) Built for Men. Coming March 31, 2026.

“‘I’m about to put you in one of the most difficult leadership positions of your career,’ he said. Then he paused.

‘Are you ready for it?’

I understood immediately what he was really asking. This role would carry responsibility for outcomes that wouldn’t be simple or comfortable. Decisions that would inevitably disappoint someone—maybe many people.

Without hesitation, I said yes.

With that step, I became CIO of the Department of Defense’s Counterintelligence Field Activity.”

Looking back, that moment became a hinge point in my career—quietly dividing everything into a before and an after.

What stands out to me now is that the question wasn’t really about competence. It was about tolerance. Tolerance for ambiguity. For criticism. For being associated with outcomes that wouldn’t make everyone happy. Leadership at that level isn’t about easy wins. It’s about absorbing tension on behalf of the organization and the people it serves.

And in that moment, my “yes” wasn’t about ambition. It was about ownership.

Over time I’ve come to believe something many leaders eventually learn: Power dynamics will shift whether you engage with them or not. Avoiding power doesn’t create safety. It simply forfeits influence. Saying yes means choosing participation over passivity. Becoming CIO wasn’t just a promotion. It was a declaration that I was willing to be accountable for decisions that carried real consequences. It was the moment I stopped operating near power—and started carrying it.

A few lessons from that experience still guide me today.

• Power isn’t a title—it’s influence in action. It shows up in how you guide decisions, stand up for people, and move outcomes forward.

• Power requires both status and influence. Status gives you the authority to sit at the table. Influence is what allows you to shape what happens once you’re there. When the two come together, leaders have the ability to move decisions, challenge systems, and create real outcomes.

• Power is a responsibility, not a reward. If you have a seat at the table, you have the ability—and the obligation—to influence decisions, challenge systems that aren’t working, and open doors so others don’t have to fight the same battles alone.

So I’ll leave you with a question:

If you already have a seat at the table, how are you using it to shape the decisions that matter?

Because leadership isn’t just about being invited into the room. It’s about what you choose to do once you’re there.

My upcoming book, The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men, explores moments like this—when leadership becomes less about titles and more about the responsibility that comes with influence.

The book launches March 31, 2026 and is now available for pre-order.

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This post is part of a series. Each week, I am sharing a preview from my upcoming book, The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a World (Still!) Built for Men. Coming March 31, 2026.

Here’s an unfortunate truth: no one can teach you grit.

No, to build up your grit, you have to go through some stuff. Grit is built the hard way, by moving through rough times when there’s no shortcut around it.

Six months after college, I found myself newly married, alone, and responsible for getting a stepchild and a 100-pound Rottweiler to Guantanamo Bay. Yes, that Guantanamo Bay.

Guantanamo Bay is a dry, desert oasis of roughly forty-five square miles of contained life, dotted with large iguanas and governed by layers of rules. Everything I had known was gone—my family, my friends, any sense of familiarity. I had never known anyone in the military before meeting my husband during a summer job at the Lakehurst Naval Base (where the Hindenburg crashed, a detail that feels symbolic in retrospect). By the time I arrived in Cuba, I was twenty-two years old and standing inside a life I barely recognized.

This excerpt comes from a chapter on grit in my new book, The Only Woman in the Room.

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As the title of this newsletter suggests, grit is something I carry closely – and consider fundamental to who I am. But it’s often misunderstood. People talk about grit like it’s a fixed trait, something you’re either born with or you’re not. As if it can be distilled into a quote, laminated into a leadership principle, or taught in a workshop. But it can’t. Grit is forged – and usually in circumstances you would never voluntarily choose.

When I look back on my time in Guantanamo Bay, I see it through a different lens now. In that time, grit didn’t start as courage. It started as survival. It was also when I realized grit doesn’t always look like digging in and pushing through. Sometimes, it looks like walking away. This chapter isn’t about glorifying perseverance at any cost; it’s about showing how the hardest moments in your life and career can be shaped into a kind of resilience that’s honest, personal, and sustaining when you need it most.

Yes, this chapter argues that grit is essential for growth – for reaching the next level. But it’s not a tribute to endurance for endurance’s sake. It’s not about white-knuckling your way through pain just to prove you can. It’s an invitation to define resilience on your own terms. The real work is learning how to take the seasons that challenge you, where you feel sidelined, humbled or uncertain, and let them refine a strength that aligns with who you truly are – not who you’re trying to impress.

Grit, at its best, isn’t about how much you can withstand. It’s about recognizing when perseverance is shaping you for the better – and when the price is too high. It’s about letting hardship sharpen your clarity, then having the courage to act in accordance.

If there’s anything I hope this chapter teaches you, it’s this:

• Understand what grit actually looks like. It’s not running yourself into the ground – it’s refusing to abandon yourself.

• Build support without shame. Leaning on others doesn’t weaken grit – it reinforces it. Strength lasts longer when it’s shared.

• Distinguish talent from staying power. Many can shine once; far fewer stay consistent when the spotlight fades.

• Root perseverance in conviction. Learn how to sustain grit in the seasons when passion wavers.

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for pre-order.

Pre-Order My Book

This post is part of a series. Each week, I am sharing a preview from my upcoming book, The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a World (Still!) Built for Men. Coming March 31, 2026.

The word “authentic” has been weaponized against women in ways it hasn’t been against men. A Textio study showed that when it comes to corporate settings, women receive 22% more feedback about their personality than men do. Men get to hold things close. They can keep a private world—one that’s seen as mysterious or strategic. But when a woman doesn’t share everything she’s thinking, she’s suddenly “performative,” “fake,” or “hard to read.” A man plays his cards tight to his chest and is praised for being strategic, while a woman who does the same is accused of being cold.

You’re expected to be transparent, but not too transparent; strong, but not intimidating; empathetic, but never soft. It’s a moving target designed to keep women expending energy on perception instead of power. And it’s exhausting.

This excerpt comes from a chapter on authenticity in my new book, The Only Woman in the Room. When I wrote this chapter, my goal wasn’t to make a grand statement about leadership theory. It was to name something I’ve felt my entire career but didn’t always have the right words for: the quiet pressure women carry to prove we’re “authentic” based on terms that were never designed for us.

As Taylor Swift said, “When a man does something, it’s ‘strategic’; when a woman does the same thing, it’s ‘calculated’. A man is allowed to react. A woman can only overreact.”

At first, I tried to fight this. I tried to diminish myself to blend in with the men, to play the game, to wear the mask. I thought I needed to soften more, share more, explain more, just to be perceived as real. But that wasn’t sustainable. The moment I stopped trying to fit in and consistently showed up as myself—the more direct, honest, true-to-my-values version of me—everything changed. When you embody what you stand for with consistency, you build trust. And that trust makes you a better colleague, a better leader, and ultimately makes both you and your teams more successful.

This chapter will help you:

• Name the double standard. Stop internalizing feedback that was never neutral to begin with.

• Clarify your core values. Lead from a defined internal compass rather than adjusting to every room.

• Develop discernment. Learn the difference between honesty and recklessness.

• Hold the line under pressure. Real examples from my experience on how to prioritize integrity over short-term approval.

• Understand why authenticity drives performance. When people trust your heart and consistency, they follow you through uncertainty – building credibility, loyalty, and results.

I’ll leave you to ask yourself this: What are your core values, and where are you still editing yourself to fit someone else’s idea of “authentic”?

The Only Woman in the Room: How to Win in a Workplace (Still!) Built for Men is now available for pre-order.

Pre-Order My Book

This post is part of a series. Each week, I am sharing a preview from my upcoming book, The Only Women in the Room: How to Win in a World (Still!) Built for Men. Coming March 31, 2026.

Introduction

This is a book about perseverance—but not the kind we usually celebrate.

Not grind. Not “hustle”, especially at the cost of living your life. And certainly not self-sacrifice.

This is about what it takes to keep moving forward in systems that were never designed with you in mind—and how to do it without losing yourself along the way.

It’s about a lot of other things, too. After all, I’ve had a career as varied as one can imagine. I like to think of it as non-linear by design. I’ve held top leadership positions in the government, in academia, and in the private sector. I’ve also been a single mom struggling to put together rent while building a new career from scratch. The stories in this book will take you from Guantanamo Bay to the boardrooms of the Fortune 500, and while the amount I’ve learned in these past decades couldn’t possibly be condensed into a few hundred pages, I’ve focused on the moments that mattered most—the ones that shaped how I lead, decide, and endure.

Why?

Because, more often than not throughout my career, I was the only woman in the room.

And guess what? As I write this book, it’s 2026, and for so many women, that’s still true.

How is it possible that this is still the case? How have we been working on integrating women into top levels of leadership for more than half a century, and in 2026, female CEOs make up only 11% of the Fortune 500?

You may be thinking: Okay, but 11% is a record-breaking amount! That’s great!

To which I would respond: if 11 out of 100 is the bar we’re happy to be clearing, we need to reevaluate what “success” looks like. (Although, I should note that ten years ago, female Fortune 500 CEOs were outnumbered by Fortune 500 CEOs named John. So, hey, at least we’ve made it past that hurdle!)

I don’t mean to diminish the fact that more and more women are making it into the room. I couldn’t be more excited to see that progress. But it’s not nearly fast enough, and there are still obvious, and enormous, barriers to entry that you’ll read about in this book—barriers we all have the power to dismantle.

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Throughout my career, being the only woman in the room sometimes felt like an honor. But more often, it felt like standing on a cliff during a windstorm. Those moments taught me more than any leadership seminar ever could; I learned how to keep my footing when things got rough, how to speak up even when my voice shook, and how to appreciate the allies who were willing to use theirs when mine wasn’t enough.

Perseverance is the only reason I made it through the windstorm. I wrote this book to be a guide for anyone trying to make their career progression a little less stormy—whether you’re just starting out, whether you’re switching tracks mid-career, or whether you’re feeling stuck and not sure of your next move. In these chapters is a collection of hard-won lessons, stories that might make you laugh, and a few that might sting a little. I’ll share the moments when I got it right, and plenty when I didn’t.

If you take one thing away from this book, it should be this: even with all the barriers you face, you have the power to write the story of your career exactly the way you want it.

The chapters that follow are the key ingredients that built my story. I hope that by sharing them, they can help you build yours.

The Only Woman in the Room

One day, when I was a Senior Executive at Intel, I found myself sitting in a conference room at J.P. Morgan, alone.

Well, not alone. I was surrounded—by men.

I looked around the table and realized I was the only woman there. Again. Not a woman in the room; the woman. Dark suits, white shirts, identical haircuts, identical confidence, and then me, quietly calculating whether anyone else had noticed the visual math problem unfolding in real time. To everyone’s credit, it wasn’t remarked upon; no one treated me differently. The men launched straight into the agenda, completely unfazed, while I sat there thinking, Why am I still, at this point in my career, finding myself in so many rooms where I’m the only woman?

In fact, when I wasn’t the only woman in the room, it usually warranted recognition! Even if it was just eye contact and an invisible high five with the other female soul who was probably just as relieved and refreshed as I was to finally not be in a 100% male-dominated meeting.

So yes, I need to clarify the title of this book a little—I wasn’t always the only woman in the room. But good lord, far too often, I was.

I’ve spent most of my career inside large, complex organizations, often in roles where I was responsible for technology, people, and decisions that affected far more than systems or strategy. Over the years, I served as a Chief Information Officer across government, defense, healthcare, and Fortune 500 environments. What stayed consistent wasn’t the industry. It was the human side of leadership and the quiet weight that comes with being accountable for outcomes that ripple outward.

I didn’t set out to write this book to prove anything. I wrote it because I kept having the same conversations, over and over, with people who were capable, driven, and questioning themselves in familiar ways. I saw how often women, especially, were trying to reconcile ambition with expectations, power with likability, and success with a sense of self that still felt intact. I recognized those tensions because I lived them.

My career unfolded in rooms where I was sometimes the only woman, sometimes the newest voice, and sometimes the person expected to hold steady when things were uncertain. Along the way, I learned what holds up under pressure, what erodes trust, and what actually helps people grow. I learned how easy it is to lose your footing when the rules feel unspoken, and how grounding it can be to return to your own values when everything feels noisy.

This book grew out of reflection. It’s shaped by moments that worked and moments that didn’t, by leadership decisions I stand by and others I’ve thought about long after the meeting ended. I don’t have the perfect recipe for career success in a male-oriented workplace, but by sharing everything I’ve seen, what I’ve learned, and what I wish I’d understood earlier in my own career, I think I can get you pretty damn close.

If you’re a smart, assertive, driven woman in leadership, you’ve probably felt what I did so often in my career—that moment when confidence gets recast as arrogance, when clarity gets relabeled as aggression. You speak up with conviction, and suddenly you’re too much. You ask direct questions, and you’re told to soften your tone.

Assertiveness in a man reads as strength. In a woman, it’s somehow threatening. And when men feel threatened, they don’t always know what to do with that. So they name it. They try to box it in.

That’s how you end up with nicknames like dragon lady or honey badger or stallion. Not clever metaphors, but labels thrown like darts, often in rooms where you’re already the only woman present. The names come fast and careless—sometimes from people who think they’re being funny, sometimes from those who genuinely believe they’re offering a compliment. And sometimes, it’s just a way to put you in your place. It’s meant to remind you that while you may have earned a seat at the table, you’re still being watched. Judged. Interpreted.

I’ve been called all of those names and more. Dragon lady was one that stuck with me. It wasn’t about power. It wasn’t even about leadership. It was about discomfort—other people’s discomfort with a woman who’s no-nonsense, results-driven, and unwilling to play small. When I hear dragon lady, I hear fire—flames, fury, unpredictability. It paints a picture of someone who’s volatile rather than focused, intense rather than strategic. I don’t think it was ever meant as a compliment.

Stallion came later, when I moved from a fast-paced, high-stakes environment in Key West into the slower, more bureaucratic world of Washington, D.C. In Key West, we were in counter drug intelligence, working on tactical operations where you had to make decisions fast and get results quickly. It was clear. It was mission-driven. There was no room for posturing or delay. But when I got to D.C., the pace shifted. Everything moved slower. Policy took precedence. Meetings felt like a performance. And I walked in expecting the same urgency I was used to—let’s get it done now, not in two months. That energy wasn’t always welcome.

So when someone called me a stallion among the Clydesdales, I knew what they meant. I moved quickly. I expected others to do the same. And while the name stallion was meant as a compliment—one I was willing to take—it also reflected something deeper. Stallions, after all, are strong. Fast. Male. So even in admiration, there was a gendered edge. It was respect, but filtered through a lens that still defaulted to masculine metaphors for power.

And then there was honey badger. That one got a laugh during a keynote I gave. I remember saying, “I was called a honey badger,” and someone in the audience—bless him—shouted out, “That’s a compliment!” I do know the video: the honey badger doesn’t care. It’s fierce. Relentless. Tough. I get it. But I still asked, “Have you ever looked at a honey badger?” Because while it might be a compliment in spirit, it’s also kind of... well, a wild animal. It’s scrappy and aggressive and entirely uninterested in being liked. And sometimes, that’s exactly how people want to frame a woman who refuses to play by the rules they’ve quietly set.

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about these nicknames—about what they reflect and what they reveal. Some are meant to demean, some to admire. But in every case, they’re about how women are perceived when we lead with strength. When we don’t bend our style to make others more comfortable. When we come in clear, focused, and professional, and say, “If you have a problem, come talk to me.”

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This book may have grown out of my career experience, but it resonates far beyond that. I see it in my daughter’s world too, as she builds a career in sports. I hear it from women in investment banking, in the film industry, in politics, in law. These are still male-dominated spaces, and the challenges we face inside them echo across industries.

We all have our own version of the moment when we realized the rules are different for us. When we asked a question and got labeled combative. When we gave feedback and were called cold. When we advocated for ourselves and were told to be grateful. These aren’t isolated incidents—they’re part of a culture, a way of keeping women in a particular lane, even when we’ve long outgrown it.

And when I say long outgrown it, I mean long! It’s been over half a century since women “broke the glass ceiling” in corporate America.

You’d think by now, someone would’ve adjusted the counters, widened the doorway, or at least thought to rearrange the furniture so everyone could get around in the business world comfortably. But no. Women keep having to squeeze ourselves into a system that wasn’t built for us to thrive.

Right now, women are leaving the workforce in record numbers. In the first half of 2024, over 400,000 women—especially mothers of young children—departed their jobs, marking the steepest decline in decades. This isn’t a ripple, it’s a wave. Behind those numbers are stories of structural strain: inflexible office mandates, rising child care costs, volatile labor markets, and workplaces that fail to shift to support caregiving. We’re still expected to adapt ourselves to a structure that refuses to adapt to us. We have to contort, compromise, and strategize in ways that men in those same positions rarely have to think about.

When structures stay the same, the effect is the same as deliberately keeping women out. It might not look as overt, but the outcome is identical. When you refuse to redesign the system, when you refuse to change how leadership is structured, who it supports, and what it values—you’re reinforcing the same barriers that have always existed.

So maybe that’s how we need to start framing the problem: not as a complaint, but as a clear statement of cause and effect. If we want different outcomes, we need different systems. If we truly want women to thrive, if we want diversity at the table, if we want leadership that reflects the world we live in today, then the structure has to change.

We can’t keep celebrating progress while keeping the same outdated foundation in place. It’s like painting over cracks in the wall and calling it a renovation. Until we’re willing to rebuild the system itself—to make it fit everyone instead of asking everyone to fit it—we’ll keep having the same conversations, generation after generation, wondering why the pipeline keeps leaking and the leadership table still looks the same.

I find hope in people who are naming this out loud and pushing for that change, and it’s part of the reason I wrote this book. Melinda Gates, for instance, has been doing incredible work around this. In her recent podcasts, she talks openly about what she’s seen traveling around the world—how in country after country, paid family medical leave isn’t some radical idea, it’s just part of how they care for families (imagine that!). And it’s not “maternity leave,” it’s family leave. Both parents are supported.

We can’t keep asking women to lean in when the structure itself is tilted. If we want to fix the pipeline, we have to stop patching the leaks with platitudes and start rebuilding the system that created them in the first place.

We’re qualified. We’re prepared. We’re ready. And still, we walk into rooms and are met with a quiet undercurrent that whispers: you’re not enough.

It’s never loud, and rarely direct. But it’s always there.

By the way, I’m not talking about imposter syndrome. Why? Because we all have it. You have it. I have it. Men have it. Even the most powerful people in the world have it. In my experience, there’s not a person on earth who doesn’t have imposter syndrome. So, all things being equal, there’s something else afoot when it comes to what women face in the workplace.

You can feel it when the feedback comes wrapped in vague coaching: “Could you just... rephrase this with a little more inquiry instead of pushing your opinions?” Or, “Maybe soften your stance, sound more curious.” You look at the men around the table and think, I’ve never seen you do that. Ever. But there’s always something when it comes to women, some small way we didn’t quite measure up.

This is one of the darker undercurrents in the DEI conversation: the assumption that inclusion means compromise. That a woman in the room means a standard was softened. But the truth is that no one lets us in—we claw our way forward. We work harder, stay longer, and carry more. We do it all while managing the anxiety that comes from being the only in the room. The only woman. The only person of color. The only one who doesn’t fit the mold. That kind of visibility doesn’t feel empowering; it feels exposed.

I’ve lost count of the number of women I’ve heard say, I feel so alone. And I get it. I’ve stood on stages after receiving national awards, after leading high-performing teams, and I still looked out into a crowd and counted: how many women are here? Often, not many. So I make it a point to say it aloud: You are not alone.

I wrote this book not because I wanted to spotlight my accomplishments; rather, I wanted to tell my story to give someone else a mirror, and maybe a moment of recognition. Because when we share our stories, other women finally exhale: “Oh my god, I thought it was just me.”

And that right there—that moment of shared experience—is why we need to keep saying these things out loud. It’s not just you. It never was. Being the only woman in the room shouldn’t be the rite of passage for women who want to lead. We deserve better than isolation and exhaustion as the toll for a seat at the table. We’ve already earned it!

Get Curious, Get Loud

This book is for people who are capable, driven, and increasingly unwilling to contort themselves to fit systems that were never designed with them in mind. It’s for leaders who want to move forward with clarity rather than compromise, and who believe perseverance should expand—not diminish—who they are.

You may see yourself in these pages if you’re a woman navigating leadership in environments where the rules feel unspoken and uneven. If you’ve ever walked into a meeting knowing you were qualified, prepared, and ready—and yet you still felt the pressure to soften your voice, temper your conviction, or make others comfortable—this book is for you.

It’s also for women at different inflection points in their careers. Those just starting out, trying to understand what leadership really demands beneath the glossy headlines; those mid-career, questioning whether staying, going, or redefining success is the right next move; and those further along balancing ambition with caregiving, wondering whether stepping back—even briefly—will cost them the future they worked so hard to build.

This book is for leaders of any gender who are tired of how long meaningful change is taking and are ready to do something about it. Building workplaces where more people can thrive is not a women’s issue; it’s a leadership issue. Who sits at the table shapes how decisions are made, how systems are designed, and whose perspectives are embedded into our technology, our policies, and our future.

As artificial intelligence and emerging technologies reshape power and opportunity at unprecedented speed, the absence of women from those decisions isn’t just inequitable—it’s irresponsible. We cannot afford leadership that reflects only a narrow slice of experience. The systems we build to define the future will mirror the people who build them.

This book is also for the men in the room who are willing to be real allies. Allyship is everyday behavior—it’s noticing whose ideas get traction and whose get overlooked. It’s using influence to open doors, not just walk through them. It’s understanding that power isn’t diminished, but rather strengthened, when it’s shared.

Above all, this book is for anyone who has ever felt alone inside success. Anyone who has questioned whether the cost of leadership was quietly becoming too high. Anyone who wants to lead with integrity, build resilience without burnout, and shape impact without losing themselves in the process.

This is an invitation to get curious.

To get honest.

To get loud when it matters.

Let’s get started.

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This post is part of a series. Each week, I will be sharing a preview from my upcoming book, The Only Women in the Room: How to Win in a World (Still!) Built for Men.

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People are tired.

Tired of waiting. Tired of playing small. Tired of watching others take credit for their work, their ideas, their courage.

2026 is not the year you wait until you feel ready. It’s the year you move with the doubt, not after it disappears.

This year is for leaders who have earned their seat and are finally done shrinking inside it.

Why Moving Matters More Than Feeling Ready

Waiting for readiness is often just fear wearing a disguise.

Decades of behavioral research confirm what many of us have learned: confidence doesn’t usually come before action; it comes after it. We build belief through experience, not through endless preparation.

When we move despite uncertainty, self-efficacy grows. When we wait, hesitation becomes a habit.

Motion creates momentum. Hesitation reinforces the status quo.

This isn’t about recklessness. It’s not about skipping preparation.

It’s about recognizing a hard truth: the doubt never fully disappears. And the leaders who create real change are the ones who move anyway.

That’s the shift this year demands.

A Word About Women and Power

Women still hold just 10% of Fortune 500 CEO roles. We receive roughly 2% of venture capital funding. We’re promoted at lower rates than men at every level.

These aren’t abstract statistics. They represent missed sponsorship, closed doors, and rooms we were never invited into.

But here’s what I know, because I’ve lived it:

We have more power than we think.

Every time we recommend another woman for a role, bring her into a high-stakes conversation, or advocate for her when she’s not in the room, we shift the equation.

Every time we choose collaboration over competition, we expand what’s possible—for everyone.

What 2026 Is For

2026 is for:

→ Applying for the role you’re not “perfectly qualified” for and trusting yourself to figure it out

→ Launching before it’s flawless, because momentum beats perfection

→ Pitching the vision again after the fifth no

→ Staying in the room when you’re talked over and speaking anyway

→ Building something that scares you because it actually matters

→ Choosing yourself when no one else does

→ Bringing another woman with you when you’re in the room

→ Using your influence to amplify those without access

→ Celebrating other women’s wins, loudly

What 2026 Is Not For

→ Waiting for permission that never comes

→ Staying small to make others comfortable

→ Letting rejection define your ceiling

→ Playing by rules that were never written for you

→ Talking yourself out of opportunities you’ve earned

→ Gatekeeping once you finally have the power to open doors

Audacity without grit won’t last.

Grit without audacity keeps you stuck.

Together, they change your trajectory.

What I’m Committing to This Year

I’m committing to building a community where leaders connect, grow, and rise together.

This newsletter is part of that commitment. A space for real stories, practical tools, and honest conversations about leadership, reinvention, and power.

I’m also finishing my book.

It’s the book I wish I’d had earlier about navigating rooms not designed for you, about grit, belief, authenticity, and what it truly takes to lead when expectations are different, and the margin for error is smaller.

Pre-orders are coming soon, and I can’t wait to share them with you.

A Question for You

What’s the audacious move you’re making this year?

What’s the one thing you’ve been postponing because you’re waiting to feel ready?

Hit reply or leave a comment and tell me what 2026 is for in your world.

Thank you for being here, for reading, reflecting, sharing, and lifting as you climb.

There is enough.

Enough opportunity.

Enough success.

Enough seats at the table.

And when we believe that, we stop gatekeeping and start building.

Here’s to moving with the doubt.

Here’s to audacity and grit.

Here’s to the year we finally stop shrinking.

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Warmly,

Lisa Davis

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This was the year I stopped chasing what looked impressive and started choosing what felt aligned.

Courage and clarity didn’t arrive all at once. They showed up in small, deliberate decisions, to build with intention, to slow down even while progressing, and to let go of what no longer fit.

This was the year I climbed higher, and the year I learned to move more deliberately, a year shaped not just by ambition, but by intention.

What I Said Yes To

I said yes to things I had put off for too long.

I started writing my book.

A project I had talked about for years, but never quite made space for. Writing forced me to distill decades of leadership across intelligence, technology, and healthcare into lessons I wish I’d had earlier, especially for women navigating rooms not designed for them. The process has been humbling, exhilarating, and deeply clarifying. The book launches next year, and sharing this work feels both vulnerable and necessary.

I started this newsletter.

When I hit “publish” on the first edition, I had no idea who (or how many) would read it. Today, more than 700 of you are part of this community. Your engagement, questions, reflections, and stories have reinforced why this work matters. Thank you for being here and for shaping this space with me.

I said yes to building my advisory firm.

I officially launched Davis Core Advisory and completed a full rebrand this year, positioning the firm for an exciting 2026. Building something from the ground up has been challenging, energizing, and deeply meaningful. I’m proud to be creating a space where leaders can grow with intention, not pressure.

I said yes to real rest.

Not the performative kind, but the kind that requires presence and permission. I traveled more this year than I have in a long time, some for work, most for restoration. I walked through new cities, sat in quiet spaces, and allowed myself to simply be.

What 2025 Taught Me

This year, I documented lessons about power, authenticity, belief, grit, rest, and connection.

I explored what it means to lead in spaces that weren’t built for women. What it takes to hold your ground when you’re the only voice in the room. How to protect your energy in a world that constantly asks for more.

The response from this community has been powerful. You’ve shared your own stories of navigating impossible standards. Of being labeled “aggressive” for showing conviction. Of balancing ambition with exhaustion.

You reminded me that naming these dynamics isn’t just validating, it’s necessary.

Because when we name it, we can begin to shift it.

A Beautiful 2026 Awaits

As we close out 2025 and step into a new year, I want to ask you:

What did this year teach you about yourself? What are you saying yes to next? And what are you finally ready to say no to?

I’d love to hear from you. Hit reply and share your reflections. I read every response, and your stories continually shape this work.

Thank you for being part of this journey. For subscribing, for reading, for engaging, and for building this community with me. I’m deeply grateful.

Here’s to choosing, not chasing. Here’s to clarity, courage, and the quiet power of alignment.

May 2026 bring you rest when you need it, courage when it matters, and the wisdom to know the difference.

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Warmly,

Lisa Davis

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I did not learn about excellence from leadership books.

I learned it in rooms where a single decision could change the outcome of an operation.

I still remember standing in a command center at 2 a.m., the room tense, every screen glowing.

In those moments, clarity wasn’t inspirational; it was operational.

I spent part of my early career inside JIATF–South, a multi-agency and multinational command center tracking transnational criminal networks across the Caribbean and Latin America.

My role was to modernize the secure systems that brought together intelligence from the military, federal agencies, and partner nations.

I learned quickly how clarity could change an operation’s outcome; the system we built later helped stop drug runners headed toward the United States.

Those environments taught me something leaders rarely say out loud: excellence is not about perfection.

In those rooms, decisions carried real-time consequences.

I was often the only woman at the table, navigating command centers and operations floors where I had to outperform just to be heard.

For women in high-stakes environments, the expectations are different. The room feels different. And the margin for error can feel even smaller.

The expectation was never flawlessness.

What mattered was whether we could stay clear when the stakes were high.

Clarity is a discipline, not a feeling.

What pressure actually does to decisions

We praise leaders who “thrive under pressure,” but the science tells a more nuanced truth.

Research on decision-making under stress shows that high pressure distorts every stage of how we choose, how we frame problems, what options we consider, how long we deliberate, and how quickly we close.

A few patterns show up again and again:

• Under stress, leaders narrow their focus and default to familiar options, even when the moment demands new thinking.

• Stress impairs judgment and planning while amplifying threat responses.

• Leaders in high-stakes roles face constant psychological demands and must actively use mental skills to maintain performance and health.

Stress is not background noise. It quietly shifts how you interpret risk, how you see options, and what you’re willing to consider.

Calm vs clarity: what leaders get wrong.

Leaders are often told to “stay calm under pressure,” but calm is not the goal; clarity is. Calm only works when trust is already built. Without trust, calm can read as detachment or denial.

In every high-stakes environment I’ve worked in, the leaders who made the best decisions weren’t the quietest or the most serene. They were the ones who returned the room to the mission, made the complex simple, and created direction when everyone felt the stakes rising.

Calm without clarity is performance. Clarity without performance is leadership.

How high-stakes leaders build clarity

When I look at the research and my own journey, the leaders who excel don’t chase perfection. They build clarity.

Studies of elite military, aviation, and sport leaders reveal a consistent pattern: sustained performance under pressure comes from emotional regulation, attentional control, and the ability to frame pressure as a challenge rather than a threat.

When I reflect on my own high-stakes career, here’s what the best leaders did differently:

1. They simplified the mission. In complex environments, they returned to one question: What is the mission right now? Not the whole strategy. The next necessary outcome.

2. They created shared clarity, not solo heroics. No single person had all the information. The leader’s job was to ensure everyone understood priorities, roles, and decision rights.

3. They treated clarity as a discipline. They didn’t wait to feel calm. They used routines, checklists, debriefs, and shared language to bring the room back to what mattered when emotions ran high.

Excellence wasn’t flawless execution.

Excellence was a clear mission, clear ownership, and a clear next step.

Strategies for excelling when the margin for error is small

If you are leading in environments where the stakes are high and the cost of confusion is measurable, here are practical ways to strengthen clarity under pressure.

1. Redefine excellence as clarity, not control

Perfectionism thrives in uncertainty. It convinces you that more information will eliminate risk.

In reality, trying to control everything narrows your focus and undermines decisions. Analysis paralysis often masquerades as being thorough, but in high-stakes environments, it delays clarity, slows teams, and increases risk.

Ask yourself and your team:

• What must we be clear on right now?

• What is “good enough” for this decision?

• What would we decide if we accepted that uncertainty is unavoidable?

1. Ask questions that ensure alignment

In high-pressure meetings, people often assume alignment where none exists.

Borrow a few questions from high-stakes environments:

• “Let’s restate the mission in one sentence.”

• “Who owns what, by when?”

• “What decision are we actually making?”

Simple questions. Powerful alignment.

1. Train your attention before the pressure hits.

A global Delphi study on performance under pressure found that attentional control is one of the strongest predictors of success.

Build it through small habits:

• One-breath pause: Before responding in a tense moment, take one slow breath and name the mission.

• Cue words: Choose a phrase that anchors you when emotions spike.

• Pre-briefs: Before any high-stakes meeting, spend two minutes aligning on success criteria and boundaries.

These micro-practices compound. They help you become the clearest voice in the room, not the loudest.

1. Sustain yourself!

Long-term, unaddressed stress erodes the capacities leaders rely on most: judgment, impulse control, and perspective.

You cannot separate your well-being from your ability to lead.

A few levers that matter:

• Treat sleep as a strategic tool.

• Set boundaries; not everything is urgent.

• Build psychological safety, which widens thinking under pressure.

Excellence is not the absence of mistakes. It is the presence of direction.

One closing thought

If there is one idea I hope stays with you, it’s this:

Leaders are remembered for the clarity they brought when it mattered most.

And you build that clarity through the questions you ask, the rituals you rely on, and the way you design your team’s decision-making moments.

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Lisa Davis

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If you’ve ever had your body force you to stop, you know that sentiment isn’t just wrong, it’s dangerous.

If burnout is the badge of honor, the system is broken.

Much of my career has been spent in high-stakes, high-velocity roles across government, tech, and healthcare. From the outside, the pace looks normal. Expected. Even admirable.

But years ago, my body forced a reckoning.

I had open-heart surgery. Recovery taught me what alignment actually feels like, rest, clarity, and the reminder that health isn’t a luxury; it’s a foundation.

And like many leaders, I went right back into the grind.

At Intel, the role was incredible and relentless. One afternoon, my doctor looked at me and said, “Your blood pressure and stress levels need to come down. This isn’t sustainable.”

My body was sounding the alarm again.

I didn’t need to lead differently.

I needed to honor my limits differently.

When the Body Says “Enough”

Burnout isn’t being tired. It’s your body shutting down under chronic stress.

In 2019, the World Health Organization classified burnout as an occupational phenomenon. They didn’t do that lightly.

Decades of research told them (and us) what we already felt.

Dr. Christina Maslach’s work, used in more than 6,000 studies, shows that burnout changes how your brain processes stress. It’s not about capability. It’s about conditions that demand more than any human nervous system can sustain.

The data is staggering:

• Burnout increases the risk of cardiovascular disease by 79%.

• It raises the likelihood of coronary heart disease by 40%.

• Chronic work stress increases atrial fibrillation, a serious heart rhythm disorder, by 68%.

When my doctor warned me, he wasn’t being dramatic. He was reading the danger signals my body was sending.

What Chronic Stress Does to Your Brain

In The Body Keeps the Score, Dr. Bessel van der Kolk explains that stress embeds itself in your physiology.

Chronic stress literally reduces gray matter in the prefrontal cortex, the part of your brain responsible for judgment and decision-making, while overactivating the amygdala, your fear center.

Burned-out leaders don’t make poor decisions because they’re weak. They make poor decisions because their brain are trying to survive.

I’ve lived that. Many of you have, too.

The Boundary I Should Have Set Sooner

For years, I believed boundaries signaled a lack of commitment. Real leaders pushed through. That resilience meant never stopping.

But leadership without boundaries isn’t leadership. It’s depletion.

Here are the boundaries that changed my leadership and my health:

• Defined work hours: Productivity declines sharply after 50 hours per week.

• Recovery on the calendar: Sleep, breaks, exercise — treated as non-negotiable structure.

• Meeting-free blocks: Even 10 minutes between meetings resets stress levels.

• Selective availability: Alignment over urgency.

• Delegation and “no”: Capacity is a strategic asset, not a bottomless well.

• Monitoring signals: Blood pressure, sleep, and exhaustion are data, not inconveniences.

These boundaries didn’t make me less effective. They made me more intentional, more grounded, and ultimately a better leader.

Rest Isn’t the Opposite of Productivity

It took me decades to understand this:

Rest isn’t what you do after the work is done. It’s how meaningful work gets done well.

Burnout is not the cost of ambition. It’s the cost of systems designed without humans in mind.

We can build something better, work that is sustainable, humane, and aligned with the lives real people are living.

But it starts with one decision:

Honor your limits. Your body will keep the score either way.

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Lisa

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Across my career, I’ve watched talented women build teams, rescue products, and carry organizations across finish lines. Yet when a venture stumbles, its narrative shifts:

From visionary to risky. From strategic to lucky. From high-potential to needs more proof.

And the data reflects what so many have experienced:

Women who experience a startup failure are far less likely to receive new funding, and those who do raise about half as much as men with the same track record. That is not a capability gap. It is a signal of which bets the system is comfortable backing.

When systems reward real performance, not familiarity, volume, or pattern-matching, everyone wins. Teams get stronger. Decisions get better. Cultures get healthier.

What We Mean by Wealth

Wealth isn’t just money. It is “choice”. It is “margin”. It is “time”. It is “freedom”

The ability to say no without fear and to say yes without permission.

It is the ability to walk away from a toxic culture and toward a table that fits.

Women are building this kind of wealth every day, often while carrying invisible labor and navigating legacy systems not built around their realities.

Globally, women still perform 2.5× more unpaid care work than men and hold only 30% of managerial roles. Progress is real. But pace matters.

Investment Signals Priority

Last year, Melinda French Gates committed $150M to support women thriving at work. This fall, she partnered with Pivotal to launch the $60M WIN (Workplace Innovation Now) Challenge to elevate ideas that remove structural barriers.

When leaders invest real capital in women, they aren’t funding programs; they’re re-weighting the system.

What I’ve Seen in the Rooms Where Decisions Are Made

I’ve been in many rooms where women were underrepresented, and the dynamics were clear.

I’ve watched women deliver superior outcomes, only to see the valuation discount appear later. But I’ve also seen the opposite: a senior leader names the work, moves the budget, and keeps the door open after the first stumble.

Performance compounds when belief is resourced.

The woman who was labeled a risky bet becomes the builder everyone points to. Nothing about her capability changed. The conditions did.

This isn’t a woman’s issue. It’s a performance issue. And when performance is recognized fairly, organizations accelerate.

For Women Building Wealth and Widening the Lane

• Treat visibility like a business lever. If the work is invisible, it cannot be valued. Anchor results to metrics and tell the story.

• Design for margin. A reserve is confidence. A network is insurance. A portfolio of bets outperforms a single point of failure.

• Choose rooms that invest. Ask for sponsorship, not just advice. Define your next opportunity and name who can help you get there.

• Support other women in public. Credit transfers power. Today’s amplification becomes tomorrow’s access.

For Male Allies Who Want to Help, and Help Well

This isn’t about fault; it’s about influence. Men hold meaningful leverage in today’s workplaces, making their role invaluable.

Here’s what moves outcomes:

• Sponsor, don’t just mentor. Put political capital behind stretch roles, budget, and visibility. Track the outcomes.

• Fix the process. Standardize hiring, promotion, and pay criteria to reduce bias drift. Audit who receives high-visibility work.

• Share the floor and the credit. Redirect interruptions, attribute ideas accurately, and rotate meeting ownership.

• Resource the care reality. Flexible work, dependable parental leave, and caregiver support increase retention and performance for everyone.

• Start small. Even redirecting one interruption or naming one woman’s idea in a meeting shifts dynamics more than most people realize.

• Measure what matters. Set goals for representation, equity, and progression. Report on them. What gets measured gets managed.

Your voice and leadership matter more than you know.

A Better Wealth Story Is Possible

Women are not asking for a softer bar. We’re asking for a fair market.

When intention meets investment, performance follows.

And when workplaces are designed with women in mind, everyone benefits. Wealth is a practice.

Choose one move in the next 90 days:

• If you’re a woman founder: identify one sponsor and one next ask, put a date on it.

• If you lead a team, fix one system lever, stretch assignments, promotion rubrics, and pay review standards.

• If you’re a male ally: sponsor one woman into a higher-impact room and name the metric you’ll help her hit.

What will you do in the next 90 days to move a woman (and the system) forward?

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Daniel Goleman, who first popularized emotional intelligence, has spent decades proving this truth: When leaders rely on fear or control, they trigger an amygdala hijack, our brain’s automatic fight, flight, or freeze response.

In that moment, people stop thinking and start surviving. Creativity shuts down. Problem-solving disappears. You don’t get innovation, you get compliance.

The science of fear at work

When someone feels threatened (even psychologically), the amygdala takes over. The prefrontal cortex (the part responsible for logic, creativity, and strategy) goes offline.

That’s why after a tense meeting, you often think, “I should’ve said this…” You couldn’t. Your brain was busy protecting you.

This isn’t a weakness. It’s neuroscience.

And when leaders operate in ways that constantly trigger that response, they unknowingly destroy the very intelligence they’re trying to lead.

Harvard’s Dr. Amy Edmondson proved this in her 2003 study on psychological safety: Teams that fear embarrassment or punishment self-censor. They share less. They innovate less.

Google’s Project Aristotle later confirmed it; across 180 teams, the number one driver of high performance wasn’t IQ or tenure. It was psychological safety.

Fear silences. Trust unlocks.

What the Best Leaders Actually Do Differently

The leaders who elevate others consistently practice five things:

• Self-regulation over reaction. They pause before responding. They manage emotions instead of mirroring them.

• Micro-moments of empathy. They notice stress signals (a clenched jaw, silence, withdrawal) and check in privately: “You seemed tense earlier. Everything okay?”

• Transparency as trust. When they don’t know something, they say so. Vulnerability is credibility.

• Repair quickly. A simple, sincere apology can reset an entire team’s tone.

• Name what’s unspoken. Great leaders surface tension instead of pretending it’s not there.

A Leadership Challenge

If you want to build your emotional intelligence muscle, start small but consistently: • End each day asking: Did people leave me more anxious, or more confident?

• Notice whose ideas go unheard, and amplify them.

• When you’ve dismissed someone or raised your voice, own it and reset.

• Journal your emotional triggers. What consistently pulls you off-center?

• Commit to 30 days of EQ journaling.

Let’s see what we learn, together.

The Quiet Strength of Leadership

The smartest leaders are rarely the loudest in the room. They’re the ones who help others think more clearly, feel safer, and perform at their best.

Because when people feel safe, they don’t just comply, they create.

So this week, ask yourself:

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