Her Story Of Success

In this bonus episode hosted by past Her Story of Success guest Rita Mitchell and recorded before a live studio audience at a women and wealth conference in Nashville, Kathleen Burns Kingsbury talks about how she made the journey from clinical psychology to financial empowerment counseling, becoming a published author with nothing more than a copy of “Writing for Dummies”, and the overlap between self-esteem and financial success. As a wealth psychology expert, Kathleen believes financial success isn’t just about how much money you have in the bank. Just as important are our thoughts and feelings about money that shape our financial decisions. An internationally published author and speaker, Kathleen has devoted her career to empowering women and the financial advisers who serve them by training them to examine their money talk mindset and feel more comfortable talking openly about money. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, PBS News Hour, Money Magazine, TODAY Money, For

Rita Mitchell (IG: @ritapmitchell_oyp) summarizes her story with one word – determination. And her career proves it. A 35 year veteran of the financial services industry, Rita went from being told she didn’t have enough experience to be a waitress at Red Lobster to a top executive at First Tennessee Bank, breaking barriers at every step along the way. In that time, she passed the Series 7 broker exam with a 6 month old baby, started her own financial advisory company, and left all of her doubters in the dust. In this special live episode, Rita talks about the struggles of being an African-American female in a traditionally male-dominated industry, the value of recognizing your potential, and how the succession of "nos" she faced motivated her to teach other women to say yes to opportunity.

After finishing college, Courtney Whitmore (IG:@pizzazzerie) took a safe, secure job as a career counselor, but she soon realized she wanted something entirely different — a creative pursuit where she could be her own boss. Looking back on that time in her life, she says, “I knew I wanted to work for myself but I didn’t know what that looked like.” Since hosting dinner parties was a favorite activity, she decided to launch a website in 2010 to focus on entertaining and party planning. Today that website, Pizzazzerie.com, is the centerpiece of Courtney’s expanding role as an entertaining expert, one whose food styling and tablescapes are in demand by companies from Target and HGTV to Lindt Chocolates.  In this episode, Courtney tells us about starting a job in an industry that doesn’t exist yet, managing her brand’s social media presence, the ways in which her definition of success has changed over time and the importance of what she calls the Monday Morning Test — “If what you are doing doesn’t get you up and

Corbette Doyle describes herself as a “serial expert,” one who consistently pursues new information and builds new skills. It was this career approach that brought her leadership roles at Aon, a Chicago-based consulting and risk management firm where she built a health care industry practice from the ground up and served as Chief Diversity Officer. Now a Senior Lecturer in Organizational Leadership at Vanderbilt University, Corbette says it’s vital that women lay the groundwork for career advancement ahead of time by building new competencies. “You can’t wait until you’re ready for a change to create the opportunity for career change,” she says. “We all have to be lifelong learners now.” In this episode, Corbette also tells us about the importance of corporate culture, why women need to let go of their stereotypes about men and what it was like to start a new job when she was seven months pregnant.

Ruta Sepetys (twitter:@rutasepetys) is one of the most admired writers in contemporary children’s literature — with the bestsellers Salt to the Sea and Between Shades of Gray among her riveting historical novels for young readers. But it was only after a 22-year career as a music business manager that she finally found the courage to pursue her dream of becoming a writer. The turning point was a trip to her father’s homeland in Lithuania, where she discovered a long hidden family secret. Though she had tried to write novels before, “It was only when I started harnessing my own story that people started to respond,” she tells us. In this episode, Ruta retraces her unlikely journey to becoming an internationally bestselling author and offers her thoughts on working with challenging clients, the importance of mentoring, the power of stories and the enduring value of failure.

As a young single mother, Marcela Gómez (IG:@marcelagomez_1234) started a marketing firm in 2002 to focus on strategies for reaching the growing Latino community in the U.S. Launching her business was a turning point for Marcela, a native of Colombia who moved to North Carolina with her family as a teen. When she was laid off from her marketing job with a major Christian publishing house, she finally decided to take the reins of her own career. “I never wanted anyone else to have my destiny in their hands,” she says. In this episode, Marcela also shares her ideas on building a support network when you move to a new city, making the decision to leave a job that diminishes you, the myths of work-life balance — and why she goes to bed each night with "total peace of mind."

Raised on a farm in South Carolina, Britnie Turner (IG:@britnieturner) was a beauty contestant (and Miss North Carolina) who showed her passion for helping the disadvantaged by doing mission work in Africa and Latin America. Today, at the age of 30, Britnie is the CEO of Aerial Development Group, a multimillion-dollar real estate business she started literally from the ground up to pursue her vision of helping others on a broader scale. In this episode — recorded before a live audience in Nashville — Britnie tells us about living intentionally, thriving as a woman in a male-dominated industry and using the growth of her business to accomplish philanthropic goals. “Frustration is one of the best things you could ever have,” she says, “because it means you have the vision of a higher standard.”

The misery she felt working in corporate jobs proved to be a strong motivator for Laura Lea Goldberg (IG:@lauraleabalanced), who took a leap of faith when she left the traditional business world and began her journey to become a Certified Holistic Chef, a successful cookbook author and the voice behind the popular healthy eating website, LL Balanced. In this episode, we talk to Laura Lea about how she found the courage to make the change, how she overcame the self-limiting beliefs that held her back and how her approach to healthy eating has changed her own life and the lives of her readers. “My life just opened up,” she says about the joys of pursuing her passion. “I went from black-and-white to color.”

Success can be defined in many ways. Our conversations with trailblazers, entrepreneurs, artists and business leaders explore how diverse women have paved their own way forward. Many have launched profitable companies; others have walked away from successful careers to pursue their dreams in other fields. As you listen to the stories of these determined and talented women, we hope they will inspire you to overcome the obstacles in your path and create your own unique version of success.