Eagan is CEO of Darktrace, a startup that battles hackers using software that gets smarter over time. Invented by mathematicians and former British intelligence operatives, the technology, much like a human immune system, looks for signs of odd behavior in a client's network.

Eagan and Darktrace are on the cutting edge not only in security, but also in a gender-balanced tech workforce. Eagan says half of her employees are women. She knows how unusual that is, having operated in Silicon Valley through booms and busts … as an enterprise tech worker, a venture capitalist, and now as an executive.

Nicole Eagan sat down with Fortt Knox to share lessons from efforts that worked, and efforts that didn't.