If you’ve listened to StandUp SpeakUp before, then you’ve heard the voice of host Karla Stephens-Tolstoy. Usually, she’s helping tell the story of others, but you might not have known that Karla herself has a led a pretty interesting life!

She’s a Canadian born & raised entrepreneur, businesswoman, volunteer, mom… and those are just a few of her titles!

Karla overcame learning disabilities, and eventually landed the title of CEO at Vodafone, one of the biggest telecom companies in the world. She’s proven that with hard work, nothing is out of reach.

Also on her journey Karla has worked many interesting jobs, hosted a community TV show called “Chit Chat”, started a dating app and website called Tokii, and more.

Today, we sit down with Karla to hear her story, and later her son Zach joins to talk about the mother-son team behind StandUp SpeakUp fashion.