Marjorie Radlo-Zandi is an accomplished entrepreneur, board member, and angel investor who started her career in sales and marketing and continued as a business development executive for decades. One major professional accomplishment: She grew a life science diagnostic company with angel funds, expanded it to more than 100 countries, and sold it to a multi-billion-dollar publicly held firm. Do you think she may know a thing or two about how to scale a business?

Radlo-Zandi also reflects on timing and work-life balance. Learn which company she did not become employee number 3 at because she was becoming a mother, and knew she wasn’t willing to spend 18-hour days at a promising startup and sacrifice her chance to show up for her daughter. 

Radlo-Zandi is pragmatic about other work-life balance decisions she and her husband made, and she emphasizes the importance of finding equal opportunities for both spouses when making career moves. In her case, both she and her husband took turns putting their job first. 

That said, Radlo-Zandi acknowledges she also has skills that are in high demand, so finding a job wasn’t a struggle whether in Silicon Valley or the East Coast.  She stresses the significance of soft skills such as emotional intelligence, listening, and understanding cultural nuances in building relationships and trust.   Listen to Radlo-Zandi’s candid discussion about how more women need to be in leadership roles. She underscores how angel investing and venture capital need to expand to a more diverse and inclusive community pool for investment opportunities. She talks business and is also refreshingly frank about the balancing act between her personal and professional lives on this episode of SheVentures.

Timestamps 1:53 Radlo-Zandi recalls how growing up in a family of entrepreneurs helped shape her.  6:12 A firsthand account of being a woman in Silicon Valley in the 1980s 8:17 The current state of venture capital funding for female tech entrepreneurs 9:47 Discussion on the lack of access to friends and family rounds for diverse entrepreneurs as well as the need for improved government programs 13:05 Tips for dual-career couples who want to raise children and are considering moves for career opportunities 17:50 Steps for entrepreneurs contemplating an exit 18:51 Radlo-Zandi discusses the importance of cultural match and transparency in mergers and acquisitions. 24:16 Building relationships and establishing trust in different cultures and why it matters 28:37 The importance of work-life balance and its positive impact on productivity and health for both employers and employees 29:00 What are Radlo-Zandi’s three important lessons for female entrepreneurs? 31:24 Radlo-Zandi discusses the exciting innovations in diagnostics, immunotherapy, and gene therapy in the life sciences industry as well as what the future may hold.