Mika Straight Up

In this week's special episode of Mika Straight Up, Mika sits down with Lidia Fonseca, Executive Vice President and Chief Digital and Technology Officer at Pfizer. She credits her success to her remarkable mother and poorly produced American TV shows from the 1970s! With women representing just 34% of the workforce in science, technology, engineering, and math, closing this gender gap in STEM is a statistic Lidia is passionately working to change.

Mika welcomes Deborah Streeter and Jeanette Kaplun of The Bank of America Institute for Women's Entrepreneurship at Cornell University to discuss the importance of mentorship and chat about effective ways for young female entrepreneurs to seek capital for their professional ventures.

Mika participates in Georgetown University’s Women's Forum, where she shares the screen with AirBNB's Global Director Marisa Moret to discuss their professional journeys and also fields questions from the Georgetown students that tuned-in to this special addition of Mika Straight Up.

Mika welcomes body language expert and New York Times best-selling author Janine Driver to the podcast. With people returning to the office following the pandemic and many entering an office work environment for the first time, Mika and Janine discuss how to best utilize our body language to communicate effectively in our professional lives.

Mika is joined by social scientist and best-selling author Arthur Brooks to discuss his new book “From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life.” Brooks discusses how he identified the habits of the happiest people, how to adopt them yourself, and how to break the success addiction often responsible for mid-life crises.

Bobbi Brown stops by the pod to discuss body positivity and the unique way she picks her models. Bobbi also gives makeup tips and tells Mika why she decided to launch her own podcast.

Joe and Willie crash the pod to chat about the twists and turns of Morning Joe’s 15 year run, their first impressions of each other, how they’ve grown together, and what the future holds as the show expands to four hours. Mika and Willie also recount a particular Trump tweet on this special episode of Straight Up.

Mika discusses the make-or-break questions that can define any negotiation with Alexandra Carter, author of WSJ best-seller “Ask for More” and director of the Mediation Clinic at Columbia Law School. Alex discusses how negotiation isn’t always a zero-sum game, and Mika shares her own 7 tips for knowing your value so you can be prepared at the negotiating table.

Mika sits down with two leading voices at the forefront of the women’s rights movement, Naheed Farid and Melanne Verveer, to to discuss the Taliban’s return to Afghanistan, the dire human rights crisis, and what the international community can do to support Afghan women at this urgent time.

Mika welcomes brand marketing legend Donny Deutsch to the podcast to discuss how the one place women need to “man up” is when negotiating, reflect on their decades-old friendship and why it is imperative to Know Your Value professionally.