Work From The Inside Out

I begin each of my weekly podcast conversations by asking my guest about their early years. They often share a story about their childhood aspirations or talk about an influential person who made a special impact on their life. This week’s guest, Michael Wenderoth, offered a different twist on the theme. His recollection was of something that he didn't want to be.

Michael is half Chinese. He grew up outside of Philadelphia, in the 70s-80s, not wanting to be half Chinese, and this sentiment lasted through high school. Ironically, he’s now fluent in Chinese, despite years of going to Chinese school and rejecting it. Then, during college, Michael met people who felt more like him. He said it was as if a switch was turned on inside him. He also had the opportunity to go to Taiwan and realized how the culture and values there were familiar to him. After college, he started his career in China as a journalist. 

Within a year, Michael realized that his future in journalism was unlikely to grow the way he had expected, so he began exploring other options by speaking with a network of very interesting people, the ex-pat community in China. He met Roberta Lipson, who had a small medical equipment company that was doing business in China. She had the vision to set up a private hospital and decided to give Michael a chance to be on the leadership team that set up the first such hospital in China. He was open to something new and the mentoring that Roberta offered him. After four years, the hospital opened its doors. Michael was ready for his next move. He moved back to the US to attend business school at Stanford.

Graduating with his MBA in 2000 was a humbling experience for Michael as this was in the midst of the dot com implosion. Pushing through self-doubt and keeping his motivations up, he persisted and landed a marketing role in the tech industry in California. Eventually, he was moved to senior roles in Europe and Asia. Later, he joined the company that developed the invisible braces, Invisalign, where he worked for many years and grew their Asian markets.

Today, Michael is an executive coach who challenges leaders to re-examine their assumptions about power, politics, and authenticity, so they can break through and ascend. He is the author of Get Promoted: What You’re Really Missing at Work That’s Holding You Back. His focus is on POWER, a word with negative connotations – a topic most people mistakenly shy away from.

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Michael’s journey:

• Michael’s contrarian views have been featured in Harvard Business Review and Forbes.
• He trained as an executive coach at Columbia University.

Learn more and connect with Michael here:

• LinkedIn
• Twitter
• Website

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Megan Leatherman is the founder and director of A Wild New Work, an ecological career development agency-based in the Pacific Northwest. As a career coach, mother, writer, podcast host, and amateur ecologist, Megan has helped thousands of professionals reconnect to their strengths and to what deeply matters to them. She has aMaster’s degree in conflict resolution, and a background in Human Resources,and believes that our work can be a spiritual practice.Megan grew up in Oregon, the oldest of 5 siblings. She recalls being observant of the dynamics all around her in her large family and taking in the environment of the large property her family lived on in the country. She loved wandering in the woods and taking in the natural environment. Today she blends the theme of the seasons with her coaching model to guide clients through the process of change and growth.

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Megan’s journey:

• Megan worked in HR and found herself bone-tired all the time working in an open office environment. She came to realize that she is a highly sensitive person which means she processes stimuli very deeply and it was taking a toll on her nervous system.
• She practices meditation and journaling consistently in order to remain grounded and focused in her work and relationships that lead to productive engagements.

Learn more and connect with Megan here:

• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Website



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As far back as he can remember Travis Scott has always called himself a plant nerd. Growing up in a small town in Indiana, he loved spending time outside in nature and in the public library where he would pour through books about plants and science. Travis thought he would pursue a career in landscape architecture but in college, he decided to major in environmental science. 

Travis’ career has been anything but linear. He has taken several diverse turns along the way into environmental consulting with the Department of Defense, sales and account management, corporate recruitment, and, for the past decade-plus, marketing - specifically marketing and sales operations. The kinds of companies Travis has worked at are equally diverse including startups (Jobster), Fortune 500 companies (Microsoft, Comcast, and Booking.com), and private companies (technology, steel, hospitality, supply chain and distribution). 

Today, Travis is the Founder of RainierDigital, a consultancy helping companies solve interesting operational problems in marketing and sales. 

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Travis’ journey:

• Travis is currently enrolled in Washington State University's Master Gardener Program.
• He is the author of Think Differently: How Recruitment Marketing Gets You Noticed Over the Noise. 

Learn more and connect with Travis here:

• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Website

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• Connect with Tammy on LinkedIn
• @TammyGoolerLoeb on Instagram
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As Deepa Purushothaman grew up, she always felt different. Being one of a few students of color amongst the 500 in her school in White House Station, New Jersey, she felt challenged to belong. Each summer, Deepa would go to India to visit family, and she didn’t fit in there either, because she was ‘very American’. At home, race was not discussed. She had an inner drive and a competitive spirit, that propelled her through her different-ness. Deepa was the only girl on the boys soccer team. Later, she realized that breaking boundaries and navigating unfamiliar spaces were the paths on which she was to travel.Deepa went on to earn degrees from Wellesley College, Harvard’s Kennedy School, and the London School of Economics, consecutively. She followed her interests in politics and policy, spending her junior year in Washington, D.C. interning at the White House and the U.S. State Department. Upon graduation, Deepa felt private sector experience was important, so she joined the consulting firm, Deloitte, intending to stay for a few years. Two-plus decades later, Deepa was a senior partner at Deloitte, focusing on women’s leadership and strategies to help women of color navigate corporate structures. She was the first Indian-American woman and one of the youngest people to become a Partner in the firm's history.

Deepa spent many years growing Deloitte's Social Impact Practice and served as the National Managing Principal of Inclusion and the Managing Partner of WIN, Deloitte's renowned Women's Initiative. In these roles, she advised Fortune 100 clients on inclusion strategy and focused on acquiring and retaining diverse talent in the US firm.

Leaving Deloitte in 2020, Deepa co-founded nFormation, a company created for women of color by women of color. nFormation is a membership-based community for professional women of color, offering brave, safe, new space and helping place women of color in C-suite positions and on Boards. Deepa wrote a book, The First, The Few, The Only: How Women of Color Can Redefine Power in Corporate America, published in March 2022. 

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Deepa’s journey:

• Deepa practices what she preaches. She is a founding board member of Avasara, India's first leadership academy exclusively for young women.
• She has also served on the Board of the San Diego Chamber of Commerce and as a member of the UN WEP’s Leadership Group.
• Deepa is a Women and Public Policy Program Leader in Practice at the Harvard Kennedy School where she concentrates on research to combat systemic racism in corporate structures to help Women of Color rise.

Learn more and connect with Deepa here: 

• Deepa’s LinkedIn
• LinkedIn
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Website

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• Connect with Tammy on LinkedIn
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Shari Leid’s life started out “a little messy” as she refers to it. Born in Seoul, South Korea, she was abandoned as a baby and has never known her actual birth date, birthplace, or birth name. After being moved to approximately four different locations, Shari was adopted by a Japanese American couple from Seattle. They were older parents, both had been interned in camps during World War Two. Shari reflects on her identity struggles resulting from her own adoption by parents who had their own unresolved issues. Yet, she sees her glass as half full. Shari is grateful for the opportunities she has had, assuming that if her life had not started as it did, she would have grown up under very different circumstances. She studied psychology in college, expecting that she would go on to pursue a graduate degree. Finding that she was moved by her sense of justice, Shari decided to go to law school. She became a litigator because she wanted to have a voice for those who could not speak for themselves. Shari practiced law for 14 years as a criminal prosecutor and as a defense attorney on civil cases for an insurance company. She reached a point where she did not feel as if she was living her purpose. At the same time, Shari was starting her own family by adopting a baby from China who was soon after identified as having developmental delays. Two weeks after bringing the baby home, Shari discovered she was pregnant. She decided to take a break from the law and dedicate herself to being at home with her children. Shari said this was the hardest work she has ever done.

During this time Shari got into fitness and became a trainer. Once her kids were in school she opened a fitness studio but decided to close it when she had to have double hip replacement surgeries in her 30s. In her 40s, she went through a breast cancer diagnosis and treatment. She asked herself, “What am I doing here?” This led her to start a coaching practice and writing.

Today, Shari operates An Imperfectly Perfect Life, LLC, a professional mindset coaching business serving clients who are in those tricky middle-age years, helping them create the life of their dreams.

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Shari’s journey:

• Shari is the author of the Friendship Flow transformational book series, which includes The 50/50 Friendship Flow: Life Lessons From and For My Girlfriends and Make Your Mess Your Message - More Life Lessons From and For My Girlfriends.
• She is a certified Life Coach, a Core Dynamic Specialist, and a graduate of the Happiness Studies Academy

Learn more and connect with Shari here: 

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Website
• YouTube
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• An Imperfectly Perfect Life Facebook



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• Connect with Tammy on LinkedIn
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The oldest of four sisters, AnwinMbahalways thought she should set the example as the responsible one.Growing up in a sheltered diplomatic household, her father worked for the Cameroonian embassy and her mother was a homemaker, who received a stipend to run the household wherever they lived across the globe. Anwin shared that her parents slotted her and each of her sisters into four careers. She was the designated medic, her next sister was the designated lawyer, the one after that was an engineer, and the last one was an architect.Anwin went to university in London, and began her studies in medicine. Since she was 18, Anwin could apply for a credit card, her first taste of freedom. Unfortunately, she took more than a few bites, applying for multiple cards, and maxing out every one of them. It all caught up with her when her car was repossessed and she had to borrow money from her younger sister to pay her electric bill. 

She was supposed to be the big sis. How low could she go? Thus began her financial education. Anwin also admitted to her parents that she was not interested in becoming a doctor. 

Today, she helps successful driven businesswomen who are struggling with the overwhelm of gaining control of their finances to attain financial independence. 

Anwin is a certified Business Wealth Strategist, Gender/Racial Wealth Gap Advocate, and founder of Wealthfluency. Having 10 years of experience with major banks in Europe to implement systems that make them a lot of money, she's uniquely placed to help women understand their finances and develop systems that help them build wealth, achieve financial security, and the freedom they are looking for.

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Anwin’s journey:

• Anwin finished university with a degree in biomedical research and then pursued her career in finance.
• She attended boarding school in Italy and only visited Cameroon to see family so it never felt ‘like home’ there. Today, she lives in Florida

Learn more and connect with Anwin here: 

• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• YouTube
• Take the Wealth Booster Quiz
• Website

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• Connect with Tammy on LinkedIn
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Janine MacLachlan is on a mission to get ideas heard. She’s a communications strategist with deep experience in brand positioning and business storytelling. Janine works with executives and aspiring leaders in the areas of executive visibility, thought leadership and essentially helps them get out of their own way. How many of us would like a little help with that?

Growing up in Saginaw, Michigan with three siblings, she admits that they have different childhood memories than she does because while they were outside in the yard playing ball, she was in her room absorbed in her reading. Janine loved books. She also wrote lots of stories and sketched pictures to go along with them. In fact, when her parents downsized their home a few years ago, they gave her a box full of the stories she authored as a kid. In college, she majored in journalism, working as an editor for the university newspaper. Upon graduation, Janine went to work for a public relations agency where she was able to get a wide range of experience. 

After several job and geographic moves, Janine became the Director of Marketing and Communications for the American Dental Association in Chicago. She remained there for nine years when she decided to start her own communications firm. 

Today, Janine is a regular contributor to Forbes in the area of leadership strategy, where she has interviewed executives from AbbVie, Microsoft, and 3M, as well as authors, and academics.

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Janine’s journey:

• Janine is an activator at SheEO, a multi-national organization that provides loans and mentoring to women-owned businesses that support the United Nations’ sustainable development goals.
• An advocate for women at work, she is president of the Chicago chapter of Ellevate, a global network of professional women.
• Janine authored a book published by the University of Illinois Press, called Farmer's Markets of the Heartland where she traveled to eight Midwestern states to visit farmers' markets, meet farmers, interview chefs, and food artisans. She did all the photography, too. Her background in public relations enabled her to put together the book in a way that she could tell stories about sustainable food production, as well as the people who sell beautifully grown food at farmers' markets

Learn more and connect with Janine here:

• LinkedIn
• Instagram
• Website 

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• @TammyGoolerLoeb on Instagram
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Gaurav Bhatnagar and Mark Minukas are the founders of Co-Creation Partners, a firm that advises, consults, and coaches senior leaders and their teams on how they can design improvement programs and harness the talent and creativity of their people to achieve better business results. They focus on how people show up, communicate, problem-solve, and lead to determine how large the gap is between strategy and execution. Together Gaurav and Mark researched and authored a book, Unfear: Transform Your Organization to Create Breakthrough Performance and Employee Well-Being. They suggest we have two superpowers: the power of imagination, and the power of language, which we use to craft our future. In our imagination, we see fear as something bad that we need to protect against, and as a result, we show up in a certain way. Yet, if we imagine it as an opportunity for learning, shifting the language to ‘unfear,’ it gives us a whole new avenue, partnering with fear to explore new ideas, opening a way for making choices and decisions.

Gaurav and Mark had each been helping organizations transform their business performance for over 15 years prior to working together. Previously, Mark served in the Navy, working as an engineer, and then joined McKinsey as a business analyst, progressively elevating his role for several years. He and Gaurav first met partnering on a project there. Gaurav was an external vendor who did mindset and organizational culture work, while Mark brought operations expertise to the project. Initially, Mark was very skeptical about Gaurav’s work, concerned that he might actually harm their project. Interestingly, Mark’s view of Gaurav’s contributions to their work quickly changed. Soon after they completed the work, Mark left McKinsey to start his own consulting firm, and periodically, he and Gaurav would collaborate on projects. A few years later, they officially joined together at Co-Creation Partners.

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn about Gaurav’s and Mark’s journeys:

• Gaurav and Mark each bring their strengths to combine into a cohesive team at Co-Creation Partners. They see that there are two parts to everything: there's a being part and a doing part.
• Mark is very good about creating discipline around systems and the corresponding implementation.
• Gaurav’s strength is helping people shift their mindset, and presence, into solid behaviors.

Learn more and connect with Gaurav and Mark here:

• Visit: www.unfearbook.com
• Visit: www.cocreationpartners.com
• Connect on LinkedIn: Co–Creation Partners 
• Connect on LinkedIn: Gaurav Bhatnagar 
• Connect on LinkedIn: Mark Minukas 

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Eric Vernsten was a kid when the OJ Simpson trial was on TV. He and his older brother would watch it daily and on Friday nights, along with his family, he consumed a lineup of crime programs, such as Dateline. Eric was a talker. He liked to tell jokes and argue with people too. It occurred to him that law school might be in his future, but as he moved through high school, and then college, he turned his attention towards pro sports management. During the summer between his junior and senior college years, he got an unpaid marketing internship with the Austin Toros (now the Austin Spurs) after sending his resume to every NBA minor league team. His parents gave him $500 to get settled in Austin and he jumped into it, as he put it. In the off-hours, he worked as a wine sampler in liquor and grocery stores and waited tables. The following summer, after graduation, he was invited back to Austin to do season ticket sales, a paid role. Within a few weeks, Eric realized he hated the work. He still had law school on his mind and pivoted in that direction, moving back to his college town to live with a friend and study for the LSAT. Like the experience of many 20-somethings, Eric reflects on these decisions as big life lessons.

He didn’t get into law school the first time–another life lesson. Eric was not easily deterred. He applied again and earned dual JD/MBA degrees. After graduation, he landed in the wealth management field at a subsidiary of Goldman Sachs and while it sounds glamorous, it was not without its bumps and scrapes. He passed the bar exam but he was not getting any legal experience so he started to do volunteer legal work. Then a friend suggested he apply to the Army National Guard for a legal role. Eric got an offer and took a leave from his wealth management job to train with the Army. Once on board, he was one of a few lawyers who was tapped on January 6, 2021, to be on-site in Washington D.C. to deal with the aftermath of the insurrection. 

Eric did not return to his corporate role. Today, he is a prosecuting Assistant State’s Attorney in Winnebago County, Illinois. His newest job is father to a nine-month-old baby boy.

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Eric’s journey:

• Building off his earlier career in wealth management Eric recently opened his own business as a Financial Advisor. This is a side gig for him.
• He dabbles in stand-up comedy and improv in his “spare” time.

Learn more and connect with Eric here:

• Visit: ericvernsten.ghost.io
• Connect on LinkedIn
• Follow on Instagram
• Twitter

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• Connect with Tammy on LinkedIn
• @TammyGoolerLoeb on Instagram
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Devon Harris is a founding member of the first Jamaican bobsled team, which competed in the 1988 Olympic Games in Calgary, Canada. Their exploits inspired the Disney movie Cool Runnings. Devon competed again in 1992 and 1998 as captain of the Olympic teams. 

His very early years were spent in rural Jamaica with his grandmother, an amazing storyteller. Her stories had a great impact on him, especially those about soldiers and their extraordinary abilities. He then moved to Kingston, Jamaica to live with his Dad and attend school. He describes it as a challenging, rough, violent, ghetto environment. Early on, Devon focused on school and sports as he knew that excelling in these areas was his ticket out of the ghetto. At 15, he discovered the Olympics ABC Wide World of Sports series on TV. 

“When you think of Olympic athletes, I think of these superhuman beings. What I saw in those series were very average people but they had extraordinary dreams. And they had an equally extraordinary desire to make those dreams a reality. So that's when it dawned on me, wow, anybody could become an Olympian, within reason you need a talent. But outside of that, if you dare to dream that extraordinarily, then backed up that dream with work ethic, sacrifice, and commitment. That's when I decided that I wanted to become an Olympian.” 

Of course, bobsledding was not on Devon’s radar as his dream Olympic sport. Listen to our conversation to learn how that came to be. While Cool Runnings tells the story of how the original bobsledding team was formed, Devon shared that the movie is highly fictional. 

Today, Devon is a motivational speaker, author, and philanthropist. He shares his lessons about persistence over obstacles to living one's best life. He wrote a children's book Yes, I Can, and a semi-autobiographical book, Keep on Pushing Hot Lessons from Cool Runnings. 

In this week’s Work From The Inside Out podcast, learn more about Devon’s amazing journey:

• Devon is a graduate of the prestigious Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in England. He served as an officer in the Jamaica Defense Force retiring as a captain.
• He is a philanthropist creating the Keep On Pushing Foundation, which supports the education of kids in disadvantaged areas and his original schools in Jamaica.

Learn more and connect with Devon here:

• Instagram
• YouTube
• Facebook
• LinkedIn 
• Twitter
• Website

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• @TammyGoolerLoeb on Instagram
• Work From The Inside Out Website
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