Somi Arian Podcast

#37 - Karen Laos: How Women Give Up Power and How to Get It Back

Karen Laos is the Founder and CEO of Karen Laos Consulting, she is also a keynote speaker and communication expert for women business leaders.
 
I first discovered Karen as a guest speaker on FemPeak, where she spoke about five ways that women give up power, and how to get it back. In this conversation, we take a step further and unfold the tendencies that women, in particular, have that causes them to give up power, and consider ways to reclaim your stance and own it confidently.

#36 - Jennifer Greyson: The Future of Crypto is Female

Jennifer Greyson is a business owner, global advocate for crypto's empowerment of women and sits on the board of the Kerala Blockchain Academy. She is recognised as one of the top 50 female influencers in Crypto and top 100 people in Blockchain. 
 
In this conversation, Jen and I go into the philosophy of technology and what makes today’s world more feminine than ever before, why we should trust our intuition and most importantly tips on how anybody can achieve financial freedom with crypto.

#35 - Joti Balani: Women in Tech Space, a Rising Revolution

Joti Balani is a Conversational AI Architect and Founder and Managing Director of Freshriver.ai. She is also FemPeak’s Lead Tech Skills Sherpani. 
 
What I love about Joti is that as a conversational AI architect she has a strong understanding of both the technology and the philosophy and psychology of training Artificial Intelligence systems to be more human-centric. 
 
In this conversation, Joti and I unfold how the revolution is changing our way of living, why it is crucial to have more women in the tech space and how to get there.

#34 - Jessalyn Dean: Entrepreneurship and Finding Your Purpose

Jessalyn Dean is a certified CPA, Founder of Dune Consultants and a Financial Literacy advocate, as well as FemPeak’s Lead Finance and Wealth Sherpani. 
I met Jessalyn on Clubhouse and my first impression of her made me realise this was someone I wanted to work with. Her daring and courageous character is something that will inspire many women out there. 
 
In this conversation, Jessalyn and I talk about the difference between an entrepreneur and an intrapreneur and how to decide which one you’re built for.

#33 - Catherine D’Ignazio: True Feminism & Closing the Gender Data Gap

Catherine D’ignazio is an Assistant Professor and Director of the Data + Feminism Lab at the MIT. She is also an artist and software developer who focuses on feminism and data literacy. 
Catherine has also co-authored a super interesting and eye-opening book, Data Feminism, about what I call the female data gap.
 
I found our conversation super inspiring, touching upon subjects of culture, history and religion, digging deep into the roots of gender data and its biases, inaccuracies, and even its non-existence.

#32 - Naomi McDougall Jones: How to Thrive in Male-Dominated Industries?

Naomi McDougall Jones is a successful actress, producer, and storyteller and an advocate for bringing parity to the film industry. 
 
Naomi explains the challenges of gaining success in the film industry as a woman, and shares some valuable tips on how to navigate the system to make it to the top.
 
I come from the film and TV industry myself, and I can vouch for so many of the points that Naomi raised in this eye-opening conversation.

#31 - Dame Stephanie Shirley CH: The Generational Technological Gap

Stephanie Shirley CH also known as Steve is an information technology pioneer, a legendary businesswoman and philanthropist, and the author of a fantastic memoir, “Let It Go.” 
 
I had the privilege of co-hosting today’s episode with another legendary woman and FemPeak’s Sherpani, Sue Nelson, who has also been a guest on my podcast previously. 
 
In this episode, we discuss three unique and equally important perspectives from a multigenerational view of technology, women’s stance in the workplace across history and how to run a successful business in today’s day and age.

#30 - Lisa Forte: The Next Disruptive Innovation

Today’s episode is a little different from my previous episodes, in that this was a conversation I had a short while back as a podcast guest. 
 
Lisa Forte has had a fantastic cybersecurity career, from working in the British Intelligence and Police forces to building a non-profit and now she is a partner at the Red-Goat cybersecurity consulting firm. She is a truly inspiring woman, with a dynamic character and contagious positive energy.  
 
I thought our interview was so much fun, and it could inspire many other women no matter their professional field, so I asked Lisa if I could share this interview on my podcast too.

#29 - Shireen Smith: The Do’s and the Don’ts of Branding & Trademarks

Shireen Smith is a lawyer specialised in the legal aspects of brands having graduated from London University’s QMW with a masters’ degree in intellectual property. After working in various roles including at Reuters as an in-house lawyer for 5 years, she founded her own specialist IP law firm Azrights in 2005 which protects IP rights. Her other business, Brand Tuned provides brand consultancy services. A good starting point to get insights into how to develop a brand on solid foundations is to take the brandtuned.com/scorecard which helps you find out whether you are the first choice brand in your market and how to improve your brand. She hosts her own podcast Brand Tuned which provides useful insights into all things brand-related including the IP dimension of brands. Shireen has written 3 books, her latest being Brand Tuned, the new rules of branding, strategy and intellectual property which is available to pre-order on Amazon prior to its release on 28 September 2021.
 
Shireen shares with us some valuable tips on branding, trademark protection and how to develop brand equity. Shireen was also our trademark and IP lawyer and consultant when I first started the company and she has written a great book called “Brand Tuned” that I think every entrepreneur should read.

#28 - Neale Godfrey: The Financial Power Imbalance

Neale Godfrey is a best-selling author of 27 books on money, life skills, and value issues, including “Money Doesn’t Grow on Trees, “ and she is a leading expert on family finances. 
 
Neale and Somi discuss the reasons why historically women have been less financially empowered, the ways that power imbalance shines through today both in the business world and in relationships, and how to change that.