Her Career Unplugged — Real career stories behind the titles
Real career stories behind the titles.
Honest conversations with women who built extraordinary careers. Not the highlight reel, but the full story.
Your Hosts
Guiding the Conversation
Featured Guests
Behind The Mic
Jennifer Solberg
CEO & Founder
Quantum Improvements Consulting
Natesha Mortimer
Founder & Data Scientist
Data Swale
Betty Dannewitz
Learning & Development Professional
If You Ask Betty
Shelmina Babai-Abji
Founder and CEO
ShowYourWorth.ai
Jodi Gorenstein
Career Coach
Jodi Gorenstein Coaching
Alison Hemmings
Executive Career Coach
Newo Executive Solutions Inc.
Lynne Ghelfi
Marketing Director & Leadership Coach
Toyota of Tampa Bay
All Episodes
Unplugged
The Paths We Took (and the Ones We Didn’t
Welcome to Her Career Unplugged! In this first episode, Vimala and Joanne introduce themselves and the podcast, a space for real, unfiltered career stories from women across industries. They share the paths they took to get where they are today, the detours and dead ends along the way, and the lessons they wish they’d known at the start of their careers.
You Belong Here: Why Imposter Syndrome Lies to You
What does imposter syndrome actually sound like? In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, we sit down with Betty Dannewitz, founder and CEO of If You Ask Betty, to talk about the voice in our heads that tells us we don't belong, and how to push back. Betty shares how she personified her imposter syndrome as a puppet named Bernie, why so many high performers experience the same self-doubt, and the small mindset shifts that can make a big difference in your career. From staying five years too long in a job because of imposter syndrome… to Googling “What is augmented reality?” after volunteering to build an innovative learning program, Betty’s story is both hilarious and incredibly relatable. If you’ve ever felt like you’re about to be “found out,” this conversation is for you.
with Betty Dannewitz
You're Not Ready… Do It Anyway: Career Reinvention
What happens when your career path doesn't go according to plan? In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne Skiles and Vimala Pydi sit down with Jennifer Solberg — CEO, entrepreneur, and former Army research psychologist — to talk about career pivots, entrepreneurship, and why feeling "ready" is overrated. Jennifer shares her fascinating journey from developing training technology for the U.S. Army to founding Quantum Improvements Consulting and launching a new augmented reality company, MagellanXR. Along the way, she drops honest insights about building a business, learning from failure, and why following the market matters more than following your dreams.
with Jennifer Solberg
Community Growth: The Career Booster That Doesn't Go on Your Resume
What if the most powerful thing you could do for your career had nothing to do with your resume? In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala get real about community involvement — why it matters, how it's helped them land jobs without ever applying, and why so many people are doing it wrong. They share their own journeys building the AWS User Group in Orlando from zero to a full-scale game day event, and break down exactly how to get started — whether you're an introvert, a busy parent, or someone who's just never seen the point.
Nobody Told Us: The Unwritten Rules of Office Politics
In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala pull back the curtain on office politics — the unwritten rules that shape careers but nobody tells you about on day one. From informal power structures and decisions made in rooms you're not in, to navigating workplace dynamics with authenticity and strategy, this conversation is packed with real stories and hard-won lessons. Vimala shares what it felt like to be unknowingly labeled part of a workplace "mafia," and Joanne reflects on a toxic manager at Lockheed Martin and why she wishes she'd trusted her gut sooner.
Start Before You Feel Ready: Building a Tech Startup in Your 20s with Natesha Mortimer
In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala sit down with Natesha Mortimer — data scientist, founder of Data Swale, and self-described "Community Data Scientist" — for a real, energetic conversation about building a tech startup in your 20s. Natesha shares how a chance meetup connection dragged her into entrepreneurship after COVID, why she has never really felt "ready" for anything (and why that's okay), and the raw reality of running a company solo — where your passion becomes the smallest fraction of your actual workday. From her flywheel analogy for showing up consistently to her triangle framework for avoiding burnout, Natesha brings the kind of grounded confidence that comes from being consistently the only person in the room who looks like her — and choosing not to give energy to imposter syndrome.
with Natesha Mortimer
Stuck or Strategic: Knowing the Difference Could Save Your Career
In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala tackle the question every professional eventually faces: are you strategically pausing, or are you just stuck? From Vimala's story of staying at a difficult workplace long enough to leave on her own terms, to Joanne's unexpected detour through academia that actually accelerated her career, they unpack what a career "stall" really looks like — and why slowing down doesn't have to mean falling behind.
Show Your Worth: Engineering Your Ascent with Shelmina Babai-Abji
In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala sit down with Shelmina Babai-Abji — bestselling author of Show Your Worth, former IBM Vice President, and founder and CEO of ShowYourWorth.ai — for a conversation packed with hard-won strategy. Shelmina traces her path from leaving home in Tanzania at 15 to becoming one of the highest-ranking women of color at IBM while raising two children alone, and breaks down the frameworks from her book that took her there: defining success on your own terms, feeding your "voice of courage" over your "voice of fear," building a leadership brand that isn't self-promotion, and knowing the difference between a mentor and a sponsor. She closes with a rapid-fire round covering the strategy most women skip, what to tell a woman passed over for a promotion, and the one thing that's stayed true across every chapter of her career.
with Shelmina Babai-Abji
The Job Search Buddy: Networking, Visibility, and Getting Seen with Jodi Gorenstein
In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala sit down with Jodi Gorenstein — a global HR leader with 20+ years at brands like American Express, and founder of HR Super Connector — to talk about what it really takes to job search in today's market. Jodi traces her circuitous path into HR, from a college graduate who felt "lost" to a business partner sitting on executive leadership teams, and shares the moment a layoff-turned-opportunity showed her that a calculated risk can put a career into high gear. She breaks down the three-phase framework behind HR Super Connector — Get Ready, Get Seen, Land the Job — and gets tactical about why the goal is to find out about roles before they ever hit LinkedIn. From drafting your own LinkedIn testimonials to why "I left my last job two months ago" is a complete sentence, Jodi calls herself her clients' job search buddy, cheerleader, and champion — and it shows.
with Jodi Gorenstein
Career Glow Up: Betting on Yourself and Getting Off the Struggle Bus with Allison Hemmings
In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala sit down with Allison Hemmings — the "career glow-up coach," founder of Newo Executive Solutions, and a former recruiter who sold her house, her car, and her comfort zone to build a coaching business from the beaches of Costa Rica (now Medellín, Colombia). Allison unpacks why she rebrands career coaching as a "glow up" — because the traditional, one-job-for-twenty-years career is gone — and why the real problem her clients bring her often isn't the job itself, but a life with no boundaries around it. She breaks down her "career as real estate" framework for negotiating from strength instead of taking the first offer, shares the client story behind a $40,000 raise, and gets candid about the confidence gap that keeps qualified women stuck on what she calls the "struggle bus" while less-qualified men walk into interviews without a second thought.
with Alison Hemmings
No Talent Required: Building Culture, Trust, and Courage with Lynne Ghelfi
In this episode of Her Career Unplugged, Joanne and Vimala sit down with Lynne Ghelfi — a marketing director in the automotive industry, John Maxwell certified coach, and author of the upcoming book No Talent Required — to talk about what leadership actually looks like in the trenches. Lynne shares how a family financial crisis pushed her into car sales with zero experience, how selling over 250 cars in her first year (as the only woman on the floor) launched her into leadership, and how leading a team of 13 young women taught her that leadership is as much about life skills as job skills. She breaks down her book's twelve daily leadership practices — attitude, gratitude, courage, empathy, and more — all built on the premise that none of them require natural talent, just intentionality. Along the way, she shares the "face the mirror" exercise for resetting a bad moment, the Maxwell DISC method for reading how people communicate, and the deeply personal story about her mother stepping up as head of household that became the heart of her book's chapter on courage.
with Lynne Ghelfi
About the Show
Built for women who don't believe the highlight reel.
Her Career Unplugged is a podcast about the real career journeys behind the titles. Hosted by Vimala Pydi and Joanne Skiles, this series features honest conversations with women navigating their careers, sharing the pivots, setbacks, detours, and decisions that don't show up on LinkedIn.
Past episodes have dug into:
- Quieting impostor syndrome and actually owning your seat at the table
- Betting on yourself: pivots into entrepreneurship, leadership, and industries you've never worked in
- The unwritten rules of office politics, sponsorship, and building a career-long support system
We talk openly about mentorship, confidence, burnout, career transitions, job searching, and navigating growth while balancing life outside of work — sometimes in a quick 20-minute chat, sometimes in an hour-long deep dive.
No buzzwords. No highlight reels. Just real stories, unplugged.
"These are stories that we tell each other when we're not running a meetup and the cameras are off. We as women deal with this within our career, and this is what other women need to hear. That's why we are here."
Joanne Skiles
Co-Host, Ep. 1
"I always feel I'm surrounded by the most brilliant, brightest people in the world, and I have to tell myself, no. I'm here because I have proven myself to be here."
Vimala Pydi
Co-Host, Ep. 1
Get In Touch
Want to be on the show?
We're always looking for guests with real stories to tell. If you're a woman with a career worth unplugging, reach out.
Email us
hello@hercareerunplugged.comFollow on Instagram
@hercareerunpluggedFollow on LinkedIn
Her Career Unplugged