In Her Ellement

• The Hardest Pivot I Ever Made, with Spencer Stuart’s Lisa Caswell

  What happens when the support you need comes from someone you least expect?For Lisa Caswell, that moment came with an invitation to a surprise meeting halfway across the world. Today, Lisa is a Partner at Spencer Stuart, where she helps companies attract top Silicon Valley talent. She’s also a former CEO of eMeter, which was acquired by Siemens, and has held leadership roles at Ariba, Apple, and IBM.In this episode, Lisa opens up about the hidden trade-offs of AI, why the best leaders sometimes come from unexpected places, and how to navigate the hard pivots in a career. She also reflects on what it takes to let go of a role you once saw as your calling.1:47 A Mysterious Call to Munich4:34 Gary’s Recommendation5:49 Sailer or Entrepreneur?8:11 A Major Pivot10:45 Embracing Tough Feedback12:49 The Importance of Vulnerability and Growth14:56 Finding Leaders in Unexpected Places16:36 Missed Opportunities and the Value of Titles18:03 From the Front Lines: The Rise of the Chief AI Officer21:07 The True Costs and Benefits of AI in BusinessLinks:Lisa Caswell on LinkedInSuchi Srinivasan on LinkedInKamila Rakhimova on LinkedInAbout In Her Ellement: In Her Ellement highlights the women and allies leading the charge in digital, business, and technology innovation. Through engaging conversations, the podcast explores their journeys—celebrating successes and acknowledging the balance between work and family. Most importantly, it asks: when was the moment you realized you hadn’t just arrived—you were truly in your element?About The Hosts:Kamila Rakhimova is a fintech leader whose journey took her from Tajikistan to the U.S., where she built a career on her own terms. Leveraging her English proficiency and international relations expertise, she discovered the power of microfinance and moved to the U.S., eventually leading Amazon's Alexa Fund to support underrepresented founders.Suchi Srinivasan is an expert in AI and digital transformation. Originally from India, her career includes roles at trailblazing organizations like Bell Labs and Microsoft. In 2011, she co-founded the Cleanweb Hackathon, a global initiative driving IT-powered climate solutions with over 10,000 members across 25+ countries. She also advises Women in Cloud, aiming to create $1B in economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs by 2030.Subscribe to In Her Ellement on your podcast app of choice to hear meaningful conversations with women in digital, business, and technology.

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• The Power of Seeking Discomfort with Prudential’s Carolynn Smith

  What happens when you’re suddenly asked to lead the very people who used to be your peers?For Carolynn Smith, that moment came with her first big promotion. It taught her lessons about courage, discomfort, and how leadership often begins by stepping into the unknown.Today, Carolynn is Head of U.S. Service and Enterprise Process Excellence at Prudential Financial. She oversees large-scale transformation efforts and shapes how customer care is delivered at one of the country’s leading financial services companies.In this conversation, guest host Karen Lellouche Tordjman sits down with Carolynn to talk about seeking discomfort, the role of AI in reimagining customer experience, and what it really takes to grow into leadership. Along the way, Carolynn reflects on raising a family while rising through the ranks, and why leaning into discomfort has been her best teacher.1:59 Core Values and a Promotion3:13 Business vs. Personal Relationships4:50 Surround Yourself With People Smarter Than You8:18 Seeking Discomfort 10:15 “Work-Life Blend”14:03 AI and Customer Experience17:45 Managing Customer ExpectationsLinks:Carolynn Smith on LinkedInSuchi Srinivasan on LinkedInKamila Rakhimova on LinkedInKaren Lellouche Tordjman on LinkedInAbout In Her Ellement: In Her Ellement highlights the women and allies leading the charge in digital, business, and technology innovation. Through engaging conversations, the podcast explores their journeys—celebrating successes and acknowledging the balance between work and family. Most importantly, it asks: when was the moment you realized you hadn’t just arrived—you were truly in your element?About The Hosts:Kamila Rakhimova is a fintech leader whose journey took her from Tajikistan to the U.S., where she built a career on her own terms. Leveraging her English proficiency and international relations expertise, she discovered the power of microfinance and moved to the U.S., eventually leading Amazon's Alexa Fund to support underrepresented founders.Suchi Srinivasan is an expert in AI and digital transformation. Originally from India, her career includes roles at trailblazing organizations like Bell Labs and Microsoft. In 2011, she co-founded the Cleanweb Hackathon, a global initiative driving IT-powered climate solutions with over 10,000 members across 25+ countries. She also advises Women in Cloud, aiming to create $1B in economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs by 2030.Karen Lellouche Tordjman is a Managing Director & Senior Partner at BCG. She has spent over 2 decades in the firm supporting clients across Europe, the US and Latin America. She leads the Customer Experience topic globally for BCG, and is an expert in omnchannel & AI transformation.Subscribe to In Her Ellement on your podcast app of choice to hear meaningful conversations with women in digital, business, and technology.

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• Throwback: Role Modelling Vulnerability with Kensho’s Bhavesh Dayalji

  What does allyship look like when you’re leading a company? For Bhavesh Dayalji, it often means being honest about the challenges of balancing work and family, and choosing to show up as a husband and father first. This is a throwback episode, but Bhavesh’s reflections on leadership and allyship remain just as powerful today. Bhavesh shares how vulnerability can build trust and create cultures where people feel safe bringing their full selves to work. It’s a principle that extends to how he approaches innovation in AI. Bhavesh is the CEO of Kensho Technologies, an AI solutions provider, and also serves as Chief AI Officer at S&P Global. 1:34 Meet Bhavesh4:46 Seeing inequality in tech6:17 AI at Kensho and S&P Global9:21 Lessons from the CEO seat11:26 Why diverse voices matter in AI15:41 Being real at work17:43 Advice for newcomers in AI19:43 Family and balanceLinks:Bhavesh Diyalji on LinkedInSuchi Srinivasan on LinkedInKamila Rakhimova on LinkedInAbout In Her Ellement: In Her Ellement highlights the women and allies leading the charge in digital, business, and technology innovation. Through engaging conversations, the podcast explores their journeys—celebrating successes and acknowledging the balance between work and family. Most importantly, it asks: when was the moment you realized you hadn’t just arrived—you were truly in your element?About The Hosts:Kamila Rakhimova is a fintech leader whose journey took her from Tajikistan to the U.S., where she built a career on her own terms. Leveraging her English proficiency and international relations expertise, she discovered the power of microfinance and moved to the U.S., eventually leading Amazon's Alexa Fund to support underrepresented founders.Suchi Srinivasan is an expert in AI and digital transformation. Originally from India, her career includes roles at trailblazing organizations like Bell Labs and Microsoft. In 2011, she co-founded the Cleanweb Hackathon, a global initiative driving IT-powered climate solutions with over 10,000 members across 25+ countries. She also advises Women in Cloud, aiming to create $1B in economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs by 2030.Subscribe to In Her Ellement on your podcast app of choice to hear meaningful conversations with women in digital, business, and technology.

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• Throwback: Eclectic Career Paths with Google’s Hayete Gallot

  While we’re busy working on new episodes, we wanted to revisit one of our favorite conversations from Season 3. When we first spoke with Hayete Gallott, she was Corporate Vice President at Microsoft. Today, she is President of Customer Experience at Google. We thought this was a meaningful opportunity to revisit her reflections on career choices, change, and growth.How do you find the right career path when so many possibilities are in front of you? For Hayete Gallot, the answer has always been experimentation—trying new roles, seeing what sparks energy, and learning just as much from what doesn’t.That curiosity has shaped her eclectic journey. Hayete has moved across engineering, product management, marketing, sales, and business planning—always following the thread of what felt meaningful at the time. Behind that drive is a lesson she learned from her mother: independence matters, because life can change in an instant.2:10 Lessons from Mom5:58 Being an Information Sponge6:14 The Value of Curiosity & Lifelong Learning10:24 Day-to-Day Leadership at Microsoft 14:42 You Probably Won’t Be Working on What You Studied17:13 Confidence, Resilience, and Self-Belief18:24 Prioritize and Protect Your TimeLinks:Hayete Gallott on LinkedInSuchi Srinivasan on LinkedInKamila Rakhimova on LinkedInAbout In Her Ellement: In Her Ellement highlights the women and allies leading the charge in digital, business, and technology innovation. Through engaging conversations, the podcast explores their journeys—celebrating successes and acknowledging the balance between work and family. Most importantly, it asks: when was the moment you realized you hadn’t just arrived—you were truly in your element?About The Hosts:Kamila Rakhimova is a fintech leader whose journey took her from Tajikistan to the U.S., where she built a career on her own terms. Leveraging her English proficiency and international relations expertise, she discovered the power of microfinance and moved to the U.S., eventually leading Amazon's Alexa Fund to support underrepresented founders.Suchi Srinivasan is an expert in AI and digital transformation. Originally from India, her career includes roles at trailblazing organizations like Bell Labs and Microsoft. In 2011, she co-founded the Cleanweb Hackathon, a global initiative driving IT-powered climate solutions with over 10,000 members across 25+ countries. She also advises Women in Cloud, aiming to create $1B in economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs by 2030.Subscribe to In Her Ellement on your podcast app of choice to hear meaningful conversations with women in digital, business, and technology.

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• Building with Purpose with Across AI’s Nilou Salehi

  We want to hear from you! Email us at [email protected] with a voice memo describing your In Your Ellement moment. We might feature your story in an upcoming episode!***What does it look like to pivot while staying true to your purpose?For Nilou Salehi, it meant putting her professorship role at UC Berkeley on pause to co-found Across AI, a startup built on her human-centered AI research. Now Co-CEO, Nilou is exploring how AI is reshaping not just the tools we use, but the teams that build them. Her approach blends academic rigor with startup agility, always grounded in real human needs.This episode is part of our Builders mini series, where we talk with founders, product managers, and digital leaders about what drives their passion for building.You’ll hear Nilou reflect on the leap from academia to entrepreneurship, how AI is changing organizational life, and why the future belongs to flexible teams with shared intent.1:19 Transitioning from Academia to Startup Life5:04 The Role of UX Research in AI Product Development7:23 Balancing Grit and Flexibility in Career Choices8:42 High-Level vs. Low-Level Goals14:17 New Challenges Facing AI Product Builders in 202515:44 Upskilling and the Future of Work with AI18:57 Human-Centered Design and Organizational Change20:36 ReflectionsLinks:Nilou Salehi on LinkedInSuchi Srinivasan on LinkedInKamila Rakhimova on LinkedInAbout In Her Ellement: In Her Ellement highlights the women and allies leading the charge in digital, business, and technology innovation. Through engaging conversations, the podcast explores their journeys—celebrating successes and acknowledging the balance between work and family. Most importantly, it asks: when was the moment you realized you hadn’t just arrived—you were truly in your element?About The Hosts:Kamila Rakhimova is a fintech leader whose journey took her from Tajikistan to the U.S., where she built a career on her own terms. Leveraging her English proficiency and international relations expertise, she discovered the power of microfinance and moved to the U.S., eventually leading Amazon's Alexa Fund to support underrepresented founders.Suchi Srinivasan is an expert in AI and digital transformation. Originally from India, her career includes roles at trailblazing organizations like Bell Labs and Microsoft. In 2011, she co-founded the Cleanweb Hackathon, a global initiative driving IT-powered climate solutions with over 10,000 members across 25+ countries. She also advises Women in Cloud, aiming to create $1B in economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs by 2030.Subscribe to In Her Ellement on your podcast app of choice to hear meaningful conversations with women in digital, business, and technology.

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