In this heartfelt Season 2 finale, Susan and Juliet sit down together to reflect on the conversations, insights, and unforgettable moments that shaped another powerful season of Secrets of the C-Suite. From inspiring guests doing the hard, often unsung work in their communities, to bold leaders taking big leaps into new ventures, the season has been packed with wisdom, courage, and real talk from the top.

They revisit standout moments from guests who are:

• Deeply committed to social impact and equity
• Courageously stepping into entrepreneurship and reinvention
• Sharing creative wisdom, like our featured author
• Leading in complex, high-stakes environments, like our NBC executive

Susan and Juliet also reflect on their own duo episodes—what surprised them, what made them laugh, and the leadership lessons that stuck with them long after the mic was off.

And in true C-suite fashion, they almost forgot to thank the most important person behind the scenes: their producer and editor, Brian Clothier, whose steady hand, sharp ear, and infinite patience make every episode possible. Thank you, Brian!

As they look ahead, Susan and Juliet are beginning to plan for Season 3, with a potential focus on entrepreneurship—both inside and outside the corporate world. Intrigued? So are they.

Secrets of the C-Suite is produced by Susan Sutherland, Juliet Clothier and Brian Clothier.

Take a listen—and stay tuned for what’s next in Season 3.

Please let us know how you liked this episode, subscribe to the podcast, and leave us a five star review so others can find us! We're so grateful to each of you listeners!

You can reach Juliet directly at JulietClothier@gmail.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.JulietClothier.com

You can reach Susan directly at Susan@SusanASutherland.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.SusanASutherland.com

Secrets of the C-Suite is both a podcast AND a leadership consultancy. You can learn more about our offerings here.

Episode 11 with Valari Staab, Chairman, NBCUniversal Local, was such fun for us for us to record, and we know it will be an engaging, thought-provoking episode for you too!

Both Juliet and Susan met Valari way back in the days when Valari worked for ABC in San Francisco and served on the Board of the United Way of the Bay Area, where Juliet was CFO and Susan was also on the Board. All these many years later, now as Chairman at NBCUniversal Local, she had just moved into new offices in 30 Rockefeller Plaza, and we talked about her journey and career in media with a backdrop of a wall of TV screens behind her!

We learned a lot from speaking from Valari, and we ended our conversation inspired by purposeful, people-focused, and fun leadership she demonstrates every day. We trust you'll be as inspired as well.

Please let us know how you liked this episode, subscribe to the podcast, and leave us a five star review so others can find us! We're so grateful to each of you listeners!

You can find Valari on LinkedIn

You can reach Juliet directly at JulietClothier@gmail.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.JulietClothier.com

You can reach Susan directly at Susan@SusanASutherland.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.SusanASutherland.com

Secrets of the C-Suite is both a podcast AND a leadership consultancy. You can learn more about our offerings here.

In Episode 10 of Season Two of Secrets of the C-Suite: the Podcast, we are delighted to welcome Elizabeth Husserl, Wealth Advisor, Financial Planner, Company Founder and Author. Our conversation went deep and wide as we discussed how humans make meaning, how we (and society) define wealth, and all the ways we can be more intentional about our choices, including the financial ones.

We highly recommend Elizabeth's recent book, "The Power of Enough: Finding Joy in your Relationship with Money." It is a layered, nuanced guide to understanding how our individual relationship with money, and our stories about money and wealth, are reflections of who we are and what we believe, including those powerful limiting beliefs that we are often unconscious of!

The book challenges us to recognize the power society - capitalist society - gives to money, AND encourages us to explore the personal link between money and wealth, and how we think about scarcity and abundance, and might consider what enough and satiety means to each of us.

Elizabeth in person in this Episode is no less compelling than her book! She invites us to an engaging exploration, a rigorous pursuit led by curiosity, and offers 'on ramps' to understand and appreciate what matters to us as individuals. She's energetic and fun to talk with!

We loved our conversation with Elizabeth, and trust you will too!

Please let us know how you liked this episode, subscribe to the podcast, and leave us a five star review so others can find us! We're so grateful to each of you listeners!

You can find Elizabeth Husserl on LinkedIn and connect with her on two Instagram accounts: @ElizabethHusserl and @converstationsmoney

You can reach Juliet directly at julietClothier@gmail.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.JulietClothier.com

You can reach Susan directly at Susan@SusanASutherland.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.SusanASutherland.com

Secrets of the C-Suite is both a podcast AND a leadership consultancy. You can learn more about our offerings here.

In this episode, Juliet's flying solo as Susan is traveling. Juliet talks with Jean Cooper—another inspiring alum of the Glide Foundation and a true force in values-driven leadership. Jean’s journey includes multiple leadership roles at Glide, where she served San Francisco’s most vulnerable communities as Chief of Staff, Chief Impact Officer, and Chief Financial and Operations Officer. Her experience spans deep programmatic leadership, executive strategy, and organizational transformation.

But Jean’s story doesn’t stop there. She’s also a seasoned consultant, a dedicated equestrian, and now, a practitioner weaving together spirituality and leadership in powerful new ways. Our conversation explores what it means to lead with purpose, how to stay grounded in high-stakes environments, and what happens when you bring your whole self—spirituality included—into your leadership practice.

Whether you're navigating systems change or looking to align your inner and outer work, this episode offers thoughtful insight from a leader who's done both.

Thank you for tuning in! Don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review our podcast. If there's a topic you'd like us to explore, we'd love to hear from you at SecretsOfTheCSuite@gmail.com

You can reach Jean through her website: https://www.ignitemyexperiment.com/ and on LinkedIn

You can reach Juliet directly at julietClothier@gmail.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.JulietClothier.com

You can reach Susan directly at Susan@SusanASutherland.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.SusanASutherland.com

Secrets of the C-Suite is both a podcast AND a leadership consultancy. You can learn more about our offerings here.

In this 'duo only' episode, using the first 100 days of the current Republican Administration as a benchmark, we talk about what we're excited and hopeful about, the leadership lessons we're seeing, and how we've changed over the last 100 days.

We talk about how we practice staying grounded and open while using our voices to greater effect, a key leadership skill. We agree that the last 100 days have been a lot - an understatement actually - and how much we've learned about the world, our power, and our necessary practices for continuing to evolve as leaders and humans.

Susan and Juliet are joined by Kris Clothier (Juliet's sister) who shares with us her career highs, lows and lessons as a doctor of veterinary medicine. Her journey starts with the knowing, at a very young age, that she wanted to be a vet! It includes getting her degree, and then practicing as a vet - and a woman in a man's world - in the Central Valley of California, partnering with another vet to own and run their own practice and business, and later her decision to pursue her PhD in veterinary microbiology and immunobiology (making her a doctor doctor!). That pursuit led her to academia and to running a lab supporting students as well as practicing vets.

Recently retired from that career, Kris now teaches and tutors biological sciences and STEM to community college students, and mentors and supports them in navigating their careers.

Kris is a friend to both of us, and it was a pleasure to hear aspects of her story we hadn't heard in the way we heard it in this episode. Committed to science and her love of teaching, Kris has been an outstanding leader, supporting others, guiding aspiring vets and vet techs. As a scientist, she lets science lead but brings her considerable judgment and wisdom to the table whether treating an animal, examining slides in the lab, or working with young people aspiring to work in the field. Her insights and lessons on navigating life as a human, a scientist and a leader are illuminating and helpful. We hope you'll enjoy listening to this episode as much we did recording it.

Thank you for listening - we're so glad you're here. If you don't subscribe to the Podcast yet, please do. We'd hate for you to miss an episode!

And if you've enjoyed this or any other episodes, please leave us a 5 star review so others can find us as well.

Secrets of the C-Suite is both a podcast AND a leadership consultancy. You can learn more about our offerings here.

You can reach Juliet directly at julietClothier@gmail.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.JulietClothier.com

You can reach Susan directly at Susan@SusanASutherland.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Her website is www.SusanASutherland.com

In Episode 6 of Season 2, it's just the two of us again - Juliet and Susan - exploring the relationship between psychological safety, risk and growth.

We know that humans learn and grow best when they are, and feel, safe. We also know that in order to grow, we need to stretch beyond comfort, and into activities, areas, mindsets that don't feel easy at all. Doing so carries risk, of course, but without that stretch into areas with risk, we can't develop our skills, our leadership, ourselves.

In this episode Juliet describes a three-ring 'target': the center is your comfort zone and where you experience the most psychological safety. The outer ring represents the full-on flight or flight danger zone, where showing up is so far beyond our skills and self-concept that we are likely to be rendered immobile and/or fail. (Always? No. But it's still a good conceptual model.) So it's the middle ring, the one between the comfort zone and the danger zone that is the most generative and fruitful for risk taking, stretching and ultimately, personal and professional growth.

We didn't explore this but we know that people are notoriously poor judges of both what they can handle, and what they can't, usually blending a mix of both under- and over-estimating capacity. In another episode, we'll explore how we learn to know, and to trust ourselves in moments where we are being stretched, where there's risk, and where we are likely to expand and grow.

We enjoyed our discussion together, and doing these "duo" episodes, so we'll continue to pepper them in along with episodes with guests.

Thank you for listening - we're so glad you're here. If you don't subscribe to the Podcast yet, please do. We'd hate for you to miss an episode!

And if you've enjoyed this or any other episodes, please leave us a 5 star review so others can find us as well.

Secrets of the C-Suite is both a podcast AND a leadership consultancy. You can learn more about our offerings here.

You can reach Juliet directly at julietClothier@gmail.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.JulietClothier.com

You can reach Susan directly at Susan@SusanASutherland.com, and follow her on socials:
LinkedIn
Instagram
Her website is www.SusanASutherland.com

Episode Summary:

In this episode, we sit down with Kim Bender, a visionary strategist and nonprofit leader with over two decades of experience advancing community health, economic justice, and the arts across California. From her transformational leadership at the Healthcare Foundation Northern Sonoma County to her impactful fundraising roles at GLIDE, BAMPFA, and SFFilm, Kim has consistently led with purpose, compassion, and radical inclusivity.

We explore her journey through the nonprofit world, the evolution of community-centric fundraising, and how she’s championing trust-based philanthropy to build stronger, more equitable communities. Kim shares her insights on executive coaching, collaborative program design, and the role of unconditional love in leadership. Whether you're a nonprofit professional, an aspiring change maker, or simply curious about what it means to lead with heart, this conversation will leave you inspired and empowered.