"Where do you prioritize, ruthlessly prioritize, and where do you focus your time and your energy? It's about investing in meaningful relationships and creating balance." - Alyssa Stein, Sr. Director, Cisco

In this episode, VIP guest Alyssa Stein, Senior Director at Cisco, shares a rare, grounded look at what it actually takes to step into a new leadership role with confidence, clarity, and influence.

When you switch roles, it’s not about proving yourself fast—it’s about leading wisely from day one. ⏸️ 💼

After 15 years at Google, Alyssa made a major transition—becoming “new again” at a senior level. She opens up about how she approached this shift intentionally: setting boundaries early, prioritizing what truly mattered, and resisting the pressure to over perform or over explain.

Alyssa also reflects on some of her most defining leadership moments—leading through layoffs with compassion, hosting a global leadership offsite in Cleveland, and doubling down on culture and relationships during uncertain times. Her perspective is steady, human, and deeply earned.

Throughout the conversation, Alyssa shares practical wisdom on:

• How to ruthlessly prioritize when everything feels important

• Why boundaries are a leadership strength—not a liability

• How to stay confident and influential without burning yourself out

• And how to remember that you are more than your job, even in high-stakes roles

  
  

  Key Moments

  00:15 - Alyssa's proudest career moment

  02:17 - Building culture through people and the importance of reconnecting

  03:48 - Challenging moments: navigating layoffs with compassion and support

  05:27 - The power of pause: reflecting in turbulent times

  06:48 - Resilience after burnout and the importance of grit

  08:20 - Alyssa’s "one simple thing" for maintaining work-life balance: family routines

  09:43 - Modeling kindness and empathy at home and in leadership

  13:24 - The value of ruthlessly prioritizing and setting boundaries

  16:20 - Navigating new roles and the learning curve in large organizations

  20:23 - Building relationships in remote and startup environments

  22:52 - Practical advice for visibility in fast-paced workplaces

  23:22 - Guidance for feeling stuck or stagnant: taking one step at a time

  24:37 - Closing thoughts and commitments to personal and professional development

  LINKS

  ⁠⁠Alyssa Stein - LinkedIn⁠⁠ — Connect with Alyssa for leadership insights

  ⁠Rachael's book: Pause⁠ — The concept Alyssa references for reflection and resilience

If you’re stepping into a new tech leadership role—or quietly questioning how to lead with more confidence and less self-pressure—Alyssa’s story will resonate deeply. 🌿

What if you managed your career, energy, and life the same way elite engineers manage mission-critical systems?

In Ep 240 of The Pausecast, I chat with Jennifer Petoff, a former PhD chemist turned SRE leader at Google, to explore how Site Reliability Engineering principles can radically change how you work—and live.

This is a must-listen for anyone in tech who feels stretched thin, quietly burnt out, or craving a more intentional way to lead without stepping off the fast track. ⚡🧠

Jennifer shares how she applied SRE concepts like capacity planning, load shedding, blameless learning, and North Star decision-making to her own career—and why treating your life like a system isn’t cold or rigid, but deeply human and freeing.

We talk about designing a career that’s sustainable, values-aligned, and resilient—especially in fast-moving tech environments where “just push harder” is the default.

If you want to lead with clarity (not chaos), this conversation will land. 🌊💙

Highlights You Don’t Want to Miss

• 5:02 - Celebrating the success of the Google SRE book and its industry influence

  10:20 - The significance of capacity planning and load shedding in life
  11:44 - Using technical strategies to set boundaries and manage workload

  15:48 — Why your career deserves the same systems thinking as production code

  16:00 — Defining your North Star when every opportunity looks “good on paper”

  17:16 — How blameless learning unlocks confidence, growth, and better decisions

  
  

  Themes

• From PhD chemist → SRE leader: Jennifer’s unconventional path

• Using SRE principles to prevent burnout (before it happens)

• Capacity planning + load shedding as real-life leadership skills

• Why blameless postmortems build stronger teams and stronger humans

• Designing work around life—not the other way around

• Investing in yourself through thoughtful risk-taking and thought leadership

If you’re in tech and craving a smarter, calmer, more intentional way to lead—this episode is for you.

And if this resonates, share it with a colleague who’s carrying too much quietly.

That’s how culture shifts start. 💬✨

MORE INFO LINKS:

Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) Book — Free downloadable PDF

Connect with Jennifer Petoff LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/jenniferpetoff

Jennifer's website, The Reliable PgM: https://www.reliablepgm.com/

Getting Things Done by David Allen — Methodology for workload and task management

Ever feel like your career is moving fast, but your energy and focus aren’t keeping up?

What if the secret to leading at your best isn’t doing more, but resetting smarter?

In episode 239 of The Pausecast, I talk with Kate Eckman, executive coach, performance expert, and author of The Full Spirit Workout, about practical strategies to boost energy, focus, and resilience—without adding more hours to your day.

• Experience a leadership-focused pause led by Kate to reset energy
• Kate’s journey and the methodology behind The Full Spirit Workout
• How small “energy lifts” (endorphins without exercise) can improve focus and decision-making
• Why savoring wins and moments is critical for sustained performance
• Kate’s favorite gratitude exercise for boosting mindset and resilience
• Actionable ways to start your Full Spirit Workout today
• How Kate maintains her own high-performance edge
• Rethinking sleep and recovery as tools for leadership excellence

Why you Need to Know Kate:

Kate is a Columbia-certified executive coach, performance strategist, and leadership mentor. She draws on neuroscience, positive psychology, and whole-person coaching to equip high-achieving leaders in tech with tools to manage energy, prevent burnout, and lead with clarity and impact.

Explore more of her work and her book at: kateeckman.tv

In The Pausecast Ep. 235, Rachael O’Meara sits down with tech entrepreneur Sandra Ma for a refreshingly honest conversation about career reinvention, leaving big tech, leadership, and joy at work.

Sandra shares her journey from starting out in finance, to MTV, to Google, to co-founding Jovial, a startup dedicated to helping teams build more human, joyful, and impactful workplace cultures.

Together, Rachael and Sandra explore what happens when external success no longer feels like enough—and the inner nudges that signal it’s time for something more.

This episode is for leaders who are doing “all the right things,” yet quietly wondering if there’s another way to work, lead, and live.

You’ll hear candid reflections on investing in yourself, navigating uncertainty, breaking free from autopilot, and remembering that—sometimes—it’s really not that serious.

A grounding, perspective-shifting conversation for anyone craving more meaning, joy, and agency in their career journey.

Pause-worthy moments:

• It’s okay to still be figuring out who you’re becoming—even at the top of your game

• Wanting more impact doesn’t mean something is wrong—it means you’re evolving

• Joyful, human-centered workplaces are possible—and necessary

• The interview process is as much for you as it is for the employer

• Entrepreneurship can be the fastest personal growth accelerator there is

• Perspective is leadership: we often forget to zoom out

• Work matters—but your whole life matters more

  
  

  Standout sound bites:

• “I’m still figuring out what I want to be.”

• “We get so caught up in our own lives.”

• “It’s not that serious.”

  
  

  Episode Chapters

  • 00:00 – Introduction & Sandra’s background

  • 03:14 – From corporate success to startup curiosity

  • 06:09 – Founding Jovial and reimagining workplace culture

  • 08:45 – Navigating uncertainty, mistakes, and growth

  • 11:35 – Investing in yourself through coaching and inner work

  • 14:09 – What success looks like now

  • 16:45 – Finding balance and perspective in a busy world

  • 19:36 – Final reflections on joy, impact, and leadership

The path from humble beginnings to tech leadership isn’t linear—and it’s rarely just about working harder.

In this honest conversation, I sit down with Chelsea Wierbonski, a 20+ year seasoned product leader and coach in big tech, to unpack the inner work required to lead with clarity when the pace is relentless and the pressure is real.

Chelsea opens up about navigating imposter syndrome, chronic self-doubt, and the invisible stories many high-achievers carry—especially in fast-moving tech environments. We talk about what happens when success looks good on the outside, but doesn’t feel aligned on the inside—and how to close that gap.

You’ll hear how Chelsea shifted from scarcity and over-efforting into grounded self-trust, using practical tools like nervous system regulation, mindset work, breathwork, meditation, and understanding how the brain actually rewires patterns of fear and self-protection.

This episode is for leaders who are ready to stop muscling through and start leading from a place of clarity, confidence, and internal safety—without waiting for burnout to force the change.

If you’re quietly thinking about your next chapter, questioning your path, or feeling like your potential is capped by old patterns—this conversation offers a grounded, real-world way forward.

Key Themes

• Why high performers still struggle with self-doubt

• The inner work behind sustainable confidence in tech leadership

• How scarcity mindset shows up at work (and how to shift it)

• Nervous system regulation protocols for high-pressure environments

• Rewiring subconscious beliefs to support your next career move

• Creating aligned change without burning out

🎧 Listen in to learn how to move from “I’m stuck” to “I trust myself to choose what’s next.”

Connect with Chealsea on Linkedin here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chealsea/

What if doing meaningful work isn’t enough—you also have to know how to advocate for it?

In this episode of The Pausecast, I sit down with my former colleague Liz Heaney, a leader in big tech, for a powerful career conversation about impact, visibility, and resilience inside complex corporate systems.

Liz shares what it’s really like to champion accessibility in big tech—the work she does and is so passionate about.

Her work is deeply meaningful, emotionally driven, and is not always easy to move forward in fast-paced, results-oriented environments.

We talk candidly about navigating politics without losing your values, learning when to push and when to align, and why career growth often depends as much on how you advocate as what you’re advocating for.

This episode is for leaders who care deeply about their work, want to make a difference, and are learning how to balance passion with strategy—especially inside large organizations.

In this Episode we discuss...

• Why accessibility (and mission-driven work) requires both heart and influence

• How to increase visibility for your work and your team

• The career cost of pushing too hard—and the growth that comes from recalibrating

• Why failure is often data, not defeat

• How being kinder to yourself can actually strengthen your leadership

If you’ve ever felt torn between staying true to your values and playing the corporate game, this conversation will feel both grounding and validating—and offer a wiser way forward.

You can find Liz on LinkedIn at : https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizheaney/

#Leadership #CareerGrowth #BigTech #ThePausecast #Accessibility #ExecutivePresence

What if you didn’t have to wait for your job to change… to feel better at work? 😌
This week on The Pausecast VIP, I’m joined by the legendary Marci Shimoff—#1 NYT bestselling author of Happy for No Reason and a global thought leader in personal development.

I met Marci a while back at a women's business conference where she spoke, and I fell madly in love with her (and her concepts lol). I couldn't wait to host her and help amplify her message knowing pausing plays a big part in cultivating and sustaining happiness.

If you’re successful on paper but quietly tired, stretched, or wondering “Is this it?”—this career-meets-inner-work conversation is for you. Marci shares practical, science-backed ways to create happiness from the inside out—so your leadership gets lighter, clearer, and more fulfilling. ✨

In this episode, we explore:

• A simple 2x2x2 pause you can use before tough meetings 🧠

• How to activate your body’s “feel-good” chemistry (hello, oxytocin 💛)

• Why heart rate variability (HRV) matters for performance + resilience

• The daily question that upgrades your well-being

• Marci’s “rooms of happiness” framework (think: building a house for your joy 🏠)

• What you can—and can’t—control when it comes to fulfillment at work

This isn’t “be positive” advice.
It’s grounded wisdom for leaders navigating growth, pressure, and what’s next—without burning out. 🔥

👉 Subscribe to The Pausecast so you don’t miss these leadership conversations.
Ready to feel more fulfilled at work and navigate your next level of leadership?

👉 Book a call with me and let’s explore how to bring “happy for no reason” into your leadership—on your terms.

#ThePausecast #TechLeadership #PersonalGrowth #FulfillmentAtWork #InnerWorkMeetsLeadership #PauseToLead

What if the next level of your leadership doesn’t come from pushing harder—but from pausing on purpose?

In this episode of The Pausecast, I sit down with Melody Olson, former Senior Engineering Director at Google, for a refreshingly honest conversation about leadership, career evolution, and what happens when you stop following the “expected” path.

After a successful, high-profile career at Google, Melody chose to pause—and that decision opened the door to a new chapter defined by curiosity, intentional growth, and smarter risks.

We talk about:

• Why pausing can be a strategic move (not a setback)

• How smart risks build stronger leaders and teams

• The reality of balancing family life with ambitious careers

• Why investing in personal growth pays off long-term

• Setting boundaries, protecting deep work, and redefining success

• Letting go of linear career ladders and embracing a “jungle gym” path

If you’re a leader who’s successful on paper—but sensing there’s more available to you—this conversation will resonate.

Real talk.

Grounded wisdom.

Permission to evolve.

Connect with Melody on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melody-olson/

Thanks for tuning in this week—and as always, remember: your pause might be the most powerful move you make.