When Clara de Soto's first app company, Killswitch, was shut down by Facebook after going viral in 110 countries, it was a "really big blow," but she didn't take it sitting down. She and her colleagues got to work. "We had to put on our hustle pants…and we networked our butts off until we got in touch actually directly with Sheryl Sandberg," she said while chatting for this week's episode of The Credentialed podcast. De Soto's latest enterprise Reply.ai is still an early startup, though you wouldn't know it to look at its client list, which includes firms like Coca-Cola, Starbucks, Samsung and Hilton, all of which have employed its chatbot technology to communicate better with consumers.

She may not have had the proverbial ultra-successful lemonade stand at age ten, but it didn't take long for Heidi Lehmann to realize early in her career that things were moving a little too slowly for her. Compelled to take the reins as a mobile technology and media entrepreneur, Lehmann has been involved in getting all sorts of tech and media startups up and running. We chatted with Lehmann about her current work at body monitor tech firm Kenzen and about her passion for championing media aimed at women and LGBTQ communities.

This episode of The Credentialed features Jonathan Stephen, manager of ecommerce for Norwegian Cruise Line. We chat with him about his indirect route to the mobile world, how he straddles technology and marketing, and why sometimes hanging out in airports is the best way to get close to travelers.

In this second half of the show, Allison Clift-Jennings, CEO of Filament addresses what it was like to be a CEO trying to earn funding for her company while she was smack dab in the middle of her gender transition from male to female. "Going through a gender transition during pitching to folks like this -- I knew in my head that this could go really south really fast…because we all have unconscious biases." It turned out her decision had an unexpected -- and positive -- impact on her business.

Allison Clift-Jennings is CEO of Filament, a firm that modernizes industrial equipment, but her thoughts about her work and its potential go way beyond a time horizon for a Series C and getting acquired. The future of the planet and consumer culture are at stake. In this Part I of a two-part episode, we discuss Filament's mission, and how Clift-Jennings believes instilling value in machines can create unforeseen efficiencies even for everyday tools.  

"I remember being told I asked way too many questions." - Lauren Moores Lauren Moores is on the ground floor of a technical solution to a very real need: enabling loans for people in emerging markets. But rather than developing software or tech platforms, Lauren works with information and analytics as data director at startup Tala. The global financial technology firm helps people in Kenya, the Philippines and Tanzania obtain microloans by producing credit ratings for them based mainly on information generated by their mobile phones. Lauren explains how it works, why data-for-good is important, and how good 'ol baseball got her into numbers and statistics.    

"I also love the competitiveness of sports where there are certain rules in place but everybody competes their hardest to win – that spirit, I love." – Gladys Kong Gladys Kong, CEO of mobile tech and data firm Ubermedia has an impressive tech pedigree, with multiple patents and many years working alongside Bill Gross at his Idealab incubator. We discuss what it was like to take on the CEO role and work more closely than ever with employees after starting out in the very different position of chief technology officer. Kong also shares why playing high school basketball, running track at Caltech, rooting for the Lakers – and cheering on her hoops-playing-kids – inspire her approach to running a business.