Aspire with Emma Grede

Most of us have been taught to see conflict as a sign that something has gone wrong. Today’s guest, Priya Parker, sees it differently. After more than two decades working in conflict resolution, she believes the right kind of fight can bring us closer, make our teams stronger, and help us understand each other better. In her new book, The Art of Fighting, Priya gives us the language and the skill set to do it well. 

Priya joins Emma Grede to talk about why so many of us choose what she calls “unhealthy peace,” and what we lose when we avoid saying what we really think. They explore how our families and cultures shape the way we fight, why some disagreements are worth staying in, and how to tell when it’s time to let go. This is a conversation about what healthy conflict can look like in practice and how our differences can ultimately bring us together. 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• The questions to ask yourself before deciding whether a fight is worth having
• Why calming your body can change the way you show up in a difficult conversation
• How leaders can make it safer for people with less power to speak honestly
• How Slack and digital tools have changed workplace culture 
• Why humor and play can help people move through conflict without losing connection
• Specific examples from Priya’s work in conflict resolution, from boardrooms to restaurants
• The simple language Priya uses to start a hard conversation with someone she cares about

Law Roach is the image architect behind some of the most talked-about red carpet moments in the world. Raised on Chicago’s South Side, he built his career working with stars including Zendaya, Celine Dion, and Ariana Grande. Along the way, he became a star himself, with a name and reputation that carry value beyond the clothes. But reaching the top also brought a breaking point, and his very public retirement changed what he was willing to say yes to.

In this episode of Aspire, Law joins Emma Grede to talk about his journey to the center of fashion and how he turned his talent and taste into a business. He shares what it took to earn millions a year from styling alone, and why walking away from it at the height of his career gave him the freedom to decide what he wanted to build next.

Today, you’ll hear:

• Why a bold public persona only works when it’s backed by a professional reputation built on trust and follow-through
• How Law and Zendaya made sure his contribution was recognized and paid for in her fashion deals
• Why Keke Palmer fired him, and why being the best at your job doesn’t always mean you’re the right person for a client
• How gratitude and looking after other people’s interests build relationships that last
• Why Law uses fashion to tell stories about Black history and the women who shaped him
• What it takes to build a business that can grow beyond your own time and talent

Malika Andrews and Taylor Rooks have two of the most visible jobs in sports media. Malika is the face of ESPN's NBA coverage, hosting NBA Today and NBA Countdown. Taylor hosts NBA on Prime and is a major presence across Thursday Night Football. Between them they're speaking to millions of people every week — and interviewing some of the most famous athletes in the world.

They’ve also had a front-row seat to each other’s rise. And while they’re both incredibly ambitious and competitive, they’ve learned how to let someone else’s success push them without allowing it to diminish their own.

Emma sits down with both of them to understand what it actually takes to become that trusted at that scale — the preparation nobody sees, how you get an athlete to tell you the truth, and what it costs to do a job where every word, every question and every mistake gets picked apart in real time.

In this episode:

• Why preparation gives you the confidence to perform under pressure
• Trust as a daily deposit: accurate, honest, and fair
• How healthy competition can raise your own standard
• Why asking for what you want can change the trajectory of your career
• How to negotiate from a place of knowing your value
• Why credibility is built through small, consistent actions
• How to tell the difference between feedback worth hearing and noise
• Why longevity, not the next job, is the real ambition

For more, subscribe to our weekly newsletter at emmagrede.com.

Everyone has an opinion about Nara Smith. Very few people have asked her how the business works. At 24, with four kids under six and one of the most recognizable formats on the internet, Nara is running a company she plans to keep growing for the next 50 years.

Emma and Nara get into the moment a viral format turned into income, and why she left the modeling agency that had represented her since she was 14. Nara explains how she uses brand partnerships to test what her audience will buy before launching her own consumer goods brand, and why she still films and edits every video herself. They also talk about the money rules her dad drilled into her and what it takes to stop letting the comment section decide who you are.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How Nara turned a recognizable content format into a multimillion-dollar business
• Why knowing when to lean into what’s working can be more powerful than starting with a perfect strategy
• How she and Lucky approach money, shared wealth, and maintaining their own individual businesses
• What the internet gets wrong about the “tradwife” version of Nara Smith
• How she stops other people’s assumptions from becoming her identity
• How Nara is planning to build an empire that lasts well beyond social media

Vanessa Van Edwards has spent nearly twenty years studying what makes some people easy to talk to. Her argument is that conversation is a skill rather than a personality, and that most of us are simply out of practice.

She joins Emma to talk about how to prepare for the conversations that matter, what to say when you meet someone who could change your career, and how to handle feedback and disagreement without damaging the relationship. She also explains what happened early in her own career, when she lost a television deal during the small talk before the pitch and nobody ever told her that was why.

In this episode:

• How to prepare for conversations that could change what happens next
• The three questions you should always be ready to answer
• Why talking about how busy you are makes people think you're less competent
• How to raise a problem with someone more senior than you
• What the way someone tells their own story reveals about them

Vanessa Van Edwards's new book, Conversation: How to Connect with Anyone & Make Every Interaction Count, is out now.

Ari Emanuel is one of the most powerful people in entertainment and the real-life inspiration for Ari Gold on Entourage. He started in the CAA mailroom before co-founding Endeavor with three other agents and very little money. Over the next three decades, he merged the company with William Morris, acquired IMG and UFC, and helped reshape the modern entertainment business.

In this conversation, Ari and Emma examine the qualities behind that extraordinary career. Ari opens up about growing up with severe dyslexia, being bullied, and using the anger he carried from those experiences to drive himself forward. He explains why you have to say what you want, how he works until he finds the yes, and why curiosity only becomes valuable when you act on it.

They also explore the harder side of success. Ari reflects on the rage and aggression that helped him build his company, the moment he realized those qualities could no longer take him forward, and the work he has done to become a better leader.

They get into:

• Turning dyslexia and rejection into emotional endurance
• Why nobody will advocate for your future more fiercely than you
• What Ari learned from starting in the CAA mailroom
• His relentless approach to calls, rejection, and finding the yes
• How he turns curiosity into relationships and opportunities
• Why company culture is shaped by the behavior leaders tolerate
• What founders misunderstand about how long success takes
• Knowing when the qualities that built your career need to evolve
• Why Ari ultimately values a life of meaning over a traditional legacy

Ari’s new memoir, Roll the Calls, is available now.

Diane von Furstenberg created the iconic wrap dress in her twenties and built her namesake company DVF into one of the most recognizable fashion brands in the world. More than fifty years later, as she approaches 80, she's entering a new chapter — with a lifetime of lessons to share.

In this episode of Aspire, Emma sits down with her longtime friend and idol for a deeply personal conversation about self-belief, independence, motherhood, aging and becoming the woman you want to be. Diane opens up about the choices she made as a working mother, why guilt and fear are not options, the mistakes she's made along the way, and what it takes to like the person you've become.

Diane shares:

• How to build the kind of self-belief that carries you through every stage of life
• Why the most important relationship you'll ever have is the one you have with yourself
• How to stop comparing yourself to other people and own who you are
• Why guilt and fear should never drive your decisions
• What motherhood taught her about raising independent children without losing yourself
• Why independence has always mattered more to her than money
• How to learn from mistakes without letting them define you
• Why kindness is a currency — and how it compounds over time
• What getting older has taught her about confidence, clarity and becoming more yourself

On this special birthday solo of Aspire, Emma Grede shares 44 rules for life, business, and success—her personal operating system for nearly everything. This is everything she knows to be true about money, work, marriage, and motherhood, plus the beliefs she actually uses to make decisions, build companies, and recover from her mistakes.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why taking responsibility for your life is the biggest power move you'll ever make
• How to build confidence before you feel ready
• The question that exposes whether your full schedule is progress or avoidance
• Why you should ask for more money before resentment sets in, and how to do it
• The case for treating your choice of partner as the biggest business decision of your life
• What most successful people get wrong about happiness
• Why your reputation is built when there’s no immediate reward

Andrew Rosen has spent nearly five decades building, investing in, and shaping some of the most influential brands in American fashion. As the co-founder of Theory and an early investor in brands like TWP, rag and bone, Veronica Beard, Alice + Olivia, Good American and SKIMS, he’s also one of Emma's closest mentors.  His advice comes from doing the work — and learning what happens when things don't go to plan.

In this conversation, Andrew shares the lessons he took from his father, the setbacks that shaped how he built Theory, and the advice he gave Emma when she was becoming a brand owner. They explore how to trust your instincts, choose the right investors, and build a profitable business with staying power.

They get into:

• Taking over as CEO of the family business in his twenties
• Losing control of the company — and what he did next
• Getting fired, and why he never saw it as failure
• The experience he brought to starting Theory at 40
• Why profitability has to be part of the plan from the start
• What founders should actually look for in an investor
• The lessons he took from his father that still shape how he does business

Durana Elmi knows how to build a business. Before Cymbiotika, she built and exited four companies. She then took a wellness brand with one employee, one product, and almost no infrastructure and helped scale it into a $150 million business alongside her husband Shahab.

In this episode of Aspire, Emma sits down with Durana to unpack the decisions behind that growth. They also get candid about money, marriage, and leadership. Durana shares why financial independence matters deeply to her, what 27 years of building alongside her husband has taught her about disagreement, and how her definition of success has changed from making money to owning her time.

You’ll learn:

• Why Cymbiotika bootstrapped for five years before taking outside capital
• What infrastructure needs to be in place when a business starts growing faster than you can keep up with
• The expensive lessons founders can learn from going into retail too quickly
• What a $25 million strategic raise brought beyond capital
• Why celebrity investors became a part of Cymbiotika’s growth strategy
• How to make decisions when data challenges your instincts

It's easier than ever to launch a beauty brand—and harder than ever to make it last. In this first-ever Aspire founders roundtable, Danessa Myricks (Danessa Myricks Beauty), Dianna Cohen (Crown Affair), and Amy Liu (Tower 28) get honest about what it actually takes to build and scale a brand people believe in.

These aren’t early ideas—they’re Sephora-scale businesses: Tower 28, launched in 2019, now with a reported $228 million valuation; Crown Affair, launched in 2020 and scaled from roughly 55 to 600 Sephora doors, with a dry shampoo that has ranked #1 in the category; and Danessa Myricks Beauty, a profitable-since-launch business that had already grown to roughly 500 SKUs before entering Sephora.

From getting into Sephora and staying there, to raising capital vs. bootstrapping, to building community you can't reverse-engineer—this is the real playbook for 2026.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• What separates brands that last, and why launching is easy but sustaining is hard
• How to build community with soul, purpose, and mission
• The truth about retail and the operational and financial discipline it takes to scale in Sephora
• How to fund your vision, what outside money is really for, and why finding aligned investors is key
• How founders evolve with intention and decide what to control, when to delegate, and different ways to lead a brand through growth

There’s a lot of dopey financial advice out there. Jill Schlesinger is here to call it out, answer your questions, break down the financial news that actually matters, and help you manage your money without losing your mind. No jargon. No judgment. Just clear, actionable financial guidance about saving, investing, buying a home, managing your career, and deciding how to spend your hard-earned dollars. When it’s time to panic, Jill will tell you. When everyone else is panicking and you shouldn’t be, Jill will tell you that too. Your money. Your move. Let’s go.

Arthur C. Brooks believes we are living through an age of emptiness—a time when more people feel distracted, disconnected, and unsure of what will actually make their lives meaningful. In his latest book, The Meaning of Your Life, the Harvard professor and New York Times bestselling author examines why so many of the things we chase in pursuit of happiness can leave us feeling unsatisfied once we get them. 

In this episode, Emma Grede sits down with Brooks to unpack what is driving our unhappiness and what science actually says about building a meaningful life. Brooks reveals the two questions he gives his Harvard students to diagnose whether they’re experiencing a meaning crisis, why our brains struggle in a world of constant comfort, and how to use social media without letting it drain you. 

You’ll learn:

• Why achievement rarely satisfies us for as long as we expect
• What money can—and cannot—do for your happiness
• The five-year exercise that reveals whether your priorities match how you spend your time
• What to do in the first and last hour of the day to protect your attention 
• The step most people skip that makes new practices stick
• How to pursue a big goal without becoming emotionally attached to the outcome
• The simple ritual to shift your baseline happiness by 15 percent in 12 weeks

Jennifer Garner is an award-winning actor, producer, longtime Save the Children ambassador, and co-founder of Once Upon a Farm, an organic children’s food brand. After rising to fame on Alias, she built a career spanning more than three decades before entering entrepreneurship at 45 and helping grow Once Upon a Farm into a $724 million publicly traded company.

Jennifer joins Emma to talk about the side of success people rarely see: losing years of her life when Alias made her famous, disappearing from friendships, and how the constant presence of paparazzi warped her confidence. 

Jennifer shares:

• What Jennifer is only now realizing about approval and earning her place
• How years of rejection and several failed ideas prepared her for entrepreneurship
• What she’s learned about holding anger without burying it
• How to recognize the value you bring without conventional qualifications
• When fame and visibility can help a business, and where they cannot
• What it actually looks like to protect a company’s mission
• Why your biggest chapter doesn’t come with an age limit

In this solo episode, Emma shares how she thinks about money, from the lessons she learned growing up in East London to the principles she uses today. She gets into her personal financial priorities, why your earning power can matter more than your savings, how to negotiate from a position of strength, and why no woman should ever outsource the understanding of her own finances.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• What your financial priorities should be in your 20s, 30s, 40s, and 50s
• Why your ability to earn can be more valuable than your savings early in your career
• How your beliefs about money can influence what you earn, ask for, and keep
• How to negotiate salary, equity, and other forms of compensation more effectively
• The difference between earning money, building wealth, and protecting what you’ve built
• Why investing early matters—and what can happen when you wait
• How to think about financial independence as freedom, security, and choice

Emma sits down with Krissy Cela, founder and creative director of Oner Active, for an honest conversation about building a bootstrapped business on track to generate close to $300 million this year. Before Oner, Krissy spent a decade building a fitness audience and business from a student laptop, long before either was considered a conventional career path. Today, she owns 50 percent of one of the fastest-growing brands in the category. 

But what happens when your life asks you to become someone you don’t yet feel qualified to be, and people still look for reasons not to credit your success to you? This episode is about starting before you feel ready, letting go of the need to prove yourself, and growing into the leader your business requires.

In this episode, Krissy shares:

• Why feeling underqualified should not stop you from building something big
• How she turned an online audience into a loyal customer community
• The early legal and partnership mistakes that shapes how she operates today
• How people-pleasing weakened her leadership, and what changed since she stopped
• Why the ones who doubt you are rarely the ones who end up mattering

For more, subscribe to our weekly newsletter at emmagrede.com.

Erin and Sara Foster have spent more than 15 years working across television, fashion, media and investing. Today, they are behind the hit Netflix series Nobody Wants This, the fashion brand Favorite Daughter, a production company, a venture fund and a growing slate of projects—but their success did not arrive according to a master plan.

In this episode, they join Emma to unpack the failures, pivots and unlikely opportunities that eventually brought everything together. It is a conversation about staying in motion when the path is unclear, discovering your strengths later than expected, and refusing to treat someone else’s success as evidence that you are falling behind.

In this episode, Erin and Sara share:

• What nobody tells you about the years before anything works
• The power of saying yes before the path is clear
• How they built Favorite Daughter without being traditional “fashion girls”
• The different ways scarcity and abundance shape their relationship with money
• What Erin learned from seven years of IVF and 20 rounds of treatment
• Why it’s never too late to find your lane and how failure can redirect you toward the career you were meant for

Every woman should understand the partnership she's entering before a crisis forces her to. This episode is that conversation.

Laura Wasser has spent 32 years as one of the country's most sought-after divorce attorneys. She’s the person people call when a marriage is ending. But what makes this conversation so valuable is that almost everything she knows matters long before anyone gets divorced.

This episode is about understanding what you are building when you merge your life with another person. Laura explains why marriage is already a contract with or without a prenup, how to protect yourself whether you earn more or less than your partner, and why knowing your financial reality doesn’t make you cynical or unromantic. It makes you an equal participant in your own life.

Laura shares:

• How to have the what’s-mine-is-yours conversation about income, debt, assets, spending, and children
• What should go into a prenup—and what does not belong in one
• How a prenup can protect both the higher earner and the partner making financial or career sacrifices
• The signs that you're giving away power inside your own marriage without realizing it
• Why earning your own money doesn’t mean you’re financially protected
• What to do when you realize you have no idea what is happening with your family’s finances
• How to end a relationship with less fear and a clearer sense of what comes next
• Why divorce doesn’t have to mean you’ve failed—and how her online platform is making the process more accessible and less intimidating

For more, subscribe to our weekly newsletter at emmagrede.com.

Emma Chamberlain started posting videos at 16, before anyone fully understood what the creator economy would become. Within a couple of years she’d become one of the most watched people on YouTube with over 12 million subscribers, ambassador deals with Louis Vuitton, Cartier and Lancôme, and a Spotify-exclusive podcast. She helped define a new kind of fame, built one of the most recognizable personal brands of her generation, and turned an authentic love of coffee into Chamberlain Coffee, now sold in over 8,000 retail doors across Walmart, Target, Costco and Sprouts. 

Now, at 25, she’s asking a more complicated question: what happens when the business, and the person, need to grow beyond the identity that made them successful? Today, she’s answering why, after years of relentless momentum, she’s giving herself permission to step back and rediscover what actually fulfills her.

In this episode, Emma shares:

• Why she moved into the co-CEO seat, and the fear that came with it
• The real business story behind choosing profitability over growth
• What she’s learned about running a brand built around one person
• Why she stepped away from her podcast at the height of it
• The personal cost of giving an audience constant access to your life
• Why she believes influencer culture is approaching a major shift

Reshma Saujani a leading advocate for women’s economic power, the founder of Girls Who Code and Moms First, and the force behind the new documentary No Country for Mothers. After helping change the culture around girls in technology, she has turned her attention to the policies and assumptions that continue to push women—especially mothers—out of the workforce.

In this conversation, she joins Emma to talk about the cultural and structural forces shaping women’s ambition, motherhood, money, and power. They get into the real cost of childcare, paid leave, and workplace inflexibility; why mothers are still penalized for showing up as their full selves at work; and how the internet has turned “trad wife vs. girl boss” into a culture war that keeps women fighting each other instead of fighting for meaningful change.

In this episode, Reshma and Emma discuss:

• Who benefits from pitting women against each other
• The motherhood penalty and why it differs from the gender pay gap
• What real workplace support for women and mothers should actually look like
• Why fighting for a better system and taking responsibility for your life can both be true at once
• What it takes to create more choice, freedom, and economic power for women
• How to build a world women don’t have to shrink their lives to fit the systems around them

Kristin Cavallari became a household name before she'd even graduated high school, and spent the next two decades building a life, a business, and a family under constant public scrutiny.

But this conversation isn't just about the version of her life you've seen on screen.

In this episode, Kristin sits down with Emma for a candid conversation about money, financial independence, and what it actually took to leave her marriage on her own terms. Together, they unpack the financial planning most people never talk about, the power of building something that's truly yours, and why Kristin believes money isn't about lifestyle—it's about freedom.

Kristin shares:

• Why knowing her "number" changed the way she thinks about money and success

• How the success of Uncommon James gave her the confidence to leave her marriage

• Why she walked away from her divorce giving up money instead of taking it—and why she'd do it again

• Why she recently replaced her entire C-suite—and the leadership lesson every founder eventually faces

• How she's building Uncommon James on her own terms while raising three kids

• How twenty years in the public eye taught her to stop living for other people's approval

How much freedom does financial independence really give you? And what would change if you knew you could always choose yourself?

Drop your thoughts in the comments. And subscribe to Aspire with Emma Grede so you don't miss what's next.

In today’s solo episode, Emma dives into real listener questions: the actual mechanics of building from nothing, starting a business with no capital, why having no money can be an advantage, plus more nuanced questions about navigating your career, handling tricky mentors, and knowing when to quit.

She also gets into more personal reflections about her marriage, what her life looked like in her twenties, and what she does to look after herself. There’s a quick round at the end too, on everything from her favorite crisps to plastic surgery. 

In this episode you’ll learn:

• The type of business Emma would build if she were starting today

• How to think about fear when you’re making a decision

• What it takes to start again in your 40s

• The marketing rule that built Good American

• How to find your first customers before anyone knows you

• Her one rule for spending in year one 

• The one thing she thinks every woman needs to stop doing

If your question didn’t make it this time, hold onto it, because she’ll be doing this again. Follow Aspire so you don’t miss the next one, and sign up for the weekly newsletter at emmagrede.com.

Alicia Lyttle is the CEO of AI InnoVision and one of the clearest voices teaching entrepreneurs and operators how to actually use AI to make money. Her clients run from solo founders to Fortune 500 companies and US government agencies. She's been teaching people how to build online for 25 years, long before the current AI wave. People call Lyttle the Queen of AI for good reason.

The AI conversation right now is mostly hype or fear, but this is the more grounded version: specific tools, real workflows, and what actually works when you try to put any of this into a real business.

In this conversation:

• The one question Lyttle calls the golden ticket for figuring out what to hand to AI first when you're building your business

• Why getting good at AI has meant hiring more people, not fewer

• How to build an AI team when you can't yet afford to hire a human one

• The three-step process for turning any prompt into a "super prompt" that actually pays off

• How to use AI to create a $20,000 presentation

• What you should never put into ChatGPT, and how to protect your business while still using it

Patrick Ta built one of the most successful beauty brands in the world after dropping out of high school, filing for bankruptcy at 21, and spending years building his career one client at a time.

What started with a makeup kit and a dream eventually led to working with some of the biggest names in the world, launching Patrick Ta Beauty, and becoming one of the most influential makeup artists of his generation.

But this conversation isn't just about success.

In this episode, Patrick sits down with Emma for a candid conversation about the recent controversy surrounding his Transition Blush launch, the criticism that followed, and what accountability looks like when your name is on the brand. Together, they unpack creator credit, intention versus impact, reputation, and the challenges that come with building in public.

Patrick shares:

• How bankruptcy shaped his ambition and work ethic

• Why makeup was the first thing that gave him confidence

• The journey from celebrity makeup artist to beauty founder

• What he's learned building Patrick Ta Beauty into a leading beauty brand

• How he thinks about accountability, influence, and creator credit

• The responsibility that comes with having your name on the product

• What this experience taught him about leadership and integrity

What's a belief about success you've been carrying that might be costing you more than it's giving you?

Drop it in the comments. And subscribe to Aspire with Emma Grede so you don't miss what's next.

Julia Collins has spent much of her life chasing big goals,first to prove herself and then to save the planet.

The path took her from restaurant kitchens in New York City to Silicon Valley boardrooms, where she became the first Black woman to co-found a unicorn and raised more than $450 million in venture capital. But it also came with heartbreak, burnout, a co-founder fallout, and years spent trying to fit into a version of success that never quite felt like her own.

Today, Julia is building companies focused on the future of food and the future of the planet. But getting there required unlearning some of the biggest lessons she thought she knew about ambition, achievement, and self-worth.

In this conversation, Julia sits down with Emma to talk about what was really happening behind the headlines — the pressure to fit in, the cost of tying your identity to your success, and the belief she carried for years that the more she suffered, the more successful she would become.

Julia shares:

• Why showing up as herself changed everything — and what it cost her to try fitting in first

• What she learned raising hundreds of millions of dollars

• How she navigated a co-founder fallout and life-changing exit

• The financial habits that shaped her relationship with money

• The lesson that took her the longest to unlearn about success and sacrifice

What's a belief about success you've been carrying that might be costing you more than it's giving you? Drop it in the comments. And subscribe to Aspire with Emma Grede so you don't miss what's next.

We'd love to hear what you think. Please take this survey to help us make the show better for you: ⁠emmagrede.com/survey

Jackie Aina has been building in public for 17 years. She didn't just grow an audience, she helped define what it meant to be a Black woman with a voice in the beauty industry. But influence was never the end goal.

After nearly two decades as one of YouTube's most recognized creators, Jackie took $250,000 of her own money and started a fragrance brand. Not a makeup line — a fragrance brand. Her childhood dream. The first thing she ever did that nobody asked for.

In this conversation, Jackie sits down with Emma to talk about what it really takes to go from influencer to founder and why the two have almost nothing in common.

Jackie shares:

• Why six million followers doesn't mean six million in revenue — and what creators get wrong about turning an audience into a business

• How she self-funded Forvr Mood with $250K, sold out six months of inventory in four hours, and nearly had a breakdown closing the laptop

• The vendor relationship that looked like a smart start and took over a year to untangle

• What she had to unlearn about being "the strong one" — and why doing everything is actually a disservice to everyone around you

• Why she deliberately didn't build a makeup brand, and what it meant to finally do something just for herself

What's something you've outgrown — even if other people still expect that version of you? Drop it in the comments. And subscribe to Aspire with Emma Grede so you don't miss what's next.

We'd love to hear what you think. Please take this survey to help us make the show better for you: emmagrede.com/survey

Hiring is the single most consequential thing you do when you're building anything. Get it right and it compounds. Get it wrong and it costs you years. In today's episode, Emma is sharing the thing she's come to believe is true: the team you build is the most honest reflection of how well you know yourself.

This is the real version of what Emma's looking for when she's sitting across from a candidate—the exact framework for how she actually thinks about it, the mistakes she's made, and why she can see past a great resumé to the person underneath.

In this episode you'll learn:

• The three people you need to speak to before you write a single job description

• Why Emma hires for attitude over experience, and what she believes you cannot teach

• What to listen for in how someone talks about their wins and losses

• Why culture fit has quietly become code for comfort

• How to think about paying for talent when the margins are thin

Whether you're hiring for the first time, building a team, or sitting on the other side of the table in an interview, this one is for you.

Start With Yourself is available now.

We'd love to hear what you think. Please take this survey to help us make the show better for you: ⁠emmagrede.com/survey

Gary Vaynerchuk has spent the last two decades understanding where culture and consumer behavior were headed long before the rest of the world caught up. He was early to YouTube, Twitter, TikTok, creator commerce, and live shopping. But this conversation is about more than algorithms and internet trends.

In this episode, Gary sits down with Emma to talk about the real reason most people stay stuck: fear. Fear of judgment. Fear of failure. Fear of what other people will think if they try something new.

Together, they unpack the insecurity driving modern ambition, why so many successful people are still deeply unhappy, and why Gary believes we are entering a cultural shift where kindness, reputation, and emotional intelligence will matter more than ever.

Gary shares:

• Why most people are living for opinions they don’t even respect

• The hidden insecurity driving high achievement

• Why reputation compounds faster than money

• What social media actually revealed about human behavior

• How parents unintentionally destroy confidence in their kids

• Why proximity and visibility still matter in the AI era

• The business opportunities Gary believes people are still underestimating

• Why “nice guys finish first”

What would change in your life if you stopped making decisions based on other people’s expectations of you? Drop it in the comments — we’re reading. And subscribe to Aspire with Emma Grede so you don’t miss what’s next.

We'd love to hear what you think. Please take this survey to help us make the show better for you: ⁠emmagrede.com/survey

Bethenny Frankel turned a TikTok account into a $20-million-a-year business without a plan or a brand of her own. She had a vision and a set of deal terms that no one in the industry has been able to replicate, or get her to explain, until now.

In this conversation, Emma gets Bethenny to do the thing she never does: open her playbook. Bethenny shows the work behind it all—the deal structures, the dollar amounts, the model she built that agencies keep trying to reverse-engineer and she keeps refusing to share.

Bethenny shares:

• The Skinny Girl carve-out that started everything and the difference between licensing and ownership that determines whether you walk away rich or walk away with nothing

• How she built her business with zero exclusivity, equity in nearly every partnership, and why brands agree to terms no one else can get

• Why she says trust and attention are the only two assets that matter and what that means for anyone trying to build an audience into a business

• The true cost of building an entire business on yourself and what freedom looks like when you’re more successful in your fifties than you’ve ever been

If you’ve ever been put in a box or told your vision doesn’t fit the playbook, let us know in the comments. And subscribe to Aspire with Emma Grede so you don't miss what's next.

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Sarah Jakes Roberts is not a traditional entrepreneur. She’s the daughter of Bishop T.D. Jakes, one of the most prominent pastors in America. Sarah became a mother at 13—and in the years that followed, she carried the weight of that story in public, under a spotlight she never asked for.

This conversation is about what happens when the thing you’re most ashamed of becomes the thing you build from. Today, Sarah co-leads a megachurch while raising a blended family of six. But she didn’t set out to lead a global movement, launch conferences that fill stadiums, host a top-ranked podcast, operate more than a dozen revenue streams, or become a bestselling author. She started a blog because she had something to say and an instinct that other women might see parts of themselves in her story. It turned out to be millions of women.

In today’s conversation, Sarah sits down with Emma to talk about calling, responsibility, and a feeling she describes as being “willing to do what I’ve been trusted with.”

Sarah shares:

• The relationship between anger and people-pleasing—and why suppressing one feeds the other

• What Old Thoughts look like when you've been carrying them since you were 13

• How she went from a blog with a million views to a global conference and a publishing operation without a traditional business strategy

• What young motherhood taught her about shame and building something real from the chapter most people would want to erase

• Where ministry ends and business begins—and how she navigates making millions from a unique calling without losing what built it

What’s something in your life that you need to move past? Drop it in the comments — we're reading. And subscribe to Aspire with Emma Grede so you don't miss what's next.