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At the Exceptional Women Alliance, we enable high-level women to mentor each other to achieve personal and professional happiness through sisterhood. As the nonprofit organizations founder, chair, and CEO, I am honored to interview and share insights from thought leaders who are part of our peer-to-peer mentoring. This month, I introduce to you Courtney Wright, CEO of Gemini Builds It, and author of Lady Boss Blueprint: How to Reframe Your Business to Create the Life of Your Dreams. Known for her candid, pragmatic style, she has scaled her company in one of the most complex and high-stakes industries: manufacturing. Courtney does not sugarcoat the leadership challenges. Instead, she embraces them, making the impossible look possible while building a culture of resilience. Q: People say you make it look easy. What is the truth behind that perception? Courtney Wright: Lets be realits not easy. Scaling a manufacturing company is messy, unpredictable, and often brutal. My job as CEO is not to hide the chaos, its to cut through it and get to the finish line. Weve built systems, habits, and a culture that make the hard things manageable. From the outside that might look like ease. But every single day there is grit. What people call easy is usually the result of preparation and years of small, intentional decisions stacked on top of each other. Q: How do you personally handle those grind moments? Wright: I roll up my sleeves. If a supply chain issue threatens a delivery or a client moves the goalposts, I am there with my team figuring it out. I dont believe in ivory tower leadership. I believe in visible leadership. When your team sees you shoulder to shoulder with them in the hardest moments, they are not just following instructions. They are bought into the mission. On a personal level, I remind myself that pressure is a privilege. If people are coming to you with complex problems, it means they trust you to solve them. That mindset helps me stay grounded even in the grind. Q: What is the biggest leadership lesson you have learned while scaling Gemini Builds It? Wright: Perfection is overrated. Consistency is what wins. Its tempting to chase flawless execution, but leadership is not about being flawless. Its about getting it done again and again, even under pressure. Resilience and repeatability matter more than polish. That is how you scale a business and how you build trust. People dont want perfect leaders. They want leaders who deliver. And you cannot do it alone. Early in my career, I thought I had to carry everything myself. Over time, I learned that empowering others is the only way you scale. Today, my team is filled with people who know how to own their lane, make decisions, and drive forward. Its about creating an environment where trust and accountability thrive. Q: How do you create resilience in your team? Wright: By modeling it. When things get tough, my job is not to pretend everything is fine. Its to show that we can face it and solve it together. We do not avoid the hard stuff, we tackle it. And when you practice that enough, resilience becomes part of your DNA. You stop fearing challenges and start expecting them. Thats when you know you have a strong team. We also talk openly about failure. Mistakes happen, but real failure is when you dont learn or get back up. That gives people permission to take smart risks. In manufacturing, there are always moving parts and tight deadlines. Resilient teams are decisive, adaptable, and unafraid of the bumps along the way. Q: Whats the secret to making hard things look easy in business? Wright: The secret is that its never easy. The real trick is to build the right culture, the right systems, and the right people. If you have those three things, the impossible becomes achievable. I have built my career on cutting through the noise and creating clarity. That is how we deliver. We tackle challenges until the solution feels obvious. When people know what is expected, where the finish line is, and why it matters, the path feels manageable. Thats what transforms chaos into momentum. And when clients see the finished product, they say, You made it look easy. The truth is, it was anything but easy. It was just intentional, disciplined work. Q: Beyond scaling Gemini Builds It, how do you see your role as a leader evolving? Wright: For me, leadership goes beyond these walls. Its about showing up in industries and rooms where women have traditionally been absent and proving that results speak louder than stereotypes. I make it a point to be visible because visibility matters. When people see someone who looks like them in a role they aspire to, it changes what they believe is possible. My focus now is not just on running Gemini at a high level but also on creating ripple effects for the next generation of leaders. If I can help even one person believe they belong at the head of the table, then the work is worth it. That is the legacy I want to leave behind. Larraine Segil is founder, chair, and CEO of the Exceptional Women Alliance.
Category:
E-Commerce
AI agents going rogue isnt just a theoretical scenario anymore. Recent incidents show AI agents making errors in a variety of situations, from legal problems and technical malfunctions, to actually deleting entire production databases. These incidents will not be one-offs; we can expect more AI agents to go awry. Security leaders need to be prepared to contain the damage when that happens. As AI agents move from pilot projects to production environments, we’re entering uncharted territory where traditional security frameworks fall short. The market is already responding to the risks: Gartner anticipates that at least 40% of agentic AI projects will be withdrawn by the end of 2027, with risk management concerns being a key reason. The root of the problem lies in how AI agents fail differently than anything we’ve secured before. Failure is not predictable Traditional systems fail in predictable ways. You have logs and structured rollbacks exist. Its a solved problem. But when AI agents fail, they dont just malfunction and stopthey act. And the blast radius can be significant. When an agent decides to, for example, clean up redundant data and target your production database, there’s no kill switch to stop it. Consider the downstream implications: An agent modifying CRM data near quarter-end could compromise earnings reporting. An agent updating the wrong customer records could trigger compliance violations. We have spent decades designing security systems around human behavior. However, AI agents operate on probabilistic models rather than deterministic logic, which means they may sometimes generate inaccuracies or fabricate information. When these fabrications lead to actions within production systems, they introduce an entirely new risk category. Compound failures The situation becomes exponentially worse when multiple agents interact. If each agent is correct 90% of the time, the error rate compounds quickly when working together. We’re not just dealing with individual agent failures; we’re looking at cascading failures across interconnected systems. We’re already seeing this in the wild with generative AI. A code editor maker had their chatbot hallucinate a login rule that was unpopular with customers, prompting outrage online and subscription cancellations. A global airline had to issue refunds to customers after its chatbot provided false information that invented a ticket refund policy. Industries at risk Some sectors face disproportionate risk. Healthcare organizations using AI agents that go awry could face life-threatening disruptions, when critical monitoring systems are damaged or lost. Financial services and government agencies are also high-stakes environments where agent errors could have far-reaching consequences. The business functions most vulnerable are those adopting agents fastest: sales, support, DevOps, and automation. These areas have repetitive tasks that make them ideal for agent deployment, but they also touch mission-critical applications and customer data where mistakes can have direct business impacts. Rethink security architecture AI agents represent a new category of risk that existing security playbooks don’t address. Here are five recommendations for building resilience into your AI strategy: Embrace “Secure by Design” for AI. Just as CISA’s Secure by Design framework transformed software development, we need explainability and reversibility built into AI systems from day one. Resilience cannot be an afterthought. Prepare for recovery. Just as we “assume breach” in cybersecurity, we must “assume agent error” in AI deployments. When agents fail, visibility alone isn’t enough; you need the ability to understand what went wrong and reverse it quickly. Traditional logs won’t help you roll back an agent’s multisystem rampage through your infrastructure. Design for compound failures. When multiple agents interact, errors multiply exponentially. Using ballpark figures, if each agent is right 90% of the time, the combined error rate in multi-agent workflows could reach 30-40%. Build your AI architecture to isolate agent actions and prevent error propagation between systems. Treat agent permissions as privileged access. Overprovisioned agents represent the same risk as overprivileged users, but with superhuman speed and scale. Apply the same access control rigor to agents that you do to humans, especially for agents touching mission-critical applications or customer data. Build responsible AI with visibility. Based on our conversations with enterprises, fewer than 10% have any AI forensics capabilities in place. Most can’t answer basic questions like “What did the agent do?” or “Why did it take that action?” Implement full lifecycle visibility from source prompt to final impact, with auditability that goes beyond traditional logs to actual reversibility capabilities. The enterprises that survive the agent era will be those that plan for failure while pursuing innovation. The time to build that capability is now, before your next production outage comes with an AI agent saying it “panicked.” Arvind Nithrakashyap is CTO and cofounder of Rubrik.
Category:
E-Commerce
We just completed a brand refresh and I keep getting asked the same question: How do you know when its time? The answer isnt as straightforward as you might think. Brand refreshes arent just about updating logos or tweaking taglines (though thats part of it!). Theyre about ensuring your brand authentically reflects where your company is today and where its headed tomorrow. Ive been through this process many times, but I always learn something new. Heres what consistently sticks out: Many of the best brands refresh every two to three years, not because theyre broken, but because markets evolve, technology advances, and customer needs shift. The key is to ask the right five questions before you begin. 1. Is this whats best for the customer? This should be your North Star question throughout the brand refresh process. Every decision must be rooted in what delivers real value to the customer, not what simply satisfies internal preferences or fleeting trends. During our recent refresh, we kept coming back to a core concept: IT and security are at the very heart of organizational productivity. Without them, organizations would fall apart. Our customers are IT and security professionals who are up against increasing complexity every day. They need solutions that transform challenges into opportunities and empower teams to focus on innovation. This question helped our renewed mission become clear: elevating human potential by managing, automating, and protecting data and technology to empower continuous innovation. It directly addresses the pain points and daily battles, not only for our customers but also our internal IT and security teams. This isnt just a message. Its a commitment to tackling the real problems our customers face, helping both IT and security teams reclaim time and focus on what truly drives progress and growth. Its about making their work more valuable and enabling teams to focus on what truly drives progress and growth. 2. What am I really trying to sell? Be brutally honest here. Strip away the marketing speak and identify your core value proposition. For us, the answer is clear, and pretty refreshing: Were selling the unification of IT and security. Not just tools, but the actual alignment that lets teams work together instead of against each other. Our portfolio statement Manage. Automate. Protect. reflects this straightforward approach. If you cant explain your value proposition in simple terms, your customers probably cant either. 3. Does our brand match our current reality? Your brand should reflect who you are now, not who you were five years ago or who you hope to become someday. While our former brand ethos (Everywhere Work) had propelled us forward during the pandemic, the changing world and our evolving vision called for an identity evolution. We had to acknowledge that what worked five years ago, does not work today. Recognizing this, we understood the need for a transformationone that authentically represents the way we work now and the direction were heading. 4. Are we speaking our customers language? Technical audiences appreciate directness. They want to understand exactly what you do and how it helps them succeed. We know the terrain because weve navigated it ourselves, so we should be able to communicate that. Our new brand statementIT and Security. Innovation at Work.speaks directly (and concisely) to our core audience. This is not just a tagline; its a clear signal that we understand our audience and are dedicated to supporting their mission with solutions that matter. 5. Will this stand the test of time? Brand refreshes require significant investment. You want messaging that will remain relevant as your market evolves. While I believe in regularly assessing your brands fit, its crucial not to chase fleeting trends at the expense of long-term relevance. We built our refresh around enduring truths: the need for visibility across technology environments, the importance of automation in managing complexity, and the critical role of protection in enabling productivity. These foundational truths will only become more vital as technology advances. The execution matters as much as the strategy Having clear answers to these questions is just the starting point. The real work happens in execution, ensuring every touchpoint reflects your refreshed brand consistently. Weve structured our teams to deliver on our brand promise. Marketing, customer success, and renewals work as a unified organization focused on the complete customer lifecycle. This isnt just organizational efficiency; its brand integrity in action. The best brand refreshes feel inevitable once theyre complete. Your customers should think, Of course this is who they are. If youve answered these five questions honestly and executed them thoughtfully, thats exactly the response youll get, and youve set the stage for that unmistakable clarity and connection. Melissa Puls is chief marketing officer and SVP customer success and renewals at Ivanti.
Category:
E-Commerce
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