
Hosted by Shorty Awards · EN

Drew Sutton is the founder of Drew Sutton Leadership and creator of Culture Systems — a proprietary leadership architecture that replaces force-of-will management with scalable systems for aligning people, culture, and execution across an entire organization. This episode was recorded live at Innovate Summit in Louisville. Check out their next event in Nashville in October. Vibes improved by Old Commonwealth Kentucky Nectar. A former Chief Engineer at Lockheed Martin, Drew holds 30+ patents in rotorcraft systems and composite structures, and has led cross-disciplinary engineering teams on multimillion-dollar U.S. defense programs spanning Air Force acquisitions, SOCOM prototyping, and research partnerships with Johns Hopkins University and the Air Force Research Laboratory.Today he applies that same systems discipline to leadership development — specializing in the doer-to-leader transition for technical professionals and culture-wide change adoption for organizations in transformation. He delivers 37 talks across leadership, AI integration, multigenerational workforce alignment, change management, and decision architecture, in formats ranging from keynotes to multi-day team engagements.Drew is based in Georgetown, Kentucky and serves clients nationally.

Holly Hartman is an AI governance strategist and founder of FWS Enterprise LLC (Future Workforce Systems), where she works with enterprise leaders to build the guardrails, policies, and workforce readiness programs that make responsible AI adoption real, not just a talking point.She is also the co-founder and President of The WO Network, Kentuckiana’s largest professional women’s community with more than 4,000 members, and an international bestselling author.Holly is a NAWBO Women Business Owner of the Year 2025 honoree, a Louisville Business First Enterprising Women 2026 recipient, and a Bingham Fellow in the Class of 2026.She is currently pursuing her AI Governance Professional (AIGP) certification through IAPP.Her message to organizations wrestling with AI right now is simple: you do not have to choose between innovation and integrity. The ones who will lead are the ones building governance now, not later. Every AI decision is a workforce decision. She works with organizations to move them AI-Anxious to AI-Ready, From Guardrails to Governance all through an ethical AI Lens.futureworkforcesystems.com

Whitney Belmonte spent fifteen years scaling marketing for category-defining brands, including Supergoop!, where she helped scale digital from a single channel into a multi-format engine. She has shipped campaigns, hired teams, and rebuilt operations from the inside.Now she works with founders, marketing leads, and ops teams to put AI to work in the parts of their business that actually move revenue — without the buzzwords, without the gloss, and without breaking the parts of their company that already work.Her clients tend to be the operators noticing what's quietly broken — content cycles that take three weeks, briefs that take longer than the work itself, leads that arrive cold and stay cold. The fix is rarely the model. It's the workflow around it.

Kimberly Bottom is a 15+ year veteran in storytelling and community initiatives. An award-winning broadcast journalist and video producer, Kimberly now focuses on helping nonprofits sharpen their messaging and amplify impact through modern fundraising technology. In her current role as Director of Community at Velora, the nonprofit operations platform, Kimberly's north star is connecting nonprofit professionals to share ideas, elevate diverse voices, and celebrate the people doing the world's most important work.

Emily Benner Snyder leads social media at United Airlines, where she’s helped transform the brand into one of the industry’s most engaging and talked-about voices online. Named Ad Age’s 2025 Social Lead/Community Manager of the Year, she sets the strategy and turns everyday travel moments into scroll-stopping stories. Before United, she brought her storytelling magic to both Disney and Olive Garden—so yes, she knows how to make both planes and breadsticks go viral.

Paddy Smith is Chief Creative Officer at Born Social, where he oversees the creative output for the agency. He's spent his time at Born building a 60+ strong department spanning Creative, Design and Production, developing some of the brightest creative minds in the industry. He's pitched, won and delivered best in class creative across iconic brands like Guinness, Smirnoff, Mars, Uber and Ford, helping them transform into social-first brands. Paddy's work has collected creative awards from The One Show, The Creative Circle, The Webbys, Shortys, Marketing Week, Digiday and Campaign Awards and sat on juries with The Shorty Awards and Creative Review. Paddy has also written and hosted multiple industry events on varied creative subjects spanning brand design, generative AI, influencers, social-first brand building and modern craft, as well as writing thought pieces on creativity for the likes of The Drum, Adweek, Future London Academy and Creative Review.

Asha Shivaji is redefining what it means to innovate in marketing effectiveness and ad tech. As a woman of color and former Google executive, she co-founded SeeMe Index in 2023 to help brands and agencies unlock growth with untapped audiences. Powered by its proprietary Responsible AI, SeeMe is building the industry standard for identity measurement and provides data-driven insights, benchmarks, and certifications that connect representation to measurable business outcomes, from creative effectiveness to long-term brand loyalty.Before launching SeeMe, Asha led strategy for Google’s global marketing services organization, where she co-developed global initiatives with the UN’s Unstereotype Alliance to dismantle harmful stereotypes in media. Her career includes partnerships with iconic brands such as Apple, Disney, Moët Hennessy, Estée Lauder, and Johnson & Johnson, where she modernized marketing strategies and drove business impact.Asha is an honoree on Ad Age's Tech Power List, ADWEEK’s Innovator 50, a Campaign US 2025 Inspiring Woman in the Championing Change category, and 2025 Advertising Week Future is Female Winner. She is a sought-after speaker and advisor and has shared her insights on AI, DEI, and the future of inclusive marketing at major forums, including Cannes Lions, Advertising Week, SXSW, Ad Age’s AI Marketing Playbook, CEW’s DEIB Forum, the World Women’s Federation, and thinkLA’s Diversity Summit. She continues to serve as a consultant for the United Nations Unstereotype Alliance and is a vocal advocate for building ethical technology that reflects the richness of human experience.Asha holds a BA in Economics and Political Science and an MBA from NYU Stern School of Business.

Taylor Cromwell is a writer, content strategist, and the founder of Creator Diaries, a newsletter exploring the stories and strategies behind the creator-to-founder transition. She works with companies like beehiiv and HubSpot, and previously wrote for The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg. She's obsessed with the intersection of media, storytelling, and the creator economy.

Emma Witkowski is Vice President, Media Solutions at WildBrain where she leads the advertising teams responsible for driving monetization through innovative video advertising and branded content strategies for WildBrain’s portfolio of iconic IP such as Teletubbies, Strawberry Shortcake, Inspector Gadget and more. Witkowski and her team deliver cross-platform digital campaigns across YouTube, FAST, social media and gaming platforms, including Roblox and Fortnite, to connect brands with kids and their parents worldwide. Based in Los Angeles, Witkowski brings over 20 years of experience in digital strategy, investment planning and revenue growth within the media and entertainment industry. She has a proven track record of building scalable advertising ecosystems and driving high-impact partnerships that unlock new revenue streams.Before joining WildBrain, Witkowski served as Global Head of Strategy and Client Success at Moonbug Entertainment, where she was instrumental in developing and scaling their brand partnerships business. Her career spans leadership roles at major global media companies including WPP and Omnicom, driving digital growth and innovation for brands such as Apple, Sony Pictures, Lionsgate, Facebook and PlayStation.

Rio Wilson is the founder of Brain-Body Therapy, a mental health app rooted in the powerful connection between movement and emotional well-being. Her path into this work was deeply personal. After navigating several traumatic experiences, Rio began to notice the profound impact exercise had on her own nervous system, clarity, and healing. What started as a personal coping tool evolved into something much bigger -- a belief that mental health support should engage both the mind and the body.That belief became Brain-Body Therapy: an accessible, therapist-informed app designed to help people regulate stress, anxiety, and depression through guided therapeutic tools paired with intentional movement.Rio holds a Master’s degree in Counseling from Northwestern University and a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Nova Southeastern University, blending clinical expertise with an entrepreneurial lens to reimagine how mental health support can meet people in their everyday lives.