Teri Ijeoma, founder of Trade and Travel and New York Times bestselling author of The Risk Worth Taking, shares how she left a stressful career in education to build a $60 million investing education company. She talks candidly about leadership, risk, and why courage has to come before you have a plan.

• Ijeoma's turning point as an assistant principal — grieving a friend's death while feeling unable to take a break — and how she used trading stocks as a side hustle to eventually quit her job and build Trade and Travel
• Her "4 Cs" framework from The Risk Worth Taking (courage, clarity, caution, confidence) for taking smart risks in both investing and leadership
• How teaching to different learning styles as an educator shaped her approach to leading a 42-person team without burning them out
• The link between money, mental health, and identity — how tying self-worth to a job title (like "principal") can keep people stuck, and the role of Tony Robbins' six core human needs in her decision to leave
• Who's on her bench now — a publisher and a team of former CEOs — and her honest reflection that leveling up sometimes means outgrowing the people who got you started

The Power Table is brought to you by the California Black Women Collective Empowerment Institute. Learn more here.

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Nationally syndicated radio host DeDe McGuire shares how working two jobs in secret for five years built the leverage that launched her own show, and why she's now trademarking her way toward full ownership and independence. She also opens up about the loneliness of leadership and why she leads with a relaxed, mistake-friendly style.

• How DeDe secretly worked two radio jobs for five years to build leverage, using lessons from Tom Joyner and Doug Banks to eventually launch her own syndicated show, DeDe in the Morning
• Her current push toward full ownership of her show — including years of proactively trademarking her name, segments, and brand so her intellectual property stays with her, not the company
• The discipline shift once syndication hit: cutting out late nights, protecting her voice, and treating show prep like a full-time craft
• The mission behind the DeDe McGuire Foundation — starting with scholarships for mothers on the theory that "if you want to change a child's trajectory, change their mother's first," then expanding post-COVID to serve the whole family
• Her leadership style — relaxed, mistake-tolerant, and rooted in "plot, plan, strategize, organize, mobilize" — plus her closing advice that leadership can be lonely, and to take your seat anyway

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Civil rights attorney, advocate, and media personality Areva Martin traces her leadership journey from a young entrepreneur building her own law firm to founding Special Needs Network, now a statewide organization serving Black and brown families affected by autism. She reflects on the difference between being liked and being respected, and why building a bench is both a leadership and financial imperative.

• The early lesson that reshaped her leadership: realizing not everyone shares her work ethic, and learning the critical difference between being liked and being respected as a leader
• Her "no job too big, no job too small" philosophy, rooted in her upbringing in St. Louis, and why leaders should know and value the people they lead regardless of title
• How her son's autism diagnosis led her to co-found Special Needs Network out of a law firm cubicle, growing it into a statewide organization with 7 locations and 600+ employees
• Navigating the "why tax" — constantly having to justify why underserved Black and brown communities need dedicated advocacy, from early regional center pushback to current work on neurodivergent hiring for LA's 2028 Olympics
• Building her bench intentionally through S&N's NextGen initiative, mentoring Gen Z and millennial leaders (including her daughter Morgan), and restructuring the nonprofit's revenue model so it can outlast its founder

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Follow Areva Martin: Instagram