Hello, {{first name | Friend}}-
In 2019, I was speaking on stages about how women could “hack” their investor pitches to get a yes more easily. After nearly every panel or fireside chat, women would come up to me and say some version of the same thing: I wish I had hacks like that for everything else.
At the same time, I was searching--unsuccessfully--for a news source that focused on how women were actually making money moves in business. Not vibes. Not inspiration. Not girlboss mythology. Real decisions, real capital, real power.
So in 2023, I launched a podcast and a newsletter to explore exactly those interests.
While working on those projects, my curiosity deepened. I already understood the basics, the funding disparities, the bias, the gatekeeping women face when accessing capital. But once you start paying attention to money and power, you can’t unsee the patterns.
Bigger questions began bubbling up.
What about the Great Wealth Transfer?
What about women inheriting trillions over the next few decades?
And what do we make of the long, uncomfortable history of women being stripped of property, wealth, and autonomy, sometimes quite literally burned at the stake, right as questions of inheritance, control, and power surfaced?
Fast forward to November and December of 2025, and I was exhausted. I had multiple passion projects running simultaneously, all pulling on the same thread, and I knew something had to give.
Enter my extraordinarily brilliant Women Startup NC co-founder, Rachel Anderson, who says, almost nonchalantly, “I think you launched an entire media company without intending to.”
B. I. N. G. O.
That thread I’d been circling? It’s feminist. It’s about decoding the systems, economic signals, and power dynamics shaping women-led markets and women’s lives. Because where women rise, markets follow.
So in 2026, I’m leaning ALL. THE. WAY. IN. to being a media founder.
You can learn more, HERE →
THIS MONTH’S SIGNALS
Women Winning.
This month, I’m unpacking one woman’s insane investment strategy, brilliant, technically sound, and just a little out of touch with how most women actually live and earn. It’s useful not because we should copy it, but because it opens a much bigger question: how women can start planning now for wealth transfer, even if we’re not playing with generational money (yet).
Hacking the Patriarchy is back.
The podcast officially relaunches this month, with episodes recorded and scheduled through July. Later this summer, it will evolve, shifting more explicitly toward women’s power. Not just ambition or leadership, but economic and cultural power: how women shape markets, institutions, and outcomes when we stop asking for permission and start moving capital, influence, and narratives.
Fem-Led News continues.
It remains the constant while other parts of the media ecosystem I’m building stretch, test, and recalibrate.
What’s shaping my POV right now.
The same throughline--power, systems, opting out of broken models--shows up in what I’m reading:
Being Human(Centric) by Rachel Anderson: a data-backed challenge to the false choice between people and profits, arguing that prioritizing humans isn’t a tradeoff, but a business advantage.
Leaving the Casino by Jessica Lackey: a sharp, grounded look at opting out of rigged business games and building something more sustainable instead.
If you’ve made it this far and you’re still looking for the “productivity porn” connection, when I reimagined this newsletter, this part of my content ecosystem, I wanted it to be less business advisory and more high-level: this is what I’m paying attention to this week.
Welp. When I asked AI to help ideate what this could look like, it wrote, “yours is less productivity porn.” 💀
Turns out, less productivity porn doesn’t mean less ambition.
It means clearer power plays.
Can you guess who AI was referencing?
Onwards,
Raven O’Neal
WORK WITH ME
👯♀️ Join the Women Startup NC community of women supporting the women-led business ecosystem in North Carolina.
🎧 Tune into the Hacking the Patriarchy podcast. *Bonus: love it? Consider leaving me a review.
💌 Subscribe to my other newsletter, Fem-Led News, where I even further amplify women's achievements through stories, strategies, and role models.
👊 Become a partner and co-create bold, values-aligned campaigns that connect, convert, and make an impact.
⚡ Book a 1:1 75-minute advisory session.
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