Breaking Rank Podcast

04/26/2026

"You are only as good as your weakest team member."

Jessica Aries has been in business for six years. She has led teams, built an agency, and figured out the hard way what separates businesses that scale from businesses that stall.

And it comes down to this: you cannot do it alone. You can rely on your own brain and your own skills, and you will hit a ceiling every single time.

The leaders who actually grow are the ones who hire well, trust completely, and delegate without hesitation.

Right now Jessica says she is not stressed about a thing. Not because everything is easy. But because her team has it handled.

That is the goal. Build a team you trust that much.

Full episode link in bio. S1E9 of Breaking Rank: Pivot Without Permission: Leading Without a Blueprint.



Delegation JessicaAries ByAries LegalMarketing EntrepreneurMindset WomenEntrepreneurs SmallBusinessOwner BuildYourTeam

04/25/2026

Her mom pulled her aside when she got her first manager job and said:

"Everybody has a family. Their job isn't their life. And if you show up as the leader who only cares about the work, nobody is going to want to work for you."

Jessica Aries has carried that with her ever since.

People-first leadership was not something she learned in the boardroom. It was something she watched her mom live out loud. And it became the foundation of how she leads today.

This is the kind of leadership advice that does not come from a book. It comes from a mother who figured it out and made sure her daughter did not have to start from zero.

Full episode link in bio. S1E9 of Breaking Rank: Pivot Without Permission: Leading Without a Blueprint.



MomWisdom JessicaAries ByAries LegalMarketing WorkplaceCulture

04/24/2026

She had a plan for what becoming a mom would look like.

Like most of us do.

And then she sat across from a doctor who told her she could not produce her own eggs. That if she wanted to carry a baby, it would require a gift from someone else. A donor egg.

Jessica Aries described it the way it actually felt: like when someone makes a birth plan and the birth plan just does not go. Except this was not one moment. This was the whole vision of what she thought her family would look like.

She had to grieve that vision before she could make space for a new one.

She shared all of this on Breaking Rank and I am so grateful she trusted us with it.

If you are in the middle of a fertility journey right now, this one is for you. Full episode link in bio. S1E9: Pivot Without Permission: Leading Without a Blueprint.



IVFCommunity YouAreNotAlone FertilityWarrior

04/23/2026

She had just brought a baby into the world. Her salary was gone. And she was sitting there thinking... "Holy sh*t. How are we going to pay for this?"

So she did the most terrifying thing she had ever done in her professional life.

She made an image. Posted it on LinkedIn. Called herself a "COVID Job Seeker." Listed every digital marketing skill she had and told law firms she could help them build relationships online.

By the end of the week, 9 firms had reached out.
One post. One week. That is how By Aries was born.

Jessica Aries says it best: build your network before you need it. Because when you do, your community will show up for you.

Full episode link in bio. Season 1, Episode 9 of Breaking Rank: Pivot Without Permission: Leading Without a Blueprint.



ByAries BusinessOriginStory NewMom StartYourBusiness JessicaAries

04/17/2026

The stock market analogy hit different.

drew a straight line between women who were locked out of investing in the 70s and what is happening with AI right now. The women who stayed out missed generational gains. And she thinks legal marketers who are avoiding AI are making the same mistake.

Full conversation in Episode 9. Link in

CareerAdvice LegalMarketingAssociation NewEpisode

04/16/2026

New episode. S1E9: Pivot Without Permission: Leading Without a Blueprint. Link in bio.

and I sat down fresh off an LMA board meeting and what came out of that conversation was something I was not expecting.

She grew up in Austin with a single mom who worked nights to get her MBA. Her dad introduced her to computers at age 6 and then largely disappeared. She was raised by a village. She went to law school, left, found legal marketing, and built a company from a LinkedIn post during COVID.

Nine firms. One week. One post.

We also talked about IVF, about playing big, about AI, and about the one piece of advice that has been her north star her whole career.

I love this episode! Go listen wherever you listen to podcasts.

CareerPivot WomenEntrepreneurs WomenInBusiness AIinLegal Entrepreneurship CareerChange PlayBig NewEpisode Podcast WomenPodcast

Jessica Aries

04/12/2026

To anyone who is quietly surviving right now.
Laura Gutierrez says: there is somebody out there.

Find your community in whatever space you're in. Tell at least one person, even behind closed doors, because it's really hard to see clearly when you're surrounded by people who don't get it.

And then she told me what Breaking Rank means to her and honestly it's the best answer I've gotten yet.
"Be rebellious. Be the first person to do something. It opens doors for people."

New episode with out this week. Link in bio.

Belonging Leadership Curiosity

04/08/2026

There was a month where Laura thought she was going to die.

And in that month, work didn't matter. The things she did didn't matter. What mattered was what her kids would remember. What other people would remember. How she made people feel.

She quotes Maya Angelou at the end of this and I felt it in my chest.

New episode with out this week. Link in bio.

MentalHealth Podcast MayaAngelou WomensHealth

04/03/2026

"You beat cancer. You can do anything."

Laura Gutierrez has a lot to say about that.

She talks about the unspoken pressure on cancer survivors to be inspirational, to run marathons, to write business lessons from chemo, to perform a version of recovery that makes other people feel good.

And how exhausting and isolating it is when your reality looks nothing like that.

This conversation stopped me. New episode with out this week. Link in bio.

Podcast MentalHealth CancerAwareness

04/02/2026

New episode out now! Alignment Over Ambition: Choosing Yourself in a System That Demands More with Laura Gutierrez.

Laura is a marketing technology expert with deep experience in the legal industry, where she has had a meaningful and lasting impact on the community. She is a q***r Latina, a single parent, and a breast cancer survivor. And in this episode, she talks about things that do not usually make it into professional conversations.

She speaks honestly about the unreal expectations placed on cancer patients and survivors, the pressure to keep performing while fighting for your life, and what it looks like to rebuild your relationship with work and identity on the other side.

She has also deliberately turned down opportunities to advance in her career, not because she lacked the ability, but because alignment matters more to her than a title. That choice has shaped everything about how she leads and who she has become.

This conversation is for anyone who has ever felt the weight of a system that takes more than it gives, and anyone who has chosen to define success completely on their own terms.

Go listen. Links in the comments.

What happens when you stop chasing titles and start choosing yourself?In this episode of Breaking Rank, Diana sits down with Laura Gutierrez for a deeply hum...

04/02/2026

Laura Gutierrez is one of my favorite humans, and her episode is finally live. 🎙️

She has spent years mastering marketing technology, especially in the legal industry, where she has quietly built one of the most respected reputations in the community. She is the kind of person who does not just learn new tools. She learns them deeply, applies them strategically, and makes everyone around her better in the process.

She is also a q***r Latina, a single parent, and a breast cancer survivor.

And in this episode, she says something that I think a lot of people need to hear out loud. The expectations placed on cancer patients and survivors are genuinely unreal. The pressure to keep performing, to stay strong, to recover on someone else's timeline, as if surviving something enormous is something you just do on the side.

She has also turned down real opportunities to advance in her career. Not because she could not do them. Because they did not align with who she is and what she values. That kind of self-knowledge is rare. That kind of courage is rarer.

I am so proud of her for having this conversation.

This episode is called Alignment Over Ambition, and it is out right now. Go listen. Link in bio. 🔗🤍



WomenWhoLead NewEpisode LeadershipPodcast

04/01/2026

Laura knew early on she wasn't straight. She just didn't have the words for it yet.

In this week's episode she gets incredibly real about her identity, navigating labels that never quite fit, and how her double mastectomy connected to her gender in a way she hadn't fully expected.

This is one of those conversations I'll think about for a long time. New episode with is out this week. Link in bio.

Authenticity BreakingRank Podcast