The women who thrive in the next decade of AEC won't just be technically excellent they'll know how to leverage AI as a tool for growth, income, and creative problem-solving. Dr. Joan Palmiter Bajorek is the CEO of Clarity AI, ranked the #4 Voice AI Influencer globally by Voicebot.ai, and author of the Amazon bestseller Your AI Roadmap: Expand Your Career, Money, and Joy (Wiley, 2025).

In this episode, Joan breaks down what AI really means for your career trajectory not in abstract terms, but in concrete, actionable strategy.

What you'll learn:

• How to build custom AI solutions even if you're not a coder
• - Why resilience, networking, and financial freedom are central to the AI era
• - What Fortune 500 companies are actually using AI for right now
• - How to position yourself as an AI-forward leader in your firm

Connect: LinkedIn — Joan Palmiter Bajorek | Website: clarityai.co

The right fit doesn't always show up first. Sometimes it shows up after you've tried the wrong things, learned what you're actually made of, and gotten honest about what you're uniquely positioned to build. Lindsay Friedman is a four-time founder who failed twice before finding the work that was hers to do and she built it directly from her experience as a caregiver.

Lindsay joins Bryce to talk about entrepreneurship, purpose-driven work, and what it looks like to stop chasing the right opportunity and start building from the right foundation. She works at the intersection of technology, advocacy, and eldercare an industry that touches almost every family and gets very little attention until a crisis hits. This conversation is about finding your lane, building inside it with everything you have, and why the work that comes from lived experience hits differently than the work that comes from a business plan.

This episode is for anyone navigating a career pivot, sitting with a business idea they can't shake, or trying to figure out whether what they're building is actually the right fit or just the next thing.

About Lindsay Friedman: Lindsay Friedman is a four-time founder, lifelong multigenerational caregiver, and former nursing assistant with hands-on experience in memory care and eldercare. She is the founder of CareBloom and LTCareNav, a platform that connects families with vetted long-term care experts to make quality care more accessible and affordable. Lindsay combines technology, personal experience, and advocacy to empower families navigating complex care decisions and is committed to transforming how society cares for seniors.

What We Cover:

• Lindsay's background as a caregiver, nursing assistant, and multigenerational care advocate

• What her first two failed companies taught her that success couldn't

• How CareBloom and LTCareNav came directly from personal experience, not a market gap analysis

• What the long-term care space actually looks like for families trying to navigate it

• Building a platform at the intersection of technology and human advocacy

• The right fit question how passion and lived experience together create a different kind of business foundation

• What workplace autonomy looks like when you're the founder and the mission is personal

• Where to find Lindsay and how to connect with her work

Key Takeaways:

• Failure is not the opposite of the right fit sometimes it's the path to it

• The businesses that come from lived experience have a staying power that market-driven ideas often don't

• Passion alone isn't enough, but passion plus experience is a legitimate competitive advantage

• The long-term care space affects nearly every family and most people don't engage with it until they're already in crisis

• Workplace autonomy as a founder means you get to decide what problem is worth your career

Resources + Links:

• CareBloom: https://carebloom.com/

• LTCareNav: https://ltcarenav.com/

• Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lfriedman1/

Leaving a career you're good at is harder than leaving one that isn't working. Ryan Sullivan was a successful mechanical engineer who built a department from scratch — and then chose to walk away and start over. This episode is about that decision, what it took, and what he's built on the other side.

Ryan joins Bryce to talk about career transitions, financial autonomy, and what it looks like to build a life by design instead of by default. He works exclusively with architects and engineers, which means he understands the mindset of someone who's been trained to solve complex problems — and he applies that same precision to financial and business planning. This is not a generic money conversation. It's about using financial clarity as a tool for making better career and life decisions.

This episode is for AEC professionals at any stage who are wondering whether their financial position is actually giving them options — or quietly taking them away.

About Ryan Sullivan: Ryan Sullivan, PE is the founder and principal wealth engineer of Off the Beaten Path Financial. He began his career as a mechanical engineer, built an engineering department from the ground up, and transitioned into financial and business planning to serve architects and engineers specifically. Ryan combines engineering precision with dynamic investment strategy to help clients build resilient financial plans that give them freedom and flexibility to live life on their terms. Learn more at [Off the Beaten Path Financial URL — confirm with Ryan].

What We Cover:

• Ryan's background in mechanical engineering and what led him to leave

• The decision to become a financial advisor and what that transition actually looked like

• Why he chose to focus exclusively on architects and engineers

• Cash flow as the foundation of financial health — what that means in practice

• Aligning money with purpose — and why that's different from standard financial planning

• How engineering precision translates into dynamic, adaptive investment strategy

• What financial autonomy actually looks like for AEC professionals

• The right fit question — how to know when to stay on a path and when to leave it

• Where to find Ryan and how to work with him

Key Takeaways:

• Leaving a career that works is a different kind of hard — it requires clarity about what you're moving toward, not just what you're leaving

• Cash flow is the foundation; everything else — freedom, flexibility, options — gets built on top of it

• A financial plan that doesn't account for what you want your life to look like isn't a plan, it's a spreadsheet

• AEC professionals are well-positioned to think in systems — applying that to personal finance changes outcomes

• True financial autonomy means money stops making your decisions for you

Resources + Links:

• Off the Beaten Path Financial: https://www.obpfinancial.com/

• Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-sullivan-pe/