She Quit a Successful Job and Became a Better Leader with Breanne Byrne

You can survive a toxic environment. You can perform in it. You can even get promoted in it. But what does it cost you over time? There's a moment every serious leader faces. That moment when performance and alignment just literally drift apart. And the real question becomes, do I endure or do I realign? Today's episode is about that moment. Welcome to the NeuroLeadership Edge. I'm Claire Hayek. I'm a neuroleadership expert, TEDx speaker, founder of Mind Soul Purpose Team Building. And my work focuses on one thing: pressure breaks leadership and team performance. And I designed the systems that prevent it. This show is about what actually happens in your brain when the stakes are high and how to stay clear, grounded, and effective, and lead with calm authority no matter what. All right. So, well, in this episode, you'll learn why high performance can quietly mask misalignment. What happens in the brain when your values and environment clash? Why endurance is sometimes the most expensive leadership strategy. How clarity creates power under pressure. We're learning a lot of stuff today. And what calm authority in leadership actually looks like in real life. Today, I'm joined by Brianne Byrne. Brianne is the Chief Marketing Officer at Centari AI. She's a growth strategist who builds modern marketing functions at the intersection of brand, AI, and leadership. She's known for bringing calm, precision, and momentum when complexity is real and stakes are high. She's worked across luxury marketing, experiential campaigns for American Express, finance in the Caribbean, co-founded a women's fashion e-commerce brand, led large-scale healthcare marketing transformations, and now operates at the forefront of AI. Very impressive. But the reason she's here today is not her resume, although again, very impressive. It's a decision she made in early 2025 that fundamentally changed how she leads. Brianne, how are you?

I'm well. Thanks for having me. I appreciate this.

Yes. So really interesting. I mean, if I'm listening right now, I'll probably ask myself a question like, oh my God, what's the story? You know? So I think we've teased it enough, right? Let's dive right in. Take us back to early 2025, which I believe was around that time. What was really happening inside of you at that time?

So I was in a work environment that I didn't love. I felt that a lot of decisions that were being made in the company really didn't align with my core values. And I could see the stress that it was not only causing on myself, but on my team and the people around us. It made decisions harder. It made some of the projects that we wanted to really spearhead kind of harder to get off the floor. And, but really it was more that, that mental I'd say shift that I kept having on, do I stay? To your point before on the, in the intro is, do I stay and endure for the sake of my team? Or do I move on considering how difficult it was for me to show up every day in that environment?

Yeah. I mean, just basically the environment from what I hear is, was really Clashing with your core values from from what I'm hearing from you, and the great thing here is also the awareness, the self-awareness, and being able to recognize that sometimes we just go, oh you know it's just normal, it's work, and you just just everybody's stressed and it's okay, and they just push right through.

Right.

The fact that we're able to pause and recognize this is a really important thing that I want to talk about today, and I think I want to pick your brain on on what was happening inside your. head and your body and everything, right? As a leader, as a person, as a human. And there's something really powerful is that when leaders or people usually stay in environments that violate their core values, the brain enters this chronic stress response. It's not dramatic stress. It's just like, it's a misalignment basically.

Yeah.

And it's an actual thing. So your prefrontal cortex starts really working harder to justify what your nervous system already knows, which is get the hell out of there. And so over time, when it's that overworking, it just drains the clarity. It kind of creates that cloud around you if you're staying, right? And you said something important. You didn't want your environment to change who you were.

Right.

That's where that alignment under pressure is important. So, let's look at this endurance versus alignment thing, right?

Okay.

A lot of people talk about this. And I don't think we talk about it enough, in my opinion. But there's a cultural message in leadership that says without saying, push through, endure, be resilient, just drive through it. You could do this. It's actually rewarded. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

At what point did you realize that endurance was no longer the right strategy here?

Well, I really appreciate that. Um, so I am a long-distance runner. I really enjoy running long distances. So I really understand the concept of endurance, certainly on the physical body. And I did endure for For about a year before that day in January of 2025, I had started to see a shift in the organization, the decisions that were being made behind closed doors that I didn't align to. And, but I, at that point in '24, decided that I wanted to stay because of my team. There were a lot of amazing people on my team that I wanted to continue to see grow and thrive and flourish. But then there was also that protective part of me that wanted to sort of shelter them from some of the shifts that were happening in the company that I didn't agree with. So there was, there was definitely a long period of time that I went through that endurance phase. But what shifted for me was when I realized how much of a physical toll it was actually taking on me. I was incredibly stressed. I would show up at home, um, and my home is my sanctuary. That's my safe place, right? You walk into your home, you see your family, your children, um, even silly activities like my Friday nights trying to, you know, go through that binge Netflix or something wasn't giving me the relief that I really need or was looking for. Um, I just, You can see the conversations that you're in, the way you're having conversations with people that you love. You feel that weight on your shoulders. And I mean, even your friends, when you're going out and there's no stress of like, you know, you don't have to worry about what the kids are doing or, you know, things like that. There's— it's almost no stress going out with your friends. And I was still having conversations. They could see just like my physical presence was very draining. And I, I looked like I constantly had this huge weight on my shoulders. And that was, I'd say, probably around the holidays of '24. And that's when in January, um, I made that decision to completely shift. I knew I had to make a change. And so that's kind of that whole endurance. I think that everyone's level of comfortable of how long they are going to endure, because there's I think there's a point when you do some self-reflecting, so it feels like you're enduring the environment that you are in. But the amount of time that that takes really just depends on the individual person and the reason why you're enduring. Are you enduring for financial reasons because you have to maintain a certain level of income to thrive?

Right.

Are you enduring because of your team like I was? Are you enduring for other reasons, like you're waiting for that promotion or because it's right around the corner or whatever? I think it really depends on the reason why you would want to stay versus the reason why it's better to go.

Absolutely. And again, I don't think we talk about this enough. And I think a lot of people may be listening right now can relate. And what we're trying to do here, and you said it, you said it, Brianne. I mean, We're not trying to tell you what your endurance is. We're not trying to tell you this is right, this is wrong. I think all we want to do here is for people to be self-aware enough to recognize, am I really playing at the level that I am built for? Am I, am I lowering my— am I breaking or not respecting my core values? How is this affecting my life, my personal life, my friendships, as well as my work life? How, how am I feeling in my body? Do I even— am I even connected to what's happening here? Um, am I running in survival mode 24/7?

Right.

Because endurance is one thing, and it's great. I mean, we all have endurance for a reason, but the body and the brain and the whole biology is not programmed For the brain to be in survival mode 24/7, as if the brain is sending signal basically going, a bear is chasing after you, you gotta run for your life. Imagine this is your 24/7. That's not normal. It's— the survival mode is there for a reason, to keep us alive.

Yeah.

But when you are living in survival mode pretty much all the time and not resetting your nervous system, And getting back into your prefrontal cortex, your brain CEO, your strategic mode where your core values live and your clarity lives and, and, you know, all of the above, then you're completely misaligned. And so maybe your body can endure it to a certain extent because you have some kind of endurance of some sort. But what— to the detriment of what? And sometimes we can endure it and we're like, I take this, I could take this. until you can't. And that's where burnout sneaks in. That sneaks up on you. And that's why people are like, I had no idea. What do you mean I have a burnout? And then, that's it. Now, it's 100%. You're out.

Yeah.

It is kind of that culture sometimes where we don't, you know, we are not resetting our nervous system and getting back into our clarity, getting back into our anchor. And we wait too long and we think we're just being soft. No, that is compassory. That is power when you're able to stop, reset, and go, okay, now I can go for another day or two. But I need to stop, reset as much as I can, as opposed to just endure, just endure. Nothing to prove here. And it's the wrong thing to do. Okay? Anybody listening now, don't do that.

Yeah.

But any— and again, like the minute you reset, you know, you're bringing back that clarity, you're lowering the cortisol. You are reducing that cognitive load. And that alignment restores you into your executive function, your strategic executive brain. That's where you need to be as a leader. So kudos for you for the ability that you were really able to recognize it before it was— you pretty much avoided a possible—

Yeah.

Bigger problem, right?

So Of course.

Yeah. So you said that you regrouped and you decided, okay, these are my core values. And moving forward, I know we've talked about this earlier together, you're going to use these core values to kind of assess situations you're in, kind of like this alignment with your core values becomes some kind of filter for you to say, okay, where am I right now?

Yeah.

So when you started applying that, when you start using that, what do you— what did you notice changed after that?

Yeah, the first step for me was just really honing in on exactly what they were. So I went on a staycation, which I'd never done before. I spent 24 hours by myself, went through all these exercises, classes, and so forth just to help identify exactly what those core values were. We all have things, characteristics that we align with, personality traits we have, but to actually write them down and say, okay, I have these 5, 7, however many core values and what they mean is the first step. Then it's applying. It makes it so much easier than to in every situation in life, whether it's talking with my children or through work, I can make decisions because I'm very clear on what my core values are. There's other beliefs, of course, that we all believe in.

Yeah.

Those things that are the non-negotiables, the things that you're okay, I would have to leave a work environment if this did not show up in the workplace. And I believe the same. One of the things with my role that I've done in multiple companies is ensuring that the company also has very clear core values so that they then can have those decisions, any decision.

Right.

And so it's the same exact process of when you are faced with a difficult decision, when you're faced with a go-to-market strategy, it doesn't really matter. It's always bringing it back to your why. And your why is, for me, is revolved around those core values.

It increases agency, that ability to act intentionally, that sense that you can make the choices and influence the outcomes and tell yourself, I have options. I can decide. I can shape what happens next. And it's so underrated. And so, this ability, that agency actually activates dopamine, which who doesn't like dopamine, which creates that forward momentum.

Yes.

So, it all just feeds into one another. It starts with that definition of your core values. It's amazing how powerful that is. So, you also mentioned toxicity when you were talking about your story at the beginning. Without naming names, we're not here to do that. But it's important to talk about it though. What does toxicity actually feel like to a leader coming from your experience?

Sure. I think if I were to give it some practical examples. It's when there are decisions or things that are said. Let's take core values, for example. Let's say you— one of your core values is respect, and your leaders are shouting throughout all the meetings, we are here to respect our fellow employees, and this and that. And then you get behind closed doors and That level of respect is not visible in the decisions that are being made that are influencing the employees that you just said you're being respectful to. That's what, for me, that's how I experienced it. And then of course, any other, you know, when, when ego starts to get in the way of decisions and the way that you interact with your employees. certainly criticism, right? Anything even as negative as yelling, arguing, things like that, that you just wouldn't expect in a healthy, collaborative work environment. Those are some of the things that I experienced that I just, I did not align with, especially in when you feel, when leaders feel the need To put down others in order to help raise themselves up. That's a non-negotiable for me. That's where I see a toxic work environment and how it can— it really, I mean, it takes a toll on everyone.

God, I mean, you can feel it through and through regardless if it's—

even if it's directed at one person.

Oh God, yes. It influences the whole—

Influences. You can see it filter through. peer, that person's direct report. I mean, you just feel it kind of expand much further than the individual interaction that may have happened between 2 people. Yeah.

And I mean, you said that keyword disrespect.

Yeah.

It could break an organization. Yeah. It's that powerful. And when leaders act without that integrity, without clarity, And it's a free-for-all conversation kind of thing. Teams experience it. They experience, like, feel that. They experience it as uncertainty, as a threat. And we're very sensitive human beings. And literally mirror neurons are there for a reason to make the connection. So it could be a good empowering connection. It could be toxic connection. It's still connecting. It doesn't stop connecting because it's toxic unless you leave. Then you remove yourself from it, which is what we're talking about.

Yeah.

When you're feeling that uncertainty and that threat, the amygdala in the back of the brain becomes hyper-alert. There's no more innovation. There's no more communication. The trust is poof, disappeared. And then people are talking about, well, how come we don't have retention? Well, hello. And then the whole system breaks. So, it is huge. This is a huge, huge, huge toxic environment. And again, thanks for sharing your experience with it. And I think it could be a whole list here. I would be really curious to know what our listeners, how they experience or their definition of toxicity. And please do share it in the comment and reach out on LinkedIn and share it with us. You can find the links basically in the bio and the QR code here. This is— we love interaction here. So it also helps also define your core values in a way. I'm like, yeah, I think that's toxic. You know, it makes us think about it, right? Now, how do you personally, Brianne, how do you hold humility and ambition at the same time? Because that's like a lot of times what a lot of leaders kind of go, yeah, I know. But how do you do that? How do you balance that?

I think it's— I actually— so this concept coming from Jim Collins' book where I learned it first was Good to Great. It's a Level 5 leadership practice that he's He put together really, really well. And all the amazing, great companies out there who've become great did so because their top leadership had those 2 qualities. I think that it is possible. And I hate to go back to the same conversation we just had about core values, but it's about your why. You can have humility because you, as a leader, you want to raise up the people who are under your leadership. You want to see them thrive. You want to see them grow. And those are all going to help the company in so many ways. And we could literally just have a conversation on that.

Yes, I know.

But the ambition part is all about Going back to your why and getting, seeing the most potential for the company, as well as for the people who are working within the company. Being able to help grow your employees and get them to that next level. So whether, whether or not it's a promotion or owning a project on their own or learning a new skill.

Right.

All of that ambition then helps again grow the company and the company then become, becoming much greater than they were previously.

Yeah. I mean, this is, the combination is so powerful, humility and ambition and, you know, and then why we need to choose.

You don't have to choose.

You don't have to choose, right? Yeah.

And be a selfless leader, you know, who is hoping to see others thrive. Of course, we all want to do great. We all want to shine and do really well in our own careers. But I think that a lot of that comes from seeing other people grow and find their new, you know, their new passion, their voice, their—

Yes.

Level, their skill, whatever it is. Helping other people, I think, is a way for You just get that own set, your own sense of ambition and drive by helping others do the same, if that makes sense.

Absolutely. And humility and ambition actually stabilizes the nervous system, believe it or not.

Interesting.

It's amazing. And it really affects the team. So imagine ego-driven leadership. What is that going to do? That's going to activate defensiveness. Values-driven ambition It activates trust. Trust allows people to take risk. And risk fuels growth in an organization. And that psychological safety is basically sitting right there at the bottom. So, yeah, makes total sense. Like, I can't believe we're running out of time. I have so many other questions for you. And I'm like, I'm going to sneak this one in because I have to ask you. And let's try to kind of like marathon through— or not marathon, sprint through the last like 5 minutes here we have. So, You're leading at the intersection of AI and humanity. I know that, right? So I'm sure a lot of people are going, so how do you ensure technology amplifies people instead of replacing them?

So this kind of goes back to all the things that we've been talking about. It is removing the parts of their job that can be done by technology that now gives them this space and the freedom to think differently. So you, you're elevating the employee by taking away the mundane tasks, by taking away, um, some of the things that are quite repetitive, but also giving them that level of amplifying their skill sets, right? You can now learn things faster. You can try new skill sets in a way that, that you never could before. Without technology.

I honestly, I mean, you said it so well. And I feel like AI, I'm not an expert, but I mean, I leverage AI a lot. It really helped a lot with this as a small business, you know. I kind of feel like AI is my super brain. It just makes me be more creative and tap into untapped potential. And it really made me grow. And go, oh my God, I can do this. And I can— it helped me open up to possibilities. And again, it's all about how you position things and how you take it. You can be defensive with it and block, or you can just open it up. So yeah. All right. I had to ask, right? The AI. So let's run through rapid fire. I'm going to ask you one question. Okay. In your opinion, one behavior leaders must Absolutely get rid of in 2026?

I don't think it's unique to 2026. I'd say arrogance.

Arrogance.

Yeah, I think that blocks— like, going back to your psychological safety, I think that when your ego drives decisions, um, it doesn't allow an environment of creativity because there's fear that Any step you're taking, any decision you're making could be ridiculed, criticized, or whatnot by the person who is demonstrating arrogance.

Absolutely. All right. Well, before we close, I want to leave you all with this. Rianne's story is not just about leaving a role, right? Making that decision. It's about reclaiming agency. Remember, it's about refusing to let your environment dictate your identity, pretty much taking back your power. It's about choosing alignment over endurance. It's basically the only way you can endure in the long run and lead properly, in my opinion, in my book. The truth is that when you operate out of misalignment long enough, your brain pays the price. Whether you realize it or not, your brain is paying the price. So, decision— Clarity drops, energy fragments, your confidence is nowhere to be found. And this is why mental fitness matters. I'm always talking about mental fitness for a reason. And we can call it whatever we want, right? But if this episode resonated with you, if you feel like you've been playing smaller than you're built for, or you're carrying pressure in silence, I want you to take this one step further. If you're watching, you're going to see a QR code here. If you're listening, the link will be in the comments. It'll be my Linktree link. Inside that link, you'll find my Mental Fitness Masterclass, Play at the Level You Were Built For. This is where we train your brain to lead with calm authority, to think clearly under pressure, to align your decisions with who you really are, to stop operating in survival mode and enduring what you shouldn't be enduring and start operating from your full capacity. And today, I really want to share an offer for podcast listeners. I've opened a limited time 50% discount. Use the code NLEDGEPODCAST. But you know, the code won't live forever. But try it if you're listening to this, if it's still alive. And if this episode really helped, please share, follow, and definitely share if you think of somebody that needs to listen to Brianne's story, please do share it. If you want to talk about pressure-proof performance inside your organization, designing leadership operating systems that actually hold under pressure with strong foundations, do reach out to me on LinkedIn. I'd love to have a conversation with you. And I just want to wrap up here. And I do want to say that, you know, Brianne, thank you so much for joining us. Any final words?

Well, I think what you're doing is fantastic. Um, really having that self-reflection moment is going to be game-changing for everyone. Finding that truth in, in yourself and your core values, you know, even through, uh, what Claire, her work and, and so forth. Um, I think that's the pinnacle point that you need to have in order to get to that next level.

Thank you so much for your insights. Thank you for taking the time.

Thank you.

And I mean, the courage to come out here and share your story. I do appreciate it. I do not take that lightly. It was wonderful having you on the show. And for everybody listening, again, lead boldly, stay human, and turn every challenge into a gift. And I always say there's always 3 gifts, and we're creative enough to find those 3 gifts. So, because what else can you do? Beat yourself up and go, oh my God, you know, this is happening to me. Or you can just turn this as like, what am I learning? What should I learn out of this? Tap into your strategic brain, your executive brain. And we all have that brain, by the way. We don't have to be leaders. All right. So, thanks again, Brianne.