In this concise "6 questions in 7 minutes" interview, Professor Pete Alexander talks with Liesel Mendoza, an information technologist turned entrepreneur and founder of The Mentoring Club, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that connects emerging and seasoned leaders for mentorship. Liesel describes herself as a good human being, creative problem‑solver, technologist, employee, entrepreneur, and philanthropist, and outlines her 30‑year career progression from programmer to chief operating officer. She emphasizes that the most rewarding aspect of her work—both in technology consulting and in her nonprofit—is helping people and connecting talent with technology to advance meaningful missions. When asked about work‑life balance, she stresses the importance of aligning values, choosing the right partners, and fostering open communication to make problem‑solving easier. Liesel recommends other leaders for the podcast, citing Warren Buffett, Ray Dalio, Richard Branson, Marc Benioff, and Tony Robbins, and notes she can introduce listeners to many mentors in her network. Her core advice to business leaders is to select people whose values align, encourage transparent dialogue, empower diverse ideas, recognize contributions, and guide those willing to be helped. She recounts her first job in 1987 as an Actuarial Assistant/Programmer, where she automated manual group‑insurance costing processes, marking a formative experience in applying programming to real‑world problems. The episode concludes with her contact information (email and social media) for listeners who wish to connect.
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This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast, where business leaders share their insights. It is 6 questions in 7 minutes because successful business leaders are busy and rarely have more time to spare. So let's get to it. Question number 1: In a few sentences, please tell me who you are and what you do.
First of all, thank you, Pete, for inviting me over for this podcast. I am Liesel Mendoza, and every day I strive to be a good human being first, a creative problem solver second, an information technologist third, and lastly, a caring employee, a responsible entrepreneur, and a loving philanthropist. So anything or any actions that you see manifests from me actually emanates from those characteristics that I strive to work towards achieving on a daily basis. As far as the professional side is concerned, I am currently working on a passion project, which is the mentoring club. It is a nonprofit organization, 501, that I have established in order to provide a mentoring community for young leaders initially. But right now, we're actually looking at aspiring and seasoned leaders, supporting them in their drive to achieve their goals. And then in the last 30 years, I've actually been an information technologist, starting as a programmer, systems analyst, to project manager, to business development manager, to chief operating officer. So that's me in a nutshell.
Lysel, it's so great to have you on the show. Question number 2. What's the best thing about working in your industry?
Helping people, no question about it. Whether it's in my world of information technology solutions consulting, where we help connect business decision makers to help solve their problems with technology solution providers, or in the current nonprofit that I mentioned, which is the mentoring club, it's It's all about helping people, connecting people in order for us to find a way to leverage our talent and technology in order to push forward those missions that matter and that makes the world a better place.
Mm-hmm. Very well said. Question number 3, I hear from other business leaders that staying in a good work-life balance for them and their team members is a challenge. What are your thoughts?
Well, nothing worth doing is easy, right? Challenges bring about opportunities, always. And so the way that I look at it is I don't think that anyone can deny that balancing or even harmonizing work and life at home is hard. It is not easy. And therefore, I think the key thing is finding the right partner, finding the right team members. And when I say find the right people to work with or to be with, it has something to do with alignment of values, finding people that you have common values with and you can communicate openly. And that makes it so much easier to get into the logical resolutions of problems and challenges. But at the same time, if you don't have those connections, those solid connections in terms of values, then solving a problem makes it exponentially harder.
I couldn't agree more. The values is so critical to having a cohesive team approach. And so you've totally reinforced that. I really appreciate that. Question number 4, what other successful business leaders like yourself should be on my podcast?
Oh, okay. Well, okay, if you're talking about my level, we're trying to change the world, right? So, and we're ordinary people trying to do that. And therefore, I have over maybe 100 people in mind that I could refer you to. And some of them, and most of them are actually extremely admirable people who are mentors in the mentoring club, and definitely I could connect you with them via an email introduction.
Perfect.
Absolutely. But if you're talking about famous people, I could name a few. Like, these are the people that I follow, and you probably will not be surprised because we have talked about some of them in the past. So Warren Buffett, Ray Dalio, Richard Branson, Mark Benioff, and Tony Robbins.
Absolutely, all ones that I follow as well. So thank you for those referrals.
Yeah, well, actually, at one point I wrote Warren Buffett a letter when I was establishing the mentoring club, and I'm still persisting. So we'll see.
Keep up with it because you never know, that could just open so many doors. Can you imagine?
We shall see. I'm very persistent, so hopefully something will come out of it.
Excellent. So with a minute and 45 seconds left, question number 5: What insight or advice would you give to other business leaders?
Choose the right people to work with. Again, alignment of values is very important. Encourage open communications in your organizations. Empower people to work through diverse ideas to find a solution to a problem or a strategy to execute on. So just having meeting of the minds, and that it makes it easier if you have an agreement of values. And then also always recognize the people for the great effort and the result that they have produced for the organization, for the team, for the community. And always look for a way to guide people who need help and are willing to be helped.
That's the key. They have to be willing. You can't just help them if they're not, if they're, if they're closed off. Excellent. And question number 6: Tell me about your first job.
Okay, so this is a fun one because I was a guinea pig in my first job. It was actually my first ideal job. I studied BS Mathematics in college, and I really liked my subjects in Actuarial Science and Statistics. And in my last year, senior year in college, they introduced computer programming, and I really liked it too. So after graduation, I took additional courses on computer programming. And then the first job that I was offered was an experimental position because personal computers in businesses were being introduced at that time. And it was 1987. And don't worry, I'm okay. I can be dated. So the job title was Actuarial Assistant/Programmer. So what I had to do, I had the responsibility to understand what the manual processes are of developing a group insurance plan and the costings behind it, and I had to automate that whole process. So for me, it was really a fun job because I had to study the manual process and I was able to see it automated out of my own blood, sweat, and tears as a fresh employee, first-time employee.
That's a neat story. That is, that is especially sounds like a big impact that you made. So that's really fun. So Liesel, thank you so much for being on the show. How can people find you?
So anybody who is interested to connect with me can definitely email me directly. So it's liesel@thementoringclub.org. And I can also be found in 4 social media channels: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. So I think my name is pretty unique that people should be able to find me pretty quickly.
Excellent. This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast. For more insights and ideas, please go to LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook, or iTunes and search for the Winning at Business and Life podcast. Thanks for listening.
