Story & Lesson Highlights with Kate Isler of Northeast Seattle

We recently had the chance to connect with Kate Isler and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Kate, thank you so much for taking time out of your busy day to share your story, experiences and insights with our readers. Let’s jump right in with an interesting one: What are you being called to do now, that you may have been afraid of before?
I’m being called to think bigger about impact and speak up. This means moving beyond empowering individual women entrepreneurs and transforming the systems and business models that shape their opportunities.

For years, I’ve focused on helping women build digital skills, launch businesses, and grow through ecommerce. But with the increased pressure on women today, I feel like there needs to be a great focus put on lasting systemic change to the systems that have been in place for hundreds of years. Lasting change happens when we connect those individual successes to institutional power, when we influence policy, investment, and the way the digital economy itself is built. That level of work used to feel intimidating because it means stepping into rooms where change can be uncomfortable. But feel more ready for that now, because women’s economic power deserves to be a central force in how our future economy is designed.

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’m the author of Breaking Borders, a book on women’s leadership with practical lessons they can apply in their own careers, and the founder of WMarketplace, an economic development company based in Seattle that helps women entrepreneurs build and scale their businesses in the digital economy. My background is in global marketing. I spent many years at Microsoft leading international campaigns that connected technology and human potential. Today, I’ve channeled that experience into creating programs that empower women to thrive in the online economy.

Our flagship initiative, The WMarketplace Accelerator, equips women-owned businesses with the digital skills, ecommerce tools, and market insights they need to grow and compete globally. What makes our work special is that it’s not just about technology; it provides practical tools and strategies to unlock economic independence and create pathways for women to build lasting wealth and community through digital entrepreneurship.

My first book, Breaking Borders, explores leadership through the lens of my own journey as a working mother of three, balancing ambition, family, and authenticity in environments not always designed for women to lead. My next book, with a working title of Rise and Respond: Leading Women into the Digital Economy, builds on that foundation. It focuses on how women can create new business models, leverage digital tools, and close the economic gender gap by owning a greater share of the digital future.

Thanks for sharing that. Would love to go back in time and hear about how your past might have impacted who you are today. What part of you has served its purpose and must now be released?
I have always been a little bit idealistic. In this case, I believed that the hard work that women have been doing over the decades was starting to change the world. There has been measurable progress towards closing the economic gender gap. In 2024, there were over 12 million women-led businesses employing millions more women in the US.

However, since the beginning of 2025, almost a quarter of a million women have left the workplace in the US. The exodus of women, some driven by a cultural movement to push women back into traditional roles, and some by the massive government and business move away from policies that accept that men and women often come to the workplace with different levels of outside responsibilities. Transformation, especially the kind that shifts systems and expands opportunity for women, takes time, involves back-and-forth, and sometimes demands a commitment to uncomfortable levels of persistence.

My idealism has always been a source of energy, but now I’m having to lean more on patience and pragmatism. I’m letting go of the expectation of continued momentum from past wins and embracing a longer game, focused on steady, strategic work that truly moves the needle over time.

Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
There have definitely been moments when I’ve struggled — times when the challenges felt bigger than the mission. The most recent was earlier this year, when shifts in the political environment and new policies directly affected The WMarketplace business. It was disheartening to watch the progress we’d worked so hard for suddenly feel fragile.

The past several months have felt like a crossroads: one path would have been to dwell on what was lost, and the other — the harder but truer one — was to double down and focus on driving larger, systemic change. Because the truth is, today’s working systems and expectations were never designed with women in mind. For more than a century, women have been trying to fit into structures built for men who had someone at home to manage everything outside of work. That model enabled endless hours, constant travel, and a single-minded focus on career — conditions that simply don’t reflect how most women live or lead.

This realization reminded me why I started this work in the first place. We don’t need to keep bending ourselves to fit outdated systems. We need to redesign them — to create new models of work, leadership, and economic power that reflect the reality of women’s lives and the strength of our contributions.

Alright, so if you are open to it, let’s explore some philosophical questions that touch on your values and worldview. What important truth do very few people agree with you on?
I am unwaveringly committed to advancing women’s rights, and I firmly believe that “Women’s Rights are Human Rights”, a statement made during the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1985, It still shocks me that this fundamental truth is not universally accepted. After decades of progress, we are watching the developed world slip backward on equality, and I refuse to accept that as inevitable.

Women live, work, and lead in every part of our economy, yet we are still denied equal pay, equitable policies, and the same level of humanity afforded to men. My passion for closing the gender gap has only deepened as I’ve watched women continue to contribute so much, while being asked to settle for less. The idea that women should be relegated to low-pay or no-pay roles, or that our contributions are somehow secondary, is something I will never understand and will never stop challenging.

Throughout my career, I’ve built businesses, platforms, and communities to push women’s economic rights forward. My work now focuses on expanding opportunities for women to claim their rightful place as equals in the digital economy through entrepreneurship, access to capital, education, and representation. I’m writing a new book that explores exactly that: how we can redesign the systems of work and wealth so women are not just included, but fully empowered.

Closing the economic gender gap isn’t a project with an end date for me, it’s a lifelong commitment. I will keep doing this work, in every form it takes, until women’s rights are recognized everywhere as what they truly are: human rights.

Before we go, we’d love to hear your thoughts on some longer-run, legacy type questions. Have you ever gotten what you wanted, and found it did not satisfy you?
Yes, absolutely. Earlier in my career, I achieved many of the things I thought I wanted: senior roles at a global company, leading major campaigns, working with incredible teams, and seeing my work reach millions of people. From the outside, it looked like success. But inside, something didn’t feel complete.

I realized that while I was proud of the work, it wasn’t deeply connected to my purpose. I wanted to build something that created real opportunity, especially for women.

Throughout my career, I’ve lived and been acutely aware of the inequities women face in nearly every aspect of life. I know people sometimes get fatigued hearing about pay gaps and inequality, but the data in every key measure is clear: women are still paid less than men for doing the same work, given fewer opportunities for advancement, and underrepresented in leadership. Women make up more than half of the U.S. population, yet hold fewer than 24% of elected offices.

Many women aren’t in a position to speak out, and many more aren’t being seen or supported within the systems we’ve built. That realization was both unsettling and clarifying. It led me to leave corporate life, to write a book, Breaking Borders, and create businesses like The WMarketplace , which help women entrepreneurs build economic power in the digital economy, with the ultimate goal of closing the economic gender gap.

Getting what I thought I wanted taught me that achievement alone doesn’t equal fulfillment — meaning does. Today, my definition of success is rooted in impact: seeing other women succeed, build confidence, and create change in their own lives and communities. That’s what satisfies me now.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.kateisler.com/ , https://www.wmarketplace.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kateisler/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kateisler/
• Other: https://substack.com/@kateisler?