Rachel Warren

I'm Motley Fool contributing stock analyst Rachel Warren, and I'm delighted to be joined on the show today by Steph Wagner, a nationally recognized authority on women's economic security and National Director of Women and Wealth at Northern Trust.

Steph leads the firm's advisory practice for women and its Elevating Women platform.

It's a national program focused on building financial literacy and helping women use their wealth to create meaningful impact in their families, businesses, and communities.

Before joining Northern Trust, Steph spent years advising high-net-worth women navigating major life transitions.

She also built a national consulting practice for wealth management firms seeking to better serve female clients and founded Women Wealthy Wise, a platform dedicated to advancing financial literacy and empowerment for women.

In her new book, Fly, A Woman's Guide to Financial Freedom and Building a Life You Love, Steph gives women an empowering tools-based approach to help achieve financial freedom and thrive for years to come.

Steph, I'm really excited to talk with you today and discuss your book.

Welcome to the show.

Well, thank you.

It's wonderful to be here.

I want to really set the table here for our conversation today.

Your book starts with your own deeply personal story, a really pivotal series of moments in your life that led you to take control of your finances and create your own plan for success and subsequently discover a real passion for educating and empowering women to take charge of their money.

Maybe just start today, you know, share with our audience your background, your story and the journey that began, I think, as you put it in your book, your wake up call to financial independence.

Yeah, I think it's a really powerful story that you tell and as you just laid out and go into more detail in your book.

And it sort of spurred as well the beginning of this journey.

You know, you've spent years actively working with women across the nation to really reclaim and renew their financial power.

I think something that, as you said, really stemmed from your own story.

So maybe tell me a bit more about the journey to writing your new book.

Yeah, I, for one, found it to be revelatory and really, really interesting work and something that I resonated a lot with as a woman in the financial field.

And one of the excerpts that really stuck out to me was in chapter four of your book,