CHITRA RAGAVAN
Go from leading your business to shaping the world
My mission is helping impactful CEOs and founders succeed in the face of extraordinary odds.
“Hiring Chitra was the best decision I ever made. Every CEO needs a Chitra in the trenches with them.”
– Micah Winkelspecht, CEO and Founder at Gem
Turning Founders into Leaders from Startup to Exit
When launching ambitious startups, the most cutting-edge technology founders and leadership teams turn to Chitra for advice.
They seek her expertise in strategic positioning; her insights and problem-solving skills; her ability to look around curves and see what’s coming; her talent for strategic partnerships and initiatives for both generating revenue and global good; her network of meaningful connections; and her core expertise in multi-media journalism that when combined with her extensive work on brand and narrative architecture, results in one-of-a-kind brands.
Chitra uses her own unique melding of time-tested, powerful strategies to help tech CEOs and founders overcome some of the most complex challenges around building their companies and crossing over to the finish line.
“Chitra was instrumental in getting our business off the ground.”
– Stewart Kelly, Founder & CEO, Ground Truth Intelligence
Confidante, Catalyst, and Coach
Chitra Ragavan partners with mission-driven tech CEO’s as a confidante and catalyst who can strategize and drive complex initiatives to completion. Her deep knowledge of startup culture and ethos helps create authentic brands with powerful narratives.
“Anyone looking to further a world-class product and company, Chitra is your woman.”
– Chris Williams, CEO & Founder, Zelos
C-Suite Executive & Board Member
Since 2007, Chitra Ragavan has advised CEOs and founders of top-tier tech companies as a full-time senior strategic advisor and C-Suite consigliere, advisory board member, and through her consulting firm, Goodstory Strategies.
Strategic Communications Advisor
Companies that have benefited from Chitra's insights and strategies include: $20 billion unicorn Palantir Technologies, Gem, Ground Truth Intelligence, Peregrine, Elementus, and Zelos.
Journalist, Columnist & Podcaster
Prior to becoming a trusted CEO confidante and advisor, Chitra was a nationally recognized journalist at National Public Radio (NPR) and U.S. News & World Report (US News) magazine. Chitra is a contributing writer to SWAAY and the host of two podcasts: When It Mattered & Techtopia.
Limited Partner & Advisor To Venture Funds
In addition to advising startups, Chitra is also a startup investor and member of K-Street Capital, a Limited Partner in Moonshots Capital and Palumni VC (the venture fund led and founded by Palantir alumni), and serves as an advisor to NextUp Ventures/NextUp Partners.
“A consummate professional, Chitra has the phenomenal ability to quickly get organizations the desired exposure, build lasting relationships, and offer expert advice rooted in decades of experience.”
- Gregory Barbaccia, Head of Core Operations, Theorem
Executive Coach, Advisor, and Narrative Builder
Chitra brings a deep reservoir of trust and integrity and instantly elevates companies through her credentials, breadth of expertise and experience, and tangible and measurable successes.
"Chitra makes things happen, and she makes sure they’re the right things that will make the greatest impact in advancing the company and team in achieving our objectives."
"Chitra is a leader who sees the big picture and then can create a plan to execute on it."
"Hiring Chitra was the best decision I ever made. Every CEO needs a Chitra in the trenches with them."
"Chitra is a seasoned strategist, an astute mind and wonderfully brilliant. She’s created an incredible professional trajectory that makes her a valuable C-suite consigliere."
"Chitra is one of the informed, insightful, fair, and trustworthy journalists with whom I have worked."
"If you want to bring and drive any key initiative to completion, Chitra is the person you would want to have."
"Chitra’s experience and expertise are vast but I was able to work with her directly on leadership and creative growth strategy and structure; witnessing her help guide and build a several-thousand-person sized company directly with the CEO."
"Chitra is the trusted advisor and right hand every CEO needs."
“Chitra was one of the most aggressive, relentless journalists that I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with.”
- Gordon Witkin, Award-Winning Journalist, U.S. News & World Report
Entrusted with the most Compelling Stories from Leaders around the World
Chitra Ragavan is the host of two popular podcasts on leadership, and technology, called “When It Mattered” and “Techtopia” where she interviews leaders from around the world as well as the creative entrepreneurs fueling the technology revolution.
Techtopia with Chitra Ragavan is a podcast examining the power, peril and promise of technology. Chitra explores the latest technological wonders, interviews the creative entrepreneurs behind them, delves into the dark side of these omnipresent innovations and examines technology’s profound impact on people and society.
On March 7, 2022, The front page of the New York Times ran a graphic photograph that summed up the tragic cost of Russia’s war on innocent Ukrainian civilians. It was a photograph of a mother, her two children, and a church volunteer crumpled to the ground. They were the victims of a Russian mortar attack on civilians as they attempted to flee over the Irpin River to Kyiv. The photo, which was was taken by the Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Lynsey Addario, sent shock-waves throughout the world.
Capturing that image also put Lynsey Addario in grave danger, something that she has confronted many times over during her more than two-decade career as one of the most accomplished war-photographers in the world.
Addario has had boots on the ground in Ukraine since the begining of the Russian invasion. And, as we near the one year anniversary of the war, she describes the toll of the conflict on Ukrainian civilians and reflects on the personal cost of covering conflict.
Ukraine is just one of the war zones that Addario has traveled in and out of, on assignment for The New York Times, National Geographic, and other publications for more than two decades.
In 2015, American Photo Magazine named Addario as one of the five most influential photographers of the past 25 years, saying she changed the way we saw the world’s conflicts.
I spoke with Addario when she made a brief stop in Washington DC on November 3rd to receive the prestigious Courage in Journalism Award from the International Women’s Media Foundation.
This is my third conversation with the fearless Addario. To hear her personal story of how she became a photojournalist, how she covers major conflicts, how she survived a violent kidnapping in Libya, and why she does the work she does, do check out my previous interview with Addario on my leadership podcast, When It Mattered, Episode 35. It’s an incredible story. And do listen to Addario’s previous appearance on Techtopia, Episode 18, as she reflects on the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and the aftermath of the chaotic pullout of U.S. troops from Afghanistan.
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When It Mattered:
🎙️70. A protector of U.S. nukes evaluates Putin’s nuclear threats / Maj Gen Robert Wheeler, USAF (ret)
🎙️ Ep. 60. Putin laid his cards on the table years before the Ukraine invasion / Gen. James Jones, USMC
🎙️ Ep. 66. Distinguished diplomat reclaims her narrative / Marie Yovanovitch, “Lessons from the Edge”
Techtopia:
🎙️ Ep. 26. Technology is rewiring Ukraine’s narrative / Alex Deane & Bryan Cunningham
Do check out these related articles in SWAAY
✍️ A “Genuine Badass”: How Marie Yovanovitch Reclaimed Her Narrative and Reputation
✍️ The Incredible, Indomitable Super-Survivors of Ukraine
✍️ Refugees in the Shadows: A Viral Insights Column on War, Displacement, and Super-Survivors
Thanks for Listening!
