When Natalie Thompson ’19 settles into her cozy home office with a notebook and a cup of tea, she is working on far more than a passion project. The Florida Polytechnic University data analytics graduate is building a growing platform that helps young professionals share their journeys and encourage others to pursue their goals in high-tech fields.
Thompson, formerly Natalie Brum, is an agile delivery manager at video game titan Electronic Arts (EA), where she supports multiple teams in the company’s security enterprise engineering department. She’s also founder and host of “Unlocking My Potential,” a new podcast focused on the personal stories of early- and mid-career professionals.
“I love being able to create spaces where people feel comfortable opening up about their paths, their challenges and their wins,” she said.
When Thompson first joined EA, she worked with a single team, but that quickly changed when a senior leader at the company recognized her potential.
“This manager took me under his wing and had big plans for me. He wanted me to work with every single team under him,” she said from her Austin, Texas, home.
Today, Thompson’s role has expanded to support five teams and includes creating dashboards to showcase team performance and outcomes, work that draws directly on her Florida Poly education. She also recently launched a growing companywide community to share knowledge, build camaraderie and improve cross-departmental communication.
That desire to connect and learn, combined with a passion for encouraging women to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), led Thompson to create the podcast in July 2025. The idea formed when she noticed a gap between field-specific podcasts and shows that only focused on top-tier executives.
“I feel like I’m still at the beginning of my career and I couldn’t find any podcast that I could relate to,” she said. “When I was in college, I related even less.”
After months of planning, researching and learning social media and podcast production from scratch, Thompson reached out to friends and Florida Poly connections to test her idea.
“I was thinking maybe two or three people would want to start this with me,” she said. “But within the first two months, I got so many ‘Yes, I love this idea’ responses, and more than 40 people wanted to be part of it.”
The podcast grew quickly, drawing listeners to its authentic stories about career transitions, leadership development, overcoming technical challenges, entrepreneurship in tech and personal growth.
“It’s becoming a lot bigger than I ever expected it to be, but I love it,” Thompson said, noting her nearly 2,000 YouTube subscribers.
Visit the “Unlocking My Potential” website to learn more about the podcast and how you can listen.
Contact:
Lydia Guzmán
Director of Communications
863-874-8557
