2025 Women of Western Wake

Photography By Jonathan Fredin Sep 2, 2025

The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.

— Mark Twain

For this year’s honorees, that why is rooted in uplifting others. For some, that comes in the form of providing hygiene products or books to those who can’t afford them. For others, it’s taking care of the people and facilities that produce life-saving medicine, helping companies define themselves to prosper, or giving others a new outlook on life one crocheted animal at a time.

Laurie Braxton

Senior Vice President, Head of North Carolina Operations, FUJIFILM Biotechnologies

Laurie Braxton cultivated a 20-year career with pharmaceutical giant GSK, serving in roles encompassing external supply, business development, supply chain integration, and site management. The catalyst?

A cool pair of pants.

“The recruiter was wearing leather pants, and I was like, “North Carolina … pharmaceuticals … It looks like they have a pretty cool team. Yeah, I’m in,” Laurie recalls.

At that time Laurie was a recent graduate of Bowling Green State University with a degree in business.

“If I would have stayed in Ohio, I probably would have gone into automotive, but pharmaceutical was really interesting to me,” she says.

Laurie’s career took her to GSK facilities in RTP, Zebulon, Maryland, and the United Kingdom.

“I have been really fortunate in my career to have had so many different opportunities. I think one of the reasons that’s true is because I was always looking for where there’s opportunity in adversity,” she says.

Wendy Coulter

President & CEO, Hummingbird Creative Group

In the grand tapestry of nature, few creatures embody the spirit of resilience and joy quite like the hummingbird. And when you meet Wendy Coulter, it makes immediate sense why the tiny iridescent bird has played such a significant role in her life.

Several years before she named her award-winning full-service branding firm after the creature, a high school friend referred to Wendy as a hummingbird because she “just kind of fluttered around and got along with all the different groups of people.”

A little over a year after she’d earned her degree in industrial design at NC State — and after a brief stint in marketing for a nonprofit during which time she was working in set design and interviewing for architecture and industrial design jobs, as well as freelancing under her own name — Wendy describes herself as being “part of the gig economy before there was a gig economy.”

Little did she know that a 1995 Cary Chamber of Commerce expo would be the very thing to help her career take flight.

Shirnetta Harrell

Founder & Executive Director, The No Woman, No Girl Initiative

Shirnetta Harrell was named for the two most important people in her life: her grandmother Shirley and her mother Bonnetta. Her name represents the legacy of a deep and abiding love. It’s a nod to her past and hope for her future.

“I was raised by a single mom, and I watched her struggle,” Shirnetta says. “She is a veteran who served in Desert Storm, and seeing how she has always kept going despite adversity has laid a strong foundation for me and has instilled in me the belief that anything is possible.”

Shirnetta spends every day living in that belief and pays it forward through The No Woman, No Girl Initiative, a Triangle nonprofit dedicated to providing essential personal care and hygiene products to women and girls in need. The organization has distributed thousands of hygiene kits since she launched it in 2021. She has gone on to inspire others to donate products, money, and time to the cause.

With a bachelor’s degree in social work from Shaw University and a master’s from Alabama A&M University, Shirnetta has already built an impressive résumé by just 33 years old.

Hiller A. Spires, Ph.D.

Executive Director & Professor Emerita, NC State University College of Education Founder, Margie’s Books

After graduating from college with her newly minted English degree, Hiller Spires couldn’t wait to tell her favorite high school teacher that she had chosen a teaching career too.

“I remember knocking on her door and telling her I was going to teach 12th grade English just like she taught me,” Hiller says. “It was around 1980, and she had retired by then, but she was thrilled.”

The teacher’s name was Laura Inabinet, and Hiller loved her for her strict demeanor and the high standards she set for her students at Hartsville High School in South Carolina.

“Not everybody liked her because she was so stern and didn’t suffer fools gladly, but I thought she was brilliant,” Hiller says. “The way she taught literature made me come alive, and I’m so glad I was able to tell her about how she influenced me and that she was the reason I became an English teacher.”

Justine Tiu

Co-Founder, The Woobles

When Justine Tiu and her husband, Adrian Zhang, launched The Woobles out of a basement five years ago, they had no way of knowing that the simple act of teaching beginning crafters how to crochet tiny animals would become a multimillion-dollar business almost overnight.

“Our Wooble kits help people achieve something they once thought was impossible, and that in turn makes people feel super excited, grateful, and accomplished,” Justine says.

In some cases, learning to crochet Woobles gives people a new lease on life.

Justine recalls a customer who was mentally and physically impaired following brain cancer surgery.

“She was so excited to receive her Wooble kit because it helped improve her hand-eye coordination, plus she got to practice her math skills with all the counting involved in crocheting. It was the best activity she’d found to aid in her recovery.”

Not all the customer reviews are that dramatic, Justine says, but many new crocheting fanatics claim The Woobles have changed their lives.

Through it all, no one’s life has changed more than Justine’s.