Culture Crush Business Podcast

In a recent episode of the Culture Crush Business podcast hosted by Kindra Maples, Catherine Mattice, CEO of Civility Partners, and Danielle Pener, Principal Attorney at Alta Employment Law Workplace Investigations, collaborated to illuminate the intricate dynamics of tackling toxic workplace cultures. Throughout their engaging dialogue, Catherine and Danielle explored the nuances of managing workplace culture, emphasizing the dual challenges of reactive responses to crises and proactive strategies for preventing them. They discussed the triggers prompting organizations to seek their expertise, ranging from public scandals to internal acknowledgments of systemic issues, underscoring the complexity of organizational dynamics. Are you looking for a little more guidance in how to tackle improving culture in a toxic workplace? This is your episode to listen to! Kindra Maples and her guests advocated for a comprehensive approach to workplace culture management, advocating for ethical leadership that prioritizes both employee well-being and organizational effectiveness. Thank you for our Podcast Sponsor! This episode is sponsored by Gateway Bank, a community bank in Arizona that specializes in serving small businesses across the Valley and the country. When you work with Gateway, you don't have to call an 800 number for support, or submit your loan application and wait weeks or months for an answer. You get fast, personal service from a team who knows you and cares about you. Whether you need a loan or banking services for your business, Gateway is here to help. Visit gcbaz.com/culturecrush for details and a free consultation with bank President James Christensen. All loans subject to approval. Member FDIC.

On the “Culture Crush Business Podcast,” host Kindra Maples chats with Jonathan Bennett, an executive coach from ClearlyThen Inc., and Amy Looper, CEO of Resilient Growth. They discuss the rising acceptance of mental health in the workplace, the need for generational understanding in leadership, and addressing employee needs. The episode highlights the importance of creating safe and motivating workplaces by transforming leadership and organizational commitment. Jonathan Bennett: Jonathan Bennett, C.Dir., is an executive coach providing leadership coaching and strategic counsel to CEOs, executive teams, politicians, and boards across Canada. With extensive experience in social purpose business strategy, governance, and communications, he founded Laridae, a management consulting firm. Jonathan also teaches at Trent University and serves on various corporate and non-profit boards. He is a published author and a member of the Institute of Corporate Directors. Amy Leigh Looper: Amy Leigh Looper, founder of Resilient Growth, is a global speaker on resilience, empowering leaders to overcome fear, self-doubt, and anxiety. After facing personal adversities, Amy founded her company to help others heal and build resilience. She has worked with global clients like Dell Technologies and Deloitte and is the author of "Leading Motherhood," with a new book, "Resilient Growth," set for release in 2025. Amy is certified by the AZ Trauma Institute. This episode is sponsored by Gateway Bank, a community bank in Arizona that specializes in serving small businesses across the Valley and the country. Whether you need a loan or banking services for your business, Gateway is here to help. Visit gcbaz.com/culturecrush for details and a free consultation with bank President James Christensen.

  This episode of Culture Crush Business is a real deep dive in the space of building communities that help with growing and positive well being. Kindra deep dives into the journeys of Nathan Coury and Ryan Tomita, two entrepreneurs on a mission to build supportive communities and foster personal growth. Nathan kicks things off by sharing his insights into creating human-centered businesses that prioritize the well-being of employees, leading to remarkable retention rates and minimal staffing challenges. Then, Ryan, the brains behind Middlefinger Mantras, opens up about his struggles with mental health and how they inspired him to create safe spaces for men to find support and empowerment. As if that wasn't enough, Nathan and Ryan also get into the nitty-gritty of balancing masculine and feminine energies in business. They stress the importance of collaboration and connection, rather than competition, in creating thriving workplace environments. They tackle the stigma head-on and wrap things up with a powerful call to prioritize mental well-being and reach out for support when needed. This episode is a must-listen for anyone looking to cultivate a culture of care and growth in their personal and professional lives.

In this episode of the Culture Crush Business Podcast, Elena Joy Thurston and Gabe Hagen discuss the critical importance of fostering inclusive workplace cultures. They highlight the necessity of inclusive leadership in today's diverse workforce, stressing the significance of small changes to enhance belonging and engagement. Overall, the episode underscores the importance of cultivating inclusive cultures in corporate settings to attract diverse talent, with a focus on communication, accountability, and continuous improvement. Brick Road Coffee, exemplifies a business seamlessly integrating quality service with a commitment to community values. Known for its exceptional coffee and inclusive atmosphere, Brick Road Coffee serves as a community hub where diversity is celebrated and individuals are welcomed. Elena Joy Thurston, a renowned Diversity & Allyship speaker, shares her personal journey as a Mormon mother of four who lost her marriage, church, and community upon coming out as a lesbian. Through transformative experiences and communication strategies, Elena Joy aims to increase safety and profit in organizations by fostering inclusion, safety, and belonging for all employees. This episode emphasizes the imperative of fostering inclusive workplace cultures through leadership, communication, and continuous improvement. By spotlighting the success of Brick Road Coffee and Elena Joy Experience, it underscores the transformative impact of prioritizing diversity and inclusion in business, both for societal progress and organizational success.  

In this episode of the Culture Crush Business podcast, host Kindra Maples and guest co-host, Karen Nowicki, delve into the significance of vulnerability in personal and workplace contexts with guests Mathew Blades and Eric Brooker. Mathew Blades, a former award-winning radio host with 27 years of experience in the broadcast industry, shares his journey of transitioning to podcasting and speaking engagements. His podcast, "Learn From People Who Lived It," and speaking series aim to engage audiences on a real, grounded, and inspirational level. Mathew encourages audiences worldwide to find self-care strategies and embrace being transitional characters. His talks have been well-received in various organizations, including Banner Health and Keller Williams. Eric Brooker, a dynamic author, keynote speaker, and business leader from Minnesota, shares insights from his book, "You Are Enough: Overcoming Lifelong Doubts of Worthiness." Drawing from personal experiences, Eric empowers readers to embrace their inherent worth and conquer self-doubt. In addition to his successful career in the technology industry, Eric hosts the acclaimed podcast "Counsel Culture," exploring culture and leadership to guide listeners towards personal and professional development. Through his work, Eric continues to inspire and empower others, leaving an indelible mark on those fortunate enough to engage with his content. Together with the hosts, Mathew and Eric discuss the importance of initiating difficult conversations, prioritizing self-care in high-stakes jobs, and fostering resilience and empathy in workplace cultures. Their personal stories and insights highlight the power of vulnerability in inspiring others to embrace their worth and achieve personal growth. This episode is sponsored by Gateway Bank, a community bank in Arizona that specializes in serving small businesses across the Valley and the country. Whether you need a loan or banking services for your business, Gateway is here to help. Visit gcbaz.com/culturecrush for details and a free consultation with bank President James Christensen. All loans subject to approval. Member FDIC. For a more detailed breakdown of this podcast episode, our guests, our sponsors, and more please visit www.culturecrushbusiness.com/

In the latest episode of the Culture Crush Business Podcast, host Kindra Maples and guest co-host James Christensen discuss military culture, personal values, and high-performance leadership with esteemed guests Waldo Waldman and Dan Clark. The conversation explores resilience, identity, and the role belief plays in shaping organizational culture, offering actionable advice for fostering positive and growth-centric environments. Lt. Col. Waldo Waldman: Waldo Waldman is a Hall of Fame leadership speaker, executive coach, and bestselling author. With experience as a combat decorated F-16 fighter pilot and expertise in change management and peak performance, Waldman advocates for collaborative cultures built on trust and courage. His keynotes emphasize the importance of overcoming obstacles and embracing teamwork to achieve peak performance. Dan Clark: Dan Clark is a New York Times bestselling author, motivational speaker, and leadership coach. Overcoming a paralyzing injury, Clark's remarkable journey to success has earned him accolades as one of the top motivational speakers globally. With experience speaking to diverse audiences worldwide, including Fortune 500 companies and combat troops, Clark's insights focus on personal development, resilience, and high performance. James Christensen, President of Gateway Bank: James Christensen is the President of Gateway Bank in Mesa, Arizona, with over 35 years of experience in the banking industry. A champion of small businesses and marginalized groups, Christensen is known for his leadership in driving financial health and community advocacy. Through his work, he inspires individuals to improve their well-being and contribute positively to their communities. Thank you for our Sponsor! This episode is sponsored by Gateway Bank, a community bank in Arizona that specializes in serving small businesses across the Valley and the country. Whether you need a loan or banking services for your business, Gateway is here to help. Visit gcbaz.com/culturecrush for details and a free consultation with bank President James Christensen. All loans subject to approval. Member FDIC.  

In this episode of the Culture Crush Business podcast, Kindra Maples, the host, and guests Stephen Smith and Jay Rayhons explore the multifaceted concept of culture. Defining culture as the shared rhythm and essence when people come together, they draw parallels between sports, business, and the dynamic nature of jazz music.  The conversation delves into Jay Rayhons' approach to financial work, emphasizing the importance of understanding clients' values, and Stephen Smith provides insights on maintaining strong team connections in remote settings, highlighting consistency in leadership and the significance of trust within organizations. Joshua Development is a strengths-based coaching & consulting firm. We believe that leadership is best defined as crafting the environment in which excellence happens. JW is a Gallup-Certified Strengths Coach and a LifeScript Learning Certified Facilitator. He is commonly described as authentic, growth-oriented, and values-based. Follow Joshua Development on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. Reworc is a platform that helps you see and plan for the future of work, today. Reworc's organizational MRI helps provide leaders and employees with the information they need to make work work. Stephen Smith is the VP of people analytics and insights at Reworc where he leads the research, strategy, and product development functions. Connect with Stephen on LinkedIn. Thank you for our Sponsor! This episode is sponsored by Gateway Bank, a community bank in Arizona that specializes in serving small businesses across the Valley and the country. When you work with Gateway, you don't have to call an 800 number for support, or submit your loan application and wait weeks or months for an answer. You get fast, personal service from a team who knows you and cares about you. When Gateway was founded in 2007, the team had a vision of building a hometown bank that prioritizes people over profits. Over 15 years later, they're proud to still be one of the highest-performing AND highest-rated community banks around. Whether you need a loan or banking services for your business, Gateway is here to help. Visit gcbaz.com/culturecrush for details and a free consultation with bank President James Christensen. All loans subject to approval. Member FDIC.  

  This Podcast Episode is on “from the vault.” This episode has a very personal side and connection for Kindra and her guest, Jean Brunson.    In this podcast episode, Kindra dives into a candid conversation about the evolution of the podcast and its focus on improving company culture. They reflect on how Jean was the one that pushed Kindra towards a more inclusive approach, emphasizing the significance of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Accessibility, and Belonging (DEIAB).   The conversation touches on the challenge of addressing diversity and inclusion in the workplace, acknowledging the reluctance some individuals may have in expressing their feelings or concerns due to fear of repercussions. The hosts highlight the need for safe spaces to have open conversations about diversity, recognizing the unique struggles faced by different communities.   As the discussion weaves through personal experiences and the impact of diversity in various settings, it emphasizes the multifaceted nature of company culture. They share insights on how the podcast evolved to embrace a broader definition of company culture, extending beyond big corporations to encompass small businesses and diverse groups.   The episode also delves into the significance of Juneteenth, tying it to the broader conversation on diversity, inclusion, and belonging. The hosts discuss the recent federal recognition of Juneteenth as a holiday and reflect on the importance of acknowledging historical events that have shaped the experiences of black communities.   Throughout the episode, there is an emphasis on the power of conversations, the importance of listening, and the need to create spaces where diverse voices can be heard. Kindra and Jean share their personal growth through this journey, illustrating the transformative impact of intentional efforts to embrace diversity and foster inclusivity in both professional and personal spheres.   Thank you Jean Brunson for your contribution to the growth of the Culture Crush Business and Podcast.    A little about Jean Brunson:  Accomplished veteran of the United States Army with a Master of Social Work Degree and 19+ years of experience within the military community, as well as expertise in program and curriculum development, mental health, veteran's advocacy, and case management.   She is a superior coach and mental health subject matter expert capable of collaborating with diverse populations. Dependable self-starter and valuable team-player that has proven to be an advocate for change and support to the community.    A little about the host, Kindra Maples:    Kindra Maples is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo Cookies. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio).   She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion for working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow.   Then came the opportunity to lead the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further.   About Culture Crush At Culture Crush, culture isn't just a corporate buzzword. It's a key factor that can either boost your company or lead to its failure.   As a growing company: Culture Crush Business is your hub for company culture resources. With deep cultural insights and years of expertise, we evaluate your company's needs and connect you with the precise resources to cultivate a thriving culture. We work with CEOs, founders, HR Directors, or Culture Leaders of companies or teams, who value company culture and understand its impact on their business success. With Culture Crush you'll learn how to transform your workplace into a place of unity, efficiency, and growth. Don't just fix your company culture – transform it with Culture Crush Business.   On this podcast: We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company. We share the resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the podcast with their tips and tricks for growing culture.    

In our latest podcast episode, we had the pleasure of hosting Lindsay, a seasoned leader with almost 17 years of dedicated service at Desert Financial Credit Union, and Nikki, a passionate advocate for employee engagement and the driving force behind PeopleForward Network. This conversation, as the others that we have, was open, authentic and natural. The conversation led to examples of both companies leading in a human centered and people focused direction. Lindsay highlighted the importance Desert Financial places on employee satisfaction and creating a workplace culture that empowers and values its staff. This commitment translates into exceptional service for members, where every interaction is more than a transaction. The organization focuses on connection, community, and service to others. Nikki, from PeopleForward Network, provided insights into their mission of sharing resources and insights with a global community of people-first minded leaders. From podcast production to growth consulting, PeopleForward Network collaborates with partners to make a meaningful impact on business development and marketing. These women are making waves in their industries in order to build companies with great cultures. If you are looking for examples, stories, and support for growing your company culture, then this is an episode for you to listen to. Nikki Lewallen Gregory believes that the workplace is a mission field to use our strengths and maximize our lives. Nikki's passion is devoted to employee engagement/employee experience; to help all people experience meaningful work. Nikki lives in Indianapolis with her husband David, 4 step sons and English Bulldog, Cardi, who she is currently training to skateboard. Nikki is involved in many philanthropic organizations as contribution and service are her WHY. Lindsay Martin is a seasoned leader in the financial industry, with a dedicated history at Desert Financial Credit Union. With nearly 17 years of unwavering commitment to the credit union, Lindsay has consistently demonstrated her passion for serving both members and the community at large. In her current role as Market Manager, she oversees the North Peoria market, managing multiple branch locations. Throughout her career, Lindsay has honed her expertise in financial services and has become a respected leader known for her ability to build and lead successful teams. Her commitment to excellence is evident in the positive impact she has had on the credit union's operations, as well as the lasting relationships she has cultivated with both colleagues and members. Lindsay's professional journey is marked by a steadfast dedication to servant leadership and service, a passion for community engagement, and a relentless pursuit of excellence. Her leadership within Desert Financial Credit Union is a testament to her unwavering commitment to delivering exceptional financial solutions while enriching the lives of those she serves. About Culture Crush At Culture Crush, culture isn't just a corporate buzzword. It's a key factor that can either boost your company or lead to its failure. We're culture consultants, with a focus on leadership, appreciation, communication, processes, accessibility, mental health, diversity, inclusion, and creating a dynamic workplace. As a growing company: Culture Crush Business is your hub for company culture resources. With deep cultural insights and years of expertise, we evaluate your company's needs and connect you with the precise resources to cultivate a thriving culture. We work with CEOs, founders, HR Directors, or Culture Leaders of companies or teams, who value company culture and understand its impact on their business success. With Culture Crush you'll learn how to transform your workplace into a place of unity, efficiency, and growth. Don't just fix your company culture – transform it with Culture Crush Business. On this podcast: We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company. We share the resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the podcast with their tips and tricks for growing culture.  

In the modern business landscape, a company's culture is not just an internal matter. It has evolved into a valuable asset that can significantly impact a company's success and reputation. We know this! However, having a fantastic company culture is not enough. It's equally crucial to communicate this culture to the broader community and potential partners. One effective way to achieve this is by partnering with experts that specialize in marketing and telling the story of your company's exceptional culture, such as achieving recognition as one of the best places to work. Having an outstanding company culture is a remarkable achievement in itself, but it's not enough if it remains hidden within the walls of your organization. To truly reap the benefits of a great culture, you must share it with your community, industry peers, and potential partners. Many companies face the challenge of being the best-kept secret in terms of culture because they don't proactively communicate their strengths. We had the chance to highlight two amazing ladies from BestCompaniesAZ to talk about the importance of company culture, the benefits of telling the story of company culture, and discussing the work that led them to this space to help shine the light on other companies. BestCompaniesAZ has the expertise to craft compelling narratives around your culture, highlighting what makes your company unique and showcasing the human side of your organization. They are the cheerleaders that you didn't know you needed! When potential partners and clients hear stories about your great company culture, they are more likely to view your organization as a desirable partner and provider of goods or services. So let's start telling more stories about great culture! Are you a company interested in sharing the remarkable story of your outstanding corporate culture?  Are you a business seeking to demonstrate to the community just how exceptional your company culture is? Do you specialize in conducting employee engagement surveys that reveal the excellence of your company's culture? Are you in search of the perfect awards to highlight and elevate the narrative of your company's culture? Well, then you should listen to this episode!!! BestCompaniesAZ is a boutique agency that specializes in employer branding. With more than 30 combined years of industry experience in marketing and human resources, BestCompaniesAZ elevates award-winning organizations through digital marketing, events, social media and award consultation services.   Follow BestCompaniesAZ on LinkedIn and Facebook. As a growing company: Culture Crush Business is your hub for company culture resources. With deep cultural insights and years of expertise, we evaluate your company's needs and connect you with the precise resources to cultivate a thriving culture. We work with CEOs, founders, HR Directors, or Culture Leaders of companies or teams, who value company culture and understand its impact on their business success. With Culture Crush you'll learn how to transform your workplace into a place of unity, efficiency, and growth. Don't just fix your company culture – transform it with Culture Crush Business. On this podcast: We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company. We share the resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the podcast with their tips and tricks for growing culture. Thank you for our Sponsor! This episode is sponsored by Gateway Bank, a community bank in Arizona that specializes in serving small businesses across the Valley and the country. When you work with Gateway, you don't have to call an 800 number for support, or submit your loan application and wait weeks or months for an answer. You get fast, personal service from a team who knows you and cares about you. When Gateway was founded in 2007, the team had a vision of building a hometown bank that prioritizes people over profits. Over 15 years later, they're proud to still be one of the highest-performing AND highest-rated community banks around. Whether you need a loan or banking services for your business, Gateway is here to help. Visit gcbaz.com/culturecrush for details and a free consultation with bank President James Christensen. All loans subject to approval. Member FDIC.

This was a unique episode for the Culture Crush Business Podcast. We are always talking about ways to improve company culture so companies can thrive, and this episode was no different in that aspect. The topic was one that is often left out from the conversation of thriving company cultures, the focus on process improvement and the technology for improving the operations and culture of the company.   We discuss the need to focus on technology and resources that will help with the strategic side of the company in order to treat employees as humans rather than machines, which is essential for preventing burnout and maintaining a motivated team.   Effective leadership involves identifying and leveraging employees' strengths and interests. This allows them to excel in their roles and contribute to the company's growth. Offloading repetitive tasks to AI or outsourcing can free up employees to concentrate on their core competencies. AI can be a game-changer for businesses, especially when handling data-intensive tasks. It can optimize scheduling, automate processes, and even enhance customer experiences, as demonstrated by the example of creating a Taylor Swift-inspired AI bot.   The conversation highlights the need to adapt to rapidly evolving technology. The emergence of new career paths, such as prompt engineering, underscores the importance of staying current and embracing technological advancements.   Many companies use numerous software tools, often without realizing the extent of their tech stack. Lauri Erickson emphasizes the importance of integrating these tools to streamline operations and data management, ultimately saving time and resources.   This episode focuses on a few key takeaways for our listeners: Empower the employees to focus on the true strengths The power of AI in enhancing efficiencies Continuous adaptation to evolving technology Integration of software and tools   Overall, the episode emphasizes the value of fostering a positive company culture, empowering employees, and leveraging outsourcing, technology, and AI to enhance efficiency and employee satisfaction. It also underscores the importance of staying open to new possibilities in the ever-changing business landscape.   Thank you to James Christensen, the President of Gateway Bank, for joining in this conversation and adding his additional insight and stories as the co- host for this episode with Lauri and Ben.   Located in Tempe, Arizona, Project Pros is a family-owned business that's dedicated to alleviating the administrative burdens faced by small business owners. Their comprehensive support services are designed to give business owners more time, spanning areas like bookkeeping, HR, social media management, phone answering, and virtual administrative assistance.   Project Pros emerged from CEO Lauri Erickson's understanding of the need to shift small business owners from working ‘in' their business to working ‘on' it. The team at Project Pros fosters a synergetic environment, collaborating to find solutions for each client's unique needs.   Their approach emphasizes collaborative problem-solving, ensuring that every team member's skills contribute to the clients' success. Project Pros goes beyond traditional outsourcing, streamlining processes to save their clients both time and money. They serve as an extension of their clients' businesses, partnering at every stage to facilitate the growth and success of those businesses. Lauri Erickson's professional journey is highlighted by her executive-level expertise gained through diverse experiences in various companies and positions. With a background in human resources, bookkeeping, customer service, and sales, she possesses invaluable insights into the unique needs of small businesses.   Lauri's driving force lies in helping small businesses thrive and flourish. To achieve this, she surrounds herself with a team of like-minded, highly talented, forward-thinking, and energetic individuals who share her passion for making a difference. Their unwavering dedication and support leave a powerful and positive impact on their customers' success.   Connect with Lauri on LinkedIn and follow Project Pros on Facebook and Instagram.   AI automation agency. We act as the automation department for your business removing redundant work and helping you scale with ease. Ben Johnson is a seasoned data engineer and software developer with 20 years of experience. He takes complex problems and solves them with simple and elegant solutions.   Connect with Ben on LinkedIn. About Our Guest Co-Host James Christensen is the President of Gateway Bank, the only community bank in Mesa, Arizona. Under his leadership, Gateway has thrived through multiple economic downturns and grown to consistently be one of the strongest performing financial institutions in its peer group.   James is also very active in the local community and was named Mesa Citizen of the Year in 2023. He is a fierce advocate for small businesses, marginalized groups, and people in need. From one-on-one meetings to presentations and podcasts like this, James enjoys educating and inspiring diverse audiences to improve their financial health and overall well-being.   Connect with James on LinkedIn. About Culture Crush At Culture Crush, culture isn't just a corporate buzzword. It's a key factor that can either boost your company or lead to its failure.    We're culture consultants, with a focus on leadership, appreciation, communication, processes, accessibility, mental health, diversity, inclusion, and creating a dynamic workplace. As a growing company: Culture Crush Business is your hub for company culture resources. With deep cultural insights and years of expertise, we evaluate your company's needs and connect you with the precise resources to cultivate a thriving culture.   We work with CEOs, founders, HR Directors, or Culture Leaders of companies or teams, who value company culture and understand its impact on their business success. With Culture Crush you'll learn how to transform your workplace into a place of unity, efficiency, and growth. Don't just fix your company culture – transform it with Culture Crush Business.   On this podcast: We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company. We share the resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the podcast with their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host Kindra Maples is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio).   She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow.   Then came the opportunity for leading the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further. Thank you for our Sponsor! This episode is sponsored by Gateway Bank, a community bank in Arizona that specializes in serving small businesses across the Valley and the country.   When you work with Gateway, you don't have to call an 800 number for support, or submit your loan application and wait weeks or months for an answer. You get fast, personal service from a team who knows you and cares about you.   When Gateway was founded in 2007, the team had a vision of building a hometown bank that prioritizes people over profits. Over 15 years later, they're proud to still be one of the highest-performing AND highest-rated community banks around.   Whether you need a loan or banking services for your business, Gateway is here to help. Visit gcbaz.com/culturecrush for details and a free consultation with bank President James Christensen.   All loans subject to approval. Member FDIC.

When it comes to improving company culture, there are a tremendous amount of resources out there to help companies. Finding which resources are the right fit for your company is the tricky part.   Lucky for you, we brought together two amazing ladies that offer support that can improve all companies! These resources help to bring creativity and clarity to your teams!   This conversation talked about the support and structure that both Sarah's company and Anca's company can help provide to others.   There is a fear of failure and these ladies are here to help build the teams so that the fear can be concurred and supported.   Investing in outside support and facilitation is one of the best things a company can do to help improve their teams and company culture. Facilitators use techniques that stimulate creative thinking and innovation- and these ladies are the pinnacle of creativity!   You should listen to this podcast if you…. are having trouble communicating with your team and trying to find the right resources to help. would like to find a unique way to improve your meetings and sharing top highlights with the company. need a little support defining the goals of the meetings and the communication taking place. are ready to invest in your company to improve the culture of the people and the company as a whole. if you need a little help capturing and synthesizing the details from your meetings.   Culture Crush is here to support and it starts with these two amazing women led companies! Design Convo is a female-owned Human Centered Strategy and Consulting firm dedicated to empowering organizations with transformative solutions. They specialize in helping organizations navigate complex challenges and achieve sustainable growth by placing humans at the heart of their strategies.   Their team of seasoned consultants brings together expertise in strategy, design thinking, organizational change, capacity building, leadership development, and digital innovation.   By combining these diverse perspectives, they create holistic solutions that blend human insights with cutting-edge technologies, unlocking new possibilities for teams and organizations.   With a deep understanding of human communication and behavior, they guide organizations in crafting strategies that resonate with their target audiences and foster meaningful connections. They believe that successful businesses are built upon strong relationships, and they work closely with teams to cultivate cultures that drive collaboration.   In addition to strategy and consulting services, they also focus on capacity building and leadership development. Through tailored training programs, coaching, and skill-building initiatives, they equip leaders and teams with the tools and knowledge they need to drive sustainable change from within. Anca M. Castillo, MS is a master facilitator in multiple techniques and approaches, including Strategic Storytelling, Human-Centered Design, and Visual Facilitation, to name a few.   Originally from Romania, Anca grew up in Alaska before moving to Arizona to pursue an education in business. She spent the past 6+ years in different leadership roles at ASU before taking the leap into entrepreneurship.   Anca loves to help organizations and leaders solve wicked problems using a variety of proven tools and techniques. She is passionate about helping leaders develop the skills and capabilities they need to do their best work and helping organizations to push the boundaries of the status quo. She describes herself as a “rule breaker” and “big picture thinker”.   When not working, you can find Anca performing improv with her team, doing DIY projects, and dancing around her kitchen with her family. Follow Design Convo on LinkedIn.   26 Letters Studio's creativity is a crucial piece to the culture work organizations do in order to grow a sustainable business.   Their graphic facilitation visually guides and captures the conversations and activities that emerge during culture meetings.   This work inspires participants in the moment and the results (called artifacts) are used to further the conversation and quickly bring new hires into the fold. Sarah Spencer is a professional visual storyteller. With experience across multiple disciplines, Sarah is valued for her ability to listen, synthesize and draw what is emerging as people meet to discuss important subjects.   The outcome is a visual representation of the meeting used for future discussions and planning and acts as an artifact of what emerged from the group.   Sarah is a published illustrator, writer, award-winning designer, inventor, and culture expert.   Follow 26 Letters on LinkedIn and Instagram. About Culture Crush At Culture Crush, culture isn't just a corporate buzzword. It's a key factor that can either boost your company or lead to its failure.    We're culture consultants, with a focus on leadership, appreciation, communication, processes, accessibility, mental health, diversity, inclusion, and creating a dynamic workplace. As a growing company: Culture Crush Business is your hub for company culture resources. With deep cultural insights and years of expertise, we evaluate your company's needs and connect you with the precise resources to cultivate a thriving culture.   We work with CEOs, founders, HR Directors, or Culture Leaders of companies or teams, who value company culture and understand its impact on their business success. With Culture Crush you'll learn how to transform your workplace into a place of unity, efficiency, and growth. Don't just fix your company culture – transform it with Culture Crush Business.   On this podcast: We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company. We share the resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the podcast with their tips and tricks for growing culture. Thank you for our Sponsor! There has been tremendous growth of the Culture Crush Business and the Podcast. This growth is thanks to the support from the community and now the support through our current podcast sponsor.    Thank you Gateway Bank for supporting us as our Cultivator Podcast Sponsor!   If you would like to be part of the Culture Crush team or would like to support sponsoring the show- please reach out: info@culturecrushbusiness.com About the Host Kindra Maples is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio).   She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow.   Then came the opportunity for leading the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further.

When it comes to inclusion, it is all about education.   Surrounding yourself around others that are not like yourself is going to push you to learn more about others. This education then leads to the ability to be more inclusive and helping to be more accessible to other groups.   On this show, we had the chance to talk with two amazing gentlemen, both who started their lives out with vision and are now legally blind. The things that these gentlemen are doing to “change the perception of blindness” for others is instrumental!   In this discussion, they talk about the fears that set in when it comes to inclusion and accessibility. There is fear from one side when it comes to asking. Asking if a blind individual needs help. Asking how you can support them. There is fear from the blind community when it comes to applying for jobs, getting support, etc.   We all have fears when it comes to taking steps to change AND change is necessary. Asking the questions is something the simplest place to start.   This episode is a vital episode to listen to if you are wanting to support different communities in being more inclusive and accessible and you don't know where to start. This podcast gives encouragement to just start. It can start with simply asking questions. Ask how to help, how to change, how to improve… and then let's do it! Did you know?   7 out of 10 working age people in Arizona who are blind or visually impaired are not working Estimated to be about 20K 45% of hiring managers believe there are no jobs within their organization that a person who is blind could do Changing the perception of blindness is the biggest barrier to employment and inclusion So, ask the questions to start to make the change.   We are in this together and can make the changes to help others in the blind community. We can help this community and others to feel included and have the tools to allow them the access to resources and jobs.   Arizona Industries for the Blind (AIB) is a solution provider… Solving today's complex business problems by providing quality products and value-added Business Process Outsourcing services that matter to their customers. While providing a viable option for Arizonians who are blind or visually impaired to achieve their version of the “American Dream” through dignified employment.   Their mission is to inspire individuals who are blind or visually impaired to achieve their highest goals and aspirations by creating and sustaining career opportunities while providing quality products and services.   Through collaborative partnerships with Federal, State and private sector companies they are able to provide Third Party Logistics services, Document Conversion services and quality AbilityOne products. David Steinmetz is the Community and Public Relations Manager at Arizona Industries for the Blind in Phoenix. David works to “change the perception of blindness” through his advocacy and public relations efforts.   Mr. Steinmetz serves as the Public Information Committee Chair on the Governor's Council on Blindness & Visual Impairments (GCBVI), and is a Board of Director on the Vision Rehabilitation Assistive Technology Expo and Arizona Center for the Blind & Visually Impaired. David is a graduate of Arizona State University and participated in the National Industries for the Blind Business Management Training program through the Darden School of business.   In 2008, David was the recipient of the National Industries for the Blind Milton J. Samuelson Career Achievement award. This prestigious award recognized Mr. Steinmetz for his career achievements and community service work.   Mr. Steinmetz enjoys spending time with his family, fishing and traveling across the United States. David believes that every person who is blind deserves the right to full participation in work, community and life and with the right training, right technology and right attitude it is possible. Follow AIB on LinkedIn and Facebook.   With a 70% unemployment rate in the blind community, Clusiv is helping remove barriers to employment for the blind community by revolutionizing training and services for the modern workforce.   Their eLearning platform has been built to be accessible with assistive technology that blind or visually impaired people use, and this platform holds employment skills training courses to cover technology, occupational and career skills for the modern-workforce. Clusiv works with state vocational rehabilitation agencies to provide access to its courses to people who are blind or visually impaired. They help simplify the work of vocational rehabilitation counselors through their Assessment Tool, easy enrollment process, and positive outcomes for their clients to achieve measurable skills gained.   Clusiv is here to equip the blind community for employment and impact inclusion in the modern workforce by giving graduates the skills, confidence, and insights needed to find competitive integrated employment and be an advocate for positive change in the workforce for people with disabilities. To learn more and get in touch go to https://clusiv.io/. Blake Steinecke grew up with perfect vision and at the age of 16 a condition called LHON caused him to go through severe central vision loss and become legally blind. This created many new challenges of relearning how to do school, navigating college, employment and more.   Blake has a degree in marketing from Cal State San Marcos and has worked in software sales, marketing in the mountain bike industry, accessibility testing and training, and now leads marketing for Clusiv as the Growth Manager.   Through Blake's work, he is able to connect his educational and professional background, lived experience navigating the challenges of education and employment being blind, and his passion to serve the blind community through the work he does with Clusiv.   Outside of work Blake plays blind hockey for the US Blind Hockey Team, enjoys spending time with his wife, Amanda, and making videos, some of which you can find on his YouTube channel Adapting Sight.   Connect with Blake on LinkedIn and follow Clusiv on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company.   According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashely Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company:    There are many resources out there for company culture but they are scattered and difficult to find. Culture is not a one size fits all, so it is important for companies to find the resources that are the right fit for growing their own company culture.    We have worked to build a hub that brings all of the resources together in one place and one community. The Culture Crush Business is the one stop shop for everything related to growing company culture.    On this podcast:   We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company. We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host Kindra Maples is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio).   She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow.   Then came the opportunity for leading the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further.

Have you ever wanted to hear from a company that was really crushing it with their company culture? Did you ever want to just listen in on the things that they were doing to improve their company culture? Well now is your chance.   We brought James Christensen from Gateway Bank and Tierra Terry with the Better Business Bureau Serving the Pacific Southwest together to hear about the various things they are doing to try and improve their company culture.   From putting a gym in the office and providing time for employees to take a break during the work day, to bringing in a specialist to work on a resilience strategy with the company. The list goes on with the variety of things that Gateway Bank and the BBB are implementing.   The company culture does not just come from space that is built in the office and programs that are implemented. It comes from the leadership. Culture comes from the leaders that really do allow the staff the opportunity to come talk to them. It comes from the leadership that is open and raw about their own struggles and journeys. It comes from the leadership being willing and open to new ideas and change. If the leadership is not open, authentic, and raw, then the rest of the work that is implemented is pointless.   This is a great episode to listen in on if you are looking to hear how leaders open up to their employees to set the tone for the company. Listen in to hear the variety of ways to implement change in the workplace such as; flexible work schedules, maternal support, catered lunches, gym space, life guides, resilience strategy, mental health support, and more. It starts with the leadership and then continues on from there. Take a listen and learn from Gateway Bank.   Gateway Bank is the only community bank in Mesa, Arizona. Gateway represents a return to how banking used to be, where the staff knew everyone by name and treated customers like people instead of numbers in a database.   They bring this nostalgic approach into modern times and offer the best of both worlds: the fast, personal service of a local bank, plus the diverse products and services of a large bank. While Gateway's branch is located in Mesa, they serve customers across the Valley.   With a nationwide network of fee-free ATMs, plus added conveniences like Remote Deposit for businesses, you can experience the Gateway difference no matter where you are.   James Christensen is the President of Gateway Bank, the only community bank in Mesa, Arizona. Under his leadership, Gateway has thrived through multiple economic downturns and grown to consistently be one of the strongest performing financial institutions in its peer group.   James is also very active in the local community and was named Mesa Citizen of the Year in 2023. He is a fierce advocate for small businesses, marginalized groups, and people in need. From one-on-one meetings to presentations and podcasts like this, James enjoys educating and inspiring diverse audiences to improve their financial health and overall well-being. Connect with James on LinkedIn.   BBB Pacific Southwest proactively supports an ethical community by providing resources and education by leading experts, coworking and executive meeting space, an online incubator, access to affordable capital, and an intensive accelerator in partnership with GoDaddy.   BBB remains dedicated to helping entrepreneurs develop their businesses ethically to build stronger, more trustworthy relationships with customers. Consumers turn to BBB as a reliable source to find trustworthy businesses, and those that earn BBB Accreditation display their comittment of doing things the right way. BBB is in the business of good business.   Tierra Terry serves as BBB's Director of Diversity & Inclusion Programming and is an advocate for community, education, and connection to support the entrepreneurial ecosystem and its consumer base.   She oversees the development and implementation of programs and services that promote diversity within and outside of BBB. Her efforts cultivate a supportive and inclusive work environment while leading diversity, inclusion and equity for all.   She is a past speaker for Conscious Capitalism San Diego on the Diversity & Inclusion panel and past interviewee on AZ Family, ABC15, Fox 10, and Channel 12 News, and iHeartRadio.   Based in Phoenix, she is available for community presentations and trainings on customer service, organizational development and culture, diversity, inclusion, innovation and community impact.   Follow BBB Pacific Southwest on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.   About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company.   According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashely Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.”   As a growing company- Culture Crush Business Podcast is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders. Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible.   Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and resources that can help improve your company culture.   On this podcast: We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company. We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture.   About the Host Kindra Maples is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio).   She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow.   Then came the opportunity for leading the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further.   Shout Outs We want to thank a few people for their behind the scenes effort in helping this relaunch to come to life. James Johnson with Tailored Penguin Media Company LLC.– It is a small, but powerful video production company with a goal to deliver the very best by articulating the vision of your brand in a visually creative way. Gordon Murray with Flash PhotoVideo, LLC. -Flash Gordon has been photographing since high school and evolving since then with new products that will equip, encourage, engage, and enable. Renee Blundon with Renee Blundon Design – She is not only one of the best free divers (that's not how she helped with the podcast) but she is great with graphics design and taking the direction for the vision that you have while also adding creative ideas to bring to your vision to life. These are just a few of the folks that supported the relaunch of the podcast. If you would like to be part of the Culture Crush team or would like to support underwriting the show- please reach out: info@culturecrushbusiness.com

The Dance Between the Employer and the Employee - That's Culture. “This conversation of culture is brand new. Everytime you turn the corner there is a new thing that has never been tried and never been done before.” So how do leaders and employers take all of these new things and learn to implement them into their workplace- through support.  It's a dance and it's not easy.  There is a dance that happens between the employer and the employees. The space between that dance is where the culture is. This space between is where the growth of the company can happen. It takes support from outside of the company to grow and improve in this space though. That support could be learning how to focus on your main stakeholders, it could be providing financial education to your employees, or even coaching the leadership team.  Having Aaron and Kent on the show was so rewarding to our team and we hope it was to the listeners as well. They are both so knowledgeable and it makes sense why they work in the spaces that they do. They discussed some of these areas where the outside support to the company is what leads to the growth of the culture and the company.  Who are your stakeholders and how do you support them?  Kent gave us some insight into the work that he does focusing on the stakeholder business model and the work that he does to shift companies from a shareholder focus to a stakeholder focus. What are the needs of the employees and the employers as they keep up that dance and redefine what those relationships look like.  Aaron walked us through the responsibilities that working “in” the business is to work “on” the business. There are trends to notice, feedback to gather, and polarities in the company to deal with. In most cases, the best way to get to know what is going on inside of the business, is to ask someone outside of the business. As a leader, having someone else check in with your team is when you are going to end up finding out more.  “Who are the stakeholders that are part of your world and can they start putting the blocks together for culture so that as it grows it is there and they don't have to correct it.”  This is a beautiful episode to listen to if you are ready to hear from two of the most knowledgeable individuals about growing a conscious business with a strong culture.  A few of our quick takeaways:  Culture is not a balanced equation.  Be intentional from the get go to grow your culture.  Define your higher purpose.  All coaches are not created equally.  Share the story of your company to show transparency.  Focus on positive reinforcement with the stakeholders.    Some resources that came up in the conversation: In addition to the resources that Aaron and Kent provide, there was a book that was mentioned in the podcast that we wanted to share as well.  The book- Bringing out the Best in People: How to Apply the Astonishing Power of Positive Reinforcement  by Aubrey Daniels   The Beyond Zero film that focused on the culture and sustainability building of the company Interface.  ------------------------------------------------------------   Stakeholder Business is a collaboration between three inspired humans who care deeply about ushering in the next paradigm of capitalism where — rather than business benefiting a select few and actively harming others — it benefits all. Our purpose is to ease the transition for business leaders from shareholder capitalism to stakeholder capitalism by providing inspirational content, educational material, and world-class training. Kent Gregoire – the Co-Founder of Stakeholder Business – is on a mission to help entrepreneurs transform their companies for maximum impact. In his consultancy work, he is known as the ‘CEO to CEOs' who focuses on a win-win approach that delivers exponential value to all stakeholders. Kent is a serial entrepreneur, having launched his first manufacturing company at age 14. Since then, he has founded or led more than a dozen organizations, guiding several through successful exits and raising tens of millions of dollars in private capital for business acquisitions, start-ups and expansions. Kent has more than 35 years of experience providing advisory services to executive-level management, is one of the first certified conscious capitalism consultants in the world and is the President of the EO U.S. East Bridge Chapter. In addition to his work with Stakeholder Business, he is also the Co-Founder and CEO of Symphony Advantage in which he is focused on helping companies do well by doing good. Connect with Kent on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. At Get Out of Your Own Way, we believe that on the way to a fulfilling, successful life the puzzle piece we are all searching for is within us, and through our inner transformation we become the person that leads our community, family, and business. Our innovative coaching methods and tools provide a reliable roadmap for inner transformation, shedding your limitations and empowering you to align with your values, grow your enterprise, and build your ideal lifestyle within 6 months. We offer six-figure earners individual coaching programs and personal development retreats, while supporting organizations with leadership training and team building workshops. Aaron Velky is a keynote speaker, CEO and coach. His career has been dedicated to building movements, companies and leaders. Get Out of Your Own Way, his leading coaching company guides successful entrepreneurs to a clear direction in their lives and business – more income, more freedom and more purpose. He leads retreats and leadership training for hundreds across the US, creating change for other emerging leaders and companies. He's the CEO of Money Club, an economic empowerment and financial wellness organization that blends personal finance with professional development. And he's the author of Let Her Play, a guide for sports coaches and parents that coach female athletes. Outside of the professional sphere, Aaron is a dad, a comic book nerd and adrenaline junky. Connect with Aaron on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. ------------------------------------------------------------- About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashely Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company- Culture Crush Business Podcast is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders.  Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and resources that can help improve your company culture. On this podcast:  We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host Kindra Maples  is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio). She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion for working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion for leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow. Then came the opportunity for leading the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further. Shout Outs We want to thank a few people for their behind the scenes effort in helping this relaunch to come to life. James Johnson with Tailored Penguin Media Company LLC.– It is a small, but powerful video production company with a goal to deliver the very best by articulating the vision of your brand in a visually creative way. Gordon Murray with Flash PhotoVideo, LLC. -Flash Gordon has been photographing since high school and evolving since then with new products that will equip, encourage, engage, and enable. Renee Blundon with Renee Blundon Design – She is not only one of the best free divers (that's not how she helped with the podcast) but she is great with graphics design and taking the direction for the vision that you have while also adding creative ideas to bring to your vision to life. These are just a few of the folks that supported the relaunch of the podcast. If you would like to be part of the Culture Crush team or would like to support underwriting the show- please reach out: info@culturecrushbusiness.com

Building Culture Through Human Connection  Do you ever feel like you are moving through the motions at work and not really connecting with the people there? You want to know them more and truly connect but you aren't. Do you ever feel this same way when you are at a networking event? As if it is a competition for how many names and business cards you can share?  This is because you are not finding the real connection with people.    True human connection and communication is what really builds culture and relationships.  True connection with others helps good leaders to become the best leaders. We discussed this with Craig Forman with CultureAmp and Bobi Seredich with Southwest Institute for Emotional Intelligence on this episode of the Culture Crush Business Podcast.  When we reflect on this podcast, we have so many topics that were discussed.  Self awareness Military culture and influence Emotional intelligence for the workplace  Ways to inspire people through culture  Having the courage to be vulnerable The fitbit affect with culture  Leveraging data to grow culture  Stop, Breath, Ask If you are curious about these topics then you will have to listen to the podcast to hear more from Bobi and Craig about them.  In the meantime, we do have a few other quick takeaways from the podcast about shifting your attitude and actions.  Intent versus impact: We all have good intentions but others judge us by our actions. When you are forming a relationship or bond with someone, be curious instead of judgemental. Love human beings, not human doings. Let's try to be more intentional.  Transformational versus transactional: Let's try to be less transactional and more transformational. When it comes to connections and relationships, it does not need to be a tit for tat game. If we come at relationships with the want and need to help support and transform, then the relationship has the opportunity to build in a more unique way.    About Craig  Craig is on the mission to help the world work better by improving the places we work. He is obsessed with how humans work, both individually and together in groups. He is striving to improve the workplace through his work with Culture Amp and beyond.  Craig Forman is a Lead People Scientist at Culture Amp, an employee experience platform used by over 6000 organizations worldwide. He both supports organizations in building effective people and culture strategies along with building the world's largest community of people focused on building a better world of work. Behind all of his work is a mission to help the world work better by improving the places we work. He holds a Masters degree in Industrial / Organizational Psychology, and is a proud veteran of the US Air Force. CultureAmp  Culture Amp is a culture-first software company that is building a survey and analytics platform for people and culture. The Culture Amp team combines deep knowledge in psychology, statistics, user experience and engineering into a platform that is transforming organizations worldwide. You can connect with Craig on LinkedIn    About Bobi  Bobi is the Co-Founder & President of The Southwest Institute for Emotional Intelligence. She is a certified coach and trainer in Emotional Intelligence from the Institute for Health and Human Potential. She is a recognized speaker, author, trainer, and successful entrepreneur specializing in leadership development. Her passion is to guide individuals and organizations to a higher performance level through her own business knowledge, inspirational stories and leadership emotional intelligence training. She has spent over 25 years of her career dedicated to creating, directing, writing and presenting leadership programs for top companies in the U.S. and around the world.  In 2001 she founded Equanimity, Inc. also known as EQ Speakers, a speakers bureau, and leadership training company. It fast became a top speaker bureau that booked hundreds of speakers with large Fortune 500 clients. EQ Speakers was sold in 2012 and continues to be a leader in the industry.  Her book, Courage Does Not Always Roar Ordinary Women with Extraordinary Courage, was published by Simple Truths in the spring of 2010. The book is a collection of her experiences and stories of women who have had the courage to overcome very difficult life events. She is a mother of twins, Alex and Gia. The Southwest Institute for Emotional Intelligence The vision at the Southwest Institute for Emotional Intelligence is to enhance life and leadership through Emotional Intelligence (EI) mastery. They have a proven approach to teaching EI skills that are immediately applied to business growth. They teach influencers and leaders to connect confidently with each other in more meaningful and productive ways – to better collaborate, communicate, express empathy, perform under stress, adapt to change, and drive results. The Southwest Institute for Emotional Intelligence offers keynotes, workshops, online courses, coaching, and consulting. You can connect with Bobi and SWIEI through  LinkedIn  Facebook Twitter  Instagram   About Culture Crush Business  Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company: Culture Crush Business is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders. Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and companies that can help improve your company culture. On this Podcast: We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host: Kindra Maples  is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio). She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion for working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion for leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow. Then came the opportunity to lead the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further. Author: info@culturecrushbusiness.com 

From first glance and the start to the podcast, you may not see the amazing alignment and similarities between Jonathan and April. We see them though! Jonathan and April are both very aligned with growing conscious businesses and supporting people in a very selfless manner. What they do helps people and companies grow; Whether it is Jonathan giving advice to other business leaders about how to grow a business and not being ruthless, or April going into the company to guide and coach them to growing their business through the principles of Generosity Culture. They are both supporting the growth of great conscious and caring leaders. It was great to hear about their backgrounds getting them to this point where they are now. Jonathan grew up and went into the Real Estate business thinking that he had to be ruthless to make money. April gained experience and knowledge from her time in the military that she is now able to put into place with the work that she does helping companies and leaders. When asked about the favorite part of her own company's culture, April said, “My favorite part of my company's culture is it's all about helping and empowering others. Everything we do is in service to others' success.” When Jonathan was asked about his company culture he told us, “Keyser was built off of 15 core operating principles. We are very clear about that during the hiring process, and because of that, I am confident that each of my team members buys into those beliefs. In fact, many of the current members have joined Keyser because they believed in the principles. This bleeds into how we interact with one another and how we serve our clients.” If you are looking for a podcast with a few passionate individuals that have a strong stance on improving company culture, being selfless, supporting others- then this is it. The two of them discuss the passion to lead selflessly, the importance of being forthcoming and honest, and building a workplace that is safe and provides courage to disagree. There are stories and examples to listen to in this podcast that are great for all levels of leaders to learn from. Driven Outcomes is a consulting firm that helps accelerate the revenue growth and culture creation of businesses across industries using the principles of The Generosity Culture. Working with company CEO's, Leaders and Entrepreneurs, Driven Outcomes drives unprecedented success by modeling the power of pouring into people, clients and the community. April Shprintz is a Business Accelerator, Speaker, host of the Winning Mindset Mastery Podcast and the Author of Magic Blue Rocks, the Secret to Doing Anything, a book about the life changing impact of a winning mindset. After spending 20 great years in a variety of industries solving problems, driving growth, and accelerating companies, April realized helping people is who she is, not just what she does. Generating over $1 Billion dollars in combined revenue, April left corporate America after her highest earning 7-figure year to form her own company and expand her impact. The creator of The Generosity Culture®, April lives her dream helping innovators and leaders grow their businesses through a combination of pouring into their people, their clients, and their community. A proud veteran, April served for nearly 7 years in the Air Force as a Television News Anchor and Executive Producer. She's a graduate of the University of Maryland and holds an MBA from the University of Texas. Connect with April on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Keyser is one of the country's most innovative and trustworthy technology-enabled occupier services commercial real estate firms. Keyser's advisors assist occupiers of space with their commercial real estate needs, including leasing, purchasing, constructing, or disposing of facilities. Keyser specializes in helping tenants leverage A.I. and market expertise to secure commercial real estate incentives and attract today's workforce while reducing cost & risk. Whether it's managing, negotiating, or assisting with commercial real estate strategy, our advisors take pride in serving our clients. Jonathan Keyser is the founder of Keyser (http://www.keyser.com/), one of the most innovative and trustworthy technology-enabled occupier services commercial real estate firms in the country. Along with their international partners, they have over 560 people worldwide. Jonathan is a #1 Wall Street Journal Best Selling Author for his book, “You Don't Have to be Ruthless to Win”, and he was named “The Commercial Real Estate Disruptor” by USA Today. He has also been named a “Top Social Capital CEO” by the International Business Times, is a highly sought after keynote speaker, a thought leader featured in over 150 articles, publications, and podcasts, and during the pandemic was recognized as one of the “Top 20 Virtual Keynote Speakers” in the country. As an entrepreneur himself, Jonathan has built Keyser into an eight-figure firm named recently as one of the Top 50 Most Trustworthy Companies in America by The Silicon Review. Today through his 6,7,8 Selfless Leadership workshop series, he helps other business leaders activate the three levels of reinvention to boost profits while increasing client and employee retention. Jonathan's efforts to change the business world through selfless service manifest in his content, thought leadership, and the level of excellence he holds his team to within Keyser. Connect with Jonathan on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. About Culture Crush Business Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashely Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company- Culture Crush Business Podcast is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders.  Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and resources that can help improve your company culture. On this podcast:  We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host Kindra Maples  is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio). She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow. Then came the opportunity for leading  the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further. Shout Outs We want to thank a few people for their behind the scenes effort in helping this relaunch to come to life. James Johnson with Tailored Penguin Media Company LLC.– It is a small, but powerful video production company with a goal to deliver the very best by articulating the vision of your brand in a visually creative way. Gordon Murray with Flash PhotoVideo, LLC. -Flash Gordon has been photographing since high school and evolving since then with new products that will equip, encourage, engage, and enable. These are just a few of the folks that supported the relaunch of the podcast. If you would like to be part of the Culture Crush team or would like to support underwriting the show- please reach out: info@culturecrushbusiness.com

Culture is a hard thing to measure but that doesn't mean that it shouldn't be an area that companies continue to focus priority on. It might be hard to track culture with metrics (and things like self care for employees) but it is possible and your company will see the long term shifts in the revenue, retention, and overall company improvements when focusing on company culture.  Kathleen and Neville have such amazing backgrounds and experiences in the space of self care, meditation, and human centered leadership support that it led the conversation to a deeper level. Self care and mental health directly relates and connects to the culture of the company and the employees that work there.  Culture is the web that connects and fuels everything that is part of the company; feelings, values, mission, people, and more. We discussed the need to create a visual map or web that might show this, but even then we might be able to add in everything that matters in culture.  Retention Success Customer support  Balance  There are companies out there that are successfully starting to incorporate self care and mental health into the workplace (such as Banner Health and EvolvedMD), but we are hoping that others can start to find these ways as well. If you are searching for a conversation about bringing self care into the workplace and hearing about the importance behind it- this is your podcast. Kathleen's company focuses on growing culture through supporting the employees with the self care journey (we talk about the science behind this too). Neville is an executive with his company but very focused on the deeper levels of people and shows this through the conversation. By the end of the show, they discussed that there was a need for another episode. It wouldn't be a part two that would extend the conversation, it would be a part two that would give folks tangible steps on dealing with stressful situations, breathing techniques, and meditation practices. We will keep everyone updated, but this follow up show will be in the works soon! Mission Federal Credit Union is a $5.5B not-for-profit, and the largest financial services organization exclusively serving San Diego. Mission Fed received Consumer Reports highest rating for all national banks or credit unions in 2015 and 2018, the BBB Torch Awards for Ethics in 2015 and 2017, Forbes rating as one of the best State Credit Unions and highest ranked local credit union in 2018 and best in the state in 2019, the Union Tribune's Top Workplace Award for 2020 and the highest ranked local credit union on the Forbes America's Best Credit Unions for 2022. Neville Billimoria is an effective communications and values leader, growing organizations through external marketing, media, and sales effectiveness, as well as internal organizational alignment, corporate communications, and leadership development. He brings experience, energy, and empowerment to his leadership role as SVP Membership/Marketing and Chief Advocacy Officer at Mission Federal Credit Union. After graduating from UC San Diego, Neville has remained involved on the UCSD Alumni Board since 2008, as well as teaching martial arts, yoga, and meditation on campus for the last 40 years. Other current Board service includes the North County Philanthropic Council Executive Committee, Real World Scholars Board, and was recently appointment to the Girl Scouts San Diego Board. Prior board and volunteer service includes serving on the Ackerman Foundation Board, the Alliance 4 Empowerment Board, AFP- National Philanthropy Day Honorary Committee, Mission Fed Community Foundation Secretary, San Diego Nonprofit Association Board, Cause Conference Co-Chair 3 times, Advisor to the Conscious Capitalism SD Board & Founder of the Chamber of Purpose SD. He is a frequent speaker on topics including brand as culture, purpose-driven leadership, social capital optimization and civic engagement for maximum impact. Connect with Neville on LinkedIn. Kinessage LLC supports performance, culture, and wellness-conscious organizations, empowering leaders, managers, and teams to live more productively, confidently, and collaboratively. Self-empowered health is taught through interactive self-activated body/mind programs that neutralize stress, release chronic tension and pain, and increase mental resiliency and long-term health for greater overall well-being. Kathleen Gramzay is the Founder and CEO of Kinessage LLC. She is a Body/Mind Resilience & Self-Care Expert, Speaker, Developer of Kinessage® Mindful Resilience, and the Kinessage® Release Your Pain Virtual Self-Care System. Kathleen applies assessment skills to business helping companies solve people issues at their root cause – chronic stress, pain, and tension. She is passionate about providing leaders and teams with self-activated body/mind skill sets that restore and build mental and physical resilience to be and do their best. Connect with Kathleen on LinkedIn. About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashely Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company- Culture Crush Business is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders.  Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and resources that can help improve your company culture. On this podcast:  We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture.

Authenticity, humanity, and integrity are just a few of the words to describe the two gentlemen on this show and the direction that the conversation went in. When it comes to pairing guests for the Culture Crush Business Podcast, we pair strategically. We tend to pair a company that has a great culture with a company that offers resources to improve culture. For this show, each of the two companies that were on the show fit into both of these categories. BOTH companies are growing a great culture while ALSO supporting companies with improving their company culture. This conversation started strongly in the direction and importance of DEI in the workplace and supporting individuals in being their authentic selves in a psychologically safe work environment. Psychological safety is a shared belief held by members of a team that the team is safe for interpersonal risk taking. It gives the employees the opportunity to disagree and still be supported in the workplace. This was part of the bigger conversation of things that leaders and companies can do to support the mental health of their employees. Companies can't just talk about supporting mental health- they actually need to take action on it. We walked away with tons of examples on how to do this!! Ask the right questions What am I doing and what is the company doing that can be improved on? How are you doing professionally? How are you doing personally? Have open visibility to what goes on the calendar Therapy sessions Dentist Appointments Doctor appointments A block on the calendar for self care Support from leadership to the staff in being their own authentic self Provide a stipend that allows them additional mental health support Allowing them the time for self care during the work day Letter from the CEO articulating the importance of mental health Putting in boundaries for when emails can be sent to the staff When trying to find out more info about Hummingbird Humany, head to their website www.hummingbirdhumanity.com and go to the resources tab where they offer free resources to the Hummingbird community. From the website, visitors can also sign-up for their weekly newsletter or follow their social media accounts. evolvedMD has a variety of resources listed at their website as well. Head to their main page, https://www.evolvedmd.com/ and then head over to their resources and news tab. Both Sentari and Brian are on podcasts out there as well! Make sure to find them and follow them! Let's just say this conversation will definitely have to have a Part B to it! Hummingbird Humanity is committed to amplifying the voices of the unheard. Hummingbird's offerings include a consulting practice which partners with companies to build human-centered workplace cultures through assessment, strategy, and implementation; a speakers bureau featuring diverse voices who share about their lived experiences and offer suggestions for tangible action in their message; a growing collection of children's books and resources for grown-ups to have age-appropriate diversity conversations with kids; and a soon to be launched practice for coaching and facilitation helping leaders develop their skills to be inclusive and people-centered. Brian McComak is a consultant, speaker, author, and facilitator with over 20 years of experience in Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion, HR, company culture, change management, internal communications, and employee experience. He is the founder and CEO of Hummingbird Humanity, a consulting firm that cultivates and champions inclusive workplace cultures and human-centered leadership. Connect with Brian on LinkedIn and Instagram. evolvedMD is leading the integration of behavioral health services in modern primary care. Uniquely upfront and ongoing, our distinctive model not only places but embeds behavioral health specialists onsite at your practice. We offer an economically viable and better way to integrate behavioral health that ultimately drives improved patient outcomes. Sentari Minor is most passionate about bringing the best out of individuals and entities. His love languages are strategy, storytelling, and social impact. As Head of Strategy for evolvedMD, Mr. Minor is at the forefront of healthcare innovation with a scope of work that includes strategy, corporate development, growth, branding, culture, and coaching. Prior to evolvedMD, he worked with some of the Nation's most prominent and curious CEOs and entrepreneurs advising on philanthropy, policy, and everything social good as Regional Director of Alder (formerly Gen Next) [PHX + DAL + SFO] and strengthened social enterprises as Director at venture philanthropy firm, Social Venture Partners. A Phoenix native, Mr. Minor continued his education in the Midwest and is an alumnus of DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana where he studied English with an emphasis in Creative Writing. He is also a member of Class IV of the American Express Leadership Academy through the Arizona State University Lodestar Center. If you want to profile him: he's an ENTJ (Myers Briggs), a Maverick (Predictive Index), and trimodal Blue/Green/Red (Emergenetics). Where does he shine? In high-touch stakeholder engagement, capital raising, public relations, and strategic planning. With his background, Mr. Minor serves on the board of directors for a diverse set of social impact organizations, as a venture mentor for socially conscious companies nationwide, and as a facilitator for businesses who want organizational clarity. Committed to strengthening brands doing good in the world, Mr. Minor speaks nationally and publishes often on strategy, marketing, leadership, capacity building, social entrepreneurship, and engaging high-profile leaders in the dialogue of today. For his impact on business and community, he was honored among the Phoenix Business Journal's “40 Under 40” class of 2022. When he's not busy changing the world, self-care to him looks like working out, stirring the pot on social media, being an amateur author, and spending time with the people who make him smile. Connect with Sentari on LinkedIn and Instagram. About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company- Culture Crush Business Podcast is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders.  Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and resources that can help improve your company culture. On this podcast:  We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host Kindra Maples  is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio). She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow. Then came the opportunity for leading  the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further. Shout Outs We want to thank a few people for their behind the scenes effort in helping this relaunch to come to life. James Johnson with Tailored Penguin Media Company LLC.– It is a small, but powerful video production company with a goal to deliver the very best by articulating the vision of your brand in a visually creative way. Gordon Murray with Flash PhotoVideo, LLC. -Flash Gordon has been photographing since high school and evolving since then with new products that will equip, encourage, engage, and enable. Renee Blundon with Renee Blundon Design – She is not only one of the best free divers (that's not how she helped with the podcast) but she is great with graphics design and taking the direction for the vision that you have while also adding creative ideas to bring to your vision to life. These are just a few of the folks that supported the relaunch of the podcast. If you would like to be part of the Culture Crush team or would like to support underwriting the show- please reach out: info@culturecrushbusiness.com

Another great LIVE show in the books! It was great to have Randy and Lloyd on the show together. Not only was there alignment in the conversation around conscious business, community focus, and education improvement, there is also a new relationship built between the two of them in the Phoenix Business Community. This is another beautiful example of how we can make change in the community- one relationship at a time. These two are making amazing change in the Phoenix community and showcasing the importance of building strong communities. Along with the discussions of culture and community, there were some great tidbits and takeaways from the conversation that can be acted on immediately. What were some of the takeaway tidbits? Never discount anyone Articulate who you are Everyone wants to make a difference. Just find what is meaningful to you Just because the recording is over, doesn't mean the involvement stops there. There were some great discussions that include some actions that you can take to get involved. Time to Take Action! September 12th Event at Grand Canyon University- Beyond Zero Movie Screening Event After a life changing epiphany, the CEO of a global public company embarks on a high stakes quest to eliminate all negative environmental impacts by 2020. To succeed they must overcome deep skepticism, abandon the status quo and ignite a new industrial revolution. The full event will include snacks and drinks, networking, movie screening, and an on stage conversation with the film's producer. You can find more details by emailing Randy.gibb@gcu.edu and let him know that you heard about it on the Culture Crush Business Podcast. Classroom Supply Drive and Annual Fundraiser for the Million Dollar Teacher Project The Million Dollar Teacher Project could use your support. They are doing their best to support students by supporting teachers and can use a little more help in doing so. There is an annual fundraiser and a classroom drive going on right now.  Email lloyd@mdtproject.org to learn more and let him know that you heard about it through the Culture Crush Business Podcast. Million Dollar Teacher Project is a nonprofit organization that partners with Title I Schools, in marginalized communities, on creating community-centered strategies to help them increase how their teachers are recognized, drive more support directly into their classrooms and create innovative ways to impact how their teachers are compensated. Lloyd Hopkins is the Executive Director/Founder of Million Dollar Teacher Project. Lloyd is an organizational leader with extensive experience in community and nonprofit work. He has worked in and around education for 18 years. He graduated from Arizona State University with his degree in Nonprofit Management and Leadership and took his passion for ensuring quality education for all to launch the teacher recruitment and retention program, Million Dollar Teacher Project. In addition to being a Founder and Executive Director he is also an entrepreneur and philanthropist. As a philanthropist he is the Chair of Real Engagement through Active Philanthropy (R.E.A.P) which is a fund under the Arizona Community Foundation the supports programs making positive impacts on African-American Youth and is currently working with an Achieve60AZ Taskforce on improving attainment for the African American community in Arizona. For his efforts he was recently a finalist for the Phoenix Center of the Arts Mayor's Arts Awards for his Million Dollar Teacher Tree program and was honored by the East Valley NAACP with the Malala Yousafzai Equity in Education Award. He is also an alum of Valley Leadership's Class 40. Connect with Lloyd on LinkedIn and follow Million Dollar Teach Project on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Randy Gibb, PhD, joined GCU in July 2014 and served as the dean of the Colangelo College of Business until 2022. His team grew the college based the pillars of servant leadership, ethics, and entrepreneurism and promoted the ideals/concepts of free market capitalism and business as a form of ministry. In July 2022, he stepped into the role as Provost. Dr. Gibb served 26 years in the U.S. Air Force and commanded two Air Force flying units and retired as a Colonel and Command Pilot. He also has academic leadership experience and taught as Department Chair of the U.S. Air Force Academy's Behavioral Science and Leadership Department, helped lead the human systems integration program at the Air Force Institute of Technology in Dayton, OH, as a Senior Military Professor at the Graduate School of Engineering and Management Department, and served at Arizona State University as an Associate Professor and Chair of the Human and Environmental Systems Department. Dr. Gibb has extensive experience in aviation safety, human factors, visual perception and spatial disorientation, as well as leadership development. Dr. Gibb, originally from Wisconsin, earned his PhD and MS in Industrial Engineering from Arizona State University. He also has an MA from the U.S. Naval Command and Staff College in Newport, RI, and was a distinguished graduate from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1986. Dr. Gibb served on the Governor's Workforce Arizona Council, Canyon Angels founding board, WESTMARC board of directors, and Arizona's board of Conscious Capitalism. Connect with Randy on LinkedIn, and follow Grand Canyon University on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashely Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company- Culture Crush Business Podcast is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders.  Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and resources that can help improve your company culture. On this podcast:  We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host Kindra Maples  is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio). She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow. Then came the opportunity for leading  the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further. Shout Outs We want to thank a few people for their behind the scenes effort in helping this relaunch to come to life. James Johnson with Tailored Penguin Media Company LLC.– It is a small, but powerful video production company with a goal to deliver the very best by articulating the vision of your brand in a visually creative way. Gordon Murray with Flash PhotoVideo, LLC. -Flash Gordon has been photographing since high school and evolving since then with new products that will equip, encourage, engage, and enable. Renee Blundon with Renee Blundon Design – She is not only one of the best free divers (that's not how she helped with the podcast) but she is great with graphics design and taking the direction for the vision that you have while also adding creative ideas to bring to your vision to life. These are just a few of the folks that supported the relaunch of the podcast. If you would like to be part of the Culture Crush team or would like to support underwriting the show- please reach out: info@culturecrushbusiness.com

This conversion of culture and conscious business was so fluid that you would have thought that Kindra and her two guests, Adam and Thomas, had known each other and talked for years. This was the first time we have done a live stream where the guests could listen and post questions on the Culture Crush Business Podcast- and it was awesome! Thank you to all of the listeners that chimed in and posted questions in the chat. Thank you to Phoenix Business RadioX and Conscious Capitalism Arizona Chapter for sharing it out. They were great questions that we went over toward the end of the show. This conversation dove into many stories and examples of the actions and importance for growing a conscious business- even if it seems a little backwards sometimes. For example, Adam discussed how Goodmans Interior Structures no longer requires their office staff to come into the office to work. This might seem a little backwards for a company that builds and sells office furniture. Instead, they are assessing and redesigning the office into a place where employees want to come into the office. They took into consideration what the employees said and wanted and are putting it into action. This conscious business move will help grow and support the needs of the employees, and therefore the overall culture of the company. This conversation is a great one to listen to if you are a leader trying to improve your company culture and wanting to learn more about conscious capitalism and how it can help influence and support the change you are trying to make in your company. According to Thomas, “Consciousness has no finish line” which means we can always learn and add to our growth and our tool box. When it comes to helping companies grow in conscious ways, Thomas is the man for the job. He has supported the growth of various Conscious Capitalism chapters as well as helped over 800 leaders in his program on developing their conscious journey. He gives away a few of these tips in the podcast conversation with Adam as well. Thank you to our sponsor, the Conscious Capitalism Arizona Chapter, for seeing the value in this conversation of conscious capitalism, culture, and these two amazing gentlemen. Conscious Capitalism Arizona Chapter (CCAZ) is a nonprofit organization whose purpose, in partnership with Conscious Capitalism Inc (CCI), is to build a movement of business leaders improving the practice and perception of capitalism to elevate humanity so that billions of people flourish, leading lives infused with passion, purpose, love and creativity; a world of freedom, harmony, prosperity, and compassion. All in all that means CCAZ is elevating humanity through business. CBJourney is a movement with the purpose to accelerate the upgrade or ofganizations towards a more conscious business ecosystem. We have over 800 certified Conscious Capitalist Consultants in 21 countries, we celebrate our accomplishements though the podcast Capitalista Consciente and the books published, and we grouw our community with our programs for Consultants, leaders and Board of Directors. Thomas Eckschmidt is the father of Gabriela, husband of Ana Maria and an enthusiast of conscious capitalism. This is the journey forward, but we can share from the “obituary” too: Thomas is former farmer, engineer University of Sao Paulo who holds an Executive MBA in finance from Business School São Paulo / University of Toronto, Brazil. His corporate journey included work in twenty different countries before he launched a successful entrepreneurial career that includes 12 business awards, 4 patents filed, and 21 books published, Amazon best Seller and also one published by Harvard: Conscious Capitalism Field Guide – coauthored with Raj Sisodia. A strong believer that business leaders and organizations can do well by doing good, Thomas has been promoting Conscious Capitalism since 2010. He launched a Conscious Capitalism chapter in Brazil and Peru and supported the launch of chapters in other countries. Thomas teaches Conscious Capitalism classes in major business schools and in Corporate Governance programs. He also runs workshops that teaches the fundamentals of Conscious Capitalism and certifies consultants and Bard of Directors. TEDx Speaker with 400k views. Thomas is the cofounder and CEO of CBJ Conscious Business Journey a global network with the purpose to accelerate the upgrade of organizations towards a more conscious business ecosystem. CBJ has certified 800+ Conscious Capitalist Consultants in 21 countries and is an international program based on the Conscious Capitalism Field Guide and Fundamentals of Conscious Capitalism. He also cofounded the first conscious capitalism consultant network (Conscious Business Network) to support organizations interested in upgrading themselves. Thomas also works as a trusted adviser to help organizations implement conscious practices. He cofounded a few conscious businesses along the way, was a B-Corp certified entrepreneur and he also serves on the boards of several different companies. Connect with Thomas on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. Goodmans is a third-generation office furniture distributor in Arizona and New Mexico. Goodmans was the first benefit corporation in Arizona. Adam Goodman, president and CEO of Goodmans Interior Structures, is the third generation to lead the family business. Under Adam's leadership, Goodmans has developed many innovative programs to give back to the community. These programs include Office Chair Hockey, Goodmans Eye for the Good Guy, AIM to Make a Difference, Rooted in Good, GoodInc, GoodART, GoodTHREADS and more. In 2009, Goodmans won the first-ever ACE Award for Community Impact and in 2011 Goodmans became the third certified B Corp in Arizona. In 2012, Goodmans won the overall Impact Company of the Year Award from the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce. In 2013, Goodmans was the Better Business Bureau's Ethics Award winner for Arizona and then Goodmans was honored with the BBB's International Torch Award for Ethics. In 2014 Goodmans was named to the Game Changers 500 list as one of the top 500 companies in the world using business as a force for social change. In 2015 Goodmans became the first Benefit Corporation (B Corp) registered in the State of Arizona and in 2018 Goodmans was recognized as the Top Social Responsibility Company among the Arizona Republic's Top Companies awardees. That same year, Adam was honored with the Greater Phoenix Economic Council's Community Impact Award. Adam has held leadership positions with the Jewish Community Center of Greater Phoenix, Phoenix Country Day School, Young Presidents Organization, Conscious Capitalism, Independent Newsmedia, Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting, the Jewish Federation, the Jewish Community Relations Council, Greater Phoenix Leadership, the Phoenix Symphony, CEO's Against Cancer, Banner Health Foundation, University of Arizona Cancer Center, the State of Arizona Secretary of State's Commerce Council, First Place AZ, Greater Phoenix Economic Council, ASU Herberger Institute Dean's Creativity Council, WP Carey School of Business Economic Club of Phoenix, the National Dealer Alliance and the Herman Miller Certified Dealer Network. Adam has a bachelor's degree in business administration from University of Texas at Austin. He resides in Paradise Valley with his wife Stephanie and their three children. Follow Goodmans on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company- Culture Crush Business Podcast is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders.  Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and resources that can help improve your company culture. On this podcast:  We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture. About the Host Kindra Maples  is spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio). She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion of working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations and leadership roles. From there her passion of leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow. Then came the opportunity for leading  the Culture Crush Business Podcast and she jumped on it. Leadership, growth, and strong company cultures are all areas that Kindra is interested in diving into further.

Andy and Kristy were another perfect pairing for the Culture Crush Business Podcast. Kristy discussed what her team does to help leaders to enhance culture and optimize performance, while Andy gave us insight into the heart of his company and ways other leaders can support their internal teams. According to Kristy and her team, the four main areas that individuals in the workplace are searching for is to be known, grown, included and inspired. These four pieces are areas that Kristy and her team focus on improving but these are four main areas that your team and company can start to focus on as well! When improving company culture and focusing on your people, the ROI is there in the end. There are a handful of tips that came from the conversation that can help improve the company culture, increase retention, and attract the right new candidates. So where do you start? Take the time to know your people and who they are. Support and grow your people. Provide them professional development support and stop being afraid that they “might” leave the company. Guess what? They might stay too! Reach out to your staff and ask for their thoughts and input. Allow your staff the opportunity to feel inspired with the work that your company is doing. Both Know Your Talents and ESI are perfect examples of companies that are doing great things and allowing their staff to feel inspired with what they are doing. The next step is honesty. This means that leadership is honest to the staff and they provide a space for the staff to be honest as well. This opens the opportunity for staff to be open with their bosses and management about their goals and future growth. Maybe the employee wants to grow in the company or maybe they want to have a food truck someday. You'll never know unless you give them the space to open up. This podcast is for any level leader that understands culture is going to happen whether you work on it or not. So why not work on it and make it better? You don't have to be sick to work on your health and your culture doesn't have to be bad to want to work and improve it. All in all- when you start to focus on improving the company culture at your company, once you start you have to keep going. You can't talk to employees about their feelings, thoughts, and ideas and then not consider them as you grow and improve. Andy put it simply, “You can't put the genie back in the bottle.” In the end- as a leader- be bold, courageous, purposeful, and mindful. Know Your Talents (KYT) is a management consulting firm that enhances culture and optimizes performance at every level. Our expertise is centered around four key principles: helping businesses know, include, inspire and grow their employees. Kristy Bach serves as the President at Know Your Talents, a premier management consulting partner working with leaders to enhance culture and optimize performance at every level. Know Your Talents is the corporate division of LearnKey, a workforce education solutions provider. Kristy leads the corporate division enabling the company to offer a complete “enterprise development solution” that aligns people strategy to business strategy. Kristy brings her success to immediately connect with, consult, and inspire individuals across every level and discipline, building trust and authentic relationships with clients, team members and peers. Prior to joining KYT, Kristy was with BestCompaniesAZ a leading Arizona Marketing Company. Additionally, she served in a COO capacity for over ten years at The Finders, a local staffing and recruiting firm, specializing in Technology, Human Resources, and Finance/Accounting. Kristy currently serves on the Board of Directors for a local non-profit organization, Career Connectors and serves on the GCU Technology Advisory Board. Kristy is a graduate of the University of Arizona and she enjoys spending time with her husband and family, friends, community involvement, running, biking and hiking in her free time. Follow Know Your Talents on LinkedIn and Facebook. Educational Services (ESI) is the leading provider of employee staffing solutions for Arizona school districts, as well as assisting governments and colleges. Founded in 1999 by three educators, ESI has a passion for helping people by making a positive impact in education and public service. ESI's featured services include a return-to-work program known as RetireRehire, and SubSource, the largest substitute staffing program in the state. ESI has proudly served over 10,000 of Arizona's public retirees and actively employs over 6,000 substitute educators. Andy Shirk is the President & CEO of ESI, delighted to lead a company where heart and integrity are cherished in a people-centered culture. Prior to joining ESI, Andy lead TrueRoots Development for 7 years advising business owners throughout the Valley. Kindness, curiosity and wisdom are his core values. His greatest joy is serving people with warmth and compassion which is the bedrock of his career. Whether as a business leader or playing upright bass in the local music scene, Andy genuinely loves to create the setting for others to shine. Follow ESI on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow the Culture Crush Business Podcast on all of our platforms! Check us out here!

We had a wonderful open conversation about culture, transparency, honesty, trust, and leadership. We knew this conversation would be powerful with Andrew Kolikoff and Christine Rogers. Here is a bit of story that started off the conversation: During the planning of this particular Culture Crush Business Podcast episode, there was a different team member from Aspireship that was supposed to be on the podcast as our guest. As we were approaching the show date, she informed our team that she was in the process of transitioning and leaving the company so it made sense to bring Christine on the show instead. Our team wanted to make sure that this original guest was not leaving the company because of the culture and in reality we found out the complete opposite. Not only is that individual leaving the company on positive terms, but they are leaving with grace, transparency and the support of Christine, the company COO, and the rest of the team. This should be an example that we all live by. Now this story was not the entire conversation of the show, but it gives you a taste of where we started. This podcast was not only full of stories, but it was full of examples. There are numerous examples in this podcast of ways that leaders can improve the culture, in baby steps, within their organizations. What does that look like: Be intentional. Be human. Own your mistakes. Be transparent. Power of pause. Pause and take a moment if you need it. Think- how can you show up at that moment? Build cohesion with your team. Create space for your staff to be vulnerable. Be curious. Take a listen and hear the stories and examples that can help you improve your team culture, trust, and connection. As Andrew says, “It takes one soul at a time.” Aspireship is an industry recognized reskilling and job placement platform that helps motivated individuals pivot their career into SaaS sales. Christine Rogers is a seasoned sales and marketing leader with over 15 years of recruiting, hiring, training, and managing high-performing sales teams. Extensive background is complemented by individual experience owning a small business, giving a unique perspective to managing and growing organizations of any size. Recognized as a passionate people leader who maximizes team performance and drives results by multiplying talents for success. Specializations include: Leadership development, strategic planning, organizational management and design, recruiting and hiring, sales process & methodology, training, on-boarding, and customer experience. Connect with Christine on LinkedIn. Aurelius is creating cultures of empowered leadership (and teams) to execute innovative growth strategies through both authentic trust building and behavior transformation. Andrew Kolikoff is a multiple time C-Level executive/company founder, one time landing him on the Cover Page of USA today for a product he invented and received licensing from the NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL in 2003. Since that time, Andrew has dedicated his life to behaviorally elevating and transforming leaders' lives. Now, Andrew is an inspirational speaker, author, leadership and culture transformation guru/coach. While he brings with him his additional, wonderfully diverse experiences: 10+ years of not-for-profit board chairmanship, former chief science officer, university adjunct professor, and national director of business development, Andrew's true gift has always shown up in HOW he delivers the change and growth. As he says, before you can authentically create a culture of accountability, authenticity and scaled profitability… each leader first has to “see themselves for who they truly are and align themselves with themselves”. Connect with Andrew on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. About Culture Crush Culture is not just a tag word to be thrown around. It is not something you throw in job descriptions to draw people to applying for jobs within a company. According to Marcus Buckingham and Ashely Goodall in their book Nine Lies About Work, “Culture is the tenants of how we behave. It's like a family creed. This is how we operate and treat each other in the family.” As a growing company- Culture Crush Business Podcast is THE culture improvement resource that supports companies and leaders.  Our Mission is to improve company cultures so people WANT to go to work. Employees and leaders should like where they work and we think this is possible. Within the company: Culture Crush has Vetted Resources and Partnerships with the right people and companies that can help improve your company culture. On this podcast:  We focus on everything surrounding businesses with good company culture. We will talk with company leaders to learn about real-life experiences, tips, and best practices for creating a healthy work environment where employees are finding joy and satisfaction in their work while also striving and growing within the company.  We also find the companies that offer resources to help improve company culture and showcase them on the show to share their tips and tricks for growing culture.

On this podcast, we do a deep dive into companies that are crushing it with a great company culture and this show was no different. We matched up two great companies that are doing amazing things in their companies to grow their company cultures. APS and Co: Collective were the star companies on the show. Whether it's a company that has been around for over 100 years like APS or over 11 years like Co: Collective, they understand that growing culture is vital and at the root of continuing to grow a successful company overall. We discuss the importance of growing this culture on the inside, with employees, and on the outside with customers and clients. The culture should be transparent and consistent from all angles. One of the ways Co: Collective does this is by bringing the clients “into the sandbox” to build with them and be part of the process. The journey and the process is key in growing a good culture. The first step in the process is self transformation which can then drive into company growth and transformation. APS does this through growth mindset focus when growing and adapting in new areas. This is a great episode to listen to if you are another “company culture” guru that is loving to learn new ways to grow company culture. You can hear the passion and experience in Kit and Leila's voices, as well as the knowledge that Derek brings from his Cultural Anthropology background. This show discusses the need for company's to set bold goals that they will try and achieve. APS has set the goal to be 100% clean by 2050. This is a goal that they are in the process of aiming towards now. Similar to the goal that Black Rifle Coffee set to hire 10,000 veterans, these are large goals but important to help lead the companies in the direction that is supportive of their company culture. It was great to hear the thoughts, suggestions, examples, and passion from Leila, Kit, and Derek, that it might just be easier to listen and hear for yourself. Enjoy! co: is a creative and strategic transformation partner for purpose-led businesses. We blend strategic and creative thinking to solve problems, marrying robust, logical, fact-based insights with creative, disruptive, intuitive thinking. We provide our clients with a set of insights, tools, and processes to spur action around their Quests. By defining and subsequently capitalizing on “right space” opportunities, we help expand footprints, open up new markets, and create businesses. We believe building a successful brand doesn't begin and end with the marketing department. It starts from the inside out with daily actions, small and large, across the entire business. That's why we engage relevant stakeholders along the way and help mobilize and socialize teams around the Quest. We work with clients to develop milestone moments that not only inform but engage the entire business. Derek Newberry is an organizational development consultant who specializes in helping leaders build great cultures and drive transformational change. Prior to joining co:, Derek was an Expert Consultant at BCG, where he worked with Fortune 500 clients to design and implement culture and capability-building programs to support large scale operating model transformations. As a thought leader in BCG's People Strategy team, he also drove the creation of new offerings and frameworks in the culture and change space, including supporting the development of BCG's approach to defining the future of work. Derek is also affiliated faculty in liberal and professional studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received his Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology. Derek delivers workshops on leadership influence, team-building and culture change at the Wharton School's Aresty Institute for Executive Education. He was a faculty director for the organizational anthropology certificate in Penn's online bachelor's degree program, the first in the Ivy League. He also co-developed and launched a series of Coursera courses on team culture that have been taken by over 10,000 learners. Derek is co-author of The Culture Puzzle: Harnessing the Forces that Drive Your Organization's Success (Berrett-Koehler) and Committed Teams: Three Steps to Inspiring Passion and Performance (Wiley Press), a Soundview Best Business Book. Derek hails from Oakland, CA and currently lives in Manhattan, NY with his wife and two daughters. Connect with Derek on LinkedIn. Kit Krugman is the Head of Organization & Culture Design at co:collective, a creative and strategic transformation consultancy. Kit has 10 years of experience designing, managing, and growing teams at creative organizations. She has worked on Future of Talent/Future of Work projects for clients like IBM, LinkedIn, and Microsoft and designed organizational change initiatives for diverse communities including schools, design firms, and publishing companies. In addition to her role at co:collective, Kit is the Global Executive Director of WIN: Women in Innovation – a global nonprofit dedicated to closing the gender gap in innovation by providing concrete learning & resources to women innovators. Kit is deeply committed to building more inclusive communities and organizations. She has been published in INC, Fast Company, and the Huffington Post and spoken at DisruptHR, Talent2030, and Adobe's 99U on numerous topics including women in leadership, new organizational models and building a culture of inclusion and innovation. In addition to her subject matter expertise in organizational psychology and change leadership via a M.A. from Columbia University, Kit brings a deep understanding of narrative and design theory from her B.A. in Literature and Studio Art from Yale. Kit began her career as a K-12 art teacher and is a certified yoga teacher. Connect with Kit on LinkedIn. Arizona Public Service (APS) is working to meet business needs with practices that balance a healthy environment, a vibrant economy and strong communities for current and future generations. They provide our nearly 1.3 million customers with clean, reliable and affordable energy today and are committed to power Arizona's future with electricity that is 100% clean and carbon-free by 2050. APS also is the operator and co-owner of the Palo Verde Generating Station – the largest nuclear plant and the single-largest generator of carbon-free electricity in the U.S. Beyond electricity, Arizona is our home and giving back is an important part of our culture. Their employees volunteer hundreds of thousands of hours to support causes and non-profits important to them. And, this company contributes to teachers and charitable organizations, assists our communities with economic development, and provides millions of dollars in direct financial assistance to customers struggling to pay their bills. Leila Zaghloul-Daly grew up in Phoenix, Arizona. She is a second generation APS employee and has held various positions in HR at many Fortune 500 companies. She holds a Ph.D. in Industrial/Organizational Psychology and her current role is as the manager of culture, learning, and inclusion at APS.

On the podcast, we love matching a great company with a company or individual that supports company culture. This time we went the route of just focusing on resources to help improve company culture. Stephanie and Larry both dedicate their careers to supporting companies to improve their company culture and they do so both in person and virtually around the world! When it comes to improving company culture and finding the right person to help (either Larry or Stephanie possibly?) it all starts at the same place- the CEO and leadership HAS to WANT to improve the company culture. Ask the CEO what they want and this will help lead the conversation so they realize that improving company culture is at the root of all of their answers. They want to make more money? Well, their staff can help increase sales. They want less turnover? Well, taking care of your staff that are already with the company can help that. Once you have the leader on board, there are a few first steps on where to look to start improving the company culture; How diverse and inclusive is the company? Is there a purpose in the company that the employees can stand behind? How is the communication within the company? Is it a physiologically safe place for conversation? These are just a few of the first places to look. Not only did the conversion talk through many of the areas of improvement for companies when they first decide to focus on improving their culture, but it also included some tidbits and takeaways for the listeners as well. Here are just a few to give you an idea, but you really should just listen to the podcast to get the full context on these tips for growing your company culture. Get over yourself. What is the message that you (as the leader) are sending without words. Get a vision and live it. Develop a culture of learning. Larry and Stephanie are great resources to help leaders improve their company culture. Larry does so through understanding the brain's role in accelerated performance and coaching leaders through his knowledge and experience Stephanie is an amazing resource and “jacqueline of all trades” when it comes to company support and the use of her Company Culture game (a game which can be played both in person and virtually). These two resources are great for growing your company culture BUT they also gave plenty of tips in the podcast that a listener can grab on to first! Stephanie Angelo works with organizations that want to create a great Company Culture to outlive, outlast and outperform their competition. With her training, speaking and consulting she helps her clients develop strong cultures by establishing customized in-house programs to create Traction not Transaction™ which helps employees do better on their jobs, decrease turnover and create a high engagement organizations. In 2020 Stephanie invented the popular board game Company Culture – a Game of Workplace Traction not Transaction® which is an exclusive element in her company culture workshops in analog and digital versions. Clients include companies like CopperPoint Mutual, Faist GreenTec, Intel and Raytheon and has spoken to numerous conferences and associations such as IFMA and ASIS and SHRM. Stephanie has been interviewed on all five Phoenix TV channels and has been featured in publications including the Arizona Republic and The Phoenix Business Journal. Stephanie is an eSpeakers Certified Virtual Presenter, a professional member of National Speakers Association and a member of Society for Human Resource Management. She has served in several leadership roles. In 2014 she co-created the first-ever board game to address domestic violence – OUTrage™ – A Game to Recognize and Change Abusive Behavior. Stephanie cowrote the true-crime memoir, Serrated, and has spoken all across the U.S. and in Europe. She has won several awards for her work. Connect with Stephanie on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Aperneo is an AN ACHIEVEMENT ACCELERATION COMPANY. Since 99% of people think about what's ever on their mind and less than 1% know how they think they are in the ‘know how you think' business. Providing the knowledge, experience, and education on how the brain processes information thus how we think, creates the small difference that makes all the difference. By understanding the brain's role in accelerated performance and capitalizing on the recent scientific breakthroughs of the new brain/result paradigm, Aperneo unleashes one's innate ability to achieve record-breaking performance while living what most are only seeking. They evaluate, educate, and establish the desired outcomes to unprecedented performance simply by educating associates on how to change their minds. Their workshops, presentations and one-on-ones create a change in performance literally overnight. Once the entire organization has the knowledge behind how we think and its impact on performance they provided leadership with the how-to-kit on unleashing the creativity and desire within every empowered associate to accomplish company's new and bodacious vision by accomplishing their personally driven visions. An advisor to Fortune 500 executives, Larry Olsen has invested the last 40 years researching, adapting, and teaching developments in the field of performance-driven neurology. As a recognized international speaker, best-selling author, executive coach, and Mindset's Playbook podcast host, Larry's expertise is based on the hands-on achievement drawn from professional success within major corporations as well as entrepreneurial businesses. Larry understands that if an organization is to succeed, its people must come first – no shortcuts, no excuses. He tells us, “It's not the size of the organization that makes it successful, but rather the size of the vision within each individual that makes or breaks a company.” Connect with Larry on LinkedIn.

Let's be honest, we have been waiting to meet and record with this team for a while. It is one thing to be able to highlight companies around the world that have a great culture. It is different when we have the opportunity to highlight a company that we frequently visit. Arizona Wilderness Brewing Co. is more than just a restaurant or brewing company. They are a company with a passion to protect and conserve the great state of Arizona through growing a great culture that can help with that mission. We know that Jon and Pat will succeed in growing their company because of the purpose and the passion in what they are doing. This conversation hit a few main areas that we were interested to dive into with this team; diversity and inclusion, passion for conservation, and the process of joining B corp. Pat and Jon's journey through researching and joining B corp is what taught them more about diversity and inclusion and inevitably led them to searching for Johanna for the Head of People and Culture role. She hasn't been with the team too long but has already brought her amazing background, education, and knowledge of diversity and people to the forefront of the company. Jon and Pat have always had a passion for focusing on people, but having Johanna in her role is really helping to put the processes and infrastructure in place to do so. So what about B corp? It is very similar in some areas to Conscious Capitalism, which marks the step and repeat background in the studio. There is a focus on people, planet, and profit and how all areas can exist in the company evenly. They are still going through the process so we will look forward to hearing more about that journey for them in the future. Then of course there is the conservation piece of it all, which we love. Their phrase “Drink like you care” is a reminder that the way they make beer—and the way people drink it—matters. One of their beers in particular, “This Beer Saves Water” is made using barley from Sinagua Malt. Every Arizona Wilderness beer uses Sinagua Malt as a base; This Beer Saves Water is made with 100% Sinagua. Since 2019, Sinagua's efforts have kept more than 425 million gallons of water in the Verde River. When we say we covered a lot of ground in this conversation- we mean it! Arizona Wilderness Brewing Company is a craft brewery and restaurant created to reflect the beauty and biodiversity of Arizona. Our mission is to produce socially, ethically, and environmentally responsible craft beer and food with the intention of inspiring and uplifting our local Arizona community. We strive to enhance the lives of our guests, employees, and members of our community by creating unique, flavorful, and satisfying food and beer; providing legendary customer service; practicing solid business principles; participating in sustainable practices whenever possible; and treating our employees well. Arizona Wilderness is a company born out of love for the great state of Arizona. AZW uses craft beer, inspired food fare, and community-driven atmosphere to act as a conduit between its consumer and the great outdoors. AZW's focus on sustainability, conservation, and community is what they believe to be the new way to operate a business in the new Arizona. Johanna Lortsher is a certified (PHR) Human Resources professional with 17 year's experience. She has been with AZ Wilderness Brewing for 6 months, and prior to that spent 7 years as an HR consultant, the last 4 years as an HR Manager at a Professional Employment Organization where she helped companies of all sizes in all different industries with their HR issues large and small. Now she is living her dream by combining her passions for employee culture, the outdoors, and craft beer. Jonathan Buford is an avid backpacker and landscape photographer. Jonathan fell in love with the grandeur of Arizona when he moved here on 2002. On a hike in 2010 he crossed the invisible boundary into one of the 90 protected wilderness areas of AZ, nature spoke to him. He knew his destiny would be to promote the protection and stewardship of the state he calls home. Patrick Ware was already 5 years into his journey as a craft brewer when he began dreaming of opening his own brewery. He had developed the skills of a professional brewer and just needed a business plan to make his dream happen. Turns out, that isn't that easy to do when you're brewing all of the time! Once he met Jonathan, and they had shared a few beers together of course, it made sense to combine their skills and passion into one, bold dream. They went on a hike to that very sign that started the ideas and dream that Jonathan had, and the name Arizona Wilderness Brewing Co. was born. Follow AZW on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

We knew going into it, that this show was going to be impactful, and it was exactly that. Both Brad and Michelle have amazing backgrounds that have led them to where they are today. When you listen to the podcast, be ready to pull out a map to track Brad's amazing background and upbringing, and then you'll be astonished to hear the longevity and growth that Michelle has had with Televerde. These two have the passion for supporting the growth of purpose driven companies in two areas that overlap through the entire conversation. The topics of mental health programs and supporting the growth opportunities for incarcerated women were the strong threads through the conversation. While talking about growing a purpose driven business it is important to also mention the importance of profit at that level as well. People, purpose, and profit can all thrive and grow at the same strong level. This is a principle that both Michelle and Kindra are familiar with through their work and alignment with Conscious Capitalism. This podcast is a great one for leaders to listen to. It is important to hear and understand the need for mental health programs to support employees. This is not a new topic but a topic that companies are not familiar with talking about, and they need to get over it. When it comes to the topic of diversity and inclusion, then the conversation of hiring previously incarcerated men and women in the workplace should be part of the conversation or companies are not truly hiring in a fully inclusive manner. This conversation was deep, honest, passionate, eye opening, and important to share. In the words of Brad's amazing late mother, “ The well being of everyone is dependent on the well being of everyone.” Culture Mindful is a workforce culture nurture and growth mindset coaching platform. Their future of work digital platform is designed upon proven methods to boost workforce performance, mental well-being, build team resiliency and nurture inspired teams. Brad Kewalramani is the Founder of Culture Mindful. He has a professional background in Talent, Culture & Employee Experience. He spent the first decade of his career in the recruitment and staffing agency space, was then headhunted for a leadership role in the home owner association management space, and most recently moved in to the space of office coffee services because he was fascinated to learn that companies justify the spend of money on coffee and snacks for culture. He is now on a mission to assist organizations cultivate culture mindful workplaces that supports performance and mental well-being. Connect with Brad on LinkedIn and follow Culture Mindful on Instagram. Michelle Cirocco is Chief Social Responsibility Officer for Televerde and the Executive Director of Televerde Foundation. She joined Televerde in 1999 and has held several leadership positions including Chief Marketing Officer. Michelle was recently named one of the World-Changing Women in Conscious Business by Conscious Company magazine. Her journey of transformation was also featured by Forbes in a two-part interview. Michelle is a strong customer champion with a tireless commitment to using business as a force for good. Michelle earned her MBA from Arizona State University where she also serves as an Advisory Board Member for the Center for Services Leadership. She holds multiple certifications from SiriusDecisions. Michelle is an avid TED fan and organized and hosted TEDxPerryvilleCorrectional, the first TEDx to be held in an Arizona prison. The event looked behind the curtain of incarceration to show the potential that exists in providing second chances. Michelle dedicates a significant amount of her free time giving back to her local community by volunteering for the Phoenix Rescue Mission and Athena International. She is a member of the National Association of Female Executives and MBA Women International. Connect with Michelle on LinkedIn and Twitter, and follow Televerde on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and the Televerde Foundation on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

It may sound odd at first, but Rick relies on his decades of studying and working with non-human animals to best serve as a coach for individuals and a consultant for businesses. And he attributes his skills in observation and decoding behavior to his dyslexia. Growing up with dyslexia, Rick was forced to learn in a system that he could not fit into. Adapting and seeing the world differently, Rick learned the importance of shifting perspectives from his own to others and vise versa. As many of us know, listening is the most important part of communicating. But Rick also applies the need to truly understand the people he works with. As he learned with working with animals – each one is an individual. Therefore you work with them in a way that suits them. He works with people ands businesses the same way, taking the time to acknowledge the individual (or individuals) and understand who they are. Rick Schwartz is a certified life coach, podcast host and has a deep fascination with human and animal behavior. Rick's formal education in Animal Science and Animal Behavior set the foundation for him working closely with people and animals for the last three decades. This has given him the opportunity to meet and work with people of all walks of life, from all over the world. Rick has mentored young adults transitioning from college to career, coached clients in rebalancing their life, advised & coached heads of organizations and has worked as a private consultant for small businesses and large organizations. Rick coaches a lifestyle framework that helps his clients create a very individualistic plan that is linked to balance, personal growth and their purpose. He focuses on seven key areas of the client's life, that influence all aspects of the client, allowing them to identify and reach the life they want. Rick works with is clients to dig down to the foundation of who they really are. Together they uncover and understand where they are versus where they want to be. Rick loves coaching his clients as they create their own plan and path to the life they want. Takeaway Teaching Moment! How shifting away from your own perspective can solve many of the challenges we face. Social Media https://www.linkedin.com/in/rick-schwartz-41972827/ https://www.facebook.com/CoachRickSchwartz https://www.instagram.com/coach_rick_schwartz/ https://www.coachrickschwartz.com https://twitter.com/Ricks_Wild_Life TikTok: https://vm.tiktok.com/TTPd2NdWvb/ In addition to the above links, YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/rickschwartz And Rick's Podcast: https://weallhavesomething.buzzsprout.com

From growing up in a coal mining town to growing a company with great company culture- it was a good thing Kindra and Rick had the full hour to talk together. The conversation was so open and honest from Rick as he talked about the ways that he has open arms towards his employees. He fully understands the way to support his people. Even when it comes to having BBQs and get togethers with the staff, they invite back past employees to attend as Alumni to events. This show is a great show to listen to for some snippets of positive thoughts and feedback for CEOs to take care of their teams. “Don't underemphasize how important it is to work on and improve your people and processes. If one of those is broke then you are toast.” Field Agent is a global Work-On-Demand Platform. Harnessing smartphones across the country, the Field Agent platform bridges the gap between brands and their customers. Rick West has co-founded multiple start-ups, including the Northstar Partnering Group, CORE4 Research, JOYN, and most recently Field Agent. He is a mentor and speaker within the entrepreneurial community and an active board member. He is also a member of the global Endeavor Entrepreneur network. Rick is an 8 wing 7 and has a BBA in Personnel and Industrial Relations with a minor in Economics from the University of Kentucky. Follow Field Agent on LinkedIn.

This was such a great show, with two wonderful guests, to round out the first year of the Culture Crush Business Podcast. This first year has been a blast and we have plans to grow even more this year. It was so great to have Darren Thompson from DiverseCity and Brian Mohr with anthym on the show this month. We are thankful for their honesty and openness to discuss the real things that really grow company culture. The show also reached some very honest and real discussions surrounding company culture when it comes to diversity and inclusion and supporting your people as real people with feelings. This show was also lighthearted and fun, with momma Maples (Kindra's mom Connie) in the studio as well. Company culture is deeper than just the values on the wall that people align with though. It is important to understand the others that you are working with as more than just what their job is. Who are they? We spend the majority of our days with the people that we work with, so why not understand them on a deeper level. It is also extremely important to understand the importance of diverse teams and make sure that everyone truly feels included and accepted. Once your company has been able to include diverse teammates and see them as people with feelings, then they can grow the culture of the company even further. There were so many great tidbits in this show, that people will definitely want to take a listen. Leaders get the teams they deserve Culture is the way and how things get done People simply want to be Once you have the taste of a company with a good culture you just can't go back. If you are a company that is trying to take your company culture to the next level, then you need to listen to the show. This podcast is for all leaders. Brian and Darren give examples, tips, and reasoning for the ways that they are helping to grow company culture. Both gentlemen are supporting companies in their journeys to grow company culture. DiverseCity is a mobile technology designed to help engage and sustain DEI initiatives. Darren Thompson is VP of Marketing at DiverseCity, a technology platform dedicated to supporting and managing diversity, equity, and inclusion education. In addition, he is also the Founder of POKR, a Digital Business Development and Marketing Firm.  Darren attended undergraduate studies at The University of Arizona, and launched his career in education. He eventually branched out into Sales & Business Development Consulting and now has a diverse client base to include his favorite: Start-ups. Today, Darren is devoted to building his own tech-based start up and currently resides in sunny Phoenix, Arizona near his identical twin brother. He is an avid traveler, musician, chess player and remains committed to working with young entrepreneurs to help them achieve their goals. Follow DiverseCity on LinkedIn. Thriving organizations recognize that their level of future success will be a direct result of a highly connected and engaged team working together to create value and impact for those they serve. Connection and engagement can't be dictated or mandated, and it doesn't happen by accident; it's the result of a deliberate focus on fostering a deep sense of belonging, inclusion, and trust within the culture. The anthym experience harnesses the power of personal storytelling to knock down artificial walls and shine a bright light on the depth and breadth of authentic human connection that exists within every team. By leveraging the universal accessibility and time machine-like power of music, anthym sparks a new level of curiosity and opens the door for a heightened level of conversation leading to unparalleled levels of connection and trust. anthym is the leading team building technology platform for remote, distributed and hybrid teams. Brian Mohr's career is a learning-based journey with an intense focus on people, purpose, values, culture, and leadership. Brian has had amazing entrepreneurial and leadership experiences at Jobing.com, P.F. Chang's China Bistro, Y Scouts, and Conscious Capitalism Arizona. Today, Brian is channeling his experiences and energy into helping organizations build cohesive teams in the rapidly accelerating distributed workplace through his new company, Anthym. Brian is on the national Board of Directors of Conscious Capitalism, Inc., he is a Board member and President Emeritus of the Arizona Chapter of Conscious Capitalism, a member of the Board of Directors of the Better Business Bureau of the Pacific Southwest, a TEDx speaker, and the co-author of “Hiring on Purpose – How the Y Scouts Method is Revolutionizing the Search for Leaders”. Brian's most important and cherished responsibilities are being the lucky father to his 2 daughters, Taylor and Riley, and the proud husband to his wife, Jackie. In his spare time, you'll find Brian practicing guitar and catching a live music concert every chance he can get. Connect with Brian on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.  

This is the first episode of a new series that is solely focused on coaches and consultants. We have found that there are a large number of coaches and consultants out there that focus on helping companies to improve their company culture- so we thought- why not highlight them!  The coaches and consultants that we will highlight in this series have a unique background that has brought them to become a coach or a consultant that focuses on company culture. The really fun part about this series is the tangible takeaway that our audience will have to walk away with after listening to the episode as well. We have asked the coaches and consultants to bring something tangible on the podcast that they can share with our listeners. This means our community will have something actionable that they can take back to the office with them.  This first episode in the series is actually a long time friend of our Culture Crush Business Podcast host.  Michael DeSchalit is a multi-award winning Hypnotist, Magician, Speaker, Trainer, and Author. His experience working in the corporate sales field has led him to become a successful entrepreneur and Las Vegas Headliner. He brings not only knowledge to the table but also the excitement of a Las Vegas production show. In his 25 plus years of experience, he has traveled the world working with small to large organizations helping them to achieve their goals and create a culture within that provides an environment that is conducive to growth and success. Michael has worked with some of the biggest and most productive organizations in the country with over 25 years of experience he brings a fresh and very unique approach to his programs. He combines traditional motivation techniques with highly focused mindset coaching integrated with hypnosis and NLP (Neuro Linguistics Programming) methods and training. His training programs are focused, purposeful, and experientially engaging with actionable steps that are easy to accomplish thereby enabling faster goal achievement and massive results. His coaching covers working with the entire organization beginning with group training and then moving to pocket group training with the managers and ultimately culminates with a focused strategic training with the core leadership team. All the while there is integrated personal coaching available for specific individual needs.  He takes pride in being able to customize his training programs to meet each organization's goals. His training is not to stock motivational programs that lack substance and lasting results, but instead, help to correct issues that exist within an organization and provide them with tools and knowledge that allow for long term growth and sustainability. His coaching style is unique and cannot be compared with other traditional coaching programs. He blends a combination of group team building and personal coaching combined with mindset reframing and hypnotic programming to achieve massive results from the individual employees all the way up the ranks to the leadership team. Connect with Michael DeSchalit on Linkedin, Instagram, Facebook or Twitter   Tangible Takeaway Listeners should tune in to the podcast to learn about The Six "R's" - Respect, Responsibility, Realize, Recognize, Reinforce, and Replace. Mike breaks down the Six R's in order to help our audience with focus areas that they can improve on in their companies. These Six R's are helpful for all listeners, not just the leaders of the companies. 

As the show wrapped up, handshakes and thank yous were exchanged, and Danny and Ken walked out of the studio to face the evening traffic. Producer Darrol turned to Kindra, the host of the Culture Crush Business Podcast. “I think that was one of your best shows so far.” Each show gets better and better. The conversations are deeper, the list of resources for companies continues to grow, and the guests seem to get even more comfortable in the studio discussing the ups and downs of company culture. Ken McElroy and Danny Openden were upfront and honest with the conversations that they discussed surrounding company culture. According to Ken, “company culture is made up of the traditions, rituals, rules, consistency and especially, the human capital of the company.” For MC Companies and Southwest Autism Research & Resource Center, these contributing factors of culture were flipped upside down during covid. Their leaders and teams have had to work through this. The two of them discussed ways they are working through this and how they are trying to grow their culture again and even stronger. Both companies are doing amazing things to support their community and their people. We hope that everyone takes the time to listen in and follow both companies to see what they are up to next. This show is great for all audiences: If you are a leader that is struggling to grow your team virtually while balancing coming back to the office in person- then you should listen up. If you are a leader looking for tangible resources to help improve your company's culture- then you should listen up. If you are passionate about supporting your teams and their growth- then you should listen up. If you are just looking for some good books to read about leadership and growth- you should listen up. MC Companies has been making Real estate Investing simply since 2001. The founder's Ross McCallister and Ken McElroy, have been leaders in the industry for over 30 years and have helped many achieve their dreams of Real Estate Investing a reality. The philosophy of both is rooted in the fundamentals of Management, Ownership, and Preservation of each asset. They act as the stewards of the company and maintain an active role in every quadrant of the organization.  Real Estate Investing is MC Companies' core business, and they know the best way to provide the highest returns is to manage each asset themselves. Lesley Brice, the President, and Partner at MC Companies, leads the Management and Finance teams that make MC Companies successful. She and her team drive the performance of each asset to ensure the best returns for each investment with long-term goals in mind. MC Companies' tag line is “Sharing the Good Life,” which means something different to everyone. For Investors, it means that the company performs at its highest level and helps them achieve financial security, look towards the future and prepare for what comes next. They do this by advising and making smart investments. This means careful market analysis and intelligent stewardship of the assets. For residents, Sharing the Good Life means providing the best in class customer service and value. MC is diligent in the quest to stay in touch through customers' journeys. They look for every touchpoint to be an opportunity to take in their customers' feedback and keep happy residents happy for as long as they choose to call MC Companies' apartment homes…home. For employees, Sharing the Good Life means that as a company, they value their people…there is no company without great people doing great things. Culture is not something that just happens at MC. It is tended to with purpose and passion. Teams are encouraged to get involved in the community and given every path to do so, from paid time off to volunteer to the opportunity to donate vacation days to charity. Ken McElroy has lived and breathed real estate for his entire adult life, learning from the ground up. Ken got his start during college when he took a job managing an apartment complex. What began as a way to simply cover his room and board ignited his entrepreneurial spirit. The turning point came when the property owner dropped by the office to pick up his check for the month. Ken decided that one day he would be on the other side of the desk, picking up his own check. Fueled by that determination, Ken bought his first investment property not long afterward. It was a small property that barely turned a profit, but it didn't matter. Ken was hooked. Since then, Ken has experienced great success in the real estate world – from investment analysis and property management to acquisitions and property development. Together with his real estate investment company, MC Companies, Ken has transacted over $1 billion in real estate. Today, Ken is committed to helping as many people as possible to achieve financial freedom through real estate. He shares his expertise with thousands of people around the world through his immensely popular YouTube channel and is a sought-after speaker on real estate investing at events around the world. In addition to all of that, Ken is the author of the best-selling books The ABC's of Real Estate Investing, The Advanced Guide to Real Estate Investing, The ABC's of Property Management, and most recently his book on entrepreneurship, The Sleeping Giant. As the Real Estate Advisor to Robert Kiyosaki of The Rich Dad Company, Ken is also a chapter contributor in the newly released Rich Dad book, More Important Than Money: An Entrepreneur's Team. Ken lives with his family in Scottsdale, Arizona. He is probably mulling over a deal right this second. Connect with Ken on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and follow MC Companies on LinkedIn. Established in 1997, Southwest Autism Research & Resource Center (SARRC) is an internationally recognized nonprofit that conducts innovative research, provides evidence-based practices, disseminates effective training, and builds inclusive communities for individuals with autism and their families. SARRC is dedicated to autism research, education, evidence-based treatment, and community outreach. Additionally, SARRC is one of the only autism organizations in the world that provides a lifetime of services for individuals and their families while also conducting cutting-edge research.  We're also an entrepreneurial nonprofit, with less than three percent of annual revenue coming from state and federal funding. Our 18,000-square-foot Campus for Exceptional Children and our 10,000-square-foot Colonel Harland D. Sanders Center for Autism Studies, co-located with our Vocational & Life Skills Academy, are state-of-the-art clinical centers that serve as models for similar research and resource facilities. Daniel Openden, Ph.D., BCBA-D is President and CEO of the Southwest Autism Research & Resource Center (SARRC) in Phoenix, Arizona. SARRC is an internationally recognized nonprofit organization dedicated to autism research, education, evidence-based treatment, and community outreach to support individuals with autism and their families throughout their lifetimes. The 18,000 square-foot Campus for Exceptional Children and 10,000-square-foot Sander's Center for Autism Studies co-located with SARRC's Vocational & Life Skills Academy are state-of-the-art clinical centers that serve as models for similar research and resource facilities. In 2007, Dr. Openden was recruited to SARRC from the renowned Koegel Autism Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara to serve as SARRC's Vice President and Clinical Services Director. Since joining SARRC, Dr. Openden has advanced the center's clinical programs and services, including an inclusive preschool, a comprehensive home-based program, a parent training program for families living in rural/remote areas, and school consultation. In 2009, Dr. Openden and Dr. Christopher J. Smith, SARRC's VP & Research Director, received funding to initiate and research SARRC's Remote Telemedicine Program to provide follow up access to services via the internet for families living outside Maricopa County. In 2011, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) identified SARRC's innovative, cutting edge inclusive preschool among the most promising practices in autism services to influence the development of effective care systems in other states. Dr. Openden is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst—Doctoral (BCBA-D) and is licensed as a behavior analyst in Arizona. He has expertise in developing training programs for teaching parents and professionals to implement Pivotal Response Treatment (PRT), a comprehensive, evidence-based treatment model for children with ASD. Dr. Openden has worked extensively with families with children, adolescents, and adults with ASD; provided consulting and training for school districts across the country; presented research at regional, state, national, and international conventions; served as Associate Editor for the Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions (JPBI) from 2008-2013, and been published in several peers reviewed journals and book chapters in the field. Dr. Openden is also an adjunct professor at Arizona State University (ASU) and serves on the Autism Speaks Family Services Committee; Scientific Council of the Organization for Autism Research (OAR); Arizona State University President's Advisory Community Council; Feeding Matters Medical Professional Council; and the Arizona Autism Coalition Advisory Committee. Further, he is a founding member of the Council on Autism Services (CAS), a networking organization that brings together Presidents, CEOs, Executive Directors, Clinical Directors, and Program Directors to share high level information and identify gaps facing autism service delivery organizations. Dr. Openden was honored as one of the Phoenix Business Journal's “Forty Under 40” up-and-coming community leaders in 2011, and in 2015 he was honored as one of the “Most Inspired Leaders.” Dr. Openden graduated from the University of California, Santa Barbara, with a bachelor's degree in sociology and a master's and Ph.D. in Education with an emphasis in special education, disability and risk studies. Connect with Dr. Openden on LinkedIn and follow SARRC on Facebook.  

Our Culture Crush team has gotten into the groove of making great matches. We used to say that the matching was like great wine and cheese, but this time it was more like great soup and a bread bowl (get it?). Katie Wall from CutlureBiz and Louis Basile from Wildflower Bread Company was a great pairing to discuss the importance of growing company culture in a way that is intentional, consistent, and fun. Whether you are bringing a blow horn to a meeting or starting your meeting off with a facilitated game (from CultureBiz), it is important to bring a level of play into the workplace. This episode is great for all audiences to listen to. If you are in leadership trying to improve meetings and overall participation and morale of your team- you should listen in. If you are determining the various ways to improve company culture- then listen in. If you are wondering how easy it is to improve company culture, it's not- so listen in. If you are looking for another resource to help grow the culture of your team- listen in? If you are looking for another great company in Arizona to support or work for-you should listen in. Wildflower is a local Arizona fast casual restaurant chain that believes success comes down to three things — outstanding food, great service, and clean restaurants. It is easy to say, but it takes a strong commitment to executing consistently. Attention to detail, putting the customers' needs first, and a deep desire to be a great company help make the Wildflower a place where customers want to be. Louis J. Basile Jr. is the Founder & President of Wildflower and has worked in the restaurant industry since his childhood growing up in Union, NJ. His father owned a local luncheonette in East Orange, NJ, where he learned the restaurant business. At the beginning of his career, Mr. Basile served as a Construction Project Manager, renovating existing steak houses into Cisco Café Mexican Restaurants for the Chart House/Cork n' Cleaver Corporation. In 1981 Mr. Basile joined a three-store chain called Au Bon Pain (Boston, MA), an upscale quick service restaurant and bakery. Louis was a key Senior Manager who helped Au Bon Pain grow to over 250 Stores during his tenure. Mr. Basile held numerous Senior Management positions, including Vice President of Operations, Construction, Research & Development, and Domestic & International Franchising. Mr. Basile and his family moved to Arizona in 1994. Before following his dream to create his own fast casual restaurant and bakery concept, Mr. Basile held the position of President/COO of the Coffee Plantation (Tempe, AZ). Mr. Basile founded the Wildflower in Scottsdale, AZ, in 1995. The first Wildflower opened in November 1996. Today, he oversees multiple restaurant locations and a growing, fresh dough Central Production Facility as well as a wholesale bread division operating throughout Greater Phoenix and Northern Arizona. Wildflower Bread Company is part of the fastest growing segment in hospitality called Fast Casual. Wildflower prides itself on delivering the most memorable restaurant bakery experience and impacting its local communities through various charitable outreach programs. In recognition of these efforts, Wildflower was awarded the 2018 Restaurant Neighbor Award by the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation. Mr. Basile started and was Chairman of the Fast-Casual Industry Council, an affiliate of the National Restaurant Association. Louis is a National Restaurant Association Board Member. He is a past Chairman of the Arizona Restaurant Association and Arizona Restaurant Association Educational Foundation. Louis serves as a Board Director for Child Crisis Arizona. Mr. Basile served on the Advisory Board for People Report/Black Box Intelligence and PeopleMatter. Louis is a founding member of Changers of Commerce, a movement of leaders who believe there is a better way of practicing Capitalism. Louis is married to Tracy Basile, and they have three children Zachary, Jessie, and Max. Follow Wildflower on Facebook. TheCultureBiz is on a mission to help teams cultivate their unique cultures through play, with pre-packaged crates and interactive workshops that are approachable, affordable, and original. Created in October 2019 by Colorado-based entrepreneurs Katie Wall and Courtney Jacobson, TheCultureBiz inspires connection and culture building at work with play. Cultivating a cohesive, psychologically safe, and productive workplace culture means focusing first and foremost on the specific individuals on your team. Their products and services are perfect for culture building at retreats, team meetings, and conferences. Play is proven to relieve stress, improve brain function, boost creativity, provide energy and bring us closer to others. Make meetings matter with TheCultureBiz. Now…go play! Katie Wall, TheCultureBiz CEO, is a certified and accomplished facilitator with over 14 years of experience creating meaningful engagements for all participants. Her background in experiential learning and expertise in play helps teams connect, ideate, and design more efficiently and effectively, generating participant consensus, leveraging the expertise in the room, and driving toward practical application. Katie has experience working with nonprofit and for-profit teams, with expertise in culture and team development, DE&I, strategic planning, human-centered design, arts integration, trauma informed care, conflict resolution, leadership team development, and innovative design. Katie has a BFA in Theatre Performance from The University of Colorado-Boulder and is certified in facilitation and Design Thinking. She is an advocate for collaboration, inclusivity, and psychological safety in every workshop. Katie lives in Denver, CO, with her husband, her two children, and a very destructive fur baby. Follow TheCultureBiz on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.

This match was like pairing great wines. We love when we have a company that has a great culture paired with a company that supports great culture. This show was just that perfect match for the Culture Crush Business Podcast. Kelle and David both bring so much knowledge and expertise to the discussion around company culture. This fluid conversation took us in the direction of discussing companies with unhealthy company culture, how to deal with companies that do not have a good culture, and how to support others in leaving those companies in their search for a company with a great culture. We live in a time where there is no need to stay stuck with a company that has an unhealthy culture. Companies are hiring everywhere and many of those companies are ones with great company culture. The consensus in the discussion was to encourage people to find the best fit for them, especially if it means leaving and finding a position somewhere else. Although we discussed many situations of companies with unhealthy culture and what to do, we also discussed that there are companies with a great company culture that still might not be the right fit. If you are a person that likes flexibility then it would not make sense for you to work at a company that is very strict. If you are not an outdoors type of person then it would not make sense for you to work for a company that has a strong culture that focuses on being outdoors. Finding the right company is like finding the right soulmate online on a dating app. This conversation is yet another one that we will have to plan on doing a part two in the future. Listen to this podcast: If you are working for a company that has a good culture but is wanting to grow it better If you are working for a company with an unhealthy culture If you are thinking of leaving your company for a company with a better company culture If you are interviewing for a new position with a different company and are trying to find the right fit If you are wanting to learn more about company culture and resources to support you in this journey CultureWise offers small to medium size businesses a turnkey operating system for culture. David Friedman is an award-winning CEO, entrepreneur, author, and renowned public speaker. In 2011, he published his first book, Fundamentally Different, which is based on the insights he learned and taught throughout his leadership career. In 2021 he published the second edition of his book, Culture by Design, the definitive “how to” manual for building a high-performance culture — even in the new remote work environment. His current company, High Performing Culture, has helped hundreds of companies throughout North America to implement his culture operating system, CultureWise®. Follow CultureWise on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. ADMANITY® is the home of the innovative, breakthrough algorithm, The ADMANITY® Protocol. ADMANITY® is the first company to create an online test and predictive emotional algorithm to determine the best emotional advertising strategy for your business, in any niche.  The affordable, 5-minute true/false ADMANITY® Protocol test isolates one of 15 emotional archetypes best suited for your business. The ADMANITY® Protocol is the only algorithm that can identify your company's emotional archetype and then identify your ideal advertising strategies, tactics, formulas, and even copywriting tactics. It gives you agency-level recommendations that your business can use for years. Discover the secrets formulas billion-dollar brands use every single day. Kelle Steinecke is the Chief Marketing Officer and Partner at ADMANITY®. An accomplished Marketing Executive, her career spans decades of success and numerous milestones of personal achievement. Being an ardent creative with a competitive spirit, Kelle fast-tracked the corporate ladder, regardless of the barriers thrown her way. Kelle initially found great success in the financial sector but has proven herself equally adept in many industries, including real estate, healthcare, automotive retail, managed IT, waste management, and bank/credit union consulting. In addition to being an expert leader of marketing teams across many diverse industries, Kelle evolved into a leadership coach for both staff and C-suite teams. Kelle is a die-hard optimist who champions the kind of culture where teams don't just survive – but thrive. She sees a challenge only as a gateway to an innovative solution and her passion for helping others achieve goals previously thought impossible, is truly what fuels her entrepreneurial soul. Connect with Kelle on LinkedIn and follow ADMANMITY® on Facebook, Twitter , and Instagram.  

This podcast was a unique and different podcast compared to the normal Culture Crush Business Podcast. This was an opportunity for our host, Kindra Maples, to join another podcast in the Phoenix community. Kelly Lorenzen, the host of the Collaborative Connections Podcast and the owner of KLM Consulting, brings 3 individuals together from the community to connect and collaborate.  The best part of this podcast conversation was the topic that it quickly leaned toward- CULTURE! This is a conversation that people can always contribute to and as we saw in the discussion here, it was a topic that they wanted to bring up and be part of. This was a great opportunity for the Culture Crush Business Podcast and we hope to join forces with Kelly again in the future.     Alcyon Consulting can help you in two ways…Financial & Business Operations Management and Business Consulting & Advisory Services. With Alcyon's financial and business operations support, you can shift the burden of managing and overseeing those necessary, but non revenue generating activities, to a professional who has the passion, experience, and training to assess, manage and improve your company's business infrastructure thus freeing you to focus on generating revenue and building the business.  If you are looking for a fresh set of eyes to review and analyze any or all aspects of your business…from financial statements to fraud prevention, then Alcyon's Business Consulting & Advisory Services could be the answer. As an Accredited Small Business Consultant (ASBC), Bob and Alcyon utilize a proprietary approach to review and analyze your business, and along with its broad business partner network, Alcyon will not be able to not only make solid recommendations for improvements but will be able to identify, vet and implement the right solution. Bob Blum leverages over 35 years of extensive and varied experience, in both staff and leadership roles, helping companies build and maintain stable business operations by focusing on maximizing both financial and human assets. These roles include Principal and Chief Financial Officer for Peerless Candy & Tobacco Company, Senior Human Resource Consultant for Peoples Energy Corporation, Controller for Ben Brooks & Associates, Controller for Incentive Logic, and most recently CFO for MAC6. Bob is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), an Accredited Small Business Consultant (ASBC), a Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, and has a Bachelor's in Business Administration from Ohio University. In addition, Bob earned a Master's in Human Resources, with a specialization in Organization Development, from Loyola University in Chicago. Connect with Bob on LinkedIn. Bell Insurance is one of the largest independently owned, full-service agencies. They've worked in insurance for more than 100 years, giving them unparalleled experience and expertise on policies designed to serve you, your family, and your business in the best way possible.  in 1911 as Warner and Company Insurance in Fargo, N.D., they became Bell Insurance in 2019 when they joined forces with Bell Bank, one of the largest independently owned banks in the nation. Bell is known for exceptional service and high integrity, where people matter, which shows in how their team members treat each other, their customers, and those around them. They understand one of your biggest challenges is managing around the things you can't control. They can help you by building an insurance plan based on what you need to address the unique risks your operation faces. By getting to know you and your business and working with you to figure out an insurance policy that gives you the right coverage at the best rate, they'll help you protect what you've worked so hard to build. Whether you need small business insurance or coverage for a large, niche operation, they'll help you protect what matters with commercial insurance coverage options in your best interest, competitive pricing, stress-free claims, and the high-quality service you can expect from Bell. Sara Kelley has over 20 years of experience serving clients in a risk management capacity. She started her insurance career in Chicago, IL with the world's largest insurance brokerage firm and moved with them to the Phoenix market. Since being in Arizona, Mrs. Kelley has developed her expertise to serve the businesses that thrive in the Valley of the Sun. Sara specializes in property and casualty insurance and risk management for a variety of industries including Healthcare, Social Services, and Non Profits, as well as Indian Nations, contractors, manufacturers, and many other businesses. Sara provides clients with insurance solutions for various insurable risks. For Insureds, Sara Kelley delivers risk and policy coverage reviews that focus on your firm's expense reduction, cash-flow improvement, balance sheet protection, and decision-making insight. Connect with Sara on LinkedIn. Conscious Capitalism Arizona  Free enterprise capitalism has served to lift more people out of poverty than any other socio-economic system ever conceived – empowering social cooperation, human progress, and elevating humanity.  Good business is the answer to many of the global issues that humankind is facing. For too long, capitalism in the media has been associated with lying, cheating, manipulating, gaming the system, and taking advantage of society. But for every horror story being told about the selfishness of corporate America and Wall Street, there are thousands of stories of businesses supporting their communities, investing in their employees, and making the world a better place. We are working to change the capitalism narrative by shining a bright light on good business – telling the stories of conscious Arizona companies (and encouraging others to follow in their footsteps). There is a lot in her background that has led Kindra Maples to where she is today. Her past experiences, interactions, careers, and partnerships have led her to grow the roles she holds in the community; the VP of Volunteers with Conscious Capitalism Arizona, Sales Development with YellowBird, and the host of the Culture Crush Business Podcast. She is a spartan racer, past animal trainer, previous magician's assistant, and has a weakness for Oreo cookie shakes. Her journey working with people actually started working with animals as a teenager (don't worry we won't go that far back for her bio). She worked for over 15 years in the zoo industry working with animals and the public. Her passion for working with animals shifted into working with people in education, operations, and leadership roles. From there her passion for leadership and helping people develop has continued to grow. Her experience in non-profit operations, communications, and program engagement have brought her to the place she is today. Her experiences have built her passion and her “why” in areas of culture building, engagement, and growing strong teams. Connect with Kindra on LinkedIn and follow Conscious Capitalism Arizona on Facebook, Twitter ,and Instagram.

This episode of Culture Crush focused on the conversation of employee recognition. We were able to highlight two great individuals leading two employee recognition companies. Dan Silivestru with Chocolate Soup and Jonathan Fields with Assembly provided insight into the need for company recognition to the employees as we way that can increase company culture, brand recognition, and increase engagement and retention of the staff. Their two companies compliment each other with the support they give to employee recognition. Assembly allows the employees the opportunity to provide recognition to their peers while Chocolate Soup allows the leadership team to provide recognition to the employees on all of their special days. 85% OF HR LEADERS SAY EMPLOYEE RECOGNITION PROGRAMS ENHANCE THEIR ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE. 79% OF EMPLOYEES SAY THEY WOULD BE MORE LOYAL TO THEIR EMPLOYERS IF THEY RECEIVED MORE RECOGNITION. This episode is great for all listeners. We can all connect with working for a company with a good culture or a bad culture, so we can all connect to the discussion of employee recognition as well. We encourage company leaders to listen to this episode to gain two new resources that are designed to help employee recognition and therefore the overall health of the company culture. These two resources can drastically help improve the engagement of the staff by showing them the recognition they need. Chocolate Soup was born out of a sheer passion for building great company culture in support of happy, caring, and respectful teams. They're here to help companies of all sizes discover the power of radical generosity, surprise and delight by recognizing important employee milestones with expertly curated, personal gifts. Chocolate Soup offers a subscription-based employee recognition program that delivers beautifully curated gift boxes filled with treats and gifts. Companies can recognize their employees' work anniversaries, birthdays, children and pet birthdays and more. They also offer custom gift boxes for company events or for unique milestones including weddings and new home purchases. Chocolate Soup lives and breathes employee happiness! Dan Silivestru is the co-founder and CEO of Chocolate Soup. A life-long entrepreneur, Dan and his partner Pj Lowe have founded three previous startups, selling TinyHippos to RIM (BlackBerry) in 2011. Their experience closing down their last startup, bitHound, gave them the idea for Chocolate Soup and its mission to help companies with employee recognition, engagement, and retention through beautifully curated, locally sourced gift boxes. In addition to running Chocolate Soup, Dan also serves on the board of several startups and mentors early-stage founders with their startups. Follow Chocolate Soup on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Assembly is an employee recognition and rewards solution that ensure employees feel appreciated and acknowledged for their hard work. Jonathan Fields started his career in investment banking. After one short year he realized that his efforts were not truly valued and wanted to work in a more collaborative environment. Jonathan joined a small startup called ZipRecruiter as the 15th employee. The company went on to grow to over 1,000 employees and recently went public. After 7 amazing years at ZipRecruiter Jonathan realized he wanted to better the employee experience and make work more efficient so he went on to build Assembly. In the past year Assembly has grown over 3,000% and continues to better work life culture in this changing environment. Jonathan is an avid golfer, lives in Marina Del Rey with his fiance Eliana and has a mini golden doodle named Charlie. Jonathan also has a very immature sense of humor and is obsessed with Coldstone. Follow Assembly on LinkedIn.  

The Culture Crush Business Podcast is a podcast that we hope is for all listeners. With that being said, this is a great episode to listen to if you are leading a company or working for a company that is trying to build its company culture into the onboarding and training for employees. Culture starts at the very beginning and Journeyage is helping to make that possible. This is also a great episode for those company leaders and employees to listen to if they are wanting to find a few new tips for adding “spice” to their company culture. We want to help companies build their company culture while also showcasing the companies that have a great company culture. There are not many companies out there where you can show up to work on your first day dressed as the Easter Bunny (wink wink…. You should just listen to the show) but we are here to showcase them to the community. This was an episode with Michael Zalle from YellowBird. Kindra, the Culture Crush Podcast host, and Michael were both attending the Behind the Mic event with PBRX and ended up in the same breakout room. After the connection and conversations, Kindra now works on the YellowBird team. Yay relationship building with PBRX!!! YellowBird is an online marketplace that simply and easily connects Environmental Health and Safety Professionals with businesses on-demand. Their vetting process ensures the deep roster of nationwide professionals are interviewed, background checked, insured, and certified so they are ready to perform when needed. YellowBird uses technology to save companies 25% and match professionals with projects 15X faster than traditional consultants or staffing agencies. Michael Zalle is the Founder and CEO of YellowBird. As a career tech entrepreneur, Board member, and advisor, he has a passion for making a difference through finding ‘the better way' to solve big problems through tech. He's responsible for creating and building new concepts and companies, resulting in multiple successful exits over a 25-year career. He attended San Francisco State University and Pepperdine University with a focus on Business Management. Michael enjoys traveling with his wife of 20 years and two awesome kids. He engages in a variety of outdoor sports including golf and tennis; he ranks himself as an incredibly average golfer and perhaps even worse tennis player but remembers a day when he was competitive at both. Follow YellowBird on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Journeyage is an enterprise training solution for onboarding remote employees. We believe that one-size training doesn't fit all, but one platform can! People have unique personalities, roles, locations, backgrounds, preferences, and possibilities. Use our robust personalization features to simply—and automatically—tailor what every employee experiences in the training you deliver to them. 50's housewife by interest and intersectional feminist by passion, Lisa Glenn Nobles is just as likely to be whipping up strawberry jalapeno preserves as crafting a Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging action plan for Journeyage. Her professional passions include building systems, creating strong cultures that value humans over profits, and making Slack a fun place to be. When she's not working on operations at Journeyage, she can just as likely be found: Hiking in the Phoenix Mountain Preserve Binge-watching Queer Eye while having a good cry Planning her next international trip (South America, Japan, Kazakhstan, and New Zealand are on the shortlist) Hanging out with her husband throwing the ball to labrador Clarence or cuddling with ragdoll cat Honey Lisa came to Journeyage after a journey through the nonprofit, operations, and education sectors, finding her true home at Journeyage (where she gets to do all those things!). She volunteers regularly with ConstellateAZ, a local nonprofit dedicated to getting high risk youth involved in entrepreneurship. If you'd like to share a recipe or an idea for generosity initiatives, Lisa can be found on Twitter and LinkedIn, and by email. Follow Journeyage on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

This show was a very unique show that we were excited to finally execute on. The Culture Crush Business Podcast and the People and Profit Podcast, sponsored by Conscious Capitalism Arizona, came together for a special crossover episode. Matt Altman, with Sportiqe, was the best guest for this crossover experience. His knowledge and understanding of running and growing a conscious business was perfect for the conversation with co-hosts Jeremy Neis and Kindra Maples. Yes, businesses are here to make money and be profitable, but this can be done while also supporting the employees as humans. People and Profit should be on the same level. Your people are the ones that are going to take care of your customers. It is important to try and support their fundamental human needs; freedom, independence, community, family, and teamwork. When we are connected together, we can help each other and there is a win- win outcome. They even had the chance to dive into the six values that Sportiqe has, that go beyond just writing on the walls. The “values and behavior are what drive a team and a family.” Teamwork, Evolve, Respect, Can Do, Integrity, and Fun are all values that have grown with the company and continuously lived through the team at Sportiqe. This episode is great for all listeners! This conversation is great for any job level to listen in and find motivation in the way that Sportiqe is growing their brand. This conversation is great for CEO's out there to listen to in order to understand the benefit and the need in taking care of your people with the same passion that drives the company to be profitable. This conversation shares insight into how to treat employees and the why behind it. We look forward to the next opportunity to have Matt back on the show. Headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, Sportiqe is a global, lifestyle apparel brand that is committed to delivering elevated basics using premium fabrics, innovative designs and an on-trend fit that not only look and feel good, but provide superior comfort no matter the occasion. Outfitting more than four-million people around the world since its inception in 2006, Sportiqe designs, manufactures and sells premium, Modern American comfort wear for men, women and youth with a focus on t-shirts, hoodies, sweatpants, headwear and more. All apparel is designed and decorated in Sportiqe's home-state of Ariz. The company was founded on the success of its wholesale division, which bridges the gap between the fan and fashion world by providing comfortable attire with on-trend garments and graphics to a number of globally recognized brands including the NBA, Nintendo, Dave Matthews Band, Peloton and Live Nation, to name a few. For more information about Sportiqe, visit Sportiqe.com. The brand was founded on the success of its wholesale division, which bridges the gap between the fan and fashion world by providing comfortable attire with on-trend graphics to a variety of globally recognized brands across the entertainment, sporting, food and beverage, health and wellness, and tech and gaming industries. Serving as a fashion house for clients, Sportiqe designs, creates and delivers elevated and on-trend, custom apparel for companies who can choose from a graphics package from the Sportiqe wheelhouse or work with the company's skilled graphic design team for custom looks and themes Sportiqe believes in making an impact that reaches far beyond its comfortable fabrics and clothing. That's why Sportiqe is dedicated to improving the lives of children in crisis around the world by investing their time and resources in causes that support their mission. As co-founder and CEO of Sportiqe, Matt Altman is a Phoenix native who spent more than a decade as the director of merchandise for the NBA's Phoenix Suns, MLB's Arizona Diamondbacks and NHL's Arizona Coyotes where he oversaw all retail operations including buying, sourcing, designing, product development, inventory, sales and logistics for Talking Stick Arena and Chase Field. In 2006, Altman co-founded Sportiqe, a global, lifestyle apparel company, that is committed to delivering elevated basics using high-quality fabrics, innovative designs and on-trend fit that not only look and feel good, but provide superior comfort no matter the occasion. Sportiqe quickly became a household name amongst some of the most recognizable brands, athletes and celebrities in the world after landing a licensing deal with the NBA early on and being amongst the first apparel companies to bridge the gap between the sports fan and fashion world. To date, Sportiqe collaborates with global leaders like the NBA, Nintendo, TREK, Rock N Roll Hall of Fame, Warner Bros. and the Dave Matthews Band, to name a few. Sportiqe has outfitted more than four-million people around the world since its inception. Altman has a lifelong passion for helping people – supporting them to live their dreams and be the best version of themselves. He serves on the board of The Prem Rawat Foundation, which addresses the fundamental human needs of food, water and peace. He is a member of Entrepreneur's Organization (EO) and serves on the board of the Arizona Chapter. Altman holds a bachelor's degree in accounting and business from the University of Arizona. In his personal life, he enjoys spending time with his wife and family, as well as practicing yoga, skiing, travelling and living his life with the goal of always learning. Follow Sportiqe on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram, and Twitter.

The Culture Crush Business Podcast team wants to make sure that we are always sharing great companies with our audience. We want to make sure that we are highlighting companies that are crushing it with a great company culture but there is more to it all then that. We want to make sure we are also proving our listeners with the best resources out there to help with building a great company culture. A great company culture starts at the top. The CEO is the individual that the team looks up to and follows. This puts a lot of pressure on that individual to show strength in leading the team in the right direction. It is important to see the leader as more than that. They are humans too; learning to balance work, family, teams, budgets, emotions, and more. Our two guests are two amazing resources that help support the CEO's in order to give them the tools and support they need to grow their teams and their companies. Andy Maurer, Emotional Wellness Coach Tom Goodman, Vistage CEO Chair New research around neuroscience and leadership shows that there is a large disconnect between logic and emotion that greatly limits a leader's capacity to perform at optimum levels in their life, work, and relationships. Leaders rarely have a place to safely and confidentially process and make sense of their inner struggles. As an emotional wellness coach, and a former licensed therapist specializing in leadership, Andy has created a space for them to show up and reclaim their humanity and true identity. Although you might have heard of Vistage before, Tom is one of the best Vistage Chair's out there. Vistage is the world's largest CEO executive coaching and peer advisory board organization, with over 24,000 members worldwide. Executives join Vistage groups to connect with other high-performing presidents & CEOs to help them become better leaders and accelerate their company's growth and profitability. Who should listen? This episode is a great episode for everyone to listen to but the focus is definitely on support for CEOs. Do you know a CEO that you would like to support and provide some resources to? Are you the CEO of a company and you are needing support from other CEOs that you can connect with? Are you a CEO that is looking for personal support that allows you a safe space to help dive into some inner struggles? Or if you are a CEO that thinks you are doing “fine” leading your company, you should listen to this episode. Thank you to Catholic Education Arizona for sponsoring this episode! For 23 years, Catholic Education Arizona has helped serve underserved children with $268 million in scholarships. Catholic High Schools have a 99.4% graduation rate and 97% move on to higher education or military service. Participating partners like APS, BBVA, and Grand Canyon University receive a dollar for dollar Arizona State Tax Credit. The corporate partners enjoy helping our future work force, Building the Arizona community and future leaders! The partners also enjoy promotion in our newsletter, social media channels and podcast! Please call us at 602-218-6542 or visit www.ceaz.org – they are changing lives one scholarship at a time! #leadership #entrepreneurship #smallbusiness #culturecrushpodcast #culturecrush #mentalhealth #emotionalwellness #CEOsupport Vistage is the world's largest CEO executive coaching and peer advisory board organization, with over 24,000 members worldwide. Executives join Vistage groups to connect with other high-performing presidents & CEOs to help them become better leaders and accelerate their company's growth and profitability. Vistage members do three things differently compared with other CEOs and business leaders: They step away from their day-to-day duties on a regular basis to think about and focus on their business, rather than work in their business. They get out of the weeds and are able to focus on strategy. They connect with other leaders in like roles and share learnings to help each other make important, more informed decisions. They become better decision-makers and are more confident in the decisions they make. They are constantly looking for outside perspectives for new and innovative ideas to bring into their businesses. Vistage peer advisory boards work: a D&B study showed that Vistage member companies grew on average 2.2x faster than did other similarly-sized companies. Before becoming a Vistage CEO Chair, Tom Goodman founded and led two technology companies that spearheaded commercialization and business development for clients ranging from start-ups to Fortune 500 companies; frequently he embedded with the clients' executive teams to develop and implement successful growth strategies for business, technology and manufacturing. Prior to focusing on his passion for developing executives and their businesses, Goodman performed in a wide range of roles from R&D, product & process engineering and manufacturing, to sales & marketing and management. He was worked extensively developing international businesses and markets, particularly in Asia. Goodman holds Master's and Bachelor's Degrees in science and engineering. His fields of specialty include business consulting, international business, product development, strategic development and technology. Connect with Tom on LinkedIn. Resources / References You can join the open source information network for this podcast at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush To subscribe to our monthly newsletter visit: https://www.culturecrushbusiness.com/subscribe/ Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com www.culturecrushbusiness.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/CultureCrushBusinessPodcast Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush

This was a very special episode for our Culture Crush Podcast team. Our sponsor, Catholic Education Arizona, was on the show! Not only is Catholic Education Arizona a great sponsor, but they are also a company building a great company culture. Nancy Padberg has been an amazing leader and advocate for building a great company culture. Nancy had the opportunity to invite a guest on the show with her that is leading a company with a great company culture, and Eric Olsen with Fasturtle Digital Marketing was her choice. What a great choice it was too! The energy with Nancy, Eric, and the Culture Crush host, Kindra Maples, was so dynamic and fluid that the hour flew by. This conversation dove into a variety of different angles of company culture including what culture is and what it is not. The trio discusses the need to grow positive company culture in all teams, the importance of values that align the team, and remembering that company culture not just having a foosball table in the office. This episode is a great one to listen to if you are a company leader that thinks you have a great company culture. This episode will help you double check the culture that you are growing and help you ask yourself if your employees think you have a good culture or if you are just handing out free snacks and have fun games in the office for the team. If you are not the company leader, this is a great podcast to listen to in order to help understand what good company culture really is and if you have it with the company that you are currently working. Thank you again to our sponsor Catholic Education Arizona, for being a great sponsor, as well as a company with a great company culture! For 23 years Catholic Education Arizona has helped serve underserved children with $268 million in scholarships. Catholic High Schools have a 99.4% graduation rate and 97% move on to higher education or military service. Participating partners like APS, BBVA, and Grand Canyon University receive a dollar for dollar Arizona State Tax Credit. The corporate partners enjoy helping our future work force, Building the Arizona community and future leaders! The partners also enjoy promotion in our newsletter, social media channels and podcast! Please call us at 602-218-6542 or visit www.ceaz.org, that's www.ceaz.org – they are changing lives one scholarship at a time! #culture #companyculture #companyculturematters #podcast #podcastshow #values #alignment #sponsorship #education #digitalmarketing Catholic Education Arizona is 23 years old and the #1 School Tuition Organization of approximately 60 in Arizona. They have served over 138,000 scholarships and provided $268 million in assistance to students in Arizona. The mission is to provide scholarships to underserved children to change lives, serve society and transform culture. They provide assistance to the Diocese of Phoenix 37 Catholic schools in Arizona. Catholic High Schools have a 99.4% graduation rate with 97% of graduates matriculating to higher education or military service. Arizona is one of estimated 19 states that have Tax Credit contributions. There are 4 revenue streams for Catholic Education Arizona: 1. Individual Tax Credits 2. Corporate Tax Credits 3. Matching Gifts from Corporations and 4. Individual/Foundation/Corporate Donations. Nancy Padberg, MBA is the President & CEO of Catholic Education Arizona. She has been in the role for almost two years. She earned her BS at Iowa State University and MBA at Pepperdine University, Graziadio School of Business with the point of view of service, purpose and leadership. She built her career in Santa Monica and San Francisco leading media companies and integrated marketing agencies. She worked on strategy, brand and execution for PETCO, Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, Whole Foods Markets, Pepperdine University, Tahiti Tourism, USF, SF State. She has been fortunate to work with entertainment brands as Food Network, Disney and Universal Studios. Nancy's expertise is servant leadership, digital marketing and building healthy cultures through trust, respect, communication and consistent behavior. She was nominated by Los Angeles Business Journal, “Women Making a Difference,” nominated for an Athena Award in Phoenix and most recently on the cover of Arizona Business Magazine for leadership with CEO's of Blue Cross/Blue Shield, FirstBank and SRP. She served on the Board of Advisors, Pepperdine University and Iowa State University's Greenlee School of Journalism & Communications. She currently serves on Board of Directors, Catholic Charities. Nancy is married to David, has three children, played Big 12 Collegiate Golf, is a Kappa Delta, loves to travel and walk their dogs, Snickers and Buttercup. Connect with Nancy on LinkedIn and Twitter, and follow Catholic Education Arizona on Facebook and Instagram. Fasturtle is a leading provider of Digital Marketing Solutions; including website design, search engine ranking, and digital marketing strategy. We are an Arizona based, top 10 ranking internet marketing firm specializing in helping small-medium size businesses, non-profit organizations, and service industry professionals. Since 2000, we have successfully delivered the most innovative and cost effective tools to expand your brand online. Working with clients in many different industries we have the skills to develop revenue generating solutions while keeping your costs down. Fasturtle has been consistently ranked one of Phoenix, Arizona's Top 10 Website Design and Internet Marketing Companies by Ranking AZ and the Phoenix Business Journal. With over 14 years of experience, an “A+” Rating by BBB and numerous other design and marketing awards including the American Marketing Association 2012 Spectrum Award, we proudly offer the highest level of customer service and results oriented internet marketing solutions. Fasturtle: Fast Turtle (N) /fast/ tur·tle /ˈtərtl/ – Many groups and cultures around the world symbolize the turtle as the wisest of all, good health, long life and protection. We at Fasturtle view our business integrity, operations model and scopes of work in the same light. We are committed to authentic, honorable, effective and long lasting business relationships with all of our clients. Our Fasturtle programs be it SEO Management, Email Marketing or Website Design are spearheaded and developed for long term sustainability. Eric Olsen is a serial entrepreneur; he has spent over 20 years in the website and digital marketing industry. A national speaker, a frequent contributor to the Phoenix Business Journal, and a thought leader in the digital marketing space. His most important position is as a husband and father of three teenagers here in Phoenix AZ.

We are so thankful to have Sidnee Peck, from Source Global, and Brian Stinson, from Peak Fleet on the podcast. We were able to go a little deeper in the conversation around values, alignment, and company culture being intentional. Sidnee talks about how their CEO and Founder, Cody Friesen, was very intentional about growing the strong company culture from day one. A company culture needs to be both organic and intentional and that is truly what he has tried to do. This intentionality starts during the hiring process with making sure that each hire truly is the best fit. Sidnee even discusses an example where there was a company hire that was brought on and shortly after it was revealed that the person was not the best fit. Sometimes it can be better to leave the seat empty instead of filling it with the wrong fit. Brian brings expertise to the table from his background and experience working with Intel, to the position he holds now as the Culture Engineer with Peak Fleet (we love that title name). He has worked with many companies, from start ups to larger organizations, to help build and develop their values which allowed for a very fluid conversation with Sidnee. There was so much to talk about and definitely not enough time- there will have to be a part two to this conversation. This episode is great for any listener and we really mean that. We talked about values, cultural alignment, misalignment, growing culture intentionally and organically, working together on a purpose and mission, having inspirational leaders at the forefront, growing a cultural legacy through storytelling and more. This conversation is for both leaders at the top and employees striving to grow to the top. At the end of the day, culture is not one size fits all. It can be difficult at times, but it is not rocket science. Thank you to our sponsor Catholic Education Arizona! For 23 years Catholic Education Arizona has helped serve underserved children with $268 million in scholarships. Catholic High Schools have a 99.4% graduation rate and 97% move on to higher education or military service. Participating partners like APS, BBVA, and Grand Canyon University receive a dollar-for-dollar Arizona State Tax Credit. The corporate partners enjoy helping our future work force, Building the Arizona community and future leaders! The partners also enjoy promotion in our newsletter, social media channels and podcast! Please call us at 602-218-6542 or visit www.ceaz.org, that's www.ceaz.org – they are changing lives one scholarship at a time! SOURCE Global, PBC makes the world's first renewable drinking water system, from just sunlight and air. Clean, safe, water made entirely off-grid, anywhere in the world. SOURCE was founded and built in Arizona and aims to perfect water for every person, every place. Sidnee Peck serves as EVP of Assets for SOURCE Global, PBC (formerly Zero Mass Water), a science and technology firm in Scottsdale, Arizona focused on Renewable Water. During her time at SOURCE she has held roles of Chief of Staff to the CEO and VP of Global BD Operations and Consumer Strategy. She is the former CEO of SMART Brain Aging, Inc. a healthcare technology company focused on dementia. Under Sidnee's leadership, SMART was awarded the Arizona Innovation Challenge award in summer 2016; she founded the Aging2.0 Local chapter and was a founding member of the action team for Dementia Friendly Tempe. She served as an instructor of entrepreneurship at the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University for nine years, where she also launched the Center for Entrepreneurship in 2014 and consulted with global technology firms in customer and market development. She helped to found the Golden Seeds Arizona Chapter and speaks frequently at StartUp Week and CCAZ events. Peck lives in Phoenix with her family and is devoted to innovation – she found her passion for startups as a co-founder with technology company, Alaris in 2009. She has her bachelor's from the University of New Mexico and her MBA from the W. P. Carey School of Business. Connect with Sidnee on LinkedIn and Twitter. The PEAK Fleet is an organizational development company with a purpose to create an engaged workforce that thrives together. The PEAK Fleet is a certified Benefit Corporation for Good and believes that improving the planet and supporting people is just as important as making a profit. They provide workshops, in-depth consulting, speaking engagements, and other events that guide organizations to improved employee satisfaction and business results. Brian Stinson, co-founder of The PEAK Fleet is a father, engineer, entrepreneur and athlete with more than 20 years building high performing teams and driving culture change. He has an Industrial Engineering degree, but believes that “people and systems thinking” has been in his DNA since birth. During his 21 years at Intel Corporation, he learned to combine the science of data and analytics with the power of empathy and authentic relationships to actually solve real world business problems. At the end of his tenure, Brian was responsible for the Workforce Strategy for Intel's 6000 person worldwide IT organization. While in this role, he decided that the balance of his career would be dedicated to Organizational Development. For Brian, launching The PEAK Fleet, represented an opportunity to help the greatest number of organizations unlock their full potential and make a bigger impact on the lives of people at work. Follow The Peak Fleet on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. Resources / References You can join the open source information network for this podcast at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush To subscribe to our monthly newsletter visit: https://www.culturecrushbusiness.com/subscribe/ Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com www.culturecrushbusiness.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/CultureCrushBusinessPodcast Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush

We have heard a lot about the company culture at Carvana, but this podcast was our opportunity to get a deeper dive with an inside perspective. Neil Shah was able to give us the inside look at the growth of Carvana and how they have continued to support their employees through the past year (in the middle of a pandemic if you forget). Carvana has grown rapidly since its inception and due to the innovation and the concept behind Carvana, the company has continued to grow over the past year, where many other companies have struggled. Since the concept of Carvana already included limited contact with others and had a foundation set in technology to make car buying easy, this allowed Carvana to focus on their people during the beginning of the pandemic instead of the business platform itself. While other companies were struggling to find the right forms of technology to support their company becoming contactless, Carvana was able to put focus on their employees first. In a matter of three fast weeks, Carvana was able to shift their employees to working remote, with a similar and comfortable set up that they had in their office. They cut back hours on some staff, but never cut their health care coverage. Carvana changed their sick plan to include support for those that got covid so they never had to tap into their PTO. The leadership team even took cuts in their own salaries to make sure that the employees were covered. After shifting their employees to remote and supporting them in their new routines, the company was able to put the focus back toward the company and ways to grow in a contactless fashion. The focus was never off the employees though. The leadership continues to stay in open communication with the employees, continues to offer opportunities for recognition, and supports the employees in being their authentic selves in the workplace. When we mention recognition, we are talking next level recognition in some cases where Carvana gifted 21 employees with a new car this year. You cannot have a conversation about company culture without talking about values. Carvana has seven values that they showcase and refer to often, but Neil gave us his top two, one of which we cannot get enough of. “Your next customer may be your mom,” is one of their core values, that is not only referenced daily as the employees interact with a wide range of customers, but this is value is showcased on one of the walls in their office. We know many companies that write core values on the wall that do not truly embody what they stand for, but Carvana took it to the next level by adding photos of the employee's moms on the wall as well. We absolutely love that Carvana has taken the value one step further to help there to be a true connection with the employees and the core values that they believe in. Here are the rest of their core values in case you are interested… • We're all in this together • Be brave • There are no sidelines • Zag forward • Don't be a Richard (you know what this one means… and we love it!) This podcast is not just to hear about a few values that are written on a wall. We know that just because you write them on the wall doesn't mean the staff feels connected and automatically feels the stronger company culture. This podcast gives our listeners the opportunity to hear about the company culture through the stories, examples, and passion that Neil shares. Hearing from him allows our listeners to connect. Most of us have left a position at least once, to join a company because we wanted more opportunities to grow. We have most likely stayed with a company because we could truly be ourselves (or left a company because we couldn't be ourselves). These actions and feelings are at the root of a good company culture and our listeners have the opportunity to connect through this podcast and hearing about the good company culture with Carvana from Neil's view. If you like disrupting the norm and are looking to join a company revolutionizing an industry then you will LOVE what Carvana has done for the car buying experience. Buying a car the old-fashioned way sucks and we are working hard to make it NOT suck. I mean, have you seen our vending machine?! We are looking for people who are excited to thrive in an environment of impactful change. Team spirit is evident at Carvana and every day we let our passions and creativity foster innovation. We take big swings, set ambitious goals, and challenge each other to make data- and process-driven decisions in everything we do. We've been changing the game since 2013, and we're not taking our foot off the gas now. Neil Shah is the Team Lead of Technical Recruiting at Carvana. He has over 13 years of experience in Technical Recruiting coming from a recruiting agency background. He made the leap from agency to corporate technical recruiting in 2018 in an effort to be a shepherd of culture and growth rather than just a placement professional. He is passionate about creating inclusive and diverse technical teams and building long-term relationships. Connect with Neil on LinkedIn. Timestamps Resources / References Carvana You can join the open source information network for this podcast at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush To subscribe to our monthly newsletter visit: https://www.culturecrushbusiness.com/subscribe/ Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com www.culturecrushbusiness.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/CultureCrushBusinessPodcast Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush

Iron Mountain Data Centers, is so much more than just a data center. IMDC is part of a larger global organization that supports their people, their community, and their global reach. A strong culture is at the root of IMDC and it shines through the staff as well as Dan and Julia on the podcast. With Dan having been part of the company for 6 years and Julia for 8 months, they were both able to give their insight into the recruitment and onboarding of the company. Although, their onboarding took place at different times (Julia during the pandemic) the culture was able to show strong for both. A great culture begins before the onboarding process though. Because IMDC has grown a strong culture of team members that care and feel connected to the overall mission, their people have become their best marketing and recruitment tool. A strong culture helps the bottom line, and while that isn't the number one goal, it allows IMDC to lower the cost of recruitment and retention. It leads the company to be successful when their employees are happy and feel supported. This conversation had so many highlights about the company and the things that they are doing to grow, not only the company, but their people and the communities where the data centers are located. IMDC offers Management training to promote and grow its employees from within. IMDC has focused greatly on sustainability and reducing their carbon footprint. With 100% renewable energy, they understand the need to be an industry leader, providing their customers with green power. IMDC Cares is a program that launched in 2020 due to the continued desire to give back to their global communities. There is a large focus on STEAM organizations and providing students with the skills that need to be successful in the future. This company is a great example of how amazing culture can help to grow the company, help the bottom line, and support new initiatives that support communities outside of the company. This podcast is great for leaders that are looking for new ways to support their team and their culture. This is also a great podcast to listen to if you are growing a start up company and need to see the examples of how a great culture can help the return and the bottom line of the company. Iron Mountain Data Centers operates a global colocation platform that enables customers to build tailored, sustainable, carrier and cloud-neutral data solutions. As a proud part of Iron Mountain Inc., a world leader in the secure management of data and assets trusted by 95% of the Fortune 1000, we are uniquely positioned to protect, connect and activate high-value customer data. We lead the data center industry in highly regulated compliance, environmental sustainability, physical security and business continuity. We collaborate with our 1,200+ customers in order to build and support their long-term digital transformations within our 3.5M SF global footprint spanning 3 continents. Dan Rattner is Chief of Staff/VP, Safety, Security, & Government Programs. Dan joined Iron Mountain in 2015 as part of Global Safety, Risk and Security. He spent his first year and a half working in the Boyers Underground, before relocating to Boston to oversee a number of GSRS functions, including safety and security for IMDC. This summer, Dan took on the role of IMDC Chief of Staff. Prior to Iron Mountain, Dan held a number of senior positions in the public and private sectors. He started his career in the CIA, and later served as Senior Advisor for Homeland Security and Public Safety for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Dan and his wife Martha own a farm in Kentucky where they breed and raise Thoroughbred and Arabian horses. Julia Kendall has more than 20 years of experience executing high tech B2B marketing communication programs. Her key focus is developing strategic, collaborative and creative solutions to enable organizations to exceed sales and growth goals. Most recently, Julia was the VP of Marketing for Cologix, where she helped them grow from a start-up company to a leading North American interconnection provider, including the integration of 10 acquired companies. Prior to Cologix, Julia was the Director of Marketing at Zayo (including zColo) and held leadership roles at several biotech companies. Julia and her husband live in Louisville, CO with their 3 kids. They play all sorts of sports, enjoy traveling, scuba diving and all the outdoor activities Colorado offers. Follow Iron Mountain Data Centers on LinkedIn. Resources / References Iron Mountain Data Centers You can join the open source information network for this podcast at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush To subscribe to our monthly newsletter visit: https://www.culturecrushbusiness.com/subscribe/ Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com www.culturecrushbusiness.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/CultureCrushBusinessPodcast Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush

This is a show that we have been wanting to do for a while now. We love highlighting the secret companies that have a great company culture. The companies that are doing amazing things that might not be the companies that people think of as having a great culture- these companies are our favorite to showcase to the community. Have you ever had a doctor give you their personal number so that you can reach out after a procedure? Well then you have not been to Carrot Eye Center to have your eyes taken care of. Dr. Hammond and Dr. Herion do amazing things when it comes to LASIK, Cataract surgery, and more. What sets them apart from other practices that focus on these same areas is the attention they provide to their patients and their staff. The people come first. Yes, they work on eyes, but the eyes are attached to a person, and that person is what comes first. They had the chance to talk about the practice, how it all started, the focus on the staff, the focus on the patients, and the ups and downs through COVID-19 over the past year. Even through it all they are now continuing to grow their “family” at the practice. These exceptional values lead the way for the Carrot team: See the future Have fun Collaborate and educate Do the right thing Be authentically human Be exceptional This conversation was a very fun and honest conversation. These two amazing doctors, veterans, and ophthalmologists are changing the world of eye care and what culture looks like in a growing eye care practice. This is an episode from everyone to listen in and hear how to bring amazing culture to the center of your company and why it is important to focus on your people first. At Carrot LASIK & Eye Center, we believe in personalized medicine. We're a practice owned and operated by doctors who really care about you, and most importantly, we approach each patient as a completely unique case. “One size fits all” solutions don't belong in eye care, and we believe that you deserve better than that. Our doctors want to know about your life, your interests, and your hobbies so that any eyecare recommendations we make support and improve your unique lifestyle. Dr. Michael Herion, M.D. is a Lt. Col. in the United States Air Force Reserve, representative of the desire to serve that motivated his choice to go into the eld of eye medicine. During his service time, he received an Air Force Commendation Medal for his service in The Global War on Terror. Dr. Herion attended Arizona State University for undergraduate studies before getting his doctorate from Saint George's University School of Medicine. His residency in ophthalmology took place at Saint Louis University before he completed a retina fellowship with The Retina Group Ltd. Dr. Herion enjoys spending time outside, including skiing and scuba diving. On fall Saturdays, Dr. Herion can be found in the stands of Arizona State Sun Devils football games. A refractive and cataract surgery specialist, Dr. Matthew Hammond, M.D. attended Utah State University for his undergraduate degree and George Washington University for medical school. His internship, as well as his residency in ophthalmology, took place at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington D.C. Like Dr. Herion, Dr. Hammond also comes from a military background, serving nine years on active duty as an Ophthalmologist. He served during the Global War on Terror and feels like the greatest honor of his career will be the time he had taken care of America's nest. He was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal and the Humanitarian award for his relief work after Hurricane Katrina and served as Chief of Ophthalmology and Director of Warfighter Refractive Surgery at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. If there's one thing that Dr. Hammond strives to demonstrate to the patients who come to Carrot LASIK & Eye Center for their eye care, it's that he and his team go the extra mile to ensure that patients get the results they want, rather than just what's expected. Connect with Matthew on LinkedIn and follow Carrot Eye Center on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Resources / References Carrot LASIK and Eye Center You can join the open source information network for this podcast at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush To subscribe to our monthly newsletter visit: https://www.culturecrushbusiness.com/subscribe/ Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com www.culturecrushbusiness.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/CultureCrushBusinessPodcast Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush

This was definitely a full house, but a fun show highlighting Muscular Moving Men & Storage, M3 Commercial Moving & Logistic, and PetSmart. This conversation highlights very different revenue generating companies that have one common focus- growing companies with a strong culture. Whether founded in 1986 like Petsmart or 2008 like Muscular Moving Men, growing a company with a great internal culture can be imperative in company growth. The culture of these two companies helped them both succeed and continue to grow through the pandemic as well. We wish the listeners could see the guests picking up their dogs to share with the camera, but the conversation (even without the dogs) is worth listening. Although puppies and kittens are of course a perk of Petsmart, there are other parts of the culture that Dani and Lauren discuss. Petsmart has continued to progress through the pandemic, support their staff through working from home, and continuing to have passion for people and pets. Jennifer and Justin gave insight into the culture of Muscular Moving Men from the beginning and through the pandemic. They have been able to keep a strong family culture, continuing to support the staff through motivation, while keeping the customers accountable and safe as well. Both companies have growth plans for the future that also include doing good for the community as well. Founders Josh Jurhill and Justin Hodge started Muscular Moving Men to be leaders in the moving industry. Arizona natives, initially just local moving company, MMM added long distance moves, storage, commercial moving & storage and this year Junk Removal. Over the last 12 years Muscular Moving Men & Storage has expanded and seen tremendous growth focusing on amazing company culture and advancement. The staff at MMM has grown with the company with most office members initially starting in the field. According to Justin Hodge Co-Founder, “Its important that our entire staff understand how a move works and how important it is we take care of our customers on moving day.”. Fast forward to 2020 MMM has expanded into a 20,000sf warehouse, 20 trucks, a commercial & junk removal division and a staff of around 70 hard working and very talented individuals. The core values of the company have and always will be “Outstanding Service, competitive rates, Muscles for a Move Made Easy!” Justin Hodge is a 2018 Phoenix Business Journal 40 Under 40 Inductee and graduate of the Walter Cronkite School at Arizona State University. He is an Arizona native and Co-Founder of Muscular Moving Men & Storage which opened their doors in 2008. With sights set on nationwide expansion, Justin and his leadership team work to change the culture of the moving industry and stay in touch with the small business feel that made the company successful out of the gate. Justin is a Husband to an amazing wife and father of two beautiful kids. Jennifer Villalobos is a first generation Latina who graduated graduated from the University of Arizona & received her MBA from the University of Phoenix. Today, as an industry executive, Phoenix Business Journal 40 Under 40 recipient & board member of multiple non profits, and now VP of Marketing for Muscular Moving Men & Storage, Jennifer inspires others to achieve beyond boundaries, never forgetting to return gratitude to those who helped lay the foundation and being a role model to her community. Follow Muscular Moving Men on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Founded in 1986, PetSmart, Inc. is the largest specialty pet retailer of services and solutions for the lifetime needs of pets. At PetSmart, we love pets, and we believe pets make us better people. Every day with every connection, PetSmart's passionate associates help bring pet parents closer to their pets so they can live more fulfilled lives. This vision impacts everything we do for our customers, the way we support our associates, and how we give back to our communities. We operate approximately 1,650 pet stores in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico as well as more than 200 in-store PetSmart PetsHotel dog and cat boarding facilities. PetSmart provides a broad range of competitively priced pet food and products and offers unique pet services including training, pet grooming, boarding, PetSmart Doggie Day Camp and in-store pet adoptions. Expert veterinarian care is available in many of our stores, where Banfield Pet Hospital®, operates full-service pet hospitals. These in-store pet hospitals operate independently of PetSmart and employ veterinarians who provide a full range of health care and emergency services. PetSmart, together with non-profits PetSmart Charities and PetSmart Charities of Canada, partners with nearly 4,000 animal welfare organizations to bring adoptable pets into stores so they have the best chance possible of finding a forever home. Through this in-store adoption program and other signature events, PetSmart has facilitated more than 9 million adoptions – more than any other brick-and-mortar organization. Lauren Givens is the Manager of Emerging Talent at PetSmart. Lauren has more than 9 years of progressive and strategic experience in learning, leadership and talent development, and talent acquisition. Lauren attended the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee where she received both her BA and MA in Communication. Lauren has worked for both for profit and not for profit retailers before she found herself at PetSmart. She is responsible for the end-to-end early career talent recruitment process that begins with development of the recruitment strategy, design and development of program content, execution of non-traditional recruitment strategies and new hire onboarding for early career talent. She is passionate about helping others see their potential and developing internal and external talent. Dani Kaufman has been with PetSmart for 5 years and currently leads the employment brand and recruitment marketing team. She is passionate about PetSmart and loves to give others a peek into #lifeatpetsmart. She also loves being a dog mom to Ace and Gizmo. Follow PetSmart on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Resources / References Muscular Moving Men Petsmart You can join the open source information network for this podcast at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush To subscribe to our monthly newsletter visit: https://www.culturecrushbusiness.com/subscribe/ Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com www.culturecrushbusiness.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/CultureCrushBusinessPodcast Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush

This was such an impactful conversation with Susan Anable, Vice President of Public Affairs- Southwest Region with COX Communications. She gave us insight into the history, the people, and the passion of the employees. We could have listened to the stories of the culture and the people all day, but unfortunately the show is only 60 minutes. If you thought you knew about the great culture at COX and the amazing people that work there, there is so much more that Susan tells on the podcast. This podcast dives into areas of the company culture that our host didn't even know about. It's a company culture all about connections and doing the right thing. This is a great episode to listen to if you are trying to grow the culture at your company, if you are looking to partner with an great company, if you want to hear about a company that is supporting the community, and if you want to hear about people just doing the right thing and making a difference.  Cox Communications is committed to creating meaningful moments of human connection through broadband applications and services. The largest private telecom company in America, we proudly serve six million homes and businesses across 18 states. In metro Phoenix, we serve approximately 2.5 million product subscribers, and in Southern Arizona, approximately 400,000 product subscribers, with residential and business digital television, 1G high speed Internet, security systems and digital telephone service over its own nationwide IP network. We're dedicated to empowering others to build a better future and celebrate diverse products, people, suppliers, communities and the characteristics that makes each one unique. The 3,100 Arizona employees of Cox are proud to have topped numerous J.D. Power and Associates' studies of customer satisfaction and for many years top “Ranking Arizona-Best of Arizona Business” list. Cox Communications is the largest division of Cox Enterprises, a family-owned business founded in 1898 by Governor James M. Cox. Susan Anable, Vice President of Government and Public Affairs, Southwest Region, has been with Cox Communications since 2001. She is responsible for media relations, community relations, government affairs and internal communications for Cox in Arizona and Nevada. From 1991 to 2001, Susan was part of the Arizona State Senate Research Staff, serving as Staff Director and Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment Analyst when she left to join Cox in 2001. Susan serves on the Executive Committee of the Arizona Chamber of Commerce, and recently passed the gavel after serving as Chair of the Board for two terms. She is the past Public Affairs Chair and Board member of the Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce. She is a former President and member of the Phoenix Suns Charities Board and serves on the Cox Charities Board. In 2015, Susan was named to the Banner Health Foundation Board of Directors. Susan was appointed to Arizona Governor Doug Ducey's Workforce Arizona Council in 2016 and has served as an appointee on numerous City of Phoenix Task Forces dealing with regulatory simplification, pension reform and technology. Susan is the past President of the Southwest Cable Communications Association and a past member of the Executive Board of the Arizona Tax Research Association. In 2019, Susan was recognized as a “Woman to Watch” by Women in Cable Television (WICT), and as Woman of the Year by the Arizona Capitol Times in its 2019 Women of Achievement Awards. She has also won numerous company and industry awards for government relations and public affairs initiatives. Originally from Wyoming, Susan came to Arizona to attend school, graduating summa cum laude with a B.A. in Broadcast Journalism from The Walter Cronkite School of Broadcast Journalism at Arizona State University in 1991, and is a graduate of the Cable Television Public Affairs Association's Institute for Public Affairs. She is married to Mike Anable and they have two adult children, Nicholas and Ellise. They reside in Phoenix where Susan loves to hike, run and spend as much time outdoors with her family. Resources / References Cox Communications You can join the open source information network for this podcast at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush To subscribe to our monthly newsletter visit: https://www.culturecrushbusiness.com/subscribe/ Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com www.culturecrushbusiness.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/ Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/CultureCrushBusinessPodcast Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/culturecrush

Culture Crush continues to highlight leaders and companies that have a great company culture and Ken Smerz, the CEO of Zelus, was a perfect leader and company to highlight for the relaunch of the show. Zelus has grown dramatically over the first three years but at the core, they stay true to their four tenants; gratitude, passion, freedom, and truth. They strive, through all levels of the organization, to be a family that follows these tenants together. Through the conversation, Ken mentions many other “bites” that he uses to lead the company with including communication, mentorship and being care-frontational. This podcast is full of many “bites” from the company Zelus on how they have grown and maintained their strong company culture. The listeners will want to listen in to hear the bites that can help their company culture as well This is a great podcast to listen to if you are wondering what great company looks like. This podcast is perfect for company leaders that are looking for new ways to strengthen their own company culture. This is also a great podcast to listen to if you are just passionate about good company culture and how to grow and support your company personally. Resources: Along with highlighting companies with great culture, Culture Crush also tries to provide other great resources and role models through the conversation as well. This episode will mention some amazing resources and quotes from Marcus Buckingham, Jocko Willink, and Michael Gerber. ZELUS is a leading provider of as-built documentation, 2D and 3D modeling, Virtual Design and Construction (VDC), and Building Information Modeling (BIM) services in North America. Utilizing state-of-the-art technology—typically laser scanners—they take the physical world and essentially create a computerized “digital twin” to radically improve the construction/building process. The company was founded on a park bench in Phoenix in 2013 and has become the largest and most experienced firm of its kind in the world. Today, ZELUS clients include Intel, Amazon, Target, as well as many large architectural firms and construction companies. Ken Smerz is the CEO of ZELUS. As CEO, he leads the company's strategic growth and partnerships, oversees team culture and talent acquisition, and guides national expansion efforts. Follow ZELUS on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. Resources / References Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/

This quick episode is a look into how the Culture Crush Business Podcast started and where it is headed. This show started as a passion project to do on the side and it has quickly grown into something bigger. This show is growing into a brand that is needed in our world today. This show will highlight the companies that are growing with a great company culture, while also providing resources to those that need the support to do so. We hope you join us on the journey in highlighting and supporting companies in growing a great company culture. Timestamps 1:27: Growing the brand- The podcast is growing into something more than just a podcast. 2:20: How it started- The show had been dormant until Karen Nowicki reached out. 3:20: The why- I wanted to focus on company culture being the root of growing good companies 4:20: Using my experiences- Using good and bad experiences to support company culture 5:40: We are the only podcast (that we have found)- focusing on company culture and what makes a great company culture. 6:20: Thank you- Thank you for listening, sharing, and supporting. Resources / References Ginger Hardage Marcus Buckingham Simon Sinek Our contact information: culturecrushpodcast@gmail.com Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturecrushpodcast/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/culturecrushbiz You Tube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgl1euEYjZGamAkWgxoJDg LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kindramaples/