Podcasts about Fast Company

If you've ever collapsed into bed after a full night's sleep and still woken up drained, this conversation will change how you think about rest. Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith—board-certified physician and leading researcher on rest—breaks down why "getting more sleep" isn't the answer for most moms, and why your exhaustion might have nothing to do with physical fatigue at all. Dr. Saundra introduces the seven types of rest (physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, social, sensory, and creative) and explains how to pinpoint exactly where you're running on empty. Spoiler: that hobby you keep telling yourself you don't have time for? It might be the exact kind of rest you're starving for. From habit-stacking tiny restorative moments into your existing routine, to why a spa day isn't actually a burnout prevention strategy, this session is packed with practical shifts that don't require a four-hour window or a babysitter. FREEBIE for all: Rest Quiz Feeling tired even after a full night of sleep? You may be dealing with a hidden rest deficit. Take my Personal Rest Deficit Assessment to quickly identify which of the 7 Types of Rest® your body and mind are missing most. In just a few minutes, gain clarity and simple next steps to restore your energy and focus. BONUS raffled off to All-Access Pass Holders: 30 Days to Resting Well This comprehensive program provides actionable steps and daily guidance to help you establish a restful routine and transform your overall well-being.   Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith is a Board-Certified internal medicine physician, speaker, and award-winning author. She is an international well-being thought-leader featured in numerous media outlets including Prevention, MSNBC, Women's Day, FOX, Fast Company, Psychology Today, INC, CNN Health, and TED.com. She is the author of numerous books including her bestseller Sacred Rest: Recover Your Life, Renew Your Energy, Restore Your Sanity, including insight on the seven types of rest needed to optimize your productivity, increase your overall happiness, overcome burnout, and live your best life. Over 500,000 people have discovered their personal rest deficits using her free assessment at RestQuiz.com. Learn more about Dr. Saundra at DrDaltonSmith.com FOLLOW ON IG WEBSITE   OTHER LINKS UPGRADE to the All-Access pass for lifetime access, special bonuses, and a private, ad-free podcast feed PARTICIPATE in the private Facebook group (+vote for your daily favorite speaker) CHECK OUT our Sponsors, who made 7 free days and an affordable All-Access pass possible Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Moneda Moves is back for Latino Heritage Month and this season centers on a guiding question: who gets trusted in the U.S. economy right now and how is that trust built? Throughout the month, we will be speaking with experts across business, politics, ecosystem building and social justice to explore that question more deeply.María Teresa Kumar is an Emmy-nominated MSNBC contributor and founding President and CEO of Voto Latino, who since 2004 has raised over $75 million to build the country's largest Latinx voter registration and advocacy organization, registering more than 600K new voters ahead of 2020, and whose pioneering use of technology, social media and celebrity earned her recognition from Fast Company and Elle.In our Moneda Moves conversation, we speak about how growing up an immigrant shaped her thinking about power and trust, and what makes someone trustworthy in public life. With her experience she is able to identify the intersection between politics and money and where trust is breaking down, and how institutions build credibility with historically excluded communities. This episode was recorded earlier this spring, but especially as we approach midterm elections, it connects civic participation to Latino economic power amid federal policy volatility and what comes next.Tune in to hear how Voto Latino has built trust with Latino voters over the last 20+ years and what's next.Follow Maria Teresa on Instagram: @mariateresakumarFollow Moneda Moves on Instagram: @monedamovesFollow your host Lyanne Alfaro on Instagram: @lyannealfaroMain podcast theme song from Premium Beat.

What Actually Helps You? This ADHD Awareness Month, I'm putting real experiences, community and practical support at the heart of the conversation. Join live conversations, podcast events and opportunities to share what actually helps you. Add your name to my event waitlist as well! Visit the Events page to see what's happening and get involved. _________________________________________ What if the burnout, the guilt and the relentless doing weren't signs that you were failing, but signs that the playbook you'd been given was never designed for you in the first place? On this week's episode of The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Podcast, I'm joined by Meghan French Dunbar, bestselling author, business anthropologist and founder of Conscious Company Magazine, the first nationally distributed print magazine in the US focusing on impact-driven business. Meghan's book, This Isn't Working: How Working Women Can Overcome Stress, Guilt, and Overload to Find True Success, is a USA Today bestseller and Next Big Idea Club selection. She works with companies including Coach, John Deere, Torani and Kate Spade on leadership and culture strategy, writes for Forbes, Fast Company and Inc, and hosts the podcast Unbehaved. She was diagnosed with ADHD four years ago, and this conversation made a lot of sense of a lot of things. We talk about purpose burnout, motherhood, identity, joy and what it actually looks like to build a life and career around meaning rather than productivity. Meghan is warm, honest and brilliantly funny, and this is one of those conversations that leaves you feeling both validated and quietly ready to do something differently. Advertisement⏐Try AG1 now at ⁠http://drinkag1.com/adhdwomen⁠ and get £20 off your first order + 5 AG1 Travel Packs for on the go, a bottle of Vitamin D3+K2, and the Welcome Kit for FREE. No risk with the 30-day money-back guarantee. Find all details about the health benefits in the link. Study results are on file with AG1, 2023. In this episode, we cover: How Meghan's ADHD diagnosis four years ago reframed her entire career and the relentless curiosity that drove it Why she burnt out running her own organisation, resigned from it, and spent two years rebuilding from the ground up The difference between social success and soul success, and the three elements the most fulfilled leaders Meghan interviewed all had in common Why sustained leadership is about the quality of your being, not the quantity of your doing The six key predictors of burnout, and why ADHD makes several of them almost inevitable without the right support What the broaden and build theory tells us about joy, and why nurturing it is not indulgent but a genuine performance strategy The joy trip: what it is, why Meghan introduced it into her family and what it has given her every year since Why ADHD women are often the outliers who model a different way of working, and why that matters for everyone around them What enough looks like, and why deciding that with your partner is one of the most radical acts available to us Why autonomy is the non-negotiable for so many neurodivergent entrepreneurs Timestamps: 00:00 - Welcome and introducing Meghan French Dunbar 02:00 - What drives Meghan's passion for business, impact and entrepreneurship 05:00 - How her ADHD diagnosis reframed decades of relentless curiosity 08:00 - Burning out as founder, resigning in 2020 and two years of rebuilding 12:00 - What the outliers taught her: soul success, purpose and quality of life 16:00 - Sustained leadership: why quality of being beats quantity of doing 19:00 - The practical foundations: sleep, movement, joy and professional support 22:00 - Why younger generations are already rewriting the playbook 25:00 - The joy trip: how it started, what it involves and why it changed everything 31:00 - The broaden and build theory: the science behind why joy makes you better at everything 35:00 - Modeling a different way for other women 38:00 - What Meghan's working life looks like now, and what enough means to her 42:00 - Autonomy, ADHD and why working for yourself so often becomes the answe Links and Resources: Find my popular ADHD Women's Wellbeing workshops and resources on my website ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠. Follow the podcast on Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠@adhd_womenswellbeing_pod⁠⁠⁠ Get my book, The ADHD Women's Wellbeing Toolkit (also available in ebook and audiobook) ⁠⁠⁠here Join the More Yourself membership community ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠ Visit Meghan's website: meghanfrenchdunbar.com Connect with Meghan on Instagram Connect with Meghan on LinkedIn Subscribe to Meghan's Substack: Unbehaved Listen to Meghan's podcast: Unbehaved Watch Meghan's TEDx talk Get Meghan's book: This Isn't Working: How Working Women Can Overcome Stress, Guilt, and Overload to Find True Success Kate Moryoussef is a women's ADHD lifestyle and wellbeing coach and EFT practitioner who helps overwhelmed and unfulfilled newly diagnosed women with ADHD find more calm, balance, hope, health, compassion, creativity, and clarity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hosts Giulia Donatello and Lee-Sean Huang welcome Jarrett Fuller, a designer, writer, educator, editor, and podcaster. He is an assistant professor and director of undergraduate programs in Graphic & Experience Design at North Carolina State University, director of the design studio twenty-six, and host of Scratching the Surface. He's edited or co-edited four books, and his writing has appeared in Fast Company, The Architect's Newspaper, Eye Magazine, and Design Observer. His work has won awards from Communication Arts and The Type Directors Club, and he was previously an editor at Eye on Design and a designer at Facebook, Warby Parker, and The Whitney Museum of American Art.Drawing from his new book, Graphic Designers After Graphic Design: Designer as Publisher, Researcher, Change Maker, Performer, Artist (Princeton Architectural Press), Jarrett explains why graphic design is far from dead. They explore how the field's lack of strict boundaries is its superpower, letting millennial and Gen Z designers expand into publishing, research, activism, performance, and fine art.
In This Episode* Graphic designers persist. Jarrett contrasts a future where design persists without human designers with one where designers thrive by reclaiming their practice beyond commercial silos.* The "superpower" of a blurry discipline. Unlike architecture or industrial design, graphic design has always resisted definition. Jarrett argues that this is what allows the discipline to keep expanding and adapting to new cultural moments.* Designer as publisher. Jarrett discusses how designers move beyond shaping the container for someone else's text and become cultural producers when they control the content and make it public.* Social change and activism. Revisiting manifestos like First Things First, Jarrett shows how making complex political ideas visual and legible remains a fundamental form of social action.* Performance, unscripted risks, and rapid prototyping. Drawing on his interview with Silvio Lorusso, Jarrett and Lee-Sean compare design research and public presentations to stand-up and improv, favoring risk, live feedback, and mistakes over slick corporate TED Talks.* Resisting the "AI sameness trap." Reflecting on his recent Fast Company essay, Jarrett argues designers fear AI only because they've been designing for lowest-common-denominator sameness. He calls for radical experimentation and cultural difference.* Going back to the roots (graphe). Jarrett revisits the Greek root of "graphic," reminding us that graphic design is medium-agnostic and encompasses studying, writing, drawing, and giving shape to the world.* Flipping design education. Jarrett proposes redesigning design curricula to start with history, ethics, and critical theory, saving tools and software for last.
Resources * Book: Graphic Designers After Graphic Design: Designer as Publisher, Researcher, Change Maker, Performer, Artist by Jarrett Fuller https://www.chroniclebooks.com/products/graphic-designers-after-graphic-design* Article: Design is on its deathbed. Long live design!, Fast Company https://www.fastcompany.com/91582682/design-is-on-its-deathbed-long-live-design* Jarrett Fuller's Website: https://jarrettfuller.com* Scratching the Surface Podcast: https://scratchingthesurface.fm* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jarrettfuller* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jarrettfuller* Book Recommendation: Fine Design by Scott Klinker https://www.setmargins.press/books/fine-design/* Documentary Recommendation: Robert Wilson and the Civil Wars (1986): https://www.criterionchannel.com/robert-wilson-and-the-civil-wars* Book Recommendation: How to Begin: Letters to a Young Artist by Edmund de Waal https://www.edmunddewaal.com/news/how-to-begin* AIGA Design Podcast Feedback and Voice Memos: podcast@aiga.org

Send us Fan MailAbout this Episode Your dream job can still burn you out, and admitting that can feel like failure even when everything looks “successful” on paper. I sit down with DJ DiDonna to get real about what actually happens when you step away from work and why that choice can be one of the most authentic, bold decisions you ever make.We dig into the illusion of certainty that keeps so many of us clinging to “safe” paths, plus the push-pull dynamic behind most sabbaticals: burnout and breakdown on one side, curiosity and meaning on the other. DJ shares what his research has found about career breaks, sabbatical policies, and the psychological permission gap that shows up as resume fear, guilt, and the worry of what other people will think. We also talk about the parts nobody glamorizes, including, grieving an old identity, hearing your inner voice get louder, and learning how to be present again.Then we go deeper into the practical side of a transformational sabbatical. DJ explains why getting out of your head and into your body can be the fastest route to healing, and he tells the story of his 900-mile pilgrimage in Japan and the confidence it gave him to “launch into uncertainty.” If you're thinking about a career break, burnout recovery, entrepreneurship, or simply building a more meaningful life with better work-life balance, this conversation offers both encouragement and a clear way to start planning before a crisis forces your hand.In this Conversation• The illusion of certainty in “safe” career paths and why it keeps us stuck• Burnout as the push, and curiosity as the pull toward what matters• Why sabbaticals can start with grief, self-doubt, and an identity vacuum• Getting out of your head and into your body through exercise and creativity• DJ's 900-mile Japan pilgrimage and the confidence it built for uncertainty• Planning a sabbatical like routine maintenance rather than a crisis response• Treating time off as a career cycle and building real time wealth• How DJ's new book Big Time Off grew from lived experienceAbout DJ DiDonnaDJ DiDonna is a Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School, entrepreneur, researcher, and founder of The Sabbatical Project, an initiative dedicated to understanding the role that meaningful extended time away from work can play in our careers and lives. Before turning his attention to sabbatical research, DJ co-founded EFL Global, a financial technology company that helped enable more than $2 billion in capital for underserved businesses and individuals around the world. His work has been featured in The Atlantic, TIME, Fast Company, The Wall Street Journal, and other major publications.His new book,Big Time Off: The Transformative Power of Sabbaticals and How to Take One, brings together nearly a decade of research, hundreds of interviews with people who have taken sabbaticals, and DJ's own experience stepping away after years of entrepreneurship. DJ's new book challenges the idea that extended time away is simply a luxury or an escape from work. Instead, he examines how purposeful time away can influence identity, relationships, creativity, career direction, and the way we think about what matters most. It also offers practical guidance for deciding when to take a sabbatical and how to design one that can create meaningful change.Additional ResourcesLinkedIn: @DJDidonnaWebsite: DJ DiDonnaNewsletter: Subscribe to the Sabbatical ProjectGet your copy of Big Time Off Support the show--------Stay Connected www.leighburgess.comWatch the episodes on YouTube Follow Leigh on Instagram: @theleighaburgessFollow Leigh on LinkedIn: @LeighBurgessSign up for Leigh's bold newsletter

The panel looks at macOS 27 ending Time Capsule backup support, then debates Google's new Android-based laptops and its attempt to build a tighter ecosystem. Other topics include Chrome's retro-style bookmark launchpad and GM's geolocation privacy settlement before a deep dive into cloud storage, AWS data loss, redundancy, service agreements, and why cloud storage is not necessarily backup.  The panel consists of Chuck Joiner, David Ginsburg, Web Bixby, Eric Bolden, Marty Jencius, Jim Rea, and Jeff Gamet. MacVoices is supported by Origin Technology. Origin is endpoint AI observability. See what a trace looks like at https://originhq.com/macvoices. Show Notes: Chapters: 00:00 macOS 27 Ends Time Capsule Backup Support 00:57 The Risks of Aging Time Capsule Hardware 02:20 Google's New Android Laptop Strategy 03:35 Google Tries to Build an Apple-Like Ecosystem 05:09 Chromebooks Versus Android-Based Laptops 06:00 Android and Apple Ecosystem Pricing 07:17 Google Book Pricing Compared With MacBook Neo 08:31 Chrome's Retro Approach to the New Tab Page 09:45 Are Bookmark Launchpads Useful Again? 11:34 GM and OnStar Geolocation Data Settlement 12:08 Origin: Endpoint AI Observability 13:37 Amazon Data Center Strikes and Permanent Data Loss 15:01 Why Didn't AWS Redundancy Prevent the Loss? 16:23 Geographic Redundancy and Cloud Infrastructure 17:52 Planning for Regional Data Center Disasters 18:30 Amazon Regions and Customer Responsibility 20:52 Who Is Responsible for Cloud Data Protection? 22:02 Microsoft Teams, AWS, Azure, and E911 23:14 What Does Your Cloud Service Agreement Promise? 24:26 Cloud Storage Is Not the Same as Backup 25:49 Service Agreements, Redundancy, and Acts of War 27:00 Protecting Critical Data Across Multiple Regions 27:41 Why the 3-2-1 Backup Strategy Still Matters 28:22 Panelist Wrap-Up and Where to Find Everyone Links: PSA: macOS 27 Drops Support for Time Machine Backups to Time Capsule https://www.mactrast.com/2026/09/psa-macos-27-drops-support-for-time-machine-backups-to-time-capsule/ Google's pitch for Googlebooks: A laptop that works better with your Android phone – Engadget https://www.engadget.com/2263649/googlebooks-a-laptop-that-works-better-with-your-android-phone/   Transform Chrome's new tab page into the ultimate bookmark launchpad – Fast Company https://www.fastcompany.com/91593352/chrome-new-tab-bookmarks   FTC Finalizes Order Settling Allegations that GM and OnStar Collected and Sold Geolocation Data Without Consumers' Informed Consent | Federal Trade Commission https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2026/01/ftc-finalizes-order-settling-allegations-gm-onstar-collected-sold-geolocation-data-without-consumers   Iran strikes on Amazon data centers caused permanent loss of customer data https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/09/iran-strikes-on-amazon-data-centers-caused-permanent-loss-of-customer-data/ Guests: Get detailed bios and contact information about for the panel on the MacVoices Live! Panel page on our web site: https://macvoices.com/macvoiceslive/macvoices-live-panel/ Support: Become a MacVoices Patron on Patreon http://patreon.com/macvoices Enjoy this episode? Make a one-time donation with PayPal Connect: Web: http://macvoices.com Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/chuckjoiner http://www.twitter.com/macvoices Mastodon: https://mastodon.cloud/@chuckjoiner Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/chuck.joiner MacVoices Page on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/macvoices/ MacVoices Group on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/groups/macvoice LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chuckjoiner/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chuckjoiner/ Subscribe: Audio in iTunes Video in iTunes Subscribe manually via iTunes or any podcatcher: Audio: http://www.macvoices.com/rss/macvoicesrss Video: http://www.macvoices.com/rss/macvoicesvideorss

What happens to your credibility when you say you're going to do something and then don't follow through? It doesn't always look like a major betrayal. Sometimes it's the small promises, the casual "we should have lunch," the email you said you'd send, or the commitment you made without even realizing the other person heard it as a promise. Over time, those little gaps between what we say and what we do can shape how people experience us as leaders, partners, and business owners. In Episode 510 of Amplify Your Success, I'm joined by bestselling author, keynote speaker, leadership coach, and founder of the Extreme Leadership Institute, Steve Farber, for a conversation about the deeper meaning of keeping your word and why credibility is one of the most powerful forms of leadership currency. Steve's new book, The Radical Promise, brings this idea to life in a way that goes far beyond simply following through on a list of commitments. We talk about what it means to actually live in alignment with the values, principles, and standards we say are important, and why the gap between what we say and what we do can have such a profound impact on the people around us. We also get into the commitments we make without even realizing we're making them, the patterns that can cause us to overpromise, and what changes when we become more intentional about the words we use. And toward the end of our conversation, Steve gives us a simple one-week practice that can help us pay much closer attention to what we're saying, what we're committing to, and where we may have opportunities to strengthen our own credibility.   Key Takeaways: [00:03:09] Consistently doing what you say you will do is surprisingly rare, and the gaps between our words and actions can significantly affect how others perceive us. [00:05:39] Credibility is built through behavior, and great leadership requires us to actually live out the values and priorities we say are important. [00:10:35] Holding yourself 100% accountable to your own words can strengthen your effectiveness, reputation, relationships, and credibility. [00:13:22] Leaders earn the credibility to ask for accountability from others when they first establish that standard for themselves. [00:15:03] Doing what you say you will do goes beyond following through on promises and commitments to acting in ways that are congruent with your values. [00:19:02] Casual statements can become implied commitments, making self-awareness and intentional communication essential to protecting trust and credibility. [00:23:17] Identifying your personal patterns around overpromising, saying yes too easily, or failing to follow through can reveal where your own "say and do" gaps exist. [00:29:18] Following through on commitments to yourself, even after the original motivation fades, can create a positive feedback loop that strengthens your relationship with your own word. [00:32:21] Self-awareness, clear communication, and choosing to see commitments as opportunities can help create greater consistency between what you say and what you do. [00:41:44] Tracking both your explicit commitments and implied promises for one week can reveal patterns and help you become more intentional about the words you speak and the commitments you make.   About The Guest:  Steve Farber is a bestselling author, sought-after keynote speaker, and seasoned leadership coach and consultant who has worked with a vast array of public and private organizations across virtually every industry. He is the founder and CEO of The Extreme Leadership Institute, whose team has helped more than 25 companies earn a place on Best Places to Work lists. Farber is the author of six acclaimed books on leadership. His first, The Radical Leap, earned Fast Company's Readers' Choice Award and was named one of the 100 Best Business Books of All Time. His third book, Greater Than Yourself, debuted as a Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestseller. His fourth, Love Is Just Damn Good Business, has been featured on Wharton Radio and the World Economic Forum, and was named a top business strategy book by Book Authority. He also co-authored Twisted Business: Lessons from My Life in Rock and Roll with Jay Jay French, founder, manager, and guitarist of the iconic rock band, Twisted Sister. Farber is a member of the Transformational Leadership Council and serves on the nonprofit boards of the Community Alliance for Youth Success and Art as Mentorship.  His newest book, The Radical Promise: Mastering the Art of Doing What You Say You Will Do, is co-written with leadership luminaries Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner and published by John Wiley & Sons.   Connect With The Guest: Connect with Steve on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevefarber/      Follow Steve on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/stevefarber/ Check out Steve's Website For Some Great Resources - www.stevefarber.com    Resources Mentioned in This Episode:  Get Steve Farber's book, The Radical Promise, here and access a free sample chapter to get a first look at the book.  - https://theradicalpromise.com/  Want me to help you build out your Substack to amplify your thought leaders, build an aligned community and leverage an ecosystem that acts like your invisible sales force? Get details on the UnIgnorable Substack Accelerator Program. - https://melaniebenson.com/usa Curious how Substack could help you land more clients (and valuable collaborations that amplify your reach?) Join me for Your Invisible Sales Force Masterclass! https://melaniebenson.com/masterclass Join me on Substack here to discover what's working now as our industry continues to evolve. Be sure to join as a Growth Fuel subscriber to gain access to upcoming live trainings and valuable tools to grow through collaboration and strategic visibility. - https://coachmelaniebenson.substack.com/  

Live from the Vusion podcast studio at booth 913 at Groceryshop 2026 in Las Vegas, Ben Miller welcomes Jim Trahanas, Chief Technology Officer at Fruitist, to explore how a fruit company is using technology, data and AI across its entire value chain. Jim breaks down what it actually means to apply AI and machine learning across the business, from the underlying data and technology foundations to the culture required to support innovation. He also discusses Fruitist's recognition as one of Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies of 2026 and what it takes to build a technically progressive organization. In this episode: • The scale and technology strategy behind Fruitist • Why Fruitist was recognized among Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies • What applying AI and ML across the value chain actually means • The data and technology foundations required to make it work • How AI can extend beyond individual use cases • Building and maintaining a technically progressive culture

On today's episode, cohosts Yasmin Gagne and Josh Christensen talk to Fast Company staff writer Grace Snelling about what it means to have a personal brand today and why it matters. She talks with the founder and CEO of Vuori, Joe Kudla, about the brand's fabric-first approach, the new direction of the brand, and partnerships with names like Jack Draper and Tom Holland. To check out Grace's reporting, go to: fastcompany.com/91582246/personal-brand-special-report-207-insights-ideas-grow-brand-career#Choose-your-AI-comfort-level  For more of the latest business and innovation news, go to fastcompany.com/news

Spooky season is almost here and with it comes an all new season of Unspookable beginning on Tuesday, September 29th.  We've been following your amazing requests and our team has been working on  episodes you're going to love, all starting with the topic of: Changelings. Have ideas for other topics? There's still time - just leave us a comment wherever you listen to the show.  Don't miss all new episodes of Unspookable beginning Tuesday, September 29th. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Unspookable is a family friendly look at the histories and mysteries behind your favorite scary stories, myths and urban legends. Each week host Elise Parisian digs into the history, brain science, and power dynamics behind such topics as Bloody Mary, Charlie Charlie, and Ouija Boards to find the stories behind the scares. (Recommended for ages 8+) The award winning podcast Unspookable is an official "Common Sense Media Selection" and has been called one of the "Best Podcasts for Kids of All Ages" by Time Out New York, one of the “7 Podcasts Big Kids Will Love” by The New York Times, one of the "20 Best Podcasts for Kids that will Make Them Forget About Screen Time" by the TODAY Show. The show has appeared multiple times across Canada on CBC Radio's Podcast Playlist, on NPR station WHYY's Kid's Listening Hour, has been featured by Apple Podcasts, Vox, Vulture, Romper, The AV Club, Fast Company, The Week Jr., and more. You can find Unspookable on TikTok, Twitter, and Instagram at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@unspookablepodcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://twitter.com/ImUnspookable⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/unspookablepodcast/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Unspookable is a production of Soundsington Media, committed to making quality programming for young audiences and the young at heart. To find out more go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠http://www.soundsingtonmedia.com ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Looking for merch from Unspookable and your favorite Soundsington Media shows? Head on over to our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Dashery store ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠for t-shirts, hoodies, mugs, stickers, hats and more. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://soundsington-media.dashery.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Advertise on Unspookable: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠advertising@airwavemedia.com

Why do people believe you can build an innovation team by hiring a few smart people and giving them a creative space? In my experience, teams built on this false premise die within eighteen months. How do organizations get it so wrong? Innovation consultants have told them, or innovation books have taught them, that this is how you build an innovation team. Those experts have rarely built and led innovation teams that delivered. So why is this episode any different? I built and ran HP's Innovation Program Office (IPO), and the teams I led there were named to Fast Company's Most Innovative list three years running. For the last fourteen years, I've run CableLabs, the research and innovation lab for the global broadband industry, where our teams build technology that half a billion people use every day. This episode is about what it takes to build innovation teams, based on my experience doing it at scale—multiple times. By the end, you'll have the six steps I use, in the order they have to happen, what goes wrong when a team skips one, and a way to score your team today. I'll start with a decision I almost got wrong. In 2007, I was about to approve a 20 percent time policy at HP. Under what is called "20 percent time", employees spend about one day a week, a fifth of their working hours, on projects of their own choosing. Google had made it famous; everyone was talking about it, and it looked like the answer. Chuck House stopped me. Chuck had spent decades at HP working for Dave Packard, who founded the company with Bill Hewlett. "Before you do anything," he said, "you need to talk to Art." Art Fong was HP employee number nine. When I sat down with him, he told me something I didn't know. HP had already tried 20 percent time. In the 1950s. The company had watched Art work on his own ideas on Friday afternoons, so it gave everyone Friday afternoons. Most people sat around not knowing what to do with the time, and HP dropped it. "The ones who were going to innovate, like me, were already doing it," Art told me. "The mandate didn't change behavior." That was the lesson. You can't order people to innovate. The people who will innovate are already trying, and your job is to find them and clear the way. I never approved the policy. Google killed its "20% time" policy in 2013. What Art told me next shaped every innovation team I built after that, and we'll keep coming back to Art and his story. Let's get into it. The Innovation Team Fallacy The innovation team fallacy is the belief that if you hire smart people and give them a creative space, innovation will follow. It's easy to believe, because every successful innovation team you've read about had smart people and a place to work. That's the part you can see from the outside. What you can't see is what had to be in place before the work began. There's a second version of it, and it's the mistake I almost made with 20 percent time: copying what worked at another company and expecting it to work at yours. I'll come back to that later, with the story of a company that learned it the hard way. Teams also fail when you build the pieces in the wrong order. Get the order wrong, and it doesn't matter how talented the people are. Here are the six steps, in the order they have to happen: Build the culture before you hire anyone Recruit for specific roles, not just talent Adapt the process, don't adopt someone else's Fund it like innovation, not like operations Measure what keeps leadership bought in Lead it day to day Step 1: Build the Culture Before You Hire Anyone Culture is how people behave when nobody is telling them what to do, especially when something goes wrong. New hires don't learn it from what you say, or from the employee handbook. They learn it from what they see. Art Fong didn't describe HP's culture with a policy. He taught me through stories. One weekend, Bill Hewlett found a manager had locked the tool room with a padlock. Bill came back with bolt cutters, cut the lock off, and left a signed note on the door: "Never lock this again." He wanted his engineers to get to parts and equipment whenever an idea hit them. The note told every engineer at HP that the founders would remove anything that stood between them and their next idea. When Art tried to buy a house in Palo Alto, and discrimination stood in the way, Bill and Dave bought it from the seller themselves and sold it to him. No memo or values poster builds that kind of trust. It's built by what leaders do. Three things have to be in place before you hire your first person. Permission to fail without penalty. Innovation means working on ideas that are too early, too unusual, or too risky for the company's normal processes. Most of them won't work, and nobody brings you ideas like that if failure costs them. People watch what happens to the first person whose project gets stopped. If that person's next performance review takes a hit, your team stops proposing anything that might fail. Trust built through integrity. Trust gets built when a leader does the costly thing they didn't have to do. It gets destroyed when a leader says one thing and does another. Leadership that protects the team from the rest of the organization. Every company has its own version of that padlock: approval chains, purchasing rules, a legal review that takes six weeks, a budget that only opens once a year. Most of them exist to protect the core business, and they do that job well. An innovation team can't work inside them. What to do: List the padlocks, then remove them. Take one idea and walk it through your organization on paper, from the first conversation to the first test with a customer. Write down every approval, every form, where the money comes from, and how many days each one takes. Then go back through and cut the ones your team doesn't need. Write what happens to a person whose project gets stopped. Do it before the first project, not after, and be specific about the performance review and the next assignment. Then keep your word the first time it's tested, because that's the one everybody remembers. Name the protector, and make sure everyone knows who it is. Pick the person with enough authority to tell the rest of the organization that a rule doesn't apply to this team. If nobody in your organization can play that role, you're not ready to build the team. Go deeper: HP Won Innovation Awards. Then Killed What Made It True. Step 2: Recruit for Specific Roles, Not Just Talent Keep the team small. I've argued for years that the right size for an innovation team is six to eight people. Bigger than that, and people lose focus and stop feeling connected to the work. Small means every seat matters. If you hire the eight smartest people you can find, you'll often end up with eight people who think alike. I look for four roles, and in my postmortems of teams that failed to innovate, they were missing at least one. The visionary. This is the person who sees an idea before there's any evidence for it. They're rare, and often hard to work with, because they're living in a future the rest of the company can't see yet. The leader, who usually isn't the visionary. This is the most common mistake I see. Somebody has a great idea, so they get put in charge. The leader's job is different: get the resources, protect the team, and stop a project when the evidence says it's time. The person who had the idea is the worst person to make that call to kill it. The evangelist. The evangelist takes the team's work to the rest of the organization and explains it in the language of the people who will have to build it, sell it, or support it. Without one, a team builds good things that nobody adopts. The radicals. These are the people a normal hiring process screens out. They're creative, they push back, and they can drive the people around them crazy. Remember what Art said: the ones who were going to innovate were already doing it. Your radicals are often inside your company right now, working on something nobody asked them to do. At HP, my group became known as the place you could send your radicals. One of them was very creative, and he drove people crazy, especially the other executives. Every week, a senior executive called me to ask if I had fired him yet. I refused, and I spent a fair amount of time running interference so he could keep working. When he left HP, he started a company with some contacts. When it was acquired, he was worth several times what any executive at HP was worth. The person the organization wants gone is often the one with the idea nobody else can see yet. If you want radicals on your team, you have to be willing to take those calls. What to do: Write the four roles on one page and put a name beside each. Use the names of real people, not job titles. Any blank is your first hire, and it tells you what to recruit for. Keep the visionary and the leader as two different people. If one person holds both roles today, decide which one they're better at and fill the other. The test is simple: can this person stop a project they fell in love with? Choose the evangelist from the part of the business that will have to adopt the work. Their credibility with that group matters more than their innovation experience, because those people already trust them. Give the evangelist standing time with that group, not just a presentation at the end. Go find your radicals, and decide in advance how you'll protect them. Ask managers who they would transfer out, and look for the people already working on something nobody asked for. Then agree with your own boss on what you'll say when the complaints start. Skip this step, and you get a team that produces what the core business would have produced anyway, or one that builds good work nobody adopts. Go deeper: What Is the Optimal Innovation Team Size? Step 3: Adapt the Process, Don't Adopt Someone Else's Once you have the culture and the people, you need a process: how ideas come in, how they get tested, and how you decide which ones get more money and which ones get stopped. At HP, we funded innovation in stages. An idea had to earn its next round of money at a checkpoint we called a stage gate, where the team answered a set of questions before anything moved forward. We ran four gates: market validation, customer validation, a limited launch, and then a full launch. We called the journey through all four gates the innovation funnel. Here is what that looked like in practice. From a pool of about three thousand idea submissions a year, we funded roughly twenty into market validation. Around twelve made it through to customer validation. Five or six were in a limited launch‌. Three or four became new products. Now, remember the second version of the fallacy from the start of this episode, copying what worked at another company? A process like this one is exactly what people try to copy. Here is what happened when a grocery chain did it. An executive at Kroger, the grocery chain, heard my podcast and emailed me to say his team wanted to use HP's innovation playbook as written. We had released it under a Creative Commons license, so anyone could use it for free. I said yes, they could use it, but I was clear: "It won't work as is." They ran it anyway. They built an innovation lab next to a Kroger test store in Northern Kentucky and used HP's playbook without changing it. It cost them eighteen months, mostly building credibility with the store teams, who had to adopt anything the lab built for their stores. Their answer was always some version of "Our customer likes it this way." Kroger got it wrong by copying the process. HP's process was built for a technology company. A grocery store is built to run the same way every day, and anything new disrupts that. So I went to Kentucky and helped them tailor it. That work is what the evangelist role exists for. Once they did, the team shipped Advantage Checkout, a scanning tunnel for groceries that was recognized at the National Retail Federation's annual show in 2011. I've said it many times: adapt, don't adopt. That runs against what a lot of innovation consultants sell: a framework you can install. I had to follow my own advice when I moved from HP to CableLabs. What worked at HP wouldn't work at CableLabs without changing the language, processes, funding level, and who the customers for the innovations were. What to do: Write how your organization already makes decisions. Who approves spending, how long an approval takes, and the words people use for customers and products. Your process has to run inside that reality, or it gets rejected. Keep the purpose of each piece and change the form. A stage gate decides whether an idea gets more money and resources or stops. Write your own gate questions, in your own vocabulary, and make them about where the market is going rather than what is happening today. Translate it, then prove it in one place. Rewrite the process in the words the group that has to adopt it already uses. At Kroger, that meant the language of the merchants and category managers, who decide what goes on the shelves. Then try it with one team, on one idea, for ninety days, and let that team show the results to everyone else instead of presenting the framework. Go deeper: Kroger Copied HP's Innovation Playbook Perfectly. It Failed Anyway. Step 4: Fund It Like Innovation, Not Like Operations Operations get budgeted once a year because operations are predictable. Ideas don't arrive on a budget schedule. Someone has an idea in March that needs a small amount of money to test, and the answer they get is to put it in next year's plan. By the time the money arrives, the opportunity has passed, or the person who had the idea has moved on. At HP's Innovation Program Office, and again at CableLabs, I set up what I call the Idea Fund. It's a pool of money that isn't committed to any project. When a good idea comes up, we give it money from the pool, say $50,000 for seven months. Once committed, the project has that money for the full seven months, no matter where we are in the fiscal year or what happens in the next budget cycle. And because the pool stayed at the same level year after year, no one had to wait for next year's budget. It takes a leader who can protect that pool, and that means having the CFO on your side. A pool of uncommitted money is an easy target when the numbers get tight. What to do: Set the pool once, and keep it at the same level year to year. Agree the number with your CFO up front, and agree that it stays in place, so it isn't swept up the first time the numbers get tight. Commit money to a project for a set amount of time, not for a fiscal year. Write the amount and the end date together, and hold to both, so the team knows exactly what it has and can get to work. Put a deadline on every commitment. If a project can't answer the questions for its next gate in the time it was given, find out why before you decide anything. Sometimes the team learns something that changes the question. Decide whether to stop or pause. If the answer at the gate is no, stop the project and put the money back into the pool for the next idea. If the problem is market timing rather than the idea, pause it, so you don't keep investing before it has a real chance to launch. Skip this step and every good idea waits for the next budget cycle, which is how innovation teams die of patience. Go deeper: Are You Playing The Innovation Long Game? An HP Story. Step 5: Measure What Keeps Leadership Bought In A team that can't show its leaders what the innovation funding is buying gets cut at the first bad quarter. A team measured on the wrong thing stops taking risks, even if nobody tells it to. You need a small set of numbers that do both jobs: show what the money is buying, without killing the risk-taking. Start with what not to measure: the number of ideas. The Innovation Program Office received over three thousand ideas and pitches a year, about sixty a week, and that sounded like success. But no team, however smart or well funded, can properly evaluate three thousand ideas a year. After reviewing a few thousand, I found myself skimming proposals that deserved hours and would catch myself looking for reasons to say no. We had built what we thought was the most sophisticated innovation evaluation process in corporate America, and it was filtering out the breakthroughs it was designed to find. The number of ideas, or the size of your funnel, doesn't matter. What matters is ranking them well enough that the best ones get the proper attention. The goal isn't to evaluate everything. The goal is to evaluate the right things properly. Then get the best ones into the funnel, so the ones that survive the gates have an impact. Leadership is not interested in the funnel. They want to see the impact from the innovations. That is what you need to measure to keep leadership bought into innovation. What to measure: Percent of revenue from new products. Pick a time window, say products that didn't exist three years ago, and keep it the same. This answers the question, "What are we getting for this money?" How many innovations ship each year. At HP, our target was two new global products a year. The Innovation Program Office averaged three to four. Profit on what shipped. Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard considered a product successful only when its profit over time was six times what it cost to develop. Any one of these on its own will push the team in the wrong direction. Measure only new-product revenue, and last year's product in a new color starts counting as new. Measure only how many products ship, and the team will ship small, safe ones. Together, they keep each other honest. Skip this step and the first bad quarter ends the team, because nobody outside it can say what the money bought. Go deeper: 6 Innovation Metrics and KPIs Every Organization Should Use Step 6: Lead It Day to Day Everything so far can be set up as a process once. This step never ends. Art Fong told me one more story. One evening, while Art was working on a new piece of equipment, Dave Packard came in, sat down next to him, and looked at his notebook. "I'll tell you what," Packard said. "I'll write it down while you take the readings." The company's co-founder worked as Art's lab assistant until nearly midnight. Packard was running a company. He could have asked for a report the next morning. Instead, he sat down and did the work alongside Art. A great example of an innovation leader who led. Three behaviors hold an innovation team together. Show up in the work. Not only in the meetings about it. The team needs to see that you understand what they're doing and care how it turns out. Hold a vision that reaches past this quarter. Innovation takes longer than anyone expects. What your team is working on now will show up as a product long after this quarter has been judged. The team needs to hear where the work is going, from you, more often than feels necessary. Take the pressure so the team doesn't have to. Every quarter, someone in an executive meeting will ask what the company is getting for this money. The leader answers that question, using the numbers we just covered, and keeps it from landing on the team every week. Those weekly calls asking whether I'd fired my radical were part of the job. The team trusts you because you protect them, and that trust keeps them innovating when a project gets hard. What to do: Spend time every week on the work itself. Sit in on a test, join a customer call, or read the raw results before someone summarizes them for you. Put it on the calendar and protect it the way you'd protect a board meeting. Write the three-to-five-year destination in one sentence, and repeat it. Say it in team meetings, in reviews, and in your own updates until everyone on the team can say it back to you without looking. Take the executive questions yourself. Bring the numbers from the last step into the leadership review, and be willing to defend the innovation teams, especially when the organization is facing a tough quarter. Protect your people in public. When someone complains about a member of your team, answer it yourself, in the room where it came up. The person being complained about should never have to defend themselves to the rest of the organization. Skip this step, and the other five come undone. The padlocks come back, the radicals leave, and the idea fund gets raided. Go deeper: 9 Leadership Behaviors for Innovation Leaders The Payoff, Told Straight When this worked at HP, the teams I led made Fast Company's Most Innovative list three years running, and the recognition credited the Innovation Program Office, the products it created, and the culture we were rebuilding. Stanford and Harvard both wrote teaching cases on how the team worked. I retired from HP in December 2011. A few years later, HP shut down the Innovation Program Office. As of last fall, when I last wrote about it, HP hadn't been back on that Fast Company list in thirteen years. That's the part of this playbook I'd underline. Leading the team day to day depends on one person. The culture is what has to survive when that leader leaves, so spread it widely enough that others defend and protect it. At CableLabs, I used the same playbook, adapted to a unique organization. In the twenty-four years between CableLabs' founding in 1988 and my arrival in 2012, CableLabs had been granted approximately 70 patents in total. In the fourteen years since, we've added more than a thousand. While I'm the CEO, innovation is a team sport. Everyone in the organization owns CableLabs' innovation culture, not one person. To avoid repeating what happened at HP, we established a small council of employees, not executives, who champion the culture and corporate values. The Innovation Team Scorecard Building a high-impact innovation team starts with an honest assessment of the team you have. Not the one described in a board update. The one your people work in. The first step is to honestly score yourself on the six steps. Then have someone on the team score it separately, and compare. The gap between your score and theirs is usually the most useful thing on the page. Fix the earliest weak step first, because later steps rest on earlier ones, and adding people to a weak foundation only makes it fail faster. You can run this on a sheet of paper today. I've built a scorecard as a free download you can fill in. For each of the six steps, the scorecard describes each step and what a 1 and a 5 look like.  

The same workplaces that have held back women aren't working especially well for men either. That insight reframes the whole conversation about gender at work.My guest is Jennifer McCollum, CEO and President of Catalyst, one of the world's leading organisations dedicated to advancing women and building workplaces where everyone can thrive. She is also the author of Men at Work: The Roadmap to Gender Partnership, a practical and timely book on men, women, power, fear and change.We explore the man box, the narrow set of expectations around strength, competition and control that creates real anxiety for 84% of men, and why fear is the biggest thing stopping men from advocating for others and for themselves. Jennifer explains what gender partnership looks like in practice and which organisational systems leaders need to examine if they want real change.If you lead a team or run an organisation, this conversation will change how you think about performance, culture and who gets to thrive.Where in your world are old expectations still limiting people?"Men feel pressure to live in the man box." - Jennifer McCollumYou'll hear about•      Why workplaces aren't working well for men•      The man box and its 84% pressure statistic•      Fear as the biggest barrier to speaking up•      What gender partnership really means in practice•      How advocating for others benefits men too•      Pitching gender partnership to a new CEO•      Key talent systems every leader should examine•      Why trust must come before truth•      The Walk the Line exercise and its surprising resultsAbout Jennifer:Jennifer McCollum is a recognized CEO, speaker, and leadership expert on a mission to build more inclusive workplaces by advancing women and engaging men as partners in equity.She is the author of the book Men at Work: The Roadmap to Gender Partnership, a powerful call for men to move beyond passive support toward shared leadership. She also wrote In Her Own Voice: A Woman's Rise to CEO, which explores the challenges women face on the path to leadership through data and personal storytelling.She is President &CEO of Catalyst, a global nonprofit dedicated to accelerating progress for women at work. Previously, she was the first female CEO of Linkage, a leadership development firm focused on changing the face of leadership, where she successfully led its acquisition by SHRM.Her insights have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Forbes, and Psychology Today, and she's spoken on hundreds of stages worldwide. She lives in the Washington, D.C., area with her husband and three children, and is a passionate tennis player and skier.Catalyst: https://www.catalyst.org/Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenniferscherermccollum/Book: https://www.catalyst.org/en-gb/insights/men-at-work-book My resources:Try my High-stakes meetings toolkit (https://bit.ly/43cnhnQ).Take my Becoming a Strategic Leader course (https://bit.ly/3KJYDTj).Sign up to my Every Day is a Strategy Day newsletter (http://bit.ly/36WRpri) for modern mindsets and practices to help you get ahead.Subscribe to my YouTube channel (http://bit.ly/3cFGk1k) where you can watch the conversation.For more details about me:●      Services (https://rb.gy/ahlcuy) to CEOs, entrepreneurs and professionals.●      About me (https://rb.gy/dvmg9n) - my background, experience and philosophy.●      Examples of my writing https://rb.gy/jlbdds).●      Follow me and engage with me on LinkedIn (https://bit.ly/2Z2PexP).●      Follow me and engage with me on Twitter (https://bit.ly/36XavNI).

While the podcast team is taking a Radical Sabbatical, Kim is interviewing authors of the books that have had a big impact on her in the past two years.  Today, employees working in organizations both large and small are faced with incredible pressure to integrate AI into their workflows both to save costs and to do more.  But many of those same employees express fears, “am I just training robots to put me out of a job?!”  While it can be tempting for leaders in the C-suites to use AI to “finally get the upper hand on these whiny/needy/entitled employees!”, they risk damaging their core mission, specifically providing value to their customers.  In fairness, those same leaders in the C-suite are rightly under pressure to integrate these new tools or risk getting wiped out by more nimble competition.  So, what's the best way to go about this?  In this episode, Kim Scott speaks with Tiffani Bova about her latest book The Experience Mindset.   In this conversation, they explore the critical relationship between employee experience and customer experience, emphasizing the importance of self-reflection, effective feedback mechanisms, and the necessity of training employees. The discussion also highlights the disconnect between executives and employees regarding training and feedback, illustrated through real-world examples like the 'Undercover Boss' show. Ultimately, the conversation underscores the need for organizations to prioritize employee engagement and actionable feedback to foster a positive workplace culture and drive business success. They discuss specifics such as the importance of addressing workplace irritations, the need for effective management training, and the significance of streamlining processes to enhance productivity.  Tiffani especially stresses the critical role of office culture in fostering open communication and the necessity of training managers to improve employee satisfaction.  The discussion also highlights the impact of automation and technology in optimizing processes and the importance of aligning incentives to encourage growth and innovation. They explore the intersection of technology and human experience, particularly focusing on the role of AI in the workplace. They discuss the importance of understanding the human element in technology adoption, the balance between tech and human interaction, and the critical role of company culture in driving business success. The conversation highlights real-world examples of AI implementation, the challenges of technology overload, and the necessity of fostering a cohesive culture that aligns with organizational values. Guest Background: As both a practitioner and academic Tiffani Bova offers a unique perspective and has helped lead the tech industry through several evolutions over her nearly 30-year career as Salesforce's former Growth and Innovation Evangelist, and previously as a Research Fellow at Gartner and a sales, marketing and customer service executive for start-ups and Fortune 500 companies. She is the author of two Wall Street Journal bestsellers: GrowthIQ and The Experience Mindset. At The Futurum Group, she runs the research and strategy organization, while working closely with the entire leadership team to develop and scale its data and intelligence platform and insights for its clients. She also leads the team's efforts within the technology and telecom channels, demonstrating the power and performance of connected go-to-market strategies and alliances. While at Gartner, her forward-looking insights and guidance helped some of the largest technology companies in the world including Microsoft, Cisco, Salesforce, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Oracle, SAP, AT&T, Dell, Amazon-AWS, expand their market share and grow their revenues. She was a trusted advisor to multiple senior executives who were responsible for shifting from on-premise to as-a-service business models resulting in new billion-dollar divisions. In the late 90's and early 2000s she was a pioneer of cloud computing, she previously led direct and indirect sales, marketing and customer service for two of the largest web-based start-ups in the US and spearheaded a newly formed division of a Fortune 500 company to $300 million in revenue over two and a half years. Tiffani has been featured in Harvard Business Review, Fortune, Fast Company, Bloomberg, MSNBC-TV, Yahoo Finance, INC and Forbes. She is also the host of the podcast What's Next! with Tiffani Bova. More info here: https://www.tiffanibova.com/ [links for YouTube description] (Bio) https://www.tiffanibova.com/biography/ (book: The Experience Mindset) https://www.tiffanibova.com/the-experience-mindset/ (how to contact) https://www.tiffanibova.com CHAPTERS (00:44) Introduction to the Experience Mindset (02:19) Self-Reflection and Critical Feedback (04:56) The Importance of Employee Experience (05:39) Understanding Employee Feedback (07:23) The Undercover Boss Example (11:25) The Value of Training Employees (15:29) Disconnect Between Executives and Employees (17:30) Real-World Application of Employee Feedback (20:05) Identifying and Fixing Workplace Irritations (24:31) The Importance of Management Training (27:58) Understanding Processes and Their Impact (36:36) Streamlining Processes for Productivity (41:51) Understanding the Human Element in Technology (44:33) AI: Triumphs and Disasters in Implementation (47:32) The Balance of Technology and Human Experience (50:17) Creating a Cohesive Company Culture (55:20) The Impact of Culture on Business Success Connect with the Radical Candor team: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What does it take for a corporate scientist with zero direct reports to land on a list dominated by business school professors and bestselling authors? That's the question Jayshree Seth had to answer for herself when she was named to the Thinkers50 Radar in 2025 — and her answer became a framework. In her third appearance on the show, Jayshree Seth, 3M's Chief Science Advocate and now-published trilogy author, returns to catch listeners up on a remarkable stretch: a Thinkers50 keynote, a panel alongside Amy Edmondson, an HBR collaboration on trust and AI, and the release of her third book, The Heart of Science: Engineering Blueprint. The conversation moves through several of Jayshree's signature acronym-driven frameworks. There's METRICS-OPTICS-RUBRICS-ENERGETICS, born from reflecting on how she — an engineer with no traditional management credentials — ended up on a list built for management thinkers. There's the "three Cs" that block innovation: copy-pasting, catchphrositis, and cherry-picking, delivered as her Thinkers50 keynote. And there's VIABLE, her personal-branding framework built around voice and visibility, image and impact, backstory and behaviors, and experience and exposure. Beyond the frameworks, this is a conversation about the mechanics of building a reputation from inside a technical role. Jayshree traces the specific chain of relationships — a mention in David Epstein's book Range, an introduction to Rita McGrath, an eventual collaboration with Amy Edmondson on psychological safety and "intelligent failure" applied to human-AI trust — that turned an internal 3M scientist into an external voice cited in Harvard Business Review and Fast Company. Bill and Jayshree also dig into what it means to write a book for three different audiences at once — emerging thought leaders, established experts, and Hall of Fame-level veterans — and why friction in that process is often a sign you're doing it right. The episode closes with a reflection on responsibility: once you have an audience, thought leadership isn't a hobby, it's a discipline that has to coexist with a full-time job. If you've ever wondered whether your expertise "counts" as thought leadership because it didn't come with a traditional credential, this one's for you.     Three Key Takeaways: • Being different can be your competitive advantage, not a liability. Jayshree's METRICS-OPTICS-RUBRICS-ENERGETICS framework argues that outsiders to a field — like an engineer among management thinkers — don't need to conform to existing rubrics. Changing the measurement, the framing, and the energy you bring can alter who gets to lead a conversation. • Reaching out to "inaccessible" experts is a discipline, not a gamble. Jayshree's collaborations with Amy Edmondson, Rita McGrath, and others didn't start with credentials — they started with cold outreach after reading an article or hearing a podcast. The lesson: most thought leaders are more accessible than they appear, and it's okay if they say no. • A personal brand for thought leadership rests on delivery, not image. Her VIABLE framework (voice/visibility, image/impact, backstory/behaviors, experience/exposure) puts the emphasis on tangible results and consistent values over aesthetics — visibility only amplifies a brand that already has substance behind it.   This episode isn't just an interview — it's a live example of the ideas in Bill's brand-new book, The Thought Leadership Handbook, co-written with Peter Winick and Naren Aryal. Jayshree's journey — from in-house corporate scientist to Thinkers50 Radar honoree — is practically a case study for the book's core idea: that thought leadership follows identifiable patterns, not luck. In fact, the book itself draws on more than 700 conversations from this very podcast, and organizes those stories into five thought leadership "avatars" — Jayshree's path as an In-House Expert turned public voice fits right into that framework. If her VIABLE branding model resonated with you, the Handbook goes deeper into exactly how experts like her make that leap from personal effort to public influence. Pick up The Thought Leadership Handbook: How the Experts Elevate Their Big Ideas — And How You Can Too, by Bill Sherman, Peter Winick, and Naren Aryal, wherever books are sold — including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Amplify Publishing Group's website.

https://media.blubrry.com/my_future_business/mfbpodcast.s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/MFB+SHOW+548+SARA+CAUSEY.mp3Subscribe: Email | TuneIn | RSSInterview With Sara CauseyThe World Leader Who Became a Role Model for Introverts#DagHammarskjöld #SimplyDag #SaraCauseyHi, and welcome to the show!On today's show I have the pleasure of welcoming award-winning author and outspoken advocate for introverts and highly sensitive people, Sara Causey, to talk about her path from corporate recruiter to Dag Hammarskjöld biographer and children's book illustrator. Sara's written multiple biographies on the UN's second Secretary-General and now writes children's books that tell quiet, sensitive kids their nature is a strength. Sara's bio reads like a checklist of impressive titles: award-winning author, poet, visual artist, biographer. What most people don't know is that she built all of it after walking away from a career in government contracting and Fortune 100 recruitment.Sara traded the boardroom for words, imagery, and ideas, and found herself drawn into the life of Dag Hammarskjöld, the introspective, poetic second Secretary-General of the United Nations. Sara calls her work on his life a true co-creation, a partnership across time. That partnership became two biographies, Decoding the Unicorn and Simply Dag, revealing a man who was fiercely intelligent and quietly revolutionary beneath his composed exterior.Sara calls her overall approach "eccentricity with purpose." That same philosophy runs through her children's book universe built around Dag the Unicorn, including How to Host a Unicorn and the bilingual Learning with Dag series, all written for quiet, sensitive kids and the adults who were once that kind of child.This work is for introverts and HSPs who rarely see themselves centered in stories about leadership, for parents wanting children's books that celebrate quiet strength, and for anyone curious about a UN figure history nearly let slip away. Decoding the Unicorn has already won a 2026 American Book Fest Award for Best Biography, and Sara's work has been featured on Yahoo Finance, FOX, and Fast Company.To learn more about the topics discussed, or to contact Sara directly, click the link below.Disclosure of Material Connection: This is a sponsored post. My Future Business is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

In this episode of The Everything ECE Podcast, Carla sits down with Cheryl Sutherland, founder of PleaseNotes, for a conversation about journaling, self-trust, confidence, and learning to pay attention to what we actually need.Cheryl shares why she once considered herself a “journaling hater,” how journaling can help us recognize patterns and make clearer decisions, and why the words we use with ourselves matter more than we may realize.Carla and Cheryl also talk about the very real overwhelm educators carry, the pressure to be everything to everyone, and what can happen when we acknowledge that something isn't working instead of continuing to push through it.And Carla makes a commitment during the episode: 30 days of journaling. Listen in, then join her for the experiment.TranscriptCHERYL SUTHERLANDCheryl Sutherland is a speaker, author, and founder of PleaseNotes, a Toronto-based personal growth brand offering guided journals, planners, and affirmation cards for confidence, clarity, and self-trust. She also works as a facilitator and mindfulness speaker for corporate clients, ERGs, and HR teams, with a background spanning banking, sales, and business coaching. She has run four successful Kickstarter campaigns and has been featured in Forbes, Fast Company, InStyle, HuffPost, CBC, and Inc. She is passionate about helping people build self-trust through journaling and reflection. LINKSWebsite: PleaseNotes & cherylsutherland.comInstagram: PleaseNotes / Cheryl SutherlandTikTok: Cheryl SutherlandAffirmations in Abundance: LinkMENTIONED IN THIS EPISODETiny Experiments by Anne-Laure Le CunffIf You Want to Change the World, Start Off by Making Your Bed - William McRaven, US Navy AdmiralSEE CHERYL LIVECheryl will be speaking at the ECE Entrepreneur Experience on November 14, 2026. www.carlatheece.com/ece-entrepreneur-experience 30 DAYS OF JOURNALINGCarla is taking Cheryl's advice and turning journaling into an experiment: 30 days of showing up and seeing what happens.Want to join her? Tag @carlatheece and Cheryl/PleaseNotes on Instagram so you can do the 30 days together.SUBSCRIBE & REVIEWIf you loved this episode, please take a moment to subscribe and leave a review. Your support helps us reach more ECEs who are in the thick of it!. Thanks for tuning in to The Everything ECE.  See you next week!CONNECT WITH CARLAEmail Newsletter: ⁠⁠Click Here⁠ Website: carlatheece.comInstagram: @carlatheece

While the podcast team is taking a Radical Sabbatical, Kim is interviewing authors whose books have had a big impact on her over the past two years.  In this episode, Kim Scott speaks with Ron Friedman, PhD.  Ron has written extensively about the sciences of building high-performing teams.  Ron's latest book is Superteams: The Science and Secrets of High-Performing Teams.  They discuss the importance of the creative process, the role of restoration in productivity, and the key strengths that distinguish super teams from average teams. The conversation delves into effective meeting strategies, communication norms, and the significance of laughter in fostering team cohesion. Ultimately, they emphasize the need for customized approaches to team dynamics and the value of building supportive relationships within teams.  They also explore the dynamics of effective teamwork, the importance of maintaining focus in a distracted world, and the role of hobbies in enhancing productivity. They discuss the attributes of great teammates, the significance of productive disagreement, and the necessity of effective feedback for continuous improvement. The dialogue emphasizes that super teams thrive on collaboration, shared goals, and a culture of open communication. Guest Background: Ron Friedman, PhD, is an award-winning psychologist who helps leaders build high-performing teams. He is the bestselling author of The Best Place to Work and Decoding Greatness, and the founder of Superteams, Inc., where he delivers keynotes, workshops, and executive advisory to senior leaders around the world. An expert on human motivation, Friedman has served on the faculties of the University of Rochester, Nazareth College, and Hobart and William Smith Colleges. He contributes regularly to Harvard Business Review, and his work has been featured in The New York Times, Financial Times, Bloomberg, NPR, CBS, FOX, NBC, Fast Company, The Washington Post, Forbes, and Inc. To learn more about his work, visit SuperteamsInc.com. CHAPTERS (00:41) Introduction to Super Teams (01:45) The Creative Process and Incubation (04:12) Restoration and Productivity (06:27) Research Behind Super Teams (07:50) Key Strengths of Super Teams (09:00) Meetings: The Double-Edged Sword (11:24) Effective Meeting Strategies (12:51) Customizing Team Dynamics (15:06) Communication Norms and Email Management (18:05) The Role of Laughter in Teams (20:57) Building Relationships Through Support (23:00) Navigating Humor and Inclusivity (26:52) Time Affluence and Productivity Strategies (30:08) Staying Focused in a Distracted World (32:51) The Power of Hobbies and Side Hustles (36:10) Attributes of Great Teammates (39:10) Building Effective Teams (41:40) The Importance of Productive Disagreement (45:02) Mastering Feedback for Improvement Connect with the Radical Candor team: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Website⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠ Keywords Super Teams, productivity, creative process, meetings, team dynamics, communication, laughter, leadership, time management, workplace culture focus, hobbies, teamwork, feedback, productivity, super teams, attributes, disagreement, communication, leadership Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

David Landsman has spent his career navigating some of the highest-stakes conversations imaginable, from the conflict in the Balkans to serving as Britain's ambassador to Greece during the financial crisis. In this episode, we talk about what diplomacy can teach all of us about listening, negotiation, and why the secret to getting your message across starts with understanding the person sitting across from you. Dr David Landsman is a former senior British diplomat and corporate executive who helps business leaders understand what they need to know about geopolitics. He is the author of the Channel Your Inner Ambassador blog, which shares stories from his varied diplomatic career and shows how a diplomat's mindset and tradecraft can help us all in our business and personal lives. New here? I am a two-time New York Times bestselling author and one of the most sought-after public speakers globally, having spoken to over 500 companies while traveling to more than 40 countries. My clients include Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Nike. My work has been covered in print media, including The New Yorker, The New York Times, Time, Fast Company, Fortune, Politico, Inc., and Harvard Business Review. It has also been featured on NPR, NBC, FOX, and multiple times on The Steve Harvey Show. Get more stuff from me: Join 200K+ subscribers on my FREE weekly newsletter: https://gregmckeown.com/1mw/ Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less Effortless: Make It Easier to Do What Matters Most The Essentialism Planner: A 90-Day Guide to Accomplishing More by Doing Less Stay in touch with me: Instagram https://www.instagram.com/gregorymckeown/ LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregmckeown/ X https://x.com/GregoryMcKeown Hire me to speak: https://gregmckeown.com/keynote/

About This Episode  In this episode, Frank Cottle talks with Charlene Li — one of the most established voices in business transformation and disruptive leadership. A New York Times bestselling author of seven books, Li founded the disruptive analyst firm Altimeter Group, served as Chief Research Officer at PA Consulting, and now runs her own firm, Quantum Networks Group. She has advised 49 of the Fortune 100, spoken at the World Economic Forum, TED, and SXSW, and was named one of the most creative people in business by Fast Company. Her latest book, Winning with AI: The 90-Day Blueprint for Success, co-authored with Dr. Katia Walsh, is — in her words — not a technology book, but a leadership and strategy book.    The conversation starts where most AI conversations refuse to: identity. If the machine can do it, who are we? From there, Li dismantles the "AI-first" label, names the scarcity trap behind headcount-cutting AI strategies, and lays out the unglamorous groundwork — mindset, skill set, toolset, decision set — that lets companies move fast because they can move safely.   

The New Thing Gap - What retail took away when it took away the friction, with NYT editor Eric Athas.In 1995, buying a pair of sneakers cost you 30 minutes and five miles of driving. Today it takes about four seconds. New York Times editor Eric Athas spent four years reporting on what that trade did to people, and he has a name for the thing retail deleted: the new thing gap. Eric's book, Saying No to New, is out now. He interviewed Ricardo in 2024 for the consumer research behind it, and Ricardo shows up on page 41 explaining why off-price stores keep shipping in fresh inventory to keep shoppers hunting. This episode puts that quote back in front of the industry that inspired it. Ricardo and Casey take Eric through the uncomfortable version of the question. If the gap between wanting something and owning it was where the customer used to think, what happens to shoppers now that frictionless shopping has closed it? And what happens when agentic commerce deletes the last click? Eric's answer about AI shopping assistants is the line that sticks: we may have built the perfect motivated reasoning machine. This is not an anti-retail hour. Eric says plainly that the goal was never to say no to every new thing. He walks through the Iron Man method for deciding what to let in, the case for useful friction, why Ed O'Brien's research shows we are wrong about familiar things in a predictable direction, and the curb cut test that separates real innovation from innovation theater. Casey pushes him on whether there is a business on the other side of this, built on rediscovery instead of replacement. If you are building for agentic commerce this year or defending a frictionless shopping roadmap to someone who signs the checks, this hour will give you better questions than the ones you walked in with.In This Episode, You'll Learn.•       Why the distance between seeing something new and owning it collapsed from 30 minutes and five miles to about four seconds, and what the industry removed along with it•       Where useful friction belongs, plus the audit Eric uses to find the access points worth slowing down•       Who an agentic commerce agent is optimizing for: the shopper, the retailer, or the company that built the agent•       Why an AI shopping assistant that agrees with you is the magic pill effect with a bigger engine•       The Iron Man method in three steps: name what matters, refuse what conflicts with it, accept what supports it•       What Ed O'Brien's repeat-experience research means for brands that want to sell quality instead of replacement•       How the Diderot effect turns one new desk into a new dining table, and what retailers owe people on the failure side of a purchase•       The curb cut test for telling genuine innovation from innovation theater, and why Eric changed his mind about AI glasses•       Ricardo's story about the UK retailer that cut buyer's-remorse returns in half by asking better questions at the shelf, and why frictionless shopping in reverse is the part retail keeps skippingSupport our sponsors.There's still time to join us at RetailClub AI Festival next week.From the founders of Shoptalk and Groceryshop, RetailClub AI Festival brings together 2,000 industry leaders from September 22 to 24 for three days fully outdoors in Huntington Beach focused entirely on how AI is transforming retail. Hear from 150 leaders shaping how AI is being used across the industry, explore the technologies changing how retail works, and connect with senior leaders from across retail, brands, technology and investment. Late registration is available at retailclub.com/retail-razor-podcast.We'll see you in Huntington Beach!W. P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University.ASU is a leading public research university and its W. P. Carey School of Business is the largest in the United States. AI-Enabled Supply Chain Strategy is a 3-day executive program running October 5-7, built by the #2-ranked Supply Chain Management department. The program is designed for senior leaders setting AI strategy across procurement, logistics, and operations.Register at https://specialevents.asu.edu/878064 with ID Code retailrazorasu for $1,500 off.Subscribe & Follow.How much did you love this episode? Drop us a 5‑star rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Goodpods. Subscribe on YouTube so you never miss an episode and check out the other shows in the Retail Razor Podcast Network: Retail Transformers, Blade to Greatness, and Data Blades.Subscribe to the Retail Razor Podcast Network: https://retailrazor.com/Subscribe to our Newsletter: https://retailrazor.substack.comSubscribe to our YouTube channel: https://go.retailrazor.com/utubeFeatured guest.Eric Athas. https://www.linkedin.com/in/ericathas/Deputy Editor, Newsroom Development & Support. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com“Saying No to New: Why New Things Are Stealing Your Time, Money, and Happiness―and How to Take Back Your Life.”https://sayingnotonew.comEric Athas is an editor at the New York Times, where he helps journalists learn new tools and skills they can use to tell stories. Before joining the Times in 2016, he worked at NPR and the Washington Post. His work has been published in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, and the Nieman Journalism Lab. Athas lives with his wife and two children in Brooklyn.Chapters.00:00 Teaser 00:43 Show Intro 05:30 Welcome to the Retail Razor Show, Eric Athas! 06:25 The Painter's Lie: Why We Believe New Is Always Better 09:14 When Does Upgrading Stop Feeling Like a Win? 13:50 The Beetle Trap: Why Our Brains Are Wired for Novelty 16:50 How Retailers Engineer You Into Buying More 22:10 The Vanishing Gap Between Wanting and Buying 33:38 The Magic Pill Effect: Why AI Tells You What You Want to Hear 41:04 The Iron Man Method: Finding Your Anchor in a World of New 45:05 Rediscovering the Familiar: Why Old Things Still Work 58:03 The Diderot Effect: How One New Purchase Ruins Everything Else 01:04:11 The Curb Cut Test: How to Know What's Worth Saying Yes To 01:12:21 Show CloseMeet your hosts.Helping you cut through the clutter in retail & retail tech:Ricardo Belmar is an NRF Top Retail Voice for 2025 and a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert from 2021 – 2026. Thinkers 360 has named him a Top 10 Thought Leader in Retail and eCommerce, a Top 25 Thought Leader in Careers, a Top 50 Thought Leader in Agentic AI, AGI and Management, and a Top 100 Thought Leader in AI Ethics, Marketing, Digital Transformation andTransformation. Thinkers 360 also awarded him an Elite Expert Certification in Retail, a Master Expert Certification in Management, and named him a Certified Expert in AI, Marketing, and Digital Transformation. Thinkers 360 also named him a Top Digital Voice for 2024 and 2025. He is an advisory council member at George Mason University's Center for Retail Transformationand the Retail Cloud Alliance. He was most recently the partner marketing leader for retail & consumer goods in the Americas at Microsoft.Casey Golden, is the North America Leader for Retail & Consumer Goods at CI&T, and CEO of Luxlock. She is a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert from 2023 - 2026, and Retail Cloud Alliance advisory council member. After a career on the fashion and supply chain technology side of the business, Casey is obsessed with the customer relationship between the brand and the consumer and is slaying franken-stacks and building retail tech! Episode Music.Includes music provided by imunobeats.com, featuring Overclocked, and E-Motive from the album Beat Hype, written by Heston Mimms, published by Imuno.

On today's episode, cohosts Yasmin Gagne and Josh Christensen talk to Fast Company contributor Clint Rainey about a high school dropout who became a a consumer packaged goods (CPG) marketing disrupter. Then Yaz talks to TikTok Shop's head of strategic initiatives, Patrick Nommensen, about how TikTok Shop works for customers and influencers, and how the company runs it.  To check out Clint's reporting, go to: fastcompany.com/91599402/connor-blakley-used-to-tell-americas-biggest-brands-what-gen-z-wanted-jams-uncrustables-bronco-pbj-smucker-dropout  For more of the latest business and innovation news, go to fastcompany.com/news

Blake DeCola is a digital media executive, precision marketing strategist, and the EVP of Performance Media at Merge.With over 15 years of experience across digital advertising, adtech, and precision marketing—including key strategic roles at enterprise platforms like Publicis' Epsilon, Rubicon Project, and Undertone—DeCola leads digital activation and growth media frameworks for major healthcare, B2B, and enterprise brands. At Brado, he focuses on leveraging zero-party data, AI-driven search experiences, and conversational engagement platforms to build human-centric digital strategies. A published contributor to outlets like Fast Company, DeCola specializes in transforming high-stakes, regulated digital media campaigns into measurable customer acquisition engines.

Somewhere in every access center there is a drop-down menu. No answer. Left message. Refused. Not interested. Wrong number. The person choosing from it has the least context in the building and the most pressure on the clock, and the choice takes about four seconds. That code then leaves the work queue, enters a report and becomes the evidence for not spending on those patients again. Chris Boyer and Reed Smith open episode 504 by pulling apart two things health systems routinely treat as one. Capacity utilization measures whether you sold the inventory. It says nothing about who could not get in. Reed puts the distinction plainly. Capacity is the view from the provider's side of the desk and access is the view from the patient's. Marrying the two is the work. Then the evidence. A cluster randomized trial across 44 primary care practices and roughly 12,000 patients found that electronic health record reminders alone moved nothing at all. Completion of overdue follow-up ran 22.7% with reminders against 22.9% for usual care. Adding a letter and a phone call took it to 31%. Ordinary contact, twice, with no technology in it. Chris keeps the ceiling in front of the audience for the rest of the episode, because even in the strongest arm roughly two thirds of patients still did not complete. The second segment asks what a person is actually for. Medicare answered part of this in 2024 when it started paying for patient navigation, and the answer it gave is clinical severity, with a cancer diagnosis qualifying automatically. Patients owe 20% of the cost, which is one of the reasons practices report they have not started using the codes. Chris and Reed then sit with the finding that argues against them. In that same trial, adding a navigator on top of the letter and the phone call moved the number four tenths of one point. They work through what that does and does not prove, and land on three jobs a person can do that a letter cannot. Only one of them changes the system instead of recovering a patient, and it is the one nobody puts in a financial model. Jessica Walker of Care Sherpa closes the episode with the case. A health system handed her a list of oncology screening patients its access team had marked unreachable after the auto-dialer sequence ran out. What she found in that list was almost never disinterest. Wrong orders, wrong referring physician, wrong location. Phone numbers and addresses that no longer worked. Carrier blocking. Patients in hospice, deceased or no longer eligible while the order sat and expired. Patients who would have had to cross a river. Her description of it is that the health system was asking people to pick up a part-time job to fix their own referral. The most useful moment comes later. Her team heard the same thing from more than one patient, that the nearest location's hours did not work for a shift worker. The system added Wednesday evenings and recovered those patients. She also describes a referring physician who had quietly stopped sending patients because his patients were never getting their screenings done, and what it took to turn that back on. If you cannot say what your people do that a letter cannot, you have bought a service tier rather than an answer. Healthcare's Long Walk Toward the Patient, the free eBook marking 500 episodes: https://www.touchpointpodcastbook.com Atlas SJ, Tosteson ANA, Burdick TE, et al. A Multilevel Primary Care Intervention to Improve Follow-Up of Overdue Abnormal Cancer Screening Test Results: A Cluster Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA. 2023;330(14):1348-1358. 44 practices, 11,980 patients: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2810508 Atlas SJ, Tosteson ANA, Burdick TE, et al. Primary Care Practitioner Perceptions on the Follow-up of Abnormal Cancer Screening Test Results. JAMA Netw Open. 2022;5(9):e2234194. Survey of 275 primary care practitioners across three health systems: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2796828 CMS, Health Equity Services in the 2024 Physician Fee Schedule Final Rule. Principal Illness Navigation codes G0023 and G0024, plus the peer support codes, effective January 1 2024: https://www.cms.gov/files/document/mln9201074-health-equity-services-2024-physician-fee-schedule-final-rule.pdf-0 Pratt-Chapman ML. Navigation Refresh: Updates to Principal Illness Navigation Billing. Journal of Oncology Navigation & Survivorship. May 2026;17(3). Source for the 20% patient coinsurance as a reported barrier to adoption: https://www.jons-online.com/issues/2026/may-2026-vol-17-no-3/navigation-refresh-updates-to-principal-illness-navigation-billing Care Sherpa: https://caresherpa.com Jessica Walker on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessicawalkercaresherpa/ Eternal, the longevity startup founded by Alex Mather of The Athletic, which now generates a weekly AI audio recap of a user's own lab and wearable data. Fast Company, June 9 2026: https://www.fastcompany.com/91555441/eternal-startup-turns-health-data-into-ai-generated-podcasts TP488, "If Marketing Owned Patient Activation," referenced in segment one on marketing capturing demand and access dispositioning it TP482, "The Pilot That Never Graduates," referenced by Chris inside the interview when he asks Jessica how she broke out of perpetual pilot status The TPS Report newsletter, at touchpoint.health Reed Smith on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/reedtsmith/ Chris Boyer on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisboyer/ Chris Boyer website: http://www.christopherboyer.com/ Chris Boyer on BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/chrisboyer.bsky.social Reed Smith on BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/reedsmith.bsky.social Recommendations from this episode: Chris: Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs. That's the Weight of the World), the Questlove documentary on HBO and HBO Max. Premiered at Tribeca June 3 2026 and released June 7 2026. 119 minutes. Covers Maurice White's jazz background and his plan for the band before it was a band: https://www.hbo.com/ Reed: the ETENWOLF P300 electric ball pump. Rechargeable, preset modes for basketball, football and soccer, custom PSI setting, inflates and deflates, ships with two needles and a pouch: https://etenwolf.com/collections/electric-ball-pump MENTIONS FROM THE SHOW Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Australian-born creative director, gardener, and entrepreneur Richard Christiansen takes us from his childhood on a rural Australian farm to the front lines of advertising, magazine publishing, and creative agency life in New York before revealing how burnout and the upheaval of COVID sparked a radical new chapter: Flamingo Estate. What begins as a conversation about career pivots quickly becomes a rich exploration of creativity, intimacy, and the price of speed. Christiansen shares the unlikely path that led him from law school to London agencies, from Benetton's provocative campaigns to building Chandelier Creative, and finally to transforming his own home into a living, breathing brand rooted in the garden.   Along the way, he reflects on what it means to create with softness in a culture that rewards hardness, why “scale is the enemy of intimacy,” and how nature has become both his business model and his North Star. He also opens up about the lessons he learned from farmers, the philosophy behind his books, and why he believes the world is craving more beauty, ceremony, and human connection. For more of the latest business and innovation news, go to https://www.fastcompany.com/news To listen to the latest episodes of Creative Control on Fast Company:https://www.fastcompany.com/podcasts/creative-control

Find Rocky Lalvani @ www.ProfitComesFirst.com  or email him at rocky@profitcomesfirst.com Make more, work less video: https://youtu.be/   A professor at Wharton once told a C-minus undergrad: don't ever be irreplaceable, because if you can't be replaced, you can't be promoted. That undergrad is now Ari Meisel, founder of Less Doing and creator of the Replaceable Founder framework, and he's spent fifteen years proving the same rule applies to founders. Most owners wear "nobody else can do this but me" as a badge of honor. This episode makes the case that it's actually the ceiling on the business. Ari and Rocky get into exactly how an owner gets out of that seat: the order of operations for deciding what to fix, automate, or hand off, the twenty-task inventory Ari uses to force real change within a year, and the specific dollar numbers behind doing it, including replacing a $235-an-hour bookkeeper and finding $140,000 in grants a nonprofit never had the capacity to chase.   In This Episode: Why being indispensable is a ceiling, not an achievement The exact order: optimize, automate, then outsource, and why skipping steps backfires The Ultimate KPI exercise: twenty tasks in, sixteen gone within a year, four that are actually yours Why most failed delegation is a failed instruction, not a broken system How Ari runs twenty-six AI agents across five organizations, and what each one replaced The verification habit ("pokayoke") that keeps delegation, human or AI, honest   Key Takeaways: Being irreplaceable isn't safety. It's a ceiling. List the twenty things you spend the most time on, and commit to eliminating sixteen within a year. Fix the process before you automate it, and automate it before you hire it out. Every delegated task, human or AI, needs a built-in check that it actually happened. Staying the bottleneck has a real cost: banks, buyers, and your own household can't tell what the business is worth if nothing works without you.   About Ari Meisel: Ari Meisel is the founder of Less Doing and creator of the Replaceable Founder framework — a system that helps entrepreneurs build businesses that run without them. After being diagnosed with Crohn's disease at 23, Ari became obsessed with optimizing, automating, and outsourcing everything — first his health, then his business. Today he works with founders to eliminate operational bottlenecks, reclaim their time, and build companies that scale without sacrificing their life. His work has been featured in the New York Times, Forbes, and Fast Company. He's the author of Less Doing, More Living and hosts the Less Doing podcast.   Links: Website: www.talktoari.com.    lessdoing.ai    Profit Blueprint Calculator I Profit Comes First: https://lp.profitcomesfirst.com/profitblueprintcalc-page   Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@profitanswerman Sign up to be notified when the next cohort of the Profit First Experience Course is available! Free Copy of the Profit Blueprint Book: https://lp.profitcomesfirst.com/landing-page-page  Monthly Newsletter signup: https://lp.profitcomesfirst.com/newsletter-signup Relay Bank (affiliate link): https://relayfi.com/?referralcode=profitcomesfirst Profit Answer Man Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/profitanswerman/ My podcast about living a richer more meaningful life: http://richersoul.com/ Music provided by Junan from Junan Podcast Any financial advice is for educational purposes only and you should consult with an expert for your specific needs.       

Caroline Webb is an economist, executive coach, and bestselling author of How to Have a Good Day, which has been published in more than 60 countries. Her new book is Leadership Intelligence: Science-Based Strategies for Mastering Twenty-One Everyday Management Challenges. Caroline has been named one of the top 50 executive coaches in the world by Thinkers50 and one of the top 50 leadership and management thinkers by Inc. magazine. She is a Senior Advisor on leadership to McKinsey & Company, where she previously served as a Partner. For more than two decades, Caroline has worked with leaders across business, government, startups, and the social sector, drawing on behavioral science, economics, and neuroscience to help people perform at their best. Her work has been featured in Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Economist, Financial Times, Fortune, Fast Company, TIME, and WIRED. In this episode we discuss the following: One of my favorite ideas from Caroline is simple: if you want to get the best out of people, it helps to understand how their brains work. When Caroline was working with the military general, it was only when she explained what was happening in the brain that she finally got through to him. Shouting might make someone more vigilant, but it's not going to improve their problem-solving ability. When people feel threatened, their ability to reason, solve problems, and be creative can actually decline. Leadership isn't so much about our personality traits as it is about our behaviors. And when people know we have their best interests at heart, they're more likely to reach their potential. When someone responds to us in an unpleasant way, our instinct is to focus on what they need to change. But sometimes the best way to change how someone behaves toward us is to change how we behave toward them first.

Most HR teams have already run their AI experiments. A pilot here, a policy draft there. Turning that scattered activity into something people actually use on a Tuesday is a completely different problem. In this episode: Why the biggest available gains from AI now come from teams working with it together, not individuals getting better at prompting How to pick a first project by finding the rock in your shoe instead of announcing a sweeping overhaul nobody asked forWhat the three Cs (crisis, commitment, and conflict) tell you about where AI should never touch an employee interaction Timestamps [00:01:52] What an AI catalyst actually does inside an HR function, and why the job changed from building fluency to driving adoption [00:02:49] Why HR teams that feel behind on AI are not, and what the range across SHRM's membership really looks like [00:03:53] Finding the rock in your shoe, and why the most annoying problem beats the most sophisticated one as a starting point [00:07:29] Nichol's dictation method for getting a model to write her prompts, including asking for a McKinsey-style or Fast Company-style prompt [00:08:15] How vibe teaming works, including the AI wrangler role, the facilitator role, and the transcript loop that feeds the group's corrections back in [00:10:08] The loneliness problem created by heavy individual AI use, and the 70-page proposal exchange that illustrates it [00:11:22] Over 44% of people use AI daily and nearly as many run into work slop daily, and what a biweekly team session does about it [00:12:44] Eight executive assistants who used vibe teaming remotely to redesign how their C-suite works together [00:15:09] The three Cs guardrail: crisis, commitment, and conflict are the moments to keep AI out of entirely [00:17:19] Why people can always tell whether a real human was on the other side, even when they can't identify AI-generated text Guest Bio Nichol Bradford is a futurist, investor, and executive with more than 20 years across technology and human potential. Her mission is to strengthen humanity's mental, emotional, and social health (MESH) as the foundation for innovation and progress. She reaches over 100,000 people annually through thought leadership and public speaking, including TEDx. As SHRM's AI + HI Executive-in-Residence, Bradford shapes global strategies that reach 362 million workers and their families through 340,000 HR professionals in 180 countries. In June 2025 she founded and launched Human Tech Week, which drew 250 speakers and more than 1,200 attendees in its first year. That event grew out of TransformativeTech.org, the global community she co-founded and built to members in 72 countries. She also co-founded Niremia Collective, a venture fund backing the future of human potential. Bradford works at the seam between advanced technology and deep human need, with a focus on human-centered AI adoption. Before this, she operated World of Warcraft in China. Today she runs the largest network for human potential technology. Brought to You by Paylocity Paylocity is the fastest growing unified platform for HR, Finance, and IT. Paylocity brings your people, processes, and data together in one place so HR leaders can spend less time managing systems and more time doing the work that actually moves their organizations forward. Learn more at paylocity.com Keywords: AI adoption in HR, responsible AI, vibe teaming, collective intelligence, work slop, AI guardrails, human potential, SHRM, AI catalyst, HR technology, team productivity, prompting, talent acquisition AI, performance management, employee experience, change management, workforce wellbeing, human-centered AI, Nichol Bradford, HR Mixtape

In today's episode, you'll discover: Why working harder, selling more, and relying on personal effort alone won't create scalable success—and why the real breakthrough comes from building a system other people can duplicate. How to turn rookies into leaders who multiply leaders and create teams that grow without depending on one superstar. Why speed, recruiting, and duplication are the real engines of wealth, without getting distracted by "shiny objects," and how proven systems can accelerate both income and impact. To support these three takeaways, I chose a quote from Peter Drucker: "Nothing is less productive than to make more efficient what should not be done at all." About Larry Weidel: Larry Weidel is a Sales Executive, Investor, and Business Advisor with over $6 billion in assets under management. He hosts the popular Million Dollar Mastermind Podcast and is the bestselling author of Serial Winner (Greenleaf, 2015). He has been featured in Forbes, Inc., Fast Company, The Globe and Main, Investor's Business Daily, and by the American Management Association. How to Get in Touch with Larry Weidel: Website: https://weidelonwinning.com/ Email: support@weidelonwinning.com Stalk me online! Linktr.ee: https://linktr.ee/conniewhitman Communication Style Assessment (CSA)™: https://www.assess.biz/assessments/assessment_entry.asp?m=1188&a=1177 Subscribe to the Enlightenment of Change Podcast on your favorite podcast streaming service or YouTube.  New episodes are posted every week - listen as Connie delves into new sales and business topics or addresses problems you may have in your business.

About This Episode In this episode, Frank Cottle sits down with David Grossman — one of America's foremost authorities on leadership and change communication inside organizations. Grossman is founder and CEO of The Grossman Group, a trusted executive coach to the C-suite, and a six-time author whose award-winning Heart First series is applauded by leaders worldwide. His latest book, The Heart Work of Modern Leadership: 6 Differentiators of Exceptional Leaders (Amplify Publishing Group, 2026), is an Amazon Best Seller across four business categories. His commentary has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Fortune, Fast Company, Newsweek, the World Economic Forum — and Allwork.Space.   The conversation moves from The Grossman Group's research with The Harris Poll — which found AI to be the single biggest change-management issue in business today — into the surprising heart of his new book: it's not the bad leaders organizations should worry about. It's the good ones.

When life throws you a curveball, what's your first instinct?Defend yourself?Shut down?Get angry?According to leadership expert Lois Barth (www.loisbarth.com), there's a better option: Get curious.WATCH THIS EPISODE ON YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/4kUmYfmi5goIn this episode, Lois shares how curiosity, compassion, connection, and courage can completely transform the way we live, work and interact with others.From overcoming a life-changing eating disorder to helping organizations build healthier workplace cultures, Lois offers practical tools for replacing judgment with curiosity and "being nice" with something far more powerful: genuine kindness.If you've ever struggled with difficult conversations, imposter syndrome, change, conflict, or your own relentless inner critic, this conversation is packed with practical ideas you can start using immediately.In this episode:• The difference between being nice and being kind• How to have difficult conversations without damaging relationships• Why disruption can become your greatest teacher• Replacing your inner critic with curiosity and compassion• How healthy workplace cultures are actually builtChapters00:00  Introduction to Disruption as a Mindset01:45 Lois Barth's Journey and Philosophy07:17 The Four C's: Curiosity, Compassion, Connection, and Courage11:26 Curiosity's Role in Disruption14:30 Implementing the Four C's in the Workplace20:34 Creating a Culture of Beautiful Honesty27:59 The Structure Behind Honest ConversationsWant more from Lois?www.loisbarth.comhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/loisbarth/ Lois works with heart-centered go-getters who crave greater meaning, fulfillment, and impact in their lives by helping them clarify their goals, foster well-being, and be more effective leaders. A term she refers to as Behavioral Wellness Meets professional development. She has been the makeover life coach for SELF Magazine; Fitness Magazine and Fit Blog (Sears) which to date 3 million people registered for. Lois has been quoted and published in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, and SELF Magazine. Her speaking clients include Capital One Bank, L'Oreal, Women in Banking & Invesco to name a few.Anne Bonney is a keynote speaker and emcee who helps organizations lead through change by building resilience, emotional intelligence, and courageous communication.

Spencer Greenberg is an entrepreneur and mathematician with a PhD in applied math from NYU. He's the founder and CEO of ClearerThinking.org, a psychology education and research organization that designs and conducts novel studies in psychology and offers more than 80 interactive educational tools to the general public, used by hundreds of thousands of people. His work has been featured by numerous major media outlets, such as Forbes, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Independent, Lifehacker, Gizmodo, Fast Company, and Financial Times. Today on the show we discuss: why most self-help advice gets recycled, how to spot grifters and too-good-to-be-true promises, why smart people still get manipulated, the dangerous side of manifestation and toxic positivity, the evidence-backed psychological tools that actually improve your life, how to stop overthinking and turn better decisions into action and much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What does it actually mean to lead with extreme commitment—and to follow through on your word, every single time? In this episode, Will sits down with Steve Farber, founder and CEO of The Extreme Leadership Institute, bestselling author, and one of the most respected voices in leadership development today.Steve's team has helped more than 25 companies earn spots on Best Places to Work lists, and his ideas have shaped leadership conversations far beyond the boardroom. He's the author of six acclaimed leadership books, starting with The Radical Leap, which won Fast Company's Readers' Choice Award and was named one of the 100 Best Business Books of All Time. His book Greater Than Yourself debuted as a Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestseller, and Love Is Just Damn Good Business has been featured everywhere from Wharton Radio to the World Economic Forum. He even teamed up with Twisted Sister's Jay Jay French to write Twisted Business, pulling leadership lessons straight from a career in rock and roll.This conversation comes at a perfect moment—Steve's newest book, The Radical Promise: Mastering the Art of Doing What You Say You Will Do, co-written with leadership legends Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner, launches the very day this episode is being recorded. Will and Rick dig into what it takes to build a culture of real accountability, why "doing what you say" is harder—and more radical—than it sounds, and how love and leadership intersect in ways most business books never touch.You can get Steve's book the Radical Promise here: https://www.amazon.com/Radical-Promise-Mastering-Doing-What-ebook/dp/B0HF4T8DPS/ref=books_amazonstores_desktop_mfs_author_smart_catalog_unrecognized_0?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_w=MtBjT&content-id=amzn1.sym.47218010-ccda-4098-a91e-bc39e6d446f4&pf_rd_p=47218010-ccda-4098-a91e-bc39e6d446f4&pf_rd_r=133-2963950-0619343&pd_rd_wg=7Tc5H&pd_rd_r=a368e788-2454-4548-ad09-d063b282ef87Get your copy of Rick Segal's book, The Heart of It here: https://amplifypublishinggroup.com/product/nonfiction/business-and-finance/entrepreneurship/the-heart-of-it/Read Rick Segal's blog: https://impactinvestorsegal.com/blog

What is the real reason your first accounting hire is drowning? When should a business owner stop DIY'ing their numbers and bring in real help? What is the messy truth about the first 12 months as a CFO? Why do strong finance hires fail in the wrong setup? On this week's episode of the Crushing Debt Podcast, Shawn & George talk to Wassia Kamon, CPA, CMA, MBA, the Chief Financial Officer of Access to Capital for Entrepreneurs (ACE), a leading Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) based in Georgia. She brings more than 15 years of experience across manufacturing, technology, pharmaceuticals, and the nonprofit sector, with leadership roles in accounting and FP&A. ​Named the 2025 CFO of the Year by the Atlanta Business Chronicle and a two-time CPA Practice Advisor 40 Under 40 honoree, Wassia is a keynote speaker and guest faculty member for the Wharton Online FP&A Certificate Program. Her insights on finance leadership and governance have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Accounting Today, Fast Company, and Strategic Finance. ​She is the host of The Diary of a CFO podcast, where she interviews finance leaders about team leadership and the realities of the modern CFO role in growing organizations. She serves on the AICPA Women's Initiatives Executive Committee and the AICPA Future of Finance Leadership Advisory Group. Please visit Wassia's websites at www.wassiakamon.com and www.TheDiaryOfACFO.com  Let us know if you enjoy this episode and, if so, please share it with your friends! Or, you can support the show by visiting our Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/crushingDebt   To contact George Curbelo, you can email him at GCFinancialCoach21@gmail.com or follow his Tiktok channel - https://www.tiktok.com/@curbelofinancialcoach   To contact Shawn Yesner, you can email him at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com or visit www.YesnerLaw.com. 

On today's episode, cohosts Yasmin Gagne and Josh Christensen talk to former Fast Company senior editor and now Alto editorial director Jeff Beer about why the influencer bubble is finally popping. Then Yaz talks to Cotopaxi CEO Lindsay Shumlas about Cotopaxi's sustainability efforts, international expansion, and how they build credibility.  To check out Jeff's reporting, go to: https://www.fastcompany.com/91576953/the-influencer-bubble-is-finally-popping  For more of the latest business and innovation news, go to fastcompany.com/news

Stop letting broken workplace rules hijack your day. In this episode of I Dare You, I'm joined by award-winning psychologist and bestselling author Dr. Ron Friedman to tear down the myths keeping you and your team stuck in survival mode. Backed by the largest study of high-performing teams ever conducted in his new bestselling book, Superteams: The Science and Secrets of High-Performing Teams, Dr. Friedman breaks down the exact, research-backed moves you need right now to take back control of your time, build fierce peer accountability, and unlock your real potential. In this episode, we get into: The Anatomy of a Superteam The Toxic Meeting Trap (and Attention Residue) The Uncomfortable Question Every Real Leader Asks Why 97% of Traditional Feedback Fails The Secret Cognitive Power of Movement Ron's Simple, High-Impact I Dare You Experiment Challenge About Dr. Ron Friedman:Ron Friedman, PhD, is an award-winning psychologist, founder of Superteams, Inc., and bestselling author of The Best Place to Work, Decoding Greatness, and Superteams: The Science and Secrets of High-Performing Teams. An expert on human motivation and peak performance, Dr. Friedman has served on the faculties of the University of Rochester, Nazareth College, and Hobart and William Smith Colleges. He contributes regularly to Harvard Business Review—where his article “How to Build a Superteam That Keeps Getting Better” was a recent cover story—and his work has also been featured in The New York Times, Forbes, Bloomberg, Fast Company, and The Wall Street Journal.

Watch the show on television by downloading the SuperCrowd.tv Channel app to your Roku or Amazon Fire TV or e360tv channel app to your Roku, LG or Amazon Fire TV. You can also see it on YouTube.Devin: What is your superpower?Chris: For me, I always think of it in terms of a toolbox or a toolkit. And there's a mix of things that I would put into that toolbox that I think have supported me on my leadership journey.Communication Service for the Deaf is expanding opportunity for deaf and hard of hearing people by fighting bias as much as by improving access.When I welcomed Chris Soukup, CEO of Communication Service for the Deaf, back to this episode, I wanted to understand how CSD's work has evolved over its 50-year history. Chris described a mission rooted in “a persevering commitment to advancing the quality of life for people who are deaf and for the broader disability community.”For decades, CSD helped lead the push for communication access. That work mattered. Interpreting services, video relay and new technologies opened doors that had long been closed.But Chris explained that access alone did not change the economic reality for the community. Employment barriers remained stubbornly high.“We're really confronting challenges with misperception and bias,” Chris said. He noted that the barrier often appears at the very start of a job search, when a deaf applicant identifies themselves and an employer immediately imagines cost, complexity or extra work.“That blocker has really made it difficult for our community to make meaningful progress,” he said.CSD is responding in every direction. Chris called the work “a process of breaking down barriers by land, by air, by sea.” That means media engagement, policy work, corporate partnerships, employee resource groups, storytelling and matching motivated employers with talented deaf professionals ready to contribute.One part of the work especially excites Chris: entrepreneurship. CSD supports deaf founders building their own businesses. As Chris explained, when those entrepreneurs succeed, “they turn right back around, and they hire from their community.”That creates a powerful cycle. Deaf business owners build companies, employ others and become proof points that help dismantle bias for the next person.Chris also reminded me that accessibility is still a matter of safety. In a 911 emergency, a deaf person may have to wait several minutes for a video relay interpreter before even reaching a dispatcher. In a crisis, that delay can be life or death.Chris's response is characteristic of CSD's culture: “There's a better way.”That optimism is not naive. It comes from 50 years of pushing systems to become more humane, more accessible and more just. CSD's work shows that inclusion is not charity. It is infrastructure. It is innovation. It is economic opportunity.tl;dr:CSD's 50-year commitment expands communication access, employment, and economic opportunity for deaf communities.Bias often blocks talented deaf professionals before employers recognize their value.Entrepreneurship is a powerful path for deaf leaders to create jobs and opportunities.Accessible emergency communication remains a critical issue of safety and equity.Chris's superpower is authentic perseverance in advocating for systemic change and inclusion.How to Develop Authentic Perseverance As a SuperpowerChris's superpower is authentic perseverance. He said leadership requires a “toolbox,” beginning with “authenticity.” Early in his career, he struggled with preconceived ideas of how a leader should behave. Over time, he learned that “you're doing yourself and the people that you support a disservice by not representing yourself in a way that really reflects the person that you are.” He also emphasized persistence: “Nothing happens overnight,” and “change happens by showing up every day and being committed to making a difference.”Chris described an awakening that came from noticing where he felt most effective. One-on-one, he could use humor, tell stories, share experiences, use metaphors and speak honestly about big goals and fears. He realized he could bring that same intimacy to a larger audience. Instead of manufacturing a leadership persona, he chose to show more of himself. That authenticity helped him connect more deeply and lead more effectively, whether speaking with one person or many.Stop performing a leadership role and identify what is genuinely true about your strengths and vulnerabilities.Practice sharing the messy mix that makes you human, including humor, confidence, fears and limitations.Notice where you feel most natural and effective, then bring that presence into bigger settings.Keep showing up month after month, even when meaningful change takes longer than expected.Stay focused on the world you want to create and keep moving toward it with resilience.By following Chris's example and advice, you can make authentic perseverance a skill. With practice and effort, you could make it a superpower that enables you to do more good in the world.Remember, however, that research into success suggests that building on your own superpowers is more important than creating new ones or overcoming weaknesses. You do you!Guest ProfileChris Soukup (he/him):CEO, Communication Service for the DeafAbout Communication Service for the Deaf: Communication Service for the Deaf (CSD) is the largest Deaf-led social impact organization in the world. Since 1975, CSD has been a leader in creating and providing accessible and innovative solutions for deaf and hard of hearing communities. Today, CSD continues its work to create opportunities for personal and economic growth, specifically addressing leadership and employment. In 2022, CSD was named to Fast Company's “Most Innovative Companies” list.Website: csd.orgX/Twitter Handle: @ThisIsCSDCompany Facebook Page: facebook.com/ThisIsCSDLinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/thisiscsdInstagram: @thisiscsdBiographical Information: Chris Soukup is Chief Executive Officer of Communication Service for the Deaf (CSD), one of the world's leading deaf-led social impact organizations. For 50 years, CSD has pioneered accessible technologies and communication services for the deaf and hard of hearing communities, including the first nationwide video relay service (VRS) in the United States and one of today's leading direct to video calling (DVC) solutions. Chris is a longtime leading advocate for the deaf and disability communities. For more than a decade, he has led CSD's transformation and global initiatives, including implementing a virtualized infrastructure; developing a disruptive sign language interpreting platform; launching the first social venture fund for deaf entrepreneurs; introducing a constellation of programs to advance employment opportunities within deaf and disabled communities; and creating a new community foundation designed to strengthen other deaf-centric nonprofits. Chris continues to serve a leadership role in the advancement of key policy and legislation to expand accessibility, including the Communications, Video, and Technology Accessibility Act (CVTA). He also has served on several prominent committees and advisory boards to increase opportunities and accessibility for the deaf and disability communities: the Federal Communications Commission's Consumer Advisory Committee; the Disability:IN Disability Equality Index Advisory Committee; NTID Foundation Board and the TDI Board of Associates.LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/csoukupSupport Our SponsorsOur generous sponsors make our work possible, serving impact investors, social entrepreneurs, community builders and diverse founders. Today's advertisers include PurposeBuilt100™ Winners and supercrowd.tv. Learn more about advertising with us here.Max-Impact Members(We're grateful for every one of these community champions who make this work possible.)Brian Christie, Brainsy | Cameron Neil, Lend For Good | Carol Fineagan, Independent Consultant | Eric Coury, Arthia AI | John Berlet, CORE Tax Deeds, LLC. | Justin Starbird, The Aebli Group | Ken Steele, Rotarian | Lory Moore, Lory Moore Law | Marcia Brinton, High Desert Gear | Mark Grimes, Networked Enterprise Development | Mike Babbit | Coledger Solutions | Mike Green, Envirosult | Nick Degnan, Unlimit Ventures | Paul Lovejoy, Stakeholder Enterprise | Pearl Wright, Global Changemaker | Scott Thorpe, Philanthropist | Sharon Samjitsingh, Health Care Originals | Add Your Name HereUpcoming SuperCrowd Event CalendarIf a location is not noted, the events below are virtual.Join the SuperCrowd Impact League! You can be recognized for making impact investments via Reg CF. See how your activity compares to your peers. It's free. Win valuable prizes. Start now!SuperCrowd Impact Member Networking Session: Impact (and, of course, Max-Impact) Members of the SuperCrowd are invited to a private networking session on September 8th at 8:00 PM ET/5:00 PM PT. Mark your calendar. We'll send private emails to Impact Members with registration details. Upgrade to Impact Membership today!SuperCrowd26 featuring PurposeBuilt100™: This August 25–27, founders, investors, and ecosystem leaders will gather for a three-day, broadcast-quality global experience focused on disciplined capital formation, regulated investment crowdfunding, and purpose-driven growth. We're bringing together leading voices in impact investing, compliance, digital marketing, and circular economy innovation to deliver practical frameworks, real-world case studies, and actionable strategies. The event culminates in the PurposeBuilt100™ Showcase, recognizing 100 of the fastest-growing purpose-driven companies in the U.S. Register now to secure your seat and get all the details. August 25–27, streaming worldwide.Visit Our Complete Community Event CalendarIf you would like to submit an event for us to share with the 10,000+ changemakers, investors and entrepreneurs who are members of the SuperCrowd, click here.Manage the volume of emails you receive from us by clicking here.We share educational information—not investment advice. Some links may generate compensation. See our full disclosure.We use AI to help us write compelling recaps of each episode. Get full access to Superpowers for Good at www.superpowers4good.com/subscribe

Ann Larson shares her journey from grocery store worker to author, revealing the hidden realities of the grocery industry, labor struggles, and potential reforms. Discover insights on corporate power, worker solidarity, and how consumers can support change.Ann Larson's writing on education, debt, and low-wage work has appeared in The New Republic, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Fast Company, and The Nation, among other publications. She is author of Cleanup on Aisle Five: Essential Work, Poverty Wages, and the View from Behind the Supermarket Register, and coauthor of Can't Pay Won't Pay: The Case for Economic Disobedience and Debt Abolition and is a fellow with the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Drowning in emails, client demands, and late nights at the office? In this episode, you'll learn how to use boundaries, focus, and smart delegation to transform your law practice from constant chaos into a business you actually enjoy running.   In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Elizabeth Grace Saunders discuss: Power of boundaries in time management Recognizing when your schedule has become a problem Niching and being selective about legal work and clients Setting and resetting client expectations around access and response times Delegation, email efficiency, and leveraging AI tools   Key Takeaways: Boundaries are one of the most powerful tools for managing time, and they start with taking responsibility for what you tolerate from clients, colleagues, and yourself. You have a time management problem when your schedule consistently harms your health, relationships, or client service—regardless of the number of hours you work. Saying yes to every kind of matter and every type of client creates “crazy” in a practice; focus on your true area of expertise and on clients who are a good fit and can pay reliably. Clear, consistent expectations around availability and response times—communicated up front and reinforced by your behavior—train clients to respect your time. Delegation, better email protocols, and AI tools that draft or prioritize messages can reclaim hours each week and free you to do higher-value legal and business development work.   "You need to be very clear within yourself and very explicit with your client when you are or not available." —  Elizabeth Grace Saunders   Check out my new show, Be That Lawyer Coaches Corner, and get the strategies I use with my clients to win more business and love your career again.   Join the Be That Lawyer Community and connect with ambitious lawyers who are serious about growing their book of business, strengthening their brand, and becoming confident, consistent rainmakers.   Ready to go from good to GOAT in your legal marketing game? Don't miss PIMCON—where the brightest minds in professional services gather to share what really works. Lock in your spot now: https://www.pimcon.org/   Thank you to our Sponsor! LEX Reception: https://www.lexreception.com/partners/bethatlawyer Rankings.io: https://rankings.io/ Lawyer.com: https://www.lawyer.com/   Ready to grow your law practice without selling or chasing? Book your free 30-minute strategy session now—let's make this your breakout year: https://fretzin.com/   About Elizabeth Grace Saunders: Elizabeth Grace Saunders is a time management coach, member of the Forbes Coaches Council, and best-selling author of The 3 Secrets to Effective Time Investment, How to Invest Your Time Like Money, and Divine Time Management. Since founding Real Life E Time Coaching & Training in 2009, she has helped thousands of individuals globally—including newly promoted professionals and parents—overcome burnout, reduce stress, and achieve work-life balance. Named one of the World's Top 30 Time Management Professionals by Global Gurus annually since 2018, Elizabeth regularly contributes to Harvard Business Review and Fast Company, drawing on prior corporate experience at Meredith Corporation and Abbott Laboratories and her summa cum laude degree from Drake University.   Connect with Elizabeth Grace Saunders:   Website: https://reallifee.com/   Connect with Steve Fretzin: LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin Twitter: @stevefretzin Instagram: @fretzinsteve Facebook: Fretzin, Inc. Website: Fretzin.com Email: Steve@Fretzin.com Book: Legal Business Development Isn't Rocket Science and more! YouTube: Steve Fretzin Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911   Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You're the expert. Your podcast will prove it. 

When Warby Parker debuted in 2010, the brand disrupted not just how much eyeglasses cost, but also how customers purchased them. Its direct-to-consumer e-commerce business model left many wondering whether Luxottica's longstanding reign over the industry would soon be over. In the decade-and-a-half since, the answer to that question is still evolving. Max Chafkin profiled Warby Parker in its early days for Fast Company, and is currently a senior reporter for Bloomberg Businessweek. He joins David to discuss Warby Parker's staying power, the company's embrace of brick-and-mortar retail, and the current state of e-commerce.Check out Max's Bloomberg podcast Everybody's Business.Audible subscribers can listen to all episodes of Business Wars ad-free right now. Join Audible today by downloading the Audible app.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Henna Pryor, workplace performance expert, executive coach, bestselling author of Good Awkward, and award-winning two-time TEDx and keynote speaker, joins me on this episode. Henna was named a SUCCESS Magazine Woman of Influence and has spoken to global organizations including Google, Johnson & Johnson, and JPMorgan Chase. She's been featured in popular media outlets including Forbes, NBC, The Washington Post, Business Insider, and Fast Company. Henna has spent much of her life thinking about what other people think, navigating the discomfort that comes with not fitting expectations, and learning what happens when we stop trying to avoid awkwardness and instead get better at it. Her work explores why awkwardness is a natural part of being human and how learning to navigate it can help us become more confident, courageous, creative, and connected. In our conversation, Henna shares the science behind awkwardness, why our social muscles may be getting weaker, and practical strategies we can use to become more comfortable with discomfort.

What if the way you use technology could actually teach you more about yourself? We spend so much of our lives surrounded by technology—scrolling, searching, streaming, texting, working, and increasingly, asking AI to think alongside us. But what if our relationship with technology isn't just about willpower or screen time? What if it's a window into our deeper emotional needs? In this episode of Centered in the City, I'm joined by Jay Vidyarthi, award-winning author of Reclaim Your Mind, designer, entrepreneur, and thought leader at the intersection of mindfulness and technology. Jay has spent more than 15 years practicing meditation and has helped design more than 50 technologies aimed at improving human wellbeing. His work includes Muse, the Healthy Minds Program, and other innovative approaches to using technology in service of human flourishing. We explore what it really means to reclaim our minds in a world designed to capture our attention. Jay offers a nuanced perspective: there is absolutely a responsibility on technology companies and attention-harvesting platforms to create healthier digital environments, but there is also a personal responsibility to become more aware of how and why we engage with technology. And that awareness can tell us a lot. In this conversation, we explore: Why our relationship with technology can be a mirror for our deeper emotional needs How scrolling, notifications, and algorithms can give us a watered-down version of what we're actually seeking How self-awareness can help us recognize when we're being hooked by an algorithm Why simply blaming technology doesn't give us back our agency How mindfulness or journaling can help us pause long enough to notice what we're actually looking for How to create a more empowered and intentional relationship with technology How we can use AI to enhance our capabilities without cannibalizing the very human capacities we want to preserve Why protecting our attention may be one of the most important ways we protect our humanity   Take a listen to this episode and share your takeaways with us on Instagram @OneWade  and @jay.vidyarthi   Resources: Centered Walks: Guided walking meditations to support you getting out of your head and into your body 100 Mindful Moments to Balance & Energize by Wade Brill Reclaim Your Mind By Jay Vidyarthi   ***** Jay Vidyarthi is the award-winning author of RECLAIM YOUR MIND and an accomplished designer, entrepreneur, and thought leader at the unique intersection of mindfulness and technology. As the founder of Still Ape, he's been involved in over fifty technologies that have helped millions of people improve their well-being, including Muse, the Healthy Minds Program, Sonic Cradle, and many more. His work and ideas have been featured by Harvard, MIT, TED, Forbes, CNN, Fast Company, Psychology Today, and Mashable. A meditation practitioner for over fifteen years, Jay is as comfy on a silent retreat as he is challenging his son to epic video game battles. On days off, he can usually be found making music, enjoying screen time, or out for a walk somewhere near Lake Ontario. Learn more at jayvidyarthi.com

Adam “Smiley” Poswolsky is a workplace belonging expert, internationally recognized keynote speaker, and bestselling author whose work explores friendship, loneliness, human connection, and the ways technology is reshaping our relationships with one another. In this conversation, Sam and Smiley trace a line from the early digital-detox movement and Camp Grounded to the present moment of AI, hybrid work, and widespread social disconnection. Smiley speaks about the loneliness crisis, the particular struggles facing young people and men, and why belonging and friendship have become increasingly important both inside and outside the workplace, arguing that organizations need to design intentionally for human connection, and that belonging cannot simply be handed off to an HR department - instead, it has to become part of the everyday culture of a workplace. The conversation also turns to artificial intelligence and the temptation to automate increasingly large parts of our creative and professional lives. Smiley makes the case for using AI thoughtfully while preserving the kinds of distinctly human practices—conversation, presence, intuition, personal storytelling, friendship, and simply spending time thinking—that technology can easily crowd out. Along the way, Sam and Smiley explore the value of “weak ties,” the difference between belonging and mattering, the difficulty of genuinely listening to another person, and why our most personal stories may become increasingly valuable in an age of machine-generated content. They close with Smiley's practice of moving from comparison toward care: when ambition, social media, or creative anxiety starts to take over, turn toward friendship, community, and service. About Adam “Smiley” Poswolsky Adam “Smiley” Poswolsky is an internationally recognized keynote speaker, workplace belonging expert, and bestselling author of The Quarter-Life Breakthrough, The Breakthrough Speaker, and Friendship in the Age of Loneliness. He has spoken for organizations including Apple, Google, Verizon, JPMorgan Chase, and the U.S. Navy, and his work has appeared in publications including Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, The New York Times, and The New Yorker. Learn more about Smiley at smileyposwolsky.com, through his Substack newsletter Friends with Smiley, on LinkedIn as Adam Smiley Poswolsky, and on Instagram at @whatsupsmiley.

This week Ivy Slater, host of Her Success Story, chats with her guest, Jacqueline Corbelli. The two talk about breaking through gender barriers in male-dominated industries, the journey of building and scaling BrightLine, a company revolutionizing the television viewing experience with interactive, streaming-driven technology, and practical strategies for women navigating fundraising and leadership in tech. In this episode, we discuss: How technology served as a means to improve business outcomes and consumer experiences, rather than being an end in itself. What BrightLine does to transform the television viewer experience, enabling deeper two-way engagement with streaming content through embedded technologies. The pandemic accelerated changes in TV consumption patterns, creating rapid growth and new opportunities for companies operating in the streaming ad model. Why raising money as a technology entrepreneur is uniquely challenging, especially for women, and how networking and proven results help overcome those challenges. What opportunities does the rise of AI present for women founders today, creating a more level playing field if they harness these new tools for smarter business development and research? Jacqueline Corbelli, Author, Founder and CEO of BrightLine Jacqueline Corbelli is an innovator, transformational change leader, and technology entrepreneur, known for identifying technology inflection points and building companies at the intersection of innovation and impact. She's a founder and the current CEO of two companies, including one folks in the room may know well, BrightLine - the original pioneer of turning TV into a two-way interactive experience.  Jacqueline originally began her career in the financial services industry, where she led corporations through large-scale transformational change efforts across businesses and brands. She's also led major initiatives in African economic development and sustainability, and is a three-time author. Jacqueline began to apply her transformational change methodologies outside of business and into the world of economic development and sustainability. Most recently she founded the US Coalition on Sustainability and created SustainChain, a reinforcement learning AI technology built with the single purpose to unify and accelerate informed action on climate change across global supply chains.  SustainChain is a Fast Company 2023 Innovation by Design, and 2022 World Changing Ideas awards recipient. She sits on numerous public and private boards, including the SDG Center for Africa, the NY Academy of Sciences, Luminari Capital, Second Curve Capital, is a co-founder of Ethics in Action, a commission of the Vatican's Pontifical Academy of Sciences, and is on the Leadership Council of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. Her latest book, "Changemaker: A Modern Playbook for Creating Personal Impact and Transformational Change," distills decades of experience across technology, finance, and global development into a playbook for driving meaningful change. She advises on organizational change, including the United Nations and the Vatican, while mentoring future leaders. Her achievements have been recognized with numerous honors, including Fast Company's World Changing Ideas Award, Innovation by Design Award, and New York Business Journal's Women of Influence. Her thought leadership has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Variety, Bloomberg Radio, Fox Business, Business Insider, and Advertising Age. Jacqueline holds a Master's in International Banking, Business, and Finance from Columbia University. She continues to mentor future leaders, serve on global boards, and champion transformational change. Originally from Batavia in upstate New York, she is now based in New York City with her husband. She enjoys her garden, time with her adult daughters, golf and the company of her dog. Website:https://brightline.tv/ https://www.jacquelinecorbelli.com/ Social Media Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacquelinecorbelli/        

Derek Champagne talks with Kyle Austin Young.Kyle Austin Young is an award-winning strategy consultant for high achievers, entrepreneurs, and leaders ina wide range of fields. This work has allowed him to develop and refine a powerful system for accomplishingbig, meaningful goals that focuses on understanding and changing your odds of success. Kyle is a popularwriter for Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, The Boston Globe, CNBC, Psychology Today, Forbes,and Business Insider.His new book, SUCCESS IS A NUMBERS GAME: Achieve Bigger Goals by Changing the Odds (Hay House Business, November 2025), details this system. In the context of a single goal, it could be the secret advantage that changes your outcome. Over the course of several goals, it could transform the trajectory of your career. Appliedto a lifetime of goals, it can level up your legacy.Business Leadership Series Intro and Outro music provided by Just Off Turner: https://music.apple.com/za/album/the-long-walk-back/268386576

On ecosystem restoration; building coherent, sustainable supply chains into the garments we wear; creating resilience in our systems, our bodies, our hearts. 0:00 - Introduction to Vanessa Barboni Hallik and Another Tomorrow 2:49 - Exploring Another Tomorrow's Sustainability Practices 4:11 - Building Relationships and Technology in Fashion 13:20 - The Role of Education and Personal Journey 16:29 - Innovative Materials and Design 23:14 - The Power of Curiosity and Consumer Agency 32:30 - Personal Reflections and Future Directions Vanessa Barboni Hallik is the founder, co-CEO and Executive Chair of Another Tomorrow, a B Corp Certified end-to-end sustainable luxury brand with a mission to model a regenerative and resilient model for fashion, including a digitized blockchain-based product infrastructure delivering transparency, authenticated re-commerce, and additional digital to physical engagement. She is an active speaker on innovation, digitalization, regenerative supply chains, and new business models and has been featured in The New York Times, Fast Company, Bloomberg, Forbes, Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, Cultured Magazine, and Vogue Business for her work among others, and is one of Wallpaper* Magazine's USA400, the Inc Magazine 500, and Worth Magazine's Worthy100. Prior to founding Another Tomorrow, Vanessa was a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley, where she held several leadership roles in the emerging markets institutional securities business. Throughout her career she has worked across global markets and managed culturally diverse and cross-border teams. While at Morgan Stanley, she served as a Trustee on the Board of the Morgan Stanley Foundation and represented the firm at the Council on Foreign Relations. She likewise chaired the Fixed Income Philanthropy Committee, during which she initiated and subsequently led the firm's mentoring program with East Side Community High School, in partnership with PENCIL.org.

On today's episode, cohosts Yasmin Gagne and Josh Christensen talk with Fast Company senior writer Ainsley Harris about the water brand Loonen and the rise of consumer safety as a status symbol. Then, Fast Company senior staff writer Jeff Beer interviews Dhar Mann about building an audience and how he ended up as the NFL's honorary chief kindness officer.  To read Ainsley's reporting, go to: https://www.fastcompany.com/91565959/loonen-and-the-rise-of-consumer-safety-as-status-symbol  For more of the latest business and innovation news, go to fastcompany.com/news

Carisa Hendrix never set out to be in show business, and yet she's created one of the most unique entertainment personas working today. Lucy Darling is a character Hendrix created who's part magician, part comedian, and wholly original. Lucy's quick-witted crowd work regularly goes viral online. But there's so much more to Lucy aside from her sharp tongue, old Hollywood glamour, and sleight of hand. What Hendrix is building through Lucy is an inclusive community and a thriving business that operates from a place of intention and values. In this episode of Creative Control, Hendrix unpacks her rather colorful start in showbiz, the origins of Lucy Darling, and how she's growing this very unlikely venture at her own pace.  For more of the latest business and innovation news, go to https://www.fastcompany.com/news To listen to the latest episodes of Creative Control on Fast Company:https://www.fastcompany.com/podcasts/creative-control

Julie Castle has dedicated her life to saving animals. Since joining Best Friends Animal Society in 1996 as employee #17, she has grown with the organization and advanced its mission to save the lives of dogs and cats in America's animal shelters.   Now CEO, Julie has helped guide Best Friends through a period of significant growth, including expanding the organization's fundraising from $60 million to more than $130 million. Under her leadership, Best Friends has been recognized as a Harris Poll Brand of the Year four times and named one of Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies. Throughout her career, Julie has championed an approach rooted in collaboration, helping bring together shelters, rescues, and communities around our shared commitment to lifesaving.   Celebrating 30 years with Best Friends in 2026, Julie remains focused on strengthening the partnerships, policies, and momentum needed to help every shelter and every community reach no-kill. She leads a team of nearly 1,000 employees working toward one shared mission: Save Them All.  

DJ DiDonna makes the case for why taking more extended time off helps professionals get further in their careers–and shares tricks for actually snagging that time. — YOU'LL LEARN — 1) How to convince your boss to let you take a sabbatical 2) How sabbaticals act as “regret insurance”3) How to plan a truly fulfilling sabbaticalSubscribe or visit AwesomeAtYourJob.com/ep1169 for clickable versions of the links below. — ABOUT DJ — DJ DiDonna is a senior lecturer of business administration at Harvard Business School, where he teaches MBA courses on entrepreneurship and building meaningful professional and personal lives. He has spent his career translating social science research into real-world tools for positive change. In 2019, DiDonna founded The Sabbatical Project to define, explore, and research the role of sabbaticals in modern life. He has helped organizations around the world—from nonprofits to Fortune 50 companies—design and implement sabbatical policies.His work has been featured in The Atlantic, Harvard Business Review, Time, Fast Company, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times. Previously, DiDonna cofounded EFL Global, a fintech company that enabled more than $2 billion in capital to underbanked businesses and individuals across twenty countries before its acquisition in 2018. DiDonna earned his MBA from Harvard Business School. On his sabbatical, DiDonna walked nine hundred miles on pilgrimage in Shikoku, Japan, helped lead the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities at his undergraduate alma mater, Notre Dame, and unskillfully remodeled his kitchen. Outside work, you can find him plotting how to be in the Big Outdoors.• Book: Big Time Off: The Transformative Power of Sabbaticals and How to Take One by DJ DiDonna• LinkedIn: DJ DiDonna• Website: TheSabbaticalProject.org• Website: djdidonna.com— RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THE SHOW — • Tool: Voice Dream Reader• Book: The Three-Body Problem (The Three-Body Problem Series, 1) by Cixin Liu• Book: Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career by Herminia Ibarra— THANK YOU SPONSORS! — • Shopify. Sign up for your free trial at Shopify.com/awesomepod• Monarch. Get 50% off your first year with code AWESOME at Monarch.comSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Ludmila Praslova: The Canary Code Ludmila Praslova is a Professor of Industrial-Organizational Psychology at Vanguard University of Southern California and regularly writes for Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Psychology Today, and Forbes. She's the recipient of the 2025 Talent Award from Thinker50 and has been named a LinkedIn Top Voice. She is the author of The Canary Code: A Guide to Neurodiversity, Dignity, and Intersectional Belonging at Work (Amazon, Bookshop)*. We've all seen career paths that sound like this: analyst 1, analyst 2, senior analyst, lead analyst, manager of analysts, etc. Those paths to leadership work for some people, but they don't work for others. In this conversation, Ludmila and I explore how to create leadership paths that work for everyone. Key Points Canaries were used in coal mines because they were more sensitive to early indicators of problems – in a way that helped everyone. The same is often true for neurodivergent leaders in organizations. The “ideal leader” is a myth. If we are honest, no individual fits the ideal profile. Having different paths to leadership makes more sense in a complex world. Many of the best leaders are specialists in something. Instead of looking for “culture fit,” challenge yourself and your organization to do a “culture add.” Neurodiverse leaders can be less susceptible to bias and have higher levels of divergent thinking – huge benefits strengths for many organizations. In addition to people management, consider paths for leadership that focus strength and skill on system and process, strategy, expertise, though leadership, global leadership, and creative ideation. Making the workplace more accessible and equitable for one population almost always makes it better for everyone. Resources Mentioned The Canary Code: A Guide to Neurodiversity, Dignity, and Intersectional Belonging at Work by Ludmilla Praslova (Amazon, Bookshop)* Interview Notes Download my interview notes in PDF format (free membership required). Related Episodes The Mindset Leaders Need to Address Burnout, with Christina Maslach (episode 608) The Neurodiversity Edge in Organizations, with Maureen Dunne (episode 694) How to Motivate Younger Employees, with David Yeager (episode 775) Discover More Activate your free membership for full access to the entire library of interviews since 2011, searchable by topic. To accelerate your learning, uncover more inside Coaching for Leaders Plus.