Podcasts about growth strategies

The core structural shift addressed in this episode centers on the unbundling and modularization of vendor platforms in the MSP technology market. This shift is exemplified by ThreatCaptain's launch of its Gen 4 product, which transitions from an all-encompassing platform to discrete modules aligned to specific MSP business challenges—lead generation, sales enablement, and ROI/risk analytics. The move is designed to align product structure and pricing more closely to the diverse operational maturity levels of MSPs, as described by Brad Powell, co-founder of ThreatCaptain. ThreatCaptain's Gen 4 is available in three modules priced at $199, $399, and $599, most notably a move away from the earlier $1,499 per month pricing reported in March. According to Brad Powell, this change was driven by limited adoption among smaller MSPs, with the prior model better suited to larger firms already equipped with mature sales teams. He cites customer Novus Insights as an example, attributing $80,000 in professional services revenue over three months and more than $1 million in expected ARR, but acknowledges this reflected a highly mature CISO-led operation. The vendor currently reports approximately 65 active paying MSP partners, intending to scale significantly. Supporting developments include the influence of insurance risk modeling and industry threat intelligence frameworks on new MSP toolsets. ThreatCaptain originally built its risk engine leveraging data from the IBM Cost of a Data Breach Report and the Verizon DBIR, adapting these for SMB scenarios. The episode also highlights the role of information sharing organizations (ISAOs), with Brad Powell noting the challenges of translating technical threat data into actionable intelligence for SMB-focused MSPs and illustrating ongoing coordination and separation of threat feeds between vendor sales processes and industry sharing mechanisms. Operational implications for MSPs include increased need for prudent selection among modular product offerings, clarity around the scope and accountability of vendor-delivered analysis, and awareness of potential misalignments between vendor risk models and actual business outcomes. The trend underscores cost versus capability tradeoffs, especially for smaller providers balancing limited resources against the operational benefits of specialized tools. For MSPs participating in threat intelligence programs, there is also an ongoing requirement to maintain clear boundaries around shared data to prevent unintentional exposure or misapplication in commercial contexts. Supported By: ScalePad Pax8

Creative is often treated as an expense. Joe Prebich, the VP of Benchmade Knife Company,  believes the best creative can become one of a brand's most valuable growth assets. In this episode, Joe shares lessons from his time at Red Bull and Benchmade about why bold ideas matter, how great content can create distribution and long-term brand loyalty, and why much of the outdoor industry has become too safe. We also explore the importance of having a strong point of view, why brands need to make real choices to stand out, how Benchmade thinks differently about organic and paid content, and why getting closer to the customer still matters more than another audience persona buried in a PowerPoint.   About:  This podcast is produced by Port Side, a creative agency that helps outdoor brands build relevance, recognition, and attention.  Enjoy this episode and discover other resources below: Support Us | We've been bootstrapping this for 6 years. Help us keep this going Relevance Project | We're building three brands in public. Follow along Email List | Follow along and join our email list  Slack Community | Tired of brainstorming with ChatGPT? Join us! LinkedIn | Connect with Cole

To learn more about becoming a Member, click here: https://trybta.com/EP286 Take our five minute quiz and get a custom Contractor Growth Scorecard: https://trybta.com/DL286 At just 30 years old, Riley Rivers owns a $7M dollar landscaping business, pulling in $120K in profit every month.Multiple divisions.Massive contracts.Complex operations.And he does it all in less than 40 hours a week.In this episode, I'm talking to Riley to find out how he built his company, including the key decisions he made as he scaled.If you're ready to step out of the day-to-day and become a real CEO, Riley's story is a must listen.—Riley is a Breakthrough Academy Member who has worked with his coach and contractor community to build a business he loves running. To learn more about becoming a Member, click here: https://trybta.com/EP286 Learn more about Rivers Landscaping: https://www.riverslandscapingmt.com/Episode highlights:Learn which systems enabled Riley to more than double his revenue without sacrificing profitability.Get insight into Riley's hiring strategies when it comes to adding high-impact leaders into his organization.Discover how Riley built his team culture… by letting his team build his culture. Find out how he stepped back and let his people establish the company's core values and the tactics used to live them out.00:00-Intro01:55-Journey to $3 Million 07:12-Evolution of Roles 09:41-Strategy for Growth 11:49-Identifying Core Gaps 21:01-Org Structure Strategy 30:18-Cultivating Company Culture 40:22-Leadership and Management

DM me "AUDIT" to connect to learn how together we can increase your leads, revenue, and confidence in your salon business.  ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram.com/jenniferjadealvarez⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠GRAB YOUR FREE FREEDOM CALCULATOR™ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://jenniferjadealvarez.myflodesk.com/freedom-calculator⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The #1 tool to help you plan to work less BTC and into Salon CEOSalon Growth Strategies With Barry Quinn: How to Increase Retention, Revenue & Team Performance In this episode of Beauty Business Game Changer, host Jennifer Alvarez welcomes Barry Quinn, President of North American Business at Forest, for a conversation about what truly drives growth in the salon industry.Barry brings more than 18 years of experience working inside the beauty industry and shares a behind-the-scenes look at the habits and systems that help salons thrive. The discussion covers loyalty programs, goal setting, client retention, team performance, marketing strategy, and how technology can support salon owners without replacing the human connection that matters most.Jennifer and Barry talk about why discounting is often the wrong way to reward loyal clients, and how salons can instead build smarter loyalty programs that encourage referrals, retention, and higher-value behaviors. Barry also explains why goal setting is one of the clearest indicators of long-term salon success and how personalized targets can help stylists feel more ownership over their growth.The conversation also explores how successful salons use data to make better decisions, including:Tracking lifetime value and customer acquisition costImproving referrals and online reputationUsing Meta ads more strategicallySupporting stylists with better appointment prepCreating more personalized client experiencesBarry shares how AI can be used in a practical, helpful way, not as a buzzword, but as a tool that gives stylists the information they need faster so they can serve clients better. He explains how that level of preparation can improve retention, retail sales, and the overall client experience.The episode closes with Barry sharing a meaningful personal story about his upcoming climb in North Africa in support of Hair to Stay, a nonprofit that helps women undergoing chemotherapy preserve their hair through cooling caps.Beyond his work in the beauty industry, Barry Quinn is using his platform to support a cause that directly impacts the salon community.Barry is taking on a challenging climb in North Africa as part of “Three Blokes, One Mountain, One Cause” to raise funds and awareness for Hair to Stay, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping women undergoing chemotherapy access scalp cooling treatments to preserve their hair during cancer treatment.This mission highlights the deeper impact of the beauty industry beyond the salon chair, supporting confidence, dignity, and quality of life for women during some of their most challenging moments.If you would like to support Barry's fundraising efforts for Hair to Stay, you can contribute here:Three Blokes, One Mountain, One Cause – GoFundMe https://www.gofundme.com/f/three-blokes-one-mountain-one-cause?attribution_id=sl:97f69320-2ad8-4a7a-9ff5-da27f2c4615f&lang=en_US&ts=1786572816&utm_campaign=fp_sharesheet&utm_content=amp30-treatment-3&utm_medium=customer&utm_source=copy_linkLoyalty should reward the right behaviors, not just spending.Goal setting can improve both retention and revenue.Stylists perform better when they understand their own “why.”The best salons measure what matters and act on the data.AI can help elevate the client experience when used intentionally.ForestHair to StayThree Blokes, One Mountain, One Cause FundraiserTune in for more conversations on Beauty Business Game Changer, where salon owners learn how to build stronger teams, smarter systems, and more profitable businesses.

Most church leaders trust their gut more than they realize, and that instinct can quietly steer a congregation in the wrong direction. In this episode of the Church Revitalization Podcast, Scott and A.J. walk through the most common pitfalls of gut-driven decision making, explain why anecdotal information is not the same as real data, and offer practical questions leaders can ask to start making better, more informed choices for their churches. Scott Ball and A.J. Mathieu are the co-hosts of the Church Revitalization Podcast, produced by the Malphurs Group, a consulting firm that helps churches develop healthy strategies for growth and ministry effectiveness. Scott and A.J. bring a blend of theological grounding and practical church leadership experience to every conversation, making the show a trusted resource for pastors and ministry leaders who want their churches to thrive. [1:08] Why gut feelings can be confirmation bias dressed up as Spirit-led discernment [5:02] Problem 1: Treating anecdotes as data and confusing what is loud with what is true [9:15] Problem 2: Silence in your church is not the same as satisfaction or health [13:59] Questions to test your assumptions about ministry programming and strategy [16:49] Who in your church holds a different view, and have you actually listened to them? Free 7-Day Trial: https://healthychurchestoolkit.com Episode Article: https://malphursgroup.com/352 Facebook: https://facebook.com/malphursgroup Instagram: https://instagram.com/malphursgroup YouTube: https://youtube.com/themalphursgroup X: https://x.com/malphursgroup

Running the economy hot may keep growth alive, but it creates a dangerous balancing act for markets. Darius Dale, founder of 42 Macro, joins us to explain why today's reflationary regime demands a different investing playbook. We also discuss rising neutral rates, bond-market pressure, Fed credibility, capital scarcity, and systematic portfolio risk management. Enjoy! TIMESTAMPS: 00:00 Intro 01:00 The Risk-On Reflation Regime 06:29 Why This Bull Market Feels Harder 14:54 The Fed Risks The Bond Market 20:57 Inside The Fed's Policy Tightrope 29:49 Can Policymakers Stick The Landing? 37:10 Why Risk Management Beats Buy-And-Hold 43:29 Making Institutional Tools Accessible FOLLOW DARIUS › X/Twitter – https://x.com/DariusDale42 › 42 Macro – https://42macro.com/ FOLLOW THE SHOW › Forward Guidance – https://x.com/ForwardGuidance › Felix – https://x.com/fejau_inc › Telegram – https://t.me/+CAoZQpC-i6BjYTEx › Blockworks – https://x.com/Blockworks EVENTS › Join. usat Digital Asset Summit 2026 Asia October 7th & Digital Asset 2026 London November 10-11th https://blockworks.com/events DISCLAIMER Nothing said on Forward Guidance is a recommendation to buy or sell securities or tokens. This podcast is for informational purposes only. Any views expressed are opinions, not financial advice. Hosts and guests may hold positions in the companies, funds, or projects discussed.

In this Kitchen Side episode, Alex Birkett and Allie Decker unpack what actually makes content valuable in the age of AI, moving past the tired debate over human versus AI-produced content to the deeper question of how companies should measure quality at all. Drawing on decision theory and the idea that almost anything can be measured, they argue that production method matters far less than whether a piece teaches something new and lands with the people it is meant for. They explore AI visibility as a kind of digital brand recall, why sentiment and context matter more than raw share of voice, and how incumbents and startups face very different battles in shaping their narrative across the web. The conversation also digs into why brands no longer own their own story, the compounding risk of building exposure in the wrong category, and why a human QA layer grounded in real customer understanding is the one part of the content system that should never be automated. Key Takeaways The debate over AI-produced versus human-produced content misses the deeper question of how to define and measure content quality in the first place. Almost anything can be measured if a decision carries uncertainty and risk, including fuzzy concepts like brand affinity or customer experience, by breaking them into concrete, quantifiable components. Measurement is only worth doing when the cost of collecting it is lower than the value of reducing uncertainty, and when you will actually act on the result. AI visibility works like a digital brand recall survey, but raw visibility is meaningless without understanding the context and sentiment in which a brand is mentioned. Segmenting prompts by ICP and buying stage reveals visibility gaps that aggregate scores hide, such as a brand appearing at 40 percent overall but only 4 percent for enterprise queries. Brands no longer own their own narrative, because if the rest of the web contradicts a company's website, LLMs treat the external consensus as the truth. Incumbents with high domain authority have an SEO advantage but face a harder AEO battle, since years of press, mentions, and third-party content are slow and expensive to re-steer. Startups can win by getting specific for narrow prompts and buying-journey stages, but building heavy exposure around one positioning creates risk if they later pivot. AI content programs fail because of weak systems, not the AI itself, so the durable model is human strategy up front, AI in the middle, and a human QA layer at the end. Customer understanding is the last defensible advantage, and the one part of the content system that should stay human is the empathy to judge whether a piece will actually land. Show Links Connect with Alex Birkett on LinkedIn and Twitter Connect with Allie Decker on LinkedIn and Twitter Connect with Omniscient Digital on LinkedIn or Twitter What is Kitchen Side? One big benefit of running an agency or working at one is you get to see the "kitchen side" of many different businesses; their revenue, their operations, their automations, and their culture. You understand how things look from the inside and how that differs from the outside. You understand how the sausage is made. As an agency ourselves, we're working both on growing our clients' businesses as well as our own. This podcast is one project, but we also blog, make videos, do sales, and have quite a robust portfolio of automations and hacks to run our business. We want to take you behind the curtain, to the kitchen side of our business, to witness our brainstorms, discussions, and internal dialogues behind the public works that we ship. Past guests on The Long Game podcast include: Morgan Brown (Shopify), Ryan Law (Animalz), Dan Shure (Evolving SEO), Kaleigh Moore (freelancer), Eric Siu (Clickflow), Peep Laja (CXL), Chelsea Castle (Chili Piper), Tracey Wallace (Klaviyo), Tim Soulo (Ahrefs), Ryan McReady (Reforge), and many more. Some interviews you might enjoy and learn from: Actionable Tips and Secrets to SEO Strategy with Dan Shure (Evolving SEO) Building Competitive Marketing Content with Sam Chapman (Aprimo) How to Build the Right Data Workflow with Blake Burch (Shipyard) Data-Driven Thought Leadership with Alicia Johnston (Sprout Social) Purpose-Driven Leadership & Building a Content Team with Ty Magnin (UiPath) Also, check out our Kitchen Side series where we take you behind the scenes to see how the sausage is made at our agency: Blue Ocean vs Red Ocean SEO Should You Hire Writers or Subject Matter Experts? How Do Growth and Content Overlap? Connect with Omniscient Digital on social: Twitter: @beomniscient LinkedIn: Be Omniscient Listen to more episodes of The Long Game podcast here: https://beomniscient.com/podcast/

In this Company Update, Wendall Zerb, Chairman and CEO of Red Canyon Resources (CSE: REDC / OTCQB: REDRF), joins us to discuss the latest exploration developments across the company's mineral portfolio. Osiris Drilling & Expansion: An update on the 2,100-meter drilling program completed at the Camp target and plans to expand the land package around the Osiris Project. High-Priority Targets: A look into upcoming drill plans for the Nautilus Prime and EV targets, including key geophysical signatures and geological potential. Portfolio Pipeline: Insights into ongoing exploration work across secondary assets, including the Kendal project in British Columbia and Scraper Springs in Nevada. Capital Position & Partnership Strategy: An overview of the company's current treasury, institutional backing, and perspective on potential strategic joint-venture partnerships.   If you have any follow up questions for Wendell please me at Fleck@kereport.com.    Click here to visit the Red Canyon website - https://www.redcanyonresources.com    ------------------------------- For more market commentary & interview summaries, subscribe to our Substacks: The KE Report: https://kereport.substack.com/ Shad's resource market commentary: https://excelsiorprosperity.substack.com/   Investment Disclaimer: This content is for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice, an offer, or a solicitation to buy or sell any security or investment product. Investing in equities, commodities, really everything involves risk, including the possible loss of principal. Do your own research and consult a licensed financial advisor before making any investment decisions. Guests and hosts may own shares in companies mentioned.

Nate Baxter, CEO and President of Scotts Miracle-Gro, joined Bloomberg Television after the company’s investor day to discuss its new growth targets, the strategy behind its 2027–2029 outlook, and how the company is trying to reach younger consumers through digital media, e-commerce and new product channels. Baxter spoke with Bloomberg's Romaine Bostick on The Close.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

AI can help us work faster, produce stronger outputs, and appear more capable. But what happens when technology allows us to skip the slow and uncomfortable stage where real learning takes place?In this episode, Charles Good speaks with Whitney Johnson, one of the world's leading experts on personal disruption and the S-Curve of Learning.Whitney explains why every period of growth begins with uncertainty and discomfort, accelerates through a productive sweet spot, and eventually reaches mastery. The challenge is recognizing when mastery has become a plateau and finding the courage to become a beginner again.AI may weaken the signals that once pushed people toward a new challenge. Output can remain strong even when learning has slowed. Professionals may look productive while the capability beneath their work stops growing.Charles and Whitney discuss how to recognize restlessness and boredom as signals for change, why learning agility becomes more valuable as technology advances, and how trust, character, and human presence continue to compound.They also explore how professionals can use AI as a mirror for development by reviewing conversations, improving their listening, challenging their assumptions, and identifying one way to become 5 percent better.Key Takeaways• Growth follows an S Curve with launch, acceleration, and mastery phases.• AI can muffle the signal that it's time to disrupt yourself.• Naming the feelings associated with change can reduce fear and restore your ability to act.• Learning agility is a capability that remains valuable across roles and technological shifts.• Trust, character, and presence become more important as knowledge becomes easier to access.• Small improvements practiced consistently can produce extraordinary long term growth.Chapters00:00 Introduction to the series and the pattern of growth in the AI era02:11 Why leaders feel less confident despite working harder04:43 Unpacking the phases of the S Curve and their feelings06:07 The importance of naming feelings to tame fear07:02 AI's role in muffling the jump signal and delaying growth07:54 Recognizing restlessness and boredom as growth signals09:00 The importance of wrestling with discomfort for growth09:26 What compounds for leaders and what is at risk10:19 The importance of trust, character, and presence in leadership11:44 The meta skill of learning agility in the AI era12:53 The risk of skipping the slow part of growth with AI13:30 The value of doing things you're bad at for growth14:18 Signals that indicate you're on the right growth curve16:31 Whitney Johnson's personal disruptions and internalized lessons18:56 Signs you're at the top of your growth curve21:50 Managing multiple S Curves in your career and life22:16 Using AI as a mirror for self development23:28 The importance of human qualities in the AI age24:20 The power of small, consistent improvements over time25:01 How to connect with Whitney Johnson and further resourcesWhitney Johnson is the bestselling author of Disrupt Yourself and Smart Growth. Her S Curve framework helps individuals and organizations understand how growth feels, why people plateau, and what it takes to begin climbing again.This episode is part of The Good Leadership Podcast milestone series, What It Takes to Keep Rising in the AI Era.Subscribe to The Good Leadership Podcast: [⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠] | [⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠] | [⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠]LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠linkedin.com/in/charlesagood⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Substack Channel (Outlearn to Outperform): ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠charlesgood.substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn Newsletter (The Outlearn Advantage): [⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Subscribe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠]⁠⁠⁠⁠The Institute for Management Studies

Running the global digital and insights organization at one of the world's largest and most storied CPG companies takes a combination of data chops, marketing savvy, and collaborative leadership skills. Keith Lehman, Global Director, Digital Commerce Marketing at Colgate-Palmolive has all of that, but in addition he credits his intense curiosity for being the additional element that helps drive the processes to help his internal customers uncover the next best action for growth. Keith joins the podcast to explain how they are building the machine to power Colgate's next era of growth.

If you're a woman leader looking to grow your career, build executive presence, increase your visibility at work, or develop your leadership skills, this episode is for you. I'm sharing four strategies my executive coaching clients are using right now to create career opportunities, establish thought leadership, strengthen their personal brand, and advance their careers—even in today's challenging environment. It's easy to find things that AREN'T working right now. And, to be fair, a lot of things truly are not working right now. However, navigating the world with a "nothing is working, why bother trying" attitude is going to harm you far more than help you. One of my most important jobs with my executive coaching clients is to help them determine and tap into what IS working. Right now, a number of my clients are exploring big questions like, "How do you find your power when it's easy to find evidence that power is systematically being taken away at every turn?" and "How do you maintain hope when you have so much evidence that people are deeply struggling right now?" As they dig into these questions, my clients are taking action and seeing results! In a sea of “everything is horrible and broken” voices, here are a few things my clients are doing that ARE working: Thinking and strategizing at a level above their current title Investing in their learning and growth for their long-term career trajectory Establishing their voice and expertise Creating visibility opportunities outside their current roles and teams You're not wrong that it's TOUGH out there right now. And… you still have the power to be seen, create opportunities, and open doors for yourself. In this episode, I'll share what's actually working, the real-life results my clients are getting, and what you can do today to feel a stronger sense of power and hope.  Links Mentioned: Early Bird Enrollment is open for my Aligned Leadership Incubator! Save $500 if you apply by July 31st: saradean.com/aligned Hire Sara to speak: saradean.com/speaking Coach with Sara: https://saradean.com/executive-coaching-services Connect with Sara on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saradeanspeaks Watch Shameless Leadership episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@saradeanspeaks Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Business growth should not depend on luck, assumptions, or the latest trend. In this episode of The Beacon Way Podcast, Adrienne Wilkerson sits down with Hugo van den Biggelaar, CEO of The Bitsing Company USA, to explore a proven methodology for making clearer, more intentional growth decisions. Hugo spent more than eight years at Nike, working across finance, insights, loyalty, digital marketing, and brand strategy before moving into entrepreneurship. Today, he is helping bring the Bitsing methodology from Europe to the United States.  Bitsing is a business growth framework developed over more than 30 years and used by more than 1,000 organizations. It brings finance, strategy, positioning, marketing, and sales together in one structured plan designed to help leaders focus on the actions most likely to produce measurable growth.  In this conversation, Hugo explains why business owners should stop relying solely on gut feeling, how to identify where growth is already proven, and why the strongest brands give people an emotional reason to choose them. Adrienne and Hugo also discuss the challenges that businesses face at every size, from small entrepreneurial teams to global organizations, and how leaders can turn scattered ideas into a practical roadmap. In This Episode -Hugo's journey from Nike to entrepreneurship  -How the Bitsing methodology was developed  -Why every business needs a clear growth roadmap  -The difference between a financial goal and a strategy  -How to use revenue data to decide where to invest  -Why businesses often overlook what is already working  -How to balance current revenue with new growth opportunities  -Preparing a business to scale, sell, or exit  -Why rational selling points are easy for competitors to copy  -How emotional positioning creates brand preference  -Three practical steps toward more intentional growth  Key Takeaways -Set financial goals first. Brand awareness, website traffic, and sales conversions can support growth, but they are strategies rather than the final business goal. -Follow the evidence. Your existing revenue data can help show which services, products, audiences, and markets deserve more of your time and budget. -Create preference, not just a reason to buy. Price, speed, and features can all be copied. A strong brand gives people an emotional and distinctive reason to choose you. Chapters:00:00 Introduction 00:36 Hugo's Journey from Amsterdam to Nike and New York 02:48 Leaving Nike and Taking the Leap into Entrepreneurship 05:59 Bringing the Bitsing Methodology to the United States 06:54 How the Bitsing Growth Method Was Developed 09:34 The Seven Principles Behind the Framework 10:19 Building a Business Growth Roadmap 11:47 Why There Is No Secret Shortcut to Growth 12:36 Knowing When to Hire, Expand, or Stay Focused 15:18 Replacing Gut Feeling with Business Data 15:47 The Pencil Methodology Explained 16:46 Deciding Where to Invest Time and Marketing Budget 18:14 Growth Strategies for Scaling, Turnarounds, and Exits 19:48 Why Businesses of Every Size Face Similar Problems 22:32 Three Steps Toward Intentional Growth 23:06 Set Financial Goals Before Choosing Strategies 24:37 Let the Data Guide Your Decisions 25:03 The Three Brand Challenges Businesses Must Solve 26:24 Why Creating Preference Matters Most 26:51 Finding an Emotional Advantage Competitors Cannot Copy 28:03 Why B2B Marketing Is Still Human 28:51 How to Connect with Hugo 30:06 Closing  Connect with Hugo van den Biggelaar:Bitsing Website https://bitsing.com Email hugo@bitsing.com LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/hugovandenbiggelaar/  Learn More About Bitsing The Bitsing Company https://bitsing.com About the Bitsing method https://bitsing.com/about Books https://www.amazon.com/Seven-Laws-Guaranteed-Growth-Management/dp/906369413X  

What does it take to build a fiber provider that customers genuinely enjoy doing business with? In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, Brad Hine sits down with Ted Schremp, CEO of IQ Fiber, to discuss how the company is challenging the traditional broadband model with transparent pricing, subscription-style billing, whole-home Wi-Fi, and a customer-first philosophy that has fueled rapid growth across the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic. Ted shares how IQ Fiber has grown from a startup to a five-state provider by combining operational simplicity with a strong company culture. The conversation explores network expansion, community engagement, acquisitions, and the future of fiber, while highlighting why lasting success in broadband still comes down to putting people first.

AI-Powered vs. AI-Native: What Mortgage Lenders Need to KnowYouTube DescriptionWhat is the difference between AI-powered mortgage technology and an AI-native mortgage platform—and does that distinction actually matter to lenders?In this episode of the Fintech Hunting Podcast, Michael Hammond sits down with Brianna Lin, co-founder of Copperlane AI, to examine what AI-native mortgage origination looks like in practice.AI-powered technology typically adds AI capabilities to an existing software product. AI-native technology places AI at the center of the workflow. But the label alone means nothing unless the technology can solve real operational problems, protect borrower information, support human judgment, and improve the mortgage experience.Brianna shares what Copperlane has learned from working directly with lenders and explains how AI can help mortgage professionals reduce repetitive administrative work while giving loan officers more time to focus on borrowers, relationships, and revenue-generating activity.In this conversation, you will learn:What separates AI-powered from AI-native mortgage technologyWhich parts of mortgage origination are most ready for automationWhy AI cannot repair a fundamentally broken workflowWhere automation should stop and human oversight should beginHow lenders can evaluate AI beyond time savingsWhy audit trails, security, compliance, and borrower-data protection matterHow to build employee trust and manage AI adoptionWhich internal AI use cases lenders should evaluate firstWhat questions lenders should ask before selecting an AI technology partnerThe biggest question is not whether AI is coming to mortgage. It is whether lenders will use it to automate outdated processes—or rethink how work gets done.This episode is for mortgage executives, operations leaders, technology teams, loan officers, and anyone responsible for evaluating or implementing AI in mortgage origination.Chapters00:00 Introduction00:34 Brianna Lin's path into mortgage technology02:24 What mortgage origination is ready to reimagine03:53 AI-powered versus AI-native technology06:04 Why AI cannot fix a broken workflow07:06 Where automation should end09:42 Measuring AI beyond time savings11:45 Change management and employee trust13:49 The best first AI use cases for lenders15:59 How AI can change the loan officer's work17:29 Connecting with Brianna and CopperlaneSubscribe to the Fintech Hunting Podcast for candid conversations with the founders, executives, and innovators shaping the future of mortgage, fintech, financial services, and artificial intelligence.###Michael Hammond, Founder of NexLevel Advisors, is the leading fractional CMO in mortgage and mortgage technology, specializing in AI-powered growth strategy and audience development.

In this episode, Jeremiah J. Hodshire, President and Chief Executive Officer, Hillsdale Hospital, discusses how rural hospitals can expand specialty services, strengthen community access, and build sustainable growth strategies amid unprecedented healthcare challenges. He shares his perspective on workforce shortages, reimbursement pressures, and the future of independent rural healthcare.

Welcome to HALO Talks, where host Pete Moore sits down with Rich Drengberg, CEO of EoS Fitness and a seasoned leader in the fitness industry. In a rare podcast appearance, Rich shares his journey from Gold's Gym SoCal to transforming EoS into a powerhouse of high-value, low-price gyms across the Sunbelt. Listeners will get an inside look at EoS's disciplined growth, the importance of industry relationships, lessons from private equity partnerships, and why knowing your brand's identity is crucial, straight from someone who's helped steer one of the fastest-growing health club chains in the country.  Whether you're an operator, investor, or fitness enthusiast, this episode offers invaluable insights on building teams, scaling strategically, and staying ahead in a competitive landscape. Regarding chosing the right partner when looking to sell, Rich states, "We were in a great situation when we went to market that we didn't have to sell, and we were able to kind of pick who we wanted to partner with. And it was an interview process both ways. And because of that, we were able to have our cake and eat it too." Key themes discussed Transition from Gold's Gym to EoS Strategic and disciplined growth decisions Importance of experienced teams and industry relationships Private equity influence and operational mindset shift Real estate strategy and anchor tenant positioning Staying true to brand identity amidst trends Partner selection and aligning with TSG for expansion A Few Key Takeaways 1. The Power of Sticking to a Clear Identity: Staying true to the company's vision and brand identity was emphasized as vital for long-term success. EoS avoided "chasing every trend" and only adopted changes that matched their strategic direction, which helped them avoid diluting their brand and losing their core audience 25:23. 2. Disciplined, Focused Growth Strategies: EoS's growth was marked by a disciplined approach to new markets and acquisitions. Opportunities were critically evaluated, and only those fitting their model (right location, box size, and alignment with EoS values) were pursued. This sometimes meant saying "no" to enticing deals that didn't fit the vision 05:10. 3. Mentorship and Learning from Experience: Rich credited much of his development and EoS's success to mentors like Bob Giardina and Bruce Bruckman. Their guidance helped shift his mindset from operating a handful of gyms to building a scalable platform, and highlighted the importance of focusing on real estate and bigger picture growth rather than getting bogged down in minor operational optimizations 12:29. 4. Building Relationships is Key to Expansion: Entering new markets and securing prime real estate depended heavily on building trust and relationships with landlords, developers, and REITs. Early on, EoS was not the first choice for many landlords, but through perseverance and relationship-building, they became a preferred anchor tenant 15:28. 5. Industry Know-How Over Outsider Expertise: The episode stressed that having a team with deep industry experience ("gym rats" as described) was critical. EoS's management came from fitness, not coffee chains or hardware stores, enabling them to make better, faster decisions pertinent to the unique demands of the fitness business 17:26. Rich Drengberg: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rich-drengberg-5923046/   EoS Fitness: https://www.eosfitness.com  Journey To A Billion Dollar Deal-2 Minute Financial Drill: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQtaGUQIyxY  Integrity Square: https://www.integritysq.com Prospect Wizard: https://www.theprospectwizard.com Promotion Vault: https://www.promotionvault.com HigherDose: https://www.higherdose.com  

Episode 154: This week, Kyle Van Pelt talks with Jason Borek, Chief Growth Officer at The Pinnacle Group. Jason has extensive experience in the financial services industry, with a focus on distribution and sales. At The Pinnacle Group, he is responsible for implementing the firm's enterprise-level business strategies.  Jason talks with Kyle about why insurance remains dramatically underutilized in wealth management, why advisors struggle to implement it, and what needs to change for it to become a meaningful part of holistic planning. He also shares how Pinnacle closes the gap between insurance manufacturers and financial advisors, where AI and technology fit into the future of distribution, and why emotional intelligence will define the next generation of great advisors.  In this episode: (00:00) - Intro (01:17) - Jason's money moment (04:38) - Inside The Pinnacle Group's core businesses  (06:35) - Why only 2% of wealth management firms use insurance  (09:59) - How and when should insurance be used in client portfolios (15:21) - How AI and data impact the future of advisor workflows  (21:17) - Will technology replace distribution in asset management or enhance it?  (23:52) - Jason's thoughts on emotional intelligence—innate or taught (27:32) - Jason's outlook on the future of wealth management (30:55) - What it takes to run a multicustodial firm  (33:51) - Jason's Milemarker Minute Key Takeaways Lead with culture and language, not product. The industry's biggest mistake has been pushing solutions before understanding the people they're meant for. Breaking into new markets isn't about forcing a pre-existing product. It's about learning how your audience thinks, operates, and communicates. Real traction comes from building bridges, not delivering pitches.   Don't confuse education with implementation. Education alone doesn't move people to action. Pair any new strategy or message with real people who can sit in the room and walk clients or stakeholders through the hard follow-up questions. Materials build awareness. People build trust. Treat clean data as your foundation, not an afterthought. You cannot begin to solve a client's problem or identify new opportunities without clean, accurate data. Clean data is the modern business currency. Without it, organizations cannot deliver true, personalized value. Don't mistake efficiency for engagement. Technology creates capacity. But its value only shows up if you reinvest that time into deeper relationships. Otherwise, you're not more effective, you're just more efficiently absent.  Quotes "About 2% of revenues come from the sale of insurance products within the wealth management space. And part of the reason why is that our industry is terrible at listening. The insurance industry has forever been a hammer looking for a nail." ~ Jason Borek "If we're going to move into a marketplace where 97% of the people who do business with us do not sell insurance as their primary means of revenue, we'd better take some time to understand how they communicate." ~ Jason Borek "Without the technology creating more client engagement, all you've then become is more efficiently absent." — Jason Borek Links  Jason Borek on LinkedIn The Pinnacle Group New York Life Insurance Holland & Knight Marshall & Stevens  Angeles Investments Cameron Rogers Altruist Jason Wenk Nimesh Patel The Explicit Gospel Connect with our hosts Milemarker.co Kyle on LinkedIn Jud on LinkedIn Subscribe and stay in touch Apple Podcasts Spotify YouTube Produce game-changing content with Turncast Turncast helps your company grow by producing top-quality content and fostering transformative conversations. We specialize in content generation, podcasting, digital strategy, and audience growth for fintech and financial services companies. Learn more at Turncast.com.

This week Kelly cracks open the Business Breakthrough Confessional, where listeners write in the questions they don't necessarily want to ask publicly, and get a confidential answer on the show.  What's inside: Why you don't need advertising money in year one How to borrow audiences other people spent years building Why live selling and referral marketing are making a comeback Finding pockets of time to build around a full-time job and family Timestamps 00:45 —Lead generation with no ad budget in year one 02:00 — Borrowing other people's audiences with virtual speaking 04:00 — Starting from 0: livestreams and daily engagement to build a network 05:30 — The 50,000-foot view: spend your time market facing 07:00 — Why live selling gets more valuable as AI takes over the feed 08:30 — Referral marketing and the return of analog strategies 10:00 — Building a business around a 40-hour job and a child 11:30 — The Miracle Hour as the hour-a-day starting point 12:15 — Keeping the faith: do not grow weary Resources & Mentions The Miracle Hour book — Kelly's one hour-a-day daily sales system, recommended as the starting point for anyone building with limited time; available on Amazon and everywhere books are sold: https://a.co/d/0h2ZpX4o  The Business Breakthrough Hotline: Ready for your business breakthrough? Text your question + name to 916-418-9799 with the hashtag #BusinessBreakthroughHotline for a chance to be featured on the show!

In this episode, I'm speaking with Roberto Salas, a Global Consumer and Sensory Insights Executive based out of Princeton, New Jersey. With over two decades in the FMCG industry, his career has spanned the globe, starting in Mexico and taking him through South Africa, the UK, Latin America, and eventually to his current work at IFF. We had a fantastic conversation about bridging technical sensory science with deep consumer understanding, and how he translates complex human behavior into actionable commercial growth strategies. Please join me in welcoming Roberto Salas. Roberto Salas is a Consumer Intelligence and Growth Strategy executive with over two decades of experience in the food and beverage industry. Operating in the Global Consumer & Sensory space, he specializes in translating complex market, consumer, sensory, and behavioral data into strategies that fuel portfolio growth, innovation, and brand differentiation. Throughout his career, Roberto has managed global and regional projects for major corporations, including Danone, ConAgra, Cargill, Yoplait, and currently IFF. His expertise lies in bridging technical product design with a deep, empathetic understanding of human needs. Over recent years, he has pioneered the use of AI-powered tools to mine unstructured data for actionable intelligence. A passionate advocate for democratizing research, he frequently conducts workshops to coach cross-functional teams, ensuring that genuine consumer value remains at the forefront of the commercialization process. Roberto holds a degree in Food Engineering from Tecnológico de Monterrey (TEC) in Mexico and a Master's Degree in Food Science, specializing in Sensory Analysis, from Kansas State University. Social Links & Resources LinkedIn: Roberto Salas Expertise Areas: Growth Strategy & Commercial Impact Global Consumer Insights & Cultural Nuances Sensory Perception Modeling AI-Powered Data Analysis (Unstructured Data)  

In this episode, Matthew and Peter from JPTD discuss the current landscape of financial advisory practices, focusing on the role of private equity, the impact of capital deployment on growth, and the challenges faced by advisors in an increasingly consolidated market. They explore the implications of AI on the industry, the ongoing wealth transfer between generations, and the importance of professional guidance in navigating M&A decisions. The conversation highlights the evolving nature of advisory practices and the potential for growth and success in the current environment. Capital Deployment and Growth Strategies With Peter Velardi Resources in today's episode: - Matt Jarvis: Website | LinkedIn - PeterVelardi: Website | LinkedIn - Get your practice valuation here - Learn More about our Coaching Programs  

Selma, Chief Revenue Officer chez Agorapulse explique sa vision sur la place du Product Marketing dans la performance commerciale.Au fil de son parcours, Selma a construit une vision très business du Product Marketing. Pour elle, cette fonction n'est pas un simple support marketing. C'est un levier qui permet d'aligner les équipes, d'améliorer la conversion, d'attirer les bons clients et de construire une croissance durable.Dans cet échange, elle partage sa vision du rôle du PMM et les signaux qui montrent qu'une entreprise a besoin de structurer cette fonction.Découvrez :

In this episode of The Long Game Podcast, Alex Birkett sits down with Sofia Sulikowski, founder of Solera Strategies and former product marketer at dbt Labs, Tableau, and Atlan, to explore why standing out in a saturated content landscape has become a core product marketing problem. Sofia breaks down what "basic marketing" really requires, why internal narratives so often drift from how customers actually describe a product, and how pulling voice of customer language directly from calls and interviews can anchor messaging that actually resonates. They discuss the erosion of trust in marketing, from products being marketed ahead of their real capabilities to the flattening effect of AI generated content, and why human authored, technical, practitioner led voices are becoming a premium differentiator. The conversation also digs into how case studies are evolving from static logo and metrics templates into technical, narrative driven assets, and why the real measure of a successful customer story is whether the featured customer feels proud enough to share it themselves. Key Takeaways Product marketing is fundamentally "basic marketing": identifying what value a product provides, for whom, and how, then aligning every channel and message to that core. Internal assumptions about a product's value often diverge from real customer usage, which is why product marketing has to synthesize input from product, sales, and customer success teams. Pulling the exact language customers use, by sitting in on beta calls or QBRs, is an underused but effective way to anchor messaging customers already recognize. Not every customer quote deserves equal weight; separating signal from noise means understanding who gave a quote, how invested they are, and what their actual outcomes look like. Companies are increasingly marketing products ahead of their real capabilities, widening the gap between what's promised and what a customer experiences on first use. AI generated content compresses everything toward the same "average" output, flooding channels with low value content and burying pieces that offer something distinct. Technical, practitioner authored content, written by the people who did the work and lightly polished by marketing, is outperforming generic thought leadership because it carries real expertise. Case studies are shifting from a template of company background, pain points, and results tables toward a hybrid with technical blog posts that shows the actual "how," including architecture and implementation decisions. A mature case study program should be organized by goal: heavy hitter logos for credibility, gap fillers for common but underrepresented use cases, and hero stories that make the customer look good. The clearest signal that a case study succeeded isn't traffic or downloads, it's whether the featured customer is proud enough to organically share their own story with their network. Show Links Connect with Sofia Sulikowski on LinkedIn Connect with Alex Birkett on LinkedIn and Twitter Connect with Omniscient Digital on LinkedIn or Twitter Past guests on The Long Game podcast include: Morgan Brown (Shopify), Ryan Law (Animalz), Dan Shure (Evolving SEO), Kaleigh Moore (freelancer), Eric Siu (Clickflow), Peep Laja (CXL), Chelsea Castle (Chili Piper), Tracey Wallace (Klaviyo), Tim Soulo (Ahrefs), Ryan McReady (Reforge), and many more. Some interviews you might enjoy and learn from: Actionable Tips and Secrets to SEO Strategy with Dan Shure (Evolving SEO) Building Competitive Marketing Content with Sam Chapman (Aprimo) How to Build the Right Data Workflow with Blake Burch (Shipyard) Data-Driven Thought Leadership with Alicia Johnston (Sprout Social) Purpose-Driven Leadership & Building a Content Team with Ty Magnin (UiPath) Also, check out our Kitchen Side series where we take you behind the scenes to see how the sausage is made at our agency: Blue Ocean vs Red Ocean SEO Should You Hire Writers or Subject Matter Experts? How Do Growth and Content Overlap? Connect with Omniscient Digital on social: Twitter: @beomniscient LinkedIn: Be Omniscient Listen to more episodes of The Long Game podcast here: https://beomniscient.com/podcast/

Discover how market leaders—Walmart, Builders FirstSource, Progressive, and JPMorgan Chase—achieved exceptional growth from 2019 to 2024, outperforming peers by an average of five percentage points in revenue and seven points in profitability. In this episode, Simon Jones, David Schiff , and Kate Siegel discuss their new article on the three critical characteristics that drive sustained profitable business growth: committed investment strategies, diversified growth engines, and systematic technology integration. Related Insights Inspired for business growth: How five companies beat the market The race takes off in the next big arenas of competition The granularity of growth Rewired 2.0: How leading companies are (still) winning with AI? The ten rules of growth How innovative companies leverage tech to outperformSupport the show: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/mckinsey-strategy-&-corporate-finance/See www.mckinsey.com/privacy-policy for privacy information

Welcome to the What's Next! Podcast with Tiffani Bova. I'm thrilled to welcome you back to a series I did with my dear friend, Roger Martin. He's the author of the amazing book, Playing to Win. In our tenth episode, Roger Martin interviews me about my book, Growth IQ.    THIS EPISODE IS PERFECT FOR…leaders looking to accelerate growth, make better strategic choices, and connect strategy with execution.   TODAY'S MAIN MESSAGE…many organizations approach growth as if there's a single initiative that will unlock results. Roger and Tiffani challenge that idea, arguing that sustainable growth comes from understanding all of the options available and making deliberate choices about which ones to pursue. They discuss the ten growth pathways Growth IQ was built around, how leaders can combine those pathways for greater impact, and why context and sequencing matter just as much as the choices themselves.   KEY TAKEAWAYS: Growth is rarely driven by a single initiative. Strong strategies come from making deliberate choices. Combining growth pathways creates greater impact than pursuing one in isolation. Existing customers are often the biggest growth opportunity. Sales execution and strategy must be developed together.   WHAT I LOVE MOST…Roger's reminder that you can't make decisions about categories you don't know exist. The more complete your view of the options available, the better your strategic choices become.   Running Time: 34:09   Subscribe on iTunes     Find Tiffani Online: LinkedIn Facebook X    Find Roger Online: LinkedIn Website

CFRA's Garrett Nelson examines PepsiCo's (PEP) rare earnings miss and the margin pressures weighing on results, while noting the company reaffirmed its full-year guidance. He discusses how aggressive post-pandemic price increases hurt demand, why consumer staples appear undervalued, and how PepsiCo's push into healthier snack and beverage brands could support future growth.======== Schwab Network ========Empowering every investor and trader, every market day.Subscribe to the Market Minute newsletter - https://schwabnetwork.com/subscribeDownload the iOS app - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/schwab-network/id1460719185Download the Amazon Fire Tv App - https://www.amazon.com/TD-Ameritrade-Network/dp/B07KRD76C7Watch on Sling - https://watch.sling.com/1/asset/191928615bd8d47686f94682aefaa007/watchWatch on Vizio - https://www.vizio.com/en/watchfreeplus-exploreWatch on DistroTV - https://www.distro.tv/live/schwab-network/Follow us on X – https://twitter.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/schwabnetworkFollow us on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/schwab-network/About Schwab Network - https://schwabnetwork.com/about

In this Kitchen Side episode, Alex Birkett, Allie Decker, and David Ly Khim unpack how brands should actually measure success in AI search, and why traditional attribution models are breaking down as buyer behavior shifts from search links to AI assistants and workflows. They discuss why self-reported attribution is becoming the most reliable signal available, the different tiers of AI visibility from simple citations to category-level consensus, and why AI visibility functions more like a brand recall survey than a channel you can optimize in isolation. The conversation also covers the idea of a “post-channel marketer” who coordinates across product, customer education, and PR, and why chasing visibility tactics with no underlying business purpose rarely pays off. Key Takeaways Self-reported attribution is more reliable than clickstream data for AI search because most AI-driven visits never result in a tracked click. AI visibility behaves more like a brand recall survey than a channel, reflecting how a brand compares to competitors rather than something to optimize in isolation. Picking up a citation on a narrow, low-competition prompt is easy, but shifting broader category-level consensus, like being named among the best CRMs, is far harder and requires changing an entire conversation. Correcting outdated third-party pricing information moved AI search outputs within about a month in one client engagement, though this was a sentiment fix rather than a visibility gain. Some AI answers now include negative or qualifying recommendations, meaning a mention doesn't always translate into a positive outcome for a brand. Different AI tools serve different roles, with ChatGPT and AI Overviews functioning as quick answer engines while agentic tools like Claude Code perform deeper multi-step research, and visibility strategies should account for that difference. Whether a company should publish a markdown version of its site for easier AI retrieval depends on its audience, mattering more for technical, developer-facing products than for typical B2B SaaS buyers. Sustainable AI search performance comes from investing in product experience, customer education, and reviews, since genuine third-party validation is difficult to fake once a brand has earned it. Marketing teams need a “post-channel” role that coordinates across product, customer success, and PR to influence sentiment and visibility, rather than treating this as an SEO-only or PR-only problem. Tactics pursued only to move an AI visibility score, with no underlying business purpose, are usually not worth the effort unless they're addressing existing negative sentiment. Show Links Connect with David Khim on LinkedIn and Twitter Connect with Alex Birkett on LinkedIn and Twitter Connect with Allie Decker on LinkedIn and Twitter Connect with Omniscient Digital on LinkedIn or Twitter What is Kitchen Side? One big benefit of running an agency or working at one is you get to see the "kitchen side" of many different businesses; their revenue, their operations, their automations, and their culture. You understand how things look from the inside and how that differs from the outside. You understand how the sausage is made. As an agency ourselves, we're working both on growing our clients' businesses as well as our own. This podcast is one project, but we also blog, make videos, do sales, and have quite a robust portfolio of automations and hacks to run our business. We want to take you behind the curtain, to the kitchen side of our business, to witness our brainstorms, discussions, and internal dialogues behind the public works that we ship. Past guests on The Long Game podcast include: Morgan Brown (Shopify), Ryan Law (Animalz), Dan Shure (Evolving SEO), Kaleigh Moore (freelancer), Eric Siu (Clickflow), Peep Laja (CXL), Chelsea Castle (Chili Piper), Tracey Wallace (Klaviyo), Tim Soulo (Ahrefs), Ryan McReady (Reforge), and many more. Some interviews you might enjoy and learn from: Actionable Tips and Secrets to SEO Strategy with Dan Shure (Evolving SEO) Building Competitive Marketing Content with Sam Chapman (Aprimo) How to Build the Right Data Workflow with Blake Burch (Shipyard) Data-Driven Thought Leadership with Alicia Johnston (Sprout Social) Purpose-Driven Leadership & Building a Content Team with Ty Magnin (UiPath) Also, check out our Kitchen Side series where we take you behind the scenes to see how the sausage is made at our agency: Blue Ocean vs Red Ocean SEO Should You Hire Writers or Subject Matter Experts? How Do Growth and Content Overlap? Connect with Omniscient Digital on social: Twitter: @beomniscient LinkedIn: Be Omniscient Listen to more episodes of The Long Game podcast here: https://beomniscient.com/podcast/

GoTo Foods CBOs Mike Smith (Moe's Southwest Grill) and Donna Varner (Schlotzsky's) join Fast Casual Nation to discuss how a shared brand platform drives menu innovation, prototype design, loyalty data, and cautious AI adoption without eroding individual brand identity. #FastCasualNation #GoToFoods #RestaurantIndustry Get Your Podcast Now! Are you a hospitality or restaurant industry leader looking to amplify your voice and establish yourself as a thought leader? Look no further than SavorFM, the premier podcast platform designed exclusively for hospitality visionaries like you. Take the next step in your industry leadership journey – visit https://www.savor.fm/ Capital & Advisory: Are you a fast-casual restaurant startup or a technology innovator in the food service industry? Don't miss out on the opportunity to tap into decades of expertise. Reach out to Savor Capital & Advisory now to explore how their seasoned professionals can propel your business forward. Discover if you're eligible to leverage our unparalleled knowledge in food service branding and technology and take your venture to new heights. Don't wait – amplify your voice or supercharge your startup's growth today with Savor's ecosystem of industry-leading platforms and advisory services. Visit https://www.savor.fm/capital-advisory

Jennifer Maanavi, Founder and CEO of Physique 57, joined me on the podcast. Physique 57 has been around for 20 years, 20 years! Jennifer has seen a lot including expanding into different countries, selling fitness DVD's, hosting on demand memberships (before that was even a thing), closing multiple studies during covid, and still continuing to operate a thriving boutique fitness business with several locations. Jennifer wears many hats including being the CEO but also as a business consultant. She understands the value of pivoting business plans, creating an environment where your studio instructors stay long-term, and truly what it takes to grow a major boutique fitness brand. I personally took a Physique 57 class and it was one of the most challenging mat classes I've ever taken! I love Jennifer and her outlook as a business owner. This conversation was inspiring with so many takeaways. Can't wait for you to listen. Download my app! It's a free marketing coach in your pocket. To keep up with me on instagram, follow me @alexagrowmybusinessTo join the The Friday Society Membership, click here To join my newsletter for free marketing advice, click hereTo view all of my free resources, click here! 

Welcome to another episode of "The Unconventional Path: Entrepreneurship and Innovation Stories and Ideas." In this episode, hosts Bela Musits and Mike Wasserman sit down with Michael Barbarita, the founder of a specialized fractional CFO firm dedicated to helping small and medium-sized companies achieve rapid growth.Michael Barbarita is not your typical CFO. While many fractional CFOs focus primarily on historical numbers and compliance, Michael's approach combines forward-looking financial expertise with strategic implementation. He shares how business owners hire him to double or even triple their profits by employing business and financial strategies that their competitors simply aren't using.The Fractional CFO Advantage: Michael explains why small to medium-sized businesses, which often cannot afford a full-time high-quality CFO, benefit from fractional services that provide a broad spectrum of scalable strategies.Beyond the Numbers: A core theme of this conversation is the necessity for CFOs to understand business strategy. Michael argues that while traditional CPAs look backward at historical data, a true CFO must be forward-looking to provide real value to a CEO.Pressure Testing Ideas: One of Michael's signature methods is "pressure testing" a CEO's ideas. Whether it's a new marketing campaign or a pricing change, he discusses the importance of expanding upon these ideas to ensure they are financially viable and strategically sound.The Conversion Formula: Michael introduces the concept of a conversion formula used to create successful messaging for things like drip campaigns, ensuring that a business stands out rather than just repeating what everyone else in the market is doing.Strategic Growth for Cash-Limited Companies: Most small companies face limited cash flow. Michael shares insights on how to improve financial foundations and implement growth strategies even when resources are tight.This interview serves as a master class for any entrepreneur looking to improve their financial footing and understand the financial ramifications of their business strategies. Michael's unique blend of strategic knowledge and financial expertise offers a roadmap for turning high costs and uncertain footing into favorable growth opportunities.Connect with The Unconventional Path:Our podcast is now available on YouTube. Simply search for "The Unconventional Path" to subscribe and never miss an episode.We're always on the lookout for interesting guests to feature on our show. If you know someone who has an inspiring story, unique perspective, or valuable expertise to share, please let us know. We're eager to connect with potential guests who can bring fresh insights and engaging conversations to our audience.We also love hearing from our listeners! Your questions, comments, and suggestions are incredibly valuable to us. Send us an email at bela.and.mike@gmail.com with your thoughts, and we'll do our best to address them in a future episode. Whether you have a question about a specific topic, feedback on a recent episode, or ideas for future content, we want to hear from you. Your engagement helps us shape the show and deliver content that resonates with our listeners.Thanks for listening,Bela and MikeFractional CFO, Entrepreneurial Finance, Business Strategy, Small Business Growth, Profit Strategy, Cash Flow Management, Strategic Implementation, Michael Barbarita, Bela Musits, Mike Wasserman, The Unconventional Path Podcast, Business Advising, Financial Forecasting, Startup Accounting, Growth Mindset.

Veteran Hang Gliding pilot Erika Klein shares her journey into the sport, the unique aspects of dune flying, and insights on safety, gear, and growing the sport. This episode offers valuable tips for beginners and enthusiasts alike- and if you haven't hang glided will get you very keen to go prone!

Schedule a Meeting with Joshua TODAY!Are you the biggest obstacle standing between your business and its next level of growth?Many contractors start their businesses because they love building projects; not managing teams, creating systems, or leading a growing company. But as businesses grow, owners often find themselves trapped in every decision, every jobsite, and every problem. In this episode, Joshua Gillow and Tanner Broughton discuss the challenges of scaling a hardscape business, building trust within a team, creating systems that support growth, and transitioning from working in the business to leading it.You will: Learn how to identify whether you're the bottleneck preventing your company from growing.  Discover why systems, delegation, and clear leadership roles are essential for scaling a contracting business.  Understand the mindset shifts needed to move from technician to business owner and create a stronger, more self-sufficient team. Press play to learn the leadership, systems, and growth strategies that can help you scale your business without carrying the entire company on your shoulders.Interested in learning more about Firescapes? Check out their website: https://www.firescapessd.com/Ready to get your copy of The CORE 10? Check it out HERE!Connect with Joshua at:The WebsiteThe Facebook GroupSales Master ClassesHow to work with Joshua - https://yes.express/apply/Tune into this podcast where a seasoned craftsman shares expert communication skills, strategies for overcoming stress and overwhelm, and insights on building a profitable business in landscaping and hardscaping, with tips on how to sell, close more deals, and achieve financial freedom to retire early as a successful business owner in the design/build and outdoor living industry. Music from #Uppbeat:https://uppbeat.io/t/abbynoise/puncherLicense code: AWUDIYK15E3NWYPK

In this episode of Ask George, Dr. George Hariri shatters the industry myth that achieving more than 10% same-store growth is impossible. For the modern dentist, transitioning from an exhausted clinician to a strategic CEO requires executing targeted dental growth strategies. Rather than forcing generalized systems onto your team, true leadership means diagnosing your clinic's unique bottlenecks. To scale efficiently, stop treating every operational issue equally and focus your administrative time on the constraints that generate massive dental practice profitability.This episode serves as your survival guide for mastering dental practice management. George reveals the four operational levers that guarantee sustainable dental practice growth:- Patient Flow: Implement the Retain, Open, Fill method. Lock the back door by mastering hygiene reappointment rates, then open new columns.- Case Acceptance: Empower your staff to co-diagnose. When the team leads patient education, doctor production becomes completely predictable.- Consistency: Close the performance gap between your best and worst clinical team members to instantly elevate the practice floor.- Efficiency: Play "Whac-A-Mole" with your metrics. Identify massive operational leaks, like a high missed call rate, and resolve them immediately.Elite dental business strategies require you to leverage your time. If you only spend a few hours a week working on the business, you must direct that energy toward your weakest links. Customizing your dental growth strategies to target these precise inefficiencies guarantees predictable expansion year after year.Ready to take the next step in your dental practice journey? Visit https://sharedpractices.com to learn more about our Buyer Representation and Coaching services, designed to help dentists buy, grow, and optimize profitable practices. You can also use our Free Look to evaluate dental practice opportunities with real data before making a decision. For daily Dental Moneyball insights, strategy tips, and updates, follow us across our social channels.

Message Clarity Matters: Bruce Ashford on the Communication Bottleneck Killing Growth Bruce Ashford spent nearly two decades in academia as a professor and provost, but a personal crisis during COVID forced him to rebuild from scratch. What he discovered in his own recovery became the blueprint for helping mission-driven nonprofits and founder-led businesses solve their biggest growth problem: they can't articulate their value. The irony? Organizations doing genuinely important work often fail not because of what they do, but because of how they communicate it. Bruce works with CEOs to unlock two critical clarity challenges—message clarity and structural clarity—that separate thriving organizations from stuck ones. In This Episode Bruce's journey: from academic leader to recovery to messaging strategist How personal crisis revealed the power of rigorous self-inventory The six organizational components that must align for sustainable growth Why marketing firms miss the most important skill: the words Storytelling frameworks where the customer or donor is the hero How nonprofits underestimate their value through unclear messaging The founder bottleneck: why CEOs become the ceiling on growth Structural clarity: the airplane analogy that transforms organizations Vision and mission statements that actually inspire (25 words or less) AI optimization alongside human connection: winning over machines and people Building a brand presence so clear that growth becomes inevitable Timestamps 00:00  Understanding the Clarity Problem 05:58  The Journey to Message Clarity 11:51  Personal Transformation and Professional Growth 17:45  The Power of Story in Messaging 23:26  Real-World Applications and Success Stories 25:27  Targeting the Right Audience for Nonprofits 27:05  Communicating Value Effectively 30:04  Growth Strategies for Organizations 34:53  Leadership and Organizational Bottlenecks 37:26  The Importance of Vision and Mission Statements 42:29  AI's Role in Marketing and Clarity 47:29  Finding the Truth in Your Message Key Insights & Takeaways Insight #1: Message Clarity Is Half the Battle Most nonprofits and founder-led businesses haven't found the right words to communicate their value to customers or donors. This isn't a confidence problem—it's a structural one. Marketing firms lack messaging expertise, and leaders can't see their own label from inside the bottle. Getting clarity on your message transforms everything. Insight #2: Six Components Must Align for Growth Organizations don't grow by doing the same things harder. They grow when leadership, marketing, sales, product optimization, management/productivity, and cash flow all work in harmony. Like an airplane, if one component fails, the whole system fails. Insight #3: The Founder Is Often the Bottleneck CEOs carry too much on their shoulders and never delegate or systematize. James Clear's principle applies: "You don't rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems." Without processes and delegation, organizations cannot scale. Insight #4: Story, Not Features, Drives Action People don't buy features—they buy transformation. The most effective messaging makes the customer or donor the hero of the story, not your organization. When audiences see their own life reflected in your words, they act. Insight #5: Authenticity Compounds Over Time Whether it's personal recovery or organizational branding, finding and communicating your truth creates a moat that tactics can't replicate. Consistent clarity and authentic storytelling naturally attract the right attention and support. Resources & Links  Bruce Ashford's Website — https://www.theashfordagency.com/ Million Dollar Message Intensive — Bruce's flagship messaging program StoryBrand by Donald Miller — The framework that shaped Bruce's approach Small Business Flight Plan — The certification model Bruce uses Nonprofit Flight Plan — Bruce's adaptation for mission-driven organizations AI Trust Signals by Marcus Sheridan — Evaluate and optimize AI ranking factors Atomic Habits by James Clear — "You fall to the level of your systems" About Bruce Ashford Bruce Ashford is a messaging strategist and organizational consultant who works exclusively with CEOs of nonprofits and founder-led businesses. With nearly two decades in academia and nonprofit leadership, he watched capable leaders with important missions fail to communicate their value. After a personal crisis and recovery, he discovered that the same rigorous self-inventory that saved his life could transform organizations. He's a certified coach in StoryBrand, Marketing Made Simple, and Small Business Flight Plan, and he specializes in helping mission-driven leaders achieve message clarity and structural clarity—the two foundations of sustainable growth. Connect with Bruce: Website: www.theashfordagency.com LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/brucerileyashford   For the accessible version of the podcast, go to our Ziotag gallery.We're happy you're here! Like the pod? Support the podcast and receive discounts from our sponsors: https://yourbrandamplified.codeadx.me/ Leave a rating and review on your favorite platform Follow @yourbrandamplified on the socials Talk to my digital avatar  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

If you're looking for restaurant growth strategies that increase sales without relying on constant discounts, this episode is for you. Roger sits down with Dog Haus CEO Mike Montagano to discuss how one of the industry's fastest-growing brands is building customer loyalty, protecting margins, and growing sales through memorable guest experiences, smart marketing, AI, menu innovation, and operational excellence. In this episode, you'll learn: • Why competing on price is a losing strategy • How loyalty programs drive repeat business • Restaurant marketing ideas that keep your brand relevant • How AI is improving restaurant operations • Why a strong bar program can become a major profit center • Menu engineering strategies that improve profitability • The KPIs every restaurant owner should monitor • How to create an experience that keeps guests coming back Whether you operate a single independent restaurant or a growing restaurant group, you'll walk away with practical ideas you can implement immediately to grow sales and protect your profits.

Jared Bell never planned to own a fencing business. He took a summer job at Butte Fence in 1994, liked the work, and decided to skip college and stay. Thirteen years later, he bought out a partner and took over day-to-day operations—just in time for the Great Recession. The company survived that challenge and has gone on to thrive, but not by following a conventional growth playbook. Bell has expanded the business by repeatedly asking a simple question: Why buy from a supplier when we can do it better ourselves? Over the years, Butte Fence has developed new products, configured more efficient processes, and steadily moved upstream, turning vendors into competitors and creating entirely new businesses along the way. In our conversation, Bell explains how that strategy evolved, what it takes to pull it off, and how a small business can identify opportunities hiding in its own supply chain.

On this episode of the EMARKETER Cannes Podcast Miniseries, we explore brand partnerships, retail data, and what it takes for retailers and brands to build more accountable, sustainable long-term growth together.   Sarah Marzano, Vice President and Principal Analyst at EMARKETER, sits down with Christine Foster, Group Vice President, Commercial Strategy and Operations at Kroger Precision Marketing, for a conversation recorded at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.   Get more insights like these with our free, industry-leading newsletters covering advertising, marketing, and commerce. Sign up at emarketer.com/newsletters Follow us on Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/emarketer/ For sponsorship opportunities contact us: advertising@emarketer.com For more information visit: https://www.emarketer.com/advertise/ Have questions or just want to say hi? Drop us a line at podcast@emarketer.com Cannes Lion 2026 Coverage Center: https://www.emarketer.com/learningcenter/toolkits/cannes-lions-2026/   For a transcript of this episode click here: https://www.emarketer.com/content/podcast-kroger-precision-marketing-discusses-how-marketers-rethinking-brand-growth-strategies © 2026 EMARKETER   Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM) is the retail media business of Kroger designed to make brand advertising more effective by closing the loop between media exposure and store sales. Powered by 84.51˚data science, and Kroger's popular loyalty card program, KPM connects consumers to brands through engaging moments that inspire purchasing online or in-store. https://www.krogerprecisionmarketing.com

Feeling lost in the noise of social media and AI slop? What if the answer to reliable visibility was proximity via partnerships, not posting? Casey Lightbody, founder of The Quiet Collective, helps quietly powerful women coaches and consultants grow consistent, fully booked businesses through strategic partnerships and relationship-led marketing, without relying on social media to be seen or successful. After burning her first six-figure business to the ground when she realized the model didn't fit her introverted, highly sensitive nature, she rebuilt everything differently, creating $166K in the first five months with zero social media posts. Casey walks us through her exact game plan for borrowing other people's audiences, the mistakes that kill most partnership attempts before they start, and why this approach to growth is actually working better now than ever. Connect with Casey: https://quietcollective.com.au https://www.instagram.com/caseylightbody.biz/ https://resources.quietcollective.com.au/marketingguide https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseylightbody/⁠ Loving our bonus content and want more Cubicle to CEO in your ears? Join us every Monday on our subscriber-only premium feed for case study–style interviews with successful entrepreneurs debriefing their real-time growth experiments and results. Subscribe to get insider access to what's actually been working for businesses in the last 3-18 months: ⁠⁠⁠⁠cubicletoceo.co/podcast⁠⁠⁠⁠ If you enjoyed today's episode, please: Post a screenshot & key takeaway on your IG story and tag us ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@cubicletoceo⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ so we can repost you. ⁠⁠⁠Subscribe to ⁠⁠⁠⁠our premium feed⁠⁠⁠⁠ for case-study style interviews every Monday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For this episode, let's revisit a strategy skills classic interview with the author of Survive, Reset, Thrive: Leading Breakthrough Growth Strategy in Volatile Times, Dr. Rebecca Homkes. Survive, Reset, Thrive is a playbook for leaders derived from the author's first-hand experience working with executive teams across industries from software, technology, retail, fashion, and construction through to manufacturing. Drawing from over a decade of rich real-world experience, the author illustrates how to navigate the most complex strategic situations with a simple, executable approach. Rebecca Homkes explains how proactively to stabilize your business to withstand and grow through market shocks, reset your strategy to take account of new realities and thrive through uncertainty. Rebecca Homkes is a high-growth strategy specialist and CEO and executive advisor. She is a Lecturer at  The London Business School, Faculty at Duke Corporate Executive Education, Advisor and Faculty at the Boston Consulting Group focused on AI and Climate and Sustainability, and a former fellow at the London School of Economics Centre for Economic Performance. A global keynote speaker and recognized thought leader, she is also the global Faculty Director of the Active Learning Program with the Young Presidents Organization (YPO), leads several fintech accelerators, and serves on the boards of many high-growth companies. She earned her doctorate at the London School of Economics as a Marshall Scholar and is now based in Miami, the Bay Area, and London, UK. Get Rebecca's book here: https://rb.gy/aq85ee Survive, Reset, Thrive: Leading Breakthrough Growth Strategy in Volatile Times Claim your free gift: Free gift #1 McKinsey & BCG winning resume www.FIRMSconsulting.com/resumePDF Free gift #2 Breakthrough Decisions Guide with 25 AI Prompts www.FIRMSconsulting.com/decisions Free gift #3 Five Reasons Why People Ignore Somebody www.FIRMSconsulting.com/owntheroom Free gift #4 Access episode 1 from Build a Consulting Firm, Level 1 www.FIRMSconsulting.com/build Free gift #5 The Overall Approach used in well-managed strategy studies www.FIRMSconsulting.com/OverallApproach Free gift #6 Get a copy of Nine Leaders in Action, a book we co-authored with some of our clients: www.FIRMSconsulting.com/gift

What does it actually look like to rebuild a content and SEO strategy for a world where search is shifting from clicks to mentions?In this episode of The Growth Leaders Series, Charlie Marchant sits down with Josh Spilker, Head of Search Marketing at AirOps, the AI-powered content and search platform. Josh has led organic growth at high-growth SaaS companies, including ClickUp, where he helped turn content into a serious revenue driver through a relentless focus on the middle funnel.Josh introduces the concept of content engineering: what it means, why it matters now more than ever, and how building connected AI-powered workflows is replacing the traditional brief-to-publish content process.The conversation gets into where Google and ChatGPT results actually overlap (and what the data says), why LinkedIn is starting to behave more like search than social, and why the middle funnel may be the most underrated opportunity in B2B content right now.Josh also shares how AirOps runs its own webinar-to-content workflow end to end, what he learned building comparison content at ClickUp that still holds up today, and why saying yes to uncomfortable things was the career advice he wished he'd had earlier.Read the full show notes: https://exposureninja.com/podcast/growth-leader-series-josh-spilker/Check out Josh's post on the “10x Content Engineer” https://www.airops.com/blog/10x-content-engineerFollow Josh Spilker on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshspilker/Listen to these episodes next:McKinsey's Thought Leadership Playbook with Daphne Luchtenberg https://exposureninja.com/podcast/growth-leader-series-daphne-luchtenberg/Growth Strategy in the AI Search Era with Nick Lafferty, Profound https://exposureninja.com/podcast/growth-leader-series-nick-lafferty/The Organic Growth Playbook Behind Wise with Fabrizio Ballarini https://exposureninja.com/podcast/growth-leader-series-fabrizio-ballarini/Book a consultation to get a live review of your website and marketing

Don Norton, General Manager of Data Solutions at AdImpact, joins AdTechGod to discuss his journey from DoubleClick and Google to AdImpact, the evolution of TV measurement, the rise of CTV, political advertising trends, AI's role in media intelligence, and why relationships still matter in an increasingly automated industry. Takeaways Don shares lessons from DoubleClick, Google, Infillion, and AdImpact. AdImpact is expanding beyond political advertising into cross-TV intelligence. CTV and broadcast measurement require larger datasets and ACR technology for accuracy. Political advertising in 2026 is expected to rival presidential election spending levels. Local CTV presents one of the biggest growth opportunities in television advertising. AI is improving data processing, automation, and predictive insights. Despite automation, trust and human relationships remain critical in media buying and selling. Chapters 00:00 Introduction to Don Norton and His Ad Tech Journey01:05 Starting at DoubleClick During the Early Internet Boom02:12 The Evolution from DoubleClick to Google04:00 Leaving Google and Joining Infillion05:31 Why Don Joined AdImpact06:06 AdImpact's Growth Strategy and Expansion Beyond Political Advertising07:05 Understanding Cross-TV Measurement: Broadcast, Cable & CTV08:01 The Challenge of Measuring Linear TV and Streaming Audiences10:09 What Advertisers Want from TV Measurement11:31 How AdImpact Uses ACR Data and Large TV Panels13:14 Who Uses AdImpact's Data and Insights?14:26 The Biggest Data Challenges in Media Intelligence16:34 AI, Data Validation, and Operational Efficiency18:54 Political Advertising Outlook for 202620:27 The Future of Local CTV Advertising23:10 What's Overhyped in Ad Tech?24:00 Why Relationships Still Matter in an AI-Driven Industry26:05 Final Thoughts and Closing Remarks Guests: AdTech God Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Anthony Rose is the Chief Financial Officer at Kapitus, where he has led financial strategy, operations, and growth initiatives since 2018. With more than 25 years of experience across investment banking, fintech, and corporate finance, he brings deep expertise in capital markets, balance sheet management, and strategic planning. Prior to joining Kapitus, Anthony served as Chief Administrative Officer at Dime Community Bancshares and held CFO roles at ISI Group and the Global Equities Investment Bank at Credit Suisse. Earlier in his career, he held key leadership positions at JPMorgan Chase, including VP of Capital and Balance Sheet Strategy and Equity Research Analyst. Anthony holds a BA from the University of Wisconsin and an MBA from Columbia Business School. He is also a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and is known for his strategic insight, leadership, and ability to drive financial performance in complex organizations. During the show we discuss: Why credit discipline (not just tech) is the real backbone of successful lending companies How lenders evaluate you using cash flow vs. credit score (and why this matters) The real criteria that determine if you qualify for business funding Why fast growth can be dangerous—and how controlled scaling wins long-term The difference between loans, lines of credit, revenue financing, and equipment financing (and when to use each) How to still get funding even if your credit isn't perfect What lenders look for in a "strong borrower profile" Why many fintech companies fail—and what separates the ones that last Resources: https://kapitus.com/

Breaking the Owner Dependency: Operational Execution and System Architecture with Thomas RechtienIn a recent episode of The Thoughtful Entrepreneur Podcast, host Josh Elledge sat down with Thomas Rechtien, the founder of Rechtien Consult, to deconstruct the operational bottlenecks that frequently trap owner-led manufacturing, contracting, and trades businesses in overwhelming 80-hour workweeks. As a premier business execution coach and strategic execution architect, Thomas details how a reliance on localized, tribal knowledge and centralized decision-making quietly devalues an enterprise and triggers executive burnout. This conversation delivers an intentional operational roadmap for founders ready to eliminate process friction, implement rigid delegation filters, and transform an exhausting daily job into a highly scalable, self-sustaining corporate asset.The Execution Architecture: Standardizing Workflows and Scaling Owner-Independent Operational EnginesThe single greatest impediment stalling the long-term capitalization of an owner-led enterprise is the founder's tendency to act as the primary operational bottleneck. When every critical decision, customer approval, and daily frontline problem must route directly through the CEO, organizational momentum grinds to a halt and leadership exhaustion becomes inevitable. Many business owners attempt to correct this strain by prematurely throwing capital at additional headcount or high-level fractional support, assuming an expanded payroll will naturally dissolve the back-office chaos. Real scalability demands the exact opposite approach: establishing a structured operational foundation first by standardizing core processes, defining clear documentation parameters, and solidifying internal workflows before attempting to inject new talent into a broken system.Transitioning an enterprise away from founder-dependency relies on a disciplined, non-negotiable commitment to communication efficiency and systematic delegation. Ineffective, unfocused corporate meetings that drag on without direction or repeat identical operational complaints week after week serve as an immediate indicator of underlying system deficiencies. True operational optimization requires strict meeting governance—anchored by predefined agendas, strict time limits, and absolute accountability tracking—paired with an intentional framework for shifting risk down the management line. Founders must overcome the psychological barrier of authority bias by delegating low-risk operational choices first, providing the training, support, and documented guidelines necessary for frontline teams to assume genuine psychological ownership over their specific outcomes.Ultimately, building a company that operates independently of its owner is a strict asset-engineering exercise, regardless of whether a clear exit strategy or liquidation event is on the immediate horizon. Businesses that rely completely on the daily physical intervention of the founder carry massive risk profiles and inherently command much lower enterprise valuations in the open market. Cultivating a calm, analytical leadership presence—often referred to as maintaining absolute composure under high-stress industry conditions—allows an executive to cut through operational noise and project clear, predictable 90-day execution metrics. By leveraging external, objective capability audits and diagnostics, forward-thinking business owners can bridge the gaps in organizational momentum, ensuring the company continuously scales its market share and functions as a highly valuable, predictable entity.About Thomas RechtienThomas Rechtien is the Founder and Owner-Led Business Execution Coach at Rechtien Consult, specializing in turning chaotic, founder-dependent operations into scalable, sellable corporate assets. Drawing from an extensive background beginning in master carpentry and expanding into decades of high-level industrial manufacturing leadership, Thomas blends practical craftsmanship with advanced execution architecture. He is widely recognized for his analytical, composed leadership style, helping trades and manufacturing leaders eliminate operational bottlenecks.About Rechtien ConsultRechtien Consult is an elite business consulting and operational engineering firm dedicated to helping owner-led contracting, manufacturing, and construction businesses scale sustainably. The consultancy specializes in executing comprehensive operational health diagnostics, meeting optimization frameworks, and custom delegation pipelines to reduce administrative strain on leadership teams. Through structured blueprints and resources like the Growth at Rechtien assessment, the firm enables small-to-mid-sized enterprises to build independent, high-valuation structures.Links Mentioned in This EpisodeRechtien Consult Official Website: rechtienconsult.comThomas Rechtien on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/thomas-rechtienKey Episode HighlightsThe Founder Bottleneck Audit: Tracking direct operational dependencies to isolate which everyday approvals can be systematically offloaded to management tiers.Structure-First Talent Stacking: Why implementing software or hiring personnel before documenting workflows multiplies administrative chaos instead of resolving it.Meeting Governance Protocols: Standardizing company communication through strict time limits, advance agendas, and dedicated action-item tracking loops.The Asset Valuation Mindset: Constructing internal operations so the entire business functions autonomously, maximizing value for future investors or successors.Calm-Under-Pressure Leadership: Leveraging a composed executive mindset to cut through operational noise and establish clear 90-day corporate priorities.ConclusionThe conversation with Thomas Rechtien highlights that achieving true business autonomy is a predictable, structured exercise rather than an unreachable goal. By stepping out of the operational bottleneck, engineering rigid process guardrails, and mastering executive delegation, founders can successfully convert an exhausting, hands-on company into a highly streamlined, self-sustaining corporate asset.More from The Thoughtful Entrepreneur

Welcome back to another episode of the unSeminary podcast. Today we're joined by Tim Foot, CEO of Slingshot Group. With nearly three decades of ministry and leadership experience having worked with thousands of churches, Tim brings deep insight into one of the most critical drivers of church health: your team. In this conversation, we explore what separates stagnant teams from those that create real momentum and how leaders can shift from survival to remarkable impact. Why teams stall out. // After working with thousands of churches, Tim consistently sees the same patterns: unclear expectations, misaligned priorities, lack of structure, and unspoken tension. Many teams are overly task-driven but underdeveloped relationally. Others don't fully understand how their strengths and weaknesses fit together. The danger of “hero-driven leadership.” // When a church relies too heavily on one standout leader to carry the mission it results in what Tim calls “hero-driven leadership.” While it can produce short-term results, it ultimately leads to burnout, unrealistic expectations, and fragile systems. Leaders often fall into this trap because it feels productive, and even rewarding, to be the one with all the answers. But over time, it limits team development and creates dependency instead of shared ownership. From hero to team. // The future of healthy ministry is team-based leadership. Instead of building ministries around individuals, churches must build systems and cultures where teams thrive together. This requires leaders humbly admitting they don't have all the answers and a willingness to slow down in order to build alignment. When leaders shift from being the “hero” to developing others, they unlock far greater long-term impact. The seven “key signatures” of remarkable teams. // Tim introduces a framework of seven core areas that every healthy team must develop: conviction, message, culture, roles, systems, friction, and risk. These “key signatures” work together like elements in music, providing structure that leads to a strong, unified outcome. Conviction anchors the mission (“why we exist”), while message communicates that mission clearly. Culture shapes how people experience the team, and roles define how individuals contribute. Systems enable growth, friction drives improvement, and risk fuels breakthrough. Why friction is actually healthy. // One of the most counterintuitive ideas Tim shares is that healthy teams need friction. Many leaders try to eliminate tension, assuming harmony equals health. But in reality, the absence of friction often means important issues are being avoided. Healthy friction leads to better ideas, stronger alignment, and greater innovation. The key is ensuring it doesn't become personal. When friction turns relationally destructive, it's unhealthy. But when it stays focused on ideas and outcomes, it becomes a powerful driver of growth. A practical tool for leaders. // To help teams take action, Tim points leaders to a free “team awareness assessment.” This tool helps churches evaluate how they're doing across the seven key signatures, identifying areas of strength and opportunities for growth. It's designed to spark meaningful conversations that lead to real change. A final challenge for leaders. // Tim leaves leaders with a simple but powerful reminder: if your mission matters, your team matters more. Churches often focus heavily on the people they're trying to reach, but neglect the health of the people they're leading alongside. Sustainable, mission-moving ministry requires both. To learn more about Tim's book Reaching for Remarkable: The 7 Key Signatures Behind Every Remarkable Team and take the free team assessment, visit reachingforremarkable.com or explore additional resources at slingshotgroup.org. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I'm grateful for that. If you enjoyed today's show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they're extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: TouchPoint As your church reaches more people, one of the biggest challenges is making sure no one slips through the cracks along the way.TouchPoint Church Management Software is an all-in-one ecosystem built for churches that want to elevate discipleship by providing clear data, strong engagement tools, and dependable workflows that scale as you grow. TouchPoint is trusted by some of the fastest-growing and largest churches in the country because it helps teams stay aligned, understand who they're reaching, and make confident ministry decisions week after week. If you've been wondering whether your current system can carry your next season of growth, it may be time to explore what TouchPoint can do for you. You can evaluate TouchPoint during a free, no-pressure one-hour demo at TouchPointSoftware.com/demo. Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. Listen, listen, listen, pull in close because today’s conversation, I don’t even know your church, but I know that a large portion of your budget is being spent on the thing we talk about. In fact, lots of churches, it’s like half of their budget. And it’s an even larger portion of the outcome of your ministry. It’s incredibly important what we’re talking about today. And so you do not want to miss this. Rich Birch — And we’ve got an expert that has worked with not tens of, not hundreds of, but literally thousands of of churches like yours and wants to help you take steps forward. Excited to have Tim Foot with us. He has nearly 30 years of experience, which I’m not sure how that’s possible, such a young man, as a leader, pastor, coach, speaker, musician in both Australia and North America, bringing a diverse background to his role as the CEO and president of Slingshot Group. If you’re not aware of who Slingshot Group is, they take the guesswork out of nonprofit and church staffing. He’s recently written a book that I’m excited for you to learn more about. But Tim, welcome to the show. So glad you’re here.Tim Foot — Rich, it is so glad, it’s so great to be on with you today. I’m excited about this conversation.Rich Birch — So good. I'm I’m excited for it too. Why don’t you kind of give us a bit of the Tim Foot background? Tell us a little bit about about you and kind of give us the how do we end up here in this conversation today?Tim Foot — Yeah, it’s interesting. I often say to people, I had no idea that I’d be on the other side of the world to where I started doing what I’m doing. But this is what happens, Rich, when you say, keep saying yes to God.Tim Foot — Born and raised Tasmanian, worked as a musician and in ministry in Sydney for 10 years after moving from Tasmania, then relocated to Boulder County, Colorado in 2002, been here for 25 years now in ministry at a great church called Lifebridge Christian Church. Built ministry there for 10 years and went bivocationally started working with the Slingshot Group when there was a handful of us doing a handful of staffing and coaching work and then things exploded.Tim Foot — And I really, really hit my sweet spot and saw how God had been preparing me for so many years to work with teams, love teams, love the strategy of teams, love working with people, love the fact that placing the right leader on the right team exponentially moves the mission forward and affects culture in all kinds of ways.Rich Birch — So true.Tim Foot — And so I’ve had all kinds of roles in Slingshot over the years, now get to lead our team of amazing consultants around the US serving so many, and beyond, serving so many ministries and teams move mission forward.Rich Birch — Love it. I’m so glad that, yeah, this is going to a good conversation. You know, one of the things I want to take advantage of is the fact you’re really an expert. You know, you’ve worked with, you and Slingshot have worked with thousands of churches and organizations, and you you really get a chance to see churches at an interesting inflection point.Rich Birch — You know, often when we’re hiring a team member, bringing someone in or trying to develop our teams, you know, we’re thinking about the future and we’re, we’re taking a step back. And like you say, I do think it’s a transformative inflection point that you’re involved in. Rich Birch — So you’re sitting across the table from a lot leaders, and maybe even some leaders who their mission is stalling. Like things aren’t maybe going as well as we would hope. Are yeah there any patterns in that you’re seeing, are there things that you see time and time again in churches that might be holding us back?Tim Foot — Yeah, I immediately thought of a common question we’ll ask teams when we’re brought in when it comes to needing a new person on the team or helping coach leaders. We’re often brought in in crisis moments, moments of transition, but they’re also moments of incredible opportunity.Tim Foot — And we’ll often ask the question, hey, do you want a painkiller or do you want a vitamin? And so often the the team is thinking they want the painkiller, they want the pain to go away. They want to solve the problem, they want to fill the seat, or they want to break through whatever it is they’re struggling with. But honestly, deep down, they need to start a regimen of vitamins to help them get to a healthy place to move the mission forward.Tim Foot — We often will see an unawareness that the wrong people are around the table. Or an unawareness that they need other leaders around the table to help them move forward, whether it be vocational paid leaders or volunteers.Tim Foot — We’ll often see misalignment and a lack of focus on the right things. Communication misfires around why the mission actually matters. We’ll often teams see teams that are task-driven at the expense of relationships.Tim Foot — And then an unawareness of strengths and weaknesses and how they complement each other, how they help move you forward or how they hold you back. Other patterns are a lack of structure to support the work. Elephants in the room, taboo topics, fear around failure that leads to lack of innovation. So many different patterns we’ll see and be able to diagnose and say, hey, we need to have conversation around that because I think uncorking that will help you accelerate the mission.Rich Birch — That’s cool. One of the things I love by reputation that I love about Slingshot is I love that you’re asking those bigger questions that it’s not just like, okay, how do we get to let’s just, let’s get the next hire done and move on.Rich Birch — It’s like, you know, you’re, you’re trying to ask those bigger questions and which I, that which I think, you know compliment to you and your organization that you’re trying to. Because we know when we need the painkillers, but really we need to take some good vitamins over an extended period of time to make our things more healthy for sure. Hmm.Tim Foot — You know, Rich, when we jumped into staffing work almost 20 years ago now, we had to educate the church on the need to have outside advice around staffing. But it was a lot of art and not as much science.Tim Foot — And now we’ve developed so much science around the art with with things like our candidate match tool. When you’re looking for a leader, you have to align around what you actually want in that new leader. So many teams will say, hey, we need this, this, this, this, this, this. And in the end, they’re looking for a purple unicorn. And that’s not going to help.Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — And we’ll talk about that as we get deeper in the conversation.Rich Birch — Right. Yes.Tim Foot — But Rich, last time I looked, unicorns are still mythical creatures. Rich Birch — True. Tim Foot — And so working working out what you actually need… Rich Birch — Right. Tim Foot — …and getting an awareness around alignment with who’s around the table may actually change your idea of what you’re looking for. Alignment is so important in getting an awareness of what our strengths and weaknesses are. Are we focused on the right thing? And are we actually moving the mission forward right now or is it stalled out?Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, that’s good. One of your consultants, that remember once I was in a conversation about that very issue and and you know we had really lofty goals for what we were trying to hire. And and they they walked us through that conversation where it was like, okay, well, let’s let’s think about how many of these people are actually out there.Rich Birch — So and you list off hat half a dozen things that we were looking for and you cut back and you think, well, how many people actually work in the church? How many people have worked as long as we want to work and have had experience that we did and have done the stuff that we want to do?Rich Birch — And you literally get down to like, Well, there might be three people, you know, like, you know, and so anyways, that’s, that’s, that’s so true.Tim Foot — And actually… Rich Birch — You… Yeah, go ahead.Tim Foot — …that’s what we’ll often say. There are maybe three to five people when you have all of these filters in place, they can actually fill this role.Rich Birch — That’s true.Tim Foot — And that’s why you need to focus on ministry and you need to let us focus on finding those people.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. Yeah, that’s good. That’s great. And yeah, and if there’s three to five and one of them is Jesus, the other is the Holy Spirit. So it’s like, you know, you’re down to just a very few. You… Tim Foot — And Rich, let’s not talk about why many, many teams wouldn’t hire Jesus these days.Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah. That’s a whole other topic. that’s That’s great. Now, you’ve said something once that caught my attention, and it’s in my head has been branded to you. And it’s that most of us were trained on a model, a leadership model that nobody named out loud, that everyone, that we’ve all absorbed.Rich Birch — What is that model? You know, what it look like? And I know when you named this, I started seeing this everywhere I looked. I was like, oh, wow, I can see this in multiple different places in myself and in our organization. What what is this model?Tim Foot — Yeah, I mean, the the model we see is hero-driven leadership. It’s when we rely too much on individuals to actually carry the mission. And I think the cracks have happened.Tim Foot — I mean, we’ve seen it, Rich, you and I are similar ages. I think the cracks are happening generationally. The builders and boomers were wired differently for a different time and culture. And us Gen Xers, we can code switch. I mean, we we see we see that happening all the time. And as we stepped into leadership, the cracks started to appear.Tim Foot — I mean, we see it every week. Another leader burning out, doing stupid things because of too much pressure. Then millennials and Gen Z are now leading in a new way that we need to embrace.Tim Foot — And so I think we’re seeing those cracks around that hero dependence, and we’re starting to see the need more than ever to have a team awareness, a holistic approach, or we’re just going to have leaders continue to burn out.Tim Foot — And we sit we see it around unrealistic hiring expectations, a lack of support for great leaders when they’re hired, a lack of development.Tim Foot — Hero dependence is a terrible staffing and growth strategy and becomes a massive trap when it comes to a number of the key focus areas or patterns we’ve seen that healthy teams focus on and move mission forward.Rich Birch — Yeah. See, this is the thing when you, I heard you say that once and it, it literally, I sat up and I was like, oh man, I’ve seen that in my own, you know, my own hiring. I’ve seen that in the way I’ve talked with, you know, I see the leaders around me. You see these people who they’ve kind of built the entire ministry around themselves and they’ve built, it’s like, it doesn’t work if they don’t, it’s like, they’re such a unique individual. They have to lift it all. Rich Birch — But what makes that model so sticky? Like, why do we keep coming back to that? Why? Even if we know like intellectually in our heads, yeah, that’s not a good idea. It feels like we just keep coming back to this same thing time. In fact, we actually reward it. We’ll be like, wow, isn’t that great? This person’s amazing. And we just kind of keep moving on. Why is that?Tim Foot — It’s the shiny object trap. I mean, that that the the shiny object, aka the the talented leader that we think is going to catapult the ministry. Often we see it in in hiring conversations when a particular organization wants to go after somebody that’s been in at a much bigger organization than them. And often that person, if if they can attract them, will come in with a playbook that isn’t uniquely suited to the organization they’re stepping into. Or there aren’t systems to support that new leader and the growth that’s going to happen. And burnout happens at every level. But but we both know, Rich, busy work makes us feel productive. But is it the right work?Rich Birch — That’s so true.Tim Foot — And and we know that we can be ourselves the shiny object. We we want to it feels good to be the hero. It feels good to be the one that’s solving problems. Rich Birch — Sure.Tim Foot — It feels good to be the one that has all the answers. Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — And I think that’s one of the biggest threats in healthy leadership today is feeling like you have to have all the answers. Because I think one of the most powerful statements from healthy leaders and healthy teams is, hey, we don’t know what to do next. Because it actually opens up the room for new thought. It opens up the room for collaboration. And it opens up the room for teamwork. Tim Foot — But it’s easier to move quick. It’s easier to move quick and be surrounded by people who agree and play it safe.Rich Birch — So true.Tim Foot — And then down the road, we realized that we weren’t growing in every sense of that word. And the mission was stalled out. We know we often have to slow down, re-strategize, look at who’s around the table, work out how we work together to move faster in the long term. We have to be vulnerable to make a team work. And sometimes it requires us to actually help others win than focus on heroes. Tim Foot — I mean, you think about a winning sports team. It’s not about just one person out there doing all the work. We’ve got to work together as a team. You know, it’s it’s it’s how do we work together and have had have less dependence on that shiny object, those standout leaders or those heroes?Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. I love that. I remember years ago, we had a coach come in and as a lead team, and this basically spent a week with us and then, you know, try to help us get better in our leading of our people. And I remember at the end of the week, the leader who we brought in said you answer way too many questions. And I was like what do you mean by that? They’re like, you need to ask more questions and you answer. You’re you’re putting yourself way too much in the middle of all of this and you’re not letting…And I was like, oh that’s a good insight. You know, we’re not raising up other people we’re trying to uh you know make it all about us rather than about our teams. Well, I’d love to talk about your book.Rich Birch — So the title is Reaching for Remarkable: The Seven key signatures behind every Remarkable Team. Let’s start with the word Remarkable. You literally have it twice in your title and subtitle. Why Remarkable? And how does that relate to hero? Because I was like, isn’t that the same thing? Like, isn’t it couldn’t this be reaching for the heroic? So unpack that.Tim Foot — I love that word remarkable. And it’s always been our mission at Slingshot. We build remarkable teams through staffing and coaching because your mission needs a remarkable team to move it forward. Tim Foot — Jesus left us with the most remarkable mission. And but it wasn’t enough. He needed a team to move it forward. And if Jesus needed a team to move it forward, we need to move it forward as a team.Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — And so we’ve all got these unique expressions of that remarkable mission. But if that mission matters, your team matters more. Rich Birch — That’s good.Tim Foot — And so when it comes to Remarkable, it’s about the mission. It all comes back to the mission. And we never fully arrive, Rich. We’re always reaching.Rich Birch — That’s good.Tim Foot — We’ve always got to be focusing on the right things, doing the deep work of of of reimagining, reinventing, and re-moving forward to reach for remarkable momentum when it comes to our mission. But we’ve got to focus on the team and the right the right areas to move that mission forward.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good. So you actually talk about these, there’s these seven key signatures. Can you take a little bit of time and just unpack those? We won’t be able to get into all of them, but kind of talk us through how does it hang together as kind of a big idea?Tim Foot — Well, give you a little bit of context behind why they’re key signatures. You mentioned it in the intro, in a former life, I was a working musician and I would do solo gigs. It was my tentmaking job to do ministry back in Australia. Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — I would work three to five nights a week as a musician. And I always had way more fun working with other musicians in a team setting, because ah a band is essentially a team. And my best experiences, Rich, was when I was on stage with other musicians who were often better than me, but I was leading the band. We all lifted each other. And to achieve remarkable results, there was structure to it.Tim Foot — I mean, you know, there’s structure to music. There’s harmony and there’s rhythm and there’s key signatures. There’s tracks to run on that allow us to have a remarkable output. Rich Birch — That’s good.Tim Foot — And so as I move from that world into team strategy world, team specialist world, building teams world, I realized, hey, there are also tracks to run on as a team to reach for health and reach for remarkable, a remarkable output and remarkable momentum. And so that’s where we came up with these seven key focus areas that we call the seven key signatures behind every remarkable team.Tim Foot — And they’re a pathway, they work together. And I’ll run through them quickly. And then we can unpack what you what you want to unpack with the time that we have left, Rich.Tim Foot — But though, and they’re simple. I mean, these are patterns that I’ve observed over the last 16 years staffing teams, but the last 30 years growing in teams, learning from teams, leading teams. I mean, you and I both grew up in in church, Rich, and I learned a lot of of leadership lessons from being a volunteer on teams in in in my late teens and and early 20s, so much.Rich Birch — Yes, 100%.Tim Foot — But these patterns, this pattern or these key signatures start with number one, conviction. Conviction, which is a shared sense of why you exist and what you’re called to do. It’s the why behind the what. It’s the Simon Sinek. People buy why you do, not what you do. So that’s number one is conviction. Tim Foot — Number two is a message, a compelling and consistent way of communicating what matters most because, Rich, everything communicates. What’s the story our leadership is communicating? What we say, what we don’t say, our actions, our systems and processes. What story is it communicating? That’s number two. Tim Foot — Number three is culture, the values and behaviors that shape the soul of our team. How are people experiencing your ministry organization or your team?Tim Foot — Number four is roles, unique contributions for remarkable impact. Roles that clarify how we work together. Tim Foot — Number five is systems, which is scalable design for remarkable growth. Systems scale our mission. Tim Foot — Number six is friction because healthy friction moves the mission forward. How do we embrace healthy friction for growth? Tim Foot — And then the last one, number seven, and these all build on each other, is risk, which is bold moves that drive remarkable outcomes, initiatives that lead to breakthrough, strategic risk, not blind gamble. So those are the seven.Rich Birch — Love it. And you know friends, i I do think I would highly recommend that you pick up copies of this book. To me, when I when I saw this, to me, this feels like the kind of book that we should read together as a leadership team. Like, hey, let’s pull this together. You know maybe you’re looking for a fall thing to do with your leadership team. This would be a great book for you to pick up and go together. Rich Birch — There’s a couple I would love to tease out a little bit. I’d love you to pull out for us. Help us understand. You differentiate between conviction and message, two different things. I think lots of times we might collapse those into one. Why are they two separate? Help us understand the difference between those two.Tim Foot — Absolutely. Conviction, again, is why we do what we do. Without shared conviction, you won’t move the mission forward. There won’t be a reason behind initiatives. They’ll fall flat. Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — There won’t be a reason behind the message you’re communicating. That’s why they’re different. So conviction is what keeps us in on the days we want to quit.Tim Foot — I mean, think about the early church in Acts 4. It’s a great, best example of conviction. Peter declaring in Acts 4:20, we cannot help but speak about what we’ve seen and heard. They didn’t just believe. They acted. It drove every decision.Tim Foot — If the disciples were just compliant, when Jesus ascended, they would have scattered. But because they were convicted, they ah nearly all of them gave their very lives for the mission. Conviction is our North Star. It’s It’s like calling. it’s It’s what keeps you the days, keeps you in it, the days you want to quit. And Rich, we know there’s going to be plenty of days you to quit. Tim Foot — Message, however, is is the story we’re communicating. It’s how we hire, fire, onboard, develop. It’s how we communicate our conviction and our overall mission. And in the book, we list a bunch of traps for each of these seven key signatures. And we can chat about some of the most common traps. But a common trap for for message is assumption. Rich Birch — It’s good.Tim Foot — We assume people understand and care like we understand and care. Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — And we don’t ask enough questions. I mean, it’s why Jesus’ ministry was full of questions, Rich. Rich Birch — Right. Right.Tim Foot — Because he was he was cementing conviction. I mean, Jesus asked the best questions and rarely gave the answers. He lived the answers and he teased the answers out because that’s what led to conviction. That’s why they build upon each other. Tim Foot — You can’t have a story without conviction. You can’t have a message without conviction. And you can’t have a healthy message unless you are asking the right questions to make sure people are hearing and understanding it. Tim Foot — Did you like like did you understand what I just communicated? What did you just hear that I that I said?Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — Why why are why are you so convicted to by our mission?Rich Birch — Yeah.Tim Foot — Why are you committed to it? So many great questions.Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s good.Tim Foot — The book is full of questions too. I’m a I’m a serial question asker. They used to call me “Quiz” when I was a teenager because I asked so many questions.Rich Birch — Yeah.Tim Foot — And it wasn’t until later that a mentor and co-founder of Slingshot, Stan Endicott—I think you know him, Rich—that he he convinced me that my proclivity for asking so many questions was actually a spiritual gift and not a special need.Rich Birch — Yeah. Tim Foot — Because questions, questions move conversations forward.Rich Birch — Yeah. Yep. Yeah, it’s true. It’s so good. And yeah, as I’ve shifted into full-time coaching, I have found, yeah, like that the the skill of asking a good question, it’s like, you know, I think the best moments I have with the people I’m working with are when we’re, I’m asking questions and they’re discovering, they’re tripping on to their own answers that maybe are a little different even than I would have. But just asking good questions, super important.Rich Birch — Okay. Another one that stood out to me of the, and again, friends, you’re going read all this. Obviously we can’t cover this in just, you know, half an hour conversation. But talk to me about friction, healthy friction. Tim Foot — Yeah. Rich Birch — So I literally have said as an executive pastor, my job was to remove friction from the organization. And so when you say, oh, you lots of us are trying to remove it. I was like, ouch, that’s me.Rich Birch — Because I think that’s, ah you know, I would I want to find places where we’re stuck and say, how do we get those unstuck and push this thing forward? So talk to me about why I’m wrong about friction.Tim Foot — I was there too, Rich. I was absolutely there. But when I get to number six, when we’re speaking on this or teaching on this, I will often say, hey number six is a wait, what? Tim Foot — I thought this was the sign of an unhealthy team. I used to think that. I used to think that the harmonious teams were the healthy ones, that when I walked into a context where there was all harmony with the team, that it was there was healthy, the absence of friction was healthy. But it’s not. It’s a sign of unhealth. Tim Foot — And I’m talking, there’s two kinds of friction, healthy and unhealthy. I’m talking about healthy friction. I mean, you think about a car and how the rubber meets the road, causes friction, moves the car forward. If you don’t have friction in your team, your mission isn’t going on anywhere.Tim Foot — It’s interesting, Zippia workplace survey found out that 76% of employees in the workplace avoid conflict, which is a real problem because healthy friction sharpens and aims teams, while avoiding conflict leads to complacency and stagnation.Tim Foot — Teams where members are passionately embracing friction will not only push through and forward to great results, they’ll attract and retain, which is really important, they’re going attract and retain top leaders. It’s where the mission truly comes alive and evolves to all it can be. Good leaders, rich, know to allow it. They know not to control it, but closely monitor it.Tim Foot — We get to decide if the tension or friction we allow is healthy or unhealthy. We call this the loaded gun of the seven key signatures, because when this gun goes off, it either breaks through a door or a wall that you needed to break through, or somebody gets hurt. And good leaders know how to monitor that and help it break through and not damage other leaders.Rich Birch — Yeah, let’s double click on that. Help me understand. So yeah, I’m going with you. I can see what you’re saying. You know, healthy friction, you know, unhealthy friction, good friction, bad friction. So give me an example. Rich Birch — You walk into it, you’re working with a ah church and there’s some telltale signs of, friction that’s that’s negative, that’s actually pulling the organization back, that’s that could be potentially hurting, or maybe has gone too far, or what’s, I’m not sure the best way to say that. Versus, hey, no, here’s some here’s some good friction that’s actually some good heat here that’s pushing the tires forward. Help us, what does that look like?Tim Foot — When when it becomes personal, Rich, that’s always the way you know it’s trending towards unhealthy. We’ll get to it in a minute, but we’ve got a team assessment on our website now around these seven key signatures, and we talk about unhealthy, inconsistent, functional, remarkable.Tim Foot — Most most teams live in that functional space. If you’re below unhealthy, it’s trending toxic, and that’s when you need ah that’s when you need the 4Sight group and Jenni Catron to come I mean, do some some deep, deep culture work. Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — I’m all about our ecosystem. I know you are too, Rich. It’s like when you need the deeper work, then you need the specialist. Rich Birch — Sure, sure.Tim Foot — But right now you’ve got the general practitioner. Rich Birch — Yeah, yeah, yeah.Tim Foot — But but when it gets when it gets personal, you know that that’s unhealthy friction. Rich Birch — That’s good. Right.Tim Foot — And let’s go back to um the the harmony piece. Because that’s one of the traps when it comes to friction. it’s It’s the harmony trap. And it’s like it’s you wanting there to be you know violins and and and and birds singing and for everybody to be loving each other. That’s also a sign that there is unhealthy friction. Rich Birch — Right. Tim Foot — Because there’s things lurking that have been pushed down below the surface that are going to come out sideways that if you had just dealt with it straight away, it actually could have become momentum for your mission. It’s the unspoken influences trap. it’s the It’s the elephants in the room.Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — It’s what everybody’s thinking about, but nobody’s talking about. That’s going to that that’s gonna be insidious and it’s going to chip away at the health of your team. Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s good.Tim Foot — And it’s gonna become unhealthy friction. And so that’s a great question to ask. And that’s in the book too. What’s every thinking about, nobody’s talking about? Because that’s what we need to engage.Tim Foot — Now, if we think that’s going to lead to unhealthy friction, let’s have the the conversations outside of the meeting. So that when we get to the conversations inside of the meeting, we can engage this as healthy friction that will actually address the topic and will move us forward rather than becoming personal and eroding relationships.Rich Birch — That’s good. Yeah, that question, what’s everybody thinking about that nobody’s talking about? That’s powerful. And I can see, yeah, that even even the organizations I’ve led, you can see where there’s seasons where we try to push away that friction. nd that can be just super negative. And it’s like this, we’re all just in la-la land. We’re all just, you know, can see that for sure. Tim Foot —Yeah.Rich Birch — So you wrote this book, you put this resource together. help me understand how you’re hoping it will help our, our churches. You know, I’m picture, I’m a church of a thousand people. Maybe I’m the executive pastor. I’ve got a team of 12 to 15 people on my team. And how how could, how could this be a helpful resource for us?Tim Foot — Well, this I believe this is the most important work we need to be doing, Rich, because if your mission matters, your team matters more. So often we get so focused on the people we’re serving that we forget the people we’re serving with.Tim Foot — And if we’re stalling out mission, mission-wise, then we’re not moving forward. And that’s not and we’re not being obedient to God’s call. And so what I’m hoping is, I mean, personally, our kingdom first principle at Slingshot is to leave teams better than than the way we found them. And the last thing we want to do is place great leaders on unhealthy teams.Tim Foot — So what we’re hoping is that teams are going to focus around these seven alignment areas and start to move mission forward, attract great leaders, retain great leaders. When we place, I mean, I you and I have both had healthy long-term ministries at churches, and it is a massive blessing when you, if God wills it, and you stay somewhere long term. I want other people to experience that. And that happens when the right leaders are placed on the right team.Tim Foot — So what I’m hoping churches do is they take our team awareness assessment on on our website, reachingforremarkable.com, which is attached to slingshotgroup.org. And they get a sense of, okay, where what where might we need attention in these seven key areas? Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s good.Tim Foot — Because it heat maps, it gives you percentages, you can take it as a team. And then to start the real important conversations.Tim Foot — I mean, I’ve been in rooms with this work, Rich, where you start to see teams have conversation around alignment and and teams that were that were stale or leaders that were burnt out start to get a glimmer of hope. Rich Birch — Yeah. That’s good.Tim Foot — That, oh, if we start to have these conversations around these areas, if we walk this pathway, if we focus in these areas where we’re struggling right now, we’re going to start to see results.Tim Foot — I mean, I even think about the key signature of systems. You know, it’s systems that scale remarkable growth. If we’re not building systems to to accommodate the growth that we keep praying for, God’s not going to bring the increase. Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s true. Tim Foot — Because God isn’t going to bring growth if it’s going to hurt us. We have to be building the right kind of systems to support our teams and leaders so that the growth can come. It’s a stewardship issue. Rich Birch — Yes, yep.Tim Foot — So what I’m hoping happens in churches all over the place is that they start to focus on these key signatures and see mission momentum results that moves them forward as an organization.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s so good. Why don’t you tell us, you’ve mentioned it, but tell us a little bit more about the team awareness assessment. Give us like a bit of a, you know, you’ve kind of given us an overview there. Give us a little bit more why we should take that test and give us that URL again that we can send people to.Tim Foot — It’s reachingforremarkable.com and it’s it’s literally 10 minutes or less. Rich Birch — Right.Tim Foot — And it’s free as a leader. You can jump in and take it or you can sign up and and take it as a team. And it gives you obviously the team percentage on each of these key signatures. but also your own results. And when we’ve worked with real high-performing teams, it’s fascinating to watch these great leaders compare their individual percentage on each of these key signatures with their entire team and just to see alignment start to happen and the right conversations to happen.Tim Foot — Because we want to be able to focus in on where alignment is needed most. It may be real simple, Rich. Most teams live in that functional space. Rich Birch — Sure. Tim Foot — Functional’s fine.Rich Birch — Yeah.Tim Foot — But it’s not going to get remarkable results. Rich Birch — Yeah.Tim Foot — And our mission is too important. We have to focus on team alignment to move it forward.Rich Birch — Yeah. It’s so good. Yeah. I was talking to a a leader recently of a very large church and they were saying, you know, I just feel like, I feel like we got a go Pro. And what he was saying is exactly what you’re saying is like, Hey, we we’re we’re fine. We’re functioning.Tim Foot — Right. Right.Rich Birch — But man, we want to go remarkable. We want to go from just just because we can do this thing week in, week out in their case, have thousands of people show up, tens of thousands of people show up. But it’s like, that’s not enough. We got it. But the mission’s too important. We’re trying to reach people. How do we go remarkable? Which to me, I think picking up a copies of these books as a team would be a great first step. Rich Birch — Where do people, where can people pick this up? Where can they get your book if they’re looking for that? I’m assuming Amazon, but is there anywhere else we want to send them?Tim Foot — No, Amazon’s a place to go. Rich Birch — Yeah, that is the bookseller apparently.Tim Foot — I mean, it’s we know these days where wherever where everybody’s going, Amazon’s the way. And I would just add to Rich that as a leader, you want to know. This is information you want to have.Rich Birch — Yes.Tim Foot — We’ve talked so much about self-awareness. And if we’re in leadership, we need to show up to our team self-awareness. So many profiles. Rich Birch — Yep.Tim Foot — We don’t talk enough about team awareness. You need to know as a leader if you’re moving your mission forward or where you might be stalling out because it’s too important. And these seven things, as I said earlier, Rich, they’re not they’re not rocket science. Tim Foot — I mean, I like to I like to couch it this way: Conviction shapes the heart. Message shapes the voice. Culture shapes the atmosphere. Role shape contribution. Systems shape sustainability. Friction shapes growth. Risk shapes the future. And that’s why I hope you’ll dig into this with us. Rich Birch — Love it. Tim Foot — Because we want to see the kingdom move forward and we want to see churches full of healthy teams that not only great leaders want to come and be part of, great volunteers want to be a part of and help move this forward.Rich Birch — That’s so good. Well, I think that’s a great place to end it. I was like, man, that’s, I’m like, I want to preach. Amen, brother. That’s fantastic. If people were, so we’ll send them to Amazon. We’ll put a link in the show notes for that. If people want to track with you or with Slingshot, where do we want to send them online to connect as well?Tim Foot — Slingshotgroup.org is our company website. And there’s a bunch of great stories there. There’s places that you can engage. We would love you to be in our ecosystem. And yeah, you can jump over there to reachingforremarkable.com. And we would love to come alongside you and help you continue to move forward in the unique ways that God has called you to.Rich Birch — Well, Tim, it’s great to see you. Tim Foot — You too.Rich Birch — We were just remarking before, we had dinner together there a couple months ago. That was fun, but it was fun to put the recording on today and connect a little bit. Appreciate you, brother. Thanks so much for being here today.Tim Foot — Thanks for having me, Rich.

In Episode 351 of The Business Development Podcast, Kelly Kennedy breaks down why so many modern growth strategies are becoming nothing more than noise. From automated emails and LinkedIn DMs to AI-driven outreach tools promising quick wins, Kelly challenges the idea that more activity automatically means more progress. He explains why vanity metrics can be misleading, why downloads in podcasting are similar to meaningless outreach numbers in business development, and why the real metric that matters is creating qualified meetings with the right people.Kelly then brings listeners back to the fundamentals of real business development: authentic human connection, active marketing, and consistency over time. He explains why AI and automation cannot replace trust, relationships, and direct conversations, and shares a practical 10-step action plan to help business developers, entrepreneurs, and leaders cut through the noise, stop wasting money, and create opportunities that actually matter. This episode is a reminder that there is no easy button for growth, but with the right strategy and consistent execution, real opportunity is always possible.Key Takeaways: Activity is not the same as progress. More outreach only matters when it creates real conversations and opportunities.There is no easy button for real growth. Sustainable business development still requires trust, strategy, and effort.Being human is your greatest competitive advantage. In the age of AI, authentic connection is what helps you stand out.Vanity metrics can create false confidence. Big numbers mean very little if they do not lead to meaningful results.Meetings with the right people are the metric that matters. Qualified conversations are what move business forward.Automation cannot replace authentic human connection. Tools can support the process, but people still build trust with people.Active marketing creates real opportunity. Growth happens when you intentionally reach out instead of waiting to be found.Relationships should be built before the customer has a need. Getting ahead of the opportunity gives you a competitive advantage.Consistency over time is your secret weapon. Weekly action compounds into long-term business development success.Real business development is built through trust, strategy, and action. The fundamentals still matter, even in the age of AI.

What if the smartest restaurant you could open wasn't the biggest, busiest, or most celebrated, but the one you could control?Kim Alter didn't build Nightbird to chase stars. She built it to survive—and more importantly, to profit. In an industry obsessed with growth and recognition, she chose discipline: tight costs, small footprint, and total operational control.In this conversation, we unpack how Kim turned a 20-seat restaurant into a high-margin business, why she was willing to run unsustainably in the short term to build long-term stability, and how consulting sharpened both her standards and her boundaries.This is for operators ready to stop chasing validation and start building something that lasts.To learn more about Nightbird, visit nightbirdrestaurant.com._________________________________________________________Free 5-Day Restaurant Marketing Masterclass – This is a live training where you'll learn the exact campaigns Josh has built and tested in real restaurants to attract new guests, increase visit frequency, and generate sales on demand. Save your spot at restaurantbusinessschool.com

AI is changing how people discover, evaluate, trust, buy, create, hire, and compete. The bigger question is whether your business model is built to survive a future where attention is fragmented, trust is harder to earn, execution is easier to automate, and buyers have more options than ever. Learn how to activate the M.A.S.S. Effect Business Model, a strategic ecosystem built around: • Media to create attention, trust, authority, and discoverability • Assets to create scalability, leverage, and income beyond your direct time • Strategy to create clarity, alignment, interpretation, and better decisions • Systems to reduce friction, support consistency, and keep the business moving Many businesses are addicted to acquisition because they never built retention. In an AI accelerated world, that becomes dangerous because information is easier to access, skills are being compressed, and execution is becoming automated. The real value now shifts toward trust, experience, clarity, influence, systems, and community. The future belongs to adaptive businesses that can evolve with the market, keep customers connected, turn trust into retention, and scale without breaking the founder, team, or customer experience. If your business grew tomorrow, could it actually hold the growth, or would the model collapse under the weight of what you asked for? Beyond The Episode Gems: Buy Troy's Book, Strategize Up: The Blueprint To Scale Your Business StrategizeUpBook.com Discover All Podcasts On The HubSpot Podcast Network Get Free HubSpot Marketing Tools To Help You Grow Your Business Grow Your Business Faster Using HubSpot's CRM Platform Support The Podcast & Connect With Troy:  Rate & Review iDigress: iDigress.fm/Reviews Follow Troy's Socials @FindTroy: LinkedIn, Instagram, Threads, TikTok Subscribe to Troy's YouTube Channel For Strategy Videos & See Masterclass Episodes Need Growth Strategy, A Keynote Speaker, Or Want To Sponsor The Podcast? Go To FindTroy.com

Marketing leaders are being asked to drive more growth with less budget, fewer resources, tighter timelines, and more pressure from every direction while AI is being treated like the shortcut to replace entire marketing teams. But AI will not fix bad strategy, weak alignment, poor customer understanding, or broken marketing fundamentals. In part two of this master class conversation with Matt Hummel, CMO of Pipeline360, the focus moves into what it really takes to become the kind of CMO AI cannot replace. Not by chasing every new tool, adding more MarTech, or hiding behind automation, but by understanding the business as a whole, building trust across departments, speaking the language of revenue, and creating alignment between marketing, sales, product, leadership, and the customer. To lead marketing in a volatile market where expectations keep rising and the old playbook is no longer enough, you need to know how to: • Make sales an ally instead of your bitter rival • Build shared pipeline ownership across marketing and sales  • Communicate risk without becoming defensive • Connect marketing decisions to the larger goals of the business • Set clearer expectations with your team and leadership • Understand resource constraints without using them as excuses • Stay close to customers while leading strategy • Create momentum without pretending there is an easy button The best marketing leaders are not just managing campaigns, tools, reports, and dashboards. They are translating complexity into strategy the business can trust. The reminder is clear: AI will not fix bad strategy. More MarTech will not fix bad marketing. The CMO AI cannot replace is the one who understands the business, earns trust, aligns with sales, leads the team, knows the customer, and gets back to real marketing when everyone else is hiding behind tools. (P.S. If you haven't, listen to Ep. 149 for part one of this masterclass episode) Beyond The Episode Gems: Connect With Matt Hummel on LinkedIn Listen To Troy On Matt's Podcast, Pipeline Brew: The Evolving Role of CMOs & Community Building Visit Pipeline360 website to learn more about how they solve B2B marketers' biggest headaches Buy Troy's Book, Strategize Up: The Blueprint To Scale Your Business StrategizeUpBook.com Discover All Podcasts On The HubSpot Podcast Network Get Free HubSpot Marketing Tools To Help You Grow Your Business Grow Your Business Faster Using HubSpot's CRM Platform Support The Podcast & Connect With Troy:  Rate & Review iDigress: iDigress.fm/Reviews Follow Troy's Socials @FindTroy: LinkedIn, Instagram, Threads, TikTok Subscribe to Troy's YouTube Channel For Strategy Videos & See Masterclass Episodes Need Growth Strategy, A Keynote Speaker, Or Want To Sponsor The Podcast? Go To FindTroy.com  

Marketing leadership has become one of the most volatile seats in business. CMOs and marketing leaders are often expected to create immediate pipeline, prove instant ROI, fix deeper business issues they did not create, defend brand investment, align sales, understand customers, translate strategy across the organization, and still become one of the first functions questioned, blamed, or cut when growth slows. In part one of this master class conversation, Matt Hummel, CMO of Pipeline360, brings a clear reminder back to the table: great marketing starts with trusting the buyer, knowing the customer, and simplifying how you market. In a market obsessed with performance data, attribution, automation, dark social, buyer signals, and immediate results, more complexity does not automatically create better customer understanding. For aspiring CMOs, current CMOs, marketing leaders, founders, and business owners, this conversation is a valuable look at how to lead marketing without getting trapped in the pressure cooker. It challenges you to rethink what it really means to put the customer at the center, not as a tagline, not as another automation workflow, and not as another dashboard filled with signals, but as a deeper responsibility to understand the person, pressure, timing, risk, and decision behind the purchase. The conversation moves through buyer trust, brand versus demand, customer empathy, attribution, sales alignment, CMO pressure, market timing, and the difference between chasing pipeline and building LTV. It is also a reminder to get out of your lane, understand product, spend time with sales, listen to customers, and learn how the whole business works. Because the best CMOs are not just campaign operators. They are translators, mediators, trust builders, and business leaders who know how to connect marketing to revenue, customer experience, and long term growth. Beyond The Episode Gems: Connect With Matt Hummel on LinkedIn Listen To Troy On Matt's Podcast, Pipeline Brew: The Evolving Role of CMOs & Community Building Visit Pipeline360 website to learn more about how they solve B2B marketers' biggest headaches Buy Troy's Book, Strategize Up: The Blueprint To Scale Your Business StrategizeUpBook.com Discover All Podcasts On The HubSpot Podcast Network Get Free HubSpot Marketing Tools To Help You Grow Your Business Grow Your Business Faster Using HubSpot's CRM Platform Support The Podcast & Connect With Troy:  Rate & Review iDigress: iDigress.fm/Reviews Follow Troy's Socials @FindTroy: LinkedIn, Instagram, Threads, TikTok Subscribe to Troy's YouTube Channel For Strategy Videos & See Masterclass Episodes Need Growth Strategy, A Keynote Speaker, Or Want To Sponsor The Podcast? Go To FindTroy.com