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Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays from the Dental A-Team! Kiera encourages listeners to acknowledge and celebrate the people in their lives in real time. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript:   The Dental A Team (00:01) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and Merry Christmas. I hope that you guys are so happy and I don't know, I feel so honored that you're sharing Christmas Day with me. I hope that you unwrapped your packages. I hope that you were able to give amazing gifts. I hope that you were not naughty this year and you were nice. I hope that like, my gosh, like I just wish that I was with you like walking down the stairs to your Christmas morning. I hope that you were with your friends, your family. And if you don't celebrate Christmas, I hope that you woke up today just feeling the special magic.   of this time of year of anticipating our next year. And I just hope that you're surrounded by friends and family and that you just feel love. I hope you feel love for yourself and just Merry Christmas. I am so, I love this time of year. I love this holiday and I did not used to love this holiday. It was my favorite growing up. And then there was a short stint of time where I hated it. Like no Christmas music, no things. I don't even know how that was possible because I was Mrs. Claus.   I worked for United Way of Utah County and I was Mrs. Claus for the year and we did Sub for Santa. And that was a year I realized that there is truly magic in our communities and in us serving each other. And gosh, I just like, I remember growing up like, yes, I loved presents and I love those things, but a lot of times it was just like my family being together and little things. And like in my family, had, when I was really, really little, we had these like dollars. don't know, they were called like.   I to say scholar dollars, but that wasn't right. They were these like little dollars that my mom gave us. And it was like little things that we did that were kind gestures to our siblings, like helping each other out. My family was lawn mowing business. And so we'd help each other with that. And growing up and getting older, I think, well, yes, it's so fun to have gifts for my siblings. The real gift that I look forward to, and I'm sure a lot of you can relate to this is   being with these people, being able to be present with them, being able to share special moments, to be able to share magic with them, that's what makes holidays magical. ⁓ And when I think about like this time of year, giving's not just about gifts, it's about like our presence. So not present, but presence, our impact, and how we're able to like show up for our families and for our teams and our practices. And so when I look at this, I just really think about like,   in the spirit of Christmas, the spirit of giving, in the spirit of that, like leadership and team culture are so important of gifts that you can give your team. And this is what can help you guys thrive. So of course, it's the holidays. I'll make this short and sweet for you ⁓ because I really want you to think about like when we're looking at our families and we're looking at today, being present with our family.   is one of the greatest gifts that we can give them. think of how many times are we scrolling on social media? How many times are we not present? I even think about me and Jason, like we're hanging out together and we are both knee deep in our phones. And I look up and like 45 minutes have passed by and I've been sitting by the person that I absolutely love. And the world is so obnoxiously annoying on asking for our time, asking for our attention. And I think that that's why we get so excited about holidays is we actually have this like   Dedicated shutoff time where we can be with our families and holidays sometimes actually bring out the worst in us I know two Christmases ago It was absolutely one of the worst days and I felt so annoyed because I had to slow down and I couldn't go anywhere and I couldn't call anybody because people with their families and I felt stuck and I felt trapped and I was like this is not a good thing Kiera you clearly are operating at such a high velocity all the time that you slowing down was actually one of your worst days and so I think when I look at like being present in life   I think being present for my team. How many times is my team talking to me and I'm slacking or I'm sending an email off or I'm not fully listening or I'm responding to a text message. I think the world today is craving people being present, of being intentional, of listening, of caring. And I think that that's like when my family gets together, yes, a gift is nice, but the gift of their time and attention is becoming more and more valuable because I think it's so hard to capture that from people. And also I think being present for yourself.   showing up for yourself every single day, having meditation time, having journal time. Like the world can be so loud. Things can be like, we have dinging things, reminders constantly that it's like being present, listening, showing up, engaged, engage with your team. I think about Britt, there's certain times that her and I would just like shoot the breeze and we're just hanging out with each other. And I'm like, those are more meaningful than our meetings. And we're just like trying to rattle things off and get things done.   And so I just think like, if we're giving a gift of presence, not present, how can you as a leader do that? And I think one of the biggest things that doctors can do is to actually be fully attentive in team meetings. ⁓ And for team members to be fully attentive in team meetings, I can't tell you how many times I watched teams and the doctors on their phone, they're not engaged. And I just think like, if you're asking your team to be here and you're asking them to solve problems, but we're not willing to be present,   Gosh, like that's just such a hard ask. And I think as leaders, that is your job to silence them, to be present, to be with the people in front of you and not to be distracted elsewhere. And I say team members to do the same. We've got to also have our minds be there. I could be completely checked out of my phone and Slack, but my mind could be elsewhere. And so how can I be fully attentive in my team meetings when I'm having conversations with people? And I will say like, doctors, this is like, Merry Christmas. Be present for your team.   ⁓ I watch often and I see doctors just scrolling on social media, even when I'm there having conversations with them. And I just think if you're willing to do that with me, that you're paying me to be here. ⁓ and that feels icky to me. How do think your team feels when they're coming to you as a leader, as someone that they're looking for, for support. And I just think for your family, the gift of like, even if it's like five seconds, even if you put the phone down, ⁓ even if you just like really commit to be there.   be there. ⁓ Another thing is like to pause during the day like a short connection. ⁓ It doesn't take a lot to be connected to people. It doesn't take a lot for you to just say hello to ask them like genuinely with no agenda, no time construction, not having your phone, not having your watch go off. Like even people is like, my watch like, hmm. Yep. huh. I'm listening. I'm like, you're not listening to me. I literally have my watch to where it will not have text messages come through at all. I use it specifically for a watch. If I need to later, I can have things pop in but   I shut off the notifications because it drives me nuts when I'm in a conversation and I'm having a conversation and they pull up their watch, they pull up their phone like, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. No, it's not uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. You're not listening to me. You're not present with me. So I think like today, practice being present with those around you. You might be Kiera who had like one of her worst Christmases a few years ago and it was awful, but I realized this is, I'm out of touch. I'm out of practice. I don't do this often.   And if we can train that muscle, gosh, what a gift it's for yourself, a gift for your team, a gift for your family to truly be present. ⁓ I also think another way for you to do it is to celebrate people in real time. So the reason why this is a gift of presence is because you have to be intentional. You have to be paying attention to them to celebrate them in real time. like look for it, look for when your assistant does like perfect handoffs to you, like.   They're handing the instruments and they're just crushing it. Celebrate that with them. Celebrate when someone closes the case for you. Celebrate when we fill this schedule hole. Celebrate when we like got that claim collected. Celebrate when like doctors, got that perfect endo, like you got all the way to the bottom of that root tip. Celebrate when you did a perfect crown prep. Celebrate and be present in that moment. Celebrate when patients tell you great things. Celebrate when we get an SRP diagnosis and we went from a bloody profie to an SRP and we told them what they really needed. Celebrate when our team   is like giving a great patient experience, celebrate when our team does a tour of the office and highlights how great of a place it is, celebrate when people edify each other, celebrate those little pieces in your life. This is such a fun, easy way, because I really do believe that we're just becoming a society that's not present. We're giving presence, but we're not present. ⁓ We're so distracted trying to be connected that   we're missing the people right in front of us. And I think about that. We have no social media Sundays in our house. And Jason and I are shocked at how many times we like go to the app on that day. And it's just a habit. It's like these habits that have been formed. And so I think like, can you be attentive in team meetings? Can you be just connected at little points, like busy times throughout the day and just pause and connect? Can you connect with your spouse or your kids? Text them, send out little magic moments to them every day. Like,   Tell them how much you love them. I will tell you like, shout out to Jace, he's such an incredible man. He's like my greatest gift in this world. Every day he texts me three reasons he loves me. And ⁓ sometimes I don't read those with intentionality. I just think, Kiera, he sat there and thought about you. The least you can do is just be like so present and say thank you. ⁓ To give that gift to me every single day is beyond magical. To send a little love bomb, you could even do it in the morning. It can be part of your morning routine of like,   I meditate and then I send out magic to somebody and just tell them how much you love them to be present, to be connected to somebody truly connected, to pick up the phone. My brother calls me and I think about how often am I distracted while I'm on the phone with my siblings rather than being present and intentional with them. Jason tells me he'll take five minutes of me being intentional rather than 30 minutes of me being distracted. And I just think like, a gift we can give each other to not just give presents this year.   but give our presence. And on our team meeting, say that like passion, present, results, solutions are four things we say in our company. We want to show up with passion. We want to be present. And that means we show up with the people in front of us, email, Slack, text, phones are closed. And I'm not here to say that we have to be perfect at it, but I am here to say that today of all days, I hope you take time to go be present with your family, present with the people in front of you, and to maybe give a little bit more of that gift of presence to your team this year.   Be attentive in team meetings, be connected during busy times, celebrate the small wins with your team. And I will tell you that, and this means like being at morning huddle, being connected and doctors who do this have higher morale, have stronger retention of teams because they feel cared about. They feel seen, they feel heard, they feel like they're a human. So I'm telling you that's five minutes of your time that you are giving up to get this huge outcome. You're gonna have stronger relationships. You're gonna have better relationships with your kids, better relationships with your spouse, parents, siblings.   aunts, uncles, neighbors, and I think it's a gift to give. And I think it's something for all of us to do. So I would just say like today, give someone your full attention, no phone, no distractions for five minutes. See if you can do it. And then maybe work up to 10 minutes and just try it and just see. And also for yourself, sit there in silence for five minutes. See if you can do it. Sit there for 10 minutes. See if you can start to train yourself that your, your preferred operating system, unlike mine a few years ago,   is to be present rather than to be distracted feeling like I am present. And I would just say that's I think a gift for all of you. And so today is Christmas. I hope that you're celebrating with family. I hope that you love yourself. I hope that you give yourself the gift of presence to be present for yourself, to shut off, to disconnect, connect to yourself, to connect to ⁓ the universe, to God, to your higher self, to the space around you, whatever you believe today that you really truly do.   Give that great gift to yourself and to those that you love, including your team. You guys, we are so blessed to be alive today. We're so blessed to have experiences. I'm so blessed to have all of you in my life, my Dental A Team family. Gosh, I just like want to celebrate you. I want to be there with you. I want to drink, you know, non-alcoholic eggnog with you. I want to be like, cheersing you on the great things you're doing. I want to be present with you. I want to listen to your struggles. I want to listen to your wins.   I want you to be a part of our community. I want to see you the first Tuesday of every single month. I want to meet you in person. I want to be that cheering cheerleader for you. I want you to see what it feels like to have somebody see you, to know you, to recognize you, to love you, to encourage you, to give you a good like push when you need a push to hold you accountable. That's our gift to you. So if that feels good to you, reach out. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. I am not working today, but I will be working tomorrow and our team will be there for you.   So reach out. know this is a time where you guys settle down. You are more present. You're not busy with patients. You have time to connect to yourself, to connect to your family. And I think, hey, maybe giving yourself the gift of time to get a team that's trained a little bit better, to get a patient experience that's a little bit better, to help you be a CEO instead of an operator all day long, every single day. It might be the time. You might be able to settle into that and to be present, to give yourself even more time back. be a gift to give yourself. So if that feels right to you, reach out. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com.   I'd love to chat more with you about it. And I hope you just go celebrate with your family. No, I'm like sitting there with you, drinking the eggnog, sitting there, chestnuts roasting on an open fire, hanging out with you at the beach, wherever you are. Just know that I'm giving you a giant hug. You're doing better than you think you are. I adore you. I love you. I'm here with you. You don't have to do this alone. And I'm happy to be the person to guide you. I'm also happy to be your friend on the podcast that walks with you every single day. But just know you're not alone. You're doing better than you think you are.   and I'm willing to give you the presence that you deserve. And I hope that you give that to those that you love as well. And as always, thanks for listening. Go have a magical, merry day, and I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team Podcast.  

Hausmeisterei Video zur Episode Text-/Audio-/Videokommentar einreichen HS-Hörer:innen im Slack treffen Aus der Preshow Giraffen, Pferde mit Mützen HS Workshops Neue Workshops geöffnet: Fotoprojekte & Großformat HS Workshop-Newsletter Testimonials von Workshopteilnehmern gesucht Alte Newsletter funktionieren nicht mehr, bitte neu anmelden Neue Newsletter Statt Werbung DANKE an alle Spender #hshi / #hsnachtrag Von Anonym: Habt Ihr Tipps … „#923 – Lufttüddelchen“ weiterlesen

Hausmeisterei Video zur Episode Text-/Audio-/Videokommentar einreichen HS-Hörer:innen im Slack treffen Aus der Preshow Giraffen, Pferde mit Mützen HS Workshops Neue Workshops geöffnet: Fotoprojekte & Großformat HS Workshop-Newsletter Testimonials von Workshopteilnehmern gesucht Alte Newsletter funktionieren nicht mehr, bitte neu anmelden Neue Newsletter Statt Werbung DANKE an alle Spender #hshi / #hsnachtrag Von Anonym: Habt Ihr Tipps … „#923 – Lufttüddelchen“ weiterlesen

Before you set goals for 2026, there's one POWERFUL thing you can do to make sure you don't repeat the same patterns.  Think about the previous year – the wins, the losses, the career moves, the travel, the adventure – and what it all means. What did you learn in 2025? And what are you bringing into 2026? In this episode, I reveal my annual reflection process, including the life audit questions I ask each December and the methods I use to stay focused while charting my vision for the year ahead. We're talking about vision boards, joining communities, and setting a "word of the year." My word for 2026? Certainty. For me, 2025 was a year of being out in the world, traveling, getting paid to speak, and hosting four events. In 2026, I'm excited to turn inward and hone in on creating. Consider this episode your gentle nudge to pause, get clear, and start dreaming up what you actually want your next chapter to feel like. P.S. Coming up next at Euphoric is Dry January, which will always have a special place in my heart. Join us for Dry Boot Camp starting January 8!   IN THIS EPISODE: How I audit every core area of my life: health, career, money, relationships, fun, spirituality—and pinpoint where I need to go ALL IN next year Why high-achievers tend to feel let down at year's end, and the counterintuitive hack to focus on massive wins instead The power of designating a "word of the year", and how I came up with mine (2026 is "certainty")  Why going after your goals solo often keeps you stuck, and how plugging into the right community or mentorship can make your transformation inevitable   LINKS/RESOURCES MENTIONED Dry Boot Camp is an immersive 22-day challenge with a course, live trainings, workbooks, meditations, and a Slack community. This year it costs only $55 to join. Sign up now before we kick off on January 8. Our next Thought Leader Mastermind starts at the end of January and includes a VIP weekend in Hawaii. This 6-month program is for alcohol-free entrepreneurs who want to grow their impact and income and step into their brilliance as an industry thought leader. Spots are limited. Apply now.  If you know you're meant to help other people change their relationship with alcohol and achieve deep healing (along with their bigger dreams), get on the waitlist for the Empowered AF 5X Coach Certification Program – and get 5x certified as a world class alcohol-free empowerment coach, mindset coach, success coach, NLP practitioner, and hypnosis practitioner when applications open. Check out Euphoric the Club, the premier club for successful women who don't drink (and the women who are becoming them) where you can get access to all my alcohol-free programs and methodology, coaching, and trainings for only $62.  Awarded the most empowering book in the sober curious genre, be sure to get your copy of Euphoric: Ditch Alcohol and Gain a Happier, More Confident You today and leave a review.  Follow @euphoric.af on Instagram. And as always, rate, review, and subscribe so we can continue spreading our message far and wide.

Grit isn't it. You need joy in community. In this second half of our Disneyland conversation, we shift from rides and rain ponchos to something deeper: how community and belonging make joy stick when life is brutal. My friends and I talk about what it really looks like to have people who've got your back—through job changes, grief, divorce, parenting, and the everyday “I cannot do one more hard thing” moments. From a weekly group that's met for 15 years, to long-distance friendships sustained by Marco Polo, to a monthly “Food Club” that became a lifeline, we unpack how joy and resilience are built together, not alone. We also dig into: why saying “yes” to embodied, in-person time changes your brain, why most adults stop marking milestones (and why that's a problem), how the gap and the gain framework helps leaders see how far they've come, and why celebrating after hard things isn't denial—it's evidence that you're still here and still growing. Here's What's in the Episode: Community is resilience infrastructure, not a bonus. Joy and resilience go hand-in-hand when you have people who will listen, pray, problem-solve, or just sit with you so you can take the next step instead of staying stuck. Belonging doesn't magically appear—you build it. “Everybody wants the village, but nobody wants to be a villager.” Showing up, checking in, hosting, inviting, and going first are how leaders create real community in life and at work. Embodied time together literally changes how you feel. Moving from “once-a-year girls' trip” to more frequent in-person time deepened connection and created a rooted sense of belonging—what your team also needs, beyond Slack and email. Celebration marks the gain, not just the goal. Using the gap and the gain idea, we talk about how consciously looking back at what you've survived and accomplished builds self-efficacy, confidence, and courage for the next hard thing. Most meaningful wins are a group sport. Writing a book is solitary, but finishing and celebrating it isn't. Leadership works the same way—you may carry the title, but you don't carry the load alone (or at least, you shouldn't). Key Takeaway Joy and resilience aren't solo acts — leaders thrive when they build and lean on real community. About the Guests: A Quorum of the March Girls These women are real-life leaders throughout the country. Camille leads an area for a global nonprofit, Jen is a PhD science educator and program consultant, and Sarah is a pediatric occupational therapist with a neonatal specialty. The four of us, plus Lindsay a trainer to professional athletes, have been friends for more than 30 years. So this is the behind the scenes of real-life leaders celebrating at Disneyland. About the Host: Jenn Whitmer Jenn is an international keynote speaker, leadership consultant, and the founder of Joyosity™, helping leaders create positive, profitable cultures through connection, curiosity, and joy. With a background in communication, conflict resolution, and team dynamics, Jenn helps leaders and organizations navigate complex people challenges, reduce burnout, and build flourishing workplaces. Her insights have resonated with audiences worldwide, blending real-world leadership expertise, engaging storytelling, and a dash of humor to make the hard stuff easier. Whether on stage, in workshops, or with coaching clients, Jenn equips leaders with the tools they need to solve conflict, cultivate communication, and lead with purpose. Her book Joyosity and the Joyosity Works Playbooks hit shelves December 9, 2025, offering leaders a fresh approach to joy at work that builds real results. Resources & Links: Get Joyosity: Joyosity: How to Cultivate Intense Happiness in Work & Life (Even If Things Are What They Are) Joy isn't extra. Joy is how you thrive. This book gives leaders the tools to turn exhaustion into resilience and build cultures where work is a joy, people are whole, and organizations flourish. https://jennwhitmer.com/books Ready to Make a Plan: Joyosity™ Jumpstart → Get crystal clear on what you want, what's in the way, and how to move forward with traction. Starting the Journey: Enneagram Navigator → Stop guessing your type. In this 1:1 session, get clarity on your motivations and blind spots. Ready to Dive In: Joyosity™ Intensive → A one-day transformative experience to realign with your values and build a practical plan for joyful leadership. A Party for More: Bring Jenn & the Joy to Speak → Bring the spark (not just the spark notes!) to your whole team with contagious joy, practical tools, and plenty of laughter. Loved this episode? Rate, review, and share with a fellow leader who's ready to ditch the drama and lead with more joy, curiosity, and clarity.

#330: In this short episode, Darin and Viktor reflect on the holiday season.   YouTube channel:  https://youtube.com/devopsparadox   Review the podcast on Apple Podcasts:  https://www.devopsparadox.com/review-podcast/   Slack: https://www.devopsparadox.com/slack/   Connect with us at: https://www.devopsparadox.com/contact/

Join Steve Stevens as he explores the weird yet relatable trend of holiday slowdown among American workers in December. Discover generational differences in work ethics during the holiday season, with Gen Z leading the way in plans to cut back on effort, followed closely by millennials. As the episode wraps up, Steve shares his personal plans for a well-deserved break, encouraging listeners to evaluate their own stance on taking it easy before the New Year.

Product owners worden dagelijks overspoeld met input: bugs, feature requests, vragen via Slack, klantverzoeken en ideeën vanuit de hele organisatie. De kunst is om overzicht te houden, scherp te blijven bepalen wat belangrijk is en duidelijk te communiceren naar stakeholders, zonder kopje-onder te gaan. In deze aflevering spreekt Ruud met Maaike, product owner en specialist in het creëren van structuur in chaos. Ze ontwikkelde een eenvoudige, maar effectieve manier om bugs en feature requests te beoordelen aan de hand van drie vragen. Daardoor ontstaat direct overzicht, betere keuzes en meer rust in het werk. We verkennen hoe product owners grip houden op alles wat er binnenkomt, hoe je slim communiceert over prioriteiten en hoe je voorkomt dat je backlog een reactieve lijst wordt in plaats van een strategisch hulpmiddel. In deze aflevering hebben we het over: backlogmanagement, prioritering, bugtriage, feature requests, stakeholdercommunicatie, overzicht creëren Over deze podcast: In de Product Owner podcast spreken we elke week met een interessante gast uit de wereld van product management en gaan we in op echte ervaringen, lessen en tactieken van product owners, ondernemers en specialisten. De Product Owner podcast is een initiatief van Productowner.nl

Kylian Mbappé marked his birthday in style, matching Cristiano Ronaldo's best-ever goal tally for Real Madrid in a calendar year. With over 200 more goal involvements than Ronaldo had at the same age, does Mbappé already have a case for being the better player at 27? Gary and Alex also break down Barcelona's dominant form after their eighth straight win against Villarreal, is there anyone who can actually stop Barça right now? Join The Players Lounge: The official fantasy football club of The Rest Is Football. It's time to take on Gary, Alan and Micah for the chance to win monthly prizes and shoutouts on the pod. It's FREE to join and as a member, you'll get access to exclusive tips from Fantasy Football Hub including AI-powered team ratings, transfer tips, and expert team reveals to help you climb the table - plus access to our private Slack community. Sign up today at therestisfootball.com https://therestisfootball.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=episode_description&utm_content=link_cta For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Xmas Special: Why project management tools fail software development - and what works instead! In this BONUS episode, we dive deep into The Project Management Trap, continuing our exploration from Episode 1 where we established that software is societal infrastructure being managed with tools from the 1800s. We examine why project management frameworks - designed for building railroads and ships - are fundamentally misaligned with software development, and what happens when we treat living capabilities like construction projects with defined endpoints. The Origin Story - Where Project Management Came From "The problem isn't that project management is bad. The problem is that software isn't building a railroad or a building, or setting up a process that will run forever (like a factory)." Project management emerged from industries with hard physical constraints - building the Transcontinental Railroad in the 1860s, coordinating factory machinery, managing finite and expensive materials. The Gantt chart, invented in the 1910s for factory scheduling, worked brilliantly for coordinating massive undertakings with calculable physics, irreversible decisions, and clear completion points. When the rails met, you were done. When the bridge was built, the project ended. These tools gave us remarkable precision for building ships, bridges, factories, and highways. But software operates in a completely different reality - one where the raw materials are time and brainpower, not minerals and hardware, and where the transformation happens in unique creative moments rather than repeated mechanical movements. The Seductive Clarity Of Project Management Artifacts "In software, we almost never know either of those things with certainty." Project management is tempting for software leaders because it offers comforting certainty. Gantt charts show every task laid out, milestones mark clear progress, "percent complete" gives us a number, and a defined "done" promises relief. The typical software project kickoff breaks down into neat phases: requirements gathering (6 weeks), design (4 weeks), development (16 weeks), testing (4 weeks), deployment (2 weeks) - total 32 weeks, done by Q3. Leadership loves this. Finance can budget it. Everyone can plan around it. But this is false precision. Software isn't pouring concrete where you measure twice and pour once. Every line of code is a hypothesis about what users need and how the system should behave. That 32-week plan assumes we know exactly what to build and exactly how long each piece takes - assumptions that are almost never true in software development. The Completion Illusion "Software products succeed by evolving. Projects end; products adapt." "Done" is the wrong goal for living software. We expand on the Slack story from Episode 1 to illustrate this point. If Slack's team had thought in project terms in 2013, they might have built a functional tool with channels, direct messages, file sharing, and search - shipped on time and on budget by Q2 2014, project complete. But that wasn't the end; it was the beginning. Through continuous user feedback and evolution, Slack added threaded conversations (2017), audio/video calls (2016), workflow automation (2019), and Canvas for knowledge management (2023). Each wasn't maintenance or bug fixing - these were fundamental enhancements. Glass's research shows that 60% of maintenance costs are enhancements, not fixes. By 2021, when Salesforce acquired Slack for $27.7 billion, it bore little resemblance to the 2014 version. The value wasn't in that initial "project" - it was in the continuous evolution. If they'd thought "build it, ship it, done," Slack would have died competing against HipChat and Campfire. When Projects Succeed (Well, Some Do, Anyway) But Software Fails "They tried to succeed at project management. They ended up failing at both software delivery AND project management!" Vasco references his article "The Software Crisis is Real," examining five distinct cases from five different countries that represent what's wrong with project thinking for software. These projects tried hard to do everything right by project management standards: detailed requirements (thousands of pages), milestone tracking, contractor coordination, hitting fixed deadlines, and proper auditing. What they didn't have was iterative delivery to test with real users early, feedback loops to discover problems incrementally, adaptability to change based on learning, or a "living capability" mindset. Project thinking demanded: get all requirements right upfront (otherwise no funding), build it all, test at the end, launch on deadline. Software thinking demands: launch something minimal early, get real user feedback, iterate rapidly, evolve the capability. These projects succeeded at following project management rules but failed at delivering valuable software. What Software-Native Delivery Management Looks Like "Software is unpredictable not because we're bad at planning - it's unpredictable because we're creating novel solutions to complex problems, and in a completely different economic system." If not projects, then what? Vasco has been exploring this question for years, since publishing the NoEstimates book. The answer starts with thinking in products and capabilities, not projects - recognizing that products have ongoing evolution, capabilities are cultivated and improved rather than "delivered" and done, and value is measured in outcomes rather than task completion. Instead of comprehensive planning, we need iteration and constant decision-making based on validated hypotheses: start with "We believe users need X," run experiments by building small and testing with real users, then learn and adapt. Instead of fixed scope, define the problem (not the solution), allow the solution to evolve as you learn, and optimize for learning speed rather than task completion.  The contrast is clear: project thinking says "We will build features A, B, C, D, and E by Q3, then we're done." Software-native thinking says "We're solving problem X for users. We'll start with the riskiest hypothesis, build a minimal version, ship it to 100 users next week, and learn whether we're on the right track." The appropriate response to software's inherent unpredictability isn't better planning - it's faster learning. References for Further Reading Vasco Duarte's article on the Software Leadership Workshop newsletter: "The Software Crisis is Real"  Glass, Robert L. "Facts and Fallacies of Software Engineering" - Fact 42: "Enhancement is responsible for roughly 60 percent of software maintenance costs. Error correction is roughly 17 percent. Therefore, software maintenance is largely about adding new capability to old software, not fixing it." NoEstimates Book: How To Measure Project Progress Without Estimating Slack evolution timeline: Company history and feature releases  The unexpected design challenge behind Slack's new threaded conversations Slack voice and video chat Slack launches admin workflow automation and announcement channels  Meet Slack Canvas - Slack's answer to the knowledge management problem. About Vasco Duarte Vasco Duarte is a thought leader in the Agile space, co-founder of Agile Finland, and host of the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast, which has over 10 million downloads. Author of NoEstimates: How To Measure Project Progress Without Estimating, Vasco is a sought-after speaker and consultant helping organizations embrace Agile practices to achieve business success. You can link with Vasco Duarte on LinkedIn.

Kris and David are back to discuss the week-plus that was December 17-24, 2000. Topics of discussion include:Raw and Smackdown featuring a TON of Vince McMahon soap opera with neither show having much wrestling of note, all while ratings are declining.The Rock and The Undertaker becoming WWF Tag Team hampions for a one day title change that nobody remembers.Road Dogg being extremely thin ice due to his personal issues.New Japan and all of their political issues with both Shinya Hashimoto and Motoko Baba.NOAH having its best match to date in the form of Jun Akiyama vs. Kenta Kobashi at Ariake Colosseum.Just how “Bangable” was Survival Tobita?The greatness of Toryumon.Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Ryan Gracie headlining a newsworthy PRIDE card.Akira Maeda attacking a female RINGS employee.The final ECW Arena show for ECW.Dave Meltzer talking about the future of “The Prototype” John Cena in UPW.A completely insane WCW section featuring the final Starrcade, DDP and Scott Steiner getting into a backstage fight, Kevin Nash being political as hell, and some wacky clips.This was a tremendous show, so we hope you enjoy it. HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!!Timestamps:0:00:00 WWF1:02:44 Int'l: NJPW, NOAH, BattlARTS, Survival Tobita, Toryumon, PRIDE, Tokyo Sports Awards, AJW, Arsion, GAEA, NEO Ladies,CMLL, IWRG, Neza, Tijuana,& Puerto Rico2:15:57 Classic Commercial Break2:21:51 Halftime with Mark Wolf tribute3:00:28 Other USA: ECW, NWA Wildside, NWA Worldwide, Memphis Power Pro, UPW, & UrbanWA3:37:09 WCWTo support the show and get access to exclusive rewards like special members-only monthly themed shows, go to our Patreon page at Patreon.com/BetweenTheSheets and become an ongoing Patron. Becoming a Between the Sheets Patron will also get you exclusive access to not only the monthly themed episode of Between the Sheets, but also access to our new mailbag segment, a Patron-only chat room on Slack, and anything else we do outside of the main shows!If you're looking for the best deal on a VPN service—short for Virtual Private Network, it helps you get around regional restrictions as well as browse the internet more securely—then Private Internet Access is what you've been looking for. Not only will using our link help support Between The Sheets, but you'll get a special discount, with prices as low as $1.98/month if you go with a 40 month subscription. With numerous great features and even a TV-specific Android app to make streaming easier, there is no better choice if you're looking to subscribe to WWE Network, AEW Plus, and other region-locked services.For the best in both current and classic indie wrestling streaming, make sure to check out IndependentWrestling.tv and use coupon code BTSPOD for a free 5 day trial! (You can also go directly to TinyURL.com/IWTVsheets to sign up that way.) If you convert to a paid subscriber, we get a kickback for referring you, allowing you to support both the show and the indie scene.To subscribe, you can find us on iTunes, Google Play, and just about every other podcast app's directory, or you can also paste Feeds.FeedBurner.com/BTSheets into your favorite podcast app using whatever “add feed manually” option it has.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/between-the-sheets/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

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Everywhere you look, people are talking about strategic planning and prepping for the new year. My approach this Christmas is the complete opposite. In this episode, I share why shutting down my business for two full weeks and stepping away from emails, Slack, and content creation is the smartest move I make for both my business and my sanity. After ten years in business, I know these breaks are absolutely essential.I talk about the power of embracing white space and why doing less is sometimes exactly what we need. Between Christmas and New Year, I focus on real downtime. No planning, no batching, just intentional rest and letting my mind wander. I share how this space away from work is when my best ideas surface, inspired by Liz Gilbert's thoughts on creativity and the magic that comes when we unplug.I hope this episode encourages you to find what truly replenishes you and reminds you that sometimes, stepping back is the wisest thing you can do for your business and your creativity.LINKSConnect with Ellie: Doors are NOW OPEN for The Mastermind Model ellieswift.com/model  Apply for the Scalable Freedom Mastermind hereFREE Private Podcast “Inside a 7-Figure Mastermind Business” hereWebsite:         https://www.ellieswift.com/Instagram:     @elliehswiftFacebook Group:     www.facebook.com/groups/shineonsocialellieswift/

Did you like the episode? Send me a text and let me know!!How to Hire Remote Workers: Why 73% Fail & How to Succeed | Nearshore Staffing with Luis DEpisode DescriptionSerial entrepreneur Luis D reveals why 73% of offshore hiring fails and how his REMOTE Intelligence Framework achieves 95% success. Learn to hire Latin American talent at 60-70% cost savings, avoid AI resume fraud, and scale your startup faster. Luis built the first Latin American tech startup to get US VC funding and pioneered distributed teams in 2003—before Zoom or Slack existed.Key Takeaways✅ The 7 Offshore Team Death Traps killing remote hires ✅ REMOTE Framework: Rigorous selection, Expert onboarding, Managed support, Optimized performance ✅ How to spot AI deepfake interviews and fake identities ✅ Nearshore vs offshore: Time zone advantages ✅ "Ideas aren't unique. Execution is key" ✅ When to hire earlier than you think you can affordTime Stamps00:00 Mexican candy smuggling to tech entrepreneur 04:00 Building distributed teams before remote work existed 08:00 73% of offshore projects fail—here's why 09:00 7 Death Trap components (Talent Mirage, Cultural Chasm, Hidden Costs) 14:00 REMOTE Intelligence Framework explained 19:00 Rigorous talent vetting process 22:00 AI fraud: Deepfakes and fake accents 28:00 "Ideas aren't unique. Execution is key" 30:00 Zone of genius: Hire earlier with 70% savings 35:00 95% success rate vs 27% industry averageGuest: Luis DFounder of Near You (NIR-U) Nearshore Staffing | First Latin American tech startup with US VC funding | 14-year CEO | Remote work pioneer since 2003Company: Near You—helps $1M-$25M companies hire Latin American talent Success Rate: 95% (vs 27% industry standard) Cost Savings: 60-70% compared to US hiringResources

In this episode of The Impostor Syndrome Files, we explore what it really means to lead with authenticity in a world that doesn't always welcome it. My guest this week is Judy Hoberman, a trailblazing executive coach, speaker and author who built her career in male-dominated industries like commercial roofing and financial services. Judy shares stories from her early days climbing ladders in skirts, navigating bias and building unexpected alliances, and how those experiences shaped her belief that relationships are at the heart of everything.Together, we talk about how the leadership landscape has changed and how it hasn't. Judy and I explore the loneliness of leadership, the complicated dynamics among women in the workplace and the ongoing tension between showing confidence and being labeled as too much. Judy also offers practical, encouraging advice on how to build a network (even as an introvert), how to start authentic conversations and how to lead from a place of generosity instead of fear.About My GuestJudy Hoberman is President of Judy Hoberman and Associates, a company focused on empowering professional women. She is an award-winning international speaker, best-selling author, trainer, and leading authority on women in leadership and sales. She is also a Certified High Performance Coach™ where changing your habits can change your life. Her focus is on Executive Coaching and Trailblazer Masterminds for women. This direction is where her true passion is and gives her the time and attention to work with these incredible women, primarily in financial services and healthcare, which has always been part of her mission and vision.Judy's 30 years in business along with her experience in sales and leadership has helped her clients realize the importance of building relationships, standing out and being the authority in their market. She is often described as “transformational.” She is a best-selling author, a TEDx speaker and the host of The Trailblazer Chronicles podcast.Judy's mission…to help one woman a day by following an important philosophy- "Women Want To Be Treated Equally...Not Identically"®~Connect with Judy:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/judyhoberman/ Website: https://sellinginaskirt.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sellinginaskirt/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sellinginaskirt~Connect with Kim and The Impostor Syndrome Files:Join the free Impostor Syndrome Challenge:https://www.kimmeninger.com/challengeLearn more about the Leading Humans discussion group:https://www.kimmeninger.com/leadinghumansgroupJoin the Slack channel to learn from, connect with and support other professionals: https://forms.gle/Ts4Vg4Nx4HDnTVUC6Join the Facebook group:https://www.facebook.com/groups/leadinghumansSchedule time to speak with Kim Meninger directly about your questions/challenges: https://bookme.name/ExecCareer/strategy-sessionConnect on LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimmeninger/Website:https://kimmeninger.com

Alex Salazar is the CEO and Co-Founder of Arcade.dev, working on secure AI agents and real-world automation integrations.Chiara Caratelli is a Data Scientist at Prosus Group, working on AI agents, web automation, and evaluation of robust multimodal models.Join the Community: https://go.mlops.community/YTJoinInGet the newsletter: https://go.mlops.community/YTNewsletterMLOps GPU Guide: ⁠https://go.mlops.community/gpuguide// AbstractAgents sound smart until millions of users show up. A real talk on tools, UX, and why autonomy is overrated.// BioChiara CaratelliChiara is a Data Scientist at Prosus, where she develops AI-driven solutions with a focus on AI agents, multimodal models, and new user experiences. With a PhD in Computational Science and a background in machine learning engineering and data science, she has worked on deploying AI-powered applications at scale, collaborating with Prosus portfolio companies to drive real-world impact.Beyond her work at Prosus, she enjoys experimenting with generative AI and art. She is also an avid climber and book reader, always eager to explore new ideas and share knowledge with the AI and ML community.Alex SalazarAlex is the CEO and co-founder of Arcade.dev, the unified agent action platform that makes AI agents production-ready. Previously, Salazar co-founded Stormpath, the first authentication API for developers, which was acquired by Okta. At Okta, he led developer products, accounting for 25% of total bookings, and launched a new auth-centric proxy server product that reached $9M in revenue within a year. He also managed Okta's network of over 7,000 auth integrations. Alex holds a computer science degree from Georgia Tech and an MBA from Stanford University.// Related LinksWebsite: https://www.prosus.com/Website: https://www.arcade.dev/~~~~~~~~ ✌️Connect With Us ✌️ ~~~~~~~Catch all episodes, blogs, newsletters, and more: https://go.mlops.community/TYExploreJoin our Slack community [https://go.mlops.community/slack]Follow us on X/Twitter [@mlopscommunity](https://x.com/mlopscommunity) or [LinkedIn](https://go.mlops.community/linkedin)] Sign up for the next meetup: [https://go.mlops.community/register]MLOps Swag/Merch: [https://shop.mlops.community/]Connect with Demetrios on LinkedIn: /dpbrinkmConnect with Alex on LinkedIn: /alexsalazar/Connect with Chiara on LinkedIn: /chiara-caratelli/Timestamps:[00:00] Intro[00:15] Insights from iFood[06:22] API vs agent intention[09:45] Tool definition clarity[15:37] Preemptive context loading[27:50] Contextualizing agent data[33:27] Prompt bloat in payments[41:33] Agent building evolution[50:09] Agent program scalability[55:29] Why multi-agent is a dead end[56:17] Wrap up

Reddit rSlash Storytime r tifu where TIFU by realizing my "mute" button wasn't muted during a 2-hour stakeholder meeting. TIFUpdate I told my PM to "get to the point" in front of 40 people. I finally opened Slack. TIFU by throwing out a family heirloom TIFU by picking my belly button TIFU by telling a stranger their baby was a potato TIFU by taking Salvia TIFU by putting two lightning strikes next to my username TIFU by not going to the doctor for my "heartburn". TIFU by letting myself into my sisters house to drop off some stuff TIFU by falling for an escort Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Arsenal remain top of the Premier League at Christmas, but with Manchester City starting to look back to their best, have they taken the mantle as favourites for the title? Morgan Rogers scored two brilliant goals as Aston Villa made it ten wins in a row in all competitions. Does this season now look like a three-horse title race? Gary, Alan and Micah also debate a controversial weekend of refereeing, asking whether this is the worst standard the Premier League has seen, and if the introduction of VAR has played a part in the decline. The Rest Is Football is powered by Fuse Energy. To sign up and for terms and conditions, visit fuseenergy.com/football. Join The Players Lounge: The official fantasy football club of The Rest Is Football. It's time to take on Gary, Alan and Micah for the chance to win monthly prizes and shoutouts on the pod. It's FREE to join and as a member, you'll get access to exclusive tips from Fantasy Football Hub including AI-powered team ratings, transfer tips, and expert team reveals to help you climb the table - plus access to our private Slack community. Sign up today at therestisfootball.com https://therestisfootball.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=episode_description&utm_content=link_cta For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Xmas Special: Software Industry Transformation - Why Software Development Must Mature Welcome to the 2025 Xmas special - a five-episode deep dive into how software as an industry needs to transform. In this opening episode, we explore the fundamental disconnect between how we manage software and what software actually is. From small businesses to global infrastructure, software has become the backbone of modern society, yet we continue to manage it with tools designed for building ships in the 1800s. This episode sets the stage for understanding why software development must evolve into a mature discipline. Software Runs Everything Now "Without any single piece, I couldn't operate - and I'm tiny. Scale this reality up: software isn't just in tech companies anymore." Even the smallest businesses today run entirely on software infrastructure. A small consulting and media business depends on WordPress for websites, Kajabi for courses, Stripe for payments, Quaderno for accounting, plus email, calendar, CRM systems, and AI assistants for content creation. The challenge? We're managing this critical infrastructure with tools designed for building physical structures with fixed requirements - an approach that fundamentally misunderstands what software is and how it evolves. This disconnect has to change. The Oscillation Between Technology and Process "AI amplifies our ability to create software, but doesn't solve the fundamental process problems of maintaining, evolving, and enhancing that software over its lifetime." Software improvement follows a predictable pattern: technology leaps forward, then processes must adapt to manage the new complexity. In the 1960s-70s, we moved from machine code to COBOL and Fortran, which was revolutionary but led to the "software crisis" when we couldn't manage the resulting complexity. This eventually drove us toward structured programming and object-oriented programming as process responses, which, in turn, resulted in technology changes! Today, AI tools like GitHub Copilot, ChatGPT, and Claude make writing code absurdly easy - but writing code was never the hard part. Robert Glass documents in "Facts and Fallacies of Software Engineering" that maintenance typically consumes between 40 and 80 percent of software costs, making "maintenance" probably the most important life cycle phase. We're overdue for a process evolution that addresses the real challenge: maintaining, evolving, and enhancing software over its lifetime. Software Creates An Expanding Possibility Space "If they'd treated it like a construction project ('ship v1.0 and we're done'), it would never have reached that value." Traditional project management assumes fixed scope, known solutions, and a definable "done" state. The Sydney Opera House exemplifies this: designed in 1957, completed in 1973, ten times over budget, with the architect resigning - but once built, it stands with "minimal" (compared to initial cost) maintenance. Software operates fundamentally differently. Slack started as an internal tool for a failed gaming company called Glitch in 2013. When the game failed, they noticed their communication tool was special and pivoted entirely. After launching in 2014, Slack continuously evolved based on user feedback: adding threads in 2017, calls in 2016, workflow builder in 2019, and Canvas in 2023. Each addition changed what was possible in organizational communication. In 2021, Salesforce acquired Slack for $27.7 billion precisely because it kept evolving with user needs. The key difference is that software creates possibility space that didn't exist before, and that space keeps expanding through continuous evolution. Software Is Societal Infrastructure "This wasn't a cyber attack - it was a software update gone wrong." Software has become essential societal infrastructure, not optional and not just for tech companies. In July 2024, a faulty software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike crashed 8.5 million Windows computers globally. Airlines grounded flights, hospitals canceled surgeries, banks couldn't process transactions, and 911 services went down. The global cost exceeded $10 billion. This wasn't an attack - it was a routine update that failed catastrophically. AWS outages in 2021 and 2023 took down major portions of the internet, stopping Netflix, Disney+, Robinhood, and Ring doorbells from working. CloudFlare outages similarly cascaded across daily-use services. When software fails, society fails. We cannot keep managing something this critical with tools designed for building physical things with fixed requirements. Project management was brilliant for its era, but that era isn't this one. The Path Ahead: Four Critical Challenges "The software industry doesn't just need better tools - it needs to become a mature discipline." This five-episode series will address how we mature as an industry by facing four critical challenges: Episode 2: The Project Management Trap - Why we think in terms of projects, dates, scope, and "done" when software is never done, and how this mindset prevents us from treating software as a living capability Episode 3: What's Already Working - The better approaches we've already discovered, including iterative delivery, feedback loops, and continuous improvement, with real examples of companies doing this well Episode 4: The Organizational Immune System - Why better approaches aren't universal, how organizations unconsciously resist what would help them, and the hidden forces preventing adoption Episode 5: Software-Native Organizations - What it means to truly be a software-native organization, transforming how the business thinks, not just using agile on teams Software is too important to our society to keep getting it wrong. We have much of the knowledge we need - the challenge is adoption and evolution. Over the next four episodes, we'll build this case together, starting with understanding why we keep falling into the same trap. References For Further Reading Glass, Robert L. "Facts and Fallacies of Software Engineering" - Fact 41, page 115  CrowdStrike incident: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_CrowdStrike_incident  AWS outages: 2021 (Dec 7), 2023 (June 13),  and November 2025 incidents  CloudFlare outages: 2022 (June 21), and November 2025 major incident  Slack history and Salesforce acquisition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slack_(software)  Sydney Opera House: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sydney_Opera_House About Vasco Duarte Vasco Duarte is a thought leader in the Agile space, co-founder of Agile Finland, and host of the Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast, which has over 10 million downloads. Author of NoEstimates: How To Measure Project Progress Without Estimating, Vasco is a sought-after speaker and consultant helping organizations embrace Agile practices to achieve business success. You can link with Vasco Duarte on LinkedIn.

2025 has continued the trend of layoffs, consolidation, and privatization. The gulf between AAA and everyone else is widening, as the AI bubble strains before an inevitable burst. With November's Circana report coming in bleak after months of stronger performance, 2026 will continue to challenge us all. BUT... there is reason to hope. Unions are growing in number and reach and studios doomed by AAA mega-corps are finding a way to survive. We need to stick together to not only survive, but thrive. You can support Virtual Economy's growth via our Ko-Fi and also purchase Virtual Economy merchandise! TIME STAMPS [00:07:28] - Circana Report on U.S. Video Game Spending for November 2025 [00:27:31] - Sony and Tencent Settle Light of Moritram Lawsuit [00:28:43] - Investment Interlude [00:37:27] - Quick Hits [00:43:53] - Labor Report  SOURCES Sony and Tencent settle lawsuit over "slavish clone" of Horizon: Zero Dawn | GamesIndustry INVESTMENT INTERLUDE Tencent makes minority investment in France's Drama Studios | GamesIndustry Disney to Invest $1 Billion in OpenAI in Major Deal That Boosts Sora in Hollywood | The Hollywood Reporter Bandai Namco sells Limbic Entertainment to "private investor" | GamesIndustry LABOR REPORT Naughty Dog Studio Orders Employee Overtime for 'Intergalactic' | Bloomberg (Paywall) Days after launching their first indie game, everyone responsible for publishing it was laid off: 'We had a Slack channel with everyone in it, and then you see them leaving one by one' | PC Gamer We are crowd funding Wreckreation | Three Fields Funcom may have closed down Metal: Hellsinger studio The Outsiders, but its co-founder and Battlefield vet David Goldfarb says it's not over yet | PC Gamer The Studio Behind Doom Just Unionized | Kotaku

Send us a textCalifornia employment law is changing again in 2026—and employers need to prepare now. In this episode of The Employee Handbook, attorneys Arta Wildeboer and Ryan Ellis break down the most significant new California labor laws taking effect January 1, 2026.Topics covered in this episode:Wage & Hour UpdatesCalifornia minimum wage increasing to $16.90/hour (with higher rates in San Francisco and San Jose)New minimum exempt salary threshold: $70,304 annuallyComputer professional exemption: $122,573.13/yearLicensed physician minimum: $107.17/hourSB 261 penalties for unpaid wage judgments—up to 3x the judgment amountRemote Work Expense ReimbursementLabor Code 2802 updates requiring employers to reimburse remote employees for internet, phone, and electricity costsWhat counts as "reasonable" reimbursement and class action risksStay-or-Pay Provisions BannedCalifornia's new prohibition on training repayment agreements and stay-or-pay contract clausesWorkplace Violence Prevention Program (SB 553)Required incident logging and documentationPenalties up to $25,000 per violation ($158,000 for willful violations)PAGA exposure and how violations multiplyReal examples: Slack threats, customer confrontations, domestic disputes at workAnnual audit and training requirementsEspinoza v. Target case discussionWhether you're a California employer, HR professional, or business owner, this episode provides practical guidance on compliance with California's evolving employment regulations.

What does it take to build products that feel thoughtful, emotionally resonant, and unmistakably high-quality, especially inside a company that ships fast and experiments constantly?In this episode of Supra Insider, Marc and Ben sit down with Nickey Skarstad, Director of Product at Duolingo, to unpack how one of the world's most beloved consumer apps maintains its bar for craft, clarity, and delight while operating at massive scale. Nickey shares how Duolingo operationalizes quality across teams, how they dogfood relentlessly, and why “unreasonable hospitality” applies just as much to software as it does to service.She also shares the internal rituals Duolingo uses - like their “hot trash” Friday forum for sharing early experiments, and how these lightweight mechanisms help PMs, designers, and engineers learn from each other. Nickey walks through Duolingo's product review process, how senior leaders give feedback, and how the company ensures teams move quickly without shipping work that falls below their quality standards.Whether you're a PM trying to strengthen your intuition, a design-driven leader aiming for higher quality bars, or a product builder exploring how AI should (and shouldn't) fit into your workflow, this episode is full of concrete lessons you can use immediately.All episodes of the podcast are also available on Spotify, Apple and YouTube.New to the pod? Subscribe below to get the next episode in your inbox

With the international break over, join Geremy on this solo cast talking about what's next regarding the Olympics and what's real about the PWHL results so far.If you like the show, please subscribe and leave us a five-star review. Crease Huddles is a podcast about women's hockey from The Ice Garden. Every episode will have a panel of the various nerdy  writers from TIG to discuss anything and everything women's hockey, from the PWHL to the NCAA to international tournaments. If you've ever wondered what its like in TIG's Slack channels, this is the podcast for you.

How many of the Top 10 all time Champions League goalscorers can Alan and Micah name without mistake? Who is the surprise inclusion on the list? Why was Micah left to rue making up a new rule to allow them to get bonus points? Gary is quiz master once again as he tests the guys knowledge on the most lethal finishers in Europe's elite competition, with a few rants and outbursts along the way! The Rest Is Football is powered by Fuse Energy. To sign up and for terms and conditions, visit fuseenergy.com/football Join The Players Lounge: The official fantasy football club of The Rest Is Football. It's time to take on Gary, Alan and Micah for the chance to win monthly prizes and shoutouts on the pod. It's FREE to join and as a member, you'll get access to exclusive tips from Fantasy Football Hub including AI-powered team ratings, transfer tips, and expert team reveals to help you climb the table - plus access to our private Slack community. Sign up today at therestisfootball.com https://therestisfootball.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=episode_description&utm_content=link_cta For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, we discuss Oracle's AI vibes, Chainguard's EmeritOSS, and GitHub's pricing U-turn. Plus, a robust robot vacuum debate. Watch the YouTube Live Recording of Episode 551 (https://youtube.com/live/TpDLcvAXrqo?feature=share) Runner-up Titles It has CarPlay iPad Range Anxiety an Australian documentary Oracle got popped Intentions I don't feel bad for them Open Source old folks home Spreadsheets love it Robots are going to take care of us The Median User Nobody feels bad for the whales I have a dog I have a Korean microwave We're the Neal Stephenson of podcasts Rundown Ford pulls the plug on the all-electric F-150 Lightning pickup truck (https://www.npr.org/2025/12/15/nx-s1-5645147/ford-discontinues-all-electric-f-150-lightning) AI Investment Oracle plummets 11% on weak revenue, pushing down AI stocks like Nvidia and CoreWeave (https://www.cnbc.com/2025/12/10/oracle-orcl-q2-earnings-report-2026.html) Oracle Shares Drop the Most Since 2001 on Mounting AI Spending (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-12-10/oracle-posts-weak-cloud-sales-raising-fear-of-delayed-payoff) OpenAI in Talks to Raise At Least $10 Billion From Amazon and Use Its AI Chips (http://1 https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openai-talks-raise-least-10-billion-amazon-use-ai-chips) S&P 500 falls after nearing record as Oracle disappointment drags down AI stocks (https://www.cnbc.com/2025/12/10/stock-market-today-live-updates.html) Inside The $1T AI Economy (https://x.com/StockSavvyShay/status/2000920959000445220?s=20) Introducing Chainguard EmeritOSS: Sustainable stewardship for mature open source (https://www.chainguard.dev/unchained/introducing-chainguard-emeritoss) Runners Announcing powerful upgrades & a new pricing model for self-hosted runners (https://www.atlassian.com/blog/bitbucket/announcing-v5-self-hosted-runners) GitHub to charge for self-hosted runners from March 2026 (https://devclass.com/2025/12/17/github-to-charge-for-self-hosted-runners-from-march-2026/) GitHub postpones changes to self-hosted runners pricing plans (https://x.com/github/status/2001372894882918548?s=46) Why Git (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3_95BZYIVs)H (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3_95BZYIVs)ub Why? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3_95BZYIVs) Coursera to buy Udemy, creating $2.5 billion firm to target AI training (https://www.reuters.com/business/coursera-udemy-merge-deal-valuing-combined-firm-25-billion-2025-12-17/) Roomba Maker iRobot Files for Bankruptcy, With Chinese Supplier Taking Control (https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/business/roomba-irobot-bankruptcy.html) Relevant to your Interests Harness raises a $240M Series E at a $5.5B valuation (https://www.axios.com/pro/enterprise-software-deals/2025/12/11/harness-goldman-sachs-series-e-software) A great platform as a product paper, and a fun platform philosophy thereof (https://cote.io/2025/12/12/a-great-platform-as-a.html) Google Launches Managed Remote MCP Servers for Its Cloud Services (https://thenewstack.io/google-launches-managed-remote-mcp-servers-for-its-cloud-services/) Fake Leonardo DiCaprio Movie Torrent Drops Agent Tesla Through Layered PowerShell Chain (https://www.bitdefender.com/en-us/blog/labs/fake-leonardo-dicaprio-movie-torrent-agent-tesla-powershell) Useful patterns for building HTML tools (https://simonwillison.net/2025/Dec/10/html-tools/) Waymo Seeking Over $15 Billion Near $100 Billion Valuation (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-12-16/waymo-seeks-to-raise-funds-at-valuation-near-100-billion) Write your CV or resume as YAML, then run RenderCV, (https://github.com/rendercv/rendercv) (https://github.com/rendercv/rendercv)and get a PDF with perfect typography. No template wrestling. No broken layouts. Consistent spacing, every time (https://github.com/rendercv/rendercv) Roomba Maker iRobot Files for Bankruptcy, With Chinese Supplier Taking Control (https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/business/roomba-irobot-bankruptcy.html) Nonsense The Full Text of Marco Rubio's Directive on State Department Typography, Re-Establishing Times New Roman (https://daringfireball.net/2025/12/full_text_of_marco_rubio_state_dept_directive_times_new_roman) Listener Feedback Sent stickers to Jelle in Belgium Conferences cfgmgmtcamp 2026 (https://cfgmgmtcamp.org/ghent2026/), February 2nd to 4th, Ghent, BE. Coté speaking and doing live SDI (https://www.softwaredefinedinterviews.com) with John Willis. DevOpsDayLA at SCALE23x (https://www.socallinuxexpo.org/scale/23x), March 6th, Pasadena, CA Use code: DEVOP for 50% off. Devnexus 2026 (https://devnexus.com), March 4th to 6th, Atlanta, GA. Whole bunch of VMUGs, mostly in the US. The CFPs are open (https://app.sessionboard.com/submit/vmug-call-for-content-2026/ae1c7013-8b85-427c-9c21-7d35f8701bbe?utm_campaign=5766542-VMUG%20Voice&utm_medium=email&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_YREN7dr6p3KSQPYkFSN5K85A-pIVYZ03ZhKZOV0O3t3h0XHdDHethhx5O8gBFguyT5mZ3n3q-ZnPKvjllFXYfWV3thg&_hsmi=393690000&utm_content=393685389&utm_source=hs_email), go speak at them! Coté speaking in Amsterdam. Amsterdam (March 17-19, 2026), Minneapolis (April 7-9, 2026), Toronto (May 12-14, 2026), Dallas (June 9-11, 2026), Orlando (October 20-22, 2026) SDT News & Community Join our Slack community (https://softwaredefinedtalk.slack.com/join/shared_invite/zt-1hn55iv5d-UTfN7mVX1D9D5ExRt3ZJYQ#/shared-invite/email) Email the show: questions@softwaredefinedtalk.com (mailto:questions@softwaredefinedtalk.com) Free stickers: Email your address to stickers@softwaredefinedtalk.com (mailto:stickers@softwaredefinedtalk.com) Follow us on social media: Twitter (https://twitter.com/softwaredeftalk), Threads (https://www.threads.net/@softwaredefinedtalk), Mastodon (https://hachyderm.io/@softwaredefinedtalk), LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/software-defined-talk/), BlueSky (https://bsky.app/profile/softwaredefinedtalk.com) Watch us on: Twitch (https://www.twitch.tv/sdtpodcast), YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCi3OJPV6h9tp-hbsGBLGsDQ/featured), Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/softwaredefinedtalk/), TikTok (https://www.tiktok.com/@softwaredefinedtalk) Book offer: Use code SDT for $20 off "Digital WTF" by Coté (https://leanpub.com/digitalwtf/c/sdt) Sponsor the show (https://www.softwaredefinedtalk.com/ads): ads@softwaredefinedtalk.com (mailto:ads@softwaredefinedtalk.com) Recommendations Brandon: Humble Audiobook Bundle: Shadows, Stars & Screams: Epic Audiobooks (https://www.humblebundle.com/books/shadows-stars-screams-epic-audiobooks-dramas-realm-books) Matt: Termination Shock (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57094295-termination-shock) - Neal Stephenson Photo Credits Header (https://unsplash.com/s/photos/electric-vehicle?orientation=landscape&license=free)

Chef Corso launched Outdoor Eats to improve the quality of trailside food. On his journey to level up everyone's culinary experience outdoors, he managed to build a brand that includes a TV series (going on its third season), a line of cookbooks, and plenty more. Reaching the outdoor audience has been an iterative process, and we dug into all of the details and steps along the way. Chef Corso: https://www.instagram.com/outdooreats365/ Outdoor Eats: https://outdooreats.tv/ Trail Meals Cookbook: https://outdooreats.com/product/trail-meals-cascade-edition/ Chef Corso Substack: https://chefcorso.substack.com/ Creativity Inc: https://amzn.to/48UruQ4 Science Of Scaling: https://amzn.to/4r6MviC Heliconia Productions: https://heliconia.ca/ Aaron's SF Peninsula Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHqGcGxmvGw Titanium Spork: https://outdooreats.com/product/creekside-titanium-spork/ OE Guided Trips 2026: https://outdooreats.com/outdoor-eats-guided-trips-2026/ BPC - Brand, Product, Content: Why You Eat What You Eat: https://amzn.to/4j2ypLy Mama Lil's Peppers: https://amzn.to/3KRoUm0 Red Bull - Everest Ski Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjZvFY6__qw Join us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/second-nature-media Meet us on Slack: https://www.launchpass.com/second-nature Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/secondnature.media Subscribe to our newsletter: https://www.secondnature.media Subscribe to the YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@secondnaturemedia

This week, I'm bringing you inside a corner of my work that I don't usually share publicly — my visibility membership, Seen & Safe.Seen & Safe is where sensitive creatives, coaches, and entrepreneurs come when they want to be visible, but also want to feel safe while doing it. We meet twice a month for nervous-system-safe visibility coaching, and between sessions we stay connected inside a private Slack community.It's a space where people ask the honest questions, name the fears they usually hide, and practice being seen in real time.In today's episode, I'm sharing a handful of the voice notes I recently sent inside our Slack channel — anonymized, of course — paired with the questions that inspired them.You'll hear coaching around:How to find your authentic story when fear feels louder than your voiceWhat motivates creativity when you're no longer running on survival-mode urgencyHow to hold boundaries (like session time) from a place of care, not guiltWhat it means to “hold the vision” when life throws a curveballWhy visibility aftercare is normal — and how to build capacity for it over timeThese are the kinds of conversations that unfold inside Seen & Safe all the time — slow, real, compassionate, nuanced, and deeply human. My hope is that you hear something today that helps you feel less alone in your own visibility journey.Seen & Safe opens for enrollment again in January.If you want to be the first to know when doors open, join the waitlist here:

Episode 88 of The Okay Podcast is pure chaos as the crew breaks down the Army–Navy game, Michigan's coaching meltdown, and the most heated chili debate you didn't know you needed.They react to Michigan's self-inflicted scandal, debate whether the program actually lost a great coach, and explain why this might be a rare reset moment for Big Blue.The guys also talk holiday lifting splits, how to train smart when schedules fall apart, and why consistency matters more than perfection this time of year.Add in college football tradition, service academy pride, unfiltered food takes, and classic Okay Podcast storytelling, and this episode goes everywhere fast.Podcast Hosts:Grant Broggi: Marine Veteran, Owner of The Strength Co. and Starting Strength Coach.Jeff Buege: Marine Veteran, Outdoorsman, Football Fan and LifterTres Gottlich: Marine Veteran, Texan, Fisherman, Crazy College Football Fan and LifterJoin the Slack and Use code OKAY:https://buy.stripe.com/dR6dT4aDcfuBdyw5ksCheck out BW Tax: https://www.bwtaxllc.comBUY A FOOTBALL HELMET: https://www.greengridiron.com/?ref=thestrengthcoTimestamps: 00:00 - Intro06:21 - Staff Brief (Mandatory Listen)12:28 - Outlying Stations, THE Ohio State Shirts29:45 - Chow Talk: Chili 37:44 - Grant Almost Lost His Cat47:29 - Michigan Scandal54:58 - Army Navy Game Recap59:14 - More College Football01:08:20 - Philip Rivers01:16:47 - Tres' Picks of The Week01:31:12 - Holiday Lifting Split01:36:45 - Sign Off

What happens when curiosity, resilience, and storytelling collide over a lifetime of building something meaningful? In this episode, I welcome Nick Francis, founder and CEO of Casual Films, for a thoughtful conversation about leadership, presence, and what it takes to keep going when the work gets heavy. Nick's journey began with a stint at BBC News and a bold 9,000-mile rally from London to Mongolia in a Mini Cooper, a spirit of adventure that still fuels how he approaches business and life today. We talk about how that early experience shaped Casual into a global branded storytelling company with studios across five continents, and what it really means to lead a creative organization at scale. Nick shares insights from growing the company internationally, expanding into Southeast Asia, and staying grounded while producing hundreds of projects each year. Along the way, we explore why emotionally resonant storytelling matters, how trust and preparation beat panic, and why presence with family, health, and purpose keeps leaders steady in uncertain times. This conversation is about building an Unstoppable life by focusing on what matters most, using creativity to connect people, and choosing clarity and resilience in a world full of noise. Highlights: 00:01:30 – Learn how early challenges shape resilience and long-term drive. 00:06:20 – Discover why focusing on your role creates calm under pressure. 00:10:50 – Learn how to protect attention in a nonstop world. 00:18:25 – Understand what global growth teaches about leadership. 00:26:00 – Learn why leading with trust changes relationships. 00:45:55 – Discover how movement and presence restore clarity. About the Guest: Nick Francis is the founder and CEO of Casual, a global production group that blends human storytelling, business know-how, and creativity turbo-charged by AI. Named the UK's number one brand video production company for five years, Casual delivers nearly 1,000 projects annually for world-class brands like Adobe, Amazon, BMW, Hilton, HSBC, and P&G. The adventurous spirit behind its first production – a 9,000-mile journey from London to Mongolia in an old Mini – continues to drive Casual's growth across offices in London, New York, LA, San Francisco, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Sydney, Singapore, Hong Kong and Greater China. Nick previously worked for BBC News and is widely recognised for his expertise in video storytelling, brand building, and corporate communications. He is the founding director of the Casual Films Academy, a charity helping young filmmakers develop skills by producing films for charitable organisations. He is also the author of ‘The New Fire: Harness the Power of Video for Your Business' and a passionate advocate for emotionally resonant, behaviorally grounded storytelling. Nick lives in San Francisco, California, with his family. Ways to connect with Nick**:** Website: https://www.casualfilms.com/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@casual_global  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/casualglobal/  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CasualFilms/  Nick's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nickfrancisfilm/  Casual's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/casual-films-international/  Beyond Casual - LinkedIn Newsletter: https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=6924458968031395840 About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog. Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards. https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/ accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/ Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below! Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset . Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. Transcription Notes: Michael Hingson  00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us. Michael Hingson  01:21 Well, hello everyone. I am your host, Mike hingson, that's kind of funny. We'll talk about that in a second, but this is unstoppable mindset. And our guest today is Nick Francis, and what we're going to talk about is the fact that people used to always ask me, well, they would call me Mr. Kingston, and it took me, as I just told Nick a master's degree in physics in 10 years to realize that if I said Mike hingson, that's why they said Mr. Kingston. So was either say Mike hingson or Michael hingson. Well, Michael hingson is a lot easier to say than Mike hingson, but I don't really care Mike or Michael, as long as it's not late for dinner. Whatever works. Yeah. Well, Nick, welcome to unstoppable mindset. We're glad you're Nick Francis  02:04 here. Thanks, Mike. It's great to be here. Michael Hingson  02:08 So Nick is a marketing kind of guy. He's got a company called casual that we'll hear about. Originally from England, I believe, and now lives in San Francisco. We were talking about the weather in San Francisco, as opposed to down here in Victorville. A little bit earlier. We're going to have a heat wave today and and he doesn't have that up there, but you know, well, things, things change over time. But anyway, we're glad you're here. And thanks, Mike. Really looking forward to it. Tell us about the early Nick growing up and all that sort of stuff, just to get us started. Nick Francis  02:43 That's a good question. I grew up in London, in in Richmond, which is southwest London. It's a at the time, it wasn't anything like as kind of, it's become quite kind of shishi, I think back in the day, because it's on the west of London. The pollution from the city used to flow east and so, like all the kind of well to do people, in fact, there used to be a, there used to be a palace in Richmond. It's where Queen Elizabeth died, the first Queen Elizabeth, that is. And, yeah, you know, I grew up it was, you know, there's a lot of rugby played around there. I played rugby for my local rugby club from a very young age, and we went sailing on the south coast. It was, it was great, really. And then, you know, unfortunately, when I was 10 years old, my my dad died. He had had a very powerful job at the BBC, and then he ran the British Council, which is the overseas wing of the Arts Council, so promoting, I guess, British soft power around the world, going and opening art galleries and going to ballet in Moscow and all sorts. So he had an incredible life and worked incredibly hard. And you know, that has brought me all sorts of privileges, I think, when I was a kid. But, you know, unfortunately, age 10 that all ended. And you know, losing a parent at that age is such a sort of fundamental, kind of shaking of your foundations. You know, you when you're a kid, you feel like a, you're going to live forever, and B, the things that are happening around you are going to last forever. And so, you know, you know, my mom was amazing, of course, and, you know, and in time, I got a new stepdad, and all the rest of it. But you know, that kind of shaped a lot of my a lot of my youth, really. And, yeah, I mean, Grief is a funny thing, and it's funny the way it manifests itself as you grow. But yeah. So I grew up there. I went to school in the Midlands, near where my stepdad lived, and then University of Newcastle, which is up in the north of England, where it rains a lot. It's where it's where Newcastle Football Club is based. And you know is that is absolutely at the center of the city. So. So the city really comes alive there. And it was during that time that I discovered photography, and I wanted to be a war photographer, because I believe that was where life was lived at the kind of the real cutting edge. You know, you see the you see humanity in its in its most visceral and vivid color in terrible situations. And I kind of that seemed like an interesting thing to go to go and do. Michael Hingson  05:27 Well, what? So what did you major in in college in Newcastle? So I did Nick Francis  05:31 history and politics, and then I went did a course in television journalism, and ended up working at BBC News as a initially running on the floor. So I used to deliver the papers that you know, when you see people shuffling or not, they do it anymore, actually, because everything, everything's digital now digital, yeah, but when they were worried about the the auto cues going down, they we always had to make sure that they had the up to date script. And so I would be printing in, obviously, the, you know, because it's a three hour news show, the scripts constantly evolving, and so, you know, I was making sure they had the most up to date version in their hands. And it's, I don't know if you have spent any time around live TV Mike, but it's an incredibly humbling experience, like the power of it. You know, there's sort of two or 3 million people watching these two people who are sitting five feet in front of me, and the, you know, the sort of slightly kind of, there was an element of me that just wanted to jump in front of them and kind of go, ah. And, you know, never, ever work in live TV, ever again. But you know, anyway, I did that and ended up working as a producer, writing and developing, developing packets that would go out on the show, producing interviews and things. And, you know, I absolutely loved it. It was, it was a great time. But then I left to go and set up my company. Michael Hingson  06:56 I am amazed, even today, with with watching people on the news, and I've and I've been in a number of studios during live broadcasts and so on. But I'm amazed at how well, mostly, at least, I've been fortunate. Mostly, the people are able to read because they do have to read everything. It isn't like you're doing a lot of bad living in a studio. Obviously, if you are out with a story, out in the field, if you will, there, there may be more where you don't have a printed script to go by, but I'm amazed at the people in the studio, how much they are able to do by by reading it all completely. Nick Francis  07:37 It's, I mean, the whole experience is kind of, it's awe inspiring, really. And you know, when you first go into a Live, a live broadcast studio, and you see the complexity, and you know, they've got feeds coming in from all over the world, and you know, there's upwards of 100 people all working together to make it happen. And I remember talking to one of the directors at the time, and I was like, How on earth does this work? And he said, You know, it's simple. You everyone has a very specific job, and you know that as long as you do your bit of the job when it comes in front of you, then the show will go out. He said, where it falls over is when people start worrying about whether other people are going to are going to deliver on time or, you know, and so if you start worrying about what other people are doing, rather than just focusing on the thing you have to do, that's where it potentially falls over, Michael Hingson  08:29 which is a great object lesson anyway, to worry about and control and don't worry about the rest Nick Francis  08:36 for sure. Yeah, yeah, for sure. You know, it's almost a lesson for life. I mean, sorry, it is a lesson for life, and Michael Hingson  08:43 it's something that I talk a lot about in dealing with the World Trade Center and so on, and because it was a message I received, but I've been really preaching that for a long time. Don't worry about what you can't control, because all you're going to do is create fear and drive yourself Nick Francis  08:58 crazy, completely, completely. You know. You know what is it? Give me the, give me this. Give me the strength to change the things I can. Give me the give me the ability to let the things that I can't change slide but and the wisdom to know the difference. I'm absolutely mangling that, that saying, but, yeah, it's, it's true, you know. And I think, you know, it's so easy for us to in this kind of modern world where everything's so media, and we're constantly served up things that, you know, shock us, sadness, enrage us, you know, just to be able to step back and say, actually, you know what? These are things I can't really change. I'd have to just let them wash over me. Yeah, and just focus on the things that you really can change. Michael Hingson  09:46 It's okay to be aware of things, but you've got to separate the things you can control from the things that you can and we, unfortunately aren't taught that. Our parents don't teach us that because they were never taught it, and it's something. That, just as you say, slides by, and it's so unfortunate, because it helps to create such a level of fear about so many things in our in our psyche and in our world that we really shouldn't have to do Nick Francis  10:13 completely well. I think, you know, obviously, but you know, we've, we've spent hundreds, if not millions of years evolving to become humans, and then, you know, actually being aware of things beyond our own village has only been an evolution of the last, you know what, five, 600 years, yeah. And so we are just absolutely, fundamentally not able to cope with a world of such incredible stimulus that we live in now. Michael Hingson  10:43 Yeah, and it's only getting worse with all the social media, with all the different things that are happening and of course, and we're only working to develop more and more things to inundate us with more and more kinds of inputs. It's really unfortunate we just don't learn to separate ourselves very easily from all of that. Nick Francis  11:04 Yeah, well, you know, it's so interesting when you look at the development of VR headsets, and, you know, are we going to have, like, lenses in our eyes that kind of enable us to see computer screens while we're just walking down the road, you know? And you look at that and you think, well, actually, just a cell phone. I mean, cell phones are going to be gone fairly soon. I would imagine, you know, as a format, it's not something that's going to abide but the idea that we're going to create technology that's going to be more, that's going to take us away from being in the moment more rather than less, is kind of terrifying. Because, I would say already, even with, you know, the most basic technology that we have now, which is, you know, mind bending, compared to where we were even 20 years ago, you know, to think that we're only going to become more immersive is, you know, we really, really as a species, have to work out how we are going to be far better at stepping away from this stuff. And I, you know, I do, I wonder, with AI and technology whether there is, you know, there's a real backlash coming of people who do want to just unplug, yeah, Michael Hingson  12:13 well, it'll be interesting to see, and I hope that people will learn to do it. I know when I started hearing about AI, and one of the first things I heard was how kids would use it to write their papers, and it was a horrible thing, and they were trying to figure out ways so that teachers could tell us something was written by AI, as opposed to a student. And I almost immediately developed this opinion, no, let AI write the papers for students, but when the students turn in their paper, then take a day to in your class where you have every student come up and defend their paper, see who really knows it, you know. And what a great teaching opportunity and teaching moment to to get students also to learn to do public speaking and other things a little bit more than they do, but we haven't. That hasn't caught on, but I continue to preach it. Nick Francis  13:08 I think that's really smart, you know, as like aI exists, and I think to to pretend somehow that, you know, we can work without it is, you know, it's, it's, it's, yeah, I mean, it's like, well, saying, you know, we're just going to go back to Word processors or typewriters, which, you know, in which it weirdly, in their own time, people looked at and said, this is, you know, these, these are going to completely rot our minds. In fact, yeah, I think Plato said that was very against writing, because he believed it would mean no one could remember anything after that, you know. So it's, you know, it's just, it's an endless, endless evolution. But I think, you know, we have to work out how we incorporate into it, into our education system, for sure. Michael Hingson  13:57 Well, I remember being in in college and studying physics and so on. And one of the things that we were constantly told is, on tests, you can't bring calculators in, can't use calculators in class. Well, why not? Well, because you could cheat with that. Well, the reality is that the smart physicists realized that it's all about really learning the concepts more than the numbers. And yeah, that's great to to know how to do the math. But the the real issue is, do you know the physics, not just the math completely? Nick Francis  14:34 Yeah. And then how you know? How are the challenges that are being set such that you know, they really test your ability to use the calculator effectively, right? So how you know? How are you lifting the bar? And in a way, I think that's kind of what we have to do, what we have to do now, Michael Hingson  14:50 agreed, agreed. So you were in the news business and so on, and then, as you said, you left to start your own company. Why did you decide to do that? Nick Francis  14:59 Well, a friend of. Ryan and I from University had always talked about doing this rally from London to Mongolia. So, and you do it in an old car that you sort of look at, and you go, well, that's a bit rubbish. It has to have under a one liter engine. So it's tiny, it's cheap. The idea is it breaks down you have an adventure. And it was something we kind of talked about in passing and decided that would be a good thing to do. And then over time, you know, we started sending off. We you know, we applied, and then we started sending off for visas and things. And then before we knew it, we were like, gosh, so it looks like we're actually going to do this thing. But by then, you know, my job at the BBC was really taking off. And so I said, you know, let's do this, but let's make a documentary of it. So long story short, we ended up making a series of diary films for Expedia, which we uploaded onto their website. It was, you know, we were kind of pitching this around about 2005 we kind of did it in 2006 so it was kind of, you know, nobody had really heard of YouTube. The idea of making videos to go online was kind of unheard of because, you know, broadband was just kind of getting sorry. It wasn't unheard of, but it was, it was very, it was a very nascent industry. And so, yeah, we went and drove 9000 miles over five weeks. We spent a week sitting in various different repair yards and kind of break his yards in everywhere from Turkey to Siberia. And when we came back, it became clear that the internet was opening up as this incredible medium for video, and video is such a powerful way to share emotion with a dispersed audience. You know, not that I would have necessarily talked about it in that in those terms back then, but it really seemed like, you know, every every web page, every piece of corporate content, could have a video aspect to it. And so we came back and had a few fits and starts and did some, I mean, we, you know, we made a series of hotel videos where we were paid 50 quid a day to go and film hotels. And it was hot and it was hard work. And anyway, it was rough. But over time, you know, we started to win some more lucrative work. And, you know, really, the company grew from there. We won some awards, which helped us to kind of make a bit of a name for ourselves. And this was, there's been a real explosion in technology, kind of shortly after when we did this. So digital SLRs, so, you know, old kind of SLR cameras, you know, turned into digital cameras, which could then start to shoot video. And so it, there was a real explosion in high quality video produced by very small teams of people using the latest technology creatively. And that just felt like a good kind of kick off point for our business. But we just kind of because we got in in kind of 2006 we just sort of beat a wave that kind of started with digital SLRs, and then was kind of absolutely exploded when video cell phones came on the market, video smartphones. And yeah, you know, because we had these awards and we had some kind of fairly blue chip clients from a relatively early, early stage, we were able to grow the company. We then expanded to the US in kind of 2011 20 between 2011 2014 and then we were working with a lot of the big tech companies in California, so it felt like we should maybe kind of really invest in that. And so I moved out here with some of our team in 2018 at the beginning of 2018 and I've been here ever since, wow. Michael Hingson  18:44 So what is it? What was it like starting a business here, or bringing the business here, as opposed to what it was in England? Nick Francis  18:53 It's really interesting, because the creatively the UK is so strong, you know, like so many, you know, from the Beatles to Led Zeppelin to the Rolling Stones to, you know, and then on through, like all the kind of, you know, film and TV, you know, Brits are very good at kind of Creating, like, high level creative, but not necessarily always the best at kind of monetizing it, you know. I mean, some of those obviously have been fantastic successes, right? And so I think in the UK, we we take a lot longer over getting, getting to, like, the perfect creative output, whereas the US is far more focused on, you know, okay, we need this to to perform a task, and frankly, if we get it 80% done, then we're good, right? And so I think a lot of creative businesses in the UK look at the US and they go, gosh. Firstly, the streets are paved with gold. Like the commercial opportunity seems incredible, but actually creating. Tracking it is incredibly difficult, and I think it's because we sort of see the outputs in the wrong way. I think they're just the energy and the dynamism of the US economy is just, it's kind of awe inspiring. But you know, so many businesses try to expand here and kind of fall over themselves. And I think the number one thing is just, you have to have a founder who's willing to move to the US. Because I think Churchill said that we're two two countries divided by the same language. And I never fully understood what that meant until I moved here. I think what it what he really means by that is that we're so culturally different in the US versus the UK. And I think lots of Brits look at America and think, Well, you know, it's just the same. It's just a bit kind of bigger and a bit Brasher, you know, and it and actually, I think if people in the US spoke a completely different language, we would approach it as a different culture, which would then help us to understand it better. Yeah. So, yeah. I mean, it's been, it's been the most fabulous adventure to move here and to, you know, it's, it's hard sometimes, and California is a long way from home, but the energy and the optimism and the entrepreneurialism of it, coupled with just the natural beauty is just staggering. So we've made some of our closest friends in California, it's been absolutely fantastic. And across the US, it's been a fantastic adventure for us and our family. Michael Hingson  21:30 Yeah, I've had the opportunity to travel all over the US, and I hear negative comments about one place or another, like West Virginia, people eat nothing but fried food and all that. But the reality is, if you really take an overall look at it, the country has so much to offer, and I have yet to find a place that I didn't enjoy going to, and people I never enjoyed meeting, I really enjoy all of that, and it's great to meet people, and it's great to experience so much of this country. And I've taken that same posture to other places. I finally got to visit England last October, for the first time. You mentioned rugby earlier, the first time I was exposed to rugby was when I traveled to New Zealand in 2003 and found it pretty fascinating. And then also, I was listening to some rugby, rugby, rugby broadcast, and I tuned across the radio and suddenly found a cricket game that was a little bit slow for me. Yeah, cricket to be it's slow. Nick Francis  22:41 Yeah, fair enough. It's funny. Actually, we know what you're saying about travel. Like one of the amazing things about our Well, I kind of learned two sort of quite fundamentally philosophical things, I think, you know, or things about the about humans and the human condition. Firstly, like, you know, traveling across, you know, we left from London. We, like, drove down. We went through Belgium and France and Poland and Slovenia, Slovakia, Slovenia, like, all the way down Bulgaria, across Turkey into Georgia and Azerbaijan and across the Caspian Sea, and through Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, into Russia, and then down into Mongolia. When we finished, we were due north of Jakarta, right? So we drove, we drove a third of the way around the world. And the two things that taught me were, firstly that human people are good. You know, everywhere we went, people would invite us in to have meals, or they'd like fix our car for not unit for free. I mean, people were so kind everywhere we went. Yeah. And the other thing was, just, when we get on a plane and you fly from here to or you fly from London, say to we, frankly, you fly from London to Turkey, it feels unbelievably different. You know, you fly from London to China, and it's, you know, complete different culture. But what our journey towards us, because we drove, was that, you know, while we might not like to admit it, we're actually quite, you know, Brits are quite similar to the French, and the French actually are quite similar to the Belgians, and Belgians quite similar to the Germans. And, you know, and all the way through, actually, like we just saw a sort of slowly changing gradient of all the different cultures. And it really, you know, we are just one people, you know. So as much as we might feel that, you know, we're all we're all different, actually, when you see it, when you when you do a drive like that, you really, you really get to see how slowly the cultures shift and change. Another thing that's quite funny, actually, was just like, everywhere we went, we would be like, you know, we're driving to Turkey. They'd be like, Oh, God, you just drove through Bulgaria, you know, how is like, everything on your car not been stolen, you know, they're so dodgy that you Bulgarians are so dodgy. And then, you know, we'd get drive through the country, and they'd be like, you know, oh, you're going into Georgia, you know, gosh, what you go. Make, make sure everything's tied down on your car. They're so dodgy. And then you get into Georgia, and they're like, Oh my God, you've just very driven through Turkey this, like, everyone sort of had these, like, weird, yeah, kind of perceptions of their neighbors. And it was all nonsense, yeah, you know. Michael Hingson  25:15 And the reality is that, as you pointed out, people are good, you know, I think, I think politicians are the ones who so often mess it up for everyone, just because they've got agendas. And unfortunately, they teach everyone else to be suspicious of of each other, because, oh, this person clearly has a hidden agenda when it normally isn't necessarily true at all. Nick Francis  25:42 No, no, no, certainly not in my experience, anyway, not in my experience. But, you know, well, oh, go ahead. No, no. It's just, you know, it's, it is. It's, it is weird the way that happens, you know, well, they say, you know, if, if politicians fought wars rather than, rather than our young men and women, then there'd be a lot less of them. Yeah, so Well, Michael Hingson  26:06 there would be, well as I tell people, you know, I I've learned a lot from working with eight guy dogs and my wife's service dog, who we had for, oh, gosh, 14 years almost, and one of the things that I tell people is I absolutely do believe what people say, that dogs love unconditionally, unless they're just totally traumatized by something, but they don't trust unconditionally. The difference between dogs and people is that dogs are more open to trust because we've taught ourselves and have been taught by others, that everyone has their own hidden agenda. So we don't trust. We're not open to trust, which is so unfortunate because it affects the psyche of so many people in such a negative way. We get too suspicious of people, so it's a lot harder to earn trust. Nick Francis  27:02 Yeah, I mean, I've, I don't know, you know, like I've been, I've been very fortunate in my life, and I kind of always try to be, you know, open and trusting. And frankly, you know, I think if you're open and trusting with people, in my experience, you kind of, it comes back to you, you know, and maybe kind of looking for the best in everyone. You know, there are times where that's not ideal, but you know, I think you know, in the overwhelming majority of cases, you know, actually, you know, you treat people right? And you know what goes what goes around, comes around, absolutely. Michael Hingson  27:35 And I think that's so very true. There are some people who just are going to be different than that, but I think for the most part, if you show that you're open to trust people will want to trust you, as long as you're also willing to trust Nick Francis  27:51 them completely. Yeah, completely. Michael Hingson  27:54 So I think that that's the big thing we have to deal with. And I don't know, I hope that we, we will learn it. But I think that politicians are really the most guilty about teaching us. Why not to trust but that too, hopefully, will be something we deal with. Nick Francis  28:12 I think, you know, I think we have to, you know, it's, it's one of the tragedies of our age, I think, is that the, you know, we spent the 20th century, thinking that sex was the kind of ultimate sales tool. And then it took algorithms to for us to realize that actually anger and resentment are the most powerful sales tools, which is, you know, it's a it's something which, in time, we will work out, right? And I think the problem is that, at the minute, these tech businesses are in such insane ascendancy, and they're so wealthy that it's very hard to regulate them. And I think in time, what will happen is, you know, they'll start to lose some of that luster and some of that insane scale and that power, and then, you know, then regulation will come in. But you know whether or not, we'll see maybe, hopefully our civilization will still be around to see that. Michael Hingson  29:04 No, there is that, or maybe the Vulcans will show up and show us a better way. But you know, Nick Francis  29:11 oh, you know, I'm, I'm kind of endlessly optimistic. I think, you know, we are. We're building towards a very positive future. I think so. Yeah, it's just, you know, get always bumps along the way, yeah. Michael Hingson  29:24 So you named your company casual. Why did you do that? Or how did that come about? Nick Francis  29:30 It's a slightly weird name for something, you know, we work with, kind of, you know, global blue chip businesses. And, you know, casual is kind of the last thing that you would want to associate with, a, with a, with any kind of services business that works in that sphere. I think, you know, we, the completely honest answer is that the journalism course I did was television, current affairs journalism, so it's called TV cadge, and so we, when we made a film for a local charity as part of that course. Course, we were asked to name our company, and we just said, well, cash, cash casual, casual films. So we called it casual films. And then when my friend and I set the company up, kind of formally, to do the Mongol Rally, we, you know, we had this name, you know, the company, the film that we'd made for the charity, had gone down really well. It had been played at BAFTA in London. And so we thought, well, you know, we should just, you know, hang on to that name. And it didn't, you know, at the time, it didn't really seem too much of an issue. It was only funny. It was coming to the US, where I think people are a bit more literal, and they were a bit like, well, casual. Like, why casual, you know. And I remember being on a shoot once. And, you know, obviously, kind of some filmmakers can be a little casual themselves, not necessarily in the work, but in the way they present themselves, right? And I remember sitting down, we were interviewing this CEO, and he said, who, you know, who are you? Oh, we're casual films. He's like, Oh, is that why that guy's got ripped jeans? Is it? And I just thought, Damn, you know, we really left ourselves open to that. There was also, there was a time one of our early competitors was called Agile films. And so, you know, I remember talking to one of our clients who said, you know, it's casual, you know, when I have to put together a little document to say, you know, which, which supplier we should choose, and when I lay it on my boss's desk, and one says casual films, and one says agile films, it's like those guys are landing the first punch. But anyway, we, you know, we, what we say now is like, you know, we take a complex process and make it casual. You know, filmmaking, particularly for like, large, complex organizations where you've got lots of different stakeholders, can be very complicated. And so, yeah, we sort of say, you know, we'll take a lot of that stress off, off our clients. So that's kind of the rationale, you know, that we've arrived with, arrived at having spoken to lots of our clients about the role that we play for them. So, you know, there's a kind of positive spin on it, I guess, but I don't know. I don't know whether I'd necessarily call it casual again. I don't know if I'm supposed to say that or not, but, oh, Michael Hingson  32:00 it's unique, you know? So, yeah, I think there's a lot of merit to it. It's a unique name, and it interests people. I know, for me, one of the things that I do is I have a way of doing this. I put all of my business cards in Braille, so the printed business cards have Braille on them, right? Same thing. It's unique completely. Nick Francis  32:22 And you listen, you know what look your name is an empty box that you fill with your identity. They say, right? And casual is actually, it's something we've grown into. And you know it's we've been going for nearly 20 years. In fact, funny enough for the end of this year is the 20th anniversary of that first film we made for the for the charity. And then next summer will be our 20th anniversary, which is, you know, it's, it's both been incredibly short and incredibly long, you know, I think, like any kind of experience in life, and it's been some of the hardest kind of times of my entire life, and some of the best as well. So, you know, it's, it is what it is, but you know, casual is who we are, right? I would never check, you know? I'd never change it. Michael Hingson  33:09 Now, no, of course not, yeah. So is the actual name casual films, or just casual? Nick Francis  33:13 So it was casual films, but then everyone calls us casual anyway, and I think, like as an organization, we probably need to be a bit more agnostic about the outcome. Michael Hingson  33:22 Well, the reason I asked, in part was, is there really any filming going on anymore? Nick Francis  33:28 Well, that's a very that's a very good question. But have we actually ever made a celluloid film? And I think the answer is probably no. We used to, back in the day, we used to make, like, super eight films, which were films, I think, you know, video, you know, ultimately, if you're going to be really pedantic about it, it's like, well, video is a digital, digital delivery. And so basically, every film we make is, is a video. But there is a certain cachet to the you know, because our films are loved and crafted, you know, for good or ill, you know, I think to call them, you know, they are films because, because of the, you know, the care that's put into them. But it's not, it's, it's not celluloid. No, that's okay, yeah, well, Michael Hingson  34:16 and I know that, like with vinyl records, there is a lot of work being done to preserve and capture what's on cellular film. And so there's a lot of work that I'm sure that's being done to digitize a lot of the old films. And when you do that, then you can also go back and remaster and hopefully in a positive way, and I'm not sure if that always happens, but in a positive way, enhance them Nick Francis  34:44 completely, completely and, you know, it's, you know, it's interesting talking about, like, you know, people wanting to step back. You know, obviously vinyl is having an absolute as having a moment right now. In fact, I just, I just bought a new stylist for my for my record. Play yesterday. It sounded incredible as a joy. This gave me the sound quality of this new style. It's fantastic. You know, beyond that, you know, running a company, you know, we're in nine offices all over the world. We produce nearly 1000 projects a year. So, you know, it's a company. It's an incredibly complicated company. It's a very fun and exciting company. I love the fact that we make these beautifully creative films. But, you know, it's a bit, I wouldn't say it's like, I don't know, you don't get many MBAs coming out of business school saying, hey, I want to set up a video production company. But, you know, it's been, it's been wonderful, but it's also been stressful. And so, you know, I've, I've always been interested in pottery and ceramics and making stuff with my hands. When I was a kid, I used to make jewelry, and I used to go and sell it in nightclubs, which is kind of weird, but, you know, it paid for my beers. And then whatever works, I say kid. I was 18. I was, I was of age, but of age in the UK anyway. But now, you know, over the last few 18 months or so, I've started make, doing my own ceramics. So, you know, I make vases and and pictures and kind of all sorts of stuff out of clay. And it's just, it's just to be to unplug and just to go and, you know, make things with mud with your hands. It's just the most unbelievably kind of grounding experience. Michael Hingson  36:26 Yeah, I hear you, yeah. One of the things that I like to do is, and I don't get to do it as much as I would like, but I am involved with organizations like the radio enthusiasts of Puget Sound, which, every year, does recreations of old radio shows. And so we get the scripts we we we have several blind people who are involved in we actually go off and recreate some of the old shows, which is really a lot of fun, Nick Francis  36:54 I bet, yeah, yeah, sort of you know that connection to the past is, is, yeah, it's great radio. Radio is amazing. Michael Hingson  37:03 Anyway, what we have to do is to train some of the people who have not had exposure to old radio. We need to train them as to how to really use their voices to convey like the people who performed in radio, whatever they're doing, because too many people don't really necessarily know how to do that well. And it is, it is something that we're going to work on trying to find ways to get people really trained. And one of the ways, of course, is you got to listen to the old show. So one of the things we're getting more and more people to do when we do recreations is to go back and listen to the original show. Well, they say, Well, but, but that's just the way they did it. That's not necessarily the way it should be done. And the response is, no, that's not really true. The way they did it sounded natural, and the way you are doing it doesn't and there's reality that you need to really learn how to to use your voice to convey well, and the only way to do it is to listen to the experts who did it. Nick Francis  38:06 Yeah, well, it's, you know, it's amazing. The, you know, when the BBC was founded, all the news readers and anyone who appeared on on the radio to to present or perform, had to wear like black tie, like a tuxedo, because it was, you know, they're broadcasting to the nation, so they had to, you know, they had to be dressed appropriately, right, which is kind of amazing. And, you know, it's interesting how you know, when you, when you change your dress, when you change the way you're sitting, it does completely change the way that you project yourself, yeah, Michael Hingson  38:43 it makes sense, yeah, well, and I always enjoyed some of the old BBC radio shows, like the Goon Show, and completely some of those are so much fun. Nick Francis  38:54 Oh, great, yeah, I don't think they were wearing tuxedo. It's tuxedos. They would Michael Hingson  38:59 have been embarrassed. Yeah, right, right. Can you imagine Peter Sellers in a in a tux? It just isn't going to happen. Nick Francis  39:06 No, right, right. But yeah, no, it's so powerful. You know, they say radio is better than TV because the pictures are better. Michael Hingson  39:15 I agree. Yeah, sure, yeah. Well, you know, I I don't think this is quite the way he said it, but Fred Allen, the old radio comedian, once said they call television the new medium, because that's as good as it's ever going Nick Francis  39:28 to get. Yeah, right, right, yeah. Michael Hingson  39:32 I think there's truth to it. Whether that's exactly the way he said it or not, there's truth to that, yeah, but there's also a lot of good stuff on TV, so it's okay. Nick Francis  39:41 Well, it's so interesting. Because, you know, when you look at the it's never been more easy to create your own content, yeah, and so, you know, and like, in a way, TV, you know, he's not wrong in that, because it suddenly opened up this, this huge medium for people just to just create. Right? And, you know, and I think, like so many people, create without thinking, and, you know, and certainly in our kind of, in the in the world that we're living in now with AI production, making production so much more accessible, actually taking the time as a human being just to really think about, you know, who are the audience, what are the things that are going to what are going to kind of resonate with them? You know? Actually, I think one of the risks with AI, and not just AI, but just like production being so accessible, is that you can kind of shoot first and kind of think about it afterwards, and, you know, and that's never good. That's always going to be medium. It's medium at best, frankly. Yeah, so yeah, to create really great stuff takes time, you know, yeah, to think about it. Yeah, for sure, yeah. Michael Hingson  40:50 Well, you know, our podcast is called unstoppable mindset. What do you think that unstoppable mindset really means to you as a practical thing and not just a buzzword. Because so many people talk about the kinds of buzzwords I hear all the time are amazing. That's unstoppable, but it's really a lot more than a buzzword. It goes back to what you think, I think. But what do you think? Nick Francis  41:15 I think it's something that is is buried deep inside you. You know, I'd say the simple answer is, is just resilience. You know, it's, it's been rough. I write anyone running a small business or a medium sized business at the minute, you know, there's been some tough times over the last, kind of 1824, months or so. And, you know, I was talking to a friend of mine who she sold out of her business. And she's like, you know, how are things? I was like, you know, it's, it's, it's tough, you know, we're getting through it, you know, we're changing a lot of things, you know, we're like, we're definitely making the business better, but it's hard. And she's like, Listen, you know, when three years before I sold my company, I was at rock bottom. It was, I genuinely thought it was so stressful. I was crushed by it, but I just kept going. And she's just like, just keep going. And the only difference between success and failure is that resilience and just getting up every day and you just keep, keep throwing stuff at the wall, keep trying new things, keep working and trying to be better. I think, you know, it's funny when you look at entrepreneurs, I'm a member of a mentoring group, and I hope I'm not talking out of school here, but you know, there's 15 entrepreneurs, you know, varying sizes of business, doing all sorts, you know, across all sorts of different industries. And if you sat on the wall, if you were fly on the wall, and you sit and look at these people on a kind of week, month to month basis, and they all present on how their businesses are going. You go, this is this being an entrepreneur does not look like a uniformly fun thing, you know, the sort of the stress and just, you know, people crying and stuff, and you're like, gosh, you know, it's so it's, it's, it's hard, and yet, you know, it's people just keep coming back to it. And yet, I think it's because of that struggle that you have to kind of have something in built in you, that you're sort of, you're there to prove something. And I, you know, I've thought a lot about this, and I wonder whether, kind of, the death of my father at such a young age kind of gave me this incredible fire to seek His affirmation, you know. And unfortunately, obviously, the tragedy of that is like, you know, the one person who would never give me affirmation is my dad. And yet, you know, I get up every day, you know, to have early morning calls with the UK or with Singapore or wherever. And you know, you just just keep on, keeping on. And I think that's probably what and knowing I will never quit, you know, like, even from the earliest days of casual, when we were just, like a couple of people, and we were just, you know, kids doing our very best, I always knew the company was going to be a success act. Like, just a core belief that I was like, this is going to work. This is going to be a success. I didn't necessarily know what that success would look like. I just but I did know that, like, whatever it took, we would map, we'd map our way towards that figure it out. We'd figure it out. And I think, you know, there's probably something unstoppable. I don't know, I don't want to sound immodest, but I think there's probably something in that that you're just like, I am just gonna keep keep on, keeping on. Michael Hingson  44:22 Do you think that resilience and unstoppability are things that can be taught, or is it just something that's built into you, and either you have it or you don't? Nick Francis  44:31 I think it's something that probably, it's definitely something that can be learned, for sure, you know. And there are obviously ways that it can there's obviously ways it can be taught. You know, I was, I spent some time in the reserve, like the Army Reserve in the UK, and I just, you know, a lot of that is about teaching you just how much further you can go. I think what it taught me was it was so. So hard. I mean, honestly, some of the stuff we did in our training was, like, you know, it's just raining and raining and raining and, like, because all your kits soaking wet is weighs twice what it did before, and you just, you know, sleeping maybe, you know, an hour or two a night, and, you know, and there wasn't even anyone shooting at us, right? So, you know, like the worst bit wasn't even happening. But like, and like, in a sense, I think, you know, that's what they're trying to do, that, you know, they say, you know, train hard and fight easy. But I remember sort of sitting there, and I was just exhausted, and I just genuinely, I was just thought, you know, what if they tell me to go now, I just, I can't. I literally, I can't, I can't do it. Can't do it. And then they're like, right, lads, put your packs on. Let's go and just put your pack on. Off you go, you know, like, this sort of, the idea of not, like, I was never going to quit, just never, never, ever, you know, and like I'd physically, if I physically, like, literally, my physical being couldn't stand up, you know, I then that was be, that would be, you know, if I was kind of, like literally incapacitated. And I think what that taught me actually, was that, you know, you have what you believe you can do, like you have your sort of, you have your sort of physical envelope, but like that is only a third or a quarter of what you can actually achieve, right, you know. And I think what that, what the that kind of training is about, and you know, you can do it in marathon training. You can do it in all sorts of different, you know, even, frankly, meditate. You know, you train your mind to meditate for, you know, an hour, 90 minutes plus. You know, you're still doing the same. You know, there's a, there's an elasticity within your brain where you can teach yourself that your envelope is so much larger. Yeah. So, yeah, you know, like, is casual going to be a success? Like, I'm good, you know, I'm literally, I won't I won't stop until it is Michael Hingson  46:52 right, and then why stop? Exactly, exactly you continue to progress and move forward. Well, you know, when everything feels uncertain, whether it's the markets or whatever, what do you do or what's your process for finding clarity? Nick Francis  47:10 I think a lot of it is in having structured time away. I say structured. You build it into your calendar, but like, but it's unstructured. So, you know, I take a lot of solace in being physically fit. You know, I think if you're, if you feel physically fit, then you feel mentally far more able to deal with things. I certainly when I'm if I'm unfit and if I've been working too much and I haven't been finding the time to exercise. You know, I feel like the problems we have to face just loom so much larger. So, you know, I, I'll book out. I, you know, I work with a fan. I'm lucky enough to have a fantastic assistant who, you know, we book in my my exercise for each week, and it's almost the first thing that goes in the calendar. I do that because I can't be the business my my I can't be the leader my business requires. And it finally happened. It was a few years ago I kind of, like, the whole thing just got really big on me, and it just, you know, and I'm kind of, like, being crushed by it. And I just thought, you know what? Like, I can't, I can't fit other people's face mask, without my face mask being fit, fitted first. Like, in order to be the business my business, I keep saying that to be the lead in my business requires I have to be physically fit. So I have to look after myself first. And so consequently, like, you know, your exercise shouldn't be something just get squeezed in when you find when you have time, because, you know, if you've got family and you know, other things happening, like, you know, just will be squeezed out. So anyway, that goes in. First, I'll go for a bike ride on a Friday afternoon, you know, I'll often listen to a business book and just kind of process things. And it's amazing how often, you know, I'll just go for a run and, like, these things that have been kind of nagging away in the back of my mind, just suddenly I find clarity in them. So I try to exercise, like, five times a week. I mean, that's obviously more than most people can can manage, but you know that that really helps. And then kind of things, like the ceramics is very useful. And then, you know, I'm lucky. I think it's also just so important just to appreciate the things that you already have. You know, I think one of the most important lessons I learned last year was this idea that, you know, here is the only there. You know, everyone's working towards this kind of, like, big, you know, it's like, oh, you know, when I get to there, then everything's going to be okay, you know. And actually, you know, if you think about like, you know, and what did you want to achieve when you left college? Like, what was the salary band that you want? That you wanted to achieve? Right? A lot of people, you know, by the time you hit 4050, you've blown way through that, right? And yet you're still chasing the receding Summit, yeah, you know. And so actually, like, wherever we're trying to head to, we're already there, because once you get there, there's going to be another there that you're trying to. Head to right? So, so, you know, it's just taking a moment to be like, you know, God, I'm so lucky to have what I have. And, you know, I'm living in, we're living in the good old days, like right now, right? Michael Hingson  50:11 And the reality is that we're doing the same things and having the same discussions, to a large degree, that people did 50, 100 200 years ago. As you pointed out earlier, the fact is that we're, we're just having the same discussions about whether this works, or whether that works, or anything else. But it's all the same, Nick Francis  50:33 right, you know. And you kind of think, oh, you know, if I just, just, like, you know, if we just open up these new offices, or if we can just, you know, I think, like, look, if I, if I'd looked at casual when we started it as it is now, I would have just been like, absolute. My mind would have exploded, right? You know, if you look at what we've achieved, and yet, I kind of, you know, it's quite hard sometimes to look at it and just be like, Oh yeah, but we're only just starting. Like, there's so much more to go. I can see so much further work, that we need so many more things, that we need to do, so many more things that we could do. And actually, you know, they say, you know, I'm lucky enough to have two healthy, wonderful little girls. And you know, I think a lot of bread winners Look at, look at love being provision, and the idea that, you know, you have to be there to provide for them. And actually, the the truest form of love is presence, right? And just being there for them, and like, you know, not being distracted and kind of putting putting things aside, you know, not jumping on your emails or your Slack messages or whatever first thing in the morning, you know. And I, you know, I'm not. I'm guilty, like, I'm not, you know, I'm not one of these people who have this kind of crazy kind of morning routine where, like, you know, I'm incredibly disciplined about that because, you know, and I should be more. But like, you know, this stuff, one of the, one of the things about having a 24 hour business with people working all over the world is there's always things that I need to respond to. There's always kind of interesting things happening. And so just like making sure that I catch myself every so often to be like, I'm just going to be here now and I'm going to be with them, and I'm going to listen to what they're saying, and I'm going to respond appropriately, and, you know, I'm going to play a game with them, or whatever. That's true love. You know? Michael Hingson  52:14 Well, there's a lot of merit to the whole concept of unplugging and taking time and living in the moment. One of the things that we talked about in my book live like a guide dog, that we published last year, and it's all about lessons I've learned about leadership and teamwork and preparedness from eight guide dogs and my wife's service dog. One of the things that I learned along the way is the whole concept of living in the moment when I was in the World Trade Center with my fifth guide dog, Roselle. We got home, and I was going to take her outside to go visit the bathroom, but as soon as I took the harness off, she shot off, grabbed her favorite tug bone and started playing tug of war with my retired guide dog. Asked the veterinarians about him the next day, the people at Guide Dogs for the Blind, and they said, Well, did anything threaten her? And I said, No. And they said, there's your answer. The reality is, dogs live in the moment when it was over. It was over. And yeah, right lesson to learn. Nick Francis  53:15 I mean, amazing, absolutely amazing. You must have taken a lot of strength from that. Michael Hingson  53:20 Oh, I think it was, it was great. It, you know, I can look back at my life and look at so many things that have happened, things that I did. I never thought that I would become a public speaker, but I learned in so many ways the art of speaking and being relaxed at speaking in a in a public setting, that when suddenly I was confronted with the opportunity to do it, it just seemed like the natural thing to do. Nick Francis  53:46 Yeah, it's funny, because I think isn't public speaking the number one fear. It is. It's the most fit. It's the most feared thing for the most people. Michael Hingson  53:57 And the reality is going back to something that we talked about before. The reality is, audiences want you to succeed, unless you're a jerk and you project that, audiences want to hear what you have to say. They want you to be successful. There's really nothing to be afraid of but, but you're right. It is the number one fear, and I've never understood that. I mean, I guess I can intellectually understand it, but internally, I don't. The first time I was asked to speak after the World Trade Center attacks, a pastor called me up and he said, we're going to we're going to have a service outside for all the people who we lost in New Jersey and and that we would like you to come and speak. Take a few minutes. And I said, Sure. And then I asked him, How many people many people were going to be at the service? He said, 6000 that was, that was my first speech. Nick Francis  54:49 Yeah, wow. But it didn't bother me, you know, no, I bet Michael Hingson  54:54 you do the best you can, and you try to improve, and so on. But, but it is true that so many people. Are public speaking, and there's no reason to what Nick Francis  55:03 did that whole experience teach you? Michael Hingson  55:06 Well, one of the things that taught me was, don't worry about the things that you can't control. It also taught me that, in reality, any of us can be confronted with unexpected things at any time, and the question is, how well do we prepare to deal with it? So for me, for example, and it took me years after September 11 to recognize this, but one of the things that that happened when the building was hit, and Neither I, nor anyone on my side of the building really knew what happened. People say all the time, well, you didn't know because you couldn't see it. Well, excuse me, it hit 18 floors above us on the other side of the building. And the last time I checked X ray vision was fictitious, so nobody knew. But did the building shake? Oh, it tipped. Because tall buildings like that are flexible. And if you go to any tall building, in reality, they're made to buffet in wind storms and so on, and in fact, they're made to possibly be struck by an airplane, although no one ever expected that somebody would deliberately take a fully loaded jet aircraft and crash it into a tower, because it wasn't the plane hitting the tower as such that destroyed both of them. It was the exploding jet fuel that destroyed so much more infrastructure caused the buildings to collapse. But in reality, for me, I had done a lot of preparation ahead of time, not even thinking that there would be an emergency, but thinking about I need to really know all I can about the building, because I've got to be the leader of my office, and I should know all of that. I should know what to do in an emergency. I should know how to take people to lunch and where to go and all that. And by learning all of that, as I learned many and discovered many years later, it created a mindset that kicked in when the World Trade Center was struck, and in fact, we didn't know until after both towers had collapsed, and I called my wife. We I talked with her just before we evacuated, and the media hadn't even gotten the story yet, but I never got a chance to talk with her until after both buildings had collapsed, and then I was able to get through and she's the first one that told us how the two buildings had been hit by hijacked aircraft. But the mindset had kicked in that said, You know what to do, do it and that. And again, I didn't really think about that until much later, but that's something that is a lesson we all could learn. We shouldn't rely on just watching signs to know what to do, no to go in an emergency. We should really know it, because the knowledge, rather than just having information, the true intellectual knowledge that we internalize, makes such a big difference. Nick Francis  57:46 Do you think it was the fact that you were blind that made you so much more keen to know the way out that kind of that really helped you to understand that at the time? Michael Hingson  57:56 Well, what I think is being blind and growing up in an environment where so many things could be unexpected, for me, it was important to know so, for example, when I would go somewhere to meet a customer, I would spend time, ahead of time, learning how to get around, learning how to get to where they were and and learning what what the process was, because we didn't have Google Maps and we didn't have all the intellectual and and technological things that we have today. Well intellectual we did with the technology we didn't have. So today it's easier, but still, I want to know what to do. I want to really have the answers, and then I can can more easily and more effectively deal with what I need to deal with and react. So I'm sure that blindness played a part in all of that, because if I hadn't learned how to do the things that I did and know the things that I knew, then it would have been a totally different ball game, and so sure, I'm sure, I'm certain that blindness had something to do with it, but I also know that, that the fact is, what I learned is the same kinds of things that everyone should learn, and we shouldn't rely on just the signs, because what if the building were full of smoke, then what would you do? Right? And I've had examples of that since I was at a safety council meeting once where there was somebody from an electric company in Missouri who said, you know, we've wondered for years, what do we do if there's a fire in the generator room, in the basement, In the generator room, how do people get out? And he and I actually worked on it, and they developed a way where people could have a path that they could follow with their feet to get them out. But the but the reality is that what people first need to learn is eyesight is not the only game in town. Yeah, right. Mean, it's so important to really learn that, but people, people don't, and we take too many things for granted, which is, which is really so unfortunate, because we really should do a li

Jonathan Wall is the CEO at Runloop.ai, working on enterprise-grade infrastructure and execution environments for AI coding agents.The Future of AI Agents is Sandboxed // MLOps Podcast #353 with Jonathan Wall, CEO at Runloop.ai.Join the Community: https://go.mlops.community/YTJoinInGet the newsletter: https://go.mlops.community/YTNewsletterShoutout to  @runloop-ai  for powering this MLOps Podcast episode.// AbstractEveryone's arguing about agents. Jonathan Wall says the real fight is about sandboxes, isolation, and why most “agent platforms” are doing it wrong.// BioJon was the techlead of Google File System, a founding engineer at Google Wallet, and then the founder of Inde, which was acquired by Stripe. He is building Runloop.ai to bridge the production gap for AI Agents by building a one-stop sandbox infrastructure for building, deploying, and refining agents. // Related LinksWebsite: runloop.aiBlogs and content at https://www.runloop.ai/~~~~~~~~ ✌️Connect With Us ✌️ ~~~~~~~Catch all episodes, blogs, newsletters, and more: https://go.mlops.community/TYExploreJoin our Slack community [https://go.mlops.community/slack]Follow us on X/Twitter [@mlopscommunity](https://x.com/mlopscommunity) or [LinkedIn](https://go.mlops.community/linkedin)] Sign up for the next meetup: [https://go.mlops.community/register]MLOps Swag/Merch: [https://shop.mlops.community/]Connect with Demetrios on LinkedIn: /dpbrinkmConnect with Jon on LinkedIn: /jonathantwall/

I do a dive into the trades this past week and talk about why some GM's understand what it takes and others seem to always miss the mark. I touch on the plight of the Buffalo Sabres and a few other things. Sign up to become a Friend of the Show to access a Slack community, behind the scenes content, discounts on merch, and more: https://www.patreon.com/dropping_glovesFollow the Show:MerchPatreonFacebookInstagramTwitter / XYouTube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today's episode is another Instagram Live session, in which the Caleb discusses a variety of topics. Caleb offers insights into business operations, including the challenges of winter work, managing equipment maintenance through systems like Slack and GPS tracking, and the crucial importance of financial planning and cash flow projection with the help of a fractional CFO, Cycle CPA. Additionally, he promotes several industry contacts and companies, shares details about upcoming Hardscape Academy training sessions, and discusses the significance of key performance indicators like Revenue Per Hour and struggles with job costing. LeanScaper Revenue Intensive (January 20 & 21, 2026 in January 20 & 21) Auman Landscape on YouTube Primed For Growth www.companycam/kcpodcast Company Cam- 50% for 2 months! Linktree/AumanLandscape @aumanlandscapellc www.CycleCPA.com  Use code: Auman and save $200 when signing up. LMN Software Save on onboarding! Code: AUMAN

Growing up in the Midwest during the 1980s, Kristi Straw was raised with traditional values of being the quiet, grateful “good girl," don't speak too boldly, and never outshine others. Alongside this mandate to be humble and accommodating came the classic Midwestern lessons in kindness, like let others go first at an intersection, and cook a pot roast for the new neighbors. But lurking underneath the surface was an undercurrent of self-diminishment. These expectations and beliefs would be both barriers and fuel for Kristi's eventual rise in the corporate world. Leaning into relentless drive and adaptability, she climbed from individual contributor to bank president and C-suite executive in just a few years. But behind the impressive title and substantial paycheck was a steadily growing sense of inauthenticity. She describes years of “chameleonizing” or masking her true self to fit an environment that wasn't built for her bold ideas, her height, or her emerging leadership voice. Ultimately, her success required constant shape-shifting and sacrificing parts of herself, a survival tactic rooted in childhood messages about what women “should” be. Everything came to a head when, after finally reaching the top, Kristi realized three hours into her dream job that she simply couldn't conform anymore. She found herself lying on her office floor with the stark realization that this life was no longer "fine." The money, status, and access couldn't mask the fundamental misalignment between who she was becoming and who she wanted to be. That raw acknowledgment sparked her greatest pivot yet. Now, Kristi is fiercely committed to building communities based on authentic connection, collaboration, and high standards of integrity. As a coach and author, she champions what she calls “psychological agility,” aka the ability to adapt, stay open to surprise, and continually learn regardless of the outcome. I suspect you'll relate to her story of realizing that sometimes the most successful-looking life is in fact the one that's keeping you furthest from your true potential. And that no matter what, you have to find the courage to break the rules that never fit you in the first place. Kristi's Hype Song All I Do is Win https://youtu.be/GGXzlRoNtHU?si=9dwag_ZqVPmTJhgV Resources Website: www.LighthouseLeadershipConsultants.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kstrawmba/ Instagram: @LighthouseLeadershipConsultant Invitation from Lori:This episode is sponsored by Zen Rabbit. Smart leaders know trust is the backbone of a thriving workplace, and in today's hybrid whirlwind, it doesn't grow from quarterly updates or the occasional Slack ping. It grows from steady, human communication. Plenty of companies think they're doing great because they host all-staff meetings, keep “open door” policies, and throw the occasional team-building event. Meanwhile, leaders who truly care about culture are choosing better tools. That's where I come in. Forward-thinking organizations bring me in to create internal podcasts that connect people through real stories, honest conversations, and genuine community—your old printed newsletter reinvented for the way people actually work now....

Welcome to Week 1 of 12 Weeks of Wintering! We're diving into the power of Visioning: not just setting goals, but creating an expansive picture of the life and version of yourself you want to become. Hear my own story of building a "successful" freelance events business that checked all the boxes on paper, but didn't align with who I actually wanted to be. You'll learn: Why it's helpful to set goals that actually feed your vision Permission to be super expansive in your vision How freelancers can use visioning when times are tough 12 Weeks of Wintering is a practice I'm sharing while I'm on parental leave. Each week offers a Wintering theme, with a minisode like this, an email companion, and reflection prompt so you can add some Being back into all your Doing. Join the free Wintering Club to add community and accountability to your being practice! You'll find: Access to a private Slack chat where you can respond to a prompt around each week's theme and connect with other creatives doing this work Monthly virtual meet-ups to unpack the practices, facilitated by Angie Lake (who'll be holding down the fort while I'm on leave) Think of this as a coaching practice you can take at your own pace. It's an invitation to reset and make time for the reflection and just being that you've been putting off. Join my email list and invite others to do the same to get the rest of 12 Weeks of Wintering in my inbox, and to hear when I return from leave in the spring.

Regulators finally caught up to how business actually happens: over text, WhatsApp, and mobile apps. In this year-end conversation, David Cowen sits down with Matt Rasmussen, Founder of ModeOne, to unpack why off-channel mobile data has become a $6B compliance problem and a massive opportunity for legal, IT, and ops professionals. Listeners will walk away with a clear view of where regulation is heading, where talent demand is exploding, and how to future-proof a legal career without chasing hype. Key Topics Covered Why email, Slack, and Teams are no longer enough to satisfy regulators and what replaces them The regulatory shift driving mobile collection at unprecedented scale (from 12 phones to 10,000+) The hidden "tax" of smartphone non-compliance, including billions in fines and stranded hardware How remote, scoped mobile collection reduces privacy risk while increasing defensibility Where talent demand is surging most: corporate legal, legal ops, and forensic hybrid roles How to use the "12% AI dividend" to pivot into high-growth forensic and compliance work A practical weekend playbook for upskilling: case law, OS changes, and encryption updates Special Shoutout:  Scott Milner – Recognized for bridging deep technical expertise with practical leadership in eDiscovery and regulatory strategy Greg Mazares – ModeOne board member and trusted mentor, shaping how technology is applied to real client problems Jerry Bui (Purpose) – Cited for his perspective on the growing importance of forensics in modern legal workflows Nathaniel Whittemore – Host of The AI Daily Brief, referenced for framing the MIT insight on task-level automation Joseph Pochron – Nardello, recommended as a future guest for his visibility into corporate investigations and compliance Anthony Cardine  – O'Melveny & Myers, highlighted for his leadership at the intersection of eDiscovery, paralegal teams, and operational change

Video zur Episode Text-/Audio-/Videokommentar einreichen HS-Hörer:innen im Slack treffen Aus der Preshow Weihnachtsmärkte, Mandeln, Nachbarn, aus der Erinnerung HS Workshops Neue Workshops geöffnet: Fotoprojekte & Großformat HS Workshop-Newsletter Testimonials von Workshopteilnehmern gesucht Alte Newsletter funktionieren nicht mehr, bitte neu anmelden Neue Newsletter Statt Werbung DANKE an alle Spender – speziell für Auphoniczeit von Alexandra und … „#922 – Drecksbatzen!“ weiterlesen

In this episode of Disguised Coverage, Anthony is joined by Kendall Mirsky to provide a film breakdown of every single play from the Buffalo Bills defense in the 2nd half vs the New England Patriots. What they did, why it worked, how it ties into the bigger picture, and much more0:00 | Opening thoughts 23:04 | Play 126:35 | Play 232:19 | Play 341:05 | Play 443:03 | Play 546:17 | Play 652:07 | Play 71:01:27 | Play 81:08:29 | Play 91:13:56 | Play 101:17:14 | Play 111:20:23 | Play 121:28:18 | Play 131:32:44 | Play 141:38:23 | Play 151:42:13 | Play 161:45:06 | Play 171:49:14 | Play 181:58:32 | Play 192:05:07 | Closing thoughts2:06:48 | One Pie Pizza and Toys for Tots 2:09:10 | Closing thoughts continuedPresenting Sponsor - One Pie Pizza https://www.onepiepizza.com/ Elevated Catering of Buffalo https://elevatedcateringbuffalo.com/Tell them Cover 1 and Disguised Coverage sent you!!Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Pro__AntFollow on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/proant.bsky.socialCover 1 would love to hear your thoughts on this topic and the show in general. Comment below and let us what you think!One Pass Premium Membership - https://www.cover1.net/onepass/Don't miss out on our PREMIUM CONTENT-Access to detailed Premium Content.-Access to our video library.-Access to our private Slack channel.-Sneak peek at upcoming content.-Exclusive group film room sessions & much more.Thank you for watching this video, we can't do it without the support of our fans. If you have any ideas for content you'd like to see from us, comment below. -DOWNLOAD THE COVER 1 MOBILE APP!► Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.coverapp► iOS: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/id1532587486► Subscribe to our YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClL6eJS1s8xmRoYRQbYgxQQ?sub_confirmation=1► Subscribe to our Cover 1 Network channel - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/cover-1-sports/id1370162953 -Cover 1 provides a multi-faceted analysis of the NFL and NFL Draft including Podcasts, Video blogs, Commentary, Scouting Reports, Highlights, and Video Breakdowns. NFL footage displayed is not owned by Cover 1. -Follow Us HereTwitter: https://twitter.com/Cover1Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/@Cover_1_Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Cover1NFL/Official Merchandise:https://teespring.com/en-GB/stores/cover-1The Cover1.net website and associated Social Media platforms are not endorsed by, directly affiliated with, maintained, authorized, or sponsored by the NFL or any of its clubs, specifically the Buffalo Bills. All products, marks, and company names are the registered trademarks of their original owners. The use of any trade name or trademark is for identification and reference purposes only and does not imply any association with the trademark holder of their product brand.

Shoutout to all the single parents out there! You make the holidays happen for your families.

How do players react when one of their teammates issues an ultimatum to force a move away from the club? Is it easy to forgive, or does it permanently damage relationships in the dressing room? The guys also dive into football superstitions — what rituals did they cling to during goal droughts, and did doubt start to creep in when the goals weren't coming? Gary, Alan and Micah round things off by comparing their Fantasy Football performances, who's on top right now? They also discuss The Rest Is Football's particularly high ranking The Rest Is Football is powered by Fuse Energy. To sign up and for terms and conditions, visit fuseenergy.com/football. Introducing Save Your WayTM from Hotels.com. Get instant savings now with Member Prices, or bank as rewards for later. Learn more at hotels.com/product/save-your-way-uk/ Join The Players Lounge: The official fantasy football club of The Rest Is Football. It's time to take on Gary, Alan and Micah for the chance to win monthly prizes and shoutouts on the pod.  It's FREE to join and as a member, you'll get access to exclusive tips from Fantasy Football Hub including AI-powered team ratings, transfer tips, and expert team reveals to help you climb the table - plus access to our private Slack community. Sign up today at therestisfootball.com https://therestisfootball.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=episode_description&utm_content=link_cta For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enjoy the What's Bruin Show Network!Multiple shows to entertain you on one feed:Support WBS at Patreon.com/WhatsBruinShow for just $2/month and get exclusive content and access to our SLACK channel.Twitter/X: @whatsbruinshow        Instagram: @whatsbruinshowCall the What's Bruin Network Hotline at 805-399-4WBS (Suck it Reign of Troy)We are also on YouTube HEREGet Your WBSN MERCH - Go to our MyLocker Site by Clicking HEREWhat's Bruin Show- A conversation about all things Bruin over drinks with Bruin Report Online's @mikeregaladoLA, @wbjake68 and friends!Subscribe to the What's Bruin Show at whatsbruin.substack.comEmail us at: whatsbruinshow@gmail.comTweet us at: @whatsbruinshowWest Coast Bias - LA Sports (mostly Lakers, Dodgers and NFL) with Jamaal and JakeSubscribe to West Coast Bias at wbwestcoastbias.substack.comEmail us at: WB.westcoastbias@gmail.comTweet us at: @WBwestcoastbiasThe BEAR Minimum - Jake and his Daughter Megan talk about student life and Cal Sports during her first year attending UC Berkeley.Subscribe to The BEAR Minimum at thebearminimum.substack.comEmail us at: wb.bearminimum@gmail.comTweet us at: @WB_BearMinimumPlease rate and review us on whatever platform you listen on.

#329: Vibe coding - the practice of casually prompting AI to generate code solutions - has become increasingly popular, but its limitations become apparent when applications need to scale beyond personal use. While AI-assisted development can be powerful for proof of concepts and small internal tools, the transition from vibe-coded solutions to production-ready applications often requires experienced engineers to rebuild from scratch. The conversation explores three distinct levels of software development: personal tooling, internal applications, and public-facing systems. Each level demands different approaches, with vibe coding being most suitable for the first category but potentially problematic as complexity increases. The analogy of cooking illustrates this well - anyone can make a simple meal, but feeding hundreds of people requires professional expertise and proper infrastructure. Technical debt in the AI era presents new challenges and opportunities. Traditional software engineering principles like DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself) and clean code practices may matter less when AI can quickly refactor and improve code. The future likely involves hybrid teams where business experts work alongside experienced engineers, with AI agents handling implementation details. Darin and Viktor examine how pair programming is evolving from developer-to-developer collaboration to human-to-AI partnerships, fundamentally changing how software gets built and maintained.   YouTube channel: https://youtube.com/devopsparadox   Review the podcast on Apple Podcasts: https://www.devopsparadox.com/review-podcast/   Slack: https://www.devopsparadox.com/slack/   Connect with us at: https://www.devopsparadox.com/contact/

I talked to Cody about his time in the show, his rare disease that cut his career short and his gig now of training the best players on the planet, and how the hell he owns a pro pickle-ball team. Sign up to become a Friend of the Show to access a Slack community, behind the scenes content, discounts on merch, and more: https://www.patreon.com/dropping_glovesFollow the Show:MerchPatreonFacebookInstagramTwitter / XYouTube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

#MentorshipPodcast #FinanceCareer #ConsultingJourney #BCG #Vision2030 #CareerGrowth #InternationalBusiness #leadershiplessons Claudio shares his incredible global journey — from starting in European finance and insurance, to working on Vision 2030 transformation projects in Saudi Arabia, and later joining BCG in management consulting. His story is a masterclass in adaptability, mentorship, and lifelong learning across borders.

 Are Real Madrid still struggling to find the right balance, and is Jude Bellingham being played out of position? Despite an away win at Alavés, questions remain over the performance, and frustration is growing among some Madridistas with Xabi Alonso. Raphinha is finally back after an injury-hit start to the season, and he made an immediate impact with two goals to keep Barcelona four points clear at the top of La Liga. Seven straight wins for the Blaugrana, can anyone catch them? Gary and Alex also break down Antoine Griezmann's brilliant winner as Atlético Madrid stay in touch with the title race Join The Players Lounge: The official fantasy football club of The Rest Is Football. It's time to take on Gary, Alan and Micah for the chance to win monthly prizes and shoutouts on the pod. It's FREE to join and as a member, you'll get access to exclusive tips from Fantasy Football Hub including AI-powered team ratings, transfer tips, and expert team reveals to help you climb the table - plus access to our private Slack community. Sign up today at: therestisfootball.com https://therestisfootball.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=episode_description&utm_content=link_cta For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this episode of The Impostor Syndrome Files, we dive into what it really means to lead with courage and integrity in complex and sometimes disheartening environments. My guest this week is Dr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves, historian, women's leadership expert and author of Leading with Courage: A Career-Long Guide for Idealistic Women. Jodi brings decades of experience in higher education, feminism and mentorship, and shares how she's translating these values into community leadership and career coaching.Together, we explore what it looks like to lead from your values, even in systems that don't always reward that. Jodi opens up about the grief she feels as DEI efforts are increasingly under attack, but also the hope she sees in those continuing the work. We talk about managing your idealism over the course of a career, how to build coalitions for change from inside large institutions and how to define your legacy through the lives you touch, not just the structures you build. She also shares powerful insights on intergenerational mentorship, networking for values-aligned connection and how to stay grounded when perfectionism and urgency take over.About My GuestDr. Jodi Vandenberg-Daves is a leadership strategist, coach, consultant, facilitator, editor, and author.  Her work with organizations and individuals builds on more than 25 years of experience in higher education, non-profit leadership, authorship, teaching, and mentoring. She empowers leaders and facilitates career journeys for people at all stages, with an emphasis on values, social impact, and creating inclusive communities. She is especially committed to developing diverse women's leadership.  With a doctorate in History, Jodi taught and held leadership roles for many years at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, focusing on systems of privilege and inequality and social change. Her specialties include women's history and gender, race, and leadership. She also directed her community's Diversity Council.Jodi is the author of Modern Motherhood: An American History (Rutgers University Press, 2014). Her latest book, Leading with Courage: Empowering Women for Impactful Careers, is available for purchase.~Connect with Jodi:Leadership Course: https://www.jodivandenberg-daves.com/onlineleadershipcourseWebsite: https://www.jodivandenberg-daves.com/Book: https://bookshop.org/lists/leading-with-courage-a-career-long-guide-for-idealistic-women~Connect with Kim and The Impostor Syndrome Files:Join the free Impostor Syndrome Challenge:https://www.kimmeninger.com/challengeLearn more about the Leading Humans discussion group:https://www.kimmeninger.com/leadinghumansgroupJoin the Slack channel to learn from, connect with and support other professionals: https://forms.gle/Ts4Vg4Nx4HDnTVUC6Join the Facebook group:https://www.facebook.com/groups/leadinghumansSchedule time to speak with Kim Meninger directly about your questions/challenges: https://bookme.name/ExecCareer/strategy-sessionConnect on LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimmeninger/Website:https://kimmeninger.co

Much of the discussion revolves around business management and growth strategies within the green industry, including a focus on the benefits and challenges of hiring and managing a Virtual Assistant (VA), discussing topics like onboarding, delegation, and specialization. The hosts, Caleb and Britney Alman, also cover aspects of business systems and Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), touch on financial and equipment pricing methods using LMN software, and mention team communication tools like Slack.  LeanScaper Revenue Intensive (January 20 & 21, 2026 in January 20 & 21) Auman Landscape on YouTube Primed For Growth www.companycam/kcpodcast Company Cam- 50% for 2 months! Linktree/AumanLandscape @aumanlandscapellc www.CycleCPA.com  Use code: Auman and save $200 when signing up. LMN Software Save on onboarding! Code: AUMAN

Sunderland make it seven wins from seven as they beat fierce local rivals Newcastle in the derby. Are Eddie Howe's problems growing as he tries to fit Nick Woltemade into Newcastle's established system, and do they lack the energy that drove last season's success? Manchester City look like they're finally back — but just how much of that revival is down to the man in form, Phil F***ing Foden**? Enzo Maresca raises eyebrows with a cryptic post-match interview that hints at a lack of backing from the ownership. Is support behind the scenes starting to crack? Plus, Gary, Alan and Micah debate Arsenal's struggles to break down low blocks and ask whether the Gunners have become too reliant on Bukayo Saka The Rest Is Football is powered by Fuse Energy. To sign up and for terms and conditions, visit fuseenergy.com/football.Join The Players Lounge: The official fantasy football club of The Rest Is Football. It's time to take on Gary, Alan and Micah for the chance to win monthly prizes and shoutouts on the pod. It's FREE to join and as a member, you'll get access to exclusive tips from Fantasy Football Hub including AI-powered team ratings, transfer tips, and expert team reveals to help you climb the table - plus access to our private Slack community. Sign up today at therestisfootball.com. https://therestisfootball.com/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=episode_description&utm_content=link_cta For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Kris and David are joined by Beau James (@KingofKingsport) and Robert O'Connor (@ghostofquinones) to discuss the week-plus that was December 10-17, 1993, our annual holiday spectacular dropping just in time for Chanukkah!!!! Topics of discussion include:Ted Turner giving a state of WCW speech to the company staff for the first time ever.WCW officially firing Sid Vicious and Davey Boy Smith and how that affected creative plans.Terry Funk and potential assistant Eddie Gilbert being rumored to be coming in to replace Dusty Rhodes as WCW's head booker(s).Paul Roma turning heel on Erik Watts to join Paul Orndorff and The Assassin.Big year-end shows from NJPW and WAR.Akira Hokuto announcing her retirement.The tragic death of Larry Cameron after suffering a mid-match heart attack in Germany.Terry Funk introducing his “Few Good Men” in ECW.What exactly down at the infamous SMW show in Wise, Virginia via as the Torch's very detailed, well-reported cover story.Eddie Gilbert returning to the USWA on a show where Jerry Lawler and Brian Christopher also introduce the fans to “Bertha,” a.k.a. Bert Prentice in Dolly Parton-themed drag to counteract Toni Adams at ringside.How new TV censorship guidelines could affect the WWF and pro wrestling in general.Vince McMahon sitting down with Owen Hart on TV to talk about his issues with his brother, Bret.Hulk Hogan is the Leader of the Gamg (He Is).This was a CLASSIC show, and we hope that everyone has a great holiday season!!!Timestamps:0:00:00 WCW1:17:52 Int'l: NJPW, WAR, Michinoku Pro, SPWF, FULL, UWFi, Akira Hokuto, AJW, India, WWS, Larry Cameron, CWA, CMLL, & UWA2:16:04 Classic Commercial Break2:20:25 Halftime2:55:07 Other USA: IWC (Skoler), ECW, PWF (Stallion/South), SMW, USWA, Big D, & GWF5:45:51 WWFTo support the show and get access to exclusive rewards like special members-only monthly themed shows, go to our Patreon page at Patreon.com/BetweenTheSheets and become an ongoing Patron. Becoming a Between the Sheets Patron will also get you exclusive access to not only the monthly themed episode of Between the Sheets, but also access to our new mailbag segment, a Patron-only chat room on Slack, and anything else we do outside of the main shows!If you're looking for the best deal on a VPN service—short for Virtual Private Network, it helps you get around regional restrictions as well as browse the internet more securely—then Private Internet Access is what you've been looking for. Not only will using our link help support Between The Sheets, but you'll get a special discount, with prices as low as $1.98/month if you go with a 40 month subscription. With numerous great features and even a TV-specific Android app to make streaming easier, there is no better choice if you're looking to subscribe to WWE Network, AEW Plus, and other region-locked services.For the best in both current and classic indie wrestling streaming, make sure to check out IndependentWrestling.tv and use coupon code BTSPOD for a free 5 day trial! (You can also go directly to TinyURL.com/IWTVsheets to sign up that way.) If you convert to a paid subscriber, we get a kickback for referring you, allowing you to support both the show and the indie scene.To subscribe, you can find us on iTunes, Google Play, and just about every other podcast app's directory, or you can also paste Feeds.FeedBurner.com/BTSheets into your favorite podcast app using whatever “add feed manually” option it has.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/between-the-sheets/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Hourly billing was keeping Jeremy Slack stuck — exhausted, underpaid, and working late nights just to stay afloat. In this powerful case study, Michelle Weinstein talks with Jeremy about how he restructured his firm, replaced his salary, and added $425K in annual retainers by shifting to a value-based model. From sleepless nights and a demanding boss to landing multi–six-figure clients and quitting his job, Jeremy shares what changed when he stopped selling time and started selling results. His story is proof that confidence, clarity, and the right system can transform both your business and your life.

This Week In Startups is made possible by:LinkedIn Ads - http://linkedin.com/thisweekinstartupsDevStats - https://www.devstats.com/twistCrusoe - https://crusoe.ai/buildToday's show: FINALLY, you can hang out with Kylo Ren and Olaf the Snowman… thanks to the magic of AI.On TWiST, we're digging into the mega OpenAI-Disney deal. Mickey is giving Sam Altman a $1 billion investment AND will allow is copyrighted characters to appear in Sora and ChatGPT images.Of course, Jason predicted this would happen WAY BACK during the summer months and even showed off his “Darth Calacanis” creation on the “All-In Podcast.”PLUS Amazon has been launching and pulling AI features from Prime Video… what gives? Jason's predictions on the coming AI blowback and who's on what side. Why he's so focused on Education, Health Care, and Housing as issues. AND why founders should always take calls from Big Companies, even if it might just be a fishing expedition.It's a new Friday TWiST! Check it out!Timestamps:(00:00) Lon joins Alex and Jason to talk about the big Disney-OpenAI deal bringing Disney characters to Sora(03:10) Jason totally called the Disney-OpenAI stuff on All-In(9:42) LinkedIn Ads: Start converting your B2B audience into high quality leads today. Launch your first campaign and get $250 FREE when you spend at least $250. Go to http://linkedin.com/thisweekinstartups to claim your credit.(18:59) DevStats - DevStats integrates your dev work and your business goals into a shared language that everyone can understand. Get 20% off, plus access to their dedicated Slack channel. Just go to https://www.devstats.com/twist.(20:15) Why Amazon Prime Video pulled its AI recaps and anime dubs(24:44) Who gets to set the rules around AI: The Debate Continues(26:13) Jason's predictions on the AI blowback coming in 2026… with clips!(30:11) Crusoe Cloud: Crusoe is the AI factory company. Reliable infrastructure and expert support. Visit https://crusoe.ai/build to reserve your capacity for the latest GPUs today.(31:21) Is AI here to help people or replace them?(35:55) It's all about EHH: Education, Health Care, Housing(40:47) How all of this and MORE will be impacted directly by AI automation(45:35) Why Alex wants to lower the temperature around AI Doomerism(51:19) JUST FOR FOUNDERS: When should you take a call from a BigCo?(53:45) Why Jason thinks just about everyone in media will lose to TikTok and YouTubeSubscribe to the TWiST500 newsletter: https://ticker.thisweekinstartups.com/Check out the TWIST500: https://twist500.comSubscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp*Follow Lon:X: https://x.com/lons*Follow Alex:X: https://x.com/alexLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexwilhelm/*Follow Jason:X: https://twitter.com/JasonLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis/*Thank you to our partners:(9:42) LinkedIn Ads: Start converting your B2B audience into high quality leads today. Launch your first campaign and get $250 FREE when you spend at least $250. Go to http://linkedin.com/thisweekinstartups to claim your credit.(18:59) DevStats - DevStats integrates your dev work and your business goals into a shared language that everyone can understand. Get 20% off, plus access to their dedicated Slack channel. Just go to https://www.devstats.com/twist.(30:11) Crusoe Cloud: Crusoe is the AI factory company. Reliable infrastructure and expert support. Visit https://crusoe.ai/build to reserve your capacity for the latest GPUs today.