Body of Work

The advice most leaders hear about handling public pressure is wrong. Dr. Melody Rose has lived the reality of it — as a professor, department head, university chancellor, president of a struggling Catholic institution, and now an executive search leader helping shape the next generation of higher-ed leadership.

If you're navigating high-stakes leadership, an institutional turnaround, or a career pivot that's forcing you to rethink who you are, this conversation offers a rare inside look at what actually holds up when the scrutiny is real. Julie and Melody trace the lessons that came from leading through crisis, raising four kids along the way, and discovering how family, humility, and emotional intelligence became strategic advantages — not distractions.

You'll hear:

• Why "soft skills" like adaptability, compassion, and self-awareness are really the essential skills of modern leadership
• How boards can do a better job evaluating candidates for crisis, ambiguity, and public-facing roles
• Why higher education leadership is changing faster than ever, and what that means for today's presidents and chancellors
• What it feels like to step out of a highly visible CEO role and find unexpected peace behind the scenes
• How Melody's work with the arts, including the Oregon Ballet Theatre, connects culture, community, and economic revitalization

Melody also opens up about the personal moments that made her rethink everything — realizing she'd missed friends' health crises while leading through COVID, relearning everyday tasks after years with large staffs, and finding out who really shows up once the title is gone. It's a candid, deeply human conversation about leadership, change, and what actually matters when life gets quieter. Essential listening for executives, higher-ed leaders, board members, and anyone rethinking what success should look like in this next season of work and life.

Guest Bio

Melody Rose, Ph.D., is Senior Partner in the Higher Education and Leadership Advisory practice at WittKieffer, where she helps boards, university presidents, and cabinet-level teams navigate change, strategy, governance, and crisis communications. Her own career reads like a masterclass in steady leadership under pressure: she led the Nevada System of Higher Education through COVID (100,000 students, three universities, four community colleges, and 25,000 employees), served as president of a small Catholic university she ultimately helped close with grace and integrity, and became the Oregon University System's first female chancellor, overseeing seven public universities and a billion-dollar budget. A first-generation college graduate and political scientist by training, she's the author of five books, founder of the Center for Women's Leadership at Portland State, and current Chair of the Oregon Ballet Theatre's Board of Trustees. She lives in Oregon, where she raised her four children and still finds her happy place on the Oregon coast.

What happens when life asks you to hold grief and joy in the same hand? In this episode, host Julie talks with Sarah Greenman — artist, writer, executive coach, and nonprofit leader — about the threshold moments that reshape a life.

Sarah traces her path from executive director to consultant, writer, and book coach, and speaks openly about caregiving for her medically complex son, Charlie, and what that experience has taught her about grief, disability, and staying in right relationship with the people around her. She and Julie dig into the value of curiosity, the courage it takes to hold more than one truth at once, and what it looks like to build a life around reciprocity, creativity, and presence.

The conversation also turns personal, as Sarah reflects on coming out later in life, learning to take herself less seriously, and making room for a fuller, more honest version of who she is.

This is an episode for anyone in the middle of their own transition — a candid, generous invitation to tell the truth and build something like paradise, right where you are.

About Sarah Greenman Sarah Greenman (she/they) is an artist, author, playwright, executive coach, facilitator, and nonprofit leader at large based in rural Oregon. Sarah's work is informed by place and rooted in a core framework of joy, justice, inclusion, reciprocity, and anti-racist praxis. She has deep experience as a nonprofit leader, community organizer, project manager, facilitator, artist, and storyteller, and has served in a wide range of creative and administrative roles across sectors. Sarah was trained and worked as a birth and death doula, and she brings this lens to her work with coaching clients and organizational consultation. Sarah's deepest joys in life are her two children, Charlie and Kelly, her partner Kelly, and her creative practice.

AI is moving fast, but Preston Callicott thinks the real shift hasn't even started yet. If you're building, investing, or leading through this moment, his take on what's actually coming next is worth fifteen minutes of your attention.

Julie sits down with Preston for a wide-ranging conversation about the lessons that shaped his career, from growing up an Army brat with a special forces dad to building businesses across HP, AMD, Price Waterhouse, and more than a dozen startups. Along the way, he explains how "adapt, improvise, overcome" became more than a family motto, why he learned early to ignore stupid rules, and how a childhood fascination with "spooky action at a distance" turned into a lifelong pull toward quantum, science, and the unseen.

You'll hear how Preston thinks about pivots, risk, and building in the field instead of hiding out at headquarters. He shares the story of being nudged out of engineering and into customer-facing work, why he kept leaving megacorps for startups, and what he took from both a successful exit and a genuine failure. He also makes the case for judging AI by outcomes instead of hype, and argues the most important question in tech right now is the one most people skip: why.

The conversation turns personal as Preston and Julie dig into what it means to build faster than ever with AI in the mix, why that might be making us smarter in some ways and dumber in others, and why critical thinking, philosophy, and ethics matter more now than they used to. If you're trying to understand where technology is really headed and how to stay relevant inside it, this one gives you a clear, sharp lens.

Preston also opens up about spirituality, curiosity, and the value of good conflict, including the salons he hosts to bring interesting people together for real debate. Essential listening for anyone who cares about entrepreneurship, AI, quantum, and the kind of thinking that helps you keep pace with a world moving this fast.

In this episode, Julie sits down with her nephew David Harrelson (he/him) — Cultural Resources Department Manager for the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde and a tribal member with 22 years of service — for one of those rare conversations that moves easily between the personal and the profound.

David talks about what summer camp taught him about leadership, why eight years as a wildland firefighter changed how he thinks about land management, and why he believes most of Oregon's public lands are dangerously undermanaged. He shares the indigenous philosophy of "may we have enough to share," the Edo-period Japanese concept of "just enough," and three practical strategies for staying grounded in community work without burning out.

He also introduces amaa Wines — his self-described "ultimate side quest" — and why he believes Oregon's world-class wine region is missing a crucial voice.

His closing advice: know the stories of the place you call home. Start with the indigenous ones.

Connect with David and his work:

• Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde: grandronde.org
• Chachalu Museum & Cultural Center: chachalu.org
• amaa Wines: amaawine.com
• Instagram: @amaawines

Join Julie in conversation with Libra Forde, Executive Director of the Women's Foundation of Oregon. Libra has spent her career asking one question: what can I do today to make the road easier for the next generation? In this episode, she shares the personal experiences, hard-won wisdom, and unstoppable sense of fairness that fuel her advocacy for women and families across Oregon.

Julie and Candace Beeke are friends and colleagues who share a love of community, food, family and Portland. Check out their conversation about leaders and why we do what we do.

Candace is the publisher of the Portland Business Journal, a mom and a convener of smart people building a better future.

In this introductory episode of Body of Work, host Julie Harrelson shares the story behind the podcast and what you can expect from future conversations. Julie talks about why the idea of a “body of work” matters—not just as a résumé or a list of achievements, but as the sum of the choices, relationships, and risks that shape a meaningful life.