Business Confidential Now with Hanna Hasl-Kelchner

Nobody expects workplace violence to happen where they work. But when the extraordinary happens to ordinary people like you and me it rattles your sense of safety.

As a responsible business leader and manager, it makes you wonder what if anything you could have done to prevent the unthinkable from happening where you work.

That’s why I’m excited to welcome Felix Nater, a workplace violence prevention expert, who says most businesses are thinking about this explosive problem all wrong.

* What size a business needs to be before considering workplace violence prevention planning.

* The “red flags” managers should keep on their radar screen to anticipate and mitigate workplace violence.

* Why the term workplace violence includes much more than going “postal.”

* How employees’ home life spills into work life and impacts workplace violence.

* Steps small businesses can take to promote a culture of safety and workplace violence prevention.

* How organizations inadvertently heighten the risk of workplace violence.

* Why effective leadership requires a humanistic perspective to achieve meaningful workplace violence prevention.

* And much MORE.

Felix Nater specializes in helping organizations solve issues around aspects of workplace security and workplace violence prevention.

He is a nationally recognized as a highly-skilled Workplace Violence Prevention Consultant and Advisor, is the President and owner of the security management consulting firm Nater Associates, Ltd., and co-author of Combating Workplace Violence: Creating and Maintaining Safe Work Environments.

His thought leadership has been showcased in articles published in nationally recognized publications which reach a global audience of professional security, facility and human resources providers. His extensive experience in mitigating the threat of workplace violence has been shared with a variety of private, corporate and government clients through presentations, workshops & training sessions, as well as panel discussions.

Contact Felix and connect with him on LinkedIn and Twitter.

You might also enjoy Felix’s interview on Bullying: The Cruel Link to Workplace Violence.

Visit his website for more insights and resources on workplace violence prevention and check out his new book – Combating Workplace Violence: Creating and Maintaining Safe Work Environments.

If you enjoyed this interview you might also enjoy our other episodes about Corporate Governance and Culture.

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Skeptical buyers are everywhere these days. With a mountain of information coming at us from all directions, it’s really no surprise.

But what if you’re trying to sell to skeptical buyers? Jeremy Miner, today’s guest, shares what do you absolutely need to know to be successful.

* Why all of us are skeptical buyers

* Brain triggers that happen in the first 7 – 12 seconds of any sales interaction  

* How to disarm the biases of skeptical buyers

* How to use Neuro Emotional Persuasion Questioning (NEPQ) when speaking with skeptical buyers

* And MUCH more.

Jeremy Miner is the Chairman of 7th Level, a global sales training company, an organization that was ranked #1 by INC magazine in 2020 and 2021 as among the fastest growing companies in the USA.

He has been featured in Forbes, USA Today, Entrepreneur magazine, the Wall Street Journal, and a host of other publications on the topic of sales, persuasion, and the role of psychology and human behavior in the buying process.

Jeremy’s particular brand of sales training pioneers the unique use of behavioral science and human psychology within the sales process and reflects his extensive study of the subject from Utah Valley University.

He says his scientific method of selling has helped over 393,000+ salespeople in 37 countries over the last three years, helping them achieve 3x, 5x, and even 10x more sales results. And he’s put some of that wisdom between 2 covers in his new book, The New Model of Selling: Selling to an Unsellable Generation.

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Sales episodes.

Contact Jeremy and connect with him on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

Check out his latest book — The New Model of Selling: Selling to an Unsellable Generation

Visit Jeremy’s website for free resources to start selling more of your products and services.

Rating and reviewing the show helps us grow our audience and allows us to bring you more of the rich information you need to succeed from our high powered guests. Leave a review at Lovethepodcast.com/BusinessConfidential.

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Cultural agility is a leadership skill many executives, managers and entrepreneurs don’t typically think about.

But the ability to work effectively with people from different cultures is increasingly important as domestic workplaces become more diversified and as more businesses expand their markets overseas.

It can be challenging, but Prof. Paula Caligiuri, a Distinguished Professor of International Business at Northeastern University offers guidance for more success.

• Why cultural agility matters
• How cultural agility is a combination of nature and nurture
• The self-assessment tool to help you identify your own stereotypes that limit your cultural agility
• The three categories of competencies that can improve your cultural agility
• PLUS so much more!

Paula Caligiuri is a Distinguished Professor of International Business at Northeastern University. She researches and consults in the areas of expatriate management, global leadership development, and cultural agility.

She has served as an Area Editor for the Journal of International Business Studies and as a Senior Editor for the Journal of World Business.

Paula has also been a frequent expert guest on CNN and CNN International and is an instructor for LinkedIn Learning courses.

She was a semi-finalist for the 2021 Forbes “50 over 50” for co-founding a public benefit corporation, Skiilify, to help foster cross-cultural understanding.

Paula holds a Ph.D. from Penn State in Organizational Psychology and is a Fellow of both the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology and the Academy of International Business.

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Corporate Governance and Culture episodes.

Contact Prof. Caligiuri and connect with her on LinkedIn.

Check out her book, Build Your Cultural Agility: The Nine Competencies of Successful Global Professionals

Learn more about Skiilify, her public benefit corporation that helps foster cross-cultural understanding

Take a self-assessment and learn more about MyGuiide

Rating and reviewing the show helps us grow our audience and allows us to bring you more of the rich information you need to succeed from our high powered guests. Leave a review at Lovethepodcast.com/BusinessConfidential.

Joining the Business Confidential Now family is easy and lets you have instant access to the latest tactics, strategies and tips to make your business more successful.

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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hannahaslkelchner.substack.com

Transitioning from corporate to entrepreneur sounds like a dream come true for many. But what’s the best way to do it? What do you need to look out for?

Doc Wright, founder of The Wright Edge shares the lessons learned from his successful journey. 

• How a side hustle assisted Doc in transitioning from corporate to entrepreneur
• The network connection that put The Wright Edge on the path to profitability
• The business mentoring needed to fill the gaps when transitioning from corporate to entrepreneur
• The benefits of financial bootstrapping
• Why identifying your market niche is essential when transitioning from corporate to entrepreneur
• PLUS so much more!

Doc is the Founder and Master Craftsman at The Wright Edge, a custom furniture maker that creates massive, 100% handmade live edge tables and artwork for hotels, businesses, and anyone looking for a distinctive statement piece for their home.

Their creative work has recently attracted a lot of interest from the woodworking industry, and Fortune 500 companies, including The Ritz Carlton, Marriott Hotels, Tesla, Toyota, and AIG, are among their list of clientele.

They have also designed specific pieces for world-famous rock stars and major sports athletes such as Mat Fraser (5-time Crossfit Games Champ) and Cole Hamels (2008 World Series MVP).

Like many entrepreneurs, Doc had a career in corporate America but left his 9-to-5 when he found custom woodworking as a way to escape the monotony and stress of his daily grind as an oil geologist.

His decision to take the risk of leaving a secure and well-paying job to follow his passion for woodworking paid off. In less than four years, Doc was able to grow his company from his backyard and garage into a market leader in the high-end custom live edge craftsmanship industry, bringing in over seven figures in revenue annually.

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Entrepreneurship and Start-up Life episodes.

Contact Doc and connect with him on Instagram.

Also be sure to check out the beautiful wood creations on his business website.

Rating and reviewing the show helps us grow our audience and allows us to bring you more of the rich information you need to succeed from our high powered guests. Leave a review at Lovethepodcast.com/BusinessConfidential.

Joining the Business Confidential Now family is easy and lets you have instant access to the latest tactics, strategies and tips to make your business more successful.

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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hannahaslkelchner.substack.com

Business planning can feel like an intimidating process. If the very thought of writing one makes your eyes glaze over, fasten your seat belt as certified SCORE mentor Carl Baumann explains why crafting a business plan is a dynamic roadmap to more business success.  

• How business planning leads to more achievement and success 
• The essential elements of a solid business plan
• Where entrepreneurs often get stuck in business planning process and how to get unstuck
• The amount of detail your need for business planning
• The biggest mistake entrepreneurs make in business planning
• PLUS much more to increase your business planning success

Carl Baumann is a certified business mentor with SCORE specializing in counseling in business planning, strategic planning, general management and management finance & accounting. Carl has an impressive track record in helping clients successfully launch their businesses and create hundreds of new jobs in the local community in the process. 

Carl teaches business planning courses and seminars for SCORE at various continuing education venues in the Chapel Hill, NC area and his practical, down-to-earth teaching style has made him a popular mentor.

Carl’s work with SCORE is the culmination of a 34 year career, some of it in commercial banking with First Citizens Bank and most of it with the Miller Brewing Company in numerous financial positions including Brewery Controller, Corporate Controller and Group Director – Sales & Marketing Finance. 

Carl earned a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from UNC Chapel Hill and an Executive MBA from the Peter F. Drucker Graduate School of Management, Claremont Graduate University, Claremont, CA.

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Entrepreneurship episodes.

Contact Carl and connect with him on LinkedIn, and Twitter.

Carl’s suggested resources for effective business planning referenced during the interview:

• SBTDC Business Start-Up Resource Guide
• Building a Sustainable Business – A Guide to Developing a Business Plan for Farms and Rural Businesses developed by the Minnesota Institute for Sustainable Agriculture. Co-Published by The Sustainable Agriculture Network
• Strategic Thinking for Smaller Businesses and Divisions by William Lasher
• 
  
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Badass leadership may sound dangerous, but today’s guest, David Wood author of Mouse in the Room: Because the Elephant isn’t Alone, says playing it safe is actually MORE dangerous. OMG!

• How to be the badass leader people want to work with
• How badass leadership empower other by being appropriately vulnerable
• Why badass leadership requires self-awareness
• How badass leadership names the elephant in the room
• PLUS so much more!

After life as a consulting actuary to Fortune 100 Companies, David built the world’s largest coaching business, becoming #1 on Google for “life coaching”.

He believes the tough conversations we avoid are our doorways to confidence, success and even love – in both work and life. David coaches high-performing entrepreneurs, executives and teams – and even prison inmates – to amazing results AND connection. One conversation at a time.

Ferreting out those important conversations is the topic of his latest book, Mouse in the Room: Because the Elephant isn’t Alone

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Leadership and Management as well as Communications episodes.

Contact David and connect with him on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.

Learn more about David’s business

Discover David’s Tough Talks podcast

Check out his latest book: Mouse in the Room: Because the Elephant isn’t Alone

Check out David’s FREE download at MouseInTheRoom  (the link is in the top left corner)

Rating and reviewing the show helps us grow our audience and allows us to bring you more of the rich information you need to succeed from our high powered guests. Leave a review at Lovethepodcast.com/BusinessConfidential.

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Initial public offerings (IPOs) tapping capital markets on Wall Street sounds glamorous and are a terrific way to fuel business expansion plans. But too many small and mid-cap companies find themselves at a serious disadvantage after they’ve gone public.

Adam J. Epstein believes many of those IPOs facing challenges are rooted in some very common pre-IPO mistakes.

Discover what they are and how to be better prepared for them.

• How pre-IPO mistakes plague IPOs and their financing options
• Why historic deal data matters to IPOs
• The most common mistake companies make when picking an investment banker and how it affects IPOs
• How mutual funds run circles around small and mid-cap companies and what you can do about it
• PLUS so much more

Adam J. Epstein is a nationally recognized small-cap expert and advisor to the boards of pre-IPO and small-cap companies through his firm, Third Creek Advisors, LLC (TCA).

Prior to TCA, Adam was a long-tenured institutional investor, an experience which gives him a comparative perspective on why some small and mid-cap companies are more successful in their post-IPO financing efforts than others.

He speaks monthly at corporate governance and investor conferences, and is a distinguished National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD) Board Leadership Fellow and faculty member.

Adam is also the small-cap contributing editor for Directorship magazine, the boardroom intelligence publication of the National Association of Corporate Directors, as well as the author of the best-selling book The Perfect Corporate Board: A Handbook for Mastering the Unique Challenges of Small-Cap Companies.

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Finance episodes.

Contact Adam and connect with him on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Learn more about Third Creek Advisors, LLC

Learn more about the National Association of Corporate Directors

Rating and reviewing the show helps us grow our audience and allows us to bring you more of the rich information you need to succeed from our high powered guests. Leave a review at Lovethepodcast.com/BusinessConfidential.

Joining the Business Confidential Now family is easy and lets you have instant access to the latest tactics, strategies and tips to make your business more successful.

Follow on your favorite podcast app here as well as on Twitter, Facebook, 

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hannahaslkelchner.substack.com

Conquering the fear of conflict at work is one way smart leaders and good bosses set themselves apart from the rest. But how do you do that?

Few people enjoy conflict. Most avoid it and get defensive. And those who do like conflict are often thought of as bullies.

Dr. Debra Dupree shares how to handle difficult conversations at work with grace.

* Why so many leaders fear conflict at work and avoid it,

* How to get past the “fight or flight” triggers when managing conflict at work,

* The two-part communication strategy that can defuse conflict at work,

* How mindset shifts help develop the courage to overcome the fear of conflict at work, and

* Much more.

Dr. Debra Dupree, the MINDSET Doc, has long been inspired to help others grow out of their FEAR of CONFLICT. She saw her own family-owned business embroiled in differences and disagreements, leading to dashed dreams, damaged relationships, and broken hearts.  She turned these early experiences into a lifetime of study and application to the business world, working with leaders at all levels of an organization.

As she sees it, people have a financial, and a personal, need to work but work doesn’t always feel ‘psychologically safe’ – and this is true at every level of the organization. Dr. D works with individuals and organizations to show up in ways that matter with influence, persuasion, and cohesion to make collaborative and meaningful environments.

Today, she takes her world-wide community to a new level of understanding with empathy and compassion using strategic skills and techniques that turn challenging confrontations into curious conversations for learning, living and growing for cohesive workplaces.

Dr. Debra is a Dispute Resolution Specialist, Conflict | Leadership Coach, and International Trainer and Keynote Speaker. She is also the host of the bi-weekly podcast ‘Decoding the Conflict Mindset’ bringing ‘thought leaders’ from various disciplines to her worldwide community to gain insight on self and others in challenging conversations, when high emotions run high, facing tough negotiations and confrontations. She is also the host and creator of “The Agile Lawyer-Mediator Interview Series” – a virtual mentorship from 12 topnotch advocates and mediators throughout the U.S.A. And all applicable to the world of business

Debra delivers training and coaching throughout North America, Europe, Australia, India and the Pacific Rim in leadership strategies, workplace conflict intervention strategies and advanced negotiation skills for leaders and dispute resolution professionals, bringing to her participants a unique perspective on the brain science behind people in conflict.

She was awarded recognition as one of the top ten trainers globally by SkillPath Corporate Strategies in 2016 and designated as a ‘Super SMART Mediator’ by the Federal Executive Board in 2008. Dr. D was the former Director of Training for Mediation Training Institute (MTI), training professionals to become workplace mediators throughout North America.

She currently serves on the the Employment Mediation Panel and Faculty for the American Arbitration Association (AAA), on the Board of Directors for the Southern California Mediation Association (SCMA), and on the Planning Committee for the ABA Advanced Mediation Strategies Section.

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Leadership and Management episodes.

Contact Dr. Dupree and connect with her on 

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hannahaslkelchner.substack.com

Sales quotas can often feel like the brass ring that’s just out of reach. But they don’t have to be. Today’s guest, Steve Weinberg, has tips for not only MEETING sales quotas, but also on how to EXCEED them.

Who wouldn’t want to be a sales star?

* The biggest problem with sales quotas,

* How poor hiring, poor leadership, and poor onboarding contributes to missed sales quotas,

* The critical importance of proper customer prospecting,

* How to get past gatekeepers, and

* Much more.

Steve Weinberg has spent his life selling and helping others sell better, more, and faster. He is an expert at building, guiding, and sustaining high caliber sales teams, and creating exemplary standards in account management. He has authored Above Quota Performance to transfer his knowledge to others that want to improve their sales results.

Steve has closed over $500 million in new business. His sales have included many leading global corporations, including Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, eBay, PayPal, Google, Facebook, Prudential, and Costco.

He has over three decades of leadership experience in sales, including Vice Presidencies at Dun & Bradstreet Software, AC Nielsen, Solcorp (then part of EDS, now HP), and at Deloitte and Touche.

He recently led the Accuity (now Lexis Nexis Risk) sales team to new sales accomplishments. While at Accuity as a salesperson and simultaneously as a manager of a team of salespeople, Steve closed the largest sale in the company’s history and was the top selling salesperson in the company many times, as he was for other companies.

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Sales episodes.

Contact Steve and connect with him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter.

Check out his website, SteveWeinbergSales.com 

 And his book: Above Quota Performance

Customer frustration is something we’ve all experienced and can relate to. When it happens to us we’re more likely to tell our family and friends about it than complain to the people who can really fix the problem.

That’s exactly why when a customer, client, guest, or patient complains about something it’s a terrific opportunity to turn lemons into lemonade and Janelle Barlow tells us how. 

* Most common ways businesses mishandle complaints and increase customer frustration,

* Why the pressure of reducing customer complaints creates vanity metrics

* The mindset service reps need to truly reduce customer frustration,

* Why businesses fail to see customer complaints as opportunities,

* How to avoid the compassion fatigue that results from dealing with customer frustration, and

* MUCH more.

Janelle is an award-winning speaker, trainer, consultant and author who translates research into practical tools to improve customer service and complaint handling.

She works with Customer Service Representatives, managers and entire companies, both nationally and internationally, to help them recover and retain customer loyalty.

She has recently released the third edition of her bestseller (more than 275,000 copies sold to date), A Complaint Is a Gift: How to Learn from Critical Feedback and Recover Customer Loyalty

If you liked this interview, you might also enjoy our other Customer Satisfaction episodes.

Contact Janelle and connect with her on LinkedIn.

Check out her business website and her best-selling book now in it’s 3rd edition, A Complaint is a Gift: How to Learn from Critical Feedback and Recover Customer Loyalty.

FREE DOWNLOAD by Janelle Barlow: “Actually, We should Want to Hear Customer Complaints.”