My guest on this episode is Eric Zenor, a learning and development expert and consultant with over 35 years focused on educational technology.  Eric shares his wealth of experience working with integrating AI into the learning and development space.  He shares the complexity of leveraging AI and the complexity of understanding and using AI and how it is rapidly changing the landscape of not just learning and development, but organizations in general.  He shares how AI can be an accelerator and is enabling organizations to move into the space of being learning organizations. One great example Eric discusses is the potential of AI to access and organize corporate knowledge from various sources. He explains how AI can easily codify explicit knowledge from documents, databases, and guidelines, but also go beyond by making sense of implicit knowledge from meeting recordings, emails, and chats. AI can identify patterns from these data and even infer tacit knowledge based on personal experiences, insights, and intuition. This combined knowledge can then be made accessible to employees based on their roles and needs. Zenor further describes a hybrid model, known as retrieval automated generation (RAG) architecture, which connects different systems to access and utilize this knowledge. If you want to learn more about Eric’s work and AI, check out his company, Epam, which is one of the market leaders in AI architecture, and their website has tons of information on those accelerators that he discusses in the podcast.

My guest this episode is Grace Judson, a trainer, leader, consultant, and author.  Grace shares her insights and ideas around helping organizations and leaders guide change, by focusing on the people and culture.  We discuss the central role of emotions around change efforts, both personal and organizational.  You can check out more of her wisdom and perspective in her monthly newsletter, The Leadership Leap, where she demystifies the art of change leadership.

My guest this episode is Miriam Dicks, who is an executive and management consultant, and founder of the 180 Management Group.  She began her journey in operations area of mergers and acquisitions.  She has leveraged her knowledge of what makes organizations successful.  She now is focused on mission-driven organizations, helping non-profits, faith-based organizations manage change.  She shares her expertise surrounding the unique challenges of mission-driven, non-profit organizations.  We discuss the challenges of these type of organizations transitioning from small start-ups to sustainable, scalable, effective organizations. 

My guest this episode is Michael Clifford, who combines his unique talents of zoo science and conservation with his expertise in organization development and change in his role as the Strategy Director for Reverse the Red. Reverse the Red is a global movement that ignites strategic cooperation and action to ensure the survival of wild species and ecosystems and reverse the negative trend of biodiversity loss. Michael shares how he utilizes OD concepts in facilitating strategic change and building partnerships and coalitions, among governments, various partner organizations, and communities.  We discuss how he uses his unique skill set to facilitate change, in an environment where he has no authority or power, just the ability to understand ecosystems and systems in general, and the ability to cast a vision and provide a pathway for change to occur.  The chat is a great example of process consulting skills in action.  The conversation also highlights the value of cross-cultural competencies in working within diverse communities and systems.  Michael mentions that with 196 different countries, there are 196 different ways of approaching conservation.

My guest this episode is Ron Banerjee, who is an experienced Change Leader, Financial Advisor, Speaker, Author, and Innovator.  Ron is also the Vice President of Partnerships and Affiliations for the International Organization Development Association (IODA).  Ron shares his Rapid Response Organization Development (RROD) model, which is featured in a chapter of the recently released book, “Building a Coaching Culture”.  Ron and I discuss the value of approaching OD efforts rapidly and how the process does not necessarily need to take a year to intervene in an organization.  Ron shares his interactions with Ed Schein and David Cooperrider in the development of his RROD model.  The model is a great tool to have for anyone who is tasked with guiding change in an organization.

My guest this episode is Dave Jamieson, Ph. D., retired professor and president of the Jamieson Consulting Group. He is passionate about coaching & teaching to change the way we change & change the way we lead.  He is dedicated to organizational leaders becoming more skilled at change leadership and systemic solutions and integrating the increasing complexity of technology with the need of supporting the humanity of their employees and customers.  We discuss how many people in organizations do change in ways that doesn’t pay enough attention to what it takes for human beings to move past their resistance and to be a part of the change.  Much of the focus is on what it is about the work that needs to change and overlooks the role of the people in change.  Dave discusses how change itself is changing.  The environment used to be stable which allowed change to be something you could manage as a separate project.  Today, the change must be integrated with the people who are doing the work and be led by those directly engaged with the change.  The need now is to approach change from a very systemic lens, and we need to understand the complexity and disruptive nature of change in very interdependent systems.

My guest this episode is Scott Spradlin, who is a consultant, educator & media developer at Wise Mind, Wise Life: Engage, Enchant, Elevate.  Scott is a licensed Dialectical Behavior Therapist, and author of the book, “Don't Let Your Emotions Run Your Life: How Dialectical Behavior Therapy Can Put You in Control”.  Scott provides education and workshops on Dialectic Behavior Therapy (DBT), Mindfulness, and has a special passion for working with those with ADHD.  We discuss the changing landscape of mental health practices and dive into what is meant by wisdom and having a wise mind.  Scott shares his ideas and strategies on more deeply understanding one’s self, managing one’s emotions, and living your best life. Scott shares his insights and perspective on what is meant by the idea of dialectic and what is so impactful about the use of DBT as an approach to mental health. 

My guest this episode is Mary Quant.   Mary combines her unique skills in organization development and design thinking, to partner with global business leaders to accelerate business strategies and execute people- and organization-focused solutions. We discuss how she works with cross-functional teams to challenge the status quo and navigate ambiguity at the intersection of people experience, design thinking and technology.  She describes how she uses visual sensemaking in guiding change along with culture mapping.  Mary shares her passion and obsession with helping individuals, teams and organizations achieve peak performance, and helping them create healthy, creative, and inclusive cultures. We discuss some creative and innovate ways to work in the virtual space so many organizations are operating in.

My guest this episode is Kathryn Goetzke, the Chief Hope Officer at the Shine Hope Company.  She is activating the science of hope globally.  She shares her personal story and her passion around the science of hope and how she is bringing her ideas to organizations, schools, and communities around the globe.  We discuss the widespread pattern of a sense of hopelessness, especially among our youth.  She shares some of her fundamental ideas, which you can find in her recent book, The Biggest Little Book About Hope.

My guest this episode is Dr. Brandon Rogers.  He shares his insightful and powerful story of his educational journey and his professional journey and how has and continues to leverage his passion for people and systems into helping organizations thrive.  He has worked with a wide range of organizations, including cyberspace, automotive, and the software industry, among others. We discuss the challenges and rewards of beginning and maintaining a solo organization development consulting company.