Daily Influence

Leaders often say, “I wish my people would take more ownership.”

They want employees to take initiative, solve problems, make decisions, and accept accountability. But there's another question leaders need to ask:

Have we actually given people something they can own?

In Episode 808 of Daily Influence, Brian Smith explores the relationship between responsibility, authority, clarity, and genuine employee ownership.

Assigning responsibility while retaining control over every meaningful decision doesn't create ownership—it creates dependency. And when employees are repeatedly required to seek approval, criticized for taking a different approach, or punished whenever a mistake occurs, leaders may unintentionally train them to stop taking initiative altogether.

Drawing from SMART Management and The I in Team Series, Brian discusses why autonomy requires greater clarity, not less management, and why leaders must learn to distinguish between achieving the right outcome and simply doing something the leader's preferred way.

If you want accountable, confident decision-makers on your team, you have to create the conditions that allow them to become exactly that.

You can't demand ownership without being willing to give it. 

On Episode 807 of Daily Influence, Brian Smith sits down with Barry Moline, author of Connect: How to Quickly Collaborate for Success in Business and Life, longtime CEO, speaker, and Cialdini Licensed Trainer, for a conversation about what really creates strong teams and meaningful influence.

Barry challenges the idea that great teamwork begins with a leader orchestrating every interaction. Instead, leaders can create stronger teams by helping people genuinely get to know one another, build trust, and develop the relationships that make collaboration possible.

Brian and Barry also explore the difference between ethical influence and manipulation, how principles such as liking, unity, authority, social proof, and scarcity affect our decisions, and why becoming aware of the influence around us can help us become more responsible influencers ourselves.

Finally, they turn to AI and the changing workplace. As technology makes organizations more efficient, leaders face an increasingly important responsibility: making sure efficiency doesn't come at the expense of human connection.

In this episode:

Why strong teams begin with relationships, not forced teamwork

How leaders can create opportunities for authentic connection

The difference between ethical influence and manipulation

How influence and persuasion show up in everyday business

Why AI should support human judgment rather than replace it

How leaders can protect relationships as technology changes the workplace

Why meaningful change often starts by simply taking action

Barry leaves listeners with a straightforward challenge: pay attention to the influence happening around you—and then take charge of the influence you choose to create.

https://barrymoline.com/

[email protected]

What happens when an entrepreneur stops chasing ideas and starts paying closer attention to the problems people face every day?

On this episode of Daily Influence, host Gregg-Brooke Koleno sits down with Samuel Ayo Oyedemi, founder of SCAP, a technology platform helping consumers better understand the ingredients, allergens, additives, and other information found in food and personal care products.

Samuel shares his journey from Nigeria to Canada and the United States, including nearly two years of testing ideas, navigating setbacks, and questioning his path as an entrepreneur. What began as a mobile self-checkout concept eventually evolved into a platform focused on food intelligence, product transparency, and informed consumer decision-making.

Samuel explains why successful innovation requires more than a good idea. It requires listening to customers, challenging assumptions, recognizing when timing is wrong, and being willing to pivot without abandoning the larger purpose.

In this conversation, Gregg and Samuel explore:

• Why Samuel believes leadership is rooted in responsibility, accountability, and compassion

• How SCAP evolved from frictionless checkout technology into a food and product intelligence platform

• How entrepreneurs can determine when a pivot represents progress rather than failure

• The responsibility technology companies have when influencing health and purchasing decisions

• Why keeping the customer at the center creates better products and better business decisions

• How Samuel uses the “law of process” to remain patient when growth takes longer than expected

• Why learning to fail faster, adapt, and move forward can make entrepreneurship more sustainable

• How paying attention to everyday problems can become the starting point for positive, responsible influence

Samuel also challenges listeners to identify a problem they genuinely care about, understand why solving it matters, and take one intentional step toward creating meaningful change.

This episode is a practical conversation about resilience, entrepreneurship, responsible leadership, innovation, and turning setbacks into information that helps you build something better.

Connect with Samuel:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/samuelayooyedemi/

https://www.instagram.com/useskaap/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/useskaap/home/

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Businesses are under constant pressure to do more with less—automate more, reduce costs, increase productivity, adopt AI, and move faster.

But what happens when efficiency starts working against the organization?

In this episode of Daily Influence, Brian Smith explores the critical difference between efficiency and effectiveness. Drawing from his experience as a Six Sigma Master Black Belt, the principles of SMART Management, and The I in Team Series, Brian challenges leaders to look beyond speed, cost reduction, and productivity metrics and ask a more important question:

Are we actually making the organization more effective?

Brian examines how seemingly efficient decisions can create unintended consequences for employees, communication, institutional knowledge, creativity, and ultimately the customer experience. He also explores the danger of managing metrics instead of managing the business—and why critical thinking and clarity must come before optimization.

The takeaway is simple:

Efficiency is a tool. Effectiveness is the objective.

Before making something faster, cheaper, or more automated, make sure it's something worth optimizing in the first place.

What if the fastest way to create meaningful change is to slow down and have the right conversations first?

In this episode of Daily Influence, Gregg-Brooke Koleno speaks with Adam Braus, professor, author, entrepreneur, founder of Elton University, and author of Leading Change at Work. Adam introduces Nemawashi, a Japanese approach to organizational change that he describes as “piecemeal consensus” developing an idea through individual conversations before asking a group to make a formal decision.

Adam explains how leaders and employees at every level can use Nemawashi to overcome “permission paralysis,” gather honest input, improve ideas, and build genuine support without manipulating people into accepting a predetermined outcome. Rather than relying on top-down announcements, the process allows change to spread through an organization through trust, collaboration, and shared ownership.

The conversation also explores Adam’s work with Elton University, a nonprofit institution designed around personalized, one-on-one education. He explains how its evidence-based, student-directed MBA and PhD programs challenge the traditional factory model of higher education by building each student’s curriculum around their specific goals.

Listeners will learn:

• How Nemawashi can reduce resistance to organizational change

• Why consensus building is different from seeking permission

• How leaders can unlock the collective intelligence of their teams

• Why ego can undermine otherwise promising change initiatives

• How personalized education can connect learning to real-world goals

• Why emotional honesty strengthens professional and personal relationships

• One conversation to initiate before advocating for your next idea

This episode offers a practical framework for leading change with greater patience, humility, responsibility, and respect for the people affected by the decision.

Connect with Adam Braus:

Website: elton.university

Email: [email protected]

Podcast: Solutions from the Multiverse

The interview focuses on Nemawashi, collaborative change leadership, personalized higher education, professional credibility, and the value of honest communication.

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What happens when you achieve the goal you thought would change everything—and discover it doesn't?

On Episode 803 of Daily Influence, Brian Smith sits down with Paralympic world-record holder Mikael Avatar for a conversation about achievement, identity, happiness, presence, and the small changes that can transform how we lead and live.

Born with cerebral palsy and surrounded by assumptions about what he would never be able to do, Mikael developed an extraordinary determination to pursue what others believed was impossible. That journey eventually took him to the Paralympic Games and a world record in the long jump.

But achieving the goal didn't create the fulfillment Mikael expected.

He shares what that experience taught him about looking inward rather than continually chasing the next external accomplishment. Brian and Mikael explore how the same pattern appears in business, where leaders can become consumed by the next revenue target, acquisition, promotion, or milestone without ever asking what fulfillment and excellence actually mean to them.

They also discuss the power of being fully present, why seemingly insignificant changes can create powerful chain reactions, and how interrupting an automatic behavior can fundamentally change the way a leader responds under pressure.

This conversation is a reminder that achievement matters—but it does not define us. Lasting influence is built through self-awareness, intentional choices, consistent behaviors, and how we show up every day.

Learn more about Mikael Avatar and his work at mikaelavatar.com.

In a world of instant information, AI, real-time dashboards, and constant communication, leaders face growing pressure to have an answer—and to have it immediately.

But access to information isn't the same as good judgment.

In Episode 802 of Daily Influence, Brian Smith explores why responsible leadership sometimes requires the confidence to say, “I don't know,” “I need more information,” or “I haven't considered that.”

Brian examines the difference between confidence and certainty, why ego can cause leaders to defend decisions long after the facts have changed, and how credibility can actually grow when a leader is honest about what they don't know.

Because people aren't only watching you after you've figured everything out. They're watching how you listen, who you involve, whether you remain curious, and how you behave while you're figuring it out.

Responsible influence isn't about always having the answer. It's about being responsible for how you lead when you don't.

What becomes possible when people feel safe enough to speak honestly?

In this episode of *Daily Influence*, Gregg-Brooke Koleno speaks with Rhonda Liebig a vitality coach, speaker, media host, and founder of Fresh Talks Global Vision and the #SpeakerLockingArms movement.

Rhonda shares how learning to use her voice transformed her health, confidence, relationships, leadership, and ability to serve others. She explains why emotional safety and personal accountability are not competing ideas, but essential parts of authentic communication and responsible influence.

Listeners will learn how to recognize the patterns that keep them silent, regulate emotional reactions, communicate difficult truths constructively, and create environments where people feel seen, heard, and respected. Rhonda also discusses the importance of journaling, self-awareness, nervous-system regulation, intentional leadership, and building relationships with people who genuinely support personal growth.

This conversation offers practical guidance for anyone who wants to stop blaming and shaming, strengthen their voice, and use their influence to create healthier families, workplaces, businesses, and communities.

Connect with Rhonda:

Website: rhondaliebig.com/tree 

Facebook Group: Fresh Talks Global Vision

The episode centers on finding one’s voice, reducing blame and shame, creating emotionally safe conversations, and balancing vulnerability with accountability.

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Eight hundred episodes. Eight hundred conversations about leadership, business, culture, communication, responsibility, resilience, and the choices we make every day.

For this milestone episode of Daily Influence, Brian Smith looks forward rather than backward and returns to the idea at the heart of The I in Team Series: You are the influence.

Influence isn't something we turn on and off. What we say matters. What we don't say matters. Our actions, inaction, and even indifference influence the people and environments around us.

Brian explores why intentional influence begins with self-awareness, why responsibility is where influence becomes leadership, and why good intentions must ultimately be supported by consistent action and follow-through.

As technology and artificial intelligence continue to accelerate the way we work and make decisions, human judgment and responsible influence become even more important. The challenge for leaders is no longer simply to understand influence, but to build organizations, cultures, systems, and habits that reinforce the behaviors they say they value.

After 800 episodes, the message isn't more complicated. It's clearer:

Find your influence. Be your influence. Build your influence.

Because in the end, you are the influence.

What if one small act of kindness could inspire hundreds or even millions of others?

On this episode of Daily Influence, Gregg-Brooke Koleno welcomes back film producer, philanthropist, author, and social entrepreneur Peter Samuelson to explore how kindness can become intentional, measurable, and contagious.

Peter introduces ROKindness.org, the world’s first public ledger of good—a free platform designed to help people record Random Opportunities for Kindness, encourage others to pay those actions forward, and track how a single thoughtful decision can ripple through communities around the world.

Drawing on his experience producing nearly 30 films and founding eight nonprofit organizations, Peter explains how he applied the practical skills of storytelling, project development, and human psychology to build a movement capable of turning isolated acts of kindness into sustained social impact.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

• How a lost wallet and a stranger’s decision to return it helped inspire a global kindness initiative

• Why kindness must become more visible, structured, and repeatable

• How ROKindness tracks the ripple effect of positive actions without making kindness transactional

• Why kindness can help bridge political, racial, and social divisions

• How volunteering can strengthen leadership skills, expand professional opportunities, and increase personal fulfillment

• Why optimism grows when we step outside our own circumstances and help someone else

• How leaders, organizations, families, and communities can create cultures where kindness becomes a consistent practice

• One simple act you can complete today to begin creating your own ripple

Peter challenges us to stop treating kindness as a passive value and begin treating it as a deliberate action. You do not need money, authority, or a large platform to make a meaningful difference. You only need to recognize an opportunity, act on it, and invite someone else to carry it forward.

Because if negativity and hatred can spread, kindness can too.

Learn more and join the movement at .

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