Life gives us enough hard crap to deal with. Why would we add more to it, on purpose?

Because that’s how we grow.

Today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast, Luis Velazquez, should know. Luis was diagnosed with a brain tumor over 20 years ago. He was crushed. Angry. And at one point, suicidal. Everything he had every right to be.

Today, he is an incredibly successful executive coach, working with leaders from companies like Google, Salesforce and more. His speciality? Coaching those deemed “uncoachable” by everyone else.

How did he get here?

He made a commitment to himself. That he would not put his mother through the pain of losing him. That he would do all the things he knew in his heart he was meant to do. That he would fully show up for life, just like his dad did after suffering a devastating accident that left him in a wheelchair.

If anyone deserves to write a book about resilience, it’s Luis. And thank God he did, because it’s wonderful. It’s called Ordinary Resilience and it reminds us that each of has access to everything Luis has demonstrated in his own life.

🐱 It starts with a simple formula: Resilience = Commitment + Persistence x Optimism. Optimism is a multiplier because without it we are simply grinding and on our way to burnout.

🐱 There are 5 pillars to resilience: embrace the suck, face your fears, build relationships, find inner strength and solve for fulfillment. Notice he didn’t say solve for merely existing.

🐱 To keep the resilience muscle strong, we must embrace intentional discomfort. Because living through a brain tumor isn’t enough? No, because living through a brain tumor proved to Luis that he became someone better through that pain—so why wouldn’t he invite more in?

Luis’ brand of intentional discomfort includes things like giving up coffee for a full year and running ultra marathons. You decide which of those sounds harder.

Such a beautiful irony, that we must embrace the suck to desuckify our lives.

Let the desuckifying begin.

You can follow Luis on LinkedIn. And check out his coaching company site at velas.com, where you can dive deep into the amazing work he does and learn more about his book—Ordinary Resilience: Rethinking How Effective Leaders Adapt And Thrive.

If you enjoyed the conversation and would like to dive deep into some of your own challenges at work, I invite you to schedule a free half-hour discovery session, where we can explore new, desuckified possibilities for your future.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus Question from Luis to our audience:What can you do today, so that two years from now, you can say that this crisis, this situation, this stuck-in moment that you're going through is the best thing that happened to your career?

To watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #resilience #ordinaryresilience #survivors #intentionaldiscomfort

If you stacked every sold copy of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, it would reach over 757 miles high. That’s about 550 miles higher than the International Space Station. The air so thin, molecules almost never run into each other, flying solo until they fall back to earth or get lost in space for eternity.

Perfect time for a good book, no?

There’s a reason over 40 million copies have been sold since it launched in 1989. It’s good. Really good. It’s wisdom timeless, grounded and, yeah, effective.

Today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast, Kory Kogon, is here to share why that wisdom is more relevant than ever. Kory is a best selling author and the VP of Content Development at The Franklin Covey Institute.

We talked about how their entire ecosystem of courses, content and technology has been transformed to meet the needs of the world we live in today. And will tomorrow.

These habits can help our dopamine-addled minds navigate the uncertainty of AI, the complexities of modern leadership and the peculiarities of the people we live and work with every day.

🐱 Habit 1: Be Proactive🐱 Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind🐱 Habit 3: Put First Things First🐱 Habit 4: Think Win-Win🐱 Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood🐱 Habit 6: Synergize🐱 Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

Here’s me being proactive:If you like this episode please like, share, rate, review, subscribe or consider naming your first born, “DesuckifyWork®.” Good news, our name is totally gender neutral!

Let the desuckifying begin.

You can follow Kory on LinkedIn. And check out the Franklin Covey Institute at franklincovey.com. Be sure to check out Kory’s book, The 5 Choices: The Path to Extraordinary Productivity as well.

If you enjoyed the conversation and would like to dive deep into some of your own challenges at work, I invite you to schedule a free half-hour discovery session, where we can explore new, desuckified possibilities for your future.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus question from Kory to our audience:What are you really good at that you could pay forward as a coach/mentor to help others?

If you’d like to watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #7Habits #franklincovey #leadership

Ever try to hold a beach ball underwater?

You can do it for a few seconds, but it takes a shocking amount of effort. And that sucker will pop back up (and maybe nail you in the face) soon enough.

That’s what our emotions are like. Especially at work. Where we try to stuff ‘em down all day long like good, rational girls and boys.

Except we’re not rational. We’re human. Highly emotional meat bags under constant assault from a world that’s gone mad.

Pop, pop, pop.

How can we lead in the midst of the craziness? Dina Denham Smith, executive coach, author, speaker and today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast, has some ideas.

🐱 We can start by accepting that our emotions are normal. Helpful, even.

🐱 We can learn to regulate them, using simple techniques like BRAVE (breathe, refocus, accept, verbalize, engage)

🐱 We can view them as information instead of judging them. What are they trying to tell us? And why does my eyelid keep twitching?

Dina dives deep into all of this and more during our conversation… touching on a ton of helpful stuff she’s outlined in her awesome new book—Emotionally Charged: How to LEAD in the new world of work.

Speaking of awesome stuff, if you like this episode please like, share, rate, review, subscribe or consider sending a letter to your congress person asking them to create an official DesuckifyWork® Day. Ask for a whole month if you’re feeling frisky.

Let the desuckifying begin.

You can follow Dina on LinkedIn. And check out her site at dinadsmith.com, where you can learn about her book, her coaching practice and her experience as a competitive equestrian.

If you enjoyed the conversation and would like to dive deep into some of your own challenges at work, I invite you to schedule a free half-hour discovery session, where we can explore new, desuckified possibilities for your future.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus question from Dina to our audience:”How can I help make these tools even easier to implement, to bring them further into organizations?”

If you’d like to watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #emotionsatwork #emotionalmeatbags #eq

If you grew up when I did, you had two big fears:

🙀 Quicksand🙀 Imposters

Both were everywhere, apparently. From Gilligan’s Island to Scooby Doo to random movies of the week where someone pretending to be someone else inevitably tied up the good guys and had them neck deep in a soupy death trap.

Fast froward to today and quicksand is nowhere to be found. But imposters have simply relocated. From the small screens in our living rooms to the mirrors in our bathrooms.

We are the imposters now. Convinced that everyone can see through our masks to the scared child underneath. The villain in own story, pulling one over on our friends and colleagues. Unaware that every one of them is doing the same, including (especially) the most successful among us.

What if we just didn’t? What if we recognized that we’ll never have all the answers and that there is tremendous power in that fact?

That’s the premise of Humble Confidence, a term coined by author, speaker and coach, Kris Kelso, today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast.

With humble confidence, we move forward because we have the ability to learn, not because we have all the answers. We embrace vulnerability, the very thing we were so afraid of with our masks on, as the source of our strength. And we build teams and communities that celebrate and reward this mindset, so we can all simply show up and do cool s**t.

Speaking of cool s**t, if you like this episode please like, share, rate, review, subscribe or consider writing a poem called DesuckifyWork® and submitting it to your favorite literary journals. Bonus points if you include the word, “twerk.”

Let the desuckifying begin.

You can follow Kris on LinkedIn. And check out his site at kriskelso.com, where you’ll find his amazing keynote and his must-have book, Overcoming the Imposter: Silence Your Inner Critic and Lead with Confidence.

If you enjoyed the conversation and would like to dive deep into some of your own challenges at work, I invite you to schedule a free half-hour discovery session, where we can explore new, desuckified possibilities for your future.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus question from Kris to our audience:What are you doing in your circles of influence, whether that's your work, your social circles, et cetera, to make it safe for other people to admit when they don't know something, when they have a weakness, when they don't understand or they feel in over their head?

If you’d like to watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #impostersyndrome #humbleconfidence #vulnerabilityisstrength

1+1+1+1+1=The solution to almost everything.

This is the promise of collective intelligence. And it’s a promise that Lorraine Margherita articulates beautifully on this week’s episode of the DesuckifyWork® podcast.

Collective intelligence:

🐱 Combines individual talents, skills, stories, and ambitions into something greater than the sum of their parts🐱 Is activated by clarifying team purpose, roles and responsibilities🐱 Invites people to contribute beyond just their job description or credentials🐱 Allows diverse teams—even those with limited experience—to outperform smaller groups of experts

The key to it all? Shared decision making.

It almost sounds counterintuitive. Too many cooks and all that. But it doesn’t mean everyone decides everything. It simply means you include those who will implement decisions in the decision-making process. Which actually shortens the gap between decision and action. And increases buy-in and effectiveness.

Lorraine literally wrote the book on this, Shared Decision Making in the Corporate Arena. And she explored over 40 frameworks organizations have used to get these results.

I don’t know about you, but with the world butt deep in problems, getting results sounds pretty good to me.

You can follow Lorraine on LinkedIn. And check out her site at co-dynamics.net/en/, where you’ll learn more abut collective intelligence, shared decision making and her amazing book.

If you enjoyed the conversation and would like to dive deep into some of your own challenges at work, I invite you to schedule a free half-hour discovery session, where we can explore new, desuckified possibilities for your future.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus Question from Lorraine to our listeners:How do you feel about the way decisions are made in your organization? When you hear about a new project or someone getting hired or the company is cutting costs or spending money or any kind of decision that affects the life of your team. How does it make you feel?

If you’d like to watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #collectiveintelligence #sharedecisionmaking #changethworld

Wanna make work suck less? Start asking weird questions.

Like, totally bizarre, off the wall stuff like:

🙀 Do you understand what I’m asking you?🙀 What does productive mean to you?🙀 What does it mean to be on time?🙀 What does success mean to you?🙀 What assumptions are we making?

Nuts, right? It’s so weird to ask these basic, foundational questions about how we communicate with each other. The shared language we rely on to get things done. The stuff we all skip over because we think we should just “get” each other.

Like, have you met other human beings? I’ve known some my entire life and still don’t fully understand them.

Fortunately, Laura Crandall has cracked the code. Today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast is a consultant and author who has spent years helping humans resist the urge to make assumptions and actually have those weird conversations with each other.

Which makes everything at work, work better:

🐱 It reduces workplace friction🐱 It saves time🐱 It lowers frustration🐱 It eliminates office politics🐱 It keeps us from creating dartboards with our coworkers’ faces on them that we eventually rip to shreds because we are terrible at darts

Ultimately, having weird conversations gives us room to do the truly hard stuff at work we should be doing. Solving big problems. Inventing amazing things. Doing work that, as Laura would say, is fruitful.

Fruitful. What a wonderful word. And what a wonderful conversation. Let’s take a listen.

You can follow Laura on LinkedIn. And check out her site at lauracrandall.com. While you're there, take a look at her book, Working With Humans: Tools You Didn’t Know You Needed for Conversations You Never Expected to Have. So good.

If you enjoyed the conversation and would like to dive deep into some of your own challenges at work, I invite you to schedule a free half-hour discovery session, where we can explore new, desuckified possibilities for your future.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus questions from Laura to our audience:

* If your day were more fruitful, if that were the driver rather than productivity or busyness, what would that do for you, your team or both?

* How would you use the word adult or the word mature in a way that felt empowered and interesting and helpful vs. being punitive or pejorative?

To watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #weirdconverstations #workcommunication #workingwithhumans

You want to make work suck less? Get a good night’s sleep.

Poor sleep affects:🙀 Productivity🙀 Relationships🙀 Attention to detail🙀 Decision-making

It also leads to long term health issues like diabetes, dementia and cardiovascular disease.

Thankfully, today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast is here to help.

Zander Keig is a licensed clinical social worker who leads organizational well-being workshops for corporations. If you want to sleep better, he suggests:

🐱 Reducing blue light exposure🐱 Creating a consistent sleep schedule🐱 Prioritizing 7-9 hours nightly🐱 Backing off the caffeine (fighting words, I know)

Zander and I went deep on a number of desuckifying topics during the show.

🐱 Creating more natural, harmonious workspaces🐱 Moving to a 32-hour workweek🐱 Navigating political and social polarization🐱 And, taking a more pro-human approach to diversity and inclusion

As a trans man, Zander brings a unique and often unexpected POV to these topics and more. It was a delightful conversation. I hope you enjoy.

If you do, please like, share, rate, review or subscribe. And feel free to share your thoughts with me directly as well.

You can follow Zander on LinkedIn. And check out his site at zanderkeig.net, where you’ll find all kinds of cool content, including his two podcasts—The Umbrella Hour and The Third Space.

If you enjoyed the conversation and would like to dive deep into some of your own challenges at work, I invite you to schedule a free half-hour discovery session, where we can explore new, desuckified possibilities for your future.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus Question from Zander to our audience:In what ways do you find yourself out of sync, or just different from what people expect of you? And are you at peace with that?

If you’d like to watch this episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #bettersleep #DEI #prohuman #thirdspaces

What is psychological safety?

We hear the term thrown around a lot these days but I’m not sure we’re clear on what it means.

🙀 It’s not the absence of stress or conflict.

🙀 It’s not emotional bubble wrap, protecting us from our feelings

🙀 It’s not a lack of responsibility or accountability

It’s quite the opposite, actually, according to Dennis DiMaggio, today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast. Dennis is a learning and development expert with over 20 years of experience.

His career has taken him from assisted living to HR to booze (spirits, if you’re fancy). He’s seen it all.

And he believes psychological safety is critical to the success of any organization. But it’s not about protecting people from the hard stuff, it’s about helping us embrace it.

🐱 It’s about feeling comfortable enough to admit what we don’t know

🐱 It’s about welcoming conflict so we can grow together

🐱 It’s about creating a culture of accountability, rooted in empathy

It’s pretty clear life’s not getting any easier these days. So we’d do well to create spaces where we can deal with that reality head on, with respect, compassion and integrity.

Dennis brings all of those things to this episode. Let’s take a listen, shall we?

You can follow Dennis on LinkedIn. And check out the amazing organizations he works with, The ProHuman Foundation and Braver Angels. I’m a huge fan of both.

Speaking of things I like, my website and my substack newsletter are pretty swell too. Take a look when you can. I’m on a mission to make work suck less and I’d love for you to join me. Want to make that desuckification happen ASAP? Let’s set up a free half hour coaching session.

If you enjoyed the episode, please like, share, rate, review, subscribe or consider getting a role in one of those Riccola commercials but instead of singing Riiiiicoooooollllaaaaa when the guy blows the Alphorn, belt out Deeeessuuuuuccckkkiiifffyyyyyy instead. Keep singing it as they drag you off the set.

Bye, everyone!

Bonus Question from Dennis to our audience:What do you do to continuously keep a people first mentality? How do you keep people in view all the time, making sure you're constantly prioritizing your team?

If you’d like to watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #executivecoaching #accountability #leadership

Would you rather be a victim or have a career your love?

Being a victim is easy.

😿 We play the job application lottery day after day, praying for the big jackpot… or even just a politely written “no thank you.”

😿 We lament the lack of job security while doing little to make ourselves stand out

😿 We get jealous of those who have better “luck” than us instead of getting curious about how they made things happen for themselves

Taking ownership of your career is harder, but way less painful. And Loren Greiff—this week’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast—is here to guide us. Loren is the founder of Portfolio Rocket, offering career coaching to folks at the VP level and above. Her mission is to end career victimization.

How in the world does she do that?

🐱 She helps you leverage the hidden job market, where 85% of the jobs actually are

🐱 She helps you see that job security is a myth and focus on adaptability instead

🐱 She helps you uncover what makes you remarkably different in a cut and paste world

🐱 She helps you build a pipeline of people cheering for you, eager to connect you to people and opportunities that never make it to LinkedIn or Indeed

Loren is no victim. She knows her stuff. And it’s stuff we all need to hear.

—————

You can follow Loren on LinkedIn. And check out her site at portfoliorocket.com. It’s loaded with life changing goodness.

My site and my Substack newsletter can change your life too. I’m on a mission to make work suck less and I’d love for you to join me. Want to make that desuckification happen ASAP? Let’s set up a free half hour coaching session.

If you enjoyed the episode, please like, share, rate, review, subscribe or consider becoming a marine biologist, learning to communicate with dolphins and telling them all about this show so they can spread the word to annoyed tourists who just want to see them do a cool trick they can share on TikTok.

Bye, everyone!

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #findyourwhy #careerownership #stopcareervictimization #executivecoaching #careercoaching

If you’d like to watch the episode on YouTube, please click here.

Bonus Question from Loren to our audience:What the bleep are you're gonna do with the next 10, 15, 20 years of your life? You're gonna live a lot longer… so what do you want to do about it?

In a world obsessed with how AI will impact our workplaces, we’ve overlooked a bigger challenge. How we bring more humanity into them.

It’s a problem we’ve struggled with since work became a four letter word. Work is supposed to suck. It’s supposed to be drudgery. It’s certainly not supposed to a place where you can experience love and human connection.

That would be crazy. Right?

🐱 People supporting each other🐱 People trying to understand each other🐱 People showing grace when someone struggles🐱 People having normal conversations with co-workers instead of hiding behind buzzwords and false politeness

Pfft, that’ll never work.

Except it does. And today’s guest on the DesuckifyWork® podcast is living proof. Jēnna Reese started her company, Connect Centric, back in 2009 with a simple mission. To bring a human centric approach to the transactional world of consulting. And 15+ years later, she’s done just that. A successful, thriving business where people are at the heart of what they do. And their clients (who are people too!) seem to actually appreciate it.

It’s hard to believe that people, working with other people, serving the needs of other people, would benefit from behaving like people. But it’s 2025 and apparently anything is possible.

I, for one, am glad that Jēnna is at the forefront of this “bringing humanity to work” movement. And I think we’d all do well to join her.

—————

You can follow Jēnna on LinkedIn. And check out her company’s site at connectcentric.com to catch a glimpse of their human-centric approach to IT consulting.

My site and my Substack newsletter are also human (and cat) centric. I’m on a mission to make work suck less and I’d love for you to join me. Want to make that desuckification happen ASAP? Let’s set up a free half hour coaching session.

If you enjoyed the episode, please like, share, rate, review, subscribe or consider dropping off the grid to start a dairy farm and raising genetically modified nanny goats who yodel “let’s DesuckifyWork®” every time you milk them.

Bye, everyone!

#desuckifyworkpodcast #desuckifywork #humancentricwork #humanityatwork #executivecoaching

Bonus Question from Jēnna to our audience:What is your work persona?🐱 Are you someone who's looking for job stability?🐱 Are you someone who's looking for work-life balance?🐱 Are you looking for an organization that's aligning with your personal values?🐱 Are you looking for an organization that is going to consistently give you a raise 🐱 every year, but you don't expect too much else?

If you’d like to watch this episode on YouTube, please click here.