IMPACTFUL Teamwork

On the Impactful Teamwork podcast, Julia Felton interviews David Guttman, a three-time Inc. 500 entrepreneur with multiple eight- and nine-figure exits, about servant leadership and building high-performing teams.

Guttman shares how a misdiagnosis of terminal cancer at 24 prompted him to shift from achievement-obsession to putting coworkers first, arguing leaders serve their people and that caring can’t be faked. They discuss authenticity, trust, assuming positive intent, and the ripple effect of leadership on employees’ lives, plus the importance of hiring for humility and curiosity and firing quickly when culture fit is wrong.

Guttman outlines practical scaling practices: bottoms-up budgeting and forecasting, financial literacy for all employees, quarterly board meetings, broad equity ownership, transparent all-hands updates, and internal/external core values reinforced through peer-given awards. He also offers his “Anti-MBA” course and community access.

00:45 Meet Dave Guttman

01:57 Cancer Wake Up Call

03:24 Servant Leadership Basics

07:10 Relationships Build Loyalty

08:56 Hire Right Fire Fast

12:00 Humility Curiosity Gen Z

14:53 Assume Positive Intent

17:24 Radical Transparency Trust

19:37 Scaling to Exit Playbook

22:13 Equity Budgets Core Values

28:03 Decision Making Culture

32:13 Servant Leader Accountability

33:53 Anti MBA Offer

35:24 Final Challenge Outro

You can connect and learn more about Dave's work here - https://www.linkedin.com/in/drguttman/

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Host Julia Felton welcomes Kelly Wendorf, founder of Equus and author of "Flying Lead Change: 56 Million Years of Wisdom for Leading and Living," to discuss how horses and nature inform leadership and teamwork.

Wendorf shares her journey from equestrian ambitions to coaching and equine-facilitated leadership, emphasizing experiential learning and presence. They explore modern disruption as a catalyst for evolution using nature’s adaptive cycle (new beginnings, growth, consolidation, letting go) and the “messy middle” of change, plus the metaphor of a flying lead change for collective pivots amid climate change, AI, war, and unrest.

Wendorf outlines five principles from horse culture—safety, connection, peace, freedom, and joy—led through care and presence rather than dominance, and defines “rewilding” as dismantling constraining social constructs to return to an innate, creative self. She invites listeners to engage via equusinspired.com, virtual courses, newsletters, and ranch retreats in Santa Fe.

00:00 Teamwork Advantage

00:50 Meet Kelly Wendorf

01:58 Calling And Origins

05:01 Coaching With Horses

06:47 Service And Adaptability

10:08 Presence Over Engagement

11:58 Adaptive Cycle Explained

14:34 Flying Lead Change Metaphor

19:22 Horse Culture Principles

22:20 Care Over Dominance

23:14 Darwin and Power With

24:49 Trauma Shifted Leadership

26:30 Care Is Not Soft

27:36 Regenerative Business Model

29:57 Courage to Change

31:26 Messy Middle Cycle

35:26 Rewilding Leaders Defined

38:25 Book and Next Steps

39:41 Final Invitation and Outro

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The episode argues teamwork is a key competitive advantage amid record-low global engagement (20%) and falling manager engagement (30% to 22%), noting managers drive 70% of team engagement variance and disengagement costs an estimated $10 trillion annually.

It warns leaders that AI won’t fix culture but will amplify it, making intentional culture design urgent. Drawing on Peter Matthies and the Conscious Business Institute, it outlines four culture levels:

Level 1 output culture (mechanistic, results-only, people as resources; AI accelerates volume and can fuel exhaustion)

Level 2 intentional culture (purpose and discernment guide AI as collaborator but trust and wellbeing may still lag)

Level 3 human-centric culture (people at the center, psychological safety, honest feedback)

Level 4 higher-purpose culture (massive transformational purpose enabling creativity and shared leadership, modeled by horse herds).

It closes with actions: make culture explicit, let teams define “rules,” and connect culture to purpose, plus an audit call-to-action.

00:00 Why Teamwork Wins

00:46 Engagement Crisis

02:27 AI Amplifies Culture

03:44 Four Culture Levels

06:19 Level One Output

10:29 Level Two Intention

13:37 Level Three Human Centric

16:19 Horses Reveal Truth

19:32 Level Four Higher Purpose

23:06 Leading Across Levels

25:47 Three Culture Shifts

29:22 Purpose Driven Turnaround

31:29 Final Questions Next Steps

32:46 Closing Thanks

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Take the IMPACTFUL Teamwork Quiz to assess your team's communication, creativity culture, goal clarity, and conflict resolution skills!

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On the Impactful Teamwork Podcast, host Julia welcomes Jean Walters, a personal growth consultant and seven-time Amazon best-selling author, to discuss teamwork as a competitive advantage and how “business energetics,” universal laws, and metaphysics influence organisational success.

Jean argues that everything is energy and that leaders can either work with it consciously or suffer its effects, emphasising gratitude, positivity, and empowerment over criticism. She shares an exercise contrasting emotions like anger vs. peace to help skeptics experience energy’s impact, and a story illustrating how negativity affected health.

They explore leadership practices such as living and repeatedly communicating mission statements, recognising employees’ unique talents and interests, using personalised motivation, hiring complementary strengths, and building relationships through attention.Jean also covers overcoming rejection in sales, taking responsibility for one’s mood, using forgiveness to shift workplace dynamics, and limiting negative news consumption.

She offers listeners three free chapters of her book, “The Journey from Anxiety to Peace,” via her website spiritualtransformation.com.

00:00 Teamwork Advantage

00:45 Meet Jean Walters

01:46 Business Energy Basics

03:54 Mindset And Health Story

06:01 Proving Energy To Skeptics

08:29 Grounded Leadership In Chaos

09:27 Mission And Employee Strengths

13:49 Ego Free Hiring And Appreciation

17:47 Avoiding Negativity And News

19:16 More Engagement Strategies

20:05 Rejection Proof Selling

21:29 Know Your Audience

22:29 Leaders Build Relationships

23:22 Forgiveness Changes Dynamics

25:32 Responsibility Over Blame

26:35 Ripple Effect Leadership

27:41 Horses Reveal Energy

31:22 Growth Through Polarity

33:36 Connect and Free Chapters

35:24 Final Takeaway Reflection

You can connect to Jean on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jean-walters/and on her website - https://www.spiritualtransformation.com/

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Julia Felton explores two research findings: 65% of leaders would rather appear decisive and be wrong than admit uncertainty and be right, and “invisibility is no longer read as neutral” but as avoidance.

Drawing on a Forbes article by Doug Melville, she argues that C-suite credibility now depends on visible, human storytelling aligned with operational truth, not polished messaging, especially amid rapid change like AI and expectations of headcount reduction.

She contrasts this with the “decisiveness crisis” research on “certainty theatre,” linking it to shame, threat responses, and transformation failure driven by uncertainty resistance.

Felton argues the real issue is teamship: performing certainty trains teams not to surface doubts, undermining co-ownership. She invites leaders to name a current unknown aloud as an invitation to think together and suggests modeling “I’m not sure” without apology.

03:14 Visibility Is Credibility

07:03 Imperfect Presence Builds Trust

10:57 The Decisiveness Crisis

13:46 Shame And Certainty Theater

16:56 Where Research Meets Reality

19:02 Teamship And The Horse Herd

20:39 Make Uncertainty Safe

21:58 Weekly Challenge And Close

23:51 Final Takeaways And Next Steps

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Take the IMPACTFUL Teamwork Quiz to assess your team's communication, creativity culture, goal clarity, and conflict resolution skills!

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Carrie Gallant and Julia Felton collaborate on a joint episode of The Tall Poppy Revolution Radio Show and the Impactful Teamwork Podcast to discuss how leaders can create conditions for better decision-making amid uncertainty and pressure.

They explore decision fatigue, reluctance to decide, and how inaction is still a decision, linking these patterns to engagement, agency, and culture. They argue that consultative decision-making, context, and psychological safety improve buy-in and reduce bottlenecks at the top, while frontline input often leads to better outcomes.

They also highlight that decisions are influenced by emotions, intuition, and energy, using stories from workplace leadership, hiring, and horse-assisted work to emphasise stillness, somatic intelligence, and adaptability, concluding with resources for strategic conversations and Julia’s team roadmap and quiz.

02:10 Decision Fatigue Today

03:50 Doubt and Agency

05:48 Engagement and Ownership

10:50 Consultative Decisions

16:09 Context and Buy In

17:14 Emotions Drive Choices

20:14 Gut Instinct Hiring

23:07 Energy and Culture Fit

25:11 Horses Sense Energy

25:45 Firefighting Leadership

26:37 Laser Focus Purpose

27:23 Undecided Energy Lesson

28:25 Human Design Blueprint

30:41 Intuition Inner Teacher

31:29 Stillness And Flow

34:22 Decision Speed Myth

39:51 Psychological Safety Culture

42:48 Adapting In Change

44:04 Closing And Resources

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Take the IMPACTFUL Teamwork Quiz to assess your team's communication, creativity culture, goal clarity, and conflict resolution skills!

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Julia Felton argues that the UK has a leadership problem driven by chronic, unrelenting pressure that the nervous system isn’t designed to sustain, leading to slower decisions, reduced trust, political caution, and emotional exhaustion.

She contrasts short-term pressure (where humans perform well) with long-term dysregulation that organisations often suppress through policies and norms, creating numbness that looks like professionalism.

Felton explains why AI cannot solve trust deficits or poor collaboration, citing Gallup engagement data and failure rates tied to silos, and notes AI can’t “read the room” or detect safety and withdrawal. She describes how horses provide immediate, unedited feedback on presence, coherence, and trust, shares a client example revealing hidden indecision, and advocates distributed, shared leadership via her Unbridled Teamship roadmap.

00:00 Teamwork Advantage

00:46 LinkedIn Leadership Storm

03:08 Chronic Pressure Biology

04:43 Suppressed Emotions Culture

06:03 Why AI Falls Short

09:09 Horses As Mirrors

11:08 Arena Breakthrough Story

13:06 Rethinking Leadership Models

14:55 Distributed Leadership Lessons

16:45 Building Team Resilience

18:51 Team Audit Invitation

20:06 Wrap Up And Subscribe

Take the Turbocharge Your Team audit at www.businesshorsepower.com/quiz

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Take the IMPACTFUL Teamwork Quiz to assess your team's communication, creativity culture, goal clarity, and conflict resolution skills!

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On the Impactful Teamwork Podcast, host Julia Felton interviews sales-team coach Luke Jorgenson, who spent 10 years in US door-to-door solar sales, about resilience, coaching, and building high-performing sales teams.

Luke explains how repeated rejection builds a “sales muscle” and says leaders should help new hires break fear quickly by getting them in the field with support and mentoring. He argues coaching should be normalised in business, as in sports, to accelerate learning and uncover blind spots.

Luke shares his “Proven Five Sales Systems” framework—compensation, incentives, sales training, team culture, and leadership mentoring—emphasising a holistic approach where culture and environment can be the biggest sales drivers. He describes using experience-based incentives to create camaraderie and retention, and advises individuals to sell authentically by asking better questions and listening.

00:00 Teamwork Advantage

00:45 Meet Luke Jorgenson

01:48 Door To Door Sales

03:30 Rejection Resilience

04:41 Training New Reps

08:35 Why Coaching Matters

12:18 Proven Five Systems

15:30 Building Winning Culture

18:07 Culture Keeps People

19:37 Working for Free Culture

19:57 Coaching Lessons for Sales

21:04 Culture Is Who Leads Daily

23:11 Sales Is a Universal Skill

25:23 Authentic Selling Mindset

27:39 Ambiverts and Adaptability

29:11 Questions Over Pitching

32:37 Energy and Belief in Product

34:29 Reputation and Long Game

35:21 Where to Find Luke

36:19 Final Wrap and Subscribe

You can connect to Luke on:

LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/lukejorgenson/

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/coach_lukej/

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Take the IMPACTFUL Teamwork Quiz to assess your team's communication, creativity culture, goal clarity, and conflict resolution skills!

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The episode argues that teamwork is a key competitive advantage and explores why work often gets stuck departments due to unclear ownership and accountability.

Drawing on Deloitte’s 2026 Human Capital Survey, it highlights that 66% of C-suite leaders say pushing beyond traditional functions (HR, finance, IT, legal, procurement) is critical, yet only 7% report real progress, creating a 59-point gap. It describes simultaneous pressures on functions—cost-cutting via shared services and automation, alongside executive calls for substantial reinvention—while noting structure and “turf” impede change.

Using a horse herd and the diamond model of shared leadership as an analogy, it contrasts “running the business” (repeatable work suited to automation) with “growing the business” (cross-functional work requiring dynamic leadership).

Examples include Moderna, Unilever, Cisco, Workleap, and Highmark Health, and the host invites listeners to assess where energy leaks and consider the Unbridled Teamship roadmap and a team audit.

00:46 Work Stuck Between Teams

01:34 Deloitte Gap Revealed

03:30 Why Functions Strain

07:09 Running Versus Growing

09:44 Horse Herd Leadership

12:28 Tension And Delays

16:36 Decouple Expertise

20:35 Turf And Clarity

23:16 Unbridled Adaptability

26:56 Key Takeaways

28:14 Teamship Invitation

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Take the IMPACTFUL Teamwork Quiz to assess your team's communication, creativity culture, goal clarity, and conflict resolution skills!

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Host Julia Felton welcomes high-performance coach and breathwork expert Lucas Kulbis to discuss how breathwork helps leaders regulate stress and improve team performance.

Lucas shares his journey from an AI-focused computer science path and startup burnout to discovering breath as a foundational tool for state control, presence, and resilience. They explain how shallow breathing can reinforce anxiety and how intentional breathing can shift the nervous system from fight-or-flight (amygdala-driven) to calmer, clearer decision-making (prefrontal cortex), supporting emotional regulation and co-regulation with others.

Lucas teaches practical techniques including the physiological sigh for rapid resets, a bedtime diaphragm-breathing practice to improve sleep, and coherence breathing (about 5.5 seconds in and out) to align heart, breath, and brain. He also describes client results, including a 10X revenue increase alongside broader life improvements, and invites listeners to his free Skool community and coaching.

00:00 Teamwork Advantage Intro

00:46 Meet Lucas Kulbis

01:55 From Startup to Burnout

02:45 Why Breath Matters

04:03 Breathwork for Leaders

05:02 Stress Reset Framework

08:54 Safety and Co Regulation

12:06 Neuroscience of Breathing

15:52 Crisis Breath Exercise

20:02 Sleep and Daily Habits

21:21 Client Results and Revenue

25:19 Coherence Breathing Basics

28:43 Resources and Closing

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Take the IMPACTFUL Teamwork Quiz to assess your team's communication, creativity culture, goal clarity, and conflict resolution skills!

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