Leadership gets thrown around so much that it’s lost meaning. We use it to describe control, management, or charisma—but the more I’ve lived through it, the more I believe real leadership is about thinking. It’s about clarity, purpose, and helping other people become who they’re capable of being. This conversation with Jeff West redefined a lot for me. 

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We talked about the dragons that hold leaders back—fear, ego, comparison, and comfort—and how to slay them so we can think clearly, care deeply, and lead with alignment. Jeff’s perspective hit home because it connects the inner work to the outer results. Leadership isn’t about doing more—it’s about creating the space and systems that let others think and grow. Caring means refusing to let people default on themselves. Competence means designing clarity so accountability is possible.  
 
If you’re an owner who feels trapped running the machine instead of leading it, this episode is for you.  It’s a masterclass in leading from within—thinking better, caring deeper, and designing a company that reflects your highest potential and brings out the best in everyone around you. 

10 Key Takeaways (My Biggest Lessons) 

Who This Is For 
For any business owner who feels like the game keeps changing, this episode will help you understand why. If you’ve ever wondered why your hard work isn’t compounding the way it should, or what Bitcoin actually means beyond speculation, this conversation connects the dots between money, time, and ownership. 
 
Jeff West has over 40 years of business experience. During his career, Jeff has been part of four high-tech start-up companies. He was a founder and CEO/President of Silicon Logic Engineering from 1996 to 2008. Over the past seventeen years, Jeff has worked with dozens of companies in the upper Midwest. His experience working with business owners and executive teams includes over 2,500 coaching sessions. Jeff is also the facilitator of the Applied Leadership Program. The program has seen dozens of area executives and potential new leaders go through its two-year program. In 2025, Jeff wrote his first book. 'Becoming Your Own Dragon Slayer' is a leadership book for kids and teens. It's been a #1 New Release on Amazon in three different categories. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Website https://www.beardowninc.com/ 
Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/  

Coming off my conversation with Lawrence Lepard, where we unpacked the broken foundation of fiat money, I wanted to push the question further: If the rules of the game are shifting, how do we navigate from here?  

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In this episode, I sit down with Alan Beaulieu of ITR Economics and Kim Clark to keep searching for what’s real — to make sense of where we actually are in the cycle and what business owners can do to design intelligently within it. The math behind the current system doesn’t work forever. Debt, demographics, and policy are pushing us toward an eventual reset. But rather than getting lost in the noise, Alan grounds us in data and context. This isn’t about doom — it’s about orientation. We dig into what’s true, what’s hype, and what owners can actually do: build moats around cash flow, people, and productivity, lead with clarity through uncertainty, and use this next downturn to do good—for employees, customers, and community. Because you can’t control the macro, but you can design within it. 

What We Covered 

Who This Is For 
For any business owner who feels like the game keeps changing, this episode will help you understand why. If you’ve ever wondered why your hard work isn’t compounding the way it should, or what Bitcoin actually means beyond speculation, this conversation connects the dots between money, time, and ownership. 

Kim Clark is a sales and marketing strategist who helped scale ITR Economics from a founder-led advisory firm to a professionally managed company that exited at eight figures. As head of sales and marketing, she built the firm’s first CRM, content strategy, and inbound engine—moving the company from personality-based selling to a system built on data, automation, and strategic execution. Today, she works with business owners to build marketing engines that align with their strategy, team, and long-term cash flow goals—so they can grow without chaos and delegate without losing visibility. Her frameworks are directly aligned with the "Maximize Growth" track inside the Build a Valuable Business module of the iBD™ Magic Model.   
 
Alan Beaulieu is a globally recognized economist and partner at ITR Economics, a firm with 94.7% forecasting accuracy over 80 years. For more than three decades, Alan has guided executives worldwide through all economic cycles, providing clear, actionable insights on markets, strategy, and investment. A respected speaker, author, and advisor, his data-driven approach helps companies anticipate change, protect value, and maximize profitability. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Kim Clark LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimberly-clark-79634845/ 
Alan Beaulieu LinkedIn linkedin.com/in/alan-beaulieu-8343283 
Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/

Most business owners I know can feel it... the harder you work, the less it seems to matter. You’re producing real value, taking real risk, and yet the system keeps changing the rules.The system isn’t broken… It’s working exactly as designed. But it’s designed to steal your time. 
 
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In this episode, I sit down with Lawrence Lepard, author of The Big Print and sound money advocate, to unpack the truth about how fiat currency erodes value, distorts incentives, and traps business owners inside a system they were never meant to win. We break down how inflation isn’t just an economic concept — it’s a moral failure. The rules of the game have been rewritten to reward those who can borrow and print, while punishing those who produce and save. But there’s a way out. We talk about sound money — and why Bitcoin represents more than a new asset class. It’s the modern evolution of fairness, freedom, and real capitalism. This conversation connects history, economics, and ownership into one simple idea: if you understand how money works, you can finally design a life and business that align with reality, not illusion. 

What We Covered 

Who This Is For 
For any business owner who feels like the game keeps changing, this episode will help you understand why. If you’ve ever wondered why your hard work isn’t compounding the way it should, or what Bitcoin actually means beyond speculation, this conversation connects the dots between money, time, and ownership. 

Lawrence Lepard is a professional investment manager who has been a long time advocate for a return to sound money. He manages funds which focus on companies involved with gold and silver mining and Bitcoin. He is an active contributor to the "sound money" discussion on X, using the handle: @LawrenceLepard, and he recently published his first book: THE BIG PRINT: What Happened to America and How Sound Money Will Fix It. 

The book is a discussion of how America's monetary system has gone astray and caused enormous pain for millions through inflation. The history of this process is laid out in the first part of the book: The Problem. The second half of the book is titled The Solution and explains what we must do to restore the American Dream. It offers investment insights that are relevant to all individuals and families and shows people how to protect themselves from inflation. The book is timely because as Mr. Lepard shows the problem is getting worse and is likely to result in a crisis very soon. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Lawrence Lepard Twitter/X: @LawrenceLepard 
Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/

Most owners talk about “creating value,” but few stop to ask a more fundamental question: 
Value for what? 

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In this episode, I sat down with my friend Nick Bradley—entrepreneur, investor, and host of The Scale Up Podcast—to explore how your ownership goals determine everything about your value-creation strategy. Nick comes from the private equity world, where the goal is clear: build to sell. I work with mid-market owners designing companies that can outlast them. 
We both work with the same kinds of businesses—but from opposite ends of the ownership spectrum. Together, we dig into how clarity of intent changes the entire game: the capital structure you choose, how you lead your team, and how you allocate your time and cash flow. 
 
This isn’t about chasing one “right” path. It’s about picking your game—and understanding what freedom, wealth, and legacy look like depending on whether you’re designing for a third-party exit or an internal transition. 

What We Covered 

Who This Is For 
For any owner trying to decide what’s next—whether to sell, transition internally, or redesign their role—this episode will help you see the tradeoffs clearly. If you want to understand how your value-creation plan must align with your personal and ownership goals, this conversation will give you the clarity to design your next move intentionally. 

Nick Bradley is an entrepreneur, investor, and former PE-backed CEO/Operating Partner who has scaled 100+ businesses and driven $5B+ in exits. Host of the top-ranked Scale Up with Nick Bradley podcast and author of the #1 bestseller Exit for Millions, he works with founders generating $1M+ EBITDA to diagnose true enterprise value and 2–10x it through operational excellence, acquisitions, and systems—so owners create freedom, optionality, and elite businesses. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Website - https://highvalueexit.com/ 
Book - https://highvalueexit.com/podcast/ 
Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/  

Every owner wants a leadership team that can run the company without them. Few actually build one that can.  

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In this episode, I sat down with Cyndi Gave to talk about what it really takes to develop a team that thinks, decides, and acts like owners. We break down the tension every entrepreneur feels: how to let go without losing control, how to build trust without blind faith, and how to design leadership that frees you — not traps you. Cyndi shares her own experiences leading through growth, building accountability structures, and navigating the emotional side of leadership development. We connect those lessons directly to enterprise value, owner freedom, and what it really means to move from operator to owner. 
 
This isn’t about org charts or titles. It’s about building a system of leadership that makes the company—and the owner—more free. 

What We Covered 

Cyndi Gave is an executive leader and organizational strategist who helps businesses build the systems, teams, and leadership culture required for sustainable growth. With deep experience guiding owners through transitions of scale, Cyndi specializes in aligning people, processes, and accountability so leadership teams can perform independently — freeing owners to focus on vision, strategy, and enterprise value creation. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
https://www.themetissgroup.com/ 

https://www.themetissgroup.com/leadership-academy/hire-employees-service 

Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/ 

Most revenue budgets start with a top-down number: add 10%, push sales harder, and hope the math works out. That’s why so many plans collapse by spring. 

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In Part 3 of our Budget Season 2026 Series, I sat down with Kim Clark to break down how to build revenue the right way: from the bottom up. Kim shares her 12-step revenue forecasting process and shows how to build by product, segment, and pipeline. We talk about aligning sales, marketing, and operations so the plan is deliverable — and how to connect the revenue build-up directly into the budget model from Part 2. 
 
This isn’t about sales stretch goals or wishful percentages. It’s about creating a clear, defensible revenue plan that finance can trust and owners can use to make boardroom decisions about hiring, capacity, and cash. 
 
In this episode, Kim and I screen-share and walk through the 12 steps. If you want to see the forecast in action, check out the video version on YouTube or Spotify. 

What We Covered 

Kim Clark is a sales and marketing strategist who helped scale ITR Economics from a founder-led advisory firm to a professionally managed company that exited at eight figures. As head of sales and marketing, she built the firm’s first CRM, content strategy, and inbound engine—moving the company from personality-based selling to a system built on data, automation, and strategic execution. Today, she works with business owners to build marketing engines that align with their strategy, team, and long-term cash flow goals—so they can grow without chaos and delegate without losing visibility. Her frameworks are directly aligned with the "Predictable Revenue" module within the iBD Ownership Operating System. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Kim Clark LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimberly-clark-79634845/ 

Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/ 
 

Most budgets don’t survive past Q1. They collapse because they aren’t built on cash flow, they don’t roll into the balance sheet, and they aren’t tied to owner goals. In other words, they’re not budgets — they’re wish lists. 

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That’s why Part 2 of our Budget Season 2026 Series is all about the model itself. I sat down with Pat Hobby, who’s spent decades building financial models, to break down how owners can create a budget file that actually runs the business. 
 
We dig into how to structure assumptions, link them to drivers, and roll everything into financials you can trust. We talk about Base, Upside, and Downside scenarios, how to keep the model simple but powerful, and how to set a monthly cadence so the budget stays alive all year. 
 
This isn’t about Excel tricks. It’s about having one system that tells you when to hire, when to invest, when to pull back — and the confidence to make those calls from the boardroom. 
 
In this episode, Pat and I screen-share and walk through an actual model. If you want to see the file in action, check out the video version on YouTube or Spotify. 

 
What We Covered: 

Pat Hobby is a seasoned CFO, CPA, and the founder of The CFO Advantage, a fractional CFO firm that helps business owners gain true financial clarity and use their numbers to drive long-term value. He was also the cofounder of Ryan Tansom’s former business, where they built a fractional CFO model serving dozens of clients across multiple industries. Pat has guided companies through ESOPs, private equity transactions, and complex financial transitions, always bringing an investor mindset and operational discipline to the finance function. He’s known for making complex financials simple, actionable, and aligned with ownership strategy. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Website: https://cfo-advantage.com/ 
LinkedIn: Pat Hobby 
Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/ 
 

Budgeting season is here. But most owners build budgets in a vacuum — starting with last year’s numbers and layering on guesses. The result? Fantasy budgets that collapse by Q2. 

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That’s why I’m kicking off a three-part Budget Season Series. Each episode will build on the last to give you a step-by-step process to create a budget you can actually run your company with. 
 
We start with the big picture. I sat down with Alan Beaulieu and Kim Clark to talk about where the economy is heading, what the data says about demand, inflation, and interest rates, and how to translate those signals into real targets for your business. Alan (previously with ITR Economics) has spent decades forecasting with 94% accuracy. Kim works with owners every day on capital and operations. Together, they’ll help you orient before you open Excel.  
 
This isn’t about predicting the future perfectly. It’s about setting guardrails, defining risks and opportunities, and making sure your budget starts with reality — not wishful thinking. 
 

What We Covered 

Kim Clark is a sales and marketing strategist who helped scale ITR Economics from a founder-led advisory firm to a professionally managed company that exited at eight figures. As head of sales and marketing, she built the firm’s first CRM, content strategy, and inbound engine—moving the company from personality-based selling to a system built on data, automation, and strategic execution. Today, she works with business owners to build marketing engines that align with their strategy, team, and long-term cash flow goals—so they can grow without chaos and delegate without losing visibility. Her frameworks are directly aligned with the "Maximize Growth" track inside the Build a Valuable Business module of the iBD™ Magic Model.  
 
Alan Beaulieu is a globally recognized economist and partner at ITR Economics, a firm with 94.7% forecasting accuracy over 80 years. For more than three decades, Alan has guided executives worldwide through all economic cycles, providing clear, actionable insights on markets, strategy, and investment. A respected speaker, author, and advisor, his data-driven approach helps companies anticipate change, protect value, and maximize profitability. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Kim Clark LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimberly-clark-79634845/ 
Alan Beaulieu LinkedIn linkedin.com/in/alan-beaulieu-8343283 
Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/

Every owner’s journey is made up of inflection points, the moments where you have to make big, irreversible decisions. 
 
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In this episode, my friend Tom Nagler shares his full story arc as an owner. From growing up in a family business, to buying it from his dad, to juggling cash and growth pains, to considering a sale but choosing to acquire instead, to bringing on a partner, and finally making the hard decision to sell — Tom lived through the full journey of ownership.  
 
What makes Tom’s story powerful is how openly he shares both the human side and the technical side of those decisions. He talks about family dynamics, cash pressure, risk, and identity — but also about valuations, deal structures, and what actually creates value in a company. He also reflects on how education, an ownership framework, and clarity gave him the confidence to understand his options and choose intentionally at each step. 
 
If you’re an owner navigating the day-to-day grind, facing big decisions, or just wondering what the road ahead might look like, Tom’s story will give you a clear window into the full arc of ownership — and the lessons you can carry into your own journey. 

What We Covered: 
Growing up in the family business and deciding to buy it from his dad 
The reality of juggling cash flow, debt, and growth pains 
The moment he considered selling — and why he chose to acquire instead 
Bringing on a partner and how it reshaped the business 
How he approached his valuation and learned to understand what really drives value 
The difficult decision to sell — and how he and his family worked through it 
What life and perspective look like after the business 

Tom Nagler is a former business owner who grew up in a family company, later bought it from his father, and spent years navigating the challenges of cash flow, growth, acquisitions, and partnerships. Through a series of major inflection points, he gained a deep understanding of valuation and what truly drives company value. After ultimately selling his business, Tom now shares candid lessons from the full arc of ownership — from family handoff to life after the sale. 

Chapters:  

Resources: 
Tom Nagler LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomnagler/ 
Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/

Margins are under pressure, and scaling isn’t about throwing more people at the problem. Owners have to leverage technology to increase throughput per employee — but that only works if your data is clean and your processes are digitized.

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This isn’t an AI-hype conversation. It’s about putting best practices in place so you can actually use automation and AI as accelerants. If your company is still running on paper, PDFs, or messy file shares, you’ll never have the information flow you need to make fast, accurate decisions from the boardroom.

That’s why I brought on Bob Muller, an expert in document and data management, to talk about how owners can digitize processes, manage change, and align their information flow with their financial and operational goals. Bob has lived this world for decades, and for me it was a full-circle moment — since I started my career in document management before building and selling our family business.

We get into what it really takes to prepare your company to scale: not just buying new tech, but organizing your processes, cleaning your data, and creating the link from operations → financials → owner goals. 

What We Cover:

⇒Why digitizing processes and cleaning data is the foundation for scaling — and how it protects margins under pressure.
⇒How analog → digital → clean data → automation creates throughput and frees owners from bottlenecks.
⇒Why AI is only an accelerant — it works if the inputs are good, but it’s useless without clean data.
⇒The real challenge of change management: how culture, leadership, and buy-in make or break tech adoption.
⇒How to connect operations → financials → owner goals so technology actually drives valuation, not just efficiency.
⇒Practical steps to start: mapping processes, prioritizing wins, and aligning tech projects with business outcomes.

Bob Muller is a veteran in document and data management with decades of experience helping companies digitize processes, clean data, and unlock efficiency. He specializes in guiding organizations through change management and building the foundation for automation and AI. Bob’s work equips owners to protect margins, scale operations, and tie information flow directly to financial performance and strategic goals.

Chapters: 

Resources:
Bob Muller LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/bob-muller-41152a82/
Image One LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/image-one/

Ryan Tansom Website https://ryantansom.com/