I'll be honest: for a long time I didn't even know Chief of Staff was a real role. In this episode of Leadership Happy Hour, I sit down with Nicole Bryce, a strategy and operations leader and Chief of Staff, to pull back the curtain on one of the most interesting and fastest-growing seats in any organization.

Nicole has fifteen years turning messy, ambiguous priorities into clear plans and real results across financial services and shared services. We get into what a Chief of Staff actually does, why the role is suddenly everywhere, and how she made each move build the foundation for the next. She also makes the case that careers aren't ladders, they're more like climbing a wall, and that you don't have to be the smartest person in the room to lead it. We close on why culture matters just as much as the plan.

Grab a drink and pull up a seat. You'll leave with one move you can make this week.

In this episode:

• What a Chief of Staff actually is, and why the role is everywhere right now
• The difference between a Chief of Staff and the roles people confuse it with
• Why each role builds the foundation for the next, even the sideways ones
• Why you don't have to be the subject matter expert to lead
• How to position yourself to move into a Chief of Staff role
• Bringing structure to ambiguity, in practice
• Why culture matters as much as the plan

Timestamps
00:00 Welcome
00:35 Meet Nicole Bryce
01:28 What a Chief of Staff actually is
03:33 Chief of Staff vs the roles people confuse it with
04:26 Why each role builds the foundation for the next
05:42 You don't have to be the subject matter expert
07:03 Careers aren't ladders: the rock wall analogy
07:48 Positioning yourself for the role
11:49 What the role is really like day to day
13:12 Getting comfortable with ambiguity
14:54 Bringing structure to ambiguity, in practice
17:13 Why the role is getting so much attention now
18:33 How to move into a Chief of Staff role
21:15 How much should leaders communicate?
22:38 Why culture matters as much as the plan
25:16 Where to find Nicole

About the guest
Nicole Bryce is a strategy and operations leader and Chief of Staff with fifteen years driving enterprise transformation across financial services and shared services. A trusted advisor to C-suite executives, she's known for bringing structure to ambiguity, aligning leaders around what matters, and turning big ideas into strategies that get executed.

About the host
Alesia Briggs is a Certified Executive Coach and founder of Briggs Consulting. Leadership Happy Hour is her show where leaders pour a drink, skip the theory, and talk about what actually makes them better. Find her at coachbriggs.com.

Work with Alesia: coachbriggs.com | New episodes weekly

You can't replace a six-figure salary by pricing like an intern. In this episode of Leadership Happy Hour, I sit down with Deb Boulanger, the Reliable Revenue Architect and host of the Life After Corporate podcast, on what it actually takes to leave corporate and build a business that pays you for your judgment.

Deb spent twenty years inside a major tech advisory firm before she walked away at the top, took a ten-day silent retreat, and built Life After Corporate. Since then she's guided hundreds of senior women through the leap. We get into what fractional work really is and how to find it, the difference between being hired for a project and retained for your expertise, why so many accomplished women underprice, and the shift from hustle to reliable revenue. Almost half of all new businesses last year were started by women, and Deb breaks down why that wave is happening now.

Grab a drink and pull up a seat. You'll leave with one move you can make this week.

In this episode

• What fractional and advisory work actually is, and how to find it
• The difference between being hired for a project and retained for your expertise
• Why accomplished women underprice, and how to stop
• Hustle versus building reliable, recurring revenue
• Why nearly half of new businesses are now started by women
• The one move to make if you're quietly planning your exit

Timestamps
00:00 Welcome to Leadership Happy Hour
00:36 Meet Deb Boulanger
01:40 What nobody tells you about leaving corporate
03:14 What fractional work actually is
05:40 Advice for making the move
08:41 Coaching yourself into the advisor seat
10:59 Learning to trust your own judgment
14:40 Why you don't hear your own value
16:16 The underpricing trap, and how to fix it
20:16 Why now: the wave of women going out on their own
24:05 Where fractional and advisory work comes from
24:19 Hustle vs reliable revenue
26:21 Getting booked for speaking and keynotes
27:41 One move if you're quietly planning your exit
28:36 The one thing Deb wants every woman to hear

About the guest
Deb Boulanger is the Reliable Revenue Architect for corporate women turned CEOs and host of the Life After Corporate podcast, with more than 250 episodes. After twenty years inside a major tech advisory firm, she built Life After Corporate to help senior women turn decades of expertise into advisory and fractional work they get retained for, not just hired for.

About the host
Alesia Briggs is a Certified Executive Coach and founder of Briggs Consulting. Leadership Happy Hour is her show where leaders pour a drink, skip the theory, and talk about what actually makes them better. Find her at coachbriggs.com.

You've read the book. Taken the course. Heard the advice. And you still haven't changed. In this episode of Leadership Happy Hour, I sit down with Jamison Jacobs, a Professional Certified Coach who coaches leaders and trains the coaches who coach them, to get at why knowing what to do is almost never enough.

Jamison makes the case that information was never the thing holding you back. The real work happens underneath, at the level of the beliefs and patterns quietly shaping your results. We get into what he listens for when a leader brings him a problem, how experience hardens into the beliefs that run your behavior, and why the leader who can't stop doing it all is usually protecting a story about what got them here. We also talk about what still makes a leader valuable in a world where AI makes information instant and endless.

Grab a drink and pull up a seat. You'll leave with one move you can make this week.

In this episode

• Why knowing what to do is almost never enough to change
• What a great coach listens for beneath the problem you bring
• How your experiences harden into the beliefs that drive your behavior
• Seeing the pattern that's quietly shaping your results
• Getting honest about what you actually value
• Why "doing it all" is so hard to let go of, and what it's really protecting
• What makes a leader valuable when AI makes information limitless

Timestamps
00:00 Welcome to Leadership Happy Hour
00:33 Meet Jamison Jacobs
01:15 Why knowing what to do is never enough
04:03 Coaching leaders vs training coaches
07:11 What "listening for what's underneath" really means
09:33 Getting past the belief that's in the way
13:19 How experience hardens into belief
15:56 Seeing the patterns driving your behavior
18:56 Getting clear on what you actually value
26:39 The belief that doing it all is what got you here
29:24 AI: what still makes a leader valuable
31:12 The one thing to shift on Monday
32:41 Where to find Jamison

About the guest
Jamison Jacobs is the founder and CEO of JJacobs Coaching and a Professional Certified Coach with the International Coaching Federation. He coaches executives, founders, and high performers through leadership transitions and identity shifts, and for more than seven years he has also trained and developed coaches through a year-long professional program. His work goes after the goals that matter while addressing the patterns and beliefs quietly standing in the way.

About the host
Alesia Briggs is a Certified Executive Coach and founder of Briggs Consulting. Leadership Happy Hour is her show where leaders pour a drink, skip the theory, and talk about what actually makes them better. Find her at coachbriggs.com.

Most of us learn leadership the hard way, one painful lesson at a time, over years. My guest has thirty of those years, and he's here to hand you the shortcuts. In this episode of Leadership Happy Hour, I sit down with Kevin Gregar, a retiring Army colonel who spent more than three decades getting the best out of people, to talk about what actually changes when you lead for that long.

We get into how to pull real value from different perspectives when you're solving hard problems, what worked thirty years ago that would fail badly today, and the moment Kevin learned that rigorous process means nothing without genuine care for people. He also makes the case that too many leaders are bolting AI onto broken process, and what to do instead.

Grab a drink and pull up a seat. You'll leave with one move you can make this week.

In this episode

• The shift from doing the work to leading the people
• Bringing in different perspectives when you're solving complex problems
• Using difference when the stakes are high and the clock's running
• What worked thirty years ago that fails today
• Why process means nothing without genuine care for people
• Where to start with AI if you feel behind, and why process comes first
• The one painful lesson you can skip

Timestamps
00:00 Welcome to Leadership Happy Hour00:42 Meet Kevin Gregar01:33 Looking back after thirty years in uniform02:19 The shift from doing to leading: empower, then get out of the way05:50 Why consistency and having their back changes everything07:48 Solving complex problems: bringing in different perspectives10:20 Using difference when the stakes are high14:33 What worked thirty years ago that fails today18:56 Process versus people: when process alone isn't enough24:34 AI: where to start if you feel behind27:11 Get the process right before you add AI28:07 The one painful lesson you can skip30:17 Thanks and close

About the guest
Kevin Gregar is a retiring U.S. Army colonel who spent more than thirty years in uniform, twenty-six as an officer, leading everything from small teams to large global commands, including running a $5.4 billion industrial operation across 23 facilities. He pairs rigorous process and accountability with genuine care for the people doing the work, and he's an early adopter of AI in enterprise operations.

About the host
Alesia Briggs is a Certified Executive Coach and founder of Briggs Consulting. Leadership Happy Hour is her show where leaders pour a drink, skip the theory, and talk about what actually makes them better. Find her at coachbriggs.com.

Links
Work with Alesia: coachbriggs.com | New episodes every week

Think sales isn't your job? If you lead, you're selling all day long. Your ideas, your decisions, your timelines, your team's work, and yourself. In this episode of Leadership Happy Hour, I sit down with Kat Hurd, a sales strategist and leadership coach who spent nearly twenty years in medical device sales, to unpack what most leaders get wrong about influence.

Kat went from Clinical Specialist to Rep of the Year, grew a $500K territory into $6.5 million, and scaled a team from zero to fifty-five before stepping out to coach. We get into building influence before you have the title, why the way you speak and strategize shapes the opportunities you get, and the systems that make success repeatable instead of accidental. She also shares one of the hardest lessons in the jump from top performer to leader: you're not there to make your team carbon copies of you, you're there to make them better than you.

Grab a drink and pull up a seat. You'll leave with one move you can make this week.

In this episode

• Why you're always selling, even when you're not in a sales role
• Building influence before you ever get the title
• How the way you speak and strategize shapes your opportunities
• The systems that make success repeatable, not accidental
• Winning big without burning out
• The shift from top performer to leader: coaching people to be better than you, not copies of you

About the guest
Kat Hurd is a sales strategist and leadership coach who spent nearly twenty years in medical device sales, going from Clinical Specialist to Rep of the Year, growing a $500K territory into $6.5 million, and leading a $25 million portfolio before scaling a sales team from zero to fifty-five as an Area Vice President. Today she helps high performers win big without burning out and opens more doors for women in the device world.

About the host
Alesia Briggs is a Certified Executive Coach and founder of Briggs Consulting. Leadership Happy Hour is her show where leaders pour a drink, skip the theory, and talk about what actually makes them better. Find her at coachbriggs.com.

Links
Work with Alesia: coachbriggs.com | New episodes every week

Busy isn't the same as intentional, and most leaders never learn the difference. In this first episode of Leadership Happy Hour, I sit down with Lisa Welker-Finney, President and CEO of Millennium Consulting, to talk about leading on purpose in a world that changes by the hour.

We get into the truth most leaders are avoiding, the one move that builds trust fast, and how to tell the difference between real intentionality and autopilot. Then we dig into the three shifts Lisa works on with executives: intentionality, strategy, and ownership. That includes why so many leaders think they have a strategy their team can't actually name, and what's really holding capable people back from taking their seat at the table.

Grab a drink and pull up a seat. You'll leave with one move you can make this week.