Today's guest, David Nour is a senior leadership/board advisor, educator, executive coach, and bestselling author of 11 books. He is internationally recognized as the leading expert on applications of strategic relationships in profitable growth, sustained innovation, and lasting change. Plus, he's super entertaining, has great energy, and is just a lot of fun to talk to!

We discuss growth mindset vs fixed mindset, work-life balance, the 3 types of friends you should have, why we need to be intentional and strategic about our relationships, and lots more.

David came equipped with all of the quick tips and witticisms for this interview! Here are a few of my favorites:

"Throw away your stopwatch and get a compass instead. It doesn’t matter how fast you do something. Are you headed in the right direction? What’s important?"

"You don’t have a work life and a personal life. You have one life. The sooner you figure out how to integrate and blend the two, the more competent and capable of a human being you’re going to become."

"Convey your credibility through the questions that you ask, not through the solutions you provide. Want better answers? Ask better questions!"

For the rest, you'll have to listen in. Enjoy.

-----

To learn more about David Nour, you can grab a copy of his new book (Curve Benders) that *just* came out! 

Visit him online at https://nourgroup.com/. Or, find him on any of the social platforms (LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram) by searching "David Nour".

Today's guest, Laurel Rutledge is a Career and Leadership Transformation Expert and HR Strategist. She has global, multi-industry experience, has built teams and departments, led large-scale human capital projects, and coached individuals from the plant floor to the board room. 

This episode is full of truth bombs--things that will really make you stop and think, and help you grow. We talk about cancel culture and toxic positivity, self-leadership vs people leadership, how to make the best decisions and modeling leadership behaviour. 

I love Laurel and could talk to her forever about all the things! Do yourself a favor and listen to this episode ASAP. It is that good! ;)

-----

To learn more about Laurel Rutledge you can find her online at https://laurelrutledge.com/. She is also on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurel-k-rutledge/), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/therutledgeperspective) Instagram, and Twitter (search Laurel K Rutledge).

For more than 35 years, Jacqueline has helped countless people become more empowered, confident, and resilient. As a motivational speaker, professional coach, and author of several books (including The Fearless Factor), she believes in the power of fearlessness to create the career and life you want.

Her work focuses on leaders willing to dig into self-discovery, take accountability for their actions, and responsibility for their decisions... Pushing boundaries and breaking through excuses to achieve results.

In this episode, we get into:
- How leading through crisis demands a great deal of self-awareness 
- Powerful questions to ask yourself that yield big results
- How to figure out what the next step is and how to take it
And, more!

If you lead a team or company, work with others (in person or remotely), or simply want to show up as your best self, this message is for you.

-----
To learn more about Jacqueline Wales, you can find her online at https://thefearlessfactoratwork.com/. She is also on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacquelinewales/) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/JacquelineWales/).

My guest today helps organizations, teams, and individuals make monumental changes. 

Over the past 35 years, Jake Jacobs has worked in 61 different industries and consulted for 96 organizations (from Fortune 50 to national non-profits and community theaters). He has supported more than 210,000 people directly on important changes to their business--everything from strategy implementation and leadership development to mergers/acquisitions and culture change. 

He is many companies' go-to when they are looking to leverage change in their organizations and is definitely an expert in the field. 

Listen in as we discuss:

- Why PURPOSE and OUTCOMES are essential drivers in the workplace

- How front-line workers want to know WHAT'S IN IT FOR ME?

- Why you should always INVITE THE TROUBLEMAKERS

- And, the most COMMON PROBLEMS that can occur with change (as well as their SOLUTIONS)

Jake is a fount of knowledge and experience. If you work, in any capacity, and have the potential to experience change, you are not going to want to miss this conversation. It was a fun one to have and super useful!

-----

To learn more about Jake Jacobs, you can grab a copy of his new book (Leverage Change: 8 Ways to Achieve Faster, Easier, Better Results) that came out last week. 

Or, visit him online at https://jakejacobsconsulting.com/. 

You can also connect with him via LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertjakejacobs/.

In this episode, I talk to Faith Clarke, an Organizational Health and Inclusion Specialist.

Our conversation was rich and we covered A LOT of ground, including but not limited to:
- How leading through a crisis can teach you to be hyper-present
- How to get to know and take care of yourself better, as a leader
- How to hold collective space and honor rhythms, energy, and needs (yours and those of others, in life and at work)
- How inclusion starts with us

True diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) has to be flexible. And, it has to include us first. 

Faith suggests that we start doing the work by asking ourselves: who's not allowed to show up IN ME in this space? 

From there, we can start to work outward--building that muscle at micro-levels (in our families and on our direct teams). Faith suggests paying attention to "who is at the party but not dancing." 

For all the good stuff, you'll have to LISTEN IN. I enjoyed this conversation immensely and know that you will too!

-----

To learn more about Faith Clarke and how she helps women leaders in social impact organizations cultivate peak performance, create inclusive culture, and lead thriving teams visit https://www.faithclarke.com/.

This solo episode is short and sweet and truly, just the beginning of the conversation I want to continue to have about failure. I wanted to start with this because I believe it’s imperative that we change our relationship with the idea of failure on an individual level. Part of that starts from recognizing and shifting the paradigms that we have in our head—right or wrong, win or lose, pass or fail. “We stay in those paradigms because categories make our brains very happy.” 

The more we can lean into the idea that “Failures” are opportunities to practice something and gather data the more we can continue to learn and grow inside of that same thing, or take that data and find a different way of doing things.

Jennifer Thornton is a sought-after business strategist, specializing in startups and large value-based organizations who assists her clients in building talent that complements their business strategies to ensure exponential growth. Her unconventional approach in creating innovative workforce development solutions for companies has driven her consulting firm into rapid growth with its Conversational Intelligence® training, Executive Coaching and Leadership Academies.

For more than 20 years Jennifer has been developing her expertise in Talent Strategy and Leadership Professional Development throughout her career as an HR Professional. She’s led international teams across Greater China, Mexico, the United Kingdom and the United States, expanding into new markets, managing franchise retailers, and developing key strategic partnerships.

In this episode, we talk about understanding fear and how it impacts our responses as leaders. Jennifer shares how we can step out of that fear state in order to move from crisis management towards collaboration and innovation. 

Jennifer also emphasizes the importance for leaders inviting their teams into the conversation, letting their voices be heard and talking about finding solutions. Effective leadership starts with the ability to know that you might not have all the answers – but together in teams, there's a chance to build knowledge and capability to move forward collectively. 

We dive into the Seven Deadly Sins of Leadership, and Jennifer gives some very interesting examples of how they show up when we are dealing with change. You definitely don’t want to miss this!

Find out more about Jennifer on her website: www.304coaching.com

Connect with her through LinkedIn: 

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

Karen started her company in 1996 and has helped top business leaders and teams from Fortune 500 companies to manage change, increase productivity and achieve success. Featured in the media several times, she is a strategic advisor to startup “Animo” which aims to help employees understand and manage their well-being using Artificial Intelligence. 

Karen is a Master Certified Coach (MCC) and a past Board member and founder of the Toronto Chapter for the International Coaching Federation. Karen has an MBA in Marketing from the Ivey School and a bachelor’s degree in Economics from Western University. 

Based on her personal and coaching experience, Karen says suffering from burnout most likely happens to “Accidental Alpha women” with the feeling of regular resentment as the first clue. Compared to the “non-accidental” Alpha women who know this is the kind of leadership they want from the get-go, the Accidental Alpha women feel disconnected with tension and frustration around them. 

Karen says in order for these women to thrive, the first step is to recognize their reality and accept that delegation and asking for help is part of leadership. She says women need to become comfortable with admitting that they are overwhelmed and asking for specific support. 

She emphasizes that self-leadership is the key to leading with more clarity. She also mentions the importance of planning for the worst scenarios while detaching from the outcome in order to transition into a more rewarding life and career. 

Access her book: “The Accidental Alpha Woman: The Guide to Thriving When Life Feels Overwhelming”

Find out more about Karen on her website: https://www.parachuteexecutivecoaching.com/

Connect with her on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenwrightcoach/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/karenwrightcoach

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/karenwrightcoach/ and https://www.instagram.com/accidentalalphawoman/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/KWrightcoach

Karin and her team have been the chosen training partners for some of the world’s most recognized companies and most respected academic institutions in the world – from Nike to Lenovo, from Duke University to the Graduate School of Business at Stanford. Karin translated her experience as an Emmy-award-winning broadcast journalist and on-camera spokesperson into a methodology called the MVPs of On-Camera Success™. 

Her first book, “On-Camera Coach: Tools and Techniques for Business Professionals in a Video-Driven World“, was a #1 Hot New Release in Business Communications on Amazon in 2017. Her second book, “Suddenly Virtual: Making Remote Meetings Work” debuts on March 9 and is written with Dr. Joseph Allen, one of the foremost thought leaders in meeting science. It’s designed to provide research-based best practices for making the most of virtual meetings with video at their core. 

During our conversation, Karin shares some key insights relative to virtual meeting success.

She advises that everyone should pay close attention to their personal production value (i.e.how they look on camera). She says being prepared with crisp audio and good quality video can show great leadership and respect to your team.

Being intentional about keeping people engaged can bring you success in virtual meetings, but to do this you have to recognize the camera as the conduit to your conversation partner and treat it as the person you’re talking to. 

However, this requires not watching yourself on screen and hiding self-view in order to engage with the camera lens. The most draining aspect of being on camera is what she calls “surface acting” where you have to appear to be engaged, which is why everyone has felt “Zoom fatigue” at some point in the last year  

The science behind all this, as well as the techniques to overcome challenges in remote meetings which can be applied to every situation, are discussed in her new book. With the crisis being a “blessing” to her business, Karin shares her process of scaling up, to help more people suddenly transition to virtual meetings.

Access her new book: “Suddenly Virtual: Making Remote Meetings Work”

Find out more about Karin on her website: www.SpeakerDynamics.com

Connect with her on LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/company/speaker-dynamics

Twitter: https://twitter.com/SpeakerDynamics

The focus of this episode is really about navigating the changing systems and realities when it comes to how we work. EB Sanders shares her insights from her work with both individuals as well as organizations, and reflects on the opportunities (and challenges) that are in front of us. When we stop thinking about our career and success as linear and we start to embrace change, as uncomfortable as it might be, we open ourselves up to entirely new experiences and ways of doing things. EB shares her observations on how systems and processes are finally starting to change, the importance of location when it comes to innovation, and the challenges and opportunities that are part and parcel of remote hiring and remote work. 

EB Sanders is a career coach who helps creative types ditch their fears and make decisions with confidence so they can achieve the fulfillment they really want.

She went from college professor to recruiting & staffing specialist to career coach all in the name of helping people find their ‘Thing.’ Having gone through two major career changes herself, she came to realize that her Thing is helping people think bigger about how they want to show up in the world.

Today she is a sought-after coach and staffing consultant serving creative individuals, companies, and organizations. She believes that great leaders have extraordinary careers and her mission is to convince everyone that they don’t have to choose between happiness and success. 

Find out more about EB Sanders and her Career Change with Confidence program at: www.ebsanders.com

Connect with her

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ebsanders
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eb_sanders