The Game Changer Network

People Are the Heartbeat of Business! The heart is the life force within each of us. It's the organ that keeps you alive with every contraction and pulse. Leaders are the life force of every team. Just as the heart pulses our nutrient-rich blood to each organ in the body, leaders push out encouragement, direction, correction, energy, growth, and influence to the team. And just like the automatic beat of the heart, leaders can make these pulses of leadership second-nature if they learn to recognize and choose them. Now more than ever, how leaders handle each pulse can empower or weaken leadership, engage or disengage teams, and positively or negatively impact an entire organization.

Dawn S. Kirk shares her proven six Pulses of Heartbeat Leadership to empower leaders:

Priorities: The Purpose of Leadership. Your priorities give you the gift of clarity and position your team to win. If priorities aren't crystal clear, you may find your ladder leaning against the wrong building and all you do will be in vain.

Preparation: The Energy of Leadership. Preparation is critical if you want to close the gap between where you are now and where you want or need to be. Only then can you start to move.

People: The Power of Leadership. People are your competitive advantage. Ensure you have the right people in the right seats, and commit to investing in them to achieve shared results.

Processes: The Drivers of Leadership. Processes are the drivers that simplify leadership. When put into place early, they enable you to measure success and mark consistent wins.

Performance: The Metrics of Leadership. Without measurable targets, it's impossible to know if you are succeeding. Performance metrics give you a system to measure, adjust, and repeat with laser-like focus.

Promotion: The Growth of Leadership. Promotion is the catalyst that helps your leadership grow. It is a delicate balance of humility and pride that shares your individual and your team's success with the organization.

When leaders embrace the Six Pulses and put them to work, the results are nothing short of amazing!

Chicke Fitzgerald is an e𝗻𝗴𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮 𝗳𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗴𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴. 💡 I zig where others zag, creating value, growth and bringing to life crazy good ideas that will leave a legacy #͏z͏i͏g͏w͏i͏t͏h͏c͏h͏i͏c͏k͏e

Interview by Chicke Fitzgerald of the Game Changer Network

Are you looking for the keys to more successful sales relationships and client conversations that don't require manipulation, probing, and closing - but produce profoundly more powerful impact and results?

The Ultimate Sales Revolution explains how to reach the highest level of a professional relationship and become an indispensable partner in your client's success. You attain this exalted level of trust, respect, and differentiation from your competition by ensuring that every client request and activity delivers meaningful results, builds the strongest and most sustainable client relationship, avoids the three sources of miscommunication, and delivers massive value and impact.

Each of the principles in this book transforms your ability to win business, get paid for your value (not your time, effort, or activity), and earn the access, recognition, respect, and rewards reserved for the most successful salespeople and privileged professional services providers. These keys promise to significantly advance your professional enjoyment, your impact, and, most importantly, your results.

Chicke Fitzgerald is an e𝗻𝗴𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮 𝗳𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗴𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴. 💡 I zig where others zag, creating value, growth and bringing to life crazy good ideas that will leave a legacy #͏z͏i͏g͏w͏i͏t͏h͏c͏h͏i͏c͏k͏e

Interview by Chicke Fitzgerald of the Game Changer Network,

A 2018 Nautilus Book Award Winner for Business and Leadership!

The founder of Menlo Innovations and author of the business culture cult classic Joy, Inc. offers an inspirational guide to leaders seeking joy in the challenge of leading others.

Rich Sheridan's Joy, Inc. told the story of how his tiny software company in Ann Arbor, Michigan, achieved success and renown by embracing offbeat culture and human-centered values. In Chief Joy Officer, he turns his attention from culture to leadership and draws on his experience running Menlo and consulting elsewhere to offer a wise, provocative guide on how anyone can build leadership capacity for joy within their own organization.

Chief Joy Officer offers sage, hard-won advice to any manager or leader who yearns to make more of an impact on the lives of others, including:

Self-understanding is the cornerstone for every virtue of leadership: authenticity, trust, humility, and optimism.

Good leaders make more leaders: Learn to judge your performance not on whether people are doing what they're told, but whether they're developing independent leadership capacity.

Influencing up is just as important is influencing down: how to encourage different thinking in those above you in your organizations.

Filled with colorful anecdotes from Sheridan's personal journey and wisdom from many leadership mentors, Chief Joy Officer offers an approachable, down-to-earth philosophy and practice that will help even the most disillusioned of middle managers bring a renewed sense of purpose to their work building others.

Chicke Fitzgerald is an e𝗻𝗴𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮 𝗳𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗴𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴. 💡 I zig where others zag, creating value, growth and bringing to life crazy good ideas that will leave a legacy #͏z͏i͏g͏w͏i͏t͏h͏c͏h͏i͏c͏k͏e

Interview by Chicke Fitzgerald of the Game Changer Network.

From Bryan Mattimore, innovation guru to Fortune 500 companies, comes a book for aspiring entrepreneurs, corporate “intrapreneurs,” and anyone else looking to break the mold.

Bryan Mattimore is a big idea guy. For the past twenty-five years, he has helped Fortune 500 companies create over $3 billion in new innovations using his unique creative-thinking exercises. In 21 DAYS TO A BIG IDEA: CREATING BREAKTHROUGH BUSINESS CONCEPTS, Mattimore takes readers through a disciplined creative process to create original and practical new business concepts.

By investing less than an hour a day for twenty-one days, you will:

1) learn a new toolkit of creative thinking strategies and problem-solving techniques that can be used for solving a wide variety of both personal and professional challenges, and

2) generate more than a dozen new concepts from which to choose the highest potential/winning idea for a new start-up.

Entertaining and easy-to-follow, 21 DAYS TO A BIG IDEA is a must-read for all aspiring entrepreneurs, helping you to discover and implement your first—or your next—biggest idea.

Chicke Fitzgerald is an 𝗘𝗻𝗴𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮 𝗳𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗴𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴. 💡 I zig where others zag, creating value, growth and bringing to life crazy good ideas that will leave a legacy #͏z͏i͏g͏w͏i͏t͏h͏c͏h͏i͏c͏k͏e

Happily Altered After podcast host and author, Maya Holihan, has been a wedding industry expert for over 18 years. Maya began her career with famed bridal gown designer, Vera Wang in New York City.

In 2003, she relocated to Norfolk, Virginia and bought her first bridal shop. By 2015 Maya owned six bridal shops, a bridal show, wedding planning company, and was the editor of a bridal publication…she had one of the most prominent wedding companies in the nation.

Maya Holihan puts her wealth of experience and knowledge to good use helping today’s bride take the stress out of that all-important purchase—the wedding gown. For over a decade she was a hands-on owner of multiple bridal businesses in the Greater Norfolk Virginia area. Finding the gown is the prized planning detail for most brides. Maya shares a great deal of inside secrets and do’s and don’ts to guide the bride down the path to wedded bliss. Her valuable commentary equips a bride with the knowledge and mindset she needs to prepare for this momentous time in her life. Happily Altered After is filled with helpful anecdotes and stunning photos from brides who’ve said, “I do,” and wedding planners who’ve masterfully dodged wedding gown mishaps. It’s an essential read for brides, mothers, and maids-of-honor, and even fathers will enjoy the useful guidance this book offers. Let Happily Altered After be your compass on the road to Happily Ever After.

Chicke Fitzgerald is an e𝗻𝗴𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗮 𝗳𝗼𝗰𝘂𝘀 𝗼𝗻 𝗴𝗶𝘃𝗶𝗻𝗴. 💡 I zig where others zag, creating value, growth and bringing to life crazy good ideas that will leave a legacy #͏z͏i͏g͏w͏i͏t͏h͏c͏h͏i͏c͏k͏e

BEST OF THE GAME CHANGER

Praise For I Didn't See It Coming

"In the fiercely competitive world of business, these authors learned how to play the game with skill and competence. They are uniquely qualified to teach others the rules of the workplace."

―PETER A. LUND, former president and chief executive officer, CBS, Inc.

"I Didn't See It Coming could change the way you think about your career and redefine your strategy to succeed in a corporation."

―ROBERT T. CORNELL, Managing Director, Lehman Brothers Inc.

"Candid and savvy, this book is the ultimate corporate politics rulebook. It provides clear and shrewd strategies to reach the corner office. Keep this book at your side at all times!"

―LYNNE DOMINICK, former publisher, Everyday Food magazine

"I Didn't See It Coming should be the bible for those climbing the corporate ladder. Every chapter gives me more and more critical strategies for reading the room and maneuvering through internal corporate politics."

―JASON JORDAN, Senior Sales Representative, T-Mobile

"In today's incredibly complex world, even the best leaders can make mistakes that prove fatal. In our work, we see it time and time again through our clients and executives. This book provides a very useful way to be better prepared to avoid those simple yet fatal mistakes."

―JERRY NOONAN, Partner, Spencer Stuart

Interview by Chicke Fitzgerald of the Game Changer Network as a part of the Best of the Game Changer series

Twenty-first century customers are demanding more than ever - they will communicate with a company in whatever channel they need to at the time they want to. They want their interactions with the company to be seamless, convenient and simple. They want to get whatever it is they want to do with your company done as fast as possible. AND they want more than just good products and services, products, services, the tools they need to control their interactions with your company and consumable experiences. All in all, if you can't compete by engaging them in ways that make them want to come back to you, you lose.

While this is a complex effort, because you have to satisfy the needs of potentially millions of customers (you want that right? Millions), it is simple in its fundamental principle - if a customer likes you and continues to like you they will continue to do business with you. If they don't they won't. Simple, but the execution isn't because you have to identify what each of those millions of customers wants and needs and keep the provision of those individual needs cost-effective enough to be of value to you and yet still provide value to them. Plus they have to e able to retain control over their own interactions with you - because if they lose the option of control of their conversation with you, they are gone.

To do this takes a substantial effort. That's where the Commonwealth of Self Interest: Business Success Through Customer Engagement by Paul Greenberg comes in. This book is the first of its kind to present the definitions, frameworks, strategies, programs, business operations, cultural transformation, systems technologies, and measurements to successfully engage your company's customers - whether your company is small and growing or an immense enterprise with hundreds of millions of customers.

The changes in sales, marketing, customer service and commerce have been profound and how to navigate those changes and provide the right approaches and programs are addressed and the impact of successfully addressing those changes is shown by case studies and stories - as is what happens when you don't adjust to what your customers have already adjusted to.

Throughout the book, which is written in a entertaining and conversational style, you will find dozens of case studies, proven best practices, expert advice and analysis from Paul and nearly 20 of his closest friends - all experts in their respective fields. Paul Greenberg, known as the "Godfather of CRM" is a best selling author who wrote CRM at the Speed of Light, called "The Bible of CRM" that has been through 4 editions and 9 languages. An adviser to many companies at the enterprise level, over the years (and there have been many of them - years that is), he has been able to piece together a strategic framework at the highest level and a lot of best practices/tips & tricks at the deepest level including things like mapping customer journeys to help you structure your company's efforts around providing and receiving value to and from your customers. If you don't want to believe him, read Brian Solis on user experience, Bruce Temkin on customer experience, Ray Wang on digital transformation, Brent Leary on the future of the engagement technology landscape or Esteban Kolsky on why building ecosystems is a practical matter not an academic exercise. And many others.

Others may claim that theirs is the only book you'll ever need to do....whatever. This book probably isn't the only book you will ever need. No one is saying customer engagement is simple. But it is likely to be the first book you'll want to read on your journey to becoming a company that is both better for your customer and great for you.

THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP AND HOW IT SHAPES OUR LIVES

Does Friendship play a role in being successful in business?

Interview by Chicke Fitzgerald of the Game Changer Network

Here you will find the answers to your questions about friendship: how do friendships start, how do you keep it going, why do some friendships last a lifetime and others end? You will also find out about friendship throughout history and in the social sciences as well as friendship throughout the lifecycle.

FRIENDSHIFTS is divided into five parts: Part 1, “That’s What Friends Are For,” covers the power of friendship, definitions of casual, close, and best friends; perspective on friendship including the Great Friend and the Modern Friend Approach; the process of becoming friends, from acquaintance to friend; and friendship patterns (two-way, three-way, four and more friendships); Part 2, “Friendshifts, or How Friendship Changes Throughout Life,” has chapters on childhood and the single years and marriage and friendship; Part 3, “How to Be a Better Friend,” has chapters on how to maintain and improve a friendship; how to prevent a friendship from ending; and how to handle friendships that end; Part 4, “Work and Friendship,” has two chapters including “How Friendship Enhances Your Career” and “Male and Female Work Friendships;” and Part 5, “Life and Friendship” has two chapters including, “The Friendship Factor in Everyday Life,” on how to apply the author’s friendship principles to befriending your relatives including your children, your father or mother, and your spouse (romantic partner) and “Summing Up.”

The book is based on the author’s doctoral thesis and additional original research consisting of surveys and interviews. "Friendshifts" is a word Dr. Yager coined to denote how sometimes our friendships may shift throughout our lives, and even how we define a friend. Fortunately, in some instances, lifelong friendship does happen. FRIENDSHIFTS explores what you can do to help a friendship to last. Even with the most enduring friendships, there may be an ending because of death. (There is a section in FRIENDSHIFTS on “Coping with Endings Because of Death.”)

The examples, anecdotes, quotes, and studies cited throughout the book reinforce the notion that the right friends will help you to get ahead or to be happy in life, and even to live a longer life; the wrong friends can sabotage you or even get you hurt or killed.

Dr. Jan Yager is a sociologist, freelance writer, coach, speaker, artist, and Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York. She also teaches at Baruch College and William Paterson University.

How Smart Companies Turn Sustainability into Billion-Dollar Businesses by Freya Williams

Interview by Chicke Fitzgerald of the Game Changer Network as a part of the Best of the Game Changer series, showcased on C-Suite Network

What do Brazil’s top beauty brand, America’s second-fastest-growing restaurant chain, and the world’s third bestselling car have in common? They are shattering the myth that acting sustainably and building a billion-dollar business are mutually exclusive.

Packed with eye-opening research, exclusive interviews, and enlightening examples from Chipotle, Toyota, Unilever, Tesla, General Electric, and more, Green Giants serves as a blueprint for sustain able success that anyone can follow.

E. Freya Williams advises organizations including Coca Cola, Unilever, the United Nations, Estee Lauder, Waste Management and many others on how to turn sustainability and social good into competitive advantage for their business and brands. Cofounder of OgilvyEarth and former lead of Edelman’s Business + Social Purpose practice in New York, today Freya is the North American CEO of Futerra, the global sustainability change agency.

Green Giants examines nine companies that are merging social responsibility with wild profitability – and reveals the six factors responsible for their success.iconoclastic leadership fueled by deep conviction and a rebellious streak; disruptive innovation that uses sustain ability to spur the development of radically better products and services; a higher purpose that ignites the company – when the mission leads, profits follow. Mainstream Appeal with positioning and packaging stripped of the crunchy cliches that alienate the average customer. This new breed of billion-dollar businesses proves it’s possible to achieve enormous success while implementing sustainable principles that help consumers live better lives. Ranging from start-ups to business lines incubated within major multi nationals, these companies collectively represent over $60 billion in revenue. What’s more – many command wider profit mar gins and are growing faster than their conventional counterparts.

Freya’s experience has given her an insider’s perspective on the trials and tribulations of incorporating sustainability into a business and the opportunity to experience the movement’s successes and failures first-hand. In the course of persuading clients to try fresh, sometimes counter-intuitive approaches, Freya has built up a wealth of data on the business case for sustainability, as well as an instinctive sense of what works and what doesn’t. She is also intimately familiar with the challenges of forcing change through large, complex, often siloed organizations—and has developed strategies and tools to overcome them.

Freya is best known for her work in making sustainability relevant to mainstream audiences. Her work has been featured on Marketplace, and in The Financial Times, Newsweek and even The Onion. She is a regular public speaker who has lectured at Columbia, Wharton and Harvard.

The world has changed over the 14 years since their founding, Futerra has played a role in changing it. Today, it’s a fiercely independent and global company. It’s majority owned and led by women, with Freya being the North American CEO, and they are one of the UK’s first B-corps.

Futerra isn’t just a logical sustainability consultancy, or a magical creative agency; they are both.

They work with people who believe they can turn the sustainability imperative into the greatest entrepreneurial opportunity for a generation. Their clients are building brands that are symbols of positive change. They are unleashing progress that has purpose. If you’re here, then it’s likely you believe the same.

The Game Changer is featured on C-Suite Network.

How Great Companies Fuel Innovation Through Diversity by David Livermore

Interview by Chicke Fitzgerald of the Game Changer Network as a part of the Best of the Game Changer series, showcased on C-Suite Network

Today’s workforce is more diverse than ever before. But despite new perspectives and talents, the promise of increased innovation rarely materializes. Why are so few businesses seeing results? Studies show that diverse teams are more creative than homogenous ones–but only when they are managed effectively.

The secret is to minimize conflict while maximizing the informational diversity found in varied values and experiences. To do this, both leaders and team members need a high level of cultural intelligence, or CQ.

David Livermore, Ph.D., is President and Partner at the Cultural Intelligence Center, a consultancy at the forefront of CQ assessment and development. The author of Leading with Cultural Intelligence, he has been cited by The Economist, Forbes, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal.

Drawing on success stories from Google, Alibaba, Novartis, and other groundbreaking companies, Driven by Difference identifies the management practices necessary to guide multicultural teams to innovation, including how to: Create an optimal environment – Build trust – Fuse differing perspectives – Align goals and expectations – Generate fresh ideas – Consider the various audiences when selecting and selling an idea – Design and test for different users Cultural differences can lead to gridlock, or they can catalyze innovation and growth. This research-based plan turns diversity’s potential into economic reality.

David Livermore is a Researcher, Speaker &,

thought leader in cultural intelligence (CQ) and global leadership and the author of ten books on cultural intelligence and global leadership. His book, Leading with Cultural Intelligence, was named a best-seller in business by The Washington Post. He’s president and partner at the Cultural Intelligence Center in East Lansing, Michigan and a visiting research fellow at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.

Prior to leading the Cultural Intelligence Center, Dave spent 20 years in leadership positions with a variety of non-profit organizations around the world and taught in universities. He’s a frequent speaker and adviser to leaders in Fortune 500’s, non-profits, and governments and has worked in more than 100 countries across the Americas, Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe.

Dave has authored several other books, including the award-winning titles, Serving With Eyes Wide Open and Cultural Intelligence: Improving your CQ to Engage our Multicultural World (Baker Publ.).

Dave loves to take research and make it accessible to practitioners. He has been interviewed and referenced by major news sources such as Atlantic Monthly, CBS News, The Christian Post, Christian Science Monitor, The Economist, Forbes, NBC, The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.

Dave averages 35 international speaking engagements annually, addressing an average of 7500 leaders over a year. He also serves on several non-profit boards.

The Game Changer is featured on C-Suite Network.