🎙️ From College Failure to Chief People Officer: Steve Browne's Journey Building People-First Culture at LaRosa's Pizzeria

In this inspiring episode, Steve Browne, Chief People Officer at LaRosa's Pizzeria and author of three influential HR books, shares his remarkable journey from nearly flunking out of engineering school to leading human resources for a beloved 71-year-old family-owned restaurant chain with 65 locations.

✨ Key Insights You'll Learn:

• Career pivot from chemical engineering failure to communications degree after mother's life-changing question

• Starting at Procter & Gamble: learning personnel work wasn't called HR yet in early 1980s

• Cultural mismatch at Fortune 10: leaving corporate structure for entrepreneurial manufacturing startup

• 30-day employee name challenge: learn all 200 names or be fired on day 31

• Foundation principle from first entrepreneur boss: "If you're not here for my people, I don't need you"

• 13 months unemployed in 1988-89 recession: girlfriend buying groceries, working as landscaper to survive

• Joining LaRosa's after 19 years: friend recommended him while interviewing for same role herself

• HR as "the black hole where everything goes to die" when he arrived in 2005

• Three-month listening mandate: no ideas allowed, just observe and learn the business

• Eliminating departments and hierarchies: creating "areas of work" with responsibility instead of bosses

• Facilitating executive meetings with no agendas: five years of strategic progress through conversation

• Office turnover at 1% with employees celebrating 20, 25, 30, 40, and 45-year anniversaries

• HR Net newsletter: 15,000 subscribers globally receiving weekly resources and HR song parodies

• HR Roundtable: 25 years running monthly gatherings averaging 100-500 people, welcoming those in transition

• Three books published through SHRM: HR on Purpose sold 15,000+ copies versus industry average of 500

• Networking as business skill: being a connector and giver, not just transactional job seeker

• Church ministry: hosting over-50s group with 40+ people, teaching adults to play and have fun again

🌟 Steve's Key Mentors & Influences:

• His Mother: Asked life-changing question about why he wasn't in a field with people, leading to communications degree and HR career path

• First Entrepreneur Boss at Trans Ten Technologies: Gave 30-day name challenge, established foundation that "if you're not here for my people, I don't need you"

• OSHA Inspector: Taught value of compliance as people protection rather than regulatory burden, turned six-figure fine into $3,000 through coaching

• Kevin Burrell (Former COO at LaRosa's): Gave three-month listening mandate, allowed creative organizational restructuring, worked together closely for 15 years until his death in 2020

• Sandy (Networking Friend): Recommended Steve for LaRosa's job while interviewing for it herself, demonstrating connector mindset

• Malcolm Gladwell (Author, The Tipping Point): Helped Steve understand his natural connector personality through business literature

👉 Don't miss this powerful conversation about authentic leadership, eliminating hierarchies that separate people, treating unemployment with dignity and support, and why HR should be a people-oriented function that happens with department leaders, not just the HR office.

🔗 Connect with Steve Browne:

LinkedIn: Steve Browne 

Email: [email protected] 

Website: LaRosa's Pizzeria 

Books on Amazon:

• HR on Purpose!!

• HR Rising!!

• HR Unleashed!! 

• HR Net Newsletter: Email Steve to subscribe to weekly HR resources and insights

📄 Transcript Available: Transforming HR from Enforcement to Partnership: Steve Browne's Leadership at LaRosa's Pizzeria

📺 Watch on YouTube: Inspired Stories Podcast

🌐 Our Website: The Inspired Stories Podcast

📄 Special Thanks to Anthony Codispoti & AddBack Benefits Agency: AddBack Benefits Agency - Providing innovative employee benefits solutions that improve employee well-being while optimizing your bottom line Website: addbackbenefits.com

🎧 The Dare That Built a Business: Norma Kropelnicki’s Journey to All Things Meetings

Norma Kropelnicki spent over a decade running events for nonprofits, celebrities, and corporations before a single dared conversation changed everything. When the owner of All Things Meetings told her he was shutting it down, she pushed back. When he dared her to buy it, she said yes — and has spent four years turning a Bay Area trade show into a sold-out connection experience that brings the event planners of Google, Apple, Adobe, and Netflix face to face with the best venues, caterers, and suppliers in Northern California.

✨ Key Insights You’ll Learn:

• Leaving Kaiser Permanente mid-career after recognizing the glass ceiling and deciding to build something of her own

• Running nonprofit galas with celebrity guests including Jay Leno, Diana Ross, Darryl Hall, Kenny Loggins, and Dana Carvey

• Pivoting during COVID to work as an activities coordinator at an assisted living facility — and discovering a creative side she didn’t know she had

• Being dared to buy All Things Meetings mid-cleanup after the previous owner’s final event

• The “party with a purpose” model: free for planners, paid by suppliers, built for real connection

• Growing from 30 exhibitors and 70 planners to 100+ exhibitors and 350+ registered planners per event

• Adding destination events in Napa, Monterey, and Santa Cruz with co-sponsored transportation and local activations

• Why Wednesday evenings became the sweet spot in a post-pandemic remote work world

• Qualifying every single planner registration personally to protect the quality of the list

• The business that is now running her — and what she’s learning about letting go

🌟 Norma’s Key Mentors:

• Previous Owner of All Things Meetings: gave her the dare that started everything and handed over 18 years of built relationships and a functioning model

• Nonprofit Executive Team: nearly a decade of working with high-profile clients and major performers that sharpened her instincts for hospitality under pressure

• Donna (Web and Technical Contractor): the behind-the-scenes partner who keeps the infrastructure running and isn’t afraid to push Norma toward growth

• Her Industry Community: suppliers and planners who told her she was the secret sauce before she believed it herself

• Her Own Instincts: a lifelong philosophy that if she wouldn’t want to attend the event herself, she hasn’t done her job

👉 Don’t miss this conversation about what it actually takes to build a business around connection — and why the most powerful ingredient might just be the person running it.

🔗 Connect with Norma Kropelnicki:

Website: allthingsmeetings.com

📤 Transcript Available: From Kaiser Permanente to Wine Country: Norma Kropelnicki’s Unexpected Path to All Things Meetings

📺 Watch on YouTube: Inspired Stories Podcast

🌐 Our Website: The Inspired Stories Podcast

📤 Special Thanks to Anthony Codispoti & AddBack Benefits Agency: AddBack Benefits Agency - Providing innovative employee benefits solutions that improve employee well-being while optimizing your bottom line Website: addbackbenefits.com

🎙️ From Staff Accountant to Managing Partner: Rich Waigand’s 30-Year Bet on Relationships at SFW Partners

Rich Waigand, managing partner of SFW Partners in St. Louis, spent 11 years at his first firm, made partner, and walked away when it became clear they were heading toward an outside sale. He joined SFW as its fifth partner when the firm had 12 people. Twenty years later it has 74. In January 2025, his partners elected him managing partner. The transition from client-first to firm-first has been the hardest thing he’s done professionally. Outside of work, he and his wife co-founded Wagon Wheels — a nonprofit delivery and skills training organization for people with developmental disabilities — while their nonverbal son Lance was recovering from life-threatening complications after back surgery.

✨ Key Insights You’ll Learn:

• Why Rich left a partnership he’d worked 11 years to earn — and what he saw in his first partner meeting that made the decision clear

• The summer of 2005: onboarding so many clients at a new firm that it became one of the busiest of his career

• Why the managing partner role required him to stop serving clients and start serving the firm — and why he resisted it

• How Nancy Wotley Blaine transformed SFW’s internal culture and then became an advisor to other firms

• The M&A advisory work that gets Rich in early — and how he helps owners capture value that traditional accountants miss

• Why private equity acquisitions are driving high-quality clients away from larger firms and toward SFW

• The Go-Giver philosophy that has shaped Rich’s entire approach to networking and client relationships

• Wagon Wheels: how a nonprofit delivery organization for people with developmental disabilities was born in a hospital room

• The Hot Wheels Racing fundraiser that went from $25K in year one to $120K in year two

• Why Lance comes to the SFW office every day — and what Rich finds in his desk drawer every time

🌟 Rich’s Key Mentors:

• His Father (Yugoslav Immigrant & Small Business Owner): Showed Rich what resourcefulness looks like — and why business owners deserve real support, not just compliance work

• His Mother (Kitchen Table Bookkeeper): The original trusted advisor — and the reason Rich understood from childhood what it means to help a business owner survive

• Lance Weiss (SFW Partner Who Made the Introduction): Invited Rich into the partnership conversation that changed the trajectory of his career

• Nancy Wotley Blaine (SFW People & Culture Leader): Transformed the firm’s internal development and gave language to what Rich had always done intuitively

• Bob Burg & John David Mann (The Go-Giver Authors): Wrote the book that articulated Rich’s entire worldview back to him — the one he now gives to every new hire

👉 Don’t miss this conversation about what it really looks like to build a career on service, why the best M&A outcomes are planned years in advance, and how one family turned the worst week of their lives into something that now serves 70 people a week.

🔗 Connect with Rich Waigand:

Website: sfw.cpa

Wagon Wheels: waigandwheels.com

📎 Transcript Available: The Go-Giver in Action: How Rich Waigand’s SFW Partners Was Built on Service Before Sales

📺 Watch on YouTube: Inspired Stories Podcast

🌐 Our Website: The Inspired Stories Podcast

📎 Special Thanks to Anthony Codispoti & AddBack Benefits Agency: Providing innovative employee benefits solutions that improve employee well-being while optimizing your bottom line. Website: addbackbenefits.com

🎙️ From Startup Rebuild to Boutique CFO: Amy Spandau’s Path to Ablaze Financial

Amy Spandau, founder of Ablaze Financial, has spent 25 years solving problems most small business owners don’t even know they have. She rebuilt a company that was about to implode, got promoted to CFO mid-crisis at Tendril, endured the verbal culture of EchoStar, lost everything on a swindled ranch deal, and came out the other side with a clear mission: build back-of-house infrastructure for founders at the one-to-five million revenue mark before it’s too late to do it right.

✨ Key Insights You’ll Learn:

• Promoted from controller to CFO mid-restructuring — how she learned on the job and led through it

• December 6, 2012: the mass layoff that cost 135 jobs and created a company worth exiting

• Why the CFO seat at EchoStar taught her what abuse of power looks like at the highest levels

• Walking away from MediaKind when the board wouldn’t do the right thing

• The ranch deal that drained her savings, retirement accounts, and nearly everything she had built

• How a Craigslist sale became her first Ablaze client

• Why fractional CFO paired with a bookkeeper is not enough — and what the gap actually costs founders

• The back-of-house suite: accounting, finance, tax coordination, HR structure, insurance, and legal translation

• Personal books for every client — because commingled finances are the default at this stage

• The alligator closest to the boat: how Amy helps founders prioritize the right fights

🌟 Amy’s Key Mentors:

• Chip (CEO at Tendril): Backed Amy’s CFO promotion when she had never done it before, threw out her first board deck, and taught her through every revision

• Her CFO Mentor (Who Went to EchoStar): Spotted her readiness before she did and gave her the platform to prove it

• Her Head of HR at Tendril: Co-architect of the five values — led with ‘do the right thing’ — that still guide Amy today

• Her Partner During the Ranch Years: Steady support through the most devastating financial and personal loss of her career

• Her College-Aged Team Members: The living proof that the next generation of accountants, given the right environment, can punch well above their weight

👉 Don’t miss this conversation about what it costs to do the right thing, why the smallest businesses deserve the most rigorous financial infrastructure, and how someone who lost everything built a firm that has grown to over a million in revenue without a single dollar of marketing.

🔗 Connect with Amy Spandau:

Website: ablazefinancial.com

LinkedIn: Amy J. Spandau

Instagram: @amyjspandau

📎 Transcript Available: From Big Corporate to Back of House: Amy Spandau’s Case for Building Small Businesses Right

📺 Watch on YouTube: Inspired Stories Podcast

🌐 Our Website: The Inspired Stories Podcast

📎 Special Thanks to Anthony Codispoti & AddBack Benefits Agency: Providing innovative employee benefits solutions that improve employee well-being while optimizing your bottom line. Website: addbackbenefits.com

From Franchisee to CEO: Healey Mendicino on Betting on Port of Subs, Losing It All, and Coming Back Stronger

Healey Mendicino, president and CEO of Port of Subs, shares her journey from writing a check at 26 to open the brand's 100th location with virtually every dollar in her savings account, through the 2008 financial collapse that wiped out her real estate empire and left her pulling the covers over her head, to rebuilding, getting the call from founder John Larson, rejoining a brand she loved, navigating its acquisition by the founders of Remax, and now steering Port of Subs toward 500 locations nationwide including its first military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Key Insights You'll Learn:

• Met Port of Subs founder John Larson at a White House conference on small business policy at 26 and turned that friendship into a franchise partnership that opened the brand's 100th location

• Invested virtually every dollar she had in her savings account into the franchise, signing personally on the SBA loan and the lease with the belief she was going to make it work no matter what

• Built multiple businesses simultaneously in the 2000s including commercial real estate development, a national diner franchise, and a ballroom dance franchise, only to watch them unravel in 2008 when her primary tenants were mortgage companies

• The biggest lesson from the collapse was not having advisors or mentors outside her own sphere during a period of high growth when everyone around her was telling her things were great

• Recovery was not a single magical moment but a slow deliberate decision to focus on what she was good at rather than what she had lost, then waiting for the right opportunity

• John Larson's phone call led to setting up the real estate and construction department, then inserting herself into franchise development and company strategy within six months because she simply could not help herself

• Area 15 Ventures, led by the founders of Remax, acquired Port of Subs in 2023 through a private sale structured to protect the team, franchisees, and 50-year legacy of the brand

• The regional developer model requires a minimum of 10 units per territory over five years and has already signed 19 regional developers with commitments for over 300 future locations

• Going slow on infrastructure and platform decisions before growth accelerates is not optional because every operational gap amplifies to the hundredth power at scale

• The first Port of Subs location at a Navy base in Guantanamo Bay is set to open in summer 2026, with a third of current regional developers being veterans

Healey's Key Mentors:

• John Larson, Port of Subs Founder: Gave Healey her first franchise opportunity at 26, waited for her while she rebuilt after 2008, called her back when the timing was right, and trusted her to lead the brand through its biggest transition

• Dave Linegar and Adam Contos, Area 15 Ventures: Brought the franchising expertise of building Remax to 9,000 franchisees in 120 countries and the capital and long-term family office mentality that removed fundraising from Healey's plate entirely

• The 2008 Financial Crisis: Forced the kind of humility, self-reflection, and systems thinking that she credits as the foundation for how she now leads organizations through complexity

• Her Own Franchisee Experience: Understanding what it feels like to sign personally on a loan and open a restaurant with your last dollar gives her a lens no executive who came up only on the franchisor side can replicate

• Port of Subs Long-Term Team

Don't miss this conversation about what it actually takes to rebuild after losing everything, why going slow in growth is sometimes the only way to go fast, and what it means to fuel up the men and women of the US military from a little sandwich shop that started in Reno in 1972.

Connect with Healey Mendicino:

Website: portofsubs.com
Email: [email protected]

🎙️ Buying Broken Businesses and Fixing Broken Thinking: Brian Wygle’s 40-Year Career as a Corporate Fixer

Brian Wygle, owner of Help for My Company, has spent four decades walking into distressed businesses — buying them, restructuring them, and getting owners to think differently about why things went wrong. From buying an oil company for $300 and turning it into a five-year cash machine, to stepping in as interim CEO for companies from $10M to $150M in revenue, his philosophy has always been the same: you cannot fix a problem using the same thinking you used to create it.

✨ Key Insights You’ll Learn:

• Why money is almost never the real solution to a struggling business

• The lender’s-eye view that launched a 40-year consulting career

• How Brian bought Max Oil for $300 and used a tax loss carry forward to build five years of income

• Five stages of a company’s life cycle and when owners actually call for help

• What people vs. why people — and why most managers never make the conversion

• PAIR framework: Participate, Anticipate, Instigate, Reciprocate

• ACME communication model: Authority, Clarity, Manage Expectations

• The E’s of leadership: Envision, Empower, Equip, Encourage

• Ethical leadership lecture at USC — and why ethics starts with knowing yourself

• Transitioning to virtual consulting to serve more clients and spend more time with family

🌟 Brian’s Key Mentors:

• Restaurant Manager (Glendale, CA): Threw his apron on the table and showed Brian his first turnaround was possible

• His Finance Boss (Banking): Brought Brian into lending and showed him the gap between what borrowers and lenders saw

• His Son (Professional Athlete): Taught Brian about caretaker dedication and the cost of running down your reserves

• His Wife of 41 Years: The sharp-tongued, steady presence who kept the family together through the hardest decade

• His Clients: Every engagement a new case study in how changed thinking drives changed outcomes

👉 Don’t miss this conversation about the real reasons businesses fail, what servant leadership actually costs, and why after 40 years Brian still believes changing the way people think is the hardest — and most important — thing he does.

🔗 Connect with Brian Wygle:

Website: helpformycompany.com

Email: [email protected]

📎 Transcript Available: Changing the Way You Think: Brian Wygle’s 40-Year Philosophy for Turning Companies Around

📺 Watch on YouTube: Inspired Stories Podcast

🌐 Our Website: The Inspired Stories Podcast

📎 Special Thanks to Anthony Codispoti & AddBack Benefits Agency: Providing innovative employee benefits solutions that improve employee well-being while optimizing your bottom line. Website: addbackbenefits.com

From Event Planner to Global CEO: Andrea Belfanti on Bad Bosses, Getting Laid Off, and Leading With Kindness Across Six Continents

Andrea Belfanti, CEO of the International Society of Hospitality Consultants, shares her path from a wine and spirits class at USC to leading a global nonprofit network of 270 senior consultants across six continents, through nightmare bosses, a 2008 layoff that shook her identity, and a leadership philosophy built on kindness, curiosity, and showing up in person.

Key Insights You'll Learn:

• Discovered hospitality at 18 through a wine class, confirmed it during internships

• Early bosses who were dismissive, sexist, and punishing, working 60 to 70 hour weeks

• Learned more from bad bosses than good ones because the lessons sear deeper

• Challenged at her first board meeting for taking care of guests, spent years deciding the critic was wrong

• ISHC networking philosophy: more like a round of golf than speed networking

• Expanded globally by showing up in person, year after year, sometimes waiting three years for a candidate to apply

• Pivoted ISHC during the pandemic by connecting US members with Asian members already months ahead in the crisis

• AI as an efficiency tool for consultants, not a replacement for human expertise and verification

• 2008 layoff forced separation of identity from job title, a lesson she still revisits under stress

• Advises young professionals: research your boss like they research you, and stay out of debt so you can choose on values not fear

Andrea's Key Mentors:

• Lori Raleigh, Former ISHC Executive Director: Smartest and kindest person in the room, networked through kindness, proved successful women don't have to be cold to lead

• Her Early Nightmare Bosses: Taught through contrast, seared lessons no good boss could

• The 2008 Financial Crisis: Forced identity rebuild, introduced a mantra she still uses under pressure

• The Senior Board Member Who Told Her to Sit Down: Challenged her leadership style, ultimately sharpened it

• The ISHC Member Community: Proved that relationships built without transactions become lifelines in a crisis

Don't miss this conversation about rebuilding identity after career loss, why hospitality is a leadership strategy, and what it means to run a global network by asking more questions than you answer.

Connect with Andrea Belfanti: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: Andrea Belfanti ISHC

🎙️ From a Brazilian Napkin to 150 Countries: Adam Harris and the CloudBeds Platform

Adam Harris, co-founder and CEO of CloudBeds, built one of the world's leading hospitality management platforms from a single insight — that independent hotels deserved better tools and a seat at the table. From an early pivot in Brazil to acquiring seven mission-critical assets and processing $15 billion in annual room sales, Adam's journey weaves together finance discipline, hospitality purpose, and technology as the bridge between them.

✨ Key Insights You'll Learn:

• Career path from Wall Street analyst to hospitality tech CEO

• Original CloudBeds idea: connecting travelers to unlisted Brazilian properties

• Pivot from booking platform to full hotel management after World Cup

• Acquiring MyAllocator, going global overnight in 60+ countries

• Unified platform replacing 14 of 19 average hotel browser tabs

• Signals product: causal neural engine forecasting demand at 95% accuracy up to 180 days

• Remote parity principle: eliminating two-class employee dynamics

• Two reductions in force and the fiduciary tension of building with heart

• Neurodivergent diagnosis at 12 — retraining the brain as competitive advantage

• No exit strategy: building by chapter, driven by purpose over transaction

🌟 Adam's Key Mentors:

• Richard Valtr (Co-Founder): Shared founding vision and complementary technical leadership from day one

• MyAllocator Team: First acquisition that forced the pivot from transactional to SaaS and launched CloudBeds globally

• Early VC Partners (Peak Spans, Cultivation Capital): Provided institutional credibility and scaling capital during formative growth

• Adam's Father (Surgeon/Hearing Expert): Modeled turning a deficiency into a life's work; inspired grit and hard-work ethic

• CloudBeds Team (750 People, 44 Countries): The daily reason to build — celebrated as the real milestone

👉 Don't miss this wide-ranging conversation about purpose-driven entrepreneurship, the intelligence layer reshaping hospitality, and why the best hotel tech is really about amplifying humans.

🔗 Connect with Adam Harris:

LinkedIn: Adam Harris

Website: cloudbeds.com

📄 Transcript Available: CloudBeds Took 12 Years to Reach Purpose — Founders Say That Was the Point, with Adam Harris

📺 Watch on YouTube: Inspired Stories Podcast

🌐 Our Website: The Inspired Stories Podcast

📄 Special Thanks to Anthony Codispoti & AddBack Benefits Agency: Providing innovative employee benefits solutions that improve employee well-being while optimizing your bottom line. Website: addbackbenefits.com

From Painting Bridges to PhD: Greg Waller's Journey as the Blue Collar Scholar of Business Valuation

Greg Waller, Managing Partner of Cornerstone Valuation and Windward Advisors, shares his unlikely path from painting structural steel bridges and going bankrupt at 26 to earning a PhD from Purdue and becoming a trusted advisor for middle market business owners navigating valuations, exit planning, and M&A transactions.

Key Insights You'll Learn:

• Dropped out of college to run a structural steel painting company before a mentor on a job site sent him back to school

• A bankruptcy at 26 from overspray damage and a called line of credit became the catalyst for his MBA and eventually his PhD

• Blue collar roots plus academic rigor create a rare perspective for valuing and selling companies other advisors miss

• Business value equals benefit divided by risk, and reducing concentration risk in customers, vendors, and key employees raises value

• Three years of clean financial data is the minimum baseline before taking any company to market

• Cash basis financial statements often need to be restated on accrual before a professional buyer will engage seriously

• 1099 employee classification and E-Verify compliance are emerging deal risks that professional buyers scrutinize closely

• Taking a company to market without a price and running a structured auction process consistently produces better outcomes

• AI may handle rote report writing, but qualitative judgment in valuation still requires trained human eyes

• Informed sellers are rare and most business owners are outmatched by well-resourced professional buyers who do this every day

Greg's Key Mentors:

• Old-timer on the bridge scaffold: Told a young Greg to go back to school, the moment that changed his entire trajectory

• Ohio University faculty: Encouraged him to pursue academics and a doctoral program when he had no such plans

• Bill Duellen, Purdue Executive Education: Gave him room to run real estate deals while finishing his PhD

• Jim Edge, Cornerstone Founder: Gracious in transitioning the practice and served as an unexpected mentor in Greg's adult career

• Entrepreneurs Organization: Ongoing community providing peer education on business development and personal growth

Don't miss this conversation about what business owners don't know that professional buyers already do, why bankruptcy can be a tool rather than a failure, and what it means to bring academic rigor to a blue collar worldview.

Connect with Greg Waller:

Website: middlemarketvalue.com

LinkedIn: Greg Waller

Company: Cornerstone Valuation / Windward Advisors

🎙️ From Pepsi VP to Career Coach: Maigread Eichten’s Mission to Get College Grads Jobs in the Hardest Market in Decades

Maigread Eichten, founder of Career Expedite, built a $450 million revenue division at PepsiCo, survived the dot-com crash as a single mom of three, got fired from an energy drink company the day after a New York Times feature, ran a cannabis company she didn’t personally use, and eventually found her purpose mentoring the young people who reminded her why it all mattered. Now she runs a concierge career coaching firm with a 99% success rate, helping college grads navigate a market that’s as hard as anything she’s seen in her career.

✨ Key Insights You’ll Learn:

• How a “depressing” reassignment to sales turned into $450M in new revenue at Pepsi

• Why being on the revenue side of any business is the best career insurance you can have

• The dot-com crash that put her family’s financial security at risk — and how she survived it

• Getting fired after the New York Times feature at FRS — and what the investor said years later

• Why she tried AI-first job coaching and walked away from it

• The one thing 29 out of 30 job applicants get completely wrong in interviews

• How to use LinkedIn as a social media algorithm — not a resume database

• The cold outreach strategy getting clients a 20-25% response rate from strangers on LinkedIn

• Why 50% of college grads who take remote jobs are unemployed within a year

• How one client went from nine months of no offers to two offers in six weeks

🌟 Maigread’s Key Mentors:

• The PepsiCo Culture: Taught her the power of being on the revenue side and leaning into who you are in rooms that expected someone different

• The CEO Who Cried (VeriSign): Showed her that even stoic leaders break — and that pivoting to profitability in a crisis is what keeps people employed

• Lance Armstrong’s Comeback (FRS): A timing lesson — and a reminder that a company’s trajectory is not the same as a CEO’s worth

• Her Three Kids: The real reason she got through being fired and the dot-com crash — showing up for them anchored everything else

• Her Cannabis Company Team: Young people who helped her see what she was actually built to do next

👉 Don’t miss this conversation about what actually gets people hired in 2025, why the job market is brutal but not hopeless, and how one of the most non-linear careers in food and beverage led to a 99% success rate in career coaching.

🔗 Connect with Maigread Eichten:

Website: careerexpedite.com

LinkedIn: Maigread Eichten

📎 Transcript Available: Maigread Eichten on the One Thing 29 Out of 30 Job Applicants Get Completely Wrong

📺 Watch on YouTube: Inspired Stories Podcast

🌐 Our Website: The Inspired Stories Podcast

📎 Special Thanks to Anthony Codispoti & AddBack Benefits Agency: Providing innovative employee benefits solutions that improve employee well-being while optimizing your bottom line. Website: addbackbenefits.com