The Quiet Work

https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-noonan-1a5aa831
https://plgwarehouse.com/

Patrick Noonan sold windows on straight commission for two years and hated every minute of it. Then a LinkedIn message pulled him into freight. He hated that too — for about six months.

Then the CEO's nephew made an offhand comment that Patrick heard as a challenge. Something clicked. Fifteen years later he's the founder of PLG, a Nashville freight brokerage moving loads for manufacturers, consumer brands, and some of the biggest events in the country — the PGA Tour, Formula One, convention centers.

We talk about why he'll never let his team blame the driver, how a small brokerage competes against multi-billion dollar behemoths, his real take on remote work, why he stopped doing refrigerated freight, and the line about culture that every founder should hear.

Timestamps:

• 0:00 – Welcome + Patrick introduces PLG
• 0:44 – CPG, events, and temporary structures — what they actually move
• 1:31 – The PGA Tour, F1 races, and why their quiet time is during the event
• 2:45 – "We're one of ten. Probably more like fifty."
• 3:51 – Selling windows on straight commission — and hating it
• 4:21 – The LinkedIn message that got him into freight
• 5:15 – The nephew's comment that lit the fire
• 5:44 – Why logistics sits in the middle of everything
• 8:04 – How to sell something nobody wants to buy
• 9:28 – "All you get is my number when something goes wrong"
• 10:34 – The rule: never blame the driver, the dispatcher, or the customer
• 11:10 – 99 times out of 100, you could have done something differently
• 12:55 – Wake up and ask: how do I get better than yesterday?
• 13:45 – Why he left refrigerated freight behind
• 15:08 – Flatbed and open deck: fewer touches, lower margins, better control
• 16:00 – How a small brokerage competes with multi-billion dollar companies
• 18:17 – You don't need the answer. You need to identify, empathize, and solve.
• 19:46 – Can you scale lean? The AI experiment happening in real time
• 20:26 – Where AI fits and where people still win
• 22:22 – Mopping floors and making cold calls — leading by example
• 24:03 – Is he building to sell? His honest answer
• 25:35 – "The bigger the village, the more villains tend to come in"
• 26:29 – His real take on remote work — and why he feels bad for new grads
• 27:27 – What you learn sitting next to someone struggling through the same calls
• 29:36 – Is it hard to hire people who'll cold call?
• 30:14 – "That little black box turns into an ATM"
• 31:49 – Matt's friend who made 16,000 cold calls in a year
• 37:00 – Electric trucks and autonomous driving: great ideas, not there yet
• 39:24 – "This truck doesn't do cold calls. How is it finding freight?"
• 42:16 – Diesel at six bucks a gallon and what it does to the business
• 44:07 – What gives him the most fulfillment
• 45:06 – The guy who landed a customer nobody told him to chase
• 46:21 – The John D. Rockefeller letters
• 47:25 – Advice to younger Patrick: keep going
• 49:22 – Would he start the same company again?
• 50:19 – Closing thoughts

https://www.linkedin.com/in/codygeorgepe/
https://www.blueprintenergy.com/

Cody George was a kid watching his grandfather work at a drafting table covered in blueprints — projects all over the world. The man rode motorcycles across continents, flew airplanes, ran ultramarathons. When Cody had to declare a major at 18, he thought: I'm good at math and science, and he lives a pretty fun life. Why don't I do that?

Thirty-plus years later, he named his company Blueprint Energy.

Cody helped build RavenVolt from concept to a $245M acquisition. Now he's starting over — designing and building microgrids, battery storage, solar, and EV charging for businesses that can't afford to lose power for even a second.

We talk about what a microgrid actually is in plain terms, why he sees utilities as friends instead of enemies, the $500,000-per-hour math behind resilience projects, the mistake that made him think he'd be fired, and why he's photographing the mundane days of a young company.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Welcome + Cody introduces Blueprint Energy
0:23 – The word "nationwide" and why it matters
0:39 – From Cal Poly to REC Solar: how his career started
1:17 – Still hands-on? Multi-state PE and engineer of record
2:23 – The grandfather story: a drafting table, a home office, and a life worth copying
3:30 – Why the company is called Blueprint Energy
4:25 – Leading by example — you never know who's watching
5:12 – When he actually started (and why not to launch a company in December)
6:17 – Why start a company in energy in 2026?
6:40 – "If I make it to 80 or 90, I'll regret not starting a company"
7:20 – Find your why before you start
8:28 – The phone call that changed everything: Coley Cook joins
9:40 – Hiring the best of the best — and never lowering that bar
11:21 – How you actually operate nationwide in energy
13:55 – Staying focused: why they don't cast a wide net
15:31 – The five-year roadmap and the North Star
17:35 – What is a microgrid? The simplest explanation you'll hear
19:10 – Batteries as shock absorbers for generators
20:34 – What "green" actually means (hint: it includes cash)
21:00 – The $500,000 hour: when downtime costs more than the system
22:19 – Demand charges and how to slash them
24:26 – Why engineering and sales have to respect each other
26:13 – The 2026 energy market: demand through the roof
27:20 – Why he sees the utility as a friend, not an enemy
30:05 – How they find projects (and the "secret sales techniques")
31:38 – Trade shows: he'll attend, but he won't exhibit
34:32 – Advice to younger Cody: ask people what they'd never do again
36:30 – Time is the commodity when you start a business
37:19 – What gives him the most fulfillment
38:23 – Seeing greatness in someone before they see it themselves
39:32 – The three days he wouldn't repeat
40:01 – The 12x material over-order and the boss who handled it perfectly
42:49 – "It's easy to be good when things are going good"
44:24 – What he's excited about — and the photos he's taking now
46:20 – Why the mundane moments are the ones that stick

https://www.linkedin.com/in/edwin-fisher-ana/
https://anasourcing.com/

Edwin Fisher started at his parents' company the day after he graduated high school. No college. He calls it Bernie University — named after his dad, who taught him sales from the ground up.

He spent his first year at the bottom of the totem pole. Getting his teeth kicked in on the phone every day. Then something clicked, and he started treating it like a game.

Today he's president of AnA Sourcing, a $30M distributor supplying industrial and MRO products to the Department of Defense, Department of Energy, and prime contractors across the country.

We talk about why he refuses to call his company a family, the Vivid Vision framework that got them 11 out of 13 three-year goals, why the follow-up is the most underrated competitive edge in business, how AI works inside a government-facing company, and the intern with no experience who's now running a team.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Welcome + Edwin introduces himself and AnA Sourcing
0:43 – How it started: 1990, a house in Collingswood, and a box of safety gloves
2:23 – Distribution, not manufacturing — how the model worked
3:16 – The candy business he ran in high school
3:57 – Matt's door-to-door days at 115 degrees
5:04 – Bernie University: why he skipped college entirely
6:34 – Treating sales like a game — the mindset shift that changed everything
7:06 – Bottom of the totem pole for a full year
7:10 – "Getting your teeth kicked in" every single day
9:00 – His father's cancer diagnosis and the moment everything changed
10:33 – Graduating from Bernie University the hard way
11:19 – The pivot: from commercial PPE to federal government contracts
13:03 – How you actually win government work
14:32 – Why relationships alone won't keep the business
16:14 – In-person vs. virtual: how they meet agencies
17:14 – Sales cycles: a week, a month, or a year
18:42 – Sourcing rules: made in USA, TAA compliance, and what agencies require
19:43 – A day in the life of the president
20:25 – Learning Spanish 30 minutes a day for his team
22:19 – The competitive edge nobody talks about: the follow-up
23:40 – The two-hour response rule
25:41 – How AI works when you serve the federal government
27:34 – How he actually grows the business: take care of the team first
28:16 – "We're not a family. We're a sports team."
29:39 – Uncle Joey, Terrell Owens, and why the analogy matters
32:05 – The Vivid Vision framework: $50M, 40 team members, three years out
33:50 – They hit 11 of 13 goals. Here's how they tracked it.
34:43 – Matt calls out his outdated LinkedIn bio
35:20 – What's next: the online catalog for government customers
37:36 – What gives Edwin the most fulfillment
38:20 – The intern with zero government experience who's now a manager
39:37 – Closing thoughts

https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-williams-ascendai/
https://ascendlabs.ai/

Kevin Williams was building consumer brands, buying patents, selling in 50 countries, spending close to eight figures on Facebook ads — and then Apple's privacy changes nearly killed the whole operation.

So he leaned into machine learning to solve the attribution problem. Sold the brands to private equity. And launched AscendAI literally one week after ChatGPT dropped.

Episode 100 of The Quiet Work Podcast. We talk about Shark Tank, Chinese factories copying his product within weeks of the episode airing, how to actually govern AI inside a company (not just talk about it), the AI Ambassador Program, why most AI ROI goes to side quests instead of the real problem, and the difference between plugging AI into your company vs. rebuilding for it.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Welcome to EP. 100 + Kevin introduces AscendAI
1:48 – He was in AI before AI was cool — how it really started
2:10 – Buying patents and testing them with $500 Facebook campaigns
3:31 – One week: Costco, Walmart, AND Shark Tank called
3:57 – Getting yelled at by Mr. Wonderful — and what happened after
4:03 – Chinese factories were watching too
4:38 – Spending eight figures on Facebook when Apple killed tracking
5:45 – Selling to PE five minutes before ChatGPT dropped — then launching AscendAI
6:35 – The exit that wasn't quite a beach retirement
8:47 – How he found patent deals in Washington DC
10:07 – The mini MVP: testing ideas for $500 before spending real money
12:48 – AI governance: what it actually means inside a company
17:00 – The AI Ambassador Program — what it is and how it works
22:00 – Build vs. Buy vs. Wait: the framework for every AI decision
26:00 – The electricity factory analogy — why plugging in AI isn't the answer
30:00 – Side quests vs. leverage points: where AI ROI actually goes
35:14 – Email is flooded — what great marketing looks like now
39:01 – Who Kevin likes working with most (it's about leadership, not industry)
41:31 – What he'd tell 30-year-old Kevin: find peace with the non-highlighted path
44:53 – Ikigai: things you like, things you're good at, things people pay you for
49:11 – TEDx talk coming: why speaking is natural but typing is learned
49:49 – He's dictated over 2 million words in 6 months
52:00 – New program: AI governance for citizen development teams
53:23 – "Here's to episode 200"

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

Richard Richardson runs five businesses at once. Brand strategy, logistics, 3PL, distribution, and hospitality. He's been doing it for over 20 years and the nickname that stuck — Mr. Strategic — wasn't something he invented. His clients gave it to him.

We talk about how he learned to sell by fitting into his customer's plan instead of pushing them into his, why he never calls for orders, how he divides his time across multiple businesses, what the "tour of love" actually costs you, and why he'd change nothing about the road he's traveled.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Welcome + Richard introduces himself and RicheRich LLC
0:43 – Serial entrepreneur, logistics, distribution, hospitality — all at once
1:49 – How "Mr. Strategic" was born (his clients named him)
3:41 – Corporate world lesson: fit into your customer's plan, not yours
5:07 – Why he never called for orders — and always hit his number by month 5
8:04 – The "tour of love" — what clients show you vs. what's really happening
9:53 – Why knowing the bad stuff matters before you market anything
12:05 – How he divides his time across five businesses
14:47 – 100 hours in your own business vs. 100 hours for someone else's
17:00 – Supply chain as a strategic truth-teller
20:00 – How logistics reveals what's actually wrong in a business
25:00 – What brand equity actually means (and why most companies get it wrong)
30:00 – The lean machine: why he doesn't keep every expert on staff
38:00 – Bringing in collaborators when they're better suited — and not hoarding business
43:18 – "We become part of the team, so they gotta win"
43:43 – What he'd tell younger Richard: change nothing
45:31 – The filing cabinet in his head — and what's useful vs. bar talk
45:54 – Nietzsche, the Knicks, and closing thoughts

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennifer-chamberlin-the-bilingual-lantern/
https://www.thebilinguallantern.com/en

Jennifer Chamberlin went to France at 14 for a 10-day homestay. The family gave her a ring when she arrived. She's still friends with them today — and the host mom is turning 80 this year.

That one family changed the trajectory of her life. She moved back at 16 to become fluent, then again at 22 permanently. Spent 15 years as a bilingual executive assistant. Got made redundant from a job she loved.

Then built The Bilingual Lantern from scratch — a virtual operations and delegation firm supporting entrepreneurs in English, French, German, Spanish, and Italian, with clients from Paris to Singapore to Australia.

We talk about what virtual assistants actually do that AI can't, why companies firing their support staff are actually just transferring the work to their managers, the shoemaker who finally got shoes (after 10 years), and why finding your people is the most underrated business strategy.

Timestamps:

• 0:00 – Welcome + Jennifer introduces The Bilingual Lantern
• 0:43 – Wait, do you actually speak all five languages?
• 1:19 – How it started: a 14-year-old flying alone to Toulouse to stay with strangers
• 3:37 – The ring in the bowl — one gesture that changed her life
• 6:11 – Why homestays matter more now than ever
• 7:04 – 15 years as a bilingual EA, then made redundant from a job she loved
• 8:47 – The network she'd already built made launching the business possible
• 9:53 – Who she works with: solo founders to large organizations
• 12:12 – Clients in Singapore, Australia, and how she handles time zones
• 14:38 – The client journey: discovery call, audit, action plan
• 17:26 – Can AI really replace what a good VA does?
• 19:00 – What virtual assistants can do that AI still can't
• 22:45 – Matt's own EA story from Poland
• 27:10 – How do clients know you're working if they can't see you?
• 27:36 – WhatsApp, Slack, and the Friday update channel
• 29:05 – The shoemaker's shoes: 10 years in, just built her own Notion hub
• 31:36 – The ABC system: Acquisition, Business, Client
• 32:56 – The biggest challenge of running a business like this
• 33:38 – Her husband: 22 years married and her anchor
• 34:36 – Would you do it all over again in 2026? Her answer.
• 35:51 – AI is pushing middle managers down, not elevating them
• 36:14 – "See you next year" — the best client feedback she ever got
• 37:22 – Matt's suggestion: a Skool community and an afternoon tea in Paris
• 40:18 – Closing thoughts

https://www.linkedin.com/in/keith-smith-725508b/
https://www.vonco.com/

Keith Smith grew up doing paper routes and cleaning strip mall shops before eventually finding his way into flexible packaging at 18. Thirty years later he's the president, CEO, and owner of Vonco Products — a medical device contract manufacturer he acquired in 2013 from a 75-year-old founder who had no exit plan.

The roofs leaked. The docks flooded every winter. The safety record was bad. And Keith bootstrapped the turnaround anyway.

Today Vonco operates two US manufacturing sites, serves clients globally, and is 80% focused on medical device — an industry they never even marketed to. We also talk about how they're using AI to replace logbooks on the production floor, why US manufacturing has to automate or die, Keith's morning routine (sauna, cold plunge, journaling, COIL tracking), and his daughter who just landed with the Chicago Bulls dance team.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Welcome + Keith introduces himself and Vonco Products
0:43 – From paper routes to flexible packaging at 18 — how it started
1:56 – Watching a company get sold, then deciding to buy his own
2:18 – Finding Vonco: a 70-year-old family business with no exit plan
3:50 – The first week: leaking roofs, flooded docks, broken equipment
5:24 – Bootstrapping a turnaround while trying to grow at the same time
7:37 – How they accidentally became 80% medical device
9:09 – Three more acquisitions since — what they've learned
10:12 – Manufacturing talent: the hardest part isn't finding people, it's keeping them
12:01 – AI and automation: why US manufacturers have no choice
14:11 – How Vonco is replacing logbooks with AI-powered knowledge search
16:55 – Their products ship to Europe, Asia, Australia — including a world-leading COVID specimen transport product
18:30 – What Vonco actually makes: bags, pouches, containers that hold fluids in and out of the body
20:00 – Tariffs, reshoring, and how trade policy is actually affecting their business
22:07 – IV drip lounges, nutraceuticals, and the compounding pharmacy trend
26:23 – How Keith manages his day: it all starts with managing his energy
27:55 – The morning routine: sauna, cold plunge, journaling, Bible, COIL tracking
28:14 – Book recommendations: Good to Great, The Obstacle Is the Way, The Expansion Sale
29:26 – Date nights, future trips always on the calendar, and journaling with his wife
31:18 – The four pillars: health, love, wealth, and faith
32:08 – Stoicism, Ryan Holiday, Epictetus, and box breathing
33:32 – What he's looking forward to: automation investments and his daughter joining the Chicago Bulls
35:43 – Half marathons, Ironman, and why he'll probably do golf this summer

https://www.linkedin.com/in/mike-j-miles/
https://www.milestone-leadership.com/blog


Mike Miles spent 20 years at Microsoft. Led teams of 700 people across 11 countries. Helped launch Bing in 75 markets. Held two patents. And nearly burned out trying to take a company public before 9/11 ended that dream.
What he walked away with wasn't the stock options. It was a question: is that really the leader I want to be?

Today Mike runs Milestone Leadership, coaches executives and impact-focused founders, sits as board chair at Watson Institute, and runs 90-mile events in his spare time. We talk about the Blue Task vs. Red Task framework, how to build the line out your door, why AI is making human skills more valuable than ever, and what 20 years at Microsoft taught him that no business school ever could.


Timestamps:

0:00 – Welcome + Mike introduces Milestone Leadership
0:39 – Three things he focuses on: new skills, balance, delegation
1:48 – From IPO to sold for pennies: the pre-Microsoft burnout story
3:54 – The line out your door — the best leadership measure nobody talks about
5:47 – Why coaching leaders wasn't a thing at Microsoft in the early 2000s
6:30 – Hard skills vs. human skills — why we don't value what we can't measure
8:48 – How he works with clients: the 4 assessments (360, DISC, balance, energy)
12:52 – The running question — and why endurance is a leadership lab
13:21 – Stepping outside your comfort zone in another dimension
15:18 – 90 miles in Park City, Utah — and a 100K coming this September
16:48 – Nature, thinking, and what the desert is missing
21:27 – The patent cubes on the shelf — what Microsoft gives you for innovating
22:54 – What gives him the most fulfillment now vs. leading 700 people
26:10 – The Blue Task vs. Red Task framework explained
29:07 – How to delegate, defer, or delete your red tasks
30:44 – The four things you can do with any email: respond, delegate, defer, delete
32:57 – How Mike keeps his workweek under 40 hours on purpose
33:50 – The business manager who's been with him for 25 years
38:30 – Why he blogs without AI — and why that matters
41:55 – Bring Back Blogging — a new hashtag is born
42:57 – What he'd tell his younger self: invest in human skills earlier
45:14 – You can't learn to swim by reading about water
47:15 – The reps that count — and why presence is the rep
49:05 – Running without headphones — and why being alone with yourself is hard
50:06 – Closing thoughts

https://www.linkedin.com/in/candicevandertholen/
https://heal.me/candice

Candice Van Dertholen spent years building other people's businesses — launching a YogaSix studio from four walls and a concept to 400 members, managing Anytime Fitness to 1,500 members, creating communities where people felt at home.

Then she burned out. And when she started her own business, she realized she'd carried the exact same energy patterns with her.

Today Candice is the founder of The Warrior Within Healing, a speaker, retreat facilitator, and private advisor to conscious business owners. We talk about why most entrepreneurs unknowingly duplicate their burnout in their own companies, what energy work actually is (without the woo), how clarity of self always comes before clarity of strategy, and why the best growth tool she ever used was just being herself in conversations.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Welcome + Candice introduces herself and The Warrior Within Healing
0:37 – What a "conscious business owner" actually means
1:20 – Who she works with: high performers leaving high-pressure industries
3:36 – How it started: franchise work, Anytime Fitness, and launching YogaSix
4:37 – From four walls to 400 members — how she built community from scratch
7:12 – Why burnout patterns follow you into your own business
9:29 – How to explain energy work to someone who's brand new to it
10:04 – We all carry energy — and everything we put in our system affects it
12:49 – The boomerang effect: what you give comes back
13:42 – What transformation actually looks like: from burnout to first launch
16:07 – Human Design and how it helps identify where your energy has been displaced
19:00 – The identity crisis moment that comes before real clarity
22:14 – The Jerry Maguire exit — and what really happens in business year one
26:17 – The best visibility strategy: get really good at being you
27:43 – Why AI is pushing everyone back toward in-person connection
29:20 – How she built referral partnerships just by showing up as herself
30:43 – Reputation takes time — put in the reps
31:00 – How to hold space for people at a four-day retreat without burning out
33:12 – In New Hampshire: asked the Divine for guidance before a heavy talk
34:40 – Going back to a contract job in 2024 — and what she learned from it
35:04 – What gives her the most fulfillment
36:20 – Matt's personal takeaway: energy habits follow you from career to career
40:19 – It's a constant evolution — and that's the beauty of it

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

https://www.kirkhamirontech.com/

Tom Kirkham has been in cybersecurity for 26 years. He's seen everything from bragging rights hackers in the late 90s to an industrial-scale trillion-dollar criminal industry.

But nothing changed his perspective quite like the day an FBI agent showed up at his office and told him he was on an ISIS kill list — because a company he signed an NDA with got hacked.

Today Tom runs Kirkham IronTech, a managed security services provider ranked in the top 250 MSPs globally for four consecutive years. We talk about how hacking became a $10 trillion industry, why 95% of breaches are caused by human error, how AI is now scaling personalized attacks to target anyone, what ransomware actually looks like from the inside, and why your coffee machine might be your biggest security risk.

Timestamps:

• 0:00 – Intro: What Kirkham IronTech does
• 1:01 – 26 years in IT and security — top 250 MSP globally
• 2:06 – Starting the company from a dining room table on January 1, 2000
• 3:02 – When hackers did it for bragging rights — and when that changed
• 4:11 – 95% of breaches are caused by human error, not technical exploits
• 5:00 – How a ransomware campaign works — the math behind $10M paydays
• 5:26 – The FBI showed up and said: you're on an ISIS kill list
• 6:19 – How he ended up on the list (a Sun Microsystems NDA got hacked)
• 9:14 – Stoicism helped him make peace with it in weeks
• 13:31 – The number one threat to every business: ransomware
• 14:33 – Hacking is now a $10 trillion industry — third largest GDP on the planet
• 16:39 – AI now scales personalized attacks to everyone, not just high-value targets
• 17:05 – Matt's real experience: CEO identity stolen, employees sent to buy gift cards
• 18:14 – Proactive vs. reactive: how Kirkham operates
• 19:07 – Gas pump skimmers, phishing, and cybersecurity beyond the office
• 20:17 – Why traditional antivirus (Norton, McAfee) is no longer enough
• 22:59 – Chinese cyber warfare and the greatest IP theft in human history
• 26:10 – The three pillars: technology, training, governance
• 27:28 – Why old laptops are costing you more than new ones
• 28:48 – Why Tom replaced every Mac in the company within 6 months of Apple Silicon
• 30:22 – They qualify clients as much as clients qualify them
• 32:36 – Clients who've been with them 20+ years — and why churn is minimal
• 35:29 – From a dining room to a radio show — how he built regional brand awareness
• 37:50 – AI in the company: privacy governance comes first
• 42:49 – Executive intelligence briefings — what's coming next
• 46:55 – What Tom would tell his younger self: trust your gut, embrace failure
• 50:17 – MSP 4.0: managed intelligence providers and the AI governance opportunity
• 53:09 – Closing thoughts