In this episode of Founders, Future, with host Jay Encarnacion, Dr. MaryJo Burchard, founder of Concord Leadership Group, shares her transformative approach to helping leaders navigate chaos with resilience. With a PhD in organizational leadership and a background spanning academia, nonprofits, and crisis response, MaryJo reveals why 70% of organizational changes fail—and how her trauma-informed "Change Readiness" model flips the script. She explains her unique 6-dimension trust assessment, why leaders need "mental de-escalation" tools during upheaval, and how she helped organizations recover from events like mass shootings by reframing trauma as a change management challenge.*

MaryJo unpacks her shift from word-of-mouth consulting to scalable programs, including executive retreats and org-wide "Change Readiness Intensives." She shares hard-won lessons on niching down ("You can’t buy-in to a hurricane, but you can prepare for one"), the AI tools streamlining her work, and why she’s betting on community over hard sales. For founders fearing pivots, her advice cuts deep: "What is to give light must endure the burning"—clarify your core thread, even if it means shedding "good" opportunities to focus on your transformative niche.*