Leadership Magic

Last week I talked about how one person can build a whole conclusion out of a single moment. This week, I'm looking at what happens when a whole group climbs that ladder together. Using the show The Traitors as my case study, I talk about why people vote with the group even when they're not sure, why the most certain voice in the room so often carries the vote, and how a story that gets repeated s...

I've recently become obsessed with The Traitors , and watching it has me thinking about how fast we decide who someone is based on very little information.  In this episode, I start a two-part series on perception. I walk through the ladder of inference (adapted in Insights Discovery as the ladder of perception) and how we climb from a neutral event to a firm belief, often in seconds. I talk about...

Insight is helpful, but nothing changes until you do something with it. In this final episode of my Leadership Shift series, I'm talking about how to turn everything you've uncovered into a real leadership roadmap. I walk through the two kinds of gaps that show up as you grow as a leader: skill gaps and mindset gaps. Skill gaps close with practice and the right tools. The mindset gap decides wheth...

Your organization has a vision statement. Do you have one for yourself as a leader? In this third episode of The Leadership Shift series, I'm talking about the vision – answering the question, "Who am I becoming?" You can't grow toward a leader you haven't yet described. I walk you through the same future-self exercise I use with my clients (and revisit for myself), built around my three keys to l...

Remember when Disney's Aladdin decided to become a prince? He figured out what a prince was supposed to look like, wear, and sound like, threw himself a grand parade, and played the part. And it worked, for a while. But keeping up that costume every single day was exhausting. I see a version of this with new leaders all the time. We find a boss or mentor we admire and try to lead exactly like them...

You got the promotion. You have the new title, maybe a team, and a whole lot of "good luck, you've got this." But what actually changed? This episode kicks off a four-part series on the shift every first-time leader makes, from "I've been promoted into a leadership role" to "I actually am a leader." Today I'm starting with stage one: understanding what's different now. I talk about why the very th...

I have a treat for you this week!  it's been a while since I've had a guest on the podcast, and this one is worth the wait. I sat down with Dr. Cindra Kamphoff, award-winning keynote speaker, certified mental performance coach, and owner of the Mentally Strong Institute. She's worked with the Minnesota Vikings, USA Track & Field at the Tokyo Olympics, and countless leaders and entrepreneurs, and h...

This week I'm picking up right where episode 243 left off. If you already know Insights Discovery is way more than a personality profile, but you're still asking "okay, now what do we actually do with it?" — this episode is for you. I walk through how I help individuals, teams, and whole organizations find their real starting point with Insights, and why the tool itself isn't where you begin — the...

I've talked about Insights Discovery on this podcast many, many times — it's core to everything I do. But if you've only ever gone through that first intro workshop and gotten your color energy profile, I want you to know: that's just the beginning. In this episode, I'm walking you through the full Insights Discovery toolkit — all the programs, profiles, and workshops that exist beyond that first...

This is it — the final episode in our Human Skills series, and it's the one that answers the question underneath all the others: so what? What actually changes when you build these skills? In this episode, I walk through the ripple effect of human-centered leadership across five levels: starting with you, then the person in front of you, your team, your organization, and finally, the greater good....

For the last six episodes, I've been asking you to look inward — self-awareness, mind management, curiosity, compassion, courage, trust. This week I'm flipping the lens outward. Reading the room is the skill that puts all of those inner skills to the test, because it's the moment you're face to face with someone whose wiring isn't the same as yours. I'm breaking down what it actually means to read...

Trust isn't a personality trait - it's a skill! In this episode, I'm breaking down what trust actually is, why vagueness is one of the fastest ways to erode it, and how Brené Brown's BRAVING framework and FranklinCovey's 13 Behaviors of High Trust can help you build it back. I also talk about the piece we don't discuss enough: trust in yourself, and why it has to come before you can really build t...

I'm back with the fifth installment of the Human Skills series, and this time I'm pairing two skills that really work hand in hand: vulnerability and courage. I break down what each one actually means, why they matter so much for building trust on your team, and the common barriers that keep so many leaders from leaning into them — things like armor, perfectionism, and the stories we make up in ou...

We're four episodes into our Human Skills series.  In this episode - I'm tackling two skills at once because they're so deeply connected: empathy and compassion. Empathy gets written off as touchy-feely, but it's actually the foundation of psychological safety, trust, and real connection with your team. Compassion takes it a step further - it's empathy plus action. I walk you through what each one...

This is the third episode in the series about the Human Skills series, and this week I'm digging into curiosity - one of the most powerful (and most underused) leadership skills there is. I share why our brains default to certainty over curiosity, what that costs us with our teams, and two real stories that show exactly how a single curious question can change the outcome of a conflict or a conver...

We're continuing our series, The Human Skills, and this week we're digging into skill number two: mind management. Here's the core idea - your thoughts aren't facts, they're a lens. And that lens shapes everything: your feelings, your actions, and ultimately your results. I walk you through The Model (circumstance → thought → feeling → action → result) with a real leadership example, then we get i...

Over the next eight episodes, we're diving into The Human Skills, the abilities that separate good leaders from truly great ones. Not soft skills - but human skills. And we're starting at the root of it all: self-awareness. I call it the pixie dust of leadership because it's where everything else begins - your EQ, your impact, your growth. In this episode, I unpack what self-awareness really is (a...

What if the most powerful leadership work you'll ever do is the work nobody sees? In this episode, I'm using Elsa from Frozen as our guide - and not for the reasons you might think. It's not the ice palace or the magic - but it's when Elsa goes to the top of the mountain . That quiet, private, uncomfortable space where she finally stops concealing and starts becoming. So many of us are doing insid...

I just saw the the recent release of the PIxar movie, Toy Story 5 - and I couldn't stop making leadership connections (as I tend to do). In this episode, I walk through all five Toy Story films and trace the arc of Woody's leadership evolution from ego-driven insecurity in 1995 to quietly showing up without needing the spotlight in 2026. Along the way, I share where I was in my own life and career...

I was not expecting a leadership masterclass at my daughter's high school graduation...but that's exactly what I got! Three student speakers took the stage and delivered some of the most honest, human leadership wisdom I've heard in a long time. In this episode, I'm walking you through three lessons from those speeches and connecting them to what I see every single day in my work with leaders. Les...

Self-trust is one of the most foundational skills in leadership — and one of the most overlooked. In this episode, I'm unpacking what self-trust actually is, how it's different from confidence, and why it's often the hidden root cause beneath the challenges leaders bring into coaching. I share seven ways to build self-trust, from taking action and learning to recognize your own voice, to naming yo...

It's graduation season - and this replay felt like the perfect episode for this moment. I'm bringing back one of my early episodes: my takeaways from Wolfpack by Abby Wambach. With my own daughter graduating high school, the message in this book hit even closer to home. Abby Wambach's Wolfpack started as a commencement speech and became a rallying cry. In it, she lays out eight rules for changing...

Most leaders say they care about their people - but there's often a gap between saying it and actually showing up in a way people can feel it. In this episode, I'm asking the question that I think every leader needs to sit with: Are you giving your employees what they need? I'm talking about the kind of investment that doesn't require a big budget or a new program - the relational, everyday invest...

I've been doing leadership development for a long time - and I've learned there's one thing that actually changes everything. It's not the skill. It's not the framework. It starts inside. In this episode, I'm sharing a moment from a coaching session that stopped me in my tracks: a client said something so simple and so profound that it became the entire lens for this conversation. I'm breaking dow...

What if painting your bathroom could teach you everything you need to know about going after hard goals, having tough conversations, and growing as a leader? This week, I'm taking you somewhere unexpected — my guest bathroom — and walking you through a painting project step by step. I realized that everything I was experiencing during my painting project maps directly onto what happens when we fin...