Meikles & Dimes

Christian Poensgen is a scientist, entrepreneur, and executive coach who holds a PhD in the relationship between stress and performance. He previously served as Senior Fellow of a Future of Work think tank in the German Federal Parliament, co-founded the European Center for Digital Competitiveness, and has also contributed to the World Economic Forum. Most recently, he co-authored the book Ultrapr...

Natalia Emanuel is a research economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. She earned her PhD in economics from Harvard University and completed a postdoc at Princeton. Her research has been featured by the BBC, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, and NPR's Planet Money, among others. She is also coauthor of the book In Person: How Working Together Fuels Creativity, P...

Emma Harrington is a professor of economics at the University of Virginia and coauthor of the book In Person: How Working Together Fuels Creativity, Productivity, and Growth. Emma earned her PhD in economics from Harvard and completed a postdoc at Princeton. Her research has been published in some of the world’s leading academic journals, including Science, and the Quarterly Journal of Economics....

Carlos Gutierrez is a Cuban immigrant who rose from selling cereal out of a Kellogg’s van to become the youngest CEO in the company’s history. He later served as U.S. Secretary of Commerce under President George W. Bush and as Vice Chairman of Citigroup. Over the course of his career, Carlos has served on the boards of organizations including Occidental Petroleum, Corning, and the Woodrow Wilson I...

Michelle Gielan is a positive psychology researcher, bestselling author, and former national CBS News anchor who examines how optimism shapes performance and well-being. She is the author of Broadcasting Happiness and Resilient Optimism: The Science of Sustaining a Positive Mindset in Tough Times. She was an executive producer of The Happiness Advantage on PBS and a featured professor in Oprah’s H...

Ron Johnson is one of the most influential retail executives of the past several decades. After graduating from Harvard Business School, he began his career at Mervyn’s before joining Target, where he helped turn Target into “Tar zhay.” That work caught the attention of Steve Jobs, who recruited Ron to create Apple’s retail business from the ground up. Over the next decade, Ron helped develop the...

Dr. Cindra Kamphoff is a professor at Minnesota State University, Mankato and a sport and performance psychologist who has spent her career helping elite performers strengthen their mindset and perform at their best. She has worked one-on-one with Minnesota Vikings players, USA Track & Field athletes at the Tokyo Olympics, and executives at companies including Target and Verizon. Cindra earned...

Caroline Webb is an economist, executive coach, and bestselling author of  How to Have a Good Day , which has been published in more than 60 countries. Her new book is  Leadership Intelligence: Science-Based Strategies for Mastering Twenty-One Everyday Management Challenges. Caroline has been named one of the top 50 executive coaches in the world by Thinkers50 and one of the top 50 leadership and...

David Booth is the founder and chairman of Dimensional Fund Advisors, one of the most influential investment firms in the world, managing more than $1 trillion in assets. Earlier in his career, David helped develop one of the world’s first index funds and spent decades applying academic financial research—including ideas developed by his mentor, Nobel laureate Eugene Fama—to real-world investing....

Elad Sherf is a Professor of Organizational Behavior at the University of North Carolina. His research examines workplace fairness and feedback seeking. He also studies why managers resist feedback, including why they avoid asking for input or ignore input when it is offered. His research has been published in leading management and psychology journals, and he also serves as an associate editor of...

Tina Seelig is the Executive Director of Knight-Hennessy Scholars at Stanford University, the world’s largest fully endowed graduate fellowship program. She is also Director Emerita of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program and has spent decades teaching creativity, innovation, entrepreneurship, and leadership at Stanford, including in the Department of Management Science and Engineering and the...

Daniel Zimet is a licensed psychologist and Certified Mental Performance Consultant who specializes in sport and performance psychology, working with athletes, executives, and other high performers on mental performance, relationships, and major life and career transitions. Daniel is a member of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee Sport Psychology Registry and has published research on ath...

Kelly Poppinga is the defensive coordinator at BYU. As a player at BYU, Kelly earned both All-Conference and Academic All-Conference honors. As a senior, he led the Cougars with 113 tackles and helped BYU win consecutive conference championships in 2006 and 2007. He later spent time with three NFL teams and was part of the Arizona Cardinals organization during its run to Super Bowl XLIII (43). Kel...

Daniel Newton is a professor of management and entrepreneurship at the University of Iowa. His research, which is regularly published in premier management journals, focuses on speaking up and staying engaged at work. A recipient of an eight-year NASA grant, he has conducted research with astronauts aboard the International Space Station, isolated crews in Houston, and cosmonauts in the Mars train...

Bobby Low is a Mental Performance Doctor who helps athletes, teams, and high performers build the mental patterns needed to perform under pressure. As a former NCAA All-American and professional pole vaulter, he learned that performance rarely breaks down due to lack of talent, but because the mind interferes in critical moments. This insight led him to earn a PhD in Sport & Performance Psycho...

DJ DiDonna is a Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School, where he teaches entrepreneurship. In 2019, he founded The Sabbatical Project to define, explore, and research sabbaticals, and he has since advised organizations ranging from nonprofits to Fortune 50 companies on how to design sabbatical policies. His work on sabbaticals has been featured in outlets including The Atlantic, Time, Fast Com...

Spencer Harrison is a Professor of Organizational Behavior at INSEAD, where he studies creativity, coordination, and connection at work. He has studied a wide range of fascinating settings, including Grammy-winning bands, modern dancers, t-shirt designers, rock climbers, architects, NASA teams, Google, and Black Diamond. Spencer’s research has been published in leading management journals and he i...

Braden Brown is the Associate Athletic Director for Mental Health at BYU Athletics, where he helps student-athletes navigate both the mental and performance demands of athletics. A Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist and Certified Mental Performance Consultant (in training), Braden works with athletes on everything from anxiety and relationships to confidence, focus, and performing under pres...

Cameron Anderson is a professor of organizational behavior at the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. His research focuses on power, status and influence, and he teaches courses on power and politics in organizations, negotiations, and conflict resolution. Before joining Cal Berkeley, Cameron was a professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern Univers...

Tali Sharot is a Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London and on the faculty of the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT. Tali’s research integrates neuroscience, behavioral economics, and psychology to study how emotion and motivation influence people’s beliefs and decisions. Tali’s award winning books – The Optimism Bias The Influential Mind, and Look Again,...

Ron Friedman is an award-winning social psychologist, and bestselling author of The Best Place to Work and Decoding Greatness. And his new book, SuperTeams draws on data from 6,000 workers. I hope you enjoy learning from Ron Friedman today. In this episode we discuss the following: The best teams are not just a lucky collection of talented people. They work differently. The best teams protect focu...

Sebastian Wernicke is a leading expert in data and AI strategy who has spent more than 20 years helping organizations—from startups to Fortune 500 companies—turn data into real-world transformation. Sebastian’s work stands out because of his core belief that the power of data isn’t unlocked through better technology—it’s unlocked through better thinking. Through his consulting, speaking, and three...

Eric Ries is the author of the New York Times bestseller  The Lean Startup , which is responsible for many of the terms commonly used in tech today, including minimum viable product and the build-measure-learn cycle. And his new book is titled, Incorruptible: Why Good Companies Go Bad... and How Great Companies Stay Great . Over the last two decades, Eric’s ideas about continuous innovation, long-...

Lara Love Hardin is a New York Times bestselling author, literary agent, and founder of True Literary, known for her memoir The Many Lives of Mama Love. Her story details her journey from suburban soccer mom to opioid addicted felon, eventually becoming a successful, award-winning ghostwriter with four New York Times Bestsellers, including The Sun Does Shine. In this episode we discuss the followi...

Wayne Simien is an NBA champion for the Miami Heat and two-time All-American and Big 12 Player of the Year for the Kansas Jayhawks. He currently serves as Associate Athletics Director of Strategic Engagement for KU. Wayne also works as a broadcaster for KU Men’s and Women’s basketball on ESPN+. Before joining Kansas athletics, Wayne spent 12 years in campus ministry. He and his wife Katie are the...