Circle City Success

Danny Lopez is the Vice President for External Affairs and Corporate Communications at Pacers Sports & Entertainment. Listen to CCS episode ​164 where you'll hear Danny tell us about ● How a decision to accept a basketball coaching job early in his career taught him about tenacity, hard work, and self discipline ● How a career shift to politics was completely unexpected yet changed his life trajec...

Randy Lewandowski is the President of the Indianapolis Indians.   Listen to CCS episode ​163 where you'll hear Randy tell us about   ● How being successful 1/3 of the time makes you really good in baseball   ● How he was good enough to play at a D1 school in college but he learned a valuable lesson about culture, and...   ● How Victory Field is actually one of the top rated (state of the art) mino...

Cathy Ferree is the President and CEO of The Indiana State Museum and Historical Sites   Listen to CCS episode ​162 where you'll hear Cathy tell us about   ● How there are 11 Historical sites around the State of Indiana as part of the State Museum   ● How she had no intentions of being in the museum industry until mentors help guide her career path   ● How she was recruited to launch a new museum...

Jake Oakman is the Executive Director of White River State Park.   Listen to CCS episode ​161 where you'll hear Jake tell us about   ● How he believes people like to help people and no one has ever told him no to a coffee meeting   ● How staying connected to his network helped him land a major career change   ● How White River State Park is home to the Indianapolis Zoo, Victory Field, TCU Amphithe...

Mike Jones is the President and CEO of Lauth Group. In this episode, you'll hear Mike tell us about how he was always interested in construction growing up and how that played out in his career, about how an early project with Tim Sexton confirmed what Mike wanted to do and helped propel him in the industry, and about how Lauth Group imploded during The Great Recession, laying off 200-250 people i...

Ron Stiver is the President of System Health Solutions at Indiana University Health. In this episode, you'll hear Ron tell us about how he played football at DePauw University and how football coaches have been significant mentors throughout his life, including after he was done playing, about how meeting former governor Mitch Daniels while working at Eli Lilly led to volunteering for the Daniels...

Fred Payne is the President & CEO of United Way of Central Indiana. In this episode you'll hear Fred tell us about how doing something that changes one person's life actually changes an entire community, about how he helped a global organization as it went through a talent transition, and about how no one person or organization can fix poverty alone. As always, don't forget to check out our partne...

Allison Melangton is the Sr. Vice President of Penske Entertainment and is responsible for the oversight of several business areas within the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the NTT INDYCAR SERIES, and the Penske Entertainment video content team. In this episode you'll hear Allison tell us about how she moved to Colorado for college without having ever been there before and then later moved to Indian...

In this episode, we spoke about some of the changes and updates in our lives in 2022, a few things that we've learned from some guests that we have had on, and what we're looking forward to in 2023. As always, don't forget to check out our partners North Indy Magazine and Synergize. CCS Podcast Partners: North Indy Magazine:  https://townepost.com/broad-ripple/ Synergize:  https://synergizeindy.co...

Jim McKenzie is the President of McKenzie Foods, which runs and operates 22 KFCs, and Co-Owner of Homes by McKenzie, which is a custom home building company. In this episode you'll hear Jim tell us about how playing football through college at Purdue has made a lasting impact on him and how he applies lessons learned from football to business, how he scaled McKenzie foods from 3 restaurants to 22...

Tamika Catchings is a former professional basketball player, Founder of the Catch the Stars Foundation, and Owner of Tea's Me Cafe Indy. In this episode you'll hear Tamika tell us about growing up with a father who was a professional basketball player and how she set a goal to be in the NBA, about how she went from never speaking as a child and teen because of a hearing disability and a speech imp...

Allison Barber is the President & COO of the Indiana Fever. In this episode you'll hear Allison tell us about how if someone says something hasn't been done before that intrigues her and becomes something she wants to do, how she has taken jobs where she doesn't have experience and becomes immersed and learns the business, and about the Indiana Fever and why she describes it as an organization in...

Dick Hester is a Senior Partner at Indiana Business Advisors. In this episode you'll hear Dick tell us about why being involved in the community is so important, why he believes seeking mentorship is a key aspect of personal development, and how if two people or business partners always agree, one is not needed. As always, don't forget to check out our partners North Indy Magazine and Synergize. D...

Coach Matt Painter is the head coach of the Purdue Men's Basketball team. In this episode you'll hear Coach Painter tell us about growing up in Muncie, Indiana and how he was a multiple sport athlete at Delta High School, why he believes there are 2 components (scheduling and recruiting) a leader/coach has to get right, and how you don't get judged on what players you don't get...you get judged on...

Adam Gonzalez is the Owner and CEO of Viva Tia Maria which is a Hispanic food manufacturing business. In this episode, you'll hear Adam tell us about growing up attending food shows as a young teenager and how the first product he sold was a fruit juicy, how he has learned to be a great communicator and why he decided to take the path in the food business, and how he was able to successfully pitch...

There are still too many amazing stories to share. We're back with Generation 3 of the Circle City Success Podcast. The mission remains the same:  To interview successful people in the Indianapolis area and share their knowledge and experience with Indianapolis' professional community. What's new? 4 rotating co-hosts and bi-weekly episodes. Be sure to listen to CCS episode 149 to hear Jason, tall...

113 unique guests. 148 published episodes. Countless lessons learned. All good things must come to an end. Over three years after we recorded our first episode on January 12, 2019, we're hanging up the mics. Be sure to listen to CCS episode 148 to hear Jared, Jason, and Drew recap some of the lessons we have had the opportunity to learn from the guests that we have interviewed as well as from each...

Jimmy Rayford is the CEO of Dealers Wholesale which is a company that sells and installs building materials for the construction industry in the Midwestern part of the United States. In this episode, you'll hear Jimmy tell us about how he accepted a job offer with IBM before he started his senior year of college and how at his first department meeting on the job he was told that the division was u...

In this episode, we recap some of the things that we learned from our four August guests who were: David Magley, former NBA player who is the President of an emerging pro basketball league named The Basketball League Joe Slater, COO & CFO of Gleaners Food Bank of Indiana Angel Henry, author of her book titled Dents in the Ceiling: Tools Women and Allies Need to Breakthrough and is the Sr. Director...

Angel Henry is the author of her book titled Dents in the Ceiling: Tools Women and Allies Need to Breakthrough and is the Sr. Director of the Transformation Value Management Office & DEI Vice-Chair at Genesys. In this episode, you'll hear Angel tell us about a program that she joined her junior year of high school that introduced her to business and corporate America and gave her the opportunity t...

Joe Slater is the COO & CFO of Gleaners Food Bank of Indiana, which is a non-profit organization that serves 21 central and southeastern Indiana counties by distributing food to pantries, homeless shelters, soup kitchens and other agencies who directly serve the hungry in Indiana. In this episode, you'll hear Joe tell us about his love for running that started in 4th grade and led him to walking o...

David Magley is a former NBA player who is the President of an emerging pro basketball league named The Basketball League. In this episode, you'll hear David tell us about his basketball career from scoring 40 points in a high school game the weekend his mother passed away to playing against Michael Jordan in Jordan's first college basketball game to his time in the NBA, how he took a stand and di...

In this episode, we recap some of the things that we learned from our four August guests who were: Victor Figlin, Co-Founder & Co-Owner of Indy Auto Man Pierre Twer, President of Bolt for the Heart Brandon Tiek, Founder & Owner of Tiek Dental Studio   But before we get to the episode, I wanna tell you really quickly about our partnership with Synergize. Synergize creates intentional friendships ce...

Brandon Tiek is the Founder & Owner of Tiek Dental Studio and the Host of his podcast, Teeth Talk Radio. In this episode, you'll hear Brandon tell us about how seemingly small things that have been said to him throughout his life have had big impacts on him, including a dentist from his home town telling him that he would be a good dentist on day, about the impact that being a part of the Purdue G...

Pierre Twer is the President of Bolt for the Heart, which is a non-profit organization established in 2010 focused on supporting Indiana State Police, local police, local fire agencies, local schools, churches and community organizations by purchasing and placing automated external defibrillators (AEDs) at their facilities free of charge and training their staffs on their successful usage. In this...