The ShiftShapers Podcast

This week’s episode focuses on the use of improvisation as a valuable training tool for business professionals. Peter Margaritis, author of Improv is No Joke, describes what improv can do for your career and organization. He also introduces the effectiveness of the "Yes, and..." principle in sharpening your leadership and communication skills. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 03:06 W...

This week’s episode looks at how having a marketer’s mindset can make a difference to your business. Kate Colbert, author of Think Like a Marketer, explains the importance of stories in today’s competitive world. She also shares the common pitfalls of DIY marketing and why companies should avoid them. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:04 What it means to think like a marketer 06:22 How stori...

This week’s episode presents key insights into where the rising musculoskeletal claims are coming from and how we can prevent them. Melissa Gill, owner and CEO of On-Site Solutions, highlights the significant intervention of physical therapy in minimizing the risks of work-related injuries and in creating a proactive, positive, and engaging workplace culture. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 0...

This week’s episode highlights the tools and techniques to be effective and confident in building a referral base. Bill Cates, president of Referral Coach International, provides an in-depth discussion on the "Perpetual Revenue System" and what should be covered in order to successfully turn referrals into introductions. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:39 An overview of Bill’s bo...

This week’s episode looks into the prevalent chronic conditions that women suffer from and the main reasons why they're unable to have access to proper care. Joe Connolly, founder and CEO at Visana Health, explains how a tech-enabled, high-touch care model can provide solutions and make a difference to women's healthcare. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:11 Introduction to the Vir...

This week’s episode covers the significant decision factors that every patient must have in this current state of healthcare. Dr. Sanjay Prasad, surgeon and author of Resetting Healthcare, explains the need to reform the industry and how transparency can also help raise the quality of care. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:17 How COVID19 has impacted the state of healthcare 06:03 Avoiding t...

This week’s episode introduces a self-care tech platform for Diabetics. Integrated with AI and Machine Learning, this new approach to healthcare is believed to enhance consumer experience. Lonny Stormo, CEO of Pops Diabetes Care, describes what these tech advances would offer as we lean toward consumer-driven healthcare. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:51 The concept and practical sense of...

This week’s episode suggests how employers can optimize their recruitment process to hire top talent and set them up for success. Robert Nickell, founder and CEO of Rocket Station, delves into the 3 foundational steps critical for the hiring and success of every individual or outsourced talent. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:13 The top 1 mistake that people make when hiring 04:20 3 Steps...

This week’s episode looks into the problem areas of every regulation that puts industries through expensive endeavors and tons of paperwork. Sarah Borders, co-founder and principal consultant at Benefits Compliance Solutions, gives interesting tidbits that clients can do right away to mitigate some of the risks. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 03:23 About COBRA: What are its problem areas, lo...

This week’s episode introduces a next-level type of healthcare that people can already receive in the comfort of their own homes. John Young, SVP Growth at Nice Healthcare, explains why it's going to be a growing demand for employers and members. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:39 How Nice Healthcare’s business model had come to fruition 08:03 Scope of healthcare services being offere...

This week's episode gives profound insights into how insurance advisors can drive sales and win relationships using the psychology of persuasion. Brian Ahearn, author of Persuasive Selling for Relationship Driven Insurance Agents, talks through the different methods that need to be applied at every step of the sales cycle in order to create long-lasting client relationships and close sales wi...

This week’s episode discusses the best strategies that business owners must do to preserve their most important asset: focus. A Managing Director of Trinity Blue & Taylor Insurance, Trey Taylor defines the practice of growing your organization’s culture, the revolutionary steps in recruiting people, and the important components to include when tracking your KPIs. All of these are based on his...

This week’s episode suggests how business leaders can move their companies forward through a better partnership with the HR department. Karen Young, founder and president of HR Resolutions, cites the fundamental topics in her book, Stop Knocking on My Door, which aims to promote employee satisfaction and productivity in the workplace. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 01:25 Introduction to Kare...

This week’s episode explores the major areas of concern with healthcare illiteracy and the huge need for innovative tools in bridging the gap between industries and providers. Ben Hale, co-founder and CEO of Bright HR, presents the do’s and don'ts in providing healthcare education so that industries will be better informed, satisfied consumers. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 02:42 Ben s...

This week’s episode helps advisors learn more about advising clients about Federal benefits, from Social Security to Medicare and beyond. Frank Cardenas, Co-founder at FEDlogic, discusses how employees and employers can both benefit from more guidance around these often-confusing benefits. What You’ll Learn From This Episode: 0202:20 Frank’s motivations for helping clients in the social benefits s...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Scott Beck, CEO at BeckTek. Businesses worldwide now rely heavily on email to communicate. While convenient and relatively safe, it does have a fatal flaw that hackers exploit for maximum effect. Phishing is a billion-dollar scam that attacks big and small companies alike. With the SLAM Method, a simple yet effective guide, you too can spot phishing...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Brian Butler, Vice President of Client Development at Flipt. PBMs use several tactics which drive up the overall costs of medical benefits. This expense is shouldered by members and employers, increasing pharmacy spend and pushing up plan costs. Innovating this model requires consumer empowerment to make intelligent health care decisions and advisor...

This week's episode features a conversation with Steve Overton, Co-founder, and CEO at Plansight. RFPs are difficult on advisors and extra hard of carriers who may or may not know how they are being represented to clients. Additionally, RFPs are time-consuming, difficult to decipher, and sometimes written with a particular carrier or plan in mind. Technology is being used to smooth out that p...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Mary Talley Bowden, M.D., an ENT from Houston, Texas and mother of 4 boys. After experiencing first-hand how traditional, insurance-driven practice models work against patients, Mary decided that she would innovate the patient experience in her own practice. By blending wellness and ENT, she has created a service that has vastly improved her patient...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Carl Schuessler, Jr., Managing Principal at Mitigate Partners. Acting as a fiduciary means acting as stewards that improve financial outcomes. There is an emphasis on trust that has become even more apparent with the creation of the Affordable Care Act. Fiduciaries also deliver active management as opposed to passive management, a beneficial role th...

This week’s episode features a conversation with T.J. Morrison, President at Benefit Design Specialists. Direct contracting offers competitively priced bundles to patients and quick payments to providers. They carve out a niche away from networks while, at the same time, avoiding direct competition with them. Direct contracting uses data-based baseline pricing to set the most competitive rates for...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Mike Vasquez, CEO and Founder at Opioid Clinical Management. The opioid crisis has been largely ignored for the past 15 months but this doesn't mean it has gone away. Novel withdrawal symptom indicators help advisors and employers identify the differences in addiction and withdrawal patterns. This allows employers to intervene with the provider...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Silvia Garcia, Founder and CEO of Feel Logic and Happiest Places to Work and Former Global Director of the Happiness Institute of Coca-Cola. The topic of happiness, what it is and how do we achieve it, has been magnified by the pandemic. In the workplace, there are 8 ways that employers can facilitate happiness including increasing employee recognit...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Surya Singh, CEO and Co-founder at gWell. Muskoskeletal claims are growing monster that gobbles up claims spends. Cutting-edge tech in genomics, AI, and machine learning help create diagnostics for the best treatments since many chronic conditions have genetic markers associated with them. At the same time, this technology cuts costs by as much as a...

This week’s episode features a conversation with Suzanne Delbanco, Executive Director at Catalyst for Payment Reform. Consolidation in the provider marketplace has detrimental effects on patients, such as provider unwillingness to change in favor of improved patient experience. In policy reform, the central issue is price transparency remains a battleground where Suzanne is very active. She also c...