Les Snead on Building a Team

Les Snead is the General Manager of the Los Angeles Rams, a position he’s held for 11 years. In his role as General Manager, he partners with Head Coach Sean McVay to direct all personnel decisions for the football team. His tenure has been marked by strategic, aggressive moves that have created a strong core nucleus of talent and depth throughout the roster. If you follow the NFL, you know that the LA Rams have had a lot of success lately; Under Les’s leadership, they went to the Super Bowl in 2019 and they won the Super Bowl in 2022.

Tiffani Bova on Growth, Experience, and Finding Happiness

Tiffani Bova is the Global Growth Evangelist at Salesforce, and the Wall Street Journal Bestsellers Growth IQ and The Experience Mindset: Changing the Way You Think About Growth. Over the past two decades, she has led large revenue-producing divisions at businesses ranging from start-ups to the Fortune 500. She has been named one of the Top 50 business thinkers in the world by Thinkers50 twice. She is also the host of the podcast What’s Next! with Tiffani Bova.

Brian Levenson's Reflections from the Aspen Ideas Festivals

Today’s episode is going to be a little bit different than a lot of our past episodes because it’s just going to be me on here. I’m going to share a lot of my observations, a lot of my notes, from a festival I recently attended called The Aspen Ideas Festival. It’s really a conference, but it’s much more than a conference. It’s where some of the best thought leaders gather to share what’s on their mind, to discuss, they have all kinds of experiences, they have debates, they have panels, they have interactive experiences. I figured I would capture the four days that I spent at the conference with all of you and share it in today’s episode.

Ryan Poles on Building and Sustaining Championship Culture

Ryan Poles is currently the General Manager of the Chicago Bears. Prior to that, he spent 13 years working with the Kansas City Chiefs and helping to build the Super Bowl Champion that they are today. He was heavily involved in the scouting and bringing on the players that you see dominating the NFL today. Ryan also played football at a very high level; he played offensive line for Boston College, and his quarterback at the time was Matt Ryan.

Brian Murphy on Incorporating Mental Skills into a Company

Brian Murphy is a founder, CEO, entrepreneur and investor -- constantly learning and chasing possible. He founded and leads ReliaQuest, the force multiplier of security operations and one of the largest and fastest growing companies in the global cybersecurity market. Murphy has grown ReliaQuest from a boot-strapped startup to high-growth unicorn with a valuation of over $1 billion, over 1,000 team members and over $350 million in growth equity with firms such as FTV Capital and KKR Growth.

Paige Thomas on Serving Customers

Paige Thomas has more than 25 years experience in the retail industry with an extensive off-price background and her passion for ecommerce. Paige most recently served as President & CEO of Saks OFF 5TH, leading the business from February 2020 through February 2023. Prior to Saks OFF 5TH, Paige spent eight years at Nordstrom where she launched NordstromRack.com and led the integration of HauteLook. Earlier in her career, Ms. Thomas held merchandising leadership positions at Kohl’s and Fred Meyer.

Laura Gassner Otting on Beyond Wonderhell

A frequent contributor to Good Morning America, the TODAY Show, Harvard Business Review, and Oprah Daily, Laura Gassner Otting’s 30-year resume is defined by her entrepreneurial edge. She served as a Presidential Appointee in Bill Clinton’s White House, helping shape AmeriCorps; left a leadership role at respected national search firm to expand a tech start-up; and founded, ran, and sold her own global search firm, partnering with the full gamut of mission driven corporate and nonprofit executives.

Cate Luzio on Building Luminary

Cate Luzio spent two decades in financial services leading global multibillion-dollar businesses. In a sharp career pivot, she launched Luminary, a gender inclusive, global professional education and networking platform created to address the systemic challenges impacting women across all industries and sectors. Luminary's mission - and Cate's - is to help women and our allies see a path forward by arming them with the tools, resources, and community to navigate their paths -- regardless of their professional journey.

Olajuwon Ajanaku and Earl Cooper on Building Eastside Golf

Olajuwon Ajanaku, the Founder of Eastside Golf grew up in East Atlanta. He gained a golf scholarship to Morehouse College and won a National Championship alongside his co-founder, Earl Cooper.

Earl Cooper is a PGA Professional and currently ranked as one of the best young teachers in America by Golf Digest. He has worked as the first African American golf professional at Detroit Golf Club and Wilmington Country Club.

Marc Riccio on Creating a Competitive Advantage

Marc Riccio is the CEO of USA Lacrosse, a nearly 400,000-member organization that serves as the governing body of the sport in the United States. Prior to joining USA Lacrosse, Marc was the Chief Commercial Officer for KlarisIP, a boutique intellectual property and media consultancy. Marc spent 17 seasons leading business operation and development for the New York Jets (NFL) and he worked for Hofstra University, leading marketing and development for intercollegiate athletics.

Lesley Poole on Seeds of Optimism

Lesley Poole serves as the chief executive officer for The SEED Foundation (www.seedfoundation.com). She is responsible for the overall health and vitality of SEED’s network of public, college-preparatory boarding schools and SEED’s mission-critical college success programming.

Val Ackerman on Leading Leagues

Val Ackerman was named the fifth Commissioner of the BIG EAST Conference on June 26, 2013. She previously served as an attorney and executive at the National Basketball Association, was the founding President of the Women’s National Basketball Association, and is a past President of USA Basketball, which oversees the U.S. men’s and women’s Olympic basketball program. She also served for two terms as the U.S. representative to the International Basketball Federation (FIBA).

Bruce Levenson (AKA My Dad) on Leveraging Optimism

Today’s episode, episode #277, is a little bit different. I have interviewed 276 different people, and over that span I’ve often contemplated and though, “You know who I would love to have on here? My dad.” He’s one of the most interesting people I’ve ever been around, and I’ve had a front row seat to witness, to him questions, to observe, to notice.

Julien Smith on Building Breather and Practice

Julien Smith is the Co-Founder and CEO at Practice. Previously, he was also the Co-Founder of a company called Breather. Additionally, he was a New York Times Bestselling Author of 3 books. He is somebody who’s been a speaker and a writer. Creative would be the word I use to best sum up Julien.

Carole Robin on Connectedness

Carole Robin, Ph.D. who taught the legendary Interpersonal Dynamics course (affectionately known by students as “Touchy Feely”) at the Stanford Graduate School of Business was the Dorothy J. King Lecturer in Leadership, Director of the Arbuckle Leadership Fellows Program, and Director of the Stanford Interpersonal Dynamics Programs for High Performing Executives (Executive Program) before co-founding Leaders in Tech, which brings the principles and process of “Touchy Feely” to executives in Silicon Valley.

Wil Reynolds on Having Enough while Constantly Growing

As Seer Interactive’s Vice President of Innovation, Wil Reynolds develops strategies and innovations to help clients build traffic and make money. His methods have shaped the search industry worldwide, and he regularly speaks for marketing conferences worldwide.

Jesse Cole on Uniquely Creating

Jesse Cole is the founder of Fans First Entertainment and is the owner of the Savannah Bananas. His teams have welcomed more than 1 million fans to their ballparks, and have been featured on MSNBC, CNN, ESPN, and Entrepreneur Magazine. The Bananas have been awarded with Organization of the Year, Entrepreneur of the Year, Business of the Year, and won the CPL Championship in their first year.

Rand Fishkin on Cultivating Chill Work

Rand Fishkin is cofounder and CEO of audience research software startup, SparkToro. He’s dedicated his professional life to helping people do better marketing through his writing, videos, speaking, and his book, Lost and Founder.

Dave Phillips on Developing Golfers and Business

Dave Phillips believes in living life with passion, curiosity, and purpose. Described as "a visionary thinker with a passion for high-performance coaching," Phillips co-founded the Titleist Performance Institute (TPI). A member of the Professional Golf Association (PGA) of America since 1993. Dave has been a Golf Magazine Top 100 teacher since 2000 and is a Golf Digest Top 50 teacher in America. He currently coaches world number one golfer Jon Rahm and is part of hall of fame golfer Phil Mickelson's team.

Kevin DeShazo on Social Media, Leadership, and Culture

Kevin DeShazo is an author, podcaster, and founder of “Fieldhouse Media,” which helps college athletes, coaches, and administrators be better on social media. Kevin also helps leaders and teams to create a championship culture with his company “Culture Wins.”

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