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In his book Nobody Is Smarter Than Everybody: Why Self-Managing Teams Make Better Decisions and Deliver Extraordinary Results, Rod Collins builds on the premise that “the digital revolution is far more than a technology revolution. It is also a sociological revolution that has generated an unprecedented capacity for mass collaboration and created new possibilities in how humans work together.” Under his leadership as the Chief Oper...

Your organization has a culture. You can be intentional about continuously shaping it or allow it to evolve and see what happens. You can also reshape it. In this episode of Qonversations, Tom Krause, Ph.D., and author of If Your Culture Could Talk, joins host Brian Gorman to delve into the hard truths about culture. They explore the cost of misalignment between what is said and the behavior of leaders as well as the five essential...

Miles Everson, CEO of MBO Partners and author of Free Birds Revolution: The Future of Work and the Independent Mind of a Free Bird, and host Brian Gorman continue their conversation with a focus on the mind of a free bird. This includes an examination of the differences in the mindsets of traditional employees vs. free birds, the differences in how they spend their time on the job, and the differences in how they evaluate such thin...

118: Free Birds Revolution – 1 of 2: Miles Everson, CEO of MBO Partners and author of Free Birds Revolution: The Future of Work and the Independent Mind of a Free Bird, doesn’t mind challenging conventional thinking. And when he does, he has the data, and the examples, to support what he is saying. In this episode of Qonversations, Miles and host Brian Gorman explore Part 1 of Miles’ book, focusing on the six forces driving a lar...

At nine pages, this may be the smallest business book you ever read. That said, it is also one worth re-reading from time to time. In changing the label from “introverts” to “quiet people,” Luke Tobin opens our eyes to the many powers that these individuals bring to the workplace, and to life more generally.

Luke, author of The Power of Quiet People (In a World That Favours Loudness), focuses on seven such powers. In this episode o...

Sometimes, we can be our own best teachers. We’ve all had leaders we trust, and those we don’t. If we’re lucky, we’ve had leaders we would follow anywhere, and those we would avoid at all costs the next time around. We’ve all had leaders that nurture us and do everything possible to help us grow and succeed, and leaders who want to ensure their own place on the organization chart by holding us down. Reflecting on our leadership e...

The prevailing organizational design model remains the top-down org chart. While some have made adjustments (removing layers, adding “matrixed” relationships), It continues to remain an industrial-age approach to structuring and leading organizations. In today’s episode, Jeffrey Beeson, author of Network Leadership, brings a refreshingly new approach to organizational design and leadership. He and host Brian Gorman explore networke...

Morag Barrett (SkyeTeam.com) joins host Brian Gorman to explore the importance of establishing person-to-person relationships across the workplace. Morag shares the results of years of research globally, including “the four yesses.” “Can I count on you?” “Can I depend on you?” “Do I care about you?” and “Do I trust you?” Reflect on someone you have worked with that you would answer yes to each of those four questions. How would you...

Retired Navy SEAL Commander, corporate CEO, and author Marty Strong returns to discuss his recently published book, Be Different: How Navy Seals and Entrepreneurs Bend, Break, or Ignore the Rules to Get Results! Marty and host Brian Gorman explore what it means to be different and why it is so important in today’s turbulent and ever-changing world.

Marty Strong is a combat veteran of the U.S. Navy SEAL Teams and holds an undergradu...

Despite continuing calls to “return to work,” there is growing evidence that the relationship of people to their work, the nature of that work, and the workplace itself are continuing to change. Guest Serena Diamond and host Brian Gorman bring their decades of experience in organizational change management and leadership to the fore as they look at the impact that these shifting forces are having on what is required to successfully...

In his 2015 TEDx talk “Stop Managing, Start Leading,” now viewed over 2.5 million times, Hamza Khan was prescient in how he described the future of leadership. A great deal of how he led then and continues to lead today became common practice during the pandemic. Today, we hear calls to reverse some of those trends. In this episode, Hamza joins host Brian Gorman to revisit that TEDx talk, trace the changes in leadership over the la...

“I think growing up…stuttering was a massive advantage.” Michael Thompson didn’t think so at the time, but looking back, he realizes it now. In this episode, Michael and host Brian Gorman explore a few of the many lessons that Michael has to offer in his book Shy By Design. Michael tells the story of why he chose to enter sales, and how he responded when, as the new leader of a sales team one of members walked out of the first team...

While we too rarely acknowledge it, neurodiversity is already in the workplace. Whether one accepts the data that 20% of the workforce is neurodiverse, or the much higher 52% self-reporting in Gen Z, it is important to become intentional about addressing neurodiversity in the workplace. Stina Borth joins host Brian Gorman to address how to interview neurodivergent individuals, how to set them up for success, and some of the benefit...

DeVon Hankins journey went from a farm in rural Missouri to college to Washington, DC, Toyota, state and city government, and even passed through the enlisted and officer ranks of the US military. In this episode, Devon joins host Brian Gorman to share her stories and the leadership lessons she has learned, lessons that are important to every leader today.

DeVon is CEO of Ascension Strategies (info@ascensionstrat.com, https://www.as...

The future isn’t what it used to be. In this episode, Marty Strong, retired SEAL commander, corporate executive, and author of Be Visionary: Strategic Leadership in the Age of Optimization, makes the case for visionary leadership at all levels, and in all parts, of organizational life. He and host Brian Gorman discuss the focus on optimization found in most organizations, and how that leaves them unprepared for the inevitable oppor...