On Your Mark, Get Set, Grow!

Guest: LaQuita Cleare, an international speaker, public speaking coach, and the CEO of Clear Communication Academy. She has extensive experience working with CEOs, executives, entrepreneurs, Fortune 500 companies, public figures, and politicians in more than 50 countries across four continents, including many clients of CEO Coaching International. Overview: People are not persuaded by information. An honest, well-crafted story that makes an audience feel something can make a lasting impression for both you and your business. Whether you're speaking at a conference or addressing your staff on Zoom, effective storytelling that showcases who you really are and gives your audience opportunities to engage with your main themes is key to connecting, inspiring, and making BIG happen.

Guest: Kurt Wilkin, a successful entrepreneur and CEO. He's the Co-Founder & Visionary of HireBetter, a company that impacts lives by connecting and empowering good people to build great companies. Prior to that, he founded, led, and sold The Controller Group, which was a professional services firm focused on accounting, technology and recruiting. Kurt is also an active member and officer of YPO. Overview: Why are so many companies struggling to fill vacancies? According to hiring expert Kurt Wilkin, businesses that are stuck in a pre-pandemic mindset have to improve their value propositions and get creative about attracting the best talent. And just as importantly, CEOs have to demonstrate to prospective candidates that their passions run deeper than just turning a profit.

Guest: Lloyd Brown, the Co-Founder and Vice Chairman of Smart Chemical Services, which has been named an Inc 5,000 Fastest Growing Company for three years in a row. Lloyd is also the author of a new book, Refined by Failure. Overview: Failure hurts. But according to Lloyd Brown -- who was fired from a company he co-founded -- if a CEO is humble enough to admit mistakes, hold himself accountable, and work on improving blind spots, failure can also grant wisdom that you can use to make BIG happen going forward.

Guest: Matt Shearer, a coach at CEO Coaching International. Matt is a highly motivated business leader and brand management executive with over 23 years of experience building teams and driving results on a global scale. Matt spent over 20 years at Under Armour and played a major role in the early stages of brand and business development, with significant focus on elevating the brand on an international level. Matt is also a member of YPO and a former professional lacrosse player. Episode in a Tweet: In business and sports, aligning the best players with a great gameplan is the only way to win BIG. Quick Background: Business is a team sport. And the very best teams use strong culture and clearly defined goals to put great players in a position to win consistently. On today's show, Matt Shearer explains how his experience as an athlete and sports brand executive influenced his leadership philosophy and team management strategies.

To find the right leaders for your team, you have to separate the true high performers from the pretenders who’ve been bobbing along in the high tide at other stellar companies. And to fill a key chair in your leadership team, you’ll also need to find candidates whose motivations and management styles fit with your company’s most pressing needs.  On today’s show, Gordon Forsythe discusses how to vet and hire talent who will succeed within your culture and execute the tasks that will make BIG happen for your firm.

It's easy for CEOs to get so caught up in taking care of their businesses that we neglect an even more important responsibility: taking care of ourselves. Poor diet and exercise habits get compounded by no sleep and an excess of stress until one day you look in the mirror and can't recognize the person looking back at you. If you're not that lucky, you might not realize that go go go is no way to run a business until you're waking up in a hospital bed. Luis Vargas was 60 pounds overweight and running on empty when he decided he needed to make self-care a BIG priority. On today's show, Luis shares the five elements he says he needed to win in order to transform his body, his mind, his business, and his life.

Guest: Megan Couch, the Chief Experience Officer at Integrity Staffing Solutions. Overview: The millions of jobs lost to the COVID-19 pandemic have created a problem that many companies weren't anticipating: as the world begins reopening, the absolute best displaced workers have lots of options. Your total value proposition has to encompass culture, leadership opportunities, hybrid work models, and, yes, a competitive comp structure if you want to attract top talent.

For the first time in history, a company's workforce could span four generations. Aligning a diverse group of employees with such a wide range of life experiences could be especially challenging if you're also trying to keep your WFH teams connected with in-person staff and salespeople. But in any business challenge there's also opportunity. If you can connect tried-and-true values with a new, more connected worldview, your employees will continually learn from each other, gain new skills and perspectives, and move your company in exciting new directions. On today's show, Lew Jaffe shares how to effectively manage a multigenerational workforce towards BIG.

All CEOs have to grow into their roles. But for Kerry Siggins, becoming a leader has been a lifelong process of learning how to maximize her strengths while overcoming weaknesses that nearly killed her. On today's show, Kerry discusses how she conquered her struggles with substance abuse and started to make BIG happen in her life and work.

Effective annual planning may be the single biggest differentiator between companies that stay small and those that get BIG. But the very best CEOs understand that the building up to your planning session and maintaining your exit velocity afterwards are just as critical to growth. On today's show, Greg Fricks explains how his company implemented the annual planning process, the lessons they learned, and how this ongoing process has set them up for continued success.

Guest: Rafael Paniagua, a coach at CEO Coaching International. Rafael is an experienced global leader and a longtime YPO member who is fluent in English, Spanish, and Portuguese. Prior to becoming a coach, Rafael was a CEO and President in the power, automation, and manufacturing industries, where he led ABB Brazil for seven years. He also led several global businesses as Group Vice President, managing more than 5,000 employees, 14 factories, and operating in more than 30 countries. Episode in a Tweet: Going global could jump start your trajectory towards BIG. Quick Background: The smaller your business is, the more vulnerable it is -- to customer attrition, to supply chain disruption, to ambitious competitors, or to fallout from a global pandemic. Now that you've completed your digital pivot, the size of your potential customer base is limited only by the scope and quality of your sales strategy. A little extra bandwidth and an office in an emerging market stocked with triple-A talent might be all you need t

Many entrepreneurs and C-suite executives think they're ready to take the BIG job as CEO. But until you've sat in that chair and felt the weight of an entire company -- and the well-being of all its employees -- resting on your shoulders, it's hard to appreciate the level of responsibility you're taking on or anticipate how you as a leader will react to that responsibility. On today's show, Douglas DeBoer shares five things every first-time CEO should be prepared to do to set up their company, their team, and themselves for BIG success.

We've talked a lot in the past year about how moments of disruption can provide entrepreneurs with a BIG opportunity to start a new business. And in this current environment, nimble startups and aggressive existing companies can identify and fulfill customer needs that their larger competitors might be overlooking. That is, as long as the CEO has a clearly defined plan and enough resilience to tackle whatever unforeseen problems are around the corner. On today's show, CEO Coaching International's Jeff Bledsoe explains how he led his food processing startup through the fire -- literally -- to $200 million in revenue and a BIG exit.

Accelerating your company's growth rate involves much more than just improving the sales skills of your team. It takes a combination of truly listening to and understanding what your clients need and positioning your people, services, and products as the ideal, one-stop solution.  On today's show, John Giegerich shares five ways that businesses that have a solid foundation in place can take that next step and empower their sales force to deepen client relationships and generate BIG sales. 

One of the toughest parts of being a CEO is all the distractions. Everybody wants a piece of your time. So how do the best CEOs manage to perform at their peak without getting burned out? How do you develop this personal and work mastery? On today's show, Bruce Bowser shares the key steps entrepreneurs and CEOs can take to take back their time and develop personal and work mastery.

For every Zoom call or Slack message that quickly becomes part of your daily workflow, there's a CRM system that doesn't quite integrate right, a customer service platform that misfires, or an inventory management system that's too cumbersome. Separating tech that could improve your business from so-called "upgrades" that will only cause more problems is going to be key to completing and refining your digital pivot. On today's show, Mike Klaus shares a five-step process for defining, planning, executing, and reviewing your tech investments to make sure they're giving your margins, service, and efficiency a BIG boost.

Guest: Rob Posner, CEO of NewDay USA, a leading mortgage company serving America’s veterans, service members, and their families. Episode in a Tweet: This mortgage company's in-house "university" trains top talent to deliver pandemic-proof customer service. Quick Background: A generation ago, why were aspiring communication pros desperate to work at CBS? Why was Ogilvy top of the list for young advertisers? Why did IBM and Hewlett-Packard hoard top talent in the tech and sales sectors? These companies weren't just industry leaders. They were leaders because of their legendary training programs. The best college graduates knew that once they'd "graduated" from those programs, they'd have the skills to excel either in-house or just about anywhere else they wanted to work. Of course, CEOs who make training central to their culture are the biggest beneficiaries of this kind of investment in talent-building. On today's show, Rob Posner explains how NewDay USA recruits, trains, and develops an exceptional workforce

Guest: Rekha Skantharaja, the CEO of Tangram Insurance Services and a member of YPO. Episode in a Tweet: Strong leaders draw on their feelings and experiences to "arrive ready" when faced with adversity. Quick Background: As the calendar flips over to 2021, COVID-19 vaccines are starting to roll out across the U.S. It's looking more and more likely that life and business might start to feel normal again by the second half of next year. So ... What's next? Even if we are able to put the pandemic in the rearview mirror soon, experienced CEOs know that the next major roadblock is just around the corner. Is your business ready to pivot and accelerate through a coming disruption? Is your culture strong enough to absorb a sudden personnel change? Will you be able to lead your company effectively if a personal problem puts new demands on your time and emotional well-being? On today's show, Rekha Skantharaja describes how she has learned to "arrive ready" for any challenge. She also talks about how being open about h

Guest: Geoff Goldwater, a founding member of Odell Studner, which is a fast-growing risk management and consulting company. Geoff is also an entrepreneur coaching client of CEO Coaching International. Episode in a Tweet: Will a crisis break your business or open up a new path towards BIG? Quick Background: The scale of Covid-19’s disruption to global life and business is unprecedented. But if you think back ten years, the experts were saying the same thing about the Great Recession. Go back another ten and we were coping with the fallout from 9/11 and the tech bubble bursting. A previous generation of leaders had to struggle through Black Monday, just as their predecessors had to deal with stagflation in the 1970s. The pandemic environment may well be more daunting than these previous challenges. But good business is good business, no matter what the particulars are. Companies that are still struggling to regain their footing during Covid-19 can adapt strategies that helped CEOs win during previous crises to

Growing your own company is challenging. Growing someone ELSE's company challenges CEOs to apply their skill sets in very different ways. Instead of building your own culture, you're inheriting the founder's. Instead of seeing your own vision of BIG, you have to make sure you and the founder see eye-to-eye. And while, at your own company, you might have struggled to hold yourself accountable, as a hired gun you won't be CEO for very long if you're not meeting the founder's expectations and maintaining a growth trajectory. On today's show, Jeff Tennyson shares his three-step framework for stepping into a founder CEO's shoes while still making the job your own.