My guest today is Rita McGrath, and she literally wrote the book on inflection points for businesses. These moments when the assumptions about your business change or become irrelevant are not always easy to spot, but, as Rita explains, they can make or break you. Rita gives some great insights into how organizations can plan for the future, as well as how they can avoid the pitfalls of short-sightedness. Join us as we discuss why big ideas sometimes fail; how to spot inflection points; and what...
Sep 03, 2019•51 min•Ep. 126
When we talk about disrupting yourself, I typically advise that you look before you leap. Make a planned exit, cushion the landing, prepare for the change. But that is not the route Ali Brown took. After two years at a small marketing firm, she knew she was undervalued. She had so much more to give! Opportunities to move up were limited, and to top it all off, there wasn't even a women's bathroom! When a freelance marketer casually mentioned to her that he thought she had the skills to be a free...
Aug 27, 2019•40 min•Ep. 125
My guest today is Hal Gregersen, the executive director of the MIT Leadership Center and a senior lecturer in leadership and innovation at MIT Sloan School of Management. A Thinkers50 globally ranked management thinker, he has authored or coauthored ten books. His most recent book, "Questions Are the Answer," examines the fact that while people are pre-programmed to look for answers, the real catalysts for innovative change are questions. Join us as we discuss Hal's early careers in photography ...
Aug 20, 2019•57 min•Ep. 124
To say that Karen Beattie is comfortable with change is a bit of an understatement. Her childhood was nomadic, with her father's job taking her family to such diverse places as Trinidad, the Caribbean, Libya, Nigeria, United Arab Emirates, and the Philippines. It was not unusual for her father to come home and say, "We're moving to a different country." And Karen loved it. It hasn't been easy; Karen compares her professional life to a roller coaster. Through it all, Karen has found that being co...
Aug 13, 2019•28 min•Ep. 123
Stephen Nelson speaks the language of music. A primarily self-taught pianist, he has an amazing talent for composition, oftentimes performing on-the-spot "mash-ups" of famous songs for live audiences. His ability to effortlessly create melodies has led to multiple collaboration efforts, including producing the cinematic pop group GENTRI. Today's podcast is unique for several reasons: first, Stephen composes a "mash-up" of two of my favorite melodies, and I am delighted at the result! Additionall...
Aug 06, 2019•46 min•Ep. 122
As the mother of two young children, all of Julie Berry's focus was on keeping them safe, happy, and healthy, but despite loving them fiercely, Julie also felt intensely isolated. Walking around in maternity clothes with spit up and pieces of breakfast clinging to her, Julie couldn't help but feel frustrated with her limited sphere of influence in the world. What had been the point of going to college? Was this really all she was made to do? Julie's story is beautiful, and especially dear to me ...
Jul 30, 2019•30 min•Ep. 121
It's time for something a little different. Instead of interviewing a guest today, I'm going to do a dive deep into one of the accelerants outlined in my seven-point framework for personal disruption that I discussed in Episode 80, as well as in my book, Disrupt Yourself . In Episode 100 I did a deep-dive on accelerant #1: taking the right kinds of risk. Today, we're going to talk about accelerant #2: play to your distinctive strengths. Links and complete show notes (including an accompanying wo...
Jul 23, 2019•39 min•Ep. 120
When Adam Grant joined his high school diving team, his coach told him he had good news and bad news: Adam lack flexibility and grace, two of the three components needed to be a successful diver. The good news? His coach would be there to support him the entire way. He [said he] doesn't care how good I am. That whatever level of effort I put in, he's willing to put in that level of effort as a coach too. He actually said, "I will never cut a diver who wants to be here." And, I mean to me that is...
Jul 16, 2019•35 min•Ep. 119
Don't hold back. That is my biggest take-away from our guest today, Carol Kauffman, the founder and Executive Director of the Institute of Coaching at the Harvard Medical School. A veteran psychologist and Professional Certified Coach, Carol has participated in over 40,000 psychotherapy and coaching sessions, working with top leaders at some of the largest organizations in the world and is known for being "the coaches coach." Her career in psychology began in helping trauma survivors, but over t...
Jul 09, 2019•35 min•Ep. 118
I always love speaking with individuals at the low end of the learning curve. So many emotions are on the surface, but by the time someone hits the sweet spot, they often don't remember how hard it was to do the things that now come easily. In an attempt to capture this movement along the learning curve, today's podcast is in a new format: part one was recorded back in December, when my guest, Sarah Green Carmichael, had just left her position as Executive Editor at the Harvard Business Review. ...
Jul 02, 2019•51 min•Ep. 117
My guest on the podcast today is Antonio Neto-Rodriguez, a passionate expert on project management and the author of The Project Revolution: How to Succeed in a Project-Driven World. In a traditional work setting, managers think of projects as something outside the regular duties of employees. Some even consider them a distraction from the "real work" that needs to be done on a daily basis. However, the evidence is beginning to suggest that projects are the work of the future: with more and more...
Jun 25, 2019•39 min•Ep. 116
Amy Edmondson is the Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management at the Harvard Business School, where she studies the dynamics of organizations and how to create a psychologically safe work environment. Over the past 20 years, Amy has shown through her research that teams who are comfortable asking questions and admitting failures work more harmoniously together. "Questions are really powerful in creating safety because they indicate to someone that you actually want to hear their voice…whe...
Jun 18, 2019•40 min•Ep. 115
We've had two married couples on the podcast so far, and today I'm excited to introduce a third - Martin and Kym Frey. On April 17, 2016, Martin Frey became the first person in the world to climb the Seven Summits – the highest peaks on each continent – and sail the Seven Seas. While Kym may not have climbed to the top of each mountain with him, she was nonetheless integral to Martin's accomplishment. As he put it, she served as a "great source of strength and confidence," becoming his biggest c...
Jun 11, 2019•35 min•Ep. 114
My guest today is Priya Parker, the founder of Thrive Labs and a strategic advisor who helps leaders and teams create transformative gatherings. She is the author of The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters , and was featured on the TED2019 stage in April. In a world full of meetings, how many of them are transformative? It's an impressive word for something so common, but for Priya, every gathering has the potential to be meaningful and memorable. Join us as we discuss the role of a...
Jun 04, 2019•46 min•Ep. 113
My guest today is Marcus Buckingham, Best-selling author and the Head of ADP Research, People + Performance. Marcus spent almost twenty years at Gallup, and recently released Nine Lies About Work: A Freethinking Leader's Guide to the Real World , which he co-wrote with Ashley Goodall of Cisco. His vast experience, applicable knowledge, and grounded wisdom make him a wonderful guest for this podcast. Join us as we discuss the lies that we've been told about leadership, the myth of "high potential...
May 28, 2019•48 min•Ep. 112
I love Brené Brown's story. A "late bloomer," Brené graduated from her undergrad when she was 29 years old, then proceeded straight into her master's and Ph.D. programs. She experienced first-hand the impact of amazing professors and knew what she wanted her life's work to be—changing the lives of students while getting to talk about what she was passionate about. And Brené is passionate about vulnerability. She shared her passion in a TedxHouston talk, "The Power of Vulnerability," and to her g...
May 21, 2019•43 min•Ep. 111
My guest on the podcast today is Safi Bahcall - physicist, biotech CEO, entrepreneur, tennis aficionado, and author of the outstanding book, Loonshots: How to Nurture the Crazy Ideas that Win Wars, Cure Diseases, and Transform Industries . Complete shownotes: https://whitneyjohnson.com/safi-bahcall
May 14, 2019•50 min•Ep. 110
When Tamika Catchings was a freshman at the University of Tennessee, her coach, Pat Summit, told her that someday her story would "impact thousands, maybe millions of people." It was a crazy idea. Diagnosed with hearing loss at the age of 3, Tamika was self-conscious about speaking in front of anyone, let alone large groups, and the idea that she would willingly speak in front of an audience was mind-boggling. "And, now you fast forward, that was 1997. Now I'm a public speaker. That's what I do,...
May 07, 2019•37 min•Ep. 109
My guest today is Jason Jedlinski, a digital product executive, innovator and brand builder currently serving as the Senior Vice President of Product for Gannett Media. Jason's career in media spans most of his life, taking root in the second grade when he began producing a monthly family newspaper. It was one of many entrepreneurial avenues Jason pursued as a child, ranging from collecting toll fees outside his father's office to tutoring computer skills on an Apple II. A discovery-driven think...
Apr 30, 2019•1 hr•Ep. 108
My guest on the podcast today is Ty Shay, the Global Chief Marketing Officer of Norton/LifeLock. Well regarded for his expertise, marketing is not the career path Ty originally set out on. After working tirelessly to get a job as an investment banker at Dean Witter Morgan Stanley, Ty quickly realized that it wasn't a career he was interested in pursuing. Join us as we discuss Ty's journey from banking to marketing, the risks of being "invaluable" to a company, and how Ty knows when it's time to ...
Apr 23, 2019•46 min•Ep. 107
My guest on the podcast today is Maren Kate Donovan, the founder and former CEO of Zirtual, a company that went from rapid growth and success to shutting down seemingly overnight. The measure of their success ended up being their downfall: rapid growth, combined with the reality of unit economics, created a firestorm where it became painfully obvious that continued operations would lead to an inability to pay employees for completed work. Maren made the difficult decision to simply stop and pay ...
Apr 16, 2019•39 min•Ep. 106
Management isn't rocket science. It's harder than rocket science. At least, that's what Paul Hill, former director of mission operations at NASA, believes. Paul has spent most of his life around rockets: first as a child growing up near the Kennedy Space Center, and then as an adult in mission control. From designing space stations to investigating the explosion of the Columbia space shuttle, Paul has had a front-row seat to the victories and tragedies of the space program. Join us as we discuss...
Apr 09, 2019•51 min•Ep. 105
My guest on the podcast is Gina Bianchini, founder and CEO of Mighty Networks. Gina created Mighty Networks to be a social platform that goes beyond the typical scrolling conversations of social media and focuses instead on community and engagement between network members. Whether it's managing email replies to a podcast newsletter or starting a discussion about living with Type 1 diabetes, Mighty Networks gives creators the opportunity to keep all of their communication tools in one place, faci...
Apr 02, 2019•42 min•Ep. 104
About six years ago, Tasha Eurich was in a work lull. Her coaching clients were on vacation for the winter holidays, and feeling the bug to accomplish something anyway she began to dig into one of her favorite topics—psychology. Tasha had noticed that many of her clients expressed a desire to see themselves clearly, to clarify who they were, and understand how others perceived them. A correlation was emerging between this self-awareness and her clients' overall confidence and success, so she del...
Mar 26, 2019•39 min•Ep. 103
Liz Wiseman knows a thing or two about bosses. She is the author of the best-selling book Multipliers , which explores the impact that leaders have on their teams, whether positive (multipliers) or negative (diminishers). In researching for the book, Liz and her team analyzed data from over 200 leaders and noticed a trend between the groups that seemed to maximize the potential of each individual versus those groups that experienced drains in intelligence, energy, and capability (despite having ...
Mar 19, 2019•42 min•Ep. 102
When Erik and Emily Orton sailed their boat up the Hudson River, there was no one to greet them. It was late, and no fanfare or celebration disturbed the stillness of the night. But the Orton's and their five children felt what they had sensed many times over the past year: a quiet victory. They had made it. One year and 2,500 miles after leaving home, the Orton's had managed to sail their family from St. Martin's in the Caribbean all the way back to New York City. Today on the podcast my guests...
Mar 12, 2019•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 101
To celebrate the 100th episode of the Disrupt Yourself Podcast, we're disrupting our format a bit. In Episode 80 we gave you a preview of an online course we're developing. It's been our most downloaded to date. So, in celebration of our hundredth episode, and as a way to say thank you for listening, we're going to pick up where we left off. Back in Episode 80 I provided an overview of the Seven Point Framework of Personal Disruption. In this episode we'll do a deep-dive on Accelerant Number One...
Mar 05, 2019•22 min•Ep. 100
Ilana Golan is someone who goes first. She was the first female commander in the Israeli Air Force, and that experience set her up for a career filled with blazing trails and then creating a wider path for others to follow. From her start at Intel in Israel to the work she is doing now with her firm Golan Ventures and her new endeavor, Homrun, she's taking her vast knowledge of startups and technology and easing the way for Israeli entrepreneurs to build a network and open doors so their startup...
Feb 26, 2019•44 min•Ep. 99
While growing up in a small farm town in Maine, Melissa Smith had the opportunity to try lots of different things. She drove the flatbed to collect hay on the family farm, was captain of the math team, captain of the cheerleading squad and played on the soccer team. But when it came time to start talking about what she wanted to be when she grew up, Melissa had set her sights on something slightly different than the other girls in town. Melissa wanted to be the CEO of Gillette. It was one of the...
Feb 19, 2019•40 min•Ep. 98
Dan Shapero's team was a rocket ship. When he stepped in as leader of LinkedIn's recruiting business, annual revenue was around $40 million. By 2014, it was a billion and a half dollars. So it came somewhat as a surprise when the CEO of LinkedIn told him that he was probably in the wrong job. Join us as we discuss the importance of teams, transformations, and the time that Dan told his boss he was the wrong guy for a promotion. Download a copy of the transcript, or see the full show notes and li...
Feb 12, 2019•43 min•Ep. 97
