Kelly talks to Aylon Samouha, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Transcend Education. Previously he served as Chief Schools Officer at Rocketship Education. He is the co-author of “Extraordinary Learning for All: How Communities Design Schools Where Everyone Thrives.”  “Students today report higher levels of stress and anxiety than ever before.”  “Employability is based on more than […]
To celebrate The Second City’s 65th anniversary, Kelly sits down with the members of the legendary theatre’s creative leadership team to talk about how each of them found their way to The Second City. “Ensemble lay at the heart of the work at Second City.” “The Second City’s creative process is sacred to the work […]
Kelly connects with Bob Moesta, founder, maker, innovator, speaker, and professor. He is the president and founder of The Re-Wired Group, as well as an adjunct lecturer at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern and a research fellow at the Clayton Christensen Institute. He is the author of Choosing College (with Michael Horn), Demand-Side […]
Kelly sits down with Stephan Meier, the James P. Gorman Professor of Business Strategy and the chair of the management division at Columbia Business School. Previously, Meier worked at the Center for Behavioral Economics and Decision-Making at the Federal Reserve Bank. HIs new book is called “The Employee Advantage: How Putting Workers First Helps Business Thrive.”  […]
Kelly connects with Ravin Jesuthasan, a recognized futurist and authority on the future of work, human capital and automation. He is Senior Partner and Global Leader for Transformation Services at Mercer and a member of the World Economic Forum’s steering committee on work and employment. He is the author of many books and his latest is called “The […]
Kelly sits down with Alok Sama, the former President and CFO of SoftBank Group International to discuss his new book ‘The Money Trap: Lost Illusions Inside the Tech Bubble.” “Impressing powerful men is a core skill for investment bankers.” “The world romanticizes the causal relationship between adversity and breakout success.”  “Money doesn’t talk, it swears.” 
Kelly welcomes Boston University professor David Livermore back to the podcast to discuss the latest edition of his successful leadership book, “Leading with Cultural Intelligence: The Real Secret to Success.” “I sometimes ask executives, ‘Will anyone tell you your joke isn’t funny?’”  “At its core, culture intelligence is about how we connect with another as humans.”  […]
Kelly sits down with old friend Mike Thomas to talk about “Carson the Magnificent,” a book about the iconic talk show host Johnny Carson. The legendary Bill Zehme began the book but never finished it. Years after Bill’s death, Mike was brought on board to complete the book. “And so, like sun and moon and […]
Kelly talks with Lindsey Cormack, a tenured professor of Political Science at Stevens Institute of Technology about her latest book “How to Raise a Citizen (And Why It’s Up to You to Do It).” “Politics doesn’t have to feel as dire as it sometimes does.”  “The system of voting is too complicated.”  “It’s hard to trust something you […]
Kelly connects with journalist Sarah Jaffe who wrote the best seller “Work Won’t Love You Back.” They talk about her new book “From The Ashes: Grief and Revolution in a World on Fire.” “In accepting loss we make possible the future.”  “We carry our ghosts with us everywhere.”  “There is no love without pain or […]
Kelly talks to business leader, author and podcast host Mo Bunnell about his new book, “Give to Grow: Invest in Relationships to Build Your Business and Your Career.” “It’s amazing how creative we can be to avoid acting.”  “Showing someone attention is one of the most meaningful things you can do.”  “Top performers fall in love with […]
Kelly connects with Michael Morris of Columbia University to talk about his timely book “Tribal: How the Cultural Instincts That Divide Us Can Help Bring Us Together.” “Tribal living is what made us truly human.”  “Our species became wiser thanks to our tribes.”  “Killing the old culture happens top-down, then building the new culture happens […]
Kelly connects with Karen Brooks Hopkins, the former president of the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), to discuss her book “BAM…And Then It Hit Me” “In an odd way, there is a kind of nobility in fundraising.”  “The first thing you need to know about fundraising is that it’s not brain surgery. It’s harder than brain surgery.”  […]
Kelly welcomes Dr. Kathleen Smith back to the podcast. Dr. Smith is a licensed therapist and associate faculty member of the Bowen Center for Study of the Family. She is the author of “Everything Isn’t Terrible.” Her new book is called “True to You: A Therapist’s Guide to Stop Pleasing Others and Start Being Yourself.”  “We look […]
Kelly talks to former FBI Hostage Negotiator Chip Massey about his new book “Convince Me: High-Stakes Negotiation Tactics to Get Results in Any Business Situation.”  “You may have truth on your side, but persuasion does not hinge on what is true.”  “Business is all about give and take, but there is a shelf life for an ask.”  […]
Kelly connects with Yumi Kendall, Assistant Principal cellist for the Philadelphia Orchestra to talk about the power of the arts and her experiences as a student in the Waldorf educational system. “I didn’t decide until the day after my SATs, because all of my friends were working on their personal essays and I thought, ‘My personal essay is cello,'” […]
Kelly talks to Sandra Steinbrecher, a Chicago documentary photographer whose new book captures the transformation of the Morton Salt factory into The Salt Shed, a premier music venue in Chicago. “We protect our past so we are connected to what came before us and so we understand what lies in front of us – today […]
Kelly meets up with writer, teacher and philanthropist Randy Fertel to talk about this new book “Winging It: Improv’s Power and Peril in the Time of Trump.” “Improv seeks to widen our mental bubble.”  “Improvisation is the discourse of paradigm shifts.”  “Innovation always begins with disruption, a pushback against the dominant culture.” 
Live from The Second City in collaboration with the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce, Kelly interviews Alison Fragale, the Mary Farley Ames Lee Distinguished Scholar of Organizational Behavior at the Kenen-Flagler Business School at the University of North Caroline Chapel Hill. She has an incredible new book, it’s called “Likeable Badass: How Women Get the Success They […]
Kelly talks Yes, And with Dr. Frederik Pferdt, Google’s first Chief Innovation Evangelist. He founded Google’s Innovation Lab, where he trained tens of thousands of Googlers to develop cutting-edge ideas and taught groundbreaking classes on innovation and creativity at Stanford University for more than a decade. His new book is called “What’s Next is Now: How […]
Kelly sits down with Robert Wolcott, adjunct professor of innovation at the Booth School of Business and adjunct professor of executive education at the Kellogg School of Management and Kaihan Krippendorff CEO of Outthinker Networks to talk about their new book: “Proximity: How Coming Breakthroughs in Just-in-Time Transform Business, Society and Daily Life.”  “People want […]
Kelly talks to Emmy award-winning former broadcaster Jessica Chen who is now the CEO of Soulcast Media and the author of “Smart Not Loud: How To Get Noticed At Work For All The Right Reasons.” “Growing up, I was never taught the importance of making myself visible.”  “Filler words sabotage our message.”  “Acknowledging isn’t agreeing, it’s just showing we’re listening.”
Kelly catches up with Stephanie Harrison, former leaning executive with Thrive. Her company, The New Happy, has revolutionized the way that people understand and pursue happiness. Her new book is called “New Happy: Getting Happiness Right in a World That’s Got It Wrong.”  “Old Happy has put us all on autopilot.”  “There is no ‘me’ without […]
Kelly explores the history of play and games with Kelly Clancy, a neuroscientist and physicist who has held research positions at MIT, University of California – Berkley, University College London and the AI company DeepMind. She has a new book, it’s called “Playing with Reality: How Games Have Shaped Our World.”   “Play is practice for the unexpected.”  […]
Kelly connects with Matt Beane, University of California professor, to discuss his new book: “The Skill Code: How to Save Human Ability in an Age of Intelligent Machines.”  “If it’s going to flourish, the future of skill needs the very technologies we’re concerned about.”  “We learn best when we get healthy challenge: too much, and we burn […]
Kelly welcomes Jo Boaler back to the podcast. Jo is the Nomellini & Olivier Professor of Education at Stanford University. She is the author of nineteen books and numerous research articles. Her latest book is called “Math-Ish: Finding Creativity, Diversity, and Meaning in Mathematics.”  “Mathematics can be a secret weapon.”  “People with a growth mindset view mistakes as […]
Kelly connects with Jessica Calarco, a Sociologist and Associate Professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. to discuss her latest book “Holding it Together: How Women Became America’s Social Safety Net. “ “Care flows through networks, and we all exist in networks of care.”  “Learned helplessness manifests inequality.”  “The problem, of course, is that when women prove they can hold […]
Kelly talks to Harvard Professor Todd Rogers about his book “Writing for Busy Readers: Communicate More Effectively in the Real World”  that he co-wrote with Jessica Lasky-Fink.  “Modern writers need extra help breaking through all the distractions.”  “Use fewer words.”  “Studies show that all-caps text does not enhance readers’ understanding.” 
Kelly welcomes back Yale professor Emma Seppala to the podcast to discuss her new book: “Sovereign: Reclaim Your Freedom, Energy, and Power in a Time of Distraction, Uncertainty and Chaos.” “Regardless of race, nationality, religion, gender, or social status, at our core we’re the same: sovereign.”  “Many of us have a toxic relationship with ourselves.”  “It […]
Kelly welcomes back fan-favorite Kim Scott to the podcast to discuss how she decided to reframe and significantly rewrite her book “Just Work” to turn it into “Radical Respect.” “Collaboration is essential to any great human accomplishment.”  “Words matter. You are not the word dictator.”  “Self-righteous shaming is an act of vengeance, not repair.” 
