Awesome Office: Lead. Create. Inspire

For most people, it's scarier than dying. Of course, we're talking about public speaking, the most dreaded of all workplace activities. Despite the fear, public speaking is an incredibly useful skill for employees - and not just executives. It's an efficient way to communicate essential information, and it helps bring a company together. Most of us want to get better, but few know where to start. That's what this episode of Awesome Office is all about - how to become a better public speaker at work. In it, you will learn: Why public speaking is important, even if you aren’t your company’s CEO. The elements that make an effective speech or presentation. Why the words you say are only the third most important part of a good presentation - and what the one and two most important factors are. The importance of storytelling, and how to tell a compelling one. Why vulnerability and confidence are equally important, plus specific tactics for projecting a sense of vulnerability to your audience. The most common mistakes people make while speaking at work, and how to fix them. Ways to get more employees to practice public speaking at work. Quick Reference - Sean's Tips for Crafting a Masterful Presentation Passion - you have to believe that what you are saying is important to your audience. Stories - we connect and learn about the world through stories, so integrating storytelling is essential. Teach - people want to be taught, so focus on one or two takeaways. Conversation - don't talk at people, talk to them.  Surprise - the element of surprise makes for a more memorable and more effective speech. Humor - there's no better way to endear yourself to your audience.  Links Master public speaker Richard Greene SnackNation’s Crush it Call (video) The original Awesome Office interview with Hank Fortener on public speaking.

Radical Candor is de rigeur in business these days. It's a concept that pops up again and again - in business books, conference keynotes, and even, dare I say, podcasts. But what is Radical Candor? And how do you pull it off with alienating people? (I.e. making people think you are a giant, insensitive weirdo.) In this episode, SnackNation CEO Sean kelly breaks down the theory behind the practice, describes how it will benefit your business, and tells you exactly how to implement it at your organization at every level. You will learn: What Radical Candor is and how it will make your company better. How to integrate Radical Candor in company-wide communications - risks and benefits. How Candor and Culture intersect. How Radical Candor extends to your brand. Radical Candor Quick Reference Guide: Radical Candor is all about respect. It requires that you connect with people personally. Make sure you get permission to use Radical Candor - especially with your boss. If you're a leader, set the example - show your team you can handle the ugly truth. Express feelings and fears - people want connection, growth, and authenticity. Links Radical Candor by Kim Scott 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership by Dehtmer, Chapman, and Klemp Self Determination Theory

Sean Kelly, an expert in advanced hiring secrets, shares valuable insights on hiring. Topics include the importance of authenticity in interviews, recognizing and correcting hiring mistakes, using group interviews for filtering candidates, and key traits to look for in candidates.

This week we’ve got something a little different. We’re debuting a brand new podcast called Brand Builder, and we’re giving Awesome Office listeners an exclusive first listen. Brand Builder is a new podcast from the folks behind Awesome Office that brings you the people, stories, and lessons learned from the most innovative brands in the world. What can you expect on Brand Builder? Fascinating entrepreneur stories, tactics you can use to grow your business and solve your biggest problems… and a few bad puns thrown in for good measure. To kick things off, we’re sharing this episode with Caue Suplicy, the CEO and co-founder of Barnana. Barnana is a Santa Monica-based company that has taken the snack world by storm with their bite-sized bags of banana deliciousness. Caue and Barnana proved that you can improve on perfection, all while promoting values like sustainability and healthier living. But it wasn’t always an easy road - far from it. Caue tells the story of Barnana’s beginnings, and how he kept things together when things got tough. If you like this, subscribe to Brand Builder in the Apple podcast app, or where ever you get your podcasts. Links Brand Builder show notes. Brand Builder on iTunes. Brand Builder on Stitcher.

These days, CEOs are kind of the new rockstars. Our collective obsession with entrepreneurship and innovation has transformed the Zuckerbergs, Musks, and Bezos’ of the world into pop culture icons. It can be easy to forget that Chief Executive Officer is a job - and a hard job at that. The role requires supreme efficiency, intense focus, and resolve. Every decision can have big consequences, and you need to be decisive in the face of uncertainty, criticism, and even self doubt. So no matter where you are in your career, you can learn a lot by the way CEOs approach their work. But what does a typical day look like for a CEO? Luckily, we happen to know one. In this episode producer Jeff Murphy talks with Awesome Office host and SnackNation CEO Sean Kelly to learn how he approaches his typical work day. As you’ll hear, Sean breaks down how he approaches a typical day, shares the framework he uses to break up his week, and provides strategies for maximizing your effectiveness from when you wake up until your head hits the pillow. He also tells us his most important activities and responsibilities, and how those have altered as the business has scaled from less than 30 people to 150.

At Awesome Office, we often say that your company is like a sports team, and I think after hearing this interview you’ll definitely agree. This week we’re bring you a conversation with Reggie Bush Yes, that Reggie Bush: Super Bowl Champion, two-time NCAA National Champion, and Heisman Trophy Winner Reggie Bush.   Not only is Reggie a great storyteller, but he’s a thoughtful guy with a pretty unique life experience and point of view. As you’ll hear in this episode, Reggie shares some of the lessons he’s learned in his decade-plus NFL career that we can all apply as we seek to achieve excellence at our own organizations. Recorded live at SnackNation headquarters in Culver City, CA. 

This week on the podcast we’re featuring a recent presentation that I gave at the Human Capital Institute conference in San Francisco. It’s all about transforming your company - not with things like new technology or processes or management techniques - but something a lot more fundamental to who we are. Human Connection. As you’ll hear in a minute, I dig into the how and why of creating a NEW type of company - one where the goal is to help people become the best versions of themselves. That means your customers and your employees. (Especially the latter.) I really wanted to share this presentation with you because it contains strategies, tactics, and stories that I haven’t told on this podcast before, but I know you’ll be able to apply at your company. In this presentation I’ll tell you The number one trait to hire for, and how to do it; How to create forced recognition in the workplace, and why it’s so important; And a super simple tactic for spreading recognition amongst your team. Links Human Capital Institute  Adam Grant Simon Sinek David Brooks Recommended Reading The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari The Fourth Turning by William Strauss and Neil Howe

When we think about training for high performance, we usually think about training our bodies. We might even think about working our craft. But how often do we consider training our emotions? Not very often, right? Well, if we care about performance, that’s actually a huge mistake. That’s a big part of we explore in this episode with Dr. Glenn Fox. Dr. Fox leads program design at USC’s Performance Science Institute, where he works with top athletes to devise strategies that optimize their abilities. He’s an expert on the ways that emotions - particularly gratitude and optimism - drive performance. According to his research, the ability to regulate emotions is the number one predictor of success in life. This is just as true in the workplace as anywhere else. Since gratitude and optimism affect performance, companies who proactively foster these positive emotions via a culture of recognition have an automatic leg-up on those who don’t. In this presentation, Dr. Glenn gives us a functional definition of optimism and gratitude that you can use at your workplace (it’s not just rosy thinking and pretending everything is great) provides the 3 core components of a Competitor’s Mindset and walks us through a visualization strategy that top athletes often use, and that we can use in our own lives too. Links Dr. Glenn Fox - bio and publications  The Empiricist Blog USC Performance Science Institute Recommended Reading Peak: Secrets of New Science of Expertise by Anders Ericsson and Robert Poole Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck

Starting a business is hard. Scaling a business is much harder. That’s one of the biggest takeaways from our interview with Brandon Weber, the co-founder and chief product officer of VTS. VTS is the world's leading asset management and leasing platform, transforming an industry that until very recently has resisted the technological innovations that others have embraced. With one foot in computer science and another in real estate, Brandon is the perfect person to bring this stodgy industry into the 21st century. In this interview, Brandon walks us through this journey, including the trials and tribulations of scaling, and tells us why he and his biggest rival ultimately decided to join forces. Plus, Brandon tells us why he believes an addiction to “Type 2” fun is one of the keys to entrepreneurial success in any industry.

We all want to experience success. But how do you get there? Is it a straight line? When do you know to adjust course or make big moves away from your original strategy? This episode will dive into all of this. HUTCH is a Los Angeles company that boasts an innovative product, major funding from marquee investors, and has even appeared on the TV show Shark Tank. If you weren’t paying attention, Hutch might look like an overnight success. But when you dig a littler deeper, the real story is much more complicated. Hutch’s story is really one of perseverance, and knowing when to pivot your business - even when doing so might feel incredibly scary. In this interview, Hutch CEO and co-founder Beatrice Fischel-Bock dives deep into these topics and tells us how she and her team made the tough decision to change course midstream. We also learn the philosophies behind Hutch’s one-of-a-kind company culture, how Beatrice and her co-founders have successfully mixed business and friendship, as well as her secret to crushing your next investor pitch. Remember, if you like what you hear in this interview, we’ve got a ton more where that came from. Subscribe to us and never miss an episode, or tell a friend to spread the awesome.   Links Hutch app Hutch on Instagram Beatrice on LinkedIn Beatrice on Instagram Recommended Reading The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz The 3G Way by Francisco S. Homem de Mello Zero to One by Peter Thiel The Lean Startup by Eric Ries The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman