The Learning Culture Podcast

Nikki Schanzer, Senior Leadership Development Sales Performance Consultant at LinkedIn, discusses the challenges faced in developing frontline managers and sales leaders. She introduces the GROW coaching model as a solution for revenue leaders to shift their approach and develop a coaching mindset. They emphasize the importance of accountability and taking actionable steps, as well as understanding the pillars of coaching. They also discuss the importance of supporting new coaches and providing additional material.

Joining me this week for the first-ever combined panel episode are Kunal Pandya and John Williamson.Kunal is a Senior Director of Global Revenue Enablement at UserZoom and the Founder + CEO of Sales Velocity Labs.John is a Sales and Revenue Enablement Change Agent with an extensive background in sales, most recently working as a Sales Enablement Leader at Analog Devices.Treat this episode as a mastermind - these two gentlemen expertly weave their way through this spiky topic from different angles. Ultimately, we all converge on the same vision and strive to work toward the same goal.This episode went over so well that we're planning to host a live-discussion version of this topic. If that's enticing to you, hop on to my newsletter at curiouslionlearning.com/newsletter.As soon as you get the first email from me, reply and say I'm interested in a workshop with John and Kunal!I had the privilege of sitting back a bit and letting John and Kunal do their thing, and it made for a stellar episode with an interesting and open-ended conclusion.After you listen, head to our newsletter, get that first email from me, and let me know if you're interested in a workshop with these guys.With that, sit back, relax, and enjoy my episode with Kunal and John.Kunal’s LinkedInJohn’s LinkedIn

Welcome to part two of Elite Human Performance with Brittany Loney. I urge you to go back and watch if you missed part one.In it, I spoke with Brittany, Director of Elite Cognition and Human Optimization for Core One (a company that works with the US Military Special Forces) about her remarkable journey into the world of performance psychology and cognitive neuroscience.We chatted about her origin story and how she ended up working with soldiers that operate in high-consequence arenas to help them develop their potential and work towards elite performance.In this episode, we explore more deeply the psychology and neuroscience that Brittany brings to her work, namely in her framework, ECHO – Elite Cognition and Human Optimization.ECHO is an outstanding training model that progressively builds a soldier (or athlete, or any human) to a level of enduring excellence.It balances high performance with sustainable practices that manage burnout.It considers the underlying physical things (nutrition, habits, productivity, cognitive dominance, integrating with the mission, etc.) we have set as our goal.It is designed to help forge elite teams to keep raising the bar of performance.It's thrilling for me to bring this to you and play a small part in Brittany's expanding influence.Once again, go check out the first episode before you dive in!It's time to sit back, relax, and enjoy this episode with Brittany Loney.

Brittany Loney joins me this week for part one of a special two-part episode! We were on such a roll, we recorded for almost two hours! Brittany is the Director of Elite Cognition and Human Optimization at Core One.She works with the US Military, specifically, soldiers in very high-risk combat situations. She works with them as groups and individuals to develop their:brain capacity,physical capacity,and emotional capacityto operate at peak performance within those high-risk arenas.In part one we explore Brittany’s traumatic college basketball background and how it led her along a learning journey about performance psychology and brain science.She applied her knowledge to other athletes and other sports and eventually found herself working in the US military (where she has been for the past 13 years) and designing an incredible program of packaged expertise called ECHO – Elite Cognition and Human Optimization.In part two (tune in next week!), we’ll explore the finer details of the ECHO program and how its foundations align with lots of things we talk about on this show.I recommend getting out a pen and paper or taking notes on your phone, because you’ll come across some practical stuff in here to apply at work for the teams that you’re responsible for developing and for your own work.This whole episode is about high performance — elite human performance.Sit back, relax, and enjoy this episode with Brittany Loney.Brittaney Loney LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brittany-loney

On this episode of The Learning Culture Podcast, Meganne Brezina, Senior Director of Field Enablement at Seismic, shares her insights on change management.Seismic prioritizes one big initiative every year, focusing on cutting through the noise and being proactive in rolling out new initiatives, achieving messaging alignment, cascading information, and all that good stuff.As a former seller and now an enablement leader, Meganne shares her journey to uncovering the framework for a proper change management approach in enablement and the importance of investing in quality content.Join us as we dive into the importance of coaching as a frontline management aspect, flexibility and adaptability in fast-paced environments, and the need for a common language to scale businesses.Please sit back and relax and enjoy my episode with Meganne Brezina.Meganne Brezina LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/meganne-brezina

On this episode of The Learning Culture Podcast, Meganne Brezina, Senior Director of Field Enablement at Seismic, shares her insights on change management.Seismic prioritizes one big initiative every year, focusing on cutting through the noise and being proactive in rolling out new initiatives, achieving messaging alignment, cascading information, and all that good stuff.As a former seller and now an enablement leader, Meganne shares her journey to uncovering the framework for a proper change management approach in enablement and the importance of investing in quality content.In this "Rapid Fire 5" segment, I gather her first thoughts on five key questions related to learning and enablement.Meganne Brezina LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/meganne-brezina

In this episode, I had the pleasure of interviewing Allison Sword, Senior Manager of Revenue Enablement at Restaurant365. We discussed her approach to onboarding called 'Leader-First Onboarding' and the importance of enablement. We also talked about using stories in sales, capturing and sharing them, and the uncomfortable aspects of sales leadership conversations. If you're interested in breaking into enablement, Allison shares some valuable advice. Check out her LinkedIn for more information.

Joining me this week is Allison Sword, the senior manager of revenue enablement at Restaurant365. She has an incredible track record within sales enablement, and has been been around basically since the beginning.  She was a sales leader herself before that and brings so much unique perspective and experience to the role. She's also very involved with the WiSE community in Chicago and has connected and grown a lot through networking with other women in the space.In this "Rapid Fire 5" segment, I gather her first thoughts on five key questions related to learning and enablement.Allison Sword LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/allison-sword/

This week, we have a special episode.Today, I want to share with you an article that I wrote from a review that I did of my first quarter in 2023. I spent the first quarter doing a lot of journaling; it is a new practice that I have taken a lot more seriously this year. And at the end of the quarter, I go away and lock myself up—in this case, in a farm—for 48 hours. And I review all of my notes from the previous quarter and write a synthesis of that.What came out of this particular one was identifying five main themes or pathways that I have found, am walking, and will constantly walk for the rest of my life. I think you'll find them valuable. Well, I hope you do, because I think maybe some of them you'll find valuable, and maybe others you won't. But these five were really essential and will continue to be essential for me to continue walking this path.In the second part of the episode, I talk about how I applied the lessons that I've learned from walking those five pathways to my business. And I share a little bit about our point of view, our purpose, our vision, and a little bit about our strategy too.If you're interested in how we are building this Revenue Enablement as a Service thing, you're really going to enjoy this episode. If you want to read this article, it's up on our blog. Go to https://curiouslionlearning.com/criticalpath. You can check out the full piece of what you're going to hear next, as well as some really cool AI generated images and a lot of other good stuff.With that, it is time for you to sit back, relax, and enjoy this episode with me.

In this special episode, I've invited one of my team members to join me. You're about to hear from Theshel Govender. Theshel is a Senior Learning Architect on our team at Curious Lion and the recent author of a post on our blog that went viral in our corner of the world.We started a project this year in which everybody on the Learning Architect team started to write articles and publish them on our blog.Our goal is for the world and our clients to hear from our team and for us to expand our own understanding of our expertise. Theshel has stepped up as a leader of this project.The article that you'll hear came, at least for me, out of the blue. I didn't even know she was writing it. I hadn't seen an early outline for it; I didn't know anything about it.And I will never forget this - I was at a brewery with my wife and son. I got a notification on my phone from Slack, saying that an article had gone up on our website. Whenever I see that, I’m immediately drawn to reading them.So, I quickly asked my wife, who said it was okay, and I just started reading this article while sipping a beer. My jaw just started to drop as I was reading.I don't want to give too much away, but a big theme of the piece is loyalty. It's an incredibly vulnerable piece in which Theshel shares a difficult period for her creatively and personally that she overcame, and that she feels like she's overcome by working at Curious Lion with the incredible team we have.It made me think about my style of leadership, which I can best describe as inclusive leadership. I've realized from reading Theshel’s article that inclusive leadership is what inspires loyalty, and loyalty creates massive leverage.That's ultimately my goal - to create a workplace in which everyone feels like they can bring their best selves to do their best work.I'll hand over the microphone to Theshel, who's going to read her amazing article. Please sit back, relax, and enjoy this episode with Theshel Govender.