Builders & Doers

Veronica Deraleau is an opera singer, Army Reserve veteran, financial coach, and author of Making Money is Simple. After graduating with an MBA and staring down six figures of student debt, she applied commercial real estate underwriting techniques to her personal finances and paid it all off in three years on a starter salary.In this conversation, Veronica walks us through her ARIA money model, the psychology of debt and shame, why outcomes-based budgeting beats cashflow management, and what opera performance training teaches about high performance under pressure.Find Veronica: makingmoneyissimple.comBuilders & Doers is produced by Horizon Search.Timestamps:0:00 Intro0:48 Graduating with six figures of debt4:12 The guilt and shame cycle with money5:12 Why personal finance feels harder than it should7:45 Learning from high net worth real estate clients8:49 Outcomes-based budgeting vs. cashflow management9:40 The Money Simple method (SIMPLE framework)11:29 Setting a 5-year target and beating it in 311:37 Military meets opera: singing in the Army Reserve14:07 Stage fright, breath compression, and performance psychology16:50 Why your average matters more than your best day19:01 Losing and finding ourselves: unlearning bad patterns21:05 Going down the wrong road is part of the process25:00 Talent plus reps plus strategic application27:57 The ARIA money model: Awaken, Reframe, Intention, Action29:16 How coaching created clarity32:01 The mental block of dual identities in business and art34:15 Pattern recognition and AI disruption38:55 Advice for entrepreneurs with low financial structure40:45 Why data points keep you sane as a founder42:48 Best purchase under $5043:12 The most expensive mistake that doesn't look expensive43:39 Renting vs. buying44:46 Best scary financial decision46:04 Favorite opera46:08 Where to find Veronica

Karen Alexander, founder of XR Women and co-founder of the Academy of Immersive Arts and Sciences, joins David and Becky to explore why extended reality is approaching a tipping point in adoption. From her unconventional journey out of academia and literature into immersive technology, Karen shares where XR is being quietly adopted across enterprise, education, and healthcare, the real risks companies face, and why the limits of XR are not technological but imaginative. She also discusses the gender gap in XR entrepreneurship, the power of body swapping for empathy training, and her vision for social, creative virtual worlds.LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/karenfalexanderWebsite: xrconnected.comXR Women: xrwomen.comAcademy of Immersive Arts and Sciences: academyimmersive.org0:00 - Highlights1:03 - Karen's journey from literature to XR3:07 - What is reality?5:19 - Where XR is headed and the tipping point8:55 - Risks of XR adoption11:40 - Benefits of immersive training15:02 - Haptics, smell, and the senses in VR16:55 - What kids understand about XR that adults miss18:10 - Body swapping and diversity training21:22 - Public speaking training in VR23:40 - Will we live in virtual worlds?30:18 - XR Women and the gender gap33:48 - XR in healthcare42:24 - Dream XR experience with unlimited budget44:10 - Where to find Karen

At 50, John Mitchell was making $200–300K a year and felt stuck. Three months later, he discovered what he calls the full secret of Think and Grow Rich, developed a 12-minute daily technique around it, and within four years had 25x'd his income.John now teaches the Science of Success at the University of Texas (rated a top-5 business school by U.S. News), licenses his methodology to coaches, and wrote the book on it. In this conversation, we unpack the science of the conscious vs. subconscious mind, why 95% of daily actions are unconscious, and how reprogramming your autopilot changes everything from your career to your health to your relationships.This is not a get-rich-quick pitch. It's a framework backed by neuroscience and vetted at the university level. Whether you're a coach, a founder, or someone who feels like there's more in the tank, this one's worth 44 minutes of your time.Learn more: themissingsecret.org0:00 – John's epiphany at 501:00 – Two life goals: money and love2:00 – Discovering Think and Grow Rich3:15 – The book only gives you half the secret4:00 – Income starts doubling5:00 – Teaching at the University of Texas6:00 – How do you create success in your life?8:00 – The two fundamental human problems9:00 – Feeding your desired life to yourself daily10:30 – Why effort doesn't match results13:00 – The snowy night in Dallas that changed everything15:00 – "I don't control the very thing that determines my success"16:00 – The full secret revealed17:00 – Control, confidence, and less stress19:00 – Why willpower fails21:30 – Conscious mind vs. subconscious mind26:00 – Overriding the survival wiring29:00 – Darren Hardy's advice: teach it to coaches33:00 – The brownie story: aware vs. evaluate36:00 – Reading vs. listening to your template38:00 – The 2% vs. the 98%42:00 – Holding his granddaughter and the meaning of it all43:30 – Where to find John and a free 9-minute video

Glenn Gow has coached CEOs for decades and served as a venture-backed CEO for 25 years. In this conversation, we explore the hidden neural pathways that drive CEO behavior, why the habits that got you here won't get you there, and what it actually takes to scale yourself alongside your company.Glenn shares how he helps leaders break through blind spots, reframe success, and build culture through storytelling. We also get into the investor-founder dynamic, AI's impact on coaching, and why the org chart of the future will have humans reporting to AI agents.Glenn's website: glenngow.comThe Scaling CEO: youtube.com/@glenngow10150:00 – The blind spot every CEO has1:10 – What are success patterns?3:15 – Why 60% of venture-backed CEOs get fired5:30 – Showing up with the wrong kit6:00 – How Glenn unlocks self-awareness7:00 – "It's always the CEO's fault"8:30 – The Sheryl Sandberg "and that's on me" story9:50 – Why personal change feels threatening11:30 – 99% of what we do is hardwired12:00 – Communication as the CEO's real job14:10 – Reframing 97% as success, not failure17:00 – Building culture through stories, not values posters21:30 – Prioritization: the three things exercise25:00 – Dopamine traps and the long arc27:00 – AI as a threat to coaching29:00 – Three areas every CEO should deploy AI32:00 – Humans reporting to AI agents35:00 – "ChatGPT is cheap. I'm expensive."37:00 – Value vs. cost in executive coaching39:30 – The investor-founder misalignment42:00 – Glenn's non-negotiables for joining a board

Goutam Challagalla is a professor at IMD Business School, where he directs the Strategy Governance for Boards program. His new book, Clean Winners, studied hundreds of companies and found that the vast majority are approaching sustainability backwards: putting it at the center of strategy instead of using it as an engine for customer value and innovation.The conversation started with a single quote from activist investor Terry Smith that changed Goutam's thinking: "Any company which thinks it has to define a purpose for Hellmann's Mayo has lost the plot." From there, we got into why the same mistake companies made with digital transformation is now happening with AI, why you should design for customers who care least about sustainability, and what Sustainability 2.0 actually looks like after the current backlash plays out.Goutam's book is Clean Winners, co-authored with Frédéric Dalsace: ⁠https://store.hbr.org/product/clean-winners-sustainability-strategy-that-puts-customers-first/10822Connect with GoutamLinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/goutam-challagalla-161118bb/⁠Timestamps:0:00 – Cold open0:58 – The Terry Smith quote that changed everything3:02 – Unilever: from poster child to cautionary tale4:50 – "Not one person out of a thousand could name their favorite brand's purpose"5:50 – Lifebuoy: the one time brand purpose actually worked6:48 – Why you can't scale purpose across 300 brands7:18 – The wrong question: "How do I become more sustainable?"8:07 – You don't need an AI mindset, a digital mindset, or a sustainability mindset9:07 – Sustainability, AI, and digital are enablers, not the center10:14 – The four mindsets: operators, strivers, enthusiasts, resonators11:36 – Why enthusiasts invest heavily and get worse results12:03 – "Ask not what you can do for sustainability, but what sustainability can do for you"13:02 – Undesired outputs: the real zone of innovation14:10 – John Deere: 65% fertilizer savings through precision AI16:17 – Healthier soil, lower cost, and no farmer cares if you call it "sustainability"17:06 – The compliance trap: one CSO spends 90% of her time on it18:08 – 18,000 regulatory changes in one year18:52 – Big Four consultants making more on compliance reporting than advisory19:18 – The pendulum swung too far: passion, regulation, and the correction20:47 – Green, blue, gray: why customer segmentation is the key22:02 – Green customers are never more than 10% of the market22:43 – "If you design for the greens, it will never scale"23:16 – Win with the grays: the counterintuitive move23:54 – Three pathways to resonance: product, usage, and strategic25:05 – "We made the mistake of thinking our goals should be the customer's goals"26:04 – Usage resonance: P&G's 10-minute laundry cycle26:36 – Autonomous mining trucks: zero accidents, 24/7 operations, pay-per-haul29:07 – AI theater vs. AI value: the same trap as sustainability theater30:25 – The one question boards should be asking but aren't32:04 – Why you don't need sustainability to attract talent32:36 – How the CSO role needs to evolve34:50 – The dot-com analogy: this is a correction, not an ending37:03 – Supply chain resilience: the cocoa crisis and Kit Kat's pricing problem39:10 – "What's the one thing to do Monday morning?"39:23 – Follow the money: strategy is where you invest, not what's in your documents40:25 – The hidden gem: East West Seeds in Thailand42:00 – Closing: don't let politics color your business vision

Nik Kinley has spent 35 years studying human behavior, from prison therapy rooms to Fortune 500 boardrooms. He's assessed over 1,500 senior leaders, coached CEOs of national banks, heads of national security, and Formula One team managers, and written nine books on leadership. In this conversation, Nik breaks down how childhood wires your leadership instincts, why "power corrupts" is a dangerous myth, and what's really happening inside organizations as leaders rise higher and hear less truth.Nik's latest books include "The Power Trap" and "Rewriting Your Leadership Code: How Your Childhood Made You the Leader You Are and What You Can Do About It," both informed by his research program at IMD Business School.Connect with NikWebsite: https://nikkinley.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikkinley/0:00 – Cold open0:50 – Nik's journey: sales, prison, boardroom3:03 – Assessed 1,500 leaders: royalty, criminals, Formula One4:20 – What extremes taught him about human nature5:10 – "We are far more products of our environment than we believe"6:50 – Authorship vs. accountability: a critical distinction8:22 – The poor performing employee problem10:10 – Nature vs. nurture: what the research actually says12:07 – Under pressure, you run on automatic12:59 – Emotional regulation: 60-70% genetically inherited15:37 – How your parents' conflict style shaped yours17:03 – Every time you rely on instincts, you're gambling blind19:24 – Darwin got mistranslated: fitness means adaptation20:00 – "Adapting is not enough. Being agile isn't enough."21:00 – The HR industry's 50-year mistake24:05 – Why caring less matters than your people feeling cared for25:55 – Private equity and getting the team right quickly28:03 – Nik's model for behavior change (and why he hates simple models)29:58 – Why coaching should show results in 2-3 sessions31:20 – Context is the #1 driver of behavior change32:06 – What brainwashing research teaches us about employees33:45 – Teenage boot camps: why change doesn't stick35:18 – What forensic psychotherapy taught him about leadership36:02 – "The Power Trap" and why power doesn't corrupt38:08 – Confidence vs. denial: the entrepreneurial tightrope39:06 – Low narcissism and overconfidence actually help performance41:05 – When success tips into self-destruction42:18 – People stop telling you the truth as you rise44:37 – Leaders become less empathetic on every metric47:05 – The halo effect: why we overestimate leaders49:50 – CNN, social media, and the rise of image management52:10 – Cancel culture's residue on information flow53:30 – The perfect storm: power, pressure, and performance theater55:00 – Strategic drift: the real leadership crisis56:40 – Where to find Nik's work57:12 – Closing

Minyang Jiang (MJ) is the Chief Strategy Officer at Credibly, where she runs marketing, sales, tech innovation, and corporate strategy. Before FinTech, she spent nearly a decade at Ford Motor Company launching commercial vehicles with $95M budgets, and before that worked in human rights. She's the youngest member of Credibly's C-suite and a fiction writer who draws on Rilke for leadership inspiration.In this conversation, we talk about what it really takes to break into industries where you're an outsider, why no one makes space for you at the leadership level, how to spot AI theater in companies, the difference between productive and toxic conflict, and why cognitive offloading might be the most important personal decision of the AI era.MJ shares the Wharton framework she teaches her team for human-AI collaboration, her honest take on why her startup didn't work out, and the one question the best manager she ever had asked in a performance review.Follow MJ on LinkedIn and Medium.—0:00 – Intro and MJ's career journey1:00 – Ford vs. Credibly: big company vs. FinTech2:34 – Being the youngest (and only woman) in the C-suite5:52 – How much should you know about the product you sell?7:08 – Speaking the language of your customer9:14 – Selling trust, not mechanics10:24 – The skeleton key: switching industries without starting over13:11 – Should leadership be comfortable or challenging?16:02 – Self-determination theory: competence, autonomy, relatedness19:50 – Short-term gain, long-term loss20:55 – How to spot a healthy vs. toxic workplace25:22 – Productive conflict and the Harvard Everest simulation28:01 – Rotating the conscientious objector role29:05 – How to close a heated meeting well30:40 – Uncurb: entrepreneurship, failure, and honest investor conversations34:04 – Entrepreneurship is dealing with your insecurities on a timeline36:07 – How to spot AI theater in companies39:30 – Agentic commerce and the human-AI interface42:22 – Tasks that should never be fully automated44:09 – The Wharton framework: where AI adds value vs. where humans do46:34 – Lightning round: metrics, servant leadership, Fortune 10 budgets48:47 – Rilke, The Panther, and what shaped her thinking50:06 – 30-day playbook for responsible GenAI transformation51:52 – Cognitive offloading and the search for meaning

At 22, Sarah Mae Selnick was cold calling billionaire real estate developers from a boutique brokerage in Manhattan with zero experience and no idea what she was doing. By 24, she had put together the largest single transaction in Brooklyn's history: a deal worth over a billion dollars.Now she's the founder of Source Forward, a company using AI and building data to help commercial real estate owners in New York City tap into energy incentives and sustainability technologies they're leaving on the table. She also leads a decarbonization task force alongside major utilities and technology providers, drafting policy recommendations for NYSERDA.In this episode of Horizon Search, Sarah Mae talks about what NYC brokerage taught her about persistence, why "no" really means "not right now," the shiny object trap that nearly derailed her startup, and why energy costs are about to hit real estate owners harder than most of them realize.Source Forward: https://sourceforward.orgSarah Mae on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/sarahmayselnick—Horizon Search is a podcast by Horizon Search Institute exploring how leaders, founders, and researchers are navigating the forces reshaping industries and institutions.Subscribe for new episodes. Learn more at https://horizonsearch.org—0:00 Cold calling Jonathan Gray at 220:50 How she got into NYC commercial real estate2:07 Persistence and goldfish memory4:17 The Vonnegut rule: New York vs. California5:30 Why phone calls still beat email6:15 The blind spot in commercial real estate8:12 How Source Forward uses AI for building owners8:55 Shiny object syndrome and founder focus10:30 How her co-founder snapped them back on track11:55 Scaling a small team with AI14:06 The billion-dollar Brooklyn deal at 2415:40 Leading a decarbonization task force17:05 NYC's climate goals and the UN SDGs17:43 Moonshot: becoming the household name in building energy19:13 Green tech trend: big building data for everyone20:25 What real estate owners underestimate about energy costs21:15 Favorite NYC spot for inspiration21:57 Where to find Sarah Mae

Chris Brisson talks about accidental entrepreneurship, human-first messaging, and where AI is taking sales.He shares how he went from selling rims and tires on eBay to building software, what he learned from a stagnant business he had to reinvent, why most companies get SMS wrong, what “texting is the sacred place” really means, how AI agents are changing lead qualification and booking, what scaling a remote-first company has taught him, and why distribution is often the real bottleneck for founders.This is a strong episode for founders, operators, marketers, and anyone thinking seriously about messaging, growth, and building in the AI era.Connect with Chris:https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisbrisson/Curious how AI is changing SMS and sales workflows? Visit https://www.salesmessage.com/Timestamps:00:00 From selling rims and tires on eBay01:03 Accidental entrepreneurship and early lessons02:14 What he’d tell his 19-year-old self02:39 From first exit to product builder04:45 The “death of Call Loop” and starting over06:26 Pre-selling Sales Message before building it08:25 Why most companies get SMS wrong09:29 “Texting is the sacred place”11:39 SMS vs WhatsApp vs social DMs13:40 Open rates, RCS, and modern messaging15:20 AI filtering, inbox changes, and the future of text17:19 AI agents, speed-to-lead, and scalable conversations20:49 Will AI end up talking to AI?23:35 AI schedulers and replacing the messy middle26:08 Lessons from scaling a remote-first company30:30 Resilience, sacrifice, and not chasing money33:05 Why distribution is the hardest part35:31 Built-in audiences, integrations, and growth43:17 Who inspires him right now45:21 The best advice he ever received46:41 Where to follow Chris

Most managers were promoted because they were good at the work, not because they were trained to lead people.In this conversation, Laura Ashley-Timms explains why so many “manager as coach” programs fail, why accidental managers are quietly draining productivity, and why the best leaders stop trying to be the fixer, solver, and solution giver.We talk about operational coaching, purposeful inquiry, coachable moments, the STAR model, the bottleneck effect, and what it really takes to build managers who create better performance through others. Laura also shares the story behind a major London School of Economics-backed study that found dramatic gains in management capability, retention, and ROI.A sharp episode for founders, operators, executives, HR leaders, L&D teams, and anyone trying to lead without becoming the bottleneck.The Answer Is a Question by Laura Ashley-Timms and Dominic Ashley-Timms, available via Amazon and other retailers: https://a.co/d/0gmY9gONConnect with Laura Ashley-Timms: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-ashley-timms/Connect with Dominic Ashley-Timms: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dominic-ashley-timms/For more on STAR Manager, visit: https://www.starmanager.global/podcastTimestamps:00:00 Brilliant managers don’t have the answers01:00 Why this is a management operating system problem01:53 Why “manager as coach” training often fails04:03 The real cost of coaching confined to sessions04:33 The accidental manager problem06:43 Why most leadership programs aren’t properly measured07:55 Operational coaching as a mindset shift09:21 Why managers become fixers and bottlenecks10:18 How asking questions gives managers time back11:29 AI, management, and developing others12:13 What a coachable moment looks like15:54 Purposeful inquiry vs polite questioning16:53 “Helpful” questions that steal accountability17:49 How managers stop being fixers20:49 Why high performers struggle to scale21:14 The manager-on-holiday test22:02 The STAR model explained24:23 Putting leadership impact under academic scrutiny27:12 The 74x ROI result31:33 What actually drives the ROI33:42 Why management development moves at a glacial pace35:57 Transformation, not just another training program40:04 Why first-wave champions matter44:28 A three-question starter kit47:12 The “marriage saver” question48:05 What to say when you don’t know the answer53:29 Laura’s closing message for accidental managers54:10 Resources and where to find Laura