In this revealing interview, Wynne Nowland, Bradley & Parker CEO, shares her simple, yet powerful worldview of expansive and united leadership.

Bradley & Parker is a premier insurance, risk management, and financial services firm founded in 1939 in Long Island, New York.

With more than 15,000 clients, including publicly traded companies with complex global insurance programs and the largest software framework company for autonomous systems, Bradley & Parker is one of the largest privately held insurance companies in the United States, underwriting in excess of $100 million in insurance premiums annually.

Wynne Joined Bradley & Parker 34 years and 9 months ago. She was promoted from Executive Vice President to CEO 4.5 years ago, and shortly after, she came out as transgender.

Wynne insights:

• The positive effect of longevity on the job
  
  
• The importance of expanding your role to other corporate function
  
  
• How the leadership propels the company's success
  
  
• The challenges in creating a hybrid remote and in-office post-pandemic
  
  
• How to have clear communication across the organization
  
  
• How to foster an inclusive work environment
  
  
• Creating a diverse workforce improves business performance
  
  
• There is more that unites us than divides us
  
  

Learn more about Wynne Nowland at / wnowland

Learn more about Bradley & Parker at https://bradley-parker.com/

In this insightful interview, Paula Schneider, Susan G. Komen CEO, reveals the leadership lessons she learned from leading global organizations.

Susan G. Komen is a global movement that, over 30 years, has led the way in funding $3 billion in groundbreaking research, community health initiatives, and advocacy programs in local communities across the U.S. and in more than 30 countries, serving millions of people.

Paula joined Komen three and a half years ago, after serving as president and CEO of American Apparel, the largest apparel manufacturer in the United States with 260 retail stores globally; CEO of Delta Galil Premium Brands; and president at Warnaco Swimwear Group.

Among Paula's insights:

• How to empower your team when you are not physically empowered
  
  
• How a defining moment can change trajectories in career and life
  
  
• Leading with a sense of urgency to expedite the vision
  
  
• Over-communicate always and even more in a multicultural organization
  
  
• The power of age diversity and what she learned in the "escape room"
  
  
• Inclusiveness happens when we take action on the diverse point of views
  
  
• The 'need to know' gets in the way of high performance
  
  
• The CEO, as a statesman, should you get involved in social justice?
  
  

Learn more about Paula at / paula-schneider-6322661a

Learn about Susan G. Komen at https://www.komen.org/

In this video, Manish Hirapara shares the leadership strategies that helped him scale PeakActivity to more than 200 employees.

PeakActivity is a digital strategy and implementation company that partners with businesses to accelerate growth through e-commerce, Digital Marketing, and Technology solutions.

Topics discussed:

• Transforming from a scrappy startup to a high-performing organization
  
  
• Working on the business rather than working in the business
  
  
• Alignment around purpose
  
  
• Being an authentic leader
  
  
• Overcoming the constraints we set in our minds

Learn more:
https://peakactivity.com/
/ peakactivity
/ manishhirapara

In this discerning interview, Andrew Pass, the CEO of A Pass Educational Group, shares the magic of empowerment by having a double bottom line.

A Pass Educational Group develops customized educational content, from designing courses to creating assessments, for K-12, higher education, and corporate clients.

Prior to founding A Pass Educational Group, Andrew completed advanced doctoral work in Curriculum, Teaching, and Educational Policy at Michigan State University.

He started his career as an elementary school teacher and continued teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in topics such as educational technology, or ed-tech, at Michigan State University.

Among Andrew's insights:

• Empower employees by aligning their higher purpose and inner voice
  
  
• Accept diverse points of view
  
  
• Encourage critical thinking
  
  
• Develop and promote leaders from within
  
  

Learn more about Andrew at / andrewpass

Learn more about A Pass Educational Group at https://apasseducation.com/

In this thought-provoking interview, Nathan Stooke the CEO of Wisper Internet, a company that provides fast, reliable internet services to rural communities where other providers don't, shares the leadership lessons learned during the pandemic year leading the growth from 71 to 187 employees.

Nathan founded Wisper Internet 18 years ago when a friend didn’t have Internet access at his business.

Nathan Stooke accepted the challenge. It took a little research, a few maxed-out credit cards, and hard work, and Wisper Internet was born to bridge the gap in rural America with fast internet.

Some of Nathan's insights:

• The changing needs of the leadership team in hyper-growth
  
  
• The power of executive coaching to expose blind spots
  
  
• How to balance the individuals and the team
  
  
• How framework helps to navigate uncharted territories
  
  
• From CEO by default to CEO by choice
  
  
• Developing agile mindset
  
  
• Losing efficiency to get things done
  
  

Learn more about Nathan at / nathan-stooke-76028b1

Learn more about Wisper Internet at https://wisperisp.com/

In this fascinating interview, Kevin Jones, the CEO of Celero Commerce, which provides payment processing services, business management software, and data intelligence on a single holistic platform, discusses the leadership challenges and solutions for leading high growth through Mergers and Acquisitions.

Celero’s leadership team has completed 6 acquisitions since its inception. That's untypical for a young company.

Among Kevin's insights:

• The need to have a strong core leadership team
  
  
• Culture fit as a prerequisite for an acquisition
  
  
• How culture evolves as the company absorbs new cultures
  
  
• The shift from culture-fit to culture-blend
  
  
• Transparent communication as a key leadership style
  
  
• How to run business-as-usual concurrently with M&A activity
  
  
• The importance of leveraging efficiencies to scale up quickly
  
  

Kevin founded Celero in 2018, and 2.5 years later, it’s the 16th largest non-bank payment processor in the United States, serving more than 25,000 businesses.

He began his fin-tech career at Chase Paymentech. He is the former President of SignaPay, and former CEO of Anovia Payments, which he led to a successful exit.

Learn more about Celero Commerce at https://www.celerocommerce.com/

Learn more about Kevin Jones at / kevingjones

In this insightful interview, Matt Powell, the CEO of Moroch, an independent, integrated marketing agency based in Dallas, shares his 20-year journey from media planner to CEO and offers valuable insights about career, work, and life.

Among his insights:

• How to fight through a career wall
  
  
• How to have a tough conversation with an employer
  
  
• Are you running from something or towards something?
  
  
• The shift from the C-suite peer group to the CEO role
  
  
• Acknowledging the elephant in the room accelerates teamwork
  
  
• How to quickly come together as a team
  
  
• A leadership team is a soccer team vs. a basketball team
  
  
• The mistake of hiring leaders like us
  
  
• Multi-generational leadership impact on the organization
  
  

Matt Joined Moroch almost 20 years ago as a media planner. In his first week, Matt was sent to observe at his first client meeting. But when his boss didn’t make her flight, he presented the agency’s media plan himself.

Matt’s been stepping up ever since solving media puzzles for some of the largest companies. He is an evangelist for new platforms and technologies and he describes himself as “constantly evolving.”

With dozens of offices across the United States, Moroch has the ability to work with clients such as McDonald's, Six Flags, Planet Fitness, Disney, Midas, Visionworks, and Baylor Healthcare System, among others.

Moroch’s integration model includes expertise in creative, digital, social media, planning, analytics, media, multicultural, experiential, and PR, all under one roof, working together on behalf of over 100 brands.

Learn more about mat at / matt-powell-89335b3

Learn more about Moroch at https://moroch.com/

In this discerning interview, Brady Harris, the CEO of Dwolla, a FinTech company that develops payment gateway software to transform the way innovative businesses move money, shares his simple yet powerful framework for delegation.

Brady's 5 steps to stewardship delegation:

1. Establishing results, goals, and outcomes
2. Setting guidelines to accomplish these outcomes
3. Providing the resources necessary to be successful
4. Holding people accountable for the outcomes mutually agreed on
5. Clarifying the consequences of the accountability

Brady has some additional insights about:

• "Leadership is more so about organizing the collective genius and less about having the answer yourself"
  
  
• The similarities between leadership and parenthood
  
  
• How to drive alignment and buy-in in teams

Brady joined Dwolla a year ago after serving as the president of PayScape for almost three years. Before that, he scaled the corporate ladder over more than 16 years from various sales positions to the president of Elliott Management Group.

Brady has two bachelor's degrees in International Economic Studies and in Russian. He has a Master's degree in International Affairs and Global Enterprise.

Learn more about Brady at / brady-harris

Learn more about Dwolla at https://www.dwolla.com/