The Career Couch with Dr. Carole & Friends had a diverse and amazing  group of subject matters experts this season from various locations around the world.  The listeners were privileged to hear from many who were authors and  had completed a lot of research to support their discussion. The topics were rich and engaging. The listeners commented and sent feedback to me from every continent. 

I want thank my listeners for being interested and finding value in these topics and guests. I also want to thank my guests in season four: 

• Mark Bobbitt and Chris Edmonds, consultants and co-authors of “Good Comes First: How Today’s Leaders Create an Uncompromising Company Culture that Doesn’t Suck”
•  Dr. Barbara Dallay Pezee, international leadership coach and consultant
• Jamie Flinchbaugh, advisor and author of "People Solve Problems: The Power of Every Person, Every Day, Every Problem"
• Michael Timms, author of “How Leaders Can Inspire Accountability"
• Steve White, president and special counsel to the CEO of Comcast and author of "Uncompromising" 
• Michael Chang Wenderoth, executive coach and author of “Get promoted: What You are Really Missing at Work that’s Holding You Back” and, 
• Sonya Barnes, brand expert of Sonya Barnes International

I appreciate each and everyone of you for your commitment to helping others reach their full potential. 

Thank you, 

Dr. Carole Isom-Barnes, podcast host and business consultant
Xperience Leadership, LLC
www.XperienceLeadership.com

Are you thinking about quitting your job and pursuing that great idea that has been on your mind for years? Numbers released by the U.S. Census Bureau found that a whopping 5.4 million new business applications were filed in 2021, surpassing the record set in 2020 of 4.4 million.

Your podcast host, Dr. Carole Isom-Barnes, also took the leap and left her traditional job over a decade ago to pursue her entrepreneurial dream. As the now business owner of Xperience Leadership, LLC , for twelve years, she takes the mic solo to offer sound advice in the midst of the Great Resignation for those considering the plunge. If you are thinking about it, you will definitely want to listen to this episode. 

Brand expert, Sonya Barnes of Sonya Barnes International, places great emphasis on the need to develop your personal brand and not be satisfied with your default brand.  In this episode, she stresses the need to be consistent with your personal brand standards and the importance of never falling beneath  those standards regardless of the environment.  Sonya also walks us through the model of personal branding: 

1. A = Appearance
2. B = Behavior
3. C = Communication (verbal and non-verbal)
4. D = Digital footprint

For those working from home or in hybrid environments, she provides advice on how to  remain professionally visible, show value, and advance one's career.

Sonya is an entrepreneur and consultant, with two decades as an international style and brand expert. She has traveled throughout the United States and globally to destinations, such as Southeast Asia and Europe, providing keynote presentations and leading engaged training and workshops to Fortune 500 companies. She has  appeared in national and international media outlets, such as the Charlotte Observer, Charlotte Today, Good Day Vietnam, The Moulin Gazetteer (France), and the Chicago Tribune.   For more information you can visit her website at:  SonyaBarnesInternational.com.

Author and business consultant, Michael (Chang) Wenderoth, discusses a topic that we have all experienced – office politics.  If you haven’t experienced it, you are likely to at some point in your career. He posits that we should not ignore office politics, but rather engage in it for the benefit of our careers. He refers to the management of office politics as a “legitimate skill” that must be learned in the same manner as any other soft skill. 

His book, Get Promoted: What You’re REALLY Missing at Work That’s Holding You Back , is available April 6th and offers a three-part framework to support listeners and readers in developing these skills. 

Additionally, he addresses how the pandemic has altered office politics: 

1. Previous political structures in some organizations have ossified.
2. Informal organizational networks have been freed up in other organizations.

For more information on Michael, visit his website at ChangWenderoth.com.

Comcast President and Special Counsel to the CEO, Steve White, continues with part two of  "Navigating a Promotion and Organizational Success." In episode 2, Steve, discusses employee growth from an organizational and employee perspective. 

Organizationally, he shares how leaders can and should ensure their teams are experiencing growth, fair promotions,  and healthy cultures.  He candidly discusses the need for termination of those leaders who disrespect employees or are not living the organization's values.  He also lays out a process to build systems that break down walls of communication for the overall organizational  good.

At the employee level, he offers honest thoughts about work-life balance, referring to it as "work-life integration." He suggests focusing on the long-game and self-reflecting, especially if you failed to receive a deserved promotion. And, for those of you who aspire to be the next President or CEO of a company,  he provides realistic feedback - "You won't become president working 100% remotely or 9-5; growth requires an adjustment." 

As President of Comcast’s West Division for eleven years, launching his career in 1996 as Regional Vice President, Steve's insight is rich in wisdom. He was responsible for all of Comcast Cable operations in the Western U.S., leading nearly thirty thousand employees, serving almost ten million customers, and driving annual revenue of nearly $18 billion. 

His new book Uncompromising: How an Unwavering Commitment to Your Why Leads to an Impactful Life and a Lasting Legacy , is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and SteveWhiteSpeaks.com.

Steve White, President of Comcast’s West Division for eleven years, and now serving as President and special counsel to the Comcast CEO, allows us to experience his personal journey of professional successes and failures, as he climbed the corporate ladder. 

In part 1 of the podcast, he provides the listeners with tried and proven wisdom on getting promoted and understanding your "whys." He states, "If you are doing something that is not consistent with your "why" and purpose, it's a problem."

He also addresses: 

1. what he looks for when selecting leaders for a role,
2. the need for leaders with diverse skillsets,
3. why high-potential leaders sometimes fail to get promoted, and, 
4. how to eliminate the "no's."

Steve's new book, Uncompromising: How an Unwavering Commitment to Your Why Leads to an Impactful Life and a Lasting Legacy , can be found on Amazon and his website, SteveWhiteSpeaks. 

Most leaders believe they are accountable because they are successful. Not so, says this week's guest, Michael Timms, author of "How Leaders Can Inspire Accountability: Three Habits That Make or Break Leaders and Elevate Organizational Performance."

In this episode, Michael addresses three behaviors or habits of personal accountability:

1. not blaming,
2. looking in the mirror, and
3. engineering the solution

He also discusses the organizational impact of a culture of blame and what he means when he states, "We are not asking leaders to risk their lives, only their egos."

Michael is a leadership development consultant and principal of Avail Leadership.  Prior to forming his own consultancy, Michael was a consultant with Deloitte and an HR leader in the construction and manufacturing industries.

His new book can be found here.

Jamie Flinchbaugh is  an author and advisor who has worked with over 300 companies around the world, including Harley-Davidson, Intel, Mars, Amazon, Crayola, Fidelity, and Whirlpool.  For three decades, he has coached at every level - from entry-level employees to experienced CEOs of multi-billion-dollar corporations.

He joins the Career Couch with a perspective on successful project management, with less emphasis on tools, such as Lean and Kaizen methodologies, and more focus on shaping behaviors for organizational problem-solving.  He addresses how leaders should: 

• normalize and interpret behaviors,
• measure behaviors and observations,
• focus on the "how" of the work (and not just the outcomes).

Jaime's  new book, People Solve Problems: The Power of Every Person, Every Day, Every Problem  can be found on his website at www.jflinch.com.