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Dr. Steven Segal is a psychologist, philosophical counsellor, and leadership coach. He is a former Associate Professor at the Macquarie Graduate School of Management and has spent more than two decades working at the intersection of psychology, philosophy, leadership, and organisational life. His work explores how individuals and communities respond to uncertainty, disruption, and existential threats—those moments when people experience a loss of meaning, belonging, identity, or a sense of being at home in the world. Through his therapy, counselling, coaching, teaching, and writing, he helps individuals and organisations navigate complexity, anxiety, and change while remaining connected to what matters most.

His most recent book is Mandela's Leadership Legacy: Emotional and Existential Wisdom. The book was written as a kind of conversation between Martin Heidegger’s existential philosophy and Mandela’s way of being a leader. It used Heidegger to shed light on Mandela’s existential journey and used Mandela to provide an accessible introduction to the philosophy of Heidegger.

A Couple Quotes From This Episode

• "Mandela wasn't the kind of motivational speaker who gets people hyped up. His style was much more thoughtful in the sense of working through emotion."
• "Dialogue across difference, it gets to your identity. And when our identity feels a bit threatened, we tend to become reactive rather than listening. Mandela was able to listen when there were threats to his identity."

Resources

• Book: Business Feel: From the Science of Management to the Philosophy of Leadership
• Philosophical Reflections and Insights for Psychologists and Psychotherapists (forthcoming)
• Website - Dr. Steven Segal

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in studying, practicing, and teaching leadership. Attend The Global Conference in Toronto, October 28-31.

About Scott J. Allen

• Website
• Weekly Newsletter: Practical Wisdom for Leaders

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.

Send us Fan Mail

Dr. Shane McLoughlin is an Associate Professor in the School of Education at the University of Birmingham, where he works in the world-leading Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues. He is a leading expert on Aristotle’s concept of practical wisdom, and his work brings together moral philosophy and psychology, character education, behavioural science, differential psychology, clinical psychology, coaching psychology, and psychometrics to explore how people develop the good character and judgement needed to live and act well.

Shane is the author of Practical Wisdom Coaching, published by Routledge, and serves as Programme Lead for the MA in Character Education. His research focuses especially on practical wisdom, virtue, flourishing, measurement, and the limits of “one-size-fits-all” approaches to education, coaching, clinical practice, and human development. Across his work, Shane treats wisdom as a practical capacity: the ability to discern what matters, respond proportionately to complexity, and choose well when no rulebook can do the choosing for us.

A Couple Quotes From This Episode

• "Intelligence is knowing how to do things. Wisdom is knowing whether you should do them."
• "You're finding the right amount at the right time for the context that is conducive to flourishing."

Resources

• Book: Practical Wisdom Coaching

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in studying, practicing, and teaching leadership. Attend The Global Conference in Toronto, October 28-31.

About Scott J. Allen

• Website
• Weekly Newsletter: Practical Wisdom for Leaders

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.

Send us Fan Mail

Dr. William (Willy) Donaldson has over 35 years of experience as a Board member and President and has been CEO of 8 companies and over 30 years of experience in higher education. Willy is the Founder and President of Strategic Venture Planning, a management consulting firm that assists boards, investors and senior management teams maximize results.

Dr. Donaldson is an Assistant Professor in Finance. He teaches Advanced Financial Statement Analysis, Entrepreneurial Finance, Strategic Management, Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Systems Thinking, as well as multiple capstone classes. Dr. Donaldson is the Director of the Luter Business Institute.

A Few Quotes From This Episode

• "Managers and leaders don't solve problems, they manage messes."
• "If you don't see the whole system, you're gonna draw a boundary around your job...and you're gonna start optimizing in that space. And that may be great for finance, but it may be disastrous for the whole system."

Resources

• Book: Simple Complexity: A Management Book For The Rest of Us
• Resource: OODA Loop by John Boyd

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in studying, practicing, and teaching leadership. Attend The Global Conference in Toronto, October 28-31.

About Scott J. Allen

• Website
• Weekly Newsletter: Practical Wisdom for Leaders

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.

Send us Fan Mail

Keith Eigel, Ph.D. is the founder of The Leaders Lyceum (lye-see-um), an organization dedicated to leveraging challenges to accelerate the leaderʼs journey to sustained effectiveness. He is co-author of a forthcoming book on personality, leader effectiveness, and leveraging the diversity of perspective for team performance called The Vehicle. Over the last twenty-five years, his research and writing have had a global reach, being cited in academic and best-selling publications on 5 continents. Keith and his team have honed a developmental curriculum that extends and leverages over sixty years of research to help executive and next-generation leaders measurably advance leader maturity, the best predictor of a leader’s effectiveness. Thousands of leaders from dozens of industries have been transformed by their experiences with The Leaders Lyceum. Additionally, he'sbeen an executive coach to several C-Level Fortune 50 leaders and University Presidents.

A Few Quotes From This Episode

• "I don't want my growth to be determined by the whims of circumstance. I want to have some voice, some proactivity in that."
• "Developmental maturity, vertical development, is about challenging the lens that we see the world through. This conversation may make the lens we have tomorrow slightly different. And if it has, that's vertical growth."
• "Learn to embrace your complaint — because it is the thing that we can't help but feel. And wherever our lens is, our pain meets us where we are. Then it opens the door."

Resources

• Book: The Map by Eigel and Kuhnert

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in studying, practicing, and teaching leadership. Attend The Global Conference in Toronto, October 28-31.

About Scott J. Allen

• Website
• Weekly Newsletter: Practical Wisdom for Leaders

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.

Send us Fan Mail

Dr. Randal Joy Thompson is a scholar-practitioner and global citizen who has assumed leadership positions and led teams in countries around the world including Cameroon, Morocco, Romania, Ukraine, Moldova, and Belarus, Iraq, Afghanistan, Morocco, Liberia, Nigeria, Ghana, Myanmar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and El Salvador, initially as a Commissioned US Foreign Service Officer and then as independent contractor. Her scholarship has focused primarily on leadership, focusing on women, teams, and the commons. She works with organizations to help facilitate the establishment of autonomous self-led teams as well as to help build relationships among existing team members by creating the environment where they experience the socio-emotional forces connecting them.

In addition to her PhD and MA in Human and Organizational Systems from Fielding Graduate University, she earned an MBA from the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago, an MA in Political Philosophy from the University of Chicago, an MA in Biblical Exposition from Capitol Bible and Graduate School, and a BA in Philosophy from the University of California, Berkeley.

A Few Quotes From This Episode

• "Relationships, not structure, are what create stability now in organizations.”
• “The team itself is a leader.”
• “What binds them together are relationships.

Resources

• Book: The Four Forces: Igniting Emergent Generative Team Leadership in a Complex Perennial World Inspired by Nature and the Dao

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in studying, practicing, and teaching leadership. Attend The Global Conference in Toronto, October 28-31.

About Scott J. Allen

• Website
• Weekly Newsletter: Practical Wisdom for Leaders

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.

Send us Fan Mail

Dr. Jonathan W. White is an endowed professor in the School of Civic Leadership at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author or editor of more than 17 books covering various topics, including civil liberties during the Civil War, the USS Monitor and the Battle of Hampton Roads, the presidential election of 1864, and what Abraham Lincoln and soldiers dreamt about.

Among his awards are the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia’s Outstanding Faculty Award (2019), CNU’s Alumni Society Award for Teaching and Mentoring (2016), the Abraham Lincoln Institute Book Prize (2015), and the University of Maryland Alumni Excellence Award in Research (2024).

His recent books include A House Built By Slaves: African American Visitors to the Lincoln White House (2022), which was co-winner of the Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize (with Jon Meacham); Shipwrecked: A True Civil War Story of Mutinies, Jailbreaks, Blockade-Running, and the Slave Trade (2023); Final Resting Places: Reflections on the Meaning of Civil War Graves (2023); and an exciting new children’s book, My Day with Abe Lincoln (2024).

Quotes From This Episode

• “Lincoln understood you start with something that everyone can agree on.”
• “He believed that persuasiveness is the most important thing for a leader.”

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

• Book: Lincoln Home (Images of America)

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in studying, practicing, and teaching leadership. Attend The Global Conference in Toronto, October 28-31.

About Scott J. Allen

• Website
• Weekly Newsletter: Practical Wisdom for Leaders

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.

Send us Fan Mail

Adam Tarnow is a leadership development specialist, keynote speaker, and author of The Fog of Work. With a unique blend of humor, humility, and hard-won insight, Adam helps professionals get out of their own way, navigate complexity, and lead with confidence.

A recovering CPA and former public accountant, Adam now heads up the Leadership Development Practice at PeopleWorks International, where he equips leaders to thrive in today’s fast-paced, people-driven workplaces. He’s spoken to audiences across industries—from manufacturing to professional services to education—and has a gift for making complex leadership ideas simple, practical, and unforgettable.

He earned his accounting degree from Clemson University and holds a “Ducktorate” from Disney University (yes, it’s real… no, it’s not accredited). He’s been married since 2003, is the proud dad of two teenage boys, and believes any day is better when it starts with coffee and a New York Times crossword puzzle.

Whether he’s speaking about leadership, communication, optimism, or culture, Adam’s goal is always the same: cut through the noise and help good people become great leaders.

A Few Quotes From This Episode

• "You are being held accountable for outcomes you know you do not fully control.”
• “I didn’t need a new job. I needed a new system for handling the inevitable stress that goes with leadership.”
• “Your story doesn’t have a villain. It just has a valley.”

Resources

• Book: The Fog of Work

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

• The ILA was created in 1999 to bring together professionals interested in studying, practicing, and teaching leadership. Attend The Global Conference in Toronto, October 28-31.

About Scott J. Allen

• Website
• Weekly Newsletter: Practical Wisdom for Leaders

My Approach to Hosting

• The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.

♻️ Please share with others and follow/subscribe to the podcast!
⭐️ Please leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or your platform of choice.
➡️ Follow me on LinkedIn for more on leadership, communication, and tech.
📜 Subscribe to my weekly newsletter featuring four hand-picked articles.
🌎 You can learn more about my work on my Website.