Michael interviews Patrick Cates, Associate Dean for Undergraduate Programs at USC, Marshall School of Business, about the turbulent “new normal” facing higher education amid political pressures, international student compliance shifts, financial strain, layoffs, leadership turnover, and rapid AI-driven change. Cates argues AI is primarily a culture-change issue, noting universities’ slow, brittle structures—like the 1–2 year peer-review lifecycle—are colliding with the speed of AI. He explains why blanket AI policies often fail in distributed power environments and highlights change via respected faculty examples, including Marshall’s early AI pedagogy paper. Reflecting on USC’s post-2018 culture transformation, he emphasizes operationalizing shared values, measuring culture through people-centered indicators, and prioritizing strong, kind leadership, psychological safety, and adaptability as foundations for higher ed’s future.

Timestamps:
00:24 Welcome
01:27 Meet Patrick Cates
02:48 Higher Ed Turbulence
05:15 Resistance to Change
06:41 Perfect Storm Pressures
10:18 AI as Culture Change
13:59 How Universities Adapt
18:00 USC Culture Journey
20:30 Making Values Real
29:49 Measuring Culture Health
34:56 Culture Over AI
37:04 Psychological Safety
40:27 Key Takeaways
43:09 Walk Up Song
44:18 Where to Connect
44:55 Closing

Connect with Patrick:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrickcates/

Michael's National Workforce Study on Change Management: https://www.michaeljlopez.coach/research

Michael welcomes Naphtali Bryant, managing principal consultant at RAC Leadership and former US Marine and chief people officer, to discuss the “curse of competence” and how leaders become bottlenecks by continuing to solve, edit, and rescue instead of building team capability. Naphtali explains that promotions often reward past competence, but leadership requires shifting from having answers to developing others, using the question “Whose growth does this moment belong to?” They cover how dependence shrinks ownership and initiative, why “my team needs to step up” can mean the leader must step back, and practical tactics like restraint, better questions, and telling hard truths. They also discuss culture, leadership inflection points, AI’s impact on leadership value, and when staying an individual contributor may be the best path.

Timestamps:
00:24 Welcome
01:10 Meet Naphtali Bryant
02:39 Marine Corps to Tech Journey
05:38 Defining the Curse
08:45 Whose Growth Is It
11:05 Ego and Restraint
13:10 Inflection Points Mirror
16:03 How Leaders Get Stuck
19:22 Culture and Echo
23:32 Top Down to AI Shift
25:54 AI Changes Leadership Value
28:15 IC vs Leader Path
31:06 Key Takeaways and Closing

Connect with Naphtali:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/naphtalibryant/
https://racleadership.com

Michael's National Workforce Study on Change Management: https://www.michaeljlopez.coach/research

Michael hosts Aditi Joshi, an emergency medicine physician turned digital health leader, to discuss the evolution and adoption challenges of telemedicine and broader healthcare technology. Aditi recounts entering telemedicine in 2013, scaling programs through the pandemic, and now consulting on digital health adoption and scaling. They cover why patients generally like telehealth, why many health tech startups fail due to slow health-system implementation and clinician behavior change, and how required usage plus department-level ownership helped scale telemedicine at Jefferson. They also discuss AI in healthcare, distinguishing administrative “back-end” uses from clinical “front-end” advice, and why confidence, trust, and messaging affect adoption. Aditi shares her book, “Telehealth Success,” and key takeaways on implementation strategy and understanding end users.

Timestamps:
00:24 Welcome and Setup
01:24 Aditi's Telehealth Journey
02:46 Telemedicine Then to Now
04:56 What Patients Really Want
07:07 Why Health Tech Fails
10:40 Clinician Adoption Barriers
16:34 Scaling Across Hospitals
21:02 AI Hype vs Reality
27:19 AI Telehealth Agents
29:01 Book and Consulting Work
31:37 Cost Savings and Incentives
34:00 Key Takeaways and Closing

Connect with Aditi:
https://draditiujoshi.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-aditi-joshi/

Aditis book:
https://a.co/d/08473ukY

Michael's National Workforce Study on Change Management: https://www.michaeljlopez.coach/research