“Alcohol’s reputation is crumbling…” And I agree! That quote is from James Swanwick, Founder and CEO of Alcohol-Free Lifestyle, my guest on this episode of the B2B Leadership podcast. In January, I shared the transformation journey I’ve been on in my relationship with alcohol publicly for the first time. The response and support blew me away. I heard so many inspiring stories and received so many messages of appreciation for sharing my story. Having this conversation with James reinforced every decision I’ve made for the last 15 months regarding alcohol. Regardless of where you are right now, you’re going to get a lot out of this episode.

When you get promoted from manager to Director level, the game changes… You are now going to be responsible for the performance of multiple teams… And, you will also be managing managers as well… How do you get yourself ready for this promotion? How do you end up as the #1 choice for Director when the time comes in your company… Or, how do you positing yourself as the best possible candidate while interviewing? On this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje discusses the roadmap you can follow in order to get promoted from a manager-level to a director-level position.

In a leadership position, what you say matters… Not just some of the time, all of the time. One statement can have the power to completely change someone’s day, week, month, year, or career. It is for this reason that any leadership position needs to be treated with the highest level of respect. On this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Patrick Mirza, Director of Content Marketing and Publications at WorldatWork. Patrick was on the receiving end of one statement that left him feeling discouraged and hollow. This conversation opened up a discussion about the importance of giving effective feedback.

For nearly the first 10 years of my professional career, I was not promoted… I did an average job and received an average amount of recognition for my contributions. In every role, I waited for my boss and my company to tell me what to do… I thought I was doing the right thing… Then, everything changed… When I invested in myself and began to deliver more value to my organizations, I understood what a promotion really means. From that point on, earning promotions was the result of applying a specific formula. This formula allowed me to go from an individual contributor to a Vice President in 30 months! This formula is something I have shared with my private coaching clients and members of the B2B Leaders Academy. In this episode of the B2B Leadership Podcast, I’m going to share my formula with you. This episode is full of behind-the-scenes tips, tricks and strategies to help you land your next promotion.

How do you transition from a completely non-technical field to a successful leader inside a SaaS business? That’s what best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje sat down with Simon Cundall, Head of Customer Experience at CampMinder to find out. Discover the pivotal moments in Simon’s career as he reveals his path to leadership in an industry he loves.

On this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje discusses how to choose a leadership coach and why you would hire a leadership coach in the first place.

A leader’s job is to do everything possible to make sure the people that work for them are successful. Success means different things to different people… And success might come in their current role, another role in the same company, or another role in a completely different company. Taking this approach builds a lot of trust. But, not every leader thinks or operates this way. In my opinion, this is one of the best strategies to build trust and a long-term relationship. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Sam Gurdus, Senior Director of Customer Success at Mezmo about creating new opportunities for others. To find out how to do it, tune in to this episode.

What you say as a leader may not be what is received by the person you are speaking to. Sometimes, things said with good intentions can have negative consequences. This is why communication skills and emotional intelligence need to be at the top of every leader’s list. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Melissa Benua, Senior Director of Engineering at mParticle. Melissa went through a conversation with her boss early in her career that demotivated her despite the fact that what her boss said was intended as a compliment. There are always two sides to every conversation and if you are a leader who only thinks about your side, you’re going to run into trouble. Tune in to this episode to find out how Melissa overcame this challenge with her manager and went on to become an amazing leader.

One of your greatest leadership secrets has been with you for your entire life. It was celebrated when you first started to use it and then it just became “normal”... It is something you use each and every single day, but you probably don’t think about it very much… It is your VOICE! In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with John Henny about how leaders can tap into the incredible potential they have in their voice. John is an all-star vocal coach and has experience working with some of Hollywood’s biggest stars. Tune in to this episode to discover an entirely new side to your voice and how big of an impact your voice has in leadership.

Confidence and trust are at the heart of great leadership. These two elements build great relationships with employees, employers, customers, partners, etc. whether the relationship is personal or professional in nature. While we see countless examples in the media where confidence and trust have been broken, there is always an opportunity to do the right thing and lead in a way that builds confidence and trust. In this episode of the B2B Leadership podcast, I spoke with Mark Stouse, Chairman and CEO at Proof Analytics. Mark has experienced the world that is possible when confidence and trust are at the center and when they are not (you have to hear the backstory on this). He and his team at Proof Analytics are champions of the truth with their clients, employees, and partners. The level of trust built has earned them incredible customer renewal and expansion rates.

Have you ever wondered why people don’t meet your expectations? Maybe the reason is that you didn’t set the expectation properly or maybe the other person didn’t know it existed at all! Expectations are misset all the time and it causes real frustration and trouble for leaders and their teams. On this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Francois Dellea, Senior Director of Engineering at Archipelago, about managing expectations and relationships as a leader.

Jake Jorgovan, Founder and CEO of Content Allies faced a big challenge when it came to developing leaders in his organization. He bought them books, gave them tips, spent time with them during 1:1s covering leadership topics. It was draining and not the highest and best use of their time together. Jake knew something had to change but was skeptical about “leadership coaching” programs based on his past experiences. He enrolled 4 team members into the B2B Leaders Academy and within a few short months those 4 people were all promoted! On top of that awesome achievement, Jake was able to save time every week because he knew his leaders were getting the very best when it comes to leadership development. Now when Jake meets with his team, the time spent is significantly more productive as the conversations are now at a strategic level. Jake’s leaders are building incredible leadership skills through the B2B Leaders Academy every month and this opens up a whole new set of topics to discuss with them that were never possible before. Jake recognized that he did not have to be the one to do everything and that’s when he went from a skeptic to a thriving success story with the B2B Leaders Academy.

What’s the point of A/B testing your leadership? The point is to get valuable data to inform decisions that will help you improve. This is the same thing that expert marketers do to bring awareness of a product to a target audience. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Can Ozdoruk, VP of Marketing at Netomi. Can has an incredible ability to break down the complex world of OKRs into simple steps that have allowed him and his team to consistently hit 90% of their targets every quarter. Want to know how he does it? Tune in to find out.

A lot of people get into leadership roles by accident. Someone excels as an individual contributor and then is offered the opportunity to lead the team. What happens when the star performer takes over the team? It can be an incredible move and produce amazing results. Or, it can end in failure with relationships destroyed. What’s the difference between these two outcomes? The difference comes down to leadership skills. Leadership skills are not something you are born with, despite what some may think. They are skills that are learned and developed over time. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Sarah E. Brown, Vice President of Marketing at Sastrify and author of Lead Upwards about leadership roles, coaching, ownership, and much, much more.

If you were to leave your position as a leader tomorrow, what would happen? Would everything continue running as normal because you built repeatable systems that are designed to run without you? Or would everything fall apart because the systems you have in place rely on you running them? This is a really important area where I spend a lot of time working with leaders in the B2B Leaders Academy. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Austen Asadorian, Senior Vice President of Sales at SevenRooms. Before getting into the tech world, Austen ran restaurants for the Hillstone group and learned the incredible power of systems that can run without you. Tune in to this episode to get all the juicy details.

Doing the work as a leader is not enough!! You must market your leadership. You must tell the story of you, your team, and your accomplishments. If you don’t, nobody will truly know what you do. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Anu Shukla, Co-Founder and Executive Chairman at Botco.ai. We discussed how leaders need to market themselves to be heard, seen, and recognized. Anu has been recognized as one of the top B2B Marketers in the world. Buckle up and get your notepad ready for this episode!

You will fail, but quitting is a decision… This is a really important distinction that my guest, Luke Hansen, Founder & CEO of CompanyCam, made during this episode of the B2B Leadership Podcast. When everyone else looks like they have everything perfectly put together, where does your focus as a leader need to be? Tune in to find out!

If you are a leader and you are the center of your team, you’re doing it wrong. Many leaders think that this is the right place to be, after all I am the “leader” right? The simple answer is no. If it’s your team, your ideas, your direction, it’s a “you” show. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Jerome Placido, Sr. Director of Engineering at Coursedog about how to take the emphasis off of you and put in on your team. When you get this strategy right, the whole team dynamic changes.

If you have a surface-level relationship with your employees, you're going to get a low level of engagement. If you have a relationship built on top of a strong foundation of mutual respect and trust, you're going to get a drastically different level of engagement. The best part is that as a leader, it's your choice. Nobody is going to tell you what to do, you have to decide which type of relationship you want and ultimately which level of engagement you want from your team. In this episode, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Katie Pocklington, Director of Customer Success at Opal about this very important leadership topic and much, much, more.

Shoeb Mogal, Director of Engineering at NewStore, Inc, has been on a fascinating ride form co-founder to engineer to Director of Engineering. In his first round as a leader, he wasn’t successful even though he had the full support of his peers. He made a decision to become great at leadership and set a course based on continuous improvement. He invested in himself and the rest is history.