A Ride Down the Cul-De-Sac (ft. Ken Sterling, Exec VP + Chief Learning Officer, BigSpeak)
Description
A Ride Down the Cul-De-Sac (ft. Ken Sterling, Exec VP + Chief Learning Officer, BigSpeak)
Change your mindset, change your life
OPENING QUOTE:
“You really get to the heart of it in any organization when you hit some turbulence. Hitting turbulence is going to happen and good leaders will anticipate this.”
—Ken Sterling
GUEST BIO:
Ken Sterling is the Executive Vice President and Chief Learning Officer at BigSpeak, one of the world's top speaking bureaus on a mission to awaken the greatness within each and every one of us.
Along with being an attorney and talent agent, he describes himself as a people whisperer. His background includes being homeless, a Ph.D., and everything in between. Ken is also a researcher at USC and teaches marketing and business ethics at UC Santa Barbara.
Show Links:
CORE TOPICS + DETAILS:
[13:57 ] - Simple is Not Easy
The power of turbulence
“Building something elegant— thinking of Steve Jobs and the iPod and the iPhone— which on the outside is so seemingly simple…that’s what good leadership does. When you're being a playmaker, you’re setting yourself up and your team up for success by doing the groundwork.”
You’ll never be able to make difficult tasks easy for you or your people— but you can make them simple.
[22:43 ] - Anticipate, Communicate, Execute
A three-part framework for confronting challenges
When facing turbulence, there are three steps to survival. The first is to anticipate what’s coming. Wear your knee pads, as Ken says. Next, communicate. Speak to the people you trust about what’s going on. Finally, execute. This is when you get to take action and do something. It’s the most powerful step of all, but it’s nothing without the foundation of anticipating and communicating.
[33:45 ] - Life is a Cul-de-sac, Not a One-Way Street
Ken’s perspective on adversity
Sometimes in life you’ll suddenly realize you’re going down a dark, ugly road that won’t get you where you want to be. But life isn’t a one-way street. It’s a cul-de-sac. You’re always able to go slowly, go around that street and come back out as quickly and as reasonably as you can. There’s no road you can’t turn back from in life.
[37:35 ] - The “Five and Five” Rule
Lessons from being kicked out of school
One day as Ken was sitting in the principal’s office of his high school, about to be kicked out, his principal told him something he’s never forgotten. “Kenny, it’s all about five and five. There’s always going to be five people worse off than you, and five people better off than you.” As Ken puts it, “We don’t need to compare who’s been through more s***.” Don’t play the comparison game.
[47:16 ] - Ken’s Parting Advice
Cut down on screen time
Ken’s an advocate for de-cluttering your mind by reducing your technology use. His advice is to start with a one-hour reduction each day, including the removal of your phone from the bedroom. Let yourself have peace at night and when you wake up in the morning. You owe it to yourself.
RESOURCES:
- [0:54 ] About BigSpeak
- [20:59 ] Ken Sterling’s TEDx Talk
- [25:20 ] About the ACE Framework
- [35:32 ] About Insight Seminars
Follow Ken:
Follow Paul:
- Keynote Speaking Website
- Playmakers Podcast
- The Power of Playing Offense
- Youtube
SHOW PARTNER:
The WHY Institute
Are you ready to find your ‘why’? Our partners at the WHY Institute have created the single most high-impact assessment for finding your personal why in life and work. In just five minutes, discover more about who you are, how you think, and why you do what you do than any other personal assessment available.
The best part? It’s completely free for Playmakers listeners. Are you ready to find our WHY in just five minutes? Take your assessment now.
ABOUT THE HOST:
Paul Epstein may not be a hard charging running back on the actual football field, but his list of high-profile wins in the world of sports will have you thinking that he could be.
Paul has spent nearly 15 years as a pro sports executive for multiple NFL and NBA teams, a global sports agency, and the NFL league office. He’s transformed numerous NBA teams from the absolute bottom in league revenue to top-two in financial performance. He’s broken every premium revenue metric in Super Bowl history as the NFL’s sales leader. He opened a billion-dollar stadium, helped save the New Orleans NBA franchise, and founded the San Francisco 49ers Talent Academy.
He's since installed his leadership and high-performance playbook with Fortune 500 leaders, Founders and CEOs, MBAs, and professional athletes.
Now, as a global keynote speaker, #1 bestselling author, personal transformation expert, turned senior leader and advisor to PurposePoint and the Why Institute, and host of the Playmakers: On Purpose podcast, Paul explores how living and working with a focus on leadership, culture, and purpose can transform organizations and individuals anywhere to unleash their full potential.
Learn more about Paul at PaulEpsteinSpeaks.com
ABOUT PLAYMAKERS: ON PURPOSE:
The Playmakers: On Purpose podcast is an all-access pass to a purpose-centered tribe of leaders in business, sports, and life who are on a mission of meaning and impact. The show takes purpose from an out of reach North Star to a practical and tactical exploration of how we can step into each day, ON PURPOSE, where life no longer happens “to us”, it begins to happen “for us”.
From the Why Coach of the San Francisco 49ers to your coach, take a seat at the table with sports industry executive, #1 bestselling author, personal transformation expert, turned senior leader and advisor to PurposePoint and the Why Institute, Paul Epstein, in this inspiring, yet immediately actionable podcast.
From formative stories pre-purpose to personal and professional transformation’s post-purpose, each show will share a high-energy, prescriptive blueprint to ignite impact and drive inner success, fulfillment, and purpose no matter your starting point. It’s time to meet Paul at the 50 and get ready to live and lead ON PURPOSE.
Learn more at: PlaymakersPod.com
ABOUT DETROIT PODCAST STUDIOS:
In Detroit, history was made when Barry Gordy opened Motown Records back in 1960. More than just discovering great talent, Gordy built a systematic approach to launching superstars. His rigorous processes, technology, and development methods were the secret sauce behind legendary acts such as The Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Diana Ross and Michael Jackson.
As a nod to the past, Detroit Podcast Studios leverages modern versions of Motown’s processes to launch today’s most compelling podcasts. What Motown was to musical artists, Detroit Podcast Studios is to podcast artists today.
With over 75 combined years of experience in content development, audio production, music scoring, storytelling, and digital marketing, Detroit Podcast Studios provides full-service development, training, and production capabilities to take podcasts from messy ideas to finely tuned hits. Here’s to making (podcast) history together.
Learn more at: DetroitPodcastStudios.com
CREDITS:
- Paul Epstein: Host | paul@paulepsteinspeaks.com
- Connor Trombley: Executive Producer | connor@detroitpodcaststudios.com
United States
