Where Others Won’t

Each episode is designed to bring together thinkers and practitioners from sports, business, and academia to detail the leadership and culture secrets of the world's best teams.

Here’s a full guide to all the episodes:

WOW 1 - Adam Grant and Joe Dumars

Three-time NYT bestselling author Adam Grant and three-time NBA champion Joe Dumars pair up to discuss how humility shapes modern leadership.

WOW 2: Claude Silver and Whitney Johnson

Vaynermedia’s Claude Silver and bestselling author Whitney Johnson join me to explore how organizations can create competitive advantage by betting on their people.

WOW 3: Gary Curneen and Angus Reid

Chicago Red Stars assistant coach Gary Curneen and former BC Lions Grey Cup winner Angus Reid come together to talk about the art of coaching, and the art of being coached.

WOW 4: Paul Roos and James Kerr

Legendary Sydney Swans coach Paul Roos and Legacy author James Kerr join me to outline how they think about creating cultures of sustained success.

WOW 5: Alan Stein Jr. and Dan Abrahams

Keynote speaker Alan Stein Jr. and leading sports psychologist Dan Abrahams join forces to explain how habits shape who we become, both as individuals and as organizations.

WOW 6: Garry Ridge and Fergus Connolly

WD-40 CEO Garry Ridge and high-performance pioneer Fergus Connolly explore how to innovate your processes to set your people up for success.

WOW 7: Daniel Jackson and Neill Potts

Former Richmond Tigers MVP Daniel Jackson and Scotland Rugby high-performance director Neill Potts come together to investigate how being intentional with your actions helps lift everyone’s standards.

WOW 8: Steven Caldwell 

Former Burnley, Sunderland, and Toronto FC captain Steven Caldwell joins me one-on-one to talk about what a locker room culture actually looks like.

WOW 9: Padraig Smith and Ben Darwin

Colorado Rapids general manager Padraig Smith and GainLine Analytics founder (and former Wallabies prop) Ben Darwin team up to discuss the nuances of team dynamics and the new research into cohesion analytics.

WOW 10: Aidan McCullen and Nadya Zhexembayeva

Aidan McCullen hosts the breakout podcast The Innovation Show and Nadya Zhexembayeva is the CEO of Chief Reinvention Officer. I couldn’t think of two better people to bring together to talk about reinventing the workplace.

WOW 11: Dave Meltzer

Prominent sports marketing executive Dave Meltzer joined me for a fun chat about the business of sports.

WOW 12: Neil Pasricha 

Neil Pasricha is the NYT bestselling author of The Happiness Equation, but we decided to use this conversation to talk about failure, and how to build resilience in life.

WOW 13: Sam Walker 

One of the most influential sports leadership books of recent times is The Captain Class. Its author, Sam Walker, joined me to talk about the counterintuitive traits he uncovered among the world’s best skippers.

WOW 14: Angela Ruggiero 

Angela Ruggiero is a Hockey Hall of Famer and CEO of Sports Innovation Lab. She calls in to share her perspectives on the future of technology in sport.

WOW 15: Mark Metry

Mark Metry is the host of the global top 100 podcast Humans 2.0, where he’s interviewed the likes of Seth Godin, Mark Manson, Naveen Jain, and Gretchen Rubin. Mark joins me to talk about his journey and the future of leadership.

WOW 16: Patty McCord and Michel Falcon

Patty McCord was the chief talent officer at Netflix where she was influential in establishing its now-iconic corporate culture. Similarly, Michel Falcon’s people-first culture methodology has helped revolutionize the hospitality industry across North America. This is a vibrant episode packed with new ideas.

WOW 17: Jesse Cole and Travis McKenzie

Two of North America’s finest experience creators join me to talk about how to reduce friction points in your organization, with your customers, and at your events.

WOW 18: Rasmus Ankersen

Rasmus is the football director of Brentford FC in the English Championship, and chairman of FC Midtjylland in the Danish Superliga. Both teams are owned by the founder of statistical analysis company SmartOdds, and are innovative in their use of data to create competitive advantage.

WOW 19: Michael Lombardi

Michael Lombardi has three Super Bowl rings to his name, and his book, Gridiron Genius, documents his unique experience of working with three of the titans of the game: Bill Walsh at the San Francisco 49ers, Al Davis at the Oakland Raiders, and Bill Belichick at the Cleveland Browns and New England Patriots.  

WOW 20: Nancy Spotton and Jamie Cohen

Both Nancy and Jamie use data to analyze leadership competencies, but they’re quite different in their approaches - Nancy uses questionnaire data and Jamie uses handwriting.

WOW 21: Daniel Pink and Kevin Rutherford 

There are probably not two finer embodiments of the Where Others Won’t methodology than perennial NYT bestselling author Daniel Pink and Nuun Hydration CEO Kevin Rutherford. I brought them together to unpack the world of work.

WOW 22: Jonathan Rosenberg and Alan Eagle

Together with Eric Schmidt, Google’s former chairman and CEO, Jonathan Rosenberg and Alan Eagle are the co-authors Trillion Dollar Coach: The Leadership Playbook of Silicon Valley’s Bill Campbell. This is a fun and lively conversation about how sports coaching has influenced some of the world’s largest companies.

WOW 23: Tiffani Bova 

Tiffani Bova is the growth and innovation evangelist at Salesforce, and the author of the Wall Street Journal bestselling book Growth IQ: Get Smarter About the Choices that Will Make or Break Your Business.

WOW 24: David Burkus and Zvi Band

A timely conversation about the state of modern networking, and how organizations must rethink how they invest in their relationships.

WOW 25: Howard Behar and Chip Wilson

Howard, the former president of Starbucks, and Chip, the founder of Lululemon, join me to talk about servant leadership and how to maintain culture at massive scale.

WOW 26: Tasha Eurich

Self-awareness is one of the hottest topics in leadership right now. But what is self-awareness? And as a leader, or a coach, can you develop it? Dr. Tasha Eurich’s latest book, Insight, explores the link between self-awareness and success.

WOW 27: Joe Montemurro

Arsenal Women are one of the historic powerhouses of women’s football, but had spent years in the wilderness prior to Joe Montemurro’s arrival.  In just his second year in charge, the Gunners returned to the top of the pile in England. I spoke to Joe on the eve of their title defense.  

WOW 28: Marc Champagne and Meg Popovic

Meg Popovic is Director of Athlete Wellbeing & Performance for the Toronto Maple Leafs, and Marc Champagne is the host of the leading mental fitness podcast Behind The Human. I brought Meg and Marc together for a wide-ranging discussion about the state of mental health, particularly amongst young men.

WOW 29: Marcus Buckingham

Marcus Buckingham is an author, researcher, and thought-leader focused on unlocking people's strengths, increasing their performance, and pioneering the future of how people work. I wanted to talk to him about his latest book, Nine Lies About Work.

WOW 30: Julian de Guzman and Andy Longley

I brought together Canada’s most capped men’s football player, Julian de Guzman, and adidas’ global talent director, Andy Longley, to chat about the challenges in recruitment on a global scale.

WOW 31: Michael Gervais

You might recognize Dr. Michael Gervais from his world-class podcast, Finding Mastery, where he curates conversations with extraordinary performers from across sports, business, and academia, like Steve Kerr, Abby Wambach, Georges St Pierre, Satya Nardella, and Brene Brown. He is also the co-founder of Compete to Create, a joint venture with Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll, which focuses on mindset training for individuals in the workplace.

WOW 32: Anson Dorrance

Anson Dorrance has won 22 national championships as the head coach of the University of North Carolina’s women’s soccer team, and famously led the US women’s national team to the 1991 World Cup. 

WOW 33: Stuart Lancaster 

Stuart is the senior coach for Leinster, the most successful Irish rugby team both domestically and in European competition. He is best-known for ascending to be head coach of England between 2011 and 2015, leading the team at the 2015 World Cup.

WOW 34: Claire Lew

Through her experience of receiving poor workplace leadership, Claire became fascinated with how to help people become better leaders. She is now the CEO of Know Your Team, a software company that does just that.

WOW 35: Nick Stone and Jay Mellette

Nick Stone is the founder and CEO of Bluestone Lane, and Jay Mellette is the Director of Sports Performance for the Vegas Golden Knights. Both men have career paths that are far from typical, so I brought them together to talk about their transferrable skills and experiences.

WOW 36: Roy Rana

Roy Rana is an assistant coach with the Sacramento Kings in the NBA. Roy is a four-time Canadian High School Coach of the Year, guided Ryerson University to back-to-back national championship games, and became the first coach to guide Canada to a gold medal at a basketball World Championship, when Canada's U19 squad won the title at the 2017 FIBA World Cup in Egypt.

WOW 37: Hishem Azzouz

After identifying a gap in the market, Hishem started a podcast called Recruitment Rollercoaster to bring to light the true failures, learnings, and successes from recruiters and recruitment business owners in the UK.

WOW 38: Darren Burgess and Paddy Steinfort

Darren and Paddy spend their lives getting the world’s best athletes ready to perform. Between them they count Liverpool, Boston Red Sox, Philadelphia 76ers, Arsenal, Melbourne Demons, the Socceroos, Philadelphia Eagles, Toronto Blue Jays, Port Adelaide Power, and Adelaide Crows among their collective experience.

WOW 39: Colin Mansbridge

Colin Mansbridge is the CEO of New Zealand rugby franchise The Crusaders, one of the world’s most successful sporting teams. Since 2000, The Crusaders have won 8 Super Rugby championships, and have only finished outside the semi finals three times in that span. More than their on-field exploits, though, The Crusaders are renowned for their impressive community-focused culture. 

WOW 40: Jerry Colonna

Jerry Colonna is the Founder and CEO of Reboot.io, an executive coaching practice based in Boulder, Colorado. His new book, also called Reboot, is one of the must-read leadership books of the year. 

WOW 41: Ryan Hawk

At college, Ryan battled head-to-head for the starting quarterback role with likely Hall of Famer, Ben Roethlisberger. After college, he took the skills he’d learned on the football field and applied them to selling, rising to VP of Sales at a multi-billion dollar company. Now, he hosts The Learning Leader podcast.

WOW 42: Carly Clarke

Carly Clarke is the head coach of Ryerson University’s women’s basketball program, and an assistant coach of Canada's women's national team. Carly is a real thinker, and after many coffee conversations about coaching, we finally decided to record one of them.

WOW 43: Brian Scudamore

Brian Scudamore is the founder and CEO of O2E Brands, the banner company for 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, WOW 1 DAY PAINTING, and Shack Shine. A pure entrepreneur, Brian's success is a tale of perseverance, failure, trial, and error.

WOW 44: Richard Gerver and Sunny Verma

Two of education’s most disruptive thinkers. This episode is so good that it will need repeat listening.

WOW 45: Cameron Schwab

At age 24, Cameron Schwab was named CEO of one of the Australian Football League's cornerstone teams, the Richmond Football Club. He would go on to also become CEO of Melbourne, and Fremantle, and garnered a reputation for taking on the most difficult culture change projects in the game.  

WOW 46: Meeta Singh

Dr. Singh is the service chief of sleep medicine at the Henry Ford sleep laboratory in Michigan, and has served as a consultant for multiple NFL, MLB, NHL and NBA teams, as well as college athletic programs. This is my most popular episode of the podcast.

WOW 47: Grant Baldwin 

Grant Baldwin is a renowned keynote speaker, known for his humor and the ability to keep the audience in the palm of his hand. Grant’s new book is called The Successful Speaker: Five Steps for Booking Gigs, Getting Paid, and Building Your Platform, and is a must-read for coaches, executives, and (obviously) those who’d like to make a career or a side hustle out of public speaking.

WOW 48: Michael Bungay Stanier

Michael is best known for writing The Coaching Habit, with over 700,000 copies sold. In 2019, he was named the #1 thought leader in coaching, and was shortlisted for the coaching prize by Thinkers50. Despite both being Australians who’ve lived in Toronto for over a decade, we’d never met until this call.

WOW 49: Kristen Hadeed 

Kristen is the founder and CEO of Student Maid, the author of Permission to Screw Up, and in my opinion one of the most refreshing leadership voices to appear in the last decade.

WOW 50: Stephen Rollnick and Richmond Stace

Pain and motivation aren’t two topics that traditionally go together, but I brought together Stephen (of Motivational Interviewing fame) and Richmond (a pioneering pain physiotherapist) to talk about what lies beneath the surface.

WOW 51: Terry Knickerbocker

Terry is an acting coach based in Brooklyn, New York, and counts Academy Award winner Sam Rockwell among his clientele.

WOW 52: Joel Peterson

Joel is the chairman of JetBlue Airways and a professor at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, where he teaches Entrepreneurial Management.

WOW 53: Will Ahmed

Will is the founder and CEO of next-gen wearables company WHOOP. An athlete while he studied at Harvard, Will wrote “The Feedback Tool: Measuring Fitness, Intensity, and Recovery,” which sparked the underlying physiology and engineering for his work today.

WOW 54: Laura Gassner-Otting

Better known simply as LGO, Laura is the bestselling author of Limitless: How to Ignore Everybody, Carve Your Own Path, and Live Your Best Life. It’s an apt book title for someone who blazed her own path into Bill Clinton’s White House and was a member of Hillary Clinton’s National Finance Committee.

WOW 55: Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton

Chester Elton and Adrian Gostick are the founders of The Culture Works, a global training and consulting company focused on creating great places to work. They’re also the bestselling authors of All In, The Carrot Principle, and What Motivates Me.

WOW 56: Marty Lauzon

Marty Lauzon is the director of sports medicine and performance for the Atlanta Falcons, where he is responsible for handling all aspects of the club's athletic training department. Prior to joining Atlanta, Marty spent 10 years with the Cleveland Browns.

WOW 57: Michael Lepp

Mike joined Joe Gibbs Racing at the start of the 2007 and played an instrumental role in building the organization’s pit crew teams that have won over 100 wins and multiple NASCAR championships.

WOW 58: Kirk Ferentz

Kirk Ferentz is the head football coach at the University of Iowa, a role he has held since 1999. Under Ferentz’s leadership the Iowa football program has made 17 bowl game appearances. Prior to joining Iowa, Kirk was hired by Bill Belichick on a Cleveland Browns staff that also included Nick Saban, Ozzie Newsome, Scott Pioli, Thomas Dimitroff, Mike Tannenbaum, Jim Schwartz, Eric Mangini, and Michael Lombardi.

WOW 59: Tony Granato

Tony is the head coach of the Wisconsin Badgers’ men’s hockey program. He played fourteen seasons in the NHL, most notably on the 1993 LA Kings team that made a run to the Stanley Cup Finals, before going on to coach the Colorado Avalanche and US men’s Olympic team.

WOW 60: John Lamont

John Lamont is my former Under-18 coach at the Oakleigh Chargers. “JL” had a massive impact on me as a player, and a lot of his philosophies have helped guide my coaching beliefs and practice. In this episode, we reminisce about our time together, and talk about some of the nuances of being a head coach.

WOW 61: John Herdman

John Herdman is the head coach of Canada's men's national soccer team. Having coached New Zealand's women's national team to two FIFA World Cups in 2007 and 2011, Herdman then took the head coaching role overseeing Canada's women's program. Under his stewardship, Canada won gold at the PanAm Games, won back-to-back bronze medals at the Olympic Games, and hosted a home World Cup.

WOW 62: Lisa Alexander

Lisa is the former head coach of Australia's national netball team, the Diamonds. As Australian coach, Lisa won 83 of her 102 test matches, for an impressive 81% winning record that included a Commonwealth Games gold medal, and a World Cup triumph. After leaving Netball Australia, Lisa has set her sights on an audacious new goal; coaching a men's professional Aussie Rules team.

WOW 63: Peja Lindholm

Peja Lindholm is the head coach of China's national curling team. Peja is one of the greatest curlers of his generation, capturing three world titles as skip of the Swedish men's team. Turning his attention to coaching, he spent nine years as Swedish team head coach, guiding his home country to a further four world titles, and an Olympic silver medal.

WOW 64: Dr. Amy Kruse

Dr. Amy Kruse is a neuroscientist and performance expert best known for her work with DARPA, the United States military's performance research division. Amy's efforts at DARPA generated scientific breakthroughs in areas including augmented cognition, accelerated learning, cognitive enhancement, team neurodynamics, and brain stimulation, and they resulted in the creation of multiple programs that measurably enhanced both individual and team performance in several branches of the US military.

WOW 65: Scott Robertson

Scott Robertson is the head coach of Super Rugby franchise, the Crusaders. A former All Black and Crusaders player, Robertson took over as head coach in 2017 and has led the Christchurch-based team to four straight Super Rugby titles. Over that time, they've maintained an 86% win record. 

WOW 66: Simon Strachan

Simon Strachan is the co-founder and GM of Sport for GainLine Analytics, an innovative company that measures team cohesion in sports franchises. Many of GainLine's findings challenge long-held beliefs about success in professional sport.

WOW 67: Tom Morris

Tom Morris is the head coach of Germany's women's rowing team. 

A psychology major, Tom has coached rowing squads for Australia and Canada (including a medal performance in the Rio Olympics), and worked with Ross Lyon as the Coaching Performance Manager for the Fremantle Dockers.

WOW 68: Emile Studham

Emile Studham is a founding partner at Performance by Design. 

PBD is a culture consultancy specializing in taking frameworks tested and proven in the professional sporting arena, and applying them to corporate environments. They help major organizations from all around the world to create open, honest, and high-performing cultures.  

WOW69: Anthony Seibold

‘Seibs’ is the former head coach of the South Sydney Rabbitohs and Brisbane Broncos in the National Rugby League. Currently, he’s the defensive coach for England’s men’s rugby team.

WOW70: Thomas Gronnemark

Thomas Gronnemark is changing football. His work as a specialized throw-in coach includes stops at heavyweight clubs like Liverpool FC, AFC Ajax, RB Leipzig, KAA Gent, Atlanta United, and FC Midtjylland. 

WOW71: Joanne McCallie

"Coach P" is the former head coach of Duke Women's Basketball. In a career spanning over 30 years, with stops at Maine and Michigan State, Joanne became one of the most decorated coaches in college sports. Now, she's lending her expertise and experience to tackle mental health impairment and the stigma that's still attached to mental health issues.

WOW72: Pippa Grange

Dr. Pippa Grange is a performance psychologist, culture coach, and author of the bestselling book, Fear Less: How to Win at Life Without Losing Yourself. She’s perhaps best known for her work as Head of People and Team Development at The Football Association, where she worked closely with the England men’s team in the lead-up to the World Cup in 2018.

WOW73: Adam Gotsis

Adam Gotsis is a defensive end for the Jacksonville Jaguars in the NFL. 

Originally from Melbourne, Australia, Adam played for four years at Georgia Tech before being drafted in the second round - 63rd overall - by the Denver Broncos.

WOW74: Lisa Fallon

Lisa Fallon is Galway United men's head coach. Lisa has a vast array of coaching experience across men's and women's football, as well as Gaelic Football. Prior to joining Galway, Lisa has held coaching roles with the likes of Chelsea, Cork City, Dublin GAA, and Northern Ireland.

WOW75: Peter DeBoer

Peter DeBoer is the head coach of the Vegas Golden Knights in the NHL. 

Prior to joining Vegas, Peter coached the Florida Panthers, New Jersey Devils, and San Jose Sharks, leading both the Devils and Sharks to the Stanley Cup Finals.

WOW76: Marc Champagne

Marc Champagne returns to Where Others Won't to tell me about his new book, Personal Socrates. Using strong questions from legends and world-class performers like Kobe Bryant, Maya Angelou, and Steven Hawking, Marc shows us how we're all just one question away from a different life. 

WOW77: Joan Ryan

Joan Ryan has done years of extensive research into team chemistry to try to understand whether it actually exists. Having been around the World Series-winning San Francisco Giants team, Joan felt that despite the analytic movement suggesting otherwise, team chemistry just had to be a thing.

In her most recent book, Intangibles, she explores her findings.

WOW78: Doug Lemov and Todd Beane

Doug Lemov's book, The Coach's Guide to Teaching, has become a must-have for any coach, at any level, in any sport. Todd Beane's work at TOVO has had a similar impact, where his team seeks to reframe how we perceive and teach the beautiful game using ideas passed down by the great Johan Cruyff.

WOW79: Cameron Schwab

Cameron becomes the show’s first returning guest, having appeared in WOW45. He is a CEO, leadership coach and strategist. He works with CEOs and emerging leaders to achieve high levels of trust – personally, culturally, strategically and organisationally – as the basis of high performance.

WOW80: Aaron Walsh

"Walshy" is an experienced Performance Coach. Currently working with the Chiefs in Super Rugby as well as consulting a number of teams as they build their mental skills programs. He has worked in MLB, NRL, and with various national teams.

WOW81: Fiona Murden

Fiona Murden is a psychologist and author. Her most recent book, Mirror Thinking: Why Role Models Make Us Human, explores the mirror neuron - a core element of our behaviour and learning that most of us have never heard of.

WOW82: Wade Gilbert

Wade Gilbert is a coaching scientist, performance consultant, professor, and editor of the International Sport Coaching Journal. His book, Coaching Better Every Season, is a staple on every coaching bookshelf, and his research has shaped many of the things we consider to be modern best practices.

WOW83: Brittni Donaldson

Brittni Donaldson won an NBA championship as a member of the Toronto Raptors and is now dedicating herself to reshaping youth development through sport.

WOW84: Kelly Brown and Chris Gibson

Kelly Brown won 64 caps for Scotland Rugby, including 14 as captain. He had a glittering club career, including three Premierships and two European Cups with Saracens. He is currently an assistant coach with Saracens. 

Chris Gibson MBE is a former Lieutenant Colonel with the British military. Chris was given the task of leading the development and delivery of a training model for military and NHS volunteers to combat the Ebola virus in West Africa.

WOW85: Alex Auerbach

Dr. Alex Auerbach is the Director of Wellness and Development for the Toronto Raptors in the NBA. He joined the Raptors after serving as the Director of Clinical and Sport Psychology for the University of Arizona.

WOW86: Pratik Patel and Marc Bubbs

Pratik Patel is a former NFL coach specializing in nutrition and strength. He now consults high-impact individuals on their health and lifestyle. Marc Bubbs is Canada Basketball's performance nutritionist, as well as being the bestselling author of PEAK: The New Science of Athletic Performance That is Revolutionizing Sports.

WOW87: Veronique Richard and Darren Holder

Véronique Richard is a performance psychologist specializing in creativity. She's renowned for her work with Cirque du Soleil, as well as consulting with Cricket Australia, Swimming Australia, and AFL clubs.

Darren Holder is the former coaching director for Cricket Australia, and held the same position with the West Indies, and Maharashtra. He now runs a consulting practice, Coaching Better, where he works with a who's who of the world's coaching talent.

WOW88: Russell Earnshaw

Russell Earnshaw is a coach developer and director at The Magic Academy.

WOW89: Owen Eastwood

Owen Eastwood has worked with some of the most elite teams and groups in the world, including Gareth Southgate's England Football team, the Command Group of NATO, the South African Cricket Team, corporate leadership teams, elite ballet, and the British Olympic team.

He is the author of Belonging: The Ancient Code of Togetherness, which is a must-read for anyone in leadership.