Kerry Siggins Podcast

One of the most important attributes to becoming successful is self-discipline. It’s almost impossible to achieve excellence without it. Self-discipline helps you stay focused; it gives you the grit to stick with something even when it’s difficult. It helps you choose to win the long game over short-term gratification. Self-discipline allows you to overcome obstacles and deal with the discomfort of pushing yourself to new heights. With enough self-discipline, you can form life-long, positive habits; once you create a habit, it no longer requires discipline, and you propel yourself towards success because it’s what you do day in and day out.
What is self-discipline? Essentially, it’s the ability to control your impulses, emotions, reactions, and behaviors. It’s the ability to forego short-term gratification in favor of long-term satisfaction and gain. It’s basically saying no when you really want to say yes.
The word self-discipline makes most people shudder just uttering it but being self-disciplined isn’t about leading a restrictive and boring life void of enjoyment, relaxation, and fun. In fact, it’s next to impossible to be self-disciplined in all areas of your life and I don’t recommend it. Instead, you should use self-discipline to focus your energies on what’s most important to you. Let it help you make the tradeoff between the short and long term to make better choices. You’ll be happier when you have formed habits that make your life better in the long run.
So how do you become more self-disciplined? Here are my tricks:
1. Make a self-discipline list. You can’t achieve your goals without discipline, so supplement your list with what you need to do to be disciplined enough to achieve them.
2. Use a daily “success” list to keep track of the three most important things you need to get done each day to achieve your goals. These three things should coincide with your discipline list.
3. Figure out what your barriers to success are. Are you trying to lose weight? Get the junk food out of your house. Do you want to be more productive at work? Close your email application and only check your emails twice per day.
4. Share your goals with others. It’s easier to stick with something when you’ve made a public commitment; the desire not to fail in front of others can be highly motivating.
5. Do it for someone else. I know the saying goes, “don’t do it for others, do it for yourself,” but I have found I am much more disciplined when considering how my actions, behaviors, emotions, and impulses affect others.
6. Stop making excuses. Don’t wait for tomorrow; do it now.
Tune in for more details.
Question of the Episode
This week’s question came from a young woman who reached out after heading my give a keynote and she asked, “Should I give feedback in an email so it’s documented?”
My answer: no! Listen to find out why and how to handle this situation like a pro.
Like this? Check out more at my website: www.kerrysiggins.com

Guest: Adam Mendler is the Chief Executive Officer of The Veloz Group, where he co-founded and oversees ventures across a wide variety of industries such as Beverly Hills Chairs, a leading office furniture e-tailer; Custom Tobacco, a one-of-a-kind cigar customization e-commerce platform; and Veloz Solutions, a technology consulting and software development practice.
Adam is also the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he regularly elicits insights from America’s top CEOs, founders, athletes, celebrities, and political and military leaders. Adam has written extensively on leadership, management, entrepreneurship, marketing and sales, authoring over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost. Adam’s Lessons in Leadership series in Thrive Global and other media projects total more than 500 one-on-one interviews with America’s top leaders. Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America’s top leaders as a keynote speaker to companies, universities and non-profit organizations on leadership and related topics.
Episode in a Tweet: Values are more than a list of attributes posted on a company’s website. The best way to get a feel for company culture is to walk through the organization and ask people what it’s like to work there.
Quick Background: In this week’s episode of Reflect Forward, Adam Mendler, CEO of The Veloz Group, and I what it takes to build a corporate culture and the value of building a strong team. He shares his philosophy on company values and why focus is key to success. He talks about what it’s like to be in business with his brother and the difficulty of separating family and work. Adam also tells us how he started writing and keynote speaking.
You can find Adam on his website: www.adammendler.com

It’s Thanksgiving week here in the U.S., and that time of year when we pause to give thanks. But gratitude is much more powerful when practiced regularly.
I am not the kind of person who writes in a gratitude journal. I don’t wake up every morning and run through the list of things I am grateful for. As my good friend Chris Schembra, the “Gratitude Guru” says, gratitude journals are bullshit.”
Instead, I practice gratitude in the moment. Like when I am climbing mountains and racing down them on my mountain bike, feeling overwhelmed by the scenery, my awesome bike, and my body can do such things.
I feel gratitude in the moment when my son, Jack, cuddles with me, and we laugh and tease each other.
I feel gratitude when my dog Johnnie puts his head on my shoulder in Shavasana after my yoga practice.
But what I am most grateful for are the hard things in life. I know that may sound odd, but truly, I am. There are so many gifts in difficult situations; you gain insight, solve problems and grow. I wouldn’t be where I am today without hitting rock bottom, and I am grateful for what I learned about myself and my others through the journey back from rock bottom.
In this week’s episode of Reflect Forward: Advice From a CEO, I share stories of how being grateful for hard things can change your perspective. Hopefully, it will inspire you to dig deep and find gratitude for the adversity you’ve overcome and how it shaped who you are today.
Question of the Episode
This week’s question comes from a woman who heard me speak at an event a few weeks back. “Kerry, I want to learn how to be an exceptional manager. What are your favorite management books, and should I read them?”
I love this question because I love to read. My answer was First Break All the Rules by Marcus Buckingham and Radical Candor by Kim Scott.
Tune in to find out why!

Guest: Based in Singapore, Maulik Parekh is an avid entrepreneur, highly sought-after keynote speaker, and bestselling author of Futureproof Your Career and Company. Over the years, with his popular leadership seminars and workshops, he has inspired over 10,000 leaders and prepared them for the increasingly disruptive future.
Prior to his entrepreneurial and literary ventures, Maulik was an award-winning CEO of global companies such as Inspiro and SPi Global. Under his leadership, these companies won over 100 awards, including Best Company of the Year, Best Employer of the Year, and Best Leadership Team of the Year. He was recognized as the ICT CEO of the Year. Maulik holds an International MBA from the Thunderbird School of Global Management.
When he is not busy futureproofing leaders, he is busy childproofing his home for his two young daughters.
Episode in a Tweet: AI is going to change the way we work. Learn how to futureproof your career and company.
Quick Background: Maulik Parekh is a businessman, angel investor, and highly sought-after keynote speaker. In this episode of Reflect Forward, he shares his thoughts on how three powerful trends: artificial intelligence, digital natives, and the gig economy, are going to transform the way we work. Maulik and I talk about how to upskill employees, how to avoid failure during your digital transformation, how to embrace seemingly different skills to avoid being obsolete. He advises on how to futureproof your career and company regardless of your industry. My favorite part of the episode is when he shares why he’s teaching his daughter to be like Leonardo da Vinci. Maulik also describes why the next decade will be the most disruptive and give actionable and easy-to-understand examples.
Maulik is insightful and energizing, and I am sure you will enjoy this interview as much as I did!
Find Maulik here:
https://www.maulikparekh.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/iammaulikparekh/
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08L7HBTJW?ref_=pe_3052080_276849420

In this week's episode, I talk about the power of positive intelligence and a new program I am going through aimed at helping you understand your inner critic, your inner saboteurs, and how to know when those judgmental voices in your head are highjacking you.
The Positive Intelligence (PQ) program was developed by Shirzad Chamine, the author of the New York Times bestselling "Positive Intelligence." He has been the CEO of the largest coach training organization globally, having trained faculty at Stanford and Yale business schools.
The premise of PQ is mental fitness: how do you handle the curveballs life throws at you. Activating your inner Sage, the voice that is calm, rational, and full of discernment, is so important today because who isn't getting curve balls thrown at them. All leaders have faced so many challenges over the past few years, and if you're like me, you've certainly second-guessed yourself. You've had self-doubt. You've tried to control things. You've gotten upset. You've been attempting to over rationalize. All of these are the voices of our saboteurs, and they make us show up in a way that we don't want to show up. When we show up in negative ways that hurt not only ourselves, but we also hurt our relationships with others, and it can create unnecessary negative situations,
The PQ program teaches you how to tap into positive intelligence and use your Sage - the calm, empathetic, innovative voice that drowns out the saboteurs - to help you live a more positive, healthy, and less judgmental life.
The program is remarkable, and it's helped me gain a deeper understanding of myself and others. I recognize when my controller saboteur kicks in and pushes me to control the outcome. I can see when my hyper achiever saboteur dries me to do more, even though I don't want to.
You can check out the program here: https://www.positiveintelligence.com/
I highly recommend trying the program; it only takes 6 weeks, and you'll feel better and have a lot more knowledge about your inner workings.
Question of the Episode
This week's question comes from a LinkedIn member who asked, "What's the biggest myth you'd like to dispel about being a CEO?"
My answer: that CEOs have all the answers! Tune in to find why.

Guest: Amy Parsons is the CEO and co-founder of Mozzafiato, an e-commerce DTC business that imports Italian luxury brands in beauty and men’s grooming and sells at retail in the US. Amy launched Mozzafiato during the middle of the pandemic in 2020, leaving a 20-year career as an attorney and university executive to focus exclusively on starting up the company. Today, one year into running Mozzafiato, the company represents 20 different heritage brands, selling approximately 1,000 products on its site and has been featured in Vogue, Travel & Leisure, the Robb Report, among others, and is working to quickly scale to be an industry leader in the beauty and grooming industry. Amy is also a member of YPO (Young President’s Organization).
Episode in a Tweet: Starting a new career is never easy. How this CEO left the safety a job as a university exec to launch a fiercely authentic luxury Italian beauty brand.
Quick Background: Amy Parsons has never been a risk-taker. She built her career on doing what was expected. Go to law school. Work for a great law firm. Become in-house corporate conical for a well-respected company. Take an executive position with a State University. And then the pandemic hit and made her rethink everything. She had a stable job as the Executive Chancellor at Colorado State University (CSU), but it left her questioning, “Am I really making the impact I would like? Am I living my passion?” It became clear that it was risker to stay than it was to leave, and she made the leap to co-found the Italian luxury beauty and men’s grooming brand, Mozzafiato.
And what a leap it was! During our interview, Amy shares how she overcame her fear, taking a risk on herself. She details how important a team is in a start-up and how she handles the stress of running a startup. We talk about how what you tolerate becomes what’s expected and how to manage your energy to show up as the best version of yourself. It’s a magical interview and I know you will love Amy as much as I do!
How to find Amy:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/amybuildingmozzafiato/
https://www.instagram.com/amybuildingmozzafiato/
https://mozzafiato.com/
https://www.instagram.com/iammozzafiato/

In this week’s episode, I talk about setting boundaries around your work, not just for you but your team as well.
Two weeks ago, I held a planning and team-building session with my executive management team. We all read Berne Brown’s book “Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts” and had an enlightening conversation about Armored Leadership vs. Daring Leadership.
Berne covers two models of leadership. The first she labels “Armored Leadership,” a style of leadership defined by characteristics such as driving perfectionism and fostering fear, working from scarcity and squandering opportunities for joy and recognition, and being a knower and being right. These have a profoundly negative effect in the workplace, creating fear, uncertainly, and disengagement.
Alternatively, leaders can embrace daring leadership, which is essentially the opposite of armored leadership. Examples include Modeling and encouraging healthy striving, empathy, and self-compassion, practicing gratitude and celebrating milestones and victories, and being a learner and getting it right.
As my team began talking about daring vs. armored leadership, something interesting came up: comparing numbing (armored leadership) and setting boundaries and finding REAL comfort (daring leadership). We explored how perhaps we were numbing by taking on too much and not setting real boundaries about what we say yes to and what we say no to.
I loved this conversation – it was real and deep. We explored tradeoffs: slowing down to speed up and building internal infrastructure vs. driving new revenue streams. We talked about how it’s sometimes easier to just say “yes” to taking on extra work without exploring what we will stop doing. And how numbing can mean so much more than what we typically think: using substance, food, and screens to distract ourselves from what’s making us miserable.
This was such a great exercise and an excellent way to explore Dare to Lead. Tune in to find out more!
Question of the Episode
This week’s question came from a friend of mine. She asked, “you always seem so joyful. Can you tell me what you do? How do you find so much joy and happiness in life? What can I do?
During this episode, I share five things to do to find joy in these crazy times: move my body and eat a salad every day, meditate on feelings of gratitude, focus on my purpose, be kind to everyone I interact with, and focus on building stronger relationships. Tune in for the details!

Guest: Adam Bryant is a respected and noted expert on executive leadership, whose work includes 525 Corner Office columns for the New York Times. He joined The ExCo Group as Managing Director and Partner after a distinguished career as an editor and journalist. Adam has a proven ability to distill real-world lessons and insights from his hundreds of interviews and turn them into practical tools, presentations and exercises to help The ExCo Group clients deepen their leadership benches and strengthen their teams. He works with executive leadership teams and organizations to foster a culture of innovation, based on a best-practices framework he developed for his widely praised book, "The CEO Test: Master the Challenges That Make or Break All Leaders."
Before joining The ExCo Group, Adam worked for 30 years as a journalist, including 18 years as a reporter, editor and columnist at The New York Times. He interviewed more than 500 CEOs for "Corner Office," a weekly series on leadership and management in The Times that he created in 2009.
Episode in a Tweet: Take the CEO Test! Learn what tests you need to pass to be an exceptional leader and change the world.
Quick Background: They had me at the title. A CEO Test??? I hadn't heard of any such thing, and I knew I had to find out if I would pass the test. The average CEO only lasts five years in the job, and I wanted to find out why. What was I doing differently, being that I've been in the CEO role at StoneAge for over 12 years and still have a long runway ahead of me? Would I pass or fail? Have I just been lucky, or am I doing a few things right? I waited with anticipation for the book to arrive. Once I read it, I was a fan. "The CEO Test" is one of the best books I've read in 2021. I appreciate the "tests" Adam and his co-author line out and once I finished the book, I reached out to Adam to get to know him and his firm.
During this episode, Adam and I talk about the challenges leaders face today and how they can overcome the obstacles and crises that will undoubtedly continue to come their way. Adam shares his views on a leader's superpower. News flash, it's not what you might think! We also talk about the importance of a clear and simple strategy and a business's reason for existing. Adam also shares what it was like to be a reporter and editor at one of the country's largest newspapers, The New York Times.
This is an insightful and motivating episode and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!
How to find Adam:
https://adambryantbooks.com/
https://www.excoleadership.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/adambryantleadership/
Subscribe to his newsletters:
https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/the-new-director-s-chair-6495698283434901505/
https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/leading-in-the-b-suite-6516489087090782208/
https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/art-of-leading-6509860728994881536/
https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/strategic-chro-6495697551163957248/

In this week’s episode of Advice From a CEO on Reflect Forward, I talk about trust. We each look at trust uniquely. Trust is a complex word with many meanings. For me, the fastest way to break trust is to lie to me. I have been burned many times by people I’ve given second chances only to find out that they’ve lied to me.
For others, it might look like not following through on commitments. Or relentless teasing. Or publicly criticizing.
I share a story about recently asking a question about trust on our quarterly performance conversations: “when has your manager broken your trust?”
This question caused quite a stir and got the intended result: deeper conversations about what trust means to each of us at StoneAge.
Listen in to hear how it turned out and listen to some tips on creating trust as given by Nan Russell on Psychology Today.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/trust-the-new-workplace-currency/201206/10-behaviors-demonstrate-trust
Question of the Episode
This week’s question comes from a follower on LinkedIn. He asked, “Kerry, we all know you love asking questions. What’s your favorite question to ask?”
There are many but the most powerful question I ask is, “What do you think?”
Tune in to find out why I ask this all the time and what kind of conversations it can create!

Guest: David Meltzer is the Co-Founder of Sports 1 Marketing and formerly served as CEO of the renowned Leigh Steinberg Sports & Entertainment agency, the inspiration for the movie Jerry Maguire. Considered one of the top sports entrepreneurs and investors, David is also a three-time international best-selling author, a Top 100 Business Coach, and host of the top entrepreneur podcast, The Playbook.
David is the Executive Producer of the Bloomberg and Amazon television series 2 Minute Drill and Office Hours. He is also the executive producer of Entrepreneur’s #1 digital business show, Elevator Pitch. David is featured in many books, movies, and TV shows such as World’s Greatest Motivators, Think and Grow Rich: The Legacy and Beyond the Secret, airing on Netflix. Additionally, Variety Magazine has recognized him as their Sports Humanitarian of the Year and awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.
Episode in a Tweet: What do you do when your wife says she’s leaving you and you lose all your money? Take stock in who you are, change your life, and be of service.
Quick Background: I met David when he interviewed me on his show Office Hours and we instantly connected. Much like me, David isn’t afraid to talk about his flaws or show his emotions. During this enriching and fun interview, David shares how his wife and mother inspired him to turn his less-than-authentic life around. He talks about how he bounced back after losing $100M and went on a mission to add value to every person he met. From his success, he decided to try to empower OVER 1 BILLION people to be happy! This simple yet powerful mission has led him on an incredible journey to provide one thing…VALUE. And this is what you get in this episode.
David gives us his whole self, showing up with humor, honesty and integrity. You can’t help but love him and I hope you enjoy it!
Link to Register: https://free.dmeltzer.com/training

Watch David’s mission to empower over 1 Billion people: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UOJH4zkdwE
Social Handles:
Twitter, Instagram, YouTube: @davidmeltzer
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/davidmeltzer11/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmeltzer2/
Text Community: (949) 298-2905
Email David directly to register for training or to get his book: david@dmeltzer.com