What does a country actually lose when it makes it harder for the world’s top talent to build a life there?

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Vasanthan “Vas” Ramakrishnan — founder and principal consultant of Ascend HSI Advisory Partners, who helps high-skilled scientists, engineers, researchers, and founders navigate the extraordinary-ability pathways into the U.S., and who earned his own green card the same way.

Together they draw the line between wage arbitrage and genuine talent mobility — and make the case that a freer flow of skilled expertise tends to make economies stronger, not weaker.

Tune in to episode 255 to hear how Vas turned a job lost during COVID into an award-winning global nonprofit, why he tells anxious American workers that keeping talent out won’t protect them, and the reframe at the heart of his work: he doesn’t make his clients extraordinary — they already are.

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What if you've been chasing success backwards? What if joy isn't the reward you earn after hitting your goals — but the foundation that makes hitting them inevitable?

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Bose Akadiri — motivational keynote speaker, corporate trainer, and founder and CEO of Goal and Grind LLC, where she's known as “The Joy Amplifier.”

After a decade leading corporate social responsibility at Boeing, Salesforce, and JPMorgan Chase, she wrote The Stay Joyful Method to make the business case for joy — not as a feel-good perk, but as a strategic advantage that drives retention, sharpens clarity, and moves the numbers leaders actually care about.

Tune in to episode 254 to hear why the strongest performers spend time backstage before they take the main stage, how the “joy bubble” becomes a force field when work gets hard, and what it looks like to lead with joy that has a spine — joy that's results-driven and impossible to dismiss as soft.

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In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Suzie Bishop, vice president of product development at The Center for Leadership Studies — the global home of the Situational Leadership® Model — and co-author of the newly released Situational Leadership®: The Model for Leading Others, Navigating Change, and Unlocking Performance.

A Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coach who has spent more than a decade modernizing the world’s most widely used leadership framework, Suzie makes a deceptively simple case — the best leaders don’t lean on one great style; they read the person in front of them and adapt to what the moment actually requires.

Tune in to episode 253 to hear why the well-liked “nice boss” who delegates everything can quietly leave people stranded, the first move for a newly promoted high performer who’s about to fall flat, and the humbling parenting moment that reframed how Suzie thinks about leading people who have already outgrown your instructions.

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Why do so many brilliant, accomplished leaders freeze the moment the stakes get highest — losing the room before they’ve said a single word?

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Kathryn Janicek — a 3x Emmy Award-winning executive presence strategist, former TV news producer, and founder of Janicek Performance Group, where she coaches Fortune 500 leaders for their highest-stakes moments.

Drawing on two decades in live television — including her time as the sole spokesperson during the 2007 I-35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis — Kathryn makes the case that how you show up matters every bit as much as what you say, and that presence is a skill any leader can build.

Tune in to episode 252 to hear why Kathryn calls fear “a terrible creative director,” what a bridge collapse taught her about leading through a crisis, and why, in the age of AI and deepfakes, your audience can tell in an instant when a leader’s words aren’t truly their own. It’s a practical masterclass in showing up when it counts.

AndrewTemte.com

What if building a thriving book of business didn’t require working more hours, chasing leads, or scrambling to get yourself out there — but simply getting better at the conversations you’re already having?

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Deb Feder — founder of Feder Development and author of the Client Conversation Series, including After Hello and her latest, Might I Suggest.

Deb practiced corporate law for more than fifteen years before turning her attention to how lawyers and professionals actually build lasting practices — and her answer has little to do with the perfect elevator pitch and everything to do with intentional, everyday connection. It’s a refreshingly human take on a skill most professionals are never actually taught.

Tune in to episode 251 to hear how caring for her grandmother reshaped the way Deb builds a business, why she pushes back hard on the idea that you’re either a “rainmaker” or you’re not, and her case that the strongest careers are still built one five-minute conversation at a time.

AndrewTemte.com

After 250 episodes of the Balancing Act podcast, the host becomes the guest. Producer Nick Temte steps out from behind the glass to interview his dad — and usual host — Andy Temte, in a milestone conversation about where the show started, what 250 episodes have taught him, and where it’s all going.

Dr. Andrew (Andy) Temte, CFA, is an author, musician, and the former CEO of Kaplan Professional Education. He’s the author of Balancing Act: Teach, Coach, Mentor, Inspire and The Balanced Business, with two more books on the way — The Modern Golden Rule and Stop Standing Still. He founded the Balancing Act in 2019 as a way to have authentic, non-salesy conversations with business leaders, and he closes every episode with the same three words: grace, dignity, and compassion.

Andy traces his own career rocket booster to a sunny August day in 1989, when — rejected by every other Big Ten PhD program — he climbed to the sixth floor of Phillips Hall at the University of Iowa to meet finance department chair Carl Schweser. A scheduled 30-minute interview became a two-hour conversation, and a lifelong mentorship that shaped everything that followed. From there, Nick and Andy retrace the origins of the show, the 2008 Great Recession story behind “grace, dignity, and compassion,” and the home studio where their father-son partnership — and their music — began.

What if the metrics you’re chasing — the downloads, the likes, the impressions — are quietly steering your business in the wrong direction?

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Tom Schwab — founder and CEO of Interview Valet and author of Podcast Guest Profits. A U.S. Naval Academy graduate and engineer who found his way into marketing, Tom brings a systems mindset to one deceptively simple question — what are you actually optimizing for? — and to the conversations that actually grow a business, from why most podcasts die in their first ten episodes to what it takes for a leader to step out from behind the brand in an AI-driven world.

Along the way, Tom makes the case that the more technology we gain, the more human we become — and that we may all be just one conversation away from the relationship that changes everything.

Tune in to episode 249 to hear Tom’s two mentorship moments — one for the young engineer worried their degree boxed them in, one for the CEO afraid to build a public voice — and his lightning-round reminder that relationships are the one currency inflation has never touched.

AndrewTemte.com

What if the conversations your team isn’t having are costing you more than the ones it is?

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Gustavo Razzetti — culture change instigator, CEO of Fearless Culture, and bestselling author of Remote, Not Distant, Stretch for Change, and his new book Forward Talk: The Bold New Method For Getting Teams Unstuck.

Gustavo introduces the concept of conversational debt — the compound cost of the conversations teams avoid — and unpacks the three destructive patterns that keep teams trapped: avoidance, blame, and groupthink. He explains why the corporate obsession with psychological safety has become a bandage for deeper issues, and why getting unstuck isn’t about better meetings — it’s about better conversations.

Tune in to episode 248 to hear Gustavo’s rocket-booster moment about a CEO who chose to trust his team before taking the client’s side, two mentorship moments — one for the CHRO investing in change capabilities, one for the CEO who just wants his teams to "get along" — and his closing reflection on the pointlessness paradox that quietly drains team performance.

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