“An Oscar-winning producer” is quite the click bait descriptor of this episode’s guest, but we would be remiss to leave it at that. Michael Sugar, an American film and television producer and principal at Sugar23, is first and foremost a good human being with a powerful message to all of us often running the rat race of life and career growth. Find and embrace what makes us happy now! After winning the Academy Award for the movie "Spotlight", he’s had an epiphany of not putting happiness as a goal anymore and instead reprogramming focus on opportunities one has versus those one lost. Listen in as we chat with Michael about:

• Why humility is a critical part of his life.
• All the feelings he felt the morning after winning an Oscar.
• How Sugar23 is transforming the way brands connect with people (and their wallets) through heart.
• Marrying entertainment with brand storytelling.
• Why entry point of passion trumps the brand awareness metrics.

MICHAEL SUGAR is the CEO and Founder of Sugar23 - a management, production and private equity company. He was awarded the Oscar® for Best Picture for “Spotlight,” starring Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, and Rachel McAdams. Sugar’s recent Executive Producer credits include MSNBC’s docuseries “The Turning Point,” “Knox Goes Away,” and the Apple TV+ series “Dickinson,” which garnered a Peabody Award, a Golden Tomato Award, and numerous nominations. Sugar represents an impressive roster of literary and talent clients in addition to his producorial duties. He is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the Producer’s Guild of America, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and lectures regularly at USC, NYU, Columbia, and the American Film Institute. He has been nominated for multiple Emmys and Golden Globes, and has received two Television Academy Honors, two AFI awards, and two Peabody Awards.

It was theater and Broadway where she initially hoped to pave her professional path. Instead, she fell in love with the process of writing and her very first novel became an instant success. Liesl Shurtliff is the New York Times bestselling author of 'Rump: The (Fairly) True Tale of Rumpelstiltskin' and other books in the (Fairly) True Tales series and the Time Castaways trilogy. Her books have been named to several state award lists and have won many awards, including a Children’s Book Award from the International Literacy Association. Liesl lives with her husband and four children in Chicago and found some time to chat with us about:

• Finding her voice as a writer
• The importance of seeing any experience from all sides
• Why audiences resonate with things that are both familiar and new
• How her passion for theater and Broadway influence her work
• Impact of fame on her confidence and understanding her limitations
• Learning to chill out
• Her approach to connecting with the audience on a personal level
• The need to finish, as you can revise bad writing but not a blank page

If you think geeking out on a seemingly mundane pantry item like ketchup isn’t possible, join us for an intriguing conversation with former Kraft Heinz Chief Growth Officer Sanjiv Gajiwala. He is a consumer-first brand builder and storyteller with a track record of strategic repositioning to drive growth - having worked on iconic brands like Heinz, Oscar Mayer and Pabst Blue Ribbon as well as category disrupting innovation like White Claw Hard Seltzer.

Sanjiv loves bringing new consumer experiences to life by understanding evolving culture and communication, while leading teams that thrive on the wild imagination of the impossible. He gets a sense of that impossible while living in Chicago with his wife, a 4 year old, 8 month old and a 2 year old puppy. In our candid chat, we cover:

• How being a child of immigrants guides his career choices.
• Why he’s actually excited about fragmentation of audiences.
• 'Anything is possible' mentality enables thinking about multiple solutions.
• Dedicating time for experimenting outside of your immediate industry.
• Leadership through vulnerability allows for a truer version of oneself.
• Views on the meaning of a community and how it could define brand love.
• Passion project around preservation of memories and what role brands could play in that space.

In this captivating podcast episode, we sit down with Daniel Bulteel, the marketing executive who has conquered the worlds of agency, brand, platform, and start-up.

With his extensive background at renowned companies like WPP, adidas, TikTok, ByteDance, and now Build A Rocket Boy, Dan brings a wealth of expertise in social media, creator, and community marketing.

Join us as Dan shares his insights on the true essence of social media – connecting people to the things they genuinely care about. Discover how he guides us to become our own temperature check while creating content and how we can accelerate our knowledge by studying and mastering the algorithms of each platform, and watching the superstars that do that every day, creators.

So, grab your headphones, buckle up, and prepare for a thought-provoking conversation that combines Dan's impressive professional journey with invaluable lessons on crafting compelling content.

Whether you're an aspiring marketer or a seasoned pro, this episode is packed with wisdom to help you thrive in the ever-evolving landscape of digital marketing.

A self-proclaimed amateur gardener and often dubbed CMO whisperer Lindsey Slaby is the founder of Sunday Dinner, a brand strategy consultancy that helps marketers re-imagine their marketing organization, agency models, and overall comms strategy. Recognized by Ad Age as 40 under 40, executives at Fortune 100 companies seek her out to stay closely connected to new ways of innovative collaboration and to have a finger on the pulse of the ever-shifting advertising partner landscape. She counts Target, MassMutual, NBCUniversal, & Abbvie among her clients and also manages a highly regarded global invite-only community of top marketers, creatives, and consultants appropriately called the Sunday Dinner community. We sat down with Lindsey to talk about her personal journey and her impactful work behind the marketing scenes:

• How gardening gives her energy and serves as a creative outlet.
• Building a great career doesn’t require a linear path.
• A Sunday dinner idea that evolved into a powerful online and offline community as well as a way of working.
• Why the structure in companies often keeps us from doing great work.
• Her north star of building better marketing orgs.
• Life of an introvert in an extroverted industry.
• Her contagious passion for anything and everything related to contracts.
• The current state of pressure and noise surrounding CMOs and marketing execs.

From his first job at a flower stand when he was 13 to leadership roles within the discipline of innovation, Barry McGeough has been on an incredible career journey at Fortune 500 companies in the footwear, apparel, and tech sectors. He loves to think on his feet and connect ideas to practical solutions. Growing up in a humble environment equipped him with resilience and skills to solve for the unknown. Since then, he’s driven exponential brand growth for some of the world’s most iconic brands like The North Face, Speedo, Merrell, Saucony, Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger. Most recently as Wolverine Worldwide’s Global Vice President of Innovation. In our fireside chat, Barry shares:

• How cooking served as an entry point to the space of curiosity.
• Why he believes in the idea of saying “yes” to pretty much anything.
• The spark behind being told he can’t do something.
• His contemplation about opening a muffin stand when s*&t hit the fan.
• Relentless focus on radical productization in the innovation discipline.
• Beliefs around trust earned leadership.
• How he’s learned from experience to let go of rigidity.

A passionate and driven human who is excelling both in her career and in her personal life - Singleton Beato has graced us with her presence for this episode. At work, she’s relentlessly driving all dimensions of diversity in her role as a global EVP, Chief Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer at McCann Worldgroup. At home, she is a rare aspiration for us in her three decades of happily married bliss. True to our podcast name, we dove deep into the secret behind her lasting relationships, her leadership journey, and the state of DE&I. In our candid conversation, Beato shares:

• The “ultimate secret” to any successful relationship.
• How she’s fully embedded in the richness of diversity.
• Importance of making room for other people’s journeys and stories.
• Endearing and charming aspects of cultural differences
• Why the DE&I focus has softened.
• What gets her excited about the future of the DE&I initiatives.

With over 25 years of experience as an accomplished executive, Singleton is recognized for her success driving large scale people and organizational change initiatives across a wide range of industries, having held talent leadership roles at J. Walter Thompson, Crunch Fitness International, and Bloomberg L.P. She was named one of 2019’s Most Influential Women In Corporate America by Savoy Magazine, one of AdWeek’s 2020 Women Trailblazers and one of New York’s Most Outstanding Corporate Citizens.

Davide Grasso makes top level leadership seem effortless. His mindset is to work with people on something great every day and to end each day in a better shape than it started. It’s no surprise he’s been on a remarkable international career journey at some of the world’s most recognized and loved brands. Starting out as a product line manager for Nike, and progressing to the CMO role at the Swoosh. Today he holds the CEO reigns at the Italian luxury car manufacturer Maserati. We were privileged to chat with Davide about his leadership journey and pull back the curtain on:

• His competitive spirit and instinct to follow his passion.
• The importance of creating value in everything he does.
• The ability to move massive organizations toward a common vision.
• The biggest challenge of letting go while building resilience.
• Why he enjoys the power of a good crisis.
• His take on creativity and the pitfalls of not putting the customer at the center.
• How he went about bringing Maserati to profitability.