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Are you a business owner, executive, leader, team leader, aspiring future leader, leadership junkie, a scientist, a design thinker, or simply the leader of your own life? If you are, then you are a leader, and as such, you should be experimenting!

Welcome to The Experimental Leader, a podcast where we tackle the ways leaders are experimenting in their own work. Hosted by Melanie Parish and Dr. Mel Rutherford, we dive into the most interesting questions about leaders and get into real-life conversations about how people might be experimenting with their leadership. What they are trying? How they are leading and managing their flow of work and throughput? How are they managing bottlenecks, mission, vision, strategic, operational, and tactical intents? How do they organize experiments? How do they succeed? How do they fail? How do they collect data?

The loneliness of leadership can be overwhelming, especially when a leader gets promoted and doesn’t have a roadmap for how to lead. They might feel like they are supposed to have the answers, and yet they have to figure out what that really means. The hardest part can be not having anyone to talk to about their leadership journey.

Driving Business Success Through DEI with Shirley Engelmeier

  The show’s guest in this episode is Shirley Engelmeier. She has helped global Fortune 500 companies and emerging organizations develop and implement DEI initiatives that drive business results. With her passion for teaching businesses to leverage inclusion to drive employee engagement, productivity, innovation and retention, Engelmeier began to share her philosophies and thought leadership on DEI in books designed for c-suite leaders and executives. —   Listen to the podcast here  Driving Business Success Through DEI with Shirley Engelmeier Well, hello, Mel. It’s great to be here with you today. Hi Melanie. I’m Melanie Parish, and I’m oneRead More

Navigating Gender Diversity with Dr. Lulu

  The show’s guest in this episode is Dr. Lulu. She is a former Lt. Col and Commander in the U.S. Air Force, CEO of Dr. Lulu’s Coaching & Consulting Lounge and President of Dr. Lulu’s Angel’s Haven, a nonprofit organization helping create safe spaces for (homeless) LGBTQ youth. A multiple award-winning Queer, Nigerian-born pediatrician, gender and sexuality coach, and LGBTQ+ educator. She is also the chief host of Moms 4 Trans Kids Podcast. She is a mother of 3, her eldest is a transgender young adult woman.  She is a Youth Suicide Prevention Activist and former host of SuicideRead More

Building Better Workplaces Through Kind Leadership with Christy Pretzinger

  The show’s guest in this episode is Christy Pretzinger. She transformed the landscape of healthcare content creation and, along the way, transformed what it’s like to work at a growing agency. As the owner and CEO of WG Content, she has established an industry-leading company that delivers superior content and strategy to healthcare brands nationwide. How did she do it? She intentionally focused on building the business based on kindness. —   Listen to the podcast here  Building Better Workplaces Through Kind Leadership with Christy Pretzinger Hello. I’m Melanie Parish, and I’m excited to be here with you. I’mRead More

Leading Change: Effective Decision-Making and Team Involvement

  —   /center> Listen to the podcast here  Leading Change: Effective Decision-Making and Team Involvement — Hello. I’m Melanie Parish, and I am one of your hosts of the experimental leader podcast. I am an executive coach, a team coach, a consultant, and I’m super happy to be here with you today. Hi. I’m Mel Rutherford. I’m McMasters first transgender department chair. I’m one of the CO hosts of the experimental leader podcast, and I’m happy to be here today. Well, what are you thinking about today, Mel? Well, I was thinking last week I went to aRead More

Radical Inclusivity

  —   Listen to the podcast here  Radical Inclusivity — Hi, Mel. Hi, Melanie. Well, I guess we should introduce ourselves. I’m Melanie Parrish, and I’m an executive coach. I’m a content creator and a podcast host, and it’s super exciting to be here with you today. I’m Mel Rutherford. I’m a professor of psychology, neuroscience and behavior at McMaster University, and I’m McMasters first transgender department chair. Yeah. So we don’t do this a lot, like often we have guests on our podcast, but I thought it would be really interesting to spend some time with youRead More

Experimenting with Collective Agreements with Jane Mulkewich

The show’s guest in this episode is Jane Mulkewich . She is from Hamilton, Ontario, and has had a varied career leading to her current position as Legal Director of a large union (UFCW Locals 175 & 633) leading a team of lawyers and providing legal services to more than 70,000 workers in workplaces across Ontario. She likes to say she went from the law-makers (as a political staffer) to the law-enforcers (doing high-profile anti-racism work in the Office of the Chief of the Hamilton Police Service) to becoming a lawyer later in life. Other than labor law, she hasRead More

Experimenting with Learning about Sexuality with Dr. Kim Alexander

  The show’s guest in this episode is Dr. Kim Alexander. She is a Canadian Obstetrician/Gynaecologist specializing in HPV Disease and Vulvar Health. She is a Certified Facilitator for the OWL: Our Whole Lives comprehensive SexEd curriculum and the curriculum designer for GrownUps: Your Sexual Self, a week-long workshop for adults exploring healthy sexuality. Dr. Alexander is the author of an upcoming book on sexual health and writes the monthly Savvy Sex Ed column for the Medical Post. —   Listen to the podcast here  Experimenting with Learning about Sexuality with Dr. Kim Alexander Hello. I’m Melanie Parish andRead More

White People Work: Anti-Racism Work for White People

The show’s guest in this episode is Melanie Parish and Beverly Horton. Melanie Parish is an author, speaker, podcast host, founder of Experimental Leader Academy, and Master Certified Coach. An expert in problem-solving, constraints management, operations, strategic hiring, and brand development, Melanie has consulted and coached organizations ranging from a Fortune 50 company to IT start-ups. As the author of The Experimental Leader book, Melanie shows people new ways of thinking about their leadership, informed by her understanding of the fast-paced ride of technology innovation. Beverly has a strong background in education and a deep commitment to delivering high qualityRead More

Healing and Transformation: Unveiling the Power Within with Gul Sonmez

  The show’s guest in this episode is Gül Sönmez. She is an Intuitive Healer & Transformational Coach and Mindfulness Trainer, internationally renowned for her ability to find and heal people’s past traumas and buried memories, so they can overcome anxieties, self-doubt, stress and procrastination in order to live aligned, purposeful lives. With 15 years of experience working in big multinationals (including P&G, Coca-Cola, Amazon), She has transformed her working life by learning deep healing techniques and finding alternative solutions to her own struggles. Since then, she has used her incredible gifts, to not only radically change her own life,Read More

Transitioning in the Workplace with Hannah Howard

The show’s guest in this episode is Hannah Howard. She brings over 15 years of customer service leadership experience in technology driven environments. She has been a driving force in creating high performing teams and boosting customer engagement with increasing revenues. She has a background in spanning program development, change expertise, and a knack for cross functional teamwork. —   Listen to the podcast here  Transitioning in the Workplace with Hannah Howard Hello, and welcome to The Experimental Leader Podcast. I’m Melanie Parish. Hi, I’m Mel Rutherford. It’s great to be here with you today. I’m an executive coach,Read More

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