Picture two fish swimming in a bowl. One asks the other, how's the water? The second fish replies, what's water? That's culture, says Maria Angela Calmet, and it's exactly why so many leaders never notice the assumptions shaping how their teams communicate, decide, and trust one another. In this episode…
What if the traits that get someone labeled difficult in one workplace are exactly what makes them extraordinary in another? Tara May, CEO of Aspiritech, a technology company where more than 90 percent of the team is autistic, joins us to talk about what she calls the ROI of kindness,…
Karen Tay built a peer-support program for women navigating workplace bullying and burnout, ran it through Princeton research, and found something a lot of managers don't expect: the problem usually isn't a lack of effort. It's a lack of support. In this Leading Through Change encore, Karen and Lori unpack…
AI is changing every part of how leaders communicate, and Allison Shapira has a warning worth hearing: don't outsource your voice to it. In this conversation, we get into her framework for using AI to amplify authentic leadership instead of replacing it, and why she insists the human isn't just…
One week ago, twin earthquakes tore through the Venezuelan coastline Lori Adams-Brown grew up on. In this solo episode, recorded live and shared here as this week's show, Lori reports what's actually happening on the ground, draws on her firsthand experience coordinating relief after the 2004 Indonesian tsunami, and gives…
Staying isn’t always strength, and walking away isn’t always failure. Sally J. Clarke, co-author of Walk Away: Step Out to Step Up (https://www.walk-away.com/) , joins Lori Adams-Brown to unpack why high-performing leaders so often wait for a crisis before giving themselves permission to leave. • Why a role can look…
What if the most sophisticated leadership framework you've ever encountered was grown in a vineyard? In this episode, Lori sits down with her longtime friend Susie Lipps (https://www.linkedin.com/in/susie-lipps/) , founder of Conversations in the Vineyard (https://www.linkedin.com/company/conversations-in-the-vineyard/) , for a conversation that is equal parts practical wisdom and personal depth. Susie…
Belonging does not mean comfort. Carlee Wolfe of Hyatt Hotels reveals why culture initiatives fail and what high performance actually requires. If your organization put the values on the wall and nothing moved, this conversation explains why. Lori Adams-Brown sits down with Carlee Wolfe, Associate Vice President of Leader Development…
Why do brilliant professionals go silent in meetings? Organizational psychologist Neelu Kaur reveals the hidden cultural forces behind self-advocacy, voice, and power at work. In this episode of A World of Difference, host Lori Adams-Brown sits down with Neelu Kaur, global keynote speaker, organizational psychologist, and author of Be Your…
What if the silence in your meetings has nothing to do with confidence and everything to do with culture? Organizational psychologist Neelu Kaur (https://www.neelukaur.com/) joins Lori Adams-Brown to decode the invisible operating systems shaping how professionals communicate, advocate for themselves, and lead across cultures and organizational hierarchies. IN THIS EPISODE:…
She built a $5M company across 80 countries, sold it, and woke up not knowing who she was. Fiona Macaulay's conversation on identity, failure, and reinvention will change how you think about what comes next. What happens to accomplished women when the role that defined them is gone? In this…
What happens when you spend 18 years building a company to $5 million in revenue across 80 countries, finally sell it, and then wake up with no idea who you are without it? Fiona Macaulay knows that moment intimately, and what she built from it is changing how thousands of…
What does it mean when the only HR professional in a room of 6,000 AI innovators refuses to stay silent? Anju Chaudhary attended HumanX in San Francisco, looked around, and decided that was not a coincidence. It was a calling. In this live conference conversation recorded at HumanX, Lori Adams-Brown…
Live from Move Abroad Con at Hard Rock Hotel San Diego, @loriadams-brown sits down with Shasta Townsend, real estate and relocation expert in Puerto Vallarta, for an honest conversation about what it actually looks like to build a life in Mexico. Shasta has been calling Puerto Vallarta home for nearly…
Most people put New Zealand in the wrong corner of the map, and it changes everything about how they think of it. Mischa Mannix-Opie of Greener Pastures New Zealand sat down with Lori Adams-Brown live at Move Abroad Con in San Diego to set the record straight. Live from Move…
What if the life you have been imagining could actually begin somewhere else? At Move Abroad Con in San Diego, at the Hard Rock Hotel, Lori Adams-Brown stepped onto the conference floor to have three honest conversations with people living and breathing the conference about the expat life. Each one…
What if executive presence has nothing to do with how you look in a room and everything to do with how aware you are in your own body? Presence-based leadership coach Bradley McDevitt joins Lori Adams-Brown to explore why trust is built somatically, not just strategically, and why the discomfort…
What happens to your identity when the system that formed you was built to erase it? In this deeply personal and clear-eyed conversation, New York Times bestselling author Tia Levings returns to A World of Difference with her new book, a survivor's guide that meets you wherever you are on…
She was told to die to herself, that her selfhood was the problem. NYT bestselling author Tia Levings returns with a survivor's guide to recovery after religious trauma. Full Description: What happens to your identity when the system that formed you was built to erase it? Tia Levings, New York…
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE: Why 88% of organizational changes produce no lasting results The science of motivational interviewing (2,000+ randomized control trials) Change talk vs. sustain talk — and why it's 19x more powerful than you think How to reframe resistance as actionable information Why training alone doesn't…
What if the resistance you're seeing in your organization isn't defiance, it's information? What if the way you're talking about change is the very thing blocking it? Episode Summary In this episode of A World of Difference, host Lori Adams-Brown sits down with Jeff Wetherhold, founder of the Sustainable Change…
You were trained for almost everything. Nobody trained you for this. In this solo episode, Lori Adams-Brown draws on her extraordinary career of working in civil war zones, surviving riots targeting American citizens, leading evacuations, and navigating genuine life-or-death threats across multiple countries to name the one threat most leaders…
You were trained for almost everything, except the most dangerous threat in your organization. In this powerful solo episode, Lori Adams-Brown draws on her experience working in conflict zones worldwide to expose the patterns workplace bullies use, and what every leader must do about it. ⏱ Timestamps: 00:00 — Cold…
What if the blueprint for thriving in the AI era has been buried for centuries, inside the civilization that built the pyramids? Organizational psychologist Christine Mikhail (https://www.linkedin.com/in/christine-mikhail-odconsultant/) joins Lori Adams-Brown live from the Transform Conference in Las Vegas (https://transform.us/conference/program-overview-2026/) to unpack one of the most urgent (and under-discussed) challenges in…
