Distracted Driving Podcast: Recent Episodes
Sean Genovese, Rex Williams
With decades of experience navigating large bureaucracies, Rex Williams and Sean Genovese discuss the distractions that get in the way of driving change in an organization.
With the holiday season upon us, we’re officially ending our first season of the Distracted Driving Podcast. Thank you for watching and listening, we’re excited to bring you more enticing conversations in the new year!
In the fourth and final episode of the conversation with Kevin Meredith, Rex and Sean do some professional blabberating, covering topics from school safety, experiential learning, and opportunity cost.
Is there any completely original content anymore? Probably not. But that’s a good thing, because when it comes to innovation, new is not enough. Outside of Glacier National Park and in the midst of a year-long road trip around the United States, Kevin Meredith discusses the need to mature our thinking about innovation and entrepreneurship and steps through his model for incubating innovation. Start building innovation muscle memory and listen to this episode of the Distracted Driving Podcast. #innovation #nostatusquo #entrepreneurship
Not every bit of creativity is going to have value, but creativity is the cost of entry for innovation. When creativity meets a stakeholder, you get innovation, but it may not be a commercial venture. How do you take something that’s innovative and make it profitable? That’s what Kevin Meredith helps people do, and that’s the topic of conversation for this episode of Distracted Driving.
If you like innovation and entrepreneurship, you’ll like this episode of Distracted Driving. Kevin Meredith, founder of 4th Sector Innovations, joins the podcast via Starlink from Glacier National park in the midst of an epic family road trip. The episode is full of great new vocabulary words and an explanation of how Kevin’s company operates in the 4th sector of the economy. Just in case you don’t know what that is, we explain that too.
Brett Hoffstadt is building a vision for life on the moon. He’s sharing that vision with kids around the world via his book, Goodnight Moon Base. As an added bonus, this episode starts with a review of Goodnight Moon Base by Sean’s daughter, Alyssa. Spoiler: she does not want to live on a Moon base. She’s become accustomed to gravity. Check out Goodnight Moon Base, available anywhere books are sold or http://www.goodnightmoonbase.com.
We live in an age of abundance. It is an age where you can chart your own path and you don’t need someone’s permission to do it. Brett Hoffstadt reflects on these lessons and more; lessons learned thus far as an engineer, entrepreneur, musician, and author. Inspired by Seth Godin and a successful corporate career interrupted by layoffs, Brett overcame his fear of creativity and embodies the idea that consumers are now producers.
Sean completes his conversation with industrial engineering classmates Amanda, Rick, and Eric. The quartet of friends discuss what to look for in a work environment, the importance of work-life balance, and how long to continue the conversation. Speaking of quartets, Eric was in one, and he shares the similarities of singing in a barbershop quartet and working as an engineer.
Part two of the first happy hour edition of the show features four fun, cool cats continuing a discussion of their respective career paths as engineers. If you have ever taken a breath of clean air inside a hospital, walked past an AED in an office building, or driven a car with a blind spot monitor, then their work has impacted your life. Like their careers, the episode starts off slow, but builds character and becomes more entertaining as it matures. If you are an engineer or are perhaps studying to become one, this episode is a great reminder that what you do is important, even if the impact of your contributions isn’t always visible or immediately recognized.
If you are a recent engineering graduate, this is the episode for you. While Rex is on vacation, Sean is joined by three friends–all Cal Poly industrial engineering alumni. On the heels of a recent alumni meetup, and against a backdrop of some college stories and a few cocktails, the group discusses career paths, networking, and the importance of building relationships. It’s the first happy hour edition of the Distracted Driving Podcast.
What did you do during the summer when you were eight years old? Jackson Brooks created his own 3D Printing Universe on YouTube. He has more subscribers than we do. In the third and final installment of our conversation with Brian Brooks, he shares the benefits of a 4/10 work schedule (every Friday off) and how he managed to pry his son away from Roblox. Rex is so gobsmacked by the conversation he forgets how to end the show.
We’d like to welcome you to episode 8–and in fact, we’re going to. Brian Brooks is back to discuss culture, making people feel good, and happiness. He also suggests a few words you should consider eliminating from your vocabulary. Spoiler alert: one of them may be in the title of this show. It’s too late for us, we already bought the domain name. But you should tune in to find out how culture is related to getting the job done.
Are you familiar with the latin phrase Nos Tatus Quo? You will be after listening to this episode. You’ll also be familiar with Brian Brooks, a guy who likes to learn things and get feedback. But what happens if you get feedback you don’t agree with? What happens if it hurts? There’s a barrage of advice in episode 7 and a brand new hashtag movement.
In this episode, envisioneer Michael Erickson explains how to use the artistic skills everybody has (see episode 5) to hold the space in a conversation until coherence is reached. Only then can communication truly occur and you can, in his words, “go forth and be powerful.” It’s more wisdom from “the guy what draws.”
A high school dropout with one year of college created a niche for himself in one of the largest aerospace companies in the world. His name is Michael Erickson and he is a self-proclaimed “envisioneer.” In this episode, he’ll explain why that’s not the same thing as being a Disney “Imagineer.” He’ll also tell some stories about the B-52, Leonardo DaVinci, and the power of a clipboard and a pen. Over three decades ago, he was the temp in the corner of the room sketching out pictures of what he heard people talking about. Today he leads a team of “envisioneers,” helping technical people to see what they say so they can understand what they do. Find out why, if you can draw the alphabet, you are an artist.
Do you know what you want? Do you know what stands in the way? Andrea Clough, the engineer whisperer, is back to discuss a method for figuring out what you really want and how to remove the obstacles that prevent you from achieving it. It’s called an “idea party,” and while Andrea didn’t invent it, once a month she hosts one, creating a space for strangers to listen to each other and help remove the obstacles standing in the way of what they want.
Last week it was Plato, this week it’s cornhole and the afterlife (and somehow, more dog poop). Andrea Clough is the “Engineer Whisperer,” and she has the distinct honor of being the inaugural guest on the Distracted Driving Podcast. Andrea helps great engineers become impactful engineers, and in this episode she goes deep. Growing up in Romania, Andrea loved spending time with her grandmother who regaled her with vivid stories and entertained her endless questions. As a young, five year old girl, she was so excited when one day, grandma asked her a question. Though she only had a fourth grade education, grandma is still the wisest woman Andrea knew, and the question changed her life, ultimately putting her on a trajectory to be a professional coach to engineers. Rex and Sean also discuss the world’s first podcaster.
Who changes out the bottle in the office water cooler? How do two computer scientists and an engineer solve the problem of a burnt out light bulb? These questions are answered as Rex and Sean get philosophical, covering everything from Plato's cave allegory to Steve Martin, Bill and Ted, and dog poop. Let's hope there's a guest next time.
A long time ago, in a large Fortune 100 company, Rex and Sean hosted a video podcast called The Movement Maker Show celebrating people that figured out how to navigate bureaucracy and make change happen. In this first episode of their new podcast, they dive into what it means to be a movement maker, why they started that show, and what you can expect from this one. Like 1883 and Yellowstone, this is the Distracted Driving Podcast origin story.