Business Roundtable

Business Roundtable

Welcome to the Business Roundtable Podcast, hosted by David Carr of Steward Your Business. This engaging and informative podcast series is dedicated to helping business owners, and entrepreneurs navigate the complexities of running a successful enterprise. Each episode features David Carr and a roster of industry experts, including regular contributors like Curtis Cochran, who bring their wealth of experience in mergers and acquisitions, organizational health, and team building. Dive into discussions that cover a broad range of topics essential to business growth and sustainability. From strategic planning and preparation to understanding the cycles of business ownership, the podcast provides invaluable insights into evaluating, enhancing, and exiting business ownership. Listeners can expect practical advice on scaling businesses, managing finances, and creating a culture that aligns with company goals. What sets this podcast apart is its focus on actionable strategies combined with real-world experiences. The conversations often delve into the importance of providing more value than the dollars earned and the necessity of adaptability in a rapidly changing business landscape. Whether you're a budding entrepreneur or a seasoned business owner, the Business Roundtable Podcast is vital for staying ahead in today's competitive market. Join David Carr and his guests as they explore the art of making a business profitable but also enjoyable and sustainable. Tune in for your dose of inspiration, guidance, and tools to make 2024 and beyond a resounding success for your business ventures. Become a podcast supporter at just $2 a month at https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/business-roundtable--6049255/support.

Episodes

July 14, 2026 63 mins
Everyone is racing to adopt AI. Almost no one is asking the harder question: what kind of leader are you becoming as AI gets more powerful? Technology will not fix a broken culture or poor leadership. It amplifies whatever is already there.

In this conversation, David Carr sits down with two guests who think about this differently. Christopher Skinner, founder of Stealth Dog Labs, works at the intersection of AI, cognition, ...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
When a great employee leaves, most leaders assume it was about pay. Larry Salazar has the data to argue otherwise. The single largest contributor to the financial stress that drives turnover is housing, and almost no employer is doing anything about it.

Larry is the President and co-founder of NestSTEPS, a platform that turns home ownership into an employee benefit. In this conversation with David Carr he makes the business ...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
When revenue slows, almost every company reaches for the same lever: more leads, more marketing, more pressure on sales. Ellen Smolko says that is usually the wrong move. Most revenue problems are structural, and more activity does not fix them. It just exposes the gaps.

Ellen is the founder of Foresight Performance and the Marketing Medic. In this conversation with David Carr she unpacks revenue friction, the term she coine...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
For thirty years, getting found meant ranking on Google. That era is ending. People now ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude to recommend a business, and those tools only surface a few names. If yours is not one of them, your next customer never sees you.

Solomon Thimothy is the founder of Clickx, co-founder and CEO of OneIMS, and a USA Today and Wall Street Journal best-selling author who has spent two decades helping compan...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Everyone celebrates the startup that raises a huge round and grows at all costs. Bryan Clayton built the opposite. He took GreenPal, the Uber for lawn care, past 10 million dollars a year with zero venture capital, and he argues that raising too much money before you have it figured out is more likely to kill you than save you.

Bryan is the CEO and cofounder of GreenPal. Before it he built a landscaping company to 8 figures ...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
How much money do you actually need? Most people answer with a number. Dr. Nicholas Michels says that is backwards. Don't start with a dollar amount. Start with the life you want, then let the money serve it.

Nick is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER professional, founder of Michels Family Financial, and author of Rich by Choice. In this conversation with David Carr he gets honest about why so many people are outwardly successfu...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Your business is growing. That does not mean it is stable. For a lot of founders, growth quietly hides the problems that will break the company later, and you do not see it until it snaps.

Tracy Holland is a founder, investor, and operator who took HatchBeauty Brands from zero to 100 million dollars, then built a live selling business to 27 million in two years and sold it. She now buys distressed companies and rebuilds them...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
June 19, 2026 38 mins
Most owners buy the AI tool, skip the strategy, and wonder why nothing improves. Jason Alexander, CEO of Chief AI, explains why AI is a people and process problem, not a tool problem.

Hand someone a guitar, and you still hear no music until you teach them to play. Jason has lived the operator side of this. Over 20 years, he built and scaled a staffing and consulting business to roughly 100 million dollars before selling, and...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
You can have the right strategy, the right team, and the right systems. But if you are running on empty, none of it performs the way it should. And most leaders already know what they should do. They just do not do it.

Jalene Szuba is the founder of Happiness Anchor, a nationally board certified health and wellness coach, TEDx speaker, and Tulane University wellness consultant. In this conversation with David Carr she starts...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Most business owners think PR is about getting featured. More placements, more visibility, more attention. Ronica Cleary says that is exactly where it goes wrong. Visibility without a strategy behind it is not a win. It is just noise.

Ronica is the founder and CEO of Cleary Strategies and a former White House correspondent who spent years in newsrooms before building her agency. In this conversation with David Carr she pulls...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
What do you do when your world turns to ashes? In one season, Elaine Lankford faced a yearlong attack on her character, lost her father, and watched her husband get a cancer diagnosis. Then, on a mission trip, she heard God whisper, "Go home and raise up my daughters."

That whisper became She Steps Forward. Elaine is the founder of She Steps Forward Coaching and the nonprofit She Steps Forward International, and she spent ov...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Most owners think they have a people problem, a time problem, or a strategy problem. Usually, it's none of those — the business is just built to keep everything flowing back to you.

Carol Schultz, Founder & CEO of Vertical Elevation, has spent 30 years as a recruiter and executive coach, helping CEOs stop being "hostages" to their own companies. In this conversation, she unpacks founder's syndrome, why "just hire t...
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
You are moving fast on AI. Your team is experimenting. You are deploying tools. But you have not asked the critical questions that will determine whether you are building competitive advantage or exposing your business, your people, and your customers to serious risk.

Jill Stover Heinze has spent her career helping organizations think through complex technology decisions. When generative AI hit the market, she realized that ...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played
    You built your career on accumulating knowledge, protecting your territory, and holding onto status. That strategy made sense in the old world. In the AI era, it is making you invisible.

    Nikki Barua has spent 25 years leading large-scale transformation at Fortune 500 companies and building high-growth businesses as a serial entrepreneur. What she has watched happen in real time is a fundamental shift in how power works. Old ...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played
    Most business owners believe they need to get bigger to be successful. Chip Higgins believes the opposite and forty years of banking experience backs him up.

    Chip Higgins spent four decades in banking, working directly with thousands of small business owners. What he observed was that size had almost nothing to do with success. Some of the most impressive businesses he worked with were small. What made them exceptional was m...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played
    Your business is demanding everything you have. Your body is paying the price. And by the time you realize how much damage you've done, it may be too late to avoid the crash.

    Bryan Hardy nearly died at eighteen from a ruptured appendix and spent his twenties rebuilding his health from the ground up. What he learned in that process — and what he has spent the last decade helping other high-performing men discover &mdash...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played
    Most leaders believe they are credible. Most have never actually tested that assumption — and the gap between how they see themselves and how others experience them is costing them trust, influence, and opportunity.

    Mitchell Levy has spent decades in Silicon Valley coaching executives, writing 65 books, founding 20 companies, and interviewing hundreds of thought leaders to answer one deceptively simple question: what d...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played
    Most leaders think they know what's happening inside their organization. Most are wrong and the gap between what they believe and what's actually true is where talent exits, projects stall, and money quietly disappears.

    Polly Watt and Mike Vos are the co-founders of WattNext.ai and the creators of ViVo Pulse, an AI-powered organizational diagnostic tool that interviews your entire team in the time it takes a consultant to ta...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played
    Most business owners have goals. Very few have a plan. And according to Marc Daniels, that difference is costing them everything.

    Marc L. Daniels has spent over 45 years building, turning around, and scaling companies across 16 countries. He helped grow Diligent from a two-customer startup to a $941 million acquisition. He turned a bankrupt company into $80 million in revenue. He has seen every version of a business that run...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played
    Is your business working for you, or have you become its most underpaid employee?

    Alan Franks has spent 15 years working with business owners who are successful by every external measure and quietly trapped. Trapped by time, by decisions only they can make, by a financial life that's been entirely reinvested back into the machine they built. As a Certified Financial Planner and founder of the Business Planning Institute, Ala...
  • Listen
    Watch
    Mark as Played

    Popular Podcasts

      Hey Jonas! The official Jonas Brothers podcast. Hosted by Kevin, Joe, and Nick Jonas. It’s the Jonas Brothers you know... musicians, actors, and well, yes, brothers. Now, they’re sharing another side of themselves in the playful, intimate, and irreverent way only they can. Spend time with the Jonas Brothers here and stay a little bit longer for deep conversations like never before.

      Dateline NBC

      Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com

      Betrayal Weekly

      Betrayal Weekly is back for a new season. Every Thursday, Betrayal Weekly shares first-hand accounts of broken trust, shocking deceptions, and the trail of destruction they leave behind. Hosted by Andrea Gunning, this weekly ongoing series digs into real-life stories of betrayal and the aftermath. From stories of double lives to dark discoveries, these are cautionary tales and accounts of resilience against all odds. From the producers of the critically acclaimed Betrayal series, Betrayal Weekly drops new episodes every Thursday. If you would like to share your story, you can reach out to the Betrayal Team by emailing them at betrayalpod@gmail.com and follow us on Instagram at @betrayalpod and @glasspodcasts. Please join our Substack for additional exclusive content, curated book recommendations, and community discussions. Sign up FREE by clicking this link Beyond Betrayal Substack. Join our community dedicated to truth, resilience, and healing. Your voice matters! Be a part of our Betrayal journey on Substack.

      The Bobby Bones Show

      Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.

      Crime Junkie

      Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by Audiochuck Media Company.

    Advertise With Us
    Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

    Connect

    © 2026 iHeartMedia, Inc.

    • Help
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
    • AdChoicesAd Choices