Making Waves at C-Level: Business Tips for Executives, Leaders, and Entrepreneurs

Zora Chung joins the conversation on “Making Waves at C-Level” to talk about growing a business, Angel Funding, and business success. ReJoule is a start up that does fast testing for eclectic vehicle batteries.  

About Zora Chung

Zora Chung is the cofounder and CFO at ReJoule, a battery diagnostics and optimization company focused on maximizing the value of every battery. ReJoule has graded over 1MWh of used electric vehicle (EV) batteries as part of their project to repurpose used EV into a stationary application. This project is funded by the California Energy Commission where Zora has blogged to document their learnings, progress, and obstacles. ReJoule’s work has been featured by Wired, Frost & Sullivan, and across a few podcasts and conferences. Before founding ReJoule in 2017, Zora has spent over 12 years in corporate finance at Clorox and Walmart eCommerce. She’s created long-range strategic and financial plans, negotiated contracts, and evaluated new and existing business models and optimized them for scalable growth. She holds a B.S in Business Administration from UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. 

About ReJoule

ReJoule is setting the standard for battery health diagnostics to improve the economics of electric vehicles (EV) batteries across its life cycle. Current health predictions only get worse as the batteries age and other ways to test the batteries can take hours. ReJoule’s fast and non-invasive diagnostic has already tested forklift, truck and bus batteries. It was proven to be at least 50x faster (5 min or less vs. 6-10 hours) than current testing methods without sacrificing accuracy. They’ve raised over $5M in non-dilutive grants and in 2022 got their first few paid customers – one is a top 10 automaker seeking to repurpose their used EV batteries in a second-life application. The ultimate goal is to get ReJoule’s technology into production vehicles and at service centers around the world. The founding team is a brother-sister duo balanced between an innovative technical cofounder who has built all the IP in-house and an experienced finance and business strategist.

https://thomsinger.com/podcast/rejoule

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Given changes in the economy and lack of resources, many companies are looking to do more with less. Carolyn Strauss knows you can get more done with less and she shares this with passion and enthusiasm. She has found ways throughout her career to thrive in competitive industries with limited resources. She is clear that there is a time and place to let go of the past offerings, to let go of people, and to look for the best times to make these changes.  

About Carolyn Strauss

Carolyn Strauss is a former CEO and has spent her life studying how to help companies optimize their most important resource, their people. As one of the top female professional MC’s, her job is to keep conferences energized and running smoothly. As a professional speaker having earned her CSP, Carolyn works with organizations to keep people and teams running smoothly, and over the years, she has worked in most industries.

She is the author of 5 books, the co-host of the podcast “Another Day Above Ground” and is a member of the Screen Actors Guild. Carolyn is mom to a 5 year old golden retriever and she believes a good day contains chocolate. You can reach her at carolynstrauss.com

https://thomsinger.com/podcast/carolyn-strauss

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Wellness is more important than ever for your employees. Why is it important to focus on health in the workplace? Elaine Pasqua tells us all about it and how you and your people can stay healthy.

About Elaine Pasqua

Once upon a time, a 6’5″ 250 pound man looked at petite Elaine standing at 5’3″ and said: “You are the biggest little thing I’ve ever seen!”

This funny and energetic live wire has been traversing the country for more than 27 years, advocating for positive choices, optimal health, healthy relationships, and productive lives.

Elaine’s pursuit for making a difference in the lives of others began when she spoke out after losing her mom and stepdad to AIDS related complications. Her career as a professional speaker stemmed from passion, not from the desire to make money. That passion is reflected in her work today. Enhancing the quality of life for others resonates through Elaine’s keen knowledge, compassion, ability to connect, and sharp humor.

Elaine’s enthusiasm for making a difference has remarkably taken her to work with:

• Countless businesses and professional associations
• 31 professional sports teams across the NFL, NBA, and MLB
• 700 colleges and universities nationwide
• Our military service personnel
• High schools and parent groups

Elaine is proudly serving as the president of National Speakers Association’s Philadelphia Chapter. She is an author, columnist, and producer/director of public service videos. She has been featured in USA Today, NY1 News, Time Warner TV, NPR, NBC Sports Radio, CBS Sports, and Knight Ridder News Service.

When she is not traveling on planes, trains, and automobiles, you can find Elaine hiking, traveling for pleasure with her husband Jeff, singing with friends until the wee hours of the morning, or in her beautiful gardens with lots of dirt under her fingernails! She is the proud mom of Evan and David who are happy, productive, and caring young men…whew, she made it through parenting!

https://thomsinger.com/podcast/elaine-pasqua

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In this episode the conversation is all about change and innovation at work and how companies can create a culture that leads to more innovation. The guest is Adam Braus, whom Thom met at SXSW 2022.  

Also, this is the only episode in the history of 714 shows where a cat walked across a keyboard in the middle of the interview….so listen for the cat playing piano.

About Adam Braus

Adam Braus is a people- and mission-driven leader in technology and higher education. Braus builds and works with and on teams that envision, design, build, launch, and grow innovative new institutions that build people up. He has been working in higher education building innovative new colleges and college programs that are accessible to all for almost a decade. His recent books include:

Motivate: How to Defeat Distraction, Ignite Interest, and Secure Success – https://bit.ly/motivate-book Leading Change at Work — https://bit.ly/leading-change-at-work

The Future of Good: A Guide for Good People Going Forward (coming June 1 2022)

Braus’ philosophy about people — both in teaching and managing them — is to help them generate clear goals, an inspiring purpose, and a warm, safe environment, and then give them lots of choice, time, freedom, and support — with those elements in place, people learn and achieve more than you could assign them to do (and they don’t burn out!). Braus is open to business and book coaching, collaborating on and advising high impact projects, startups, and non-profits, and exploring ambitious solutions to big problems.

Connect with him on LinkedIn to reach out or see his updates. You can also see his work on his website https://www.adambraus.com or on medium https://ajbraus.medium.com/.

https://Thomsinger.com/podcast/adam-braus

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In the middle of “The Great Resignation” you want to create a workplace culture that rocks. You want to keep your top talent from becoming your competitors top talent! This episode is a chat with retention expert Lisa Ryan. Find ways to catch your employees doing this well and say “Thank You Very Much”.

Are you holding “Stay Interviews” instead of Exit Interviews? This is a great piece of advice for all bosses. Don’t wait until people are leaving to find out how they are doing. Be open to hearing the feedback loop of the good and the not as good.  

About Lisa Ryan

Lisa Ryan is the speaker who will make your life easier and more importantly, will make you look good!

Her expertise includes:

• Keynote, breakout or workshop speaker at more than 100 national and international conferences
• Thirteen years of industrial marketing and sales experience, including seven years in the welding industry – and yes, she does weld
• The host of “Elevate Your Engagement Levels: What You Need to Know” on the Elite Expert Network
• Creator of “The Seven Mistakes Managers Make to Crush Company Culture” video series
• A best-selling author of ten books, including “Manufacturing Engagement: 98 Proven Strategies to Attract and Retain Your Industry’s Top Talent” 
• An award-winning speaker, including “Corporate Event Speaker of the Year”

Lisa is energetic and dynamic, and her presentations are anything but standard – they’re PowerPoint free! Instead, Lisa engages her audience with entertaining anecdotes gained “in the trenches”, incorporates the most current research, trends and best practices while also capturing the “wisdom in the room.” Because of her experience in a variety of industries including executive recruiting, healthcare, industrial sales, and welding, she relates easily to attendees at all levels within the organization.

Ryan’s programs focus on positive workplace culture, inter-generational communication, employee acquisition, engagement, retention, and gratitude strategies (“Grategies”) for personal and professional development. Her down-to-earth approach and willingness to share best practices have proven to be a winning formula for her clients. Ryan’s high energy and enthusiastic keynote and breakout programs, her sense of humor, and passionate delivery are what makes her sessions among the highest rated at national and international conferences, leadership retreats, and annual meetings.

Lisa Ryan currently serves as Immediate Past-President of the National Speakers Association, Ohio Chapter. She received her MBA from Cleveland State University. She has served on many other boards including The American Welding Society, Association for Equipment Manufacturing Professionals, and Toastmasters International.

Https://thomsinger.com/podcast/lisa-ryan

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The ecosystem of Austin has proven over the last thirty years to produce the hottest boom town in business. Today’s episode covers the “Secret Sauce of Austin” and what are the six “superpowers” of the region. According to Jason Scharf, this is a roadmap for other areas of the country (and the world) who want to grow their economies. It’s not about copying Austin (or the Silicon Valley), it is about developing your own superpowers.

About Jason Scharf

Jason Scharf is an experienced strategy executive and active early-stage investor in the life science and digital health sectors. For the past 15 years, he has built and led teams in strategic planning, market intelligence, and innovation. Today he is the Vice President of Strategy and Partnerships for Kean Health, a direct to consumer at home genomic and microbiome solutions company. He leads product management, business development, and strategic planning. Prior to his role at Kean, he worked across the healthcare sector at biopharma, genomics, and medtech companies including Illumina, Becton Dickinson, and Amgen.

In addition to his roles within the corporate environment, Jason has served as a co-fund manager of the San Diego Angel Conference, an investor with NuFund Venture Group, and a mentor with both the NexCubed Digital Health Accelerator and the Illumina Accelerator. He has invested in ~40 emerging companies from Seed stage to Series B focusing on the convergence of technology and biology. His investments have ranged from diagnostics/tools (Pleno, Iridia, and Visicell Medical), Biopharma (Elicio Therapeutics), and Foodtech (BlueNalu, Impossible Foods).

He is also the co-host of the Austin Next Podcast. An exploration of Austin’s transformation into the next great innovation powerhouse, what it takes to accelerate the growth of an ecosystem, and what comes next.

Jason Scharf earned his BA from University of California, San Diego and his MBA from the Rady School of Management at the University of California, San Diego.

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Michael Davis helps executives become more confident every time they speak to a group in-person or on camera. In this interview we chat about how improving your presentation skills will make a difference in your career.

About Michael Davis

Michael Davis’s work is focused on helping you attract more clients, create more efficient teams, and increase your influence through more effective speaking, business storytelling and online presentations. He helps experienced speakers, business leaders, entrepreneurs, and sales professionals confidently deliver memorable and meaningful talks of any length, even on short notice.

His passion for effective presenting was born on a desk when he was in first grade. He was being punished for breaking a class rule. The embarrassment of being ridiculed by his classmates kept him from standing in front of any group for the next 25 years, unless he was forced to.

This didn’t change until the day his boss told him, “Either get better at giving presentations or we’ve got to let you go!” Those words motivated Michael to deal with his fear of public speaking.

With the help of mentors and coaches he met through Toastmasters and the National Speakers Association, he discovered the skills and tools to manage his fear, become an effective speaker and uncovered his talent for training others to become world class presenters and business storytellers. And he continues to learn more about the craft every day.

Michael is a highly-sought presentation skills consultant and trainer, and speaker. He’s the author of ‘THE Book on Storytelling’ and the upcoming book, ‘Stop Telling Just ANY Story.’

He has trained business leaders, salespeople, and professional and TEDx speakers on four continents to deliver talks that have been viewed over 3 million times. He ‘s the Founder of Speaking CPR and is a faculty member and coach at Stage Time University.

He lives in Blue Ash, Ohio with his family, and the overlords of their house, Sky the Super Chihuahua and her underling, Riley the Mini-Chihuahua. 

https://thomsinger.com/podcast/michael-davis

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How can you get your team to embrace high performance? Mike Mooney will tell you how. With a background in professional motorsports, he knows that the little improvements deliver big results.

About Mike Mooney

Some might say that Mike Mooney’s 25-year career in professional motorsports was just going in circles!

Actually, it perfectly positioned him to be an accelerator for leaders seeking to unlock people-centered speed to drive opportunities in their lives and careers.

Mike’s dynamic storytelling and use-now lessons come from his first-hand experiences with racing champions where he watched them build and innovate their high-performance vehicles to stay on track and win.

Mike left his senior executive role with one of NASCAR’s most respected teams with a passion and the tools to work with another type of high-performance vehicle – people!

You see, Mike believes we were all designed to be high-performance vehicles in this life, yet like race cars speeding at 200 miles per hour, we all need time for pit stops and tune ups to keep us on track and in position to win!

Mike created the Shift Speed Shop as an intentional place for people to build, fix, restore, and innovate themselves in the areas of peak performance, continuous improvement, reputation, and mindset.

Mike’s interactive and action-driven experiences include:

* KEYNOTES

* WORKSHOPS

* VIRTUAL ACCELERATORS (small group)

* VIRTUAL WINE TASTINGS

Mike proudly stand behind his work, but don’t take his word for it. Please check out his LinkedIn Recommendations for feedback from inspired leaders who have invested in their teams with Mike!

An author, Mike’s breakthrough book, Reputation Shift – Lessons from Pit Road to the Boardroom, is a practical roadmap for people who are motivated to build, strengthen or repair one of their greatest competitive assets – their reputations.

Just imagine how Mike could serve you and empower your team!

Imagine a more confident, resilient, focused, creative, and trusted team of people who are energized to win – even during uncertain times!

https://thomsinger.com/podcast/mike-mooney

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We all know that stress is a problem in business. Today’s episode looks at ways to overcome stress with mathematician turned stress expert, Dr. Katie Nall. We talk about how to engage in reducing stress, and she leads the listeners through and example of “Tapping”.

About Dr. Katie Nall

Katie Nall, Ph.D., is a Florida mathematician, a TEDx speaker, a professional member of National Speakers Association, and an Accredited Master Trainer and Practitioner in Emotional Freedom Technique, also known as EFT or Tapping. Dr. Nall shows others how to dissolve WAFFLES – worries, anxiety, fear, frustration, lethargy, exhaustion, and STRESS™!

During her dissertation research, her focus was on ways for students to excel in Mathematics (especially adults returning or starting college).  She wanted to help college students overcome fear, phobia, and stress related to math class and math tests. In 2010, she found Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT or tapping) and began offering the process to students. Students reported they passed math class and found math easier to learn. In contrast to the four years she took to earn her Mathematics Education Ph.D. from Florida Institute of Technology, Dr. Nall spent eight years to earn her Master Trainer certificate in EFT.

As a professional speaker, Dr. Nall presents to groups who acknowledge the damage caused by stress and are looking for quick, effective methods to eliminate stress. With 80% of medical visits caused by stress and the major cause of death, stress management is crucial to optimal health and consequently peak performance.

In in a long-term institution of marriage, she has maintained her miserable skills in housekeeping and cooking with no desire for rehabilitation, and yet he stays. Wife of one suffering husband, mother of three perfect children, and ‘Gummi’ to five adorable granddaughters, she counts her blessings daily.

She can be reached in social media by KatieNallPhD:

https://linktr.ee/KatieNallPhD

• Website: NallEdgeCo.com
• Email: Hello@DrNall.com
• Phone: 772-226-0167
• Qi Gong FB Live – Sunday 4:30 p.m. EST
• Social Media:
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/KatieNallPhD
• FB: https://www.facebook.com/KatieNallPhD
• L-I: https://www.linkedin.com/in/KatieNallPhD
• IG: https://www.instagram.com/KatieNallPhD
• TW: https://twitter.com/KatieNallPhD
• CH: @drkatie

https://thomsinger.com/podcast/katie-nall

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In this episode, Thom Singer sits down with Hall Martin to discuss finding funding for your business, and how to be an angel investor.

About Hall Martin

Hall T. Martin is the Founder and CEO of the TEN Capital Network and Host of the Investor Connect podcast program.
He launched TEN as the Texas Entrepreneur Networks in 2009. Today, TEN Capital Network has over 15,000 investors, and has helped startups raise over $900M.
Mr. Martin serves as the Vice-Chair of the Baylor Angel Network. He previously led the Central Texas Angel Network (CTAN) as its first Executive Director.
Mr. Martin is also the Host, founder, and director of the Investor Connect podcast which is a 501(c)(3) non-profit dedicated to the education of startup investors. Mr. Martin is a Founder and initial Managing Director of SKU (Incubation Station), a consumer product goods accelerator based in Austin, Texas, and the former Managing Director of AccelerateNFC, an accelerator based in Dallas, Texas, focusing on Near Field Communication.
Mr. Martin serves as an adjunct professor for the University of Texas leading the Idea to IP program which fosters startups from the engineering program.
Our Funding as a Service Program introduces your deal to our network of 15,000+ accredited investors, including angels, family offices, high net worth investors, and venture capitalists, through a variety of outreach efforts based on your and the investor’s criteria.
We take your pitch deck and build out a campaign, with some key highlights, introducing your deal to our investor network based on your and the investors’ criteria.  
For those who respond positively, we help you follow up through a series of updates via email and events to close.
Most campaigns run for 6 months as investors have their due diligence process to run. You can track your progress with our Campaign Score. Those who reach 100 on the campaign score have a 90% success rate in funding. Successful fundraisers are super active in the campaign.
We focus on Seed, Series A, and Series B raises. Most seed raises are from $500K to $750K, Series A are from $1M to $5M, and Series B are $5M to $20M.
Typically, our angels write $25-$100K checks, our HNI write $100K-$250K checks, our Family Offices write $250K-$500K checks, and our VCs write $250K to $1M checks on the first round.
https://tencapital.group/
https://thomsinger.com/podcast/hall-martin

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