Joanne L. Smikle, PhD
323 episodes listed below
Practical leadership learning with human depth.
SmikleSpeaks is a measured professional development show centered on leadership, communication, and personal growth at work. It moves between structured teaching episodes and interview-led conversations that turn career stories into usable lessons.
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SmikleSpeaks is a professional development show built around leadership as an everyday discipline. It is steady and practical. The show returns often to the idea that good leadership is not only a title or a position, but a set of habits that must be practiced, refined, and tested in real relationships. Communication sits near the center of that work. Episodes examine listening, clarity, empathy, feedback, visual aids, storytelling, nonverbal cues, conflict avoidance, and the balance between speaking too much and fading into silence. The teaching episodes are structured and explicit. They often name the problem, explain why it happens, and then offer fixes that a leader can try in meetings, teams, or difficult conversations. The interview episodes give the show more texture. Steven H. Cady, PhD brings a conversation about professional joy, meaning, routine, emotion, and the conditions that help people want more from work. Dr. Portia Rawles brings a multi-part Next Chapters conversation about life change, fear, regret, mental blocks, education, mental health, entrepreneurship, the fire service, and the courage required to begin again. These conversations do not rush toward tidy inspiration. They make room for backstory, uncertainty, and the inner work that sits underneath visible achievement. The show’s register is warm and earnest, with enough professional language to serve managers, consultants, educators, and emerging leaders without turning abstract. It has occasional faith-adjacent references and a strong interest in human dignity, but its advice remains focused on workplace behavior and personal growth. SmikleSpeaks is best for listeners who want leadership development that sounds like a guided conversation: reflective, concrete, and patient enough to repeat the important point before moving on.
Made for: SmikleSpeaks is for emerging and established leaders, managers, consultants, educators, and professionals who want to communicate with more clarity and empathy. It especially suits listeners who prefer patient explanation over high-energy business talk.
What sets it apart: The show blends structured leadership instruction with long-form, story-driven conversations about reinvention, joy, fear, and professional identity. Its strength is turning reflective material into concrete workplace practices.
Joanne L. Smikle, PhD is a respected authority on leadership and organization development. She provides learning that helps you soar! Each episode prepares you to lead in our ever-evolving world. Subscribe today...content is updated all of the time! Get more relevant tools from The SmikleSpeaks YouTube Channel and the library at smiklespeaks.com. Contact Joanne for assistance with your individual and organizational development.
Based on 4 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Joanne Smichel turns leadership concepts and career transitions into concrete questions people can use at work.
SmikleSpeaks moves between Joanne Smichel's direct instruction and interviews about how people build working lives with more intention. Leadership is treated as daily practice: communicating through conflict, creating professional joy, changing careers, and preparing for…
A dictionary beside the doctorate reading becomes your reminder that reinvention is allowed.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A grounded look at professional joy, leadership, and the feeling that a career may not be enough.
Joanne Smichel and Dr. Stephen H. Cady spend the episode on professional joy, and the topic lands because it stays tied to ordinary work rather than drifting into empty inspiration.
A calm, practical conversation about naming fear, checking the evidence, and planning for change.
Dr. Portia Rawls frames reinvention through fear, regret, evidence, and a plainspoken plan for change. Joanne Smichel lets the personal history unfold at an unhurried pace, including Rawls's childhood wish to be a "renaissance woman" and the family support that kept room open…
A practical look at communication mistakes and the fixes that make them easier to apply.
This episode treats communication as a skill that has to be learned, practiced, and kept in shape. It moves through 15 common mistakes and shows how they surface at home, at work, in relationships, and in leadership.
A grounded conversation about leadership, reinvention, and persistence.
Dr. Portia Rawls’s return gives the conversation a clear center, tying leadership, life in the fire service, and a shift into mental health entrepreneurship into one measured arc.
Range trade talk for firearm instructors.
Clinical CE for busy veterinary teams.
On Smykle Speaks, Joanne Smykle interviews Dr.
What makes work feel alive again?
This episode explores essential communication skills for leaders, including listening, clarity, empathy, and feedback, to improve team dynamics and organizational effectiveness.
Joanne Smichel welcomes Dr.
Joanne Smichel opens by framing communication as a learned leadership skill.
Joanne Smichel welcomes Dr.
This episode explores empathetic leadership, defining it as the capacity to understand and share others' emotions while emphasizing compassion and recognizing our shared humanity.
Joanne Smikle introduces her podcast on leadership, emphasizing skills, mindset, and influence for guiding organizations and creating impact.
This episode features an interview with Dr.
Joanne Smikle interviews Ben Utecht about his concussion journey and advocacy for brain health.
Interview with a behavioral neurologist discussing cures and treatments for dementia and Alzheimer's disease.
Joanne Smikle defines critical thinking and explains its importance for leaders in making informed decisions amid complexity.
Joanne Smikle interviews Ben Utech, Super Bowl champion and author, about the power of belief and its application to individuals and organizations.
Clinical psychologist Jen Douglas discusses FOMO (fear of missing out) and JOMO (joy of missing out) in relation to values-based living and mental health.
Host Joanne Smikle interviews Teresa Ayotte about her newly diagnosed journey with early-onset Alzheimer's disease.
Joanne Smikle interviews Teresa Ayotte about her early onset Alzheimer's diagnosis and the journey leading to it.
This episode features an interview with Teresa Ayotte discussing her career and friendship with host Joanne Smykle in the context of leadership and healthcare education.
Joanne Smikle interviews Ben Utecht about transforming organizational culture and effective leadership.
Dr.
Joanne Smikle interviews Ben Utecht about his book on transforming organizational culture through belief, drawing from his NFL experience.
Dr.
Dr.
Joanne Smikle shares her personal story of how she got started in leadership and organization development, beginning with an internship at a state Department of Transportation.
This episode features an interview with Dr.
Joanne Smikle interviews HR expert Brian Powell about realigning social and government structures to support changes in employment and the workforce.
Joanne Smikle interviews Allison Dahoney about the impact and successes of her hybrid nonprofit/for-profit organization tackling nutrition and hunger.
Joanne Smikle interviews HR expert Brian Powell about workforce trends including AI's impact on jobs and DEI.
Joanne Smikle interviews Allison DeHoney about her urban agriculture organization that provides fresh food and nutrition education in underserved communities.
Joanne Smikle interviews Rob King about his transition from data science to founding a strategy consulting firm, focusing on preparation and the 'less' principle to avoid burnout.
Joanne Smikle interviews Allison Dahoney about her urban agriculture and community work in Buffalo.
This episode continues a conversation with Russ Snyder, CEO of Volunteers of America, focusing on his mission work in Russia and how it prepared him for his current role in service.