Tess Vigil has had her role reduced or eliminated four times, and she will tell you none of it was failure. It was clarity. From a Los Angeles dress company to culturally responsive education to AI enablement in healthcare, her career is a case study in letting go of what looks impressive to chase what actually feels purposeful. In this episode of The Stronger Podcast, Mike Montoya sits down with Tess, who leads change management and organizational effectiveness in patient education at DaVita, to talk about why a career is less a ladder than a rock wall, and what it takes to keep making moves around the obstacles. Tess grew up a faculty kid at a Denver prep school, studied social psychology at Columbia in Carol Dweck's classroom two years before Mindset was published, and built her whole approach to coaching on the power of "yet." She traces the pivots that followed: teaching middle school English with Teach For America, running a locally produced clothing line she now calls her favorite failure, coaching young teachers, culturally responsive work at Denver Public Schools, national talent consulting, and finally a leap into healthcare tech. Mike and Tess get into why direct feedback is a muscle most workplaces never train, why a conflict-free relationship is probably not a deep one, and why the healthcare system leaves the same families under-resourced that the education system does. They also talk about coaching, mentorship, and building a whole team of support rather than leaning on one person to be everything. Tune in to hear why Tess believes that letting go of something that isn't making you thrive isn't failure, it's the clearest thing you can do.  Chapters:👋 01:19 Meet Tess Vigil: faculty kid, educator, and serial career pivoter🏫 02:19 Growing up at the school her parents taught at, and an early lesson in wealth🧠 05:35 Studying with Carol Dweck at Columbia, two years before Mindset💪 07:59 Growth mindset is not grit, and the quiet power of "yet"🗣️ 09:11 Direct feedback is a muscle most workplaces never train🧵 18:05 My favorite failure: the dress company and what letting go taught her🧗 24:01 From culturally responsive education to four roles reduced or eliminated🏥 25:59 The pivot to DaVita and the equity gaps hiding inside healthcare🤝 35:59 Everybody needs a coach, and why your partner should not be one🧭 44:21 A life well led: fulfilled and purposeful over what looks good on LinkedIn Links:Website: Tess Vigil | Executive Coach & CreativeLinkedIn: Tess Vigil  Connect with Mike: www.linkedin.com/in/mmscStronger Consulting: strongerconsulting.comPublish a Book That Matters:  booksthatmatter.orgStart a Podcast That Matters:  podcastsmatter.comGo from Expert to Thought Leader: geniusdiscovery.org  For more great podcasts like this one, visit https://podcaststhatmatter.org Stay strong. 

Educator and community builder Craig Aarons-Martin, founder of the Black Boy Joy Summit, has spent more than two decades doing transformative work in Boston's schools, and he is candid here about the rooms he still gets shut out of and why he keeps building anyway. In this episode of Ronderings, Ron sits down with Craig, a New Orleans native, longtime school leader, and author, to talk about belonging, masculinity, faith, and what it takes to choose purpose while carrying real weight. Craig traces his path from a summer school classroom in Louisiana, where a teacher named Miss Madeline handed him a math lesson at thirteen, to Dillard University, to Lesley University and the greater Boston area. He is honest about arriving in Boston over three hundred pounds, "a hundred and seventy-five pounds of that being depression," working his calling while mostly closeted, convinced that showing up fully himself could cost him his license. Ron opens the conversation from his own grief, having just buried his nephew Arnold, and that honesty sets the tone for everything that follows. The two get into why vulnerability is so hard for men of color, what it means when a father starts learning to emote after forty years of silence, and how Craig built the Black Boy Joy Summit as a space for boys of color to see unsung heroes rather than only celebrities and seven-figure CEOs. Craig also names the harder truth underneath his visible success: a hundred outreach emails and twenty-five sponsorship proposals that went nowhere, and a calling he refuses to abandon. Tune in to hear why Craig believes the breakdown always comes before the breakthrough, and why taking L's might be the necessary cost of elevation.  Chapters:🌱 02:46 Craig Aarons-Martin on the journey of becoming🧭 05:08 More years in the North, but a Southerner first🤝 07:54 Why he finally said yes to brotherhood in his forties🫂 12:52 The loneliness young men of color carry behind the feed🍎 16:31 Miss Madeline, a math lesson, and the moment he became a teacher💔 21:12 Arriving in Boston at 300 pounds, carrying depression and a calling🏳️‍🌈 24:32 The double standard of who gets to be out at work🧱 27:35 Two decades of excellence and the rooms still closed to him🗣️ 32:15 A father learning to emote after forty years of silence🏋️ 35:34 What men lock themselves out of when they refuse to connect👑 40:17 Building the Black Boy Joy Summit for the sons he hopes to have🎯 44:33 Taking L's on the way to elevation, and the breakdown before the breakthrough Links:Email: craig@ccmeducationgroup.co Website: ccmeducationgroup.co LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/craigcmartin Linktree: linktr.ee/iamcraigaaronsmartinReach out to Craig Aarons-Martin to learn more about the Black Boy Joy Summit and his work building brave, affirming spaces for boys and men of color in education. Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo Check Out Ron's Book: www.amazon.com/dp/1613431473 Leverage Publishing Group: www.leveragepublishinggroup.com Publish a Book That Matters: http://booksthatmatter.org Start a Podcast That Matters: http://podcastsmatter.com Go from Expert to Thought Leader: http://geniusdiscovery.org 

Ten percent of Utah's children were using roughly ninety percent of the state's behavioral health funding, and no one system owned them. In this episode of The Stronger Podcast, Mike Montoya sits down with Denise Jensen, LMSW, Partner and Lead Operating Officer at Stronger Consulting, and the founding director of Utah's children's system of care. Denise grew up as the oddball in a family of seven kids in a conservative Idaho Mormon household, where the mother stayed home and the father went to work. She questioned that from childhood, made a lot of her family angry, and built her own path anyway. That questioning became a career: therapist, then state system builder, then the person leading client delivery across a national consulting firm. She walks Mike through what a system of care actually is. The kids arriving through corrections, courts, child welfare, disability, and schools, all with nowhere to land. The judges, school districts, Medicaid administrators, and parents she pulled into the same room. The state hospital she asked to loosen its own admission criteria. She also earned Utah's Governor's Award of Excellence for tearing apart substance use treatment payment models so people in recovery could choose their own care instead of being told what recovery had to look like. The second half turns to leadership. Denise makes the case that leaders, and women leaders in particular, are still armored up in a professionalism handed to them by people who are no longer in the room. Her word for the alternative is softening, and she is specific about what it buys an organization. Listen in for why she believes every person already knows what they need, and what leaders owe them once they admit it.  Chapters: 🎙️ 00:27 Denise Jensen on leaving a conservative Idaho childhood to build systems🚪 03:37 The oddball in a family of seven who made people mad👩‍👧 06:09 Refusing to let motherhood be her only identity🎭 10:47 You cannot be one person, so you wear many hats🧩 11:58 Ten percent of kids, ninety percent of the funding🏛️ 12:39 Getting judges, schools, and Medicaid into the same room🏆 16:47 The Governor's Award for letting people choose their own recovery🗝️ 19:34 Everybody already knows what they need🪓 24:54 Scalpel, hammer, and sometimes chainsaw🔁 29:31 Retention beats replacement, and the cost is momentum🛡️ 31:19 The armor women leaders are still told to wear🌿 35:29 Softening creates psychological safety, and safety keeps teams🧭 37:57 Find your community and know your value💡 42:51 You do not control everything, and that is okay Links:LinkedIn:  Denise Jensen | LinkedIn Company LinkedIn: Stronger Consulting Website: Stronger Consulting  Connect with Mike: www.linkedin.com/in/mmscStronger Consulting: strongerconsulting.comPublish a Book That Matters:  booksthatmatter.orgStart a Podcast That Matters:  podcastsmatter.comGo from Expert to Thought Leader: geniusdiscovery.org  For more great podcasts like this one, visit https://podcaststhatmatter.org Stay strong. 

Dr. Nadia Lopez banked 156 unused sick days. When she finally got too sick to work, the Department of Education separated her from payroll and told her she could come back to work. In this episode of Ronderings, Ron sits down with Dr. Nadia Lopez, award-winning educator, best-selling author of The Bridge to Brilliance, and the founding principal of Mott Hall Bridges Academy in Brownsville, Brooklyn, for a conversation about educator wellness, burnout, and what it costs to give a system everything you have. Dr. Lopez never planned to teach. She trained as a critical care nurse, detoured through Verizon, and was rejected from the NYC Teaching Fellows before a mentor forced them to put the rejection in writing. They could not. She landed in a seventh grade special education classroom in Fort Greene and brought her nursing philosophy with her: know the child before you read the IEP, treat the behaviors and not the label, understand the context before you diagnose the problem. She talks about asking her students whether they had a library at home and realizing they did not own a single book, while thousands sat unused in school storage rooms. She talks about the Global Teacher Prize taking her to Dubai, Sweden, and Korea, and what those systems understand about sustainability that we do not. She talks about her mentor Karen, who ignored her own symptoms the same way Dr. Lopez ignored hers. And she talks about the autoimmune diagnosis that ended her principalship, the medical sabbatical the DOE denied her, and the fight to get insurance back so she could have surgery. Tune in to hear why Dr. Lopez believes leadership is responsibility, not martyrdom, and what her HEART framework asks of leaders who have never once been asked how their heart and spirit are doing.  Chapters:🩺 02:53 Dr. Nadia Lopez never wanted to be an educator, she was supposed to be a nurse✉️ 06:56 Rejected by the NYC Teaching Fellows, until a mentor asked them to put it in writing🏫 11:31 Seventh grade special education in Fort Greene, and the nursing philosophy she brought with her📕 15:30 The question she asked every student: do you have a library at home🇬🇹 20:27 Guatemala, the food pantry, and the child nobody knew was struggling🌍 23:44 The Global Teacher Prize, teaching under a tree, and what other systems understand❤️ 29:30 The question she asks educators everywhere: how is your heart and spirit🕯️ 31:26 Karen Giles, glioblastoma, and the signs they both ignored🚫 41:16 The HEART framework, 156 unused sick days, and the sabbatical the DOE denied👩‍👧 45:14 Walking away as the lesson she was teaching her daughter about her own worth📋 50:36 We have attendance protocols for students and nothing for leaders💭 54:58 The Ronderings question: listen to your body or you become a hypocrite Links:Website: www.thelopezeffect.com Work with Dr. Lopez: www.thelopezeffect.com/workwithme Socials: @thelopezeffect on LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok, Threads, and X Dr. Lopez coaches women leaders in education on building careers they can sustain, and she is launching a new health and wellness endeavor. Reach out to her if you are leading a school or a system and no one has asked you lately how your heart and spirit are doing. Connect with Ron: www.linkedin.com/in/rapatalo Check Out Ron's Book: www.amazon.com/dp/1613431473 Leverage Publishing Group: www.leveragepublishinggroup.com Publish a Book That Matters: http://booksthatmatter.org Start a Podcast That Matters: http://podcastsmatter.com Go from Expert to Thought Leader: http://geniusdiscovery.org 

Dr. Aidé Acosta went from a first-generation college student navigating higher education without a map to the Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students at National Louis University. Her guiding line comes from her Sinaloan roots: like a turtle, she carries home on her back, and she has built her career making sure students never have to leave theirs behind. In this episode of The Stronger Podcast, Mike Montoya sits down with Dr. Acosta, VP for Student Affairs and Dean of Students at National Louis University in Chicago, to talk about what it takes to build a genuinely student-centered institution across every campus and learning modality.Aidé traces the arc from a childhood shaped by migration and family sacrifice to Southwestern College, UC Riverside, and a doctorate at the University of Illinois. She explains why so much of her work is about naming the invisible rules of higher education, the ones first-generation students are expected to already know, and why belonging is not a nice-to-have but the actual mechanism of student success. They get into social mobility as multigenerational impact, why access without support is an empty promise, and how an institution keeps its mission consistent when students arrive through wildly different doors. Aidé is candid about carrying her community into every room she enters and what she wants her own child to inherit from that. Tune in to hear why Aidé believes the deepest work in higher education is helping students succeed without asking them to leave home behind.  Chapters:🐢 01:37 Meet Dr. Aidé Acosta: first-generation student turned dean of students🌎 02:28 Why she carries home on her back like a turtle🎶 02:50 Sinaloan roots, migration, and the family that made the path🎓 08:14 Southwestern College to UC Riverside: learning the rules no one taught her🔍 26:41 Naming the invisible rules first-generation students are expected to know🤝 30:05 Why belonging is the mechanism of student success, not a nice-to-have🌱 34:59 Access without support is an empty promise🏛️ 40:18 Keeping one mission consistent across every campus and modality💛 44:11 Social mobility as multigenerational impact and what she wants her child to inherit Links:Website: nationallouisu | LinktreeLinkedIn: Aidé Acosta, Ph.D. Company's LinkedIn: National Louis University Connect with Mike: www.linkedin.com/in/mmscStronger Consulting: strongerconsulting.comPublish a Book That Matters:  booksthatmatter.orgStart a Podcast That Matters:  podcastsmatter.comGo from Expert to Thought Leader: geniusdiscovery.org  For more great podcasts like this one, visit https://podcaststhatmatter.org Stay strong.