Capability Edge

Some careers happen because everything goes according to plan.

Most don't.

David Jones grew up in a single-parent household, became the first person in his family to go to university, built a career in HR, started a business that was later acquired, and learned that some of the biggest career decisions come down to one thing: trusting your own judgement.

David didn't wait for someone else to tell him where his career should go. He paid attention to what gave him energy, took calculated risks, and kept choosing the path that felt right...

Everyone is talking about how to AI-proof their career.

I think we're asking the wrong question.

The question I've been thinking about is this:

What makes a company AI-proof?

Because individual capability only takes us so far if the organization around us hasn't built the capability to adapt.

In this episode, I unpack why the companies that will thrive through AI disruption won't necessarily be the most automated. They'll be the ones that build human capability before everyone else realizes it's the real competitive advantage.

I walk...

Nolan Hout has spent 15 years at InfoPro Learning without ever doing the same job twice. In this episode we talk about the culture that made that possible, the shift happening right now in consulting as AI kills the billable hour model, and why chasing a job title might be the wrong move entirely. If you work in talent development, L&D, or any kind of people consulting, this one will change how you think about pricing your own value.

Meet your host, Candice Mitchell

Candice Mitchell is a Talent Development Strategist, CEO of Talent...

I do not run a training needs analysis. I have not run one in years, and it is one of the most strategic decisions I have ever made about my own work.

The traditional training needs analysis is a real diagnostic. It can tell you what gap exists between what people can do and what the work needs. What it cannot tell you is whether training was ever the right answer in the first place, because by the time you're running the analysis, someone already decided that it was. In this episode I walk through why that...

Guest: Nigel Paine, former CLO, organizational learning researcher, author of five books.

A room full of executives is working out how AI changes their business. Real conversation, real ideas. Then the L&D person asks if they want a course built. The room stops.

What we cover:

Why is L&D diverging from the business? Nigel watched L&D teams celebrate cutting content development time by 60% while the rest of the organization was drowning. Nobody outside L&D cared.

What should that person have said instead of "shall I build a...

Fighting AI is like trying to fist-fight the ocean — you're going to lose. The professionals who stay relevant in an AI world aren't resisting the technology; they've learned to work WITH it. In this episode of The Capability Edge, Candice Mitchell shows you how to use AI as a tool without becoming someone the tool replaces.

AI is extraordinary at volume — summarizing, drafting, organizing, processing. What it cannot do is judgment, context, relationships, or anything that requires lived experience. That gap is where your professional value lives. Using a real client case study — a three-year capability strategy delive...

Is your AI implementation just busy work? Learn to spot the difference between genuine AI transformation and buying empty tools. Many businesses mistake purchasing software for actual progress. This video breaks down why most AI adoption efforts fail to produce measurable results. If you are a leader or manager looking to improve your team's output, you need to understand why spending money on licenses is not the same as changing how your company operates. We examine the primary indicator of failure: when work processes remain identical six months after new software is introduced. If your decisions and daily tasks...

What if success was not about building bigger, but building intentionally?

In this episode, Caitlin, founder of Liquid Form Design, talks about building a business that supports your life instead of consuming it.

From rebuilding after divorce, to redesigning her business model, to questioning the pressure to constantly scale, this conversation is honest, thoughtful, and packed with practical wisdom for anyone building a career or business they actually want to live inside of.

If you have ever felt stuck in hustle culture, questioned what success should really look like, or wondered if there...

What if career growth had less to do with strategy and more to do with who you become along the way?

Let’s hear Candice with Jessica Miller-Merrell, founder of Workology, talk about entrepreneurship, resilience, career pivots, and the personal growth most people never expect when building meaningful work.

From losing her job because of a blog, to building a business that reaches over a million people a month, to learning how nervous system regulation changed everything, this conversation is honest, practical, and deeply human.

If you are building a career, growing a bu...

What if the problem isn’t your job… but how much of yourself you’ve tied to it

This conversation with Madison Butler felt like saying out loud the things most people only think about Madison Butler to talk about work, identity, burnout, and what it actually means to build a life that feels like yours from people pleasing in early careers to detaching your identity from your job to walking away from corporate entirely, this is an honest conversation about what we’re not saying out loud.

If you’ve ever felt like work is taking...

From side hustle at 15 to SaaS founder — Ryan Austin shares the raw entrepreneur story behind personal growth, success mindset, self improvement, and starting a business with nothing but grit.

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In this candid conversation, Ryan — Founder and CEO of Cognota, the world's first Learn Ops platform — tells the full, unfiltered story of what entrepreneurship actually looks like from the inside. The side hustles that became real businesses. The exits. The wrong par...

What if your manager has more impact on your emotional wellbeing than almost anyone else in your life?

Ryan shares the career journey that took him from industrial-organizational psychology into leadership development, talent strategy, people analytics, and executive coaching.

From building HR systems from the ground up to leading talent development strategies across major organizations, Ryan brings both the human and commercial side of leadership into one powerful conversation.

This episode dives into what makes great leaders, why workplace culture starts with management, and how leadership decisions shape not only business outcomes, but...

Adrienne Weimer’s career path did not follow a straight line and that is exactly what makes this conversation so powerful. From nearly becoming a doctor, to building a career in consulting and leadership development, to moving alone across the world to Thailand, to leaving LinkedIn and building a million-dollar business, Adrienne shares the real story behind what it takes to trust yourself through uncertainty.

This episode is a deeply honest conversation about identity shifts, career pivots, resilience, entrepreneurship, and what success really looks like when you define it on your own terms. If you are navigating ch...

What if career growth isn’t about climbing faster — but choosing challenge over comfort?

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with learning & development leader, community builder, and solopreneur Anamaria Dorgo to unpack what a non-linear, intentional career really looks like.

From starting in retail, to staying with one company for a decade across countries and roles, to experimenting with consulting, community building, and finally finding the right hybrid — this conversation is an honest look at clarity, pivots, and designing a career that actually fits.

No hype. No “follow your passion” clichés. Just real d...

What if the way we educate people is actively working against how humans actually learn?

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with learning strategist, leadership expert, and author Nick Shackleton-Jones to unpack why traditional education and corporate learning miss the mark and what actually creates meaning, growth, and capability.

From lecturing psychology, to consulting at global organizations like the BBC, BP, and Deloitte, Nick shares real stories about learning systems, leadership mistakes, and why most development programs fail the people they’re meant to serve.

This is a candid conversation about purpose, ex...

For years, learning and development has focused on content.

More courses.

More platforms.

More information.

But information isn’t the problem anymore.

In this episode, Candice speaks with learning leader Ajay to talk about what actually helps people learn, grow, and change their behavior at work.

Ajay shares his journey from discovering e-learning early in his career to working across the UK and Europe in corporate L&D. Along the way, he began noticing something important: the moments people remember most in learning aren’t slides or modu...

What if the thing holding you back isn’t lack of talent — but lack of permission?

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with keynote speaker, author, and musician Rachel Druckenmiller for a powerful conversation about courage, burnout, self-trust, and choosing yourself — even when it feels risky.

From studying abroad and finding her voice, to building a career through initiative, to burnout, a life-altering accident, and learning to trust herself again — Rachel shares what it really takes to live an unmuted life.

This is an honest, deeply human episode about agency, resilience, and why your...

Leadership isn’t about having all the answers it’s about being willing to ask better questions.

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with Al Dea, founder of Edge of Work, to unpack what leadership really looks like in practice not theory.

From Al’s first leadership role at age 14, to navigating loss early in his consulting career, to building a consulting practice rooted in empathy, curiosity, and context this conversation is honest, grounded, and deeply human.

Together, they explore how leaders are shaped, how trust is built, and why curiosity matters more t...

In a world obsessed with hacks, shortcuts, and instant success, this conversation slows everything down.

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with Ryan Clark to explore what it actually takes to build a life and career you love without pretending it’s easy.

Ryan shares his journey from building a production company with close friends, navigating betrayal and reinvention, and ultimately choosing freedom, creativity, and values over status or certainty. Together, they talk about content creation, discipline, trusting yourself, and why loving the work matters more than motivation ever will.

This episode is...

What if the pressure to be “on” every single month is actually holding your business back?

In this episode, I sat down with Abi for a deeply honest conversation about building a business that’s profitable and sustainable.

Abi shares her journey from early entrepreneurship and freelancing to running an agency and coaching course creators — along with the reality of feast-and-famine cycles, mindset traps, and why there’s no single moment where everything suddenly feels “figured out.”

This conversation is calm, practical, and refreshingly real — especially for anyone tired of chasing constant growth.

What you’ll...

What if the pressure to “have it all figured out” is the very thing holding you back?

In this episode, I sat down with Erin Halper for a refreshingly honest conversation about entrepreneurship, consulting, and what it really looks like to build a sustainable business over time.

Erin shares her journey from early entrepreneurship to private equity, consulting, and eventually building The Upside — a global community for independent consultants and business owners. Along the way, she breaks down some uncomfortable truths we don’t talk about enough: nobody has all the answers, “overnight success” is mostly ficti...

Why do so many workplace changes fail, even when the tools are “better” and the systems are “improved”?

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with Katrina Kennedy, facilitator, consultant, and author of Learning That Lasts, to talk about learning, change, and what really happens when organizations roll out new systems without supporting the people expected to use them.

Katrina shares stories from her early career in the district attorney’s office, the moment that shaped her philosophy on training, and how decades of experience taught her that learning isn’t about information, it’s about confiden...

What if the thing holding you back isn’t fear, skill, or timing but waiting for permission that’s never coming?

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with Jenny Wood, former Google executive and author of Wild Courage, for a wide-ranging conversation about career growth, confidence, and taking bold action before you feel ready.

Jenny shares the now-famous subway story that sparked her concept of “wild courage,” along with lessons from her 18-year career at Google, her transition into entrepreneurship, and the mindset shifts that help people stop waiting and start moving.

This con...

What if the reason your career feels misaligned isn’t your role, your company, or your industry but the way you’ve been taught to separate work from life?

In this episode, Candice Mitchell sits down with Mel Fox Dhar for an honest conversation about career alignment, burnout, and navigating transitions especially in big tech. Mel shares her journey from retail and customer-facing roles to Microsoft, Amazon, and ultimately into career coaching.

Along the way, she explains why alignment doesn’t come from optimizing your resume alone but from understanding who you are as a whole...

In this episode, I sat down with Rosie for a very honest conversation about self-judgment, shame, and the quiet emotional weight many people carry especially when life doesn’t unfold the way they expected. Rosie shares what helped her move through a deeply difficult season, including the jealousy, resentment, and guilt that often stay unspoken. Candice adds context from her coaching work, where she sees these same patterns show up again and again in capable, driven people. This isn’t a conversation about “fixing yourself.” It’s about understanding yourself with more honesty and less cruelty.

What you'll get...

Behind every confident leader is a collection of awkward, funny, and deeply formative moments, and many of them start in our very first jobs.

This episode brings together some of the most memorable, laugh-out-loud stories from past guests as they reflect on their earliest working experiences. From misunderstood presentations and customer blow-ups to first paychecks, first mistakes, and first lessons in responsibility, these moments are as funny as they are meaningful.

What begins as humor quickly turns into insight:

What were the most impactful moments from Development Nerds this year? This special Top 12 compilation episode pulls together the clips that stopped me mid-sentence, rewired a belief, or made me sit in silence for a second.

You’ll hear powerful takeaways on future readiness, confidence and self-worth, burnout, career pivots, mentorship, resilience, experimentation, and what real impact looks like beyond the workplace.

Featured guests and their moments:

To wrap up the year, I’m bringing you something special — the most relatable moments shared by a curated group of incredible guests from the show.

Not all of this year’s guests appear in this episode.

These were specifically chosen because they shared something deeply human, honest, and universally felt.

This episode is part of our BEST Moments of the Year series, and this one is all about the moments that made us say:

“Wait… I’ve felt that too.”

“Oh wow, I thought I was the only one.”

“Ye...

This episode is special.

Across dozens of conversations this season, certain moments made me stop, scribble notes, replay the audio, or just sit back and breathe for a second.

These weren’t just good insights — they were the best learning moments shared by a handful of guests whose wisdom hit differently.

Today, I’m bringing them together for the first time.

You’ll hear the strongest, sharpest, most transformative moments from:

These m...

What does it look like to take ownership of your money, and your career, when the world told you not to?

In this episode, Lorie Jones (CFP®, MBA), owner of Fearless Financial Advisors, shares how she went from McDonald’s Hamburger University to helping grow an RIA from ~$30M to ~$230M, all while raising five kids, earning her licenses, and fighting imposter syndrome in a male-dominated industry. We dig into servant leadership, building systems when life is full, why “balance” is measured over years (not days), and how women can start feeling fear-less about their finances, today.

Yo...

What if everything you do today is already out of date?

In this episode of Development Nerds, Candice sits down with Allister Frost — former Microsoft marketing leader, global keynote speaker, and author of Ready Already — to talk about developing a future-ready mindset in a world that won’t stop changing.

From wiping tables at 11 to leading marketing at Microsoft, Allister shares how curiosity, empathy, and continuous learning shaped his career. He unpacks his 5-step Ready Already Growth Cycle — Follow, React, Open, Surprise, Tell — a simple but powerful framework for staying adaptable, creative, and human in the age...

If you work in Learning & Development, HR, or People Enablement and you keep asking “How do we actually close skills gaps at scale?”, this episode with David James (Chief Learning Officer at 360Learning, former Director of Learning, Talent & OD at Disney, and host of The Learning & Development Podcast) is your blueprint. We go from stacking shelves at 14 and gigging in London, to running L&D functions, mentoring (without ever asking), and designing learning that drives proficiency, not vanity metrics—so you can genuinely love Mondays again.

What you’ll learn

Proficiency at scale: David’s practical...

Executive coach Susanne Biro (Vancouver, BC) gets radically honest about leadership, self-doubt, and what entrepreneurship really looks like—sometimes 11 p.m., laptop open, tears flowing… and doing it anyway. We dig into “having your own back,” doing scary things before you feel ready, building a reputation that earns investment, and why the inside-out game (how you feel daily) drives sustainable success.

In this episode:

Dr. Jessica Schloemp’s story is a powerful reminder that leadership isn’t about titles, ladders, or likes — it’s about being honest with yourself. From dropping ketchup on a customer at 14, to door-to-door sales, to earning her doctorate in Strategic Leadership, Jessica has lived every lesson she now teaches.

In this episode, Jessica and Candice talk about:

✅ Finding yourself again after losing your identity in the corporate mold

✅ The difference between being nice and being kind

✅ How to lead authentically in a male-dominated industry

✅ Why getting off social media helped her...

On paper, Lauren Evans had everything: a secure corporate job, steady paycheck, even a pension. But inside her cubicle, she kept asking herself one quiet, uncomfortable question — is this it?

This is the story of what happens when you stop ignoring that question.

Lauren shares how she went from an 18-year-old UPS supervisor to the founder of Design and Streamline Solutions, where she helps small business owners reclaim time and sanity by simplifying their tech.

We talk about the real meaning of “paying your dues,” what happens when your weekends are the only time y...

When you hear the name “L&D Detective,” you probably think: clever branding. But for Kevin M. Yates, it’s more than that — it’s who he is.

In this episode, Kevin shares his remarkable journey: from his first job at 16 stocking shelves in a Chicago pharmacy to a global career leading learning impact at brands like McDonald’s and Meta — and ultimately, to founding Meals in the Meantime, a nonprofit that’s fed thousands.

We talk about rediscovering purpose when work starts to feel flat, why mentorship and community matter more than strategy, and what it means to...

What does it take to go from bartending in a tourist town to leading global leadership development programs for billion-dollar companies?

In this episode, I sit down with Amber Anderson, Head of Learning & Leadership Development and Executive Coach, to unpack her incredible 25-year career journey. From working in her dad’s dive shop on the Great Lakes, to creating her own role in corporate training, to taking bold leaps of faith without a safety net — Amber’s story is all about courage, self-trust, and building a career that truly fits.

We talk about:

When Dr. Sarah Nicholls hit the wall in her first year as a doctor, she did what most high-achievers do: pushed harder. That only made the burnout worse. In this conversation, Sarah shares how a toxic work culture, night shifts, and perfectionism turned life into a slog—and how she found her way back to lightness, joy, and sustainable success. (Plot twist: she also launched a mini business painting people’s pets to pay for med school. 🐶🎨)

We talk about:

What happens when you do everything “right” — top grad program at GE, Six Sigma Black Belt, big roles at BP — and still feel the tug to do life on your terms? Meet Lisa Long, a Scotland-born entrepreneur and psychologist who moved countries (more than once), left corporate, built and sold a viral custom art brand (featured by major outlets), earned a master’s in psychology at 44, and now coaches women in midlife to design sustainable, hype-free businesses that fit real life.

We talk about:

• moving overseas young and “growing up fast” — loneliness, culture shock, and finding your peopl...

What does it take to go from walking dogs for $10 a day to coaching New York Times bestselling authors, Olympians, and industry leaders on how to deliver the best speech of their lives?

In this real, unpolished conversation, I sit down with Mike Pacchione, founder of Best Speech, to hear his career journey — from comic books and mowing lawns, to botched interviews, a fax machine that changed his life, and the random Saturday class that opened the door to Nike and Silicon Valley.

Mike shares: