Pressure-Proof Leadership with Claire Hayek (The Ripple Effect Podcast)
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
Release Date: 08/04/2026
Step Into a Nonprofit Role Prepared | The Ripple Effect Podcast ft. Janelle Miller Moravek
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
How many times this month have you smiled through a day that was quietly wearing you down? Mission-driven work has a way of doing that to you. You care so much that you say yes to one more thing, then another, and then you realize you’ve been running on fumes. You hold it together for your team, your board, your donors, and your family, and the one person nobody seems to check in on is you. Now picture doing all of that in a brand new role. A new board, a new team, a new list of expectations, and a quiet worry that somebody left out a few important details before you said yes. I talk with...
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If Everyone’s Nodding, Something’s Wrong | The Ripple Effect Podcast ft. Hacia Atherton
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
You can have a room full of people nodding along and think everything is fine. That’s actually the problem. When everyone agrees, when nobody pushes back, when the room goes quiet the moment a decision is made, that silence isn’t peace. It’s a warning sign. And most leaders miss it entirely because they’re chasing the next win, the next KPI, the next quarter, and they’ve stopped looking at the people doing the actual work. Hacia Atherton works with leaders to figure out why good teams fall apart, why great people leave, and what most organizations are quietly getting wrong about the...
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What You're Willing to Risk Shapes the Life You Get (The Ripple Effect Podcast ft. Jason Boulette)
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
You can do everything right in your career and still find yourself staring at the ceiling at 2 am, wondering what exactly you’re building. The title sounds impressive, and the salary looks good, but somewhere along the way the thing that was supposed to give you a life started quietly taking it. The years go faster than the days, and it’s easy to look up one morning and realize the schedule you built isn’t the life you meant to have. This episode is about what you’re willing to risk to change that, and how much of your time you’re okay trading for comfort. Work-life balance sounds...
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Proof You Can Start Over Without Walking Away From Everything ft. Michele Trongaard
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
Twenty-three years is a long time to spend earning a reputation. Michele Trongaard has one that precedes her everywhere she goes in this industry, and after sitting across from her for this conversation, I understand exactly why. Michele is stepping away from her role as a district CFO after more than two decades in public school finance, and she's doing it on her own terms, heading into a new chapter rather than just closing the book on the old one. I wanted to talk with her about what actually built that reputation, because it wasn't the budgets or the balance sheets. It was something much...
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What the Best Leaders Can't See About Themselves (The Ripple Effect Podcast ft. Brian Vogel)
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
Picture your ideal Tuesday. You come in with a clear head, a short list of things that actually matter, and a couple of hours of uninterrupted time to think strategically about where you're taking this thing. Now picture your actual Tuesday. Six fires before noon. Three decisions that landed on your desk that someone else should have made. A calendar that left no room for anything except reacting. And somewhere around four in the afternoon, the quiet feeling that you've been incredibly busy and somehow accomplished nothing. If that second picture is more familiar, this episode is for you. My...
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You Were Creative Once. Find Your Way Back. (The Ripple Effect Podcast ft. Maria Gatling)
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
When was the last time you made something? A drawing, a photo, a collage, a doodle in the margin of a notebook. Something you made with your hands because something in you wanted to. Most of us have to think about it. And the longer we think, the further back the answer goes. Somewhere along the way, we handed our creative lives back. Not all at once, and not on purpose. Just gradually, between the jobs and the responsibilities and the screens and the schedules, the things we used to make got quietly set aside. And we told ourselves we’d get back to them. And then we didn’t. And eventually...
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The One Thing Your Competition Can Never Buy or Copy (The Ripple Effect Podcast ft. Joe Fusco)
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
Here's a question I want you to think about before you hit play. When was the last time you felt like the work you were doing actually mattered? Not mattered as in the numbers went up or the boss was happy. Mattered in that way where you finished a day and felt genuinely full rather than just done. Most of us have forgotten what that feels like. Or maybe we never had it to begin with. This conversation goes deep on that. My guest Joe Fusco and I got into what actually makes a company great, why people don't fit in a spreadsheet no matter how hard we try to make them, and what it really...
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Hurricane Katrina at 21: The Story the Media Never Fully Told featuring Sandy Rosenthal
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
Here's a question I want you to think about before you hit play. When was the last time you felt like the work you were doing actually mattered? Not mattered as in the numbers went up or the boss was happy. Mattered in that way where you finished a day and felt genuinely full rather than just done. Most of us have forgotten what that feels like. Or maybe we never had it to begin with. This conversation goes deep on that. My guest Joe Fusco and I got into what actually makes a company great, why people don't fit in a spreadsheet no matter how hard we try to make them, and what it really means...
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Pressure-Proof Leadership with Claire Hayek (The Ripple Effect Podcast)
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
Be honest. When’s the last time you actually felt calm, not just looked calm? Because those are two very different things, and most of us have gotten so good at faking the second one that we forget what the first one even feels like. You handle the hard conversation. You keep your voice steady in the meeting that’s falling apart. You hold it together for everyone else in the room. And then later, alone in your car or lying awake at night, it all comes flooding back. That gap between performing calm and actually being calm is something my guest today has spent her entire life studying,...
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Is Your Survival Brain Leading Your Team? (The Ripple Effect Podcast ft. Dr. Annie Campanile)
The Ripple Effect Podcast with Steve Harper
Most of us have spent years learning how to communicate better. Better words, better models, better frameworks. And yet somehow the same conflicts keep happening, the same conversations keep getting avoided, and the same people keep making the room tense the moment they walk in. Dr. Annie Campanile has a different theory about why, and it starts somewhere most leadership training never goes. Watch to learn what's actually driving workplace conflict beneath the surface, why the protective patterns you developed as a kid are probably still showing up in your leadership today, and what your...
info_outlineBe honest. When’s the last time you actually felt calm, not just looked calm?
Because those are two very different things, and most of us have gotten so good at faking the second one that we forget what the first one even feels like. You handle the hard conversation. You keep your voice steady in the meeting that’s falling apart. You hold it together for everyone else in the room. And then later, alone in your car or lying awake at night, it all comes flooding back.
That gap between performing calm and actually being calm is something my guest today has spent her entire life studying, first as a matter of survival, and later as her life’s work. Claire Hayek is an engineer, a musician, a TEDx speaker, and someone who’s spent decades inside high-pressure environments long before she ever had language for what was happening to her under the surface. In this conversation, we get into pressure-proof leadership, why habituation and resilience get confused all the time, even though they are not the same thing, and what she calls common authority, that steady presence that holds up even when everything around you isn’t.
Huge thanks to Claire for such an open, generous conversation. Her book, Calm Under Fire: The Leadership Skill No One Taught You, comes out this September, and you’re going to want to be first in line.
clairehayek.com/books
Free Resources for You!
If you’re a leader looking to reset your own relationship with pressure, grab Claire’s free Pressure Reset Scripts at clairehayek.com/reset
If you’re leading a team and want a clearer read on where pressure is quietly costing you, check out the free Pressure and Performance Scorecard at clairehayek.com/pp-scorecard
More About the Guest
Claire Hayek is a Neuroleadership expert, TEDx speaker, and
founder of Mind. Soul. Purpose. Teambuilding. She is the creator of Pressure-Proof Leadership™, a neuroscience-based framework that helps leaders and organizations maintain clarity, resilience, and performance in high-pressure environments.
For more than 30 years, she has operated in high-pressure
environments, from growing up in war-torn Lebanon to engineering and executive leadership. Her work examines how sustained pressure shapes the human nervous system, identity, performance, and how high performers can harness drive without letting it quietly erode clarity, health, or voice.
Ripple with Claire Hayek:
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More About the Host
Steve Harper is the founder of Ripple Central and host of The Ripple Effect Podcast, where he explores what it really takes to build authentic, meaningful relationships.
He also owns Owner Insite, a construction project management software company. Steve runs The Pond, a community built around intentional connection and 8-Minute Ripple events.
Ripple with Steve Harper:
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Speaking and coaching inquiries: [email protected]