Season 4, #4 - Chris Daden Scaling for work 4.0
The Founders Sandbox
In this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, host Brenda McCabe sits down with Chris Daden, CTO of Criteria Corp, to explore what it takes to scale purpose-driven businesses in the era of Work 4.0. Chris shares his fascinating origin story—starting with a childhood shaped by tech-savvy parents and leading to multiple exits, international teams, and leadership at a global talent success platform. He breaks down how Criteria uses science and AI to remove bias from hiring, why soft skills matter more than ever, and how to future-proof your workforce in an AI-augmented world. Learn about his...
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Season 4, #3 - Growth Gears for Scaling
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, Brenda McCabe sits down with Jen Apy, Area Managing Partner and Chief Marketing Officer at Chief Outsiders, to explore how scaling companies can unlock growth through fractional marketing leadership. Jen shares insights from her 30+ years of marketing experience—spanning Mattel, Adobe, Intuit, and now Chief Outsiders—and introduces listeners to the Growth Gears framework: a strategic methodology designed to help small and mid-sized companies grow efficiently and sustainably. Jen and Brenda also dive into key trends such as the rise of “flash...
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Season 4, #2 - Sustainable Impact Through Family Play
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, Brenda speaks with Anbern R. Guarrine: a partner of The Guarrine Group (tGG), a global training company based in Illinois. tGG has facilitated team building, leadership, and organizational development workshops around the world for over 30 years. tGG partners with excellent facilitators who help groups have FUN, which is a hallmark of tGG Anbern R. Guarrine calls herself a "Facilitator of Family Play." By facilitating games, she helps participants gain insights about their strengths, their relationships with peers, and how they can use their skills to...
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Season 4, # 1. Purpose: Ethos in Employee Benefits
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of "The Founder's Sandbox", Brenda speaks with Donovan Ryckis; CEO of Ethos Benefits, the nation’s leading fiduciary benefits consultant in mid- -large market employers. Ethos Benefits was founded in 2016, after a chance request from a client of Donovan when he operated as a financial advisor--the client was faced with an increase in the companies’ health insurance bill for the companies’ employee plan that would have had a financial burden that threatened the sustainability of the company. ‘Ethos’ represents the guiding principle, character, or...
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Season 3, #14 - Scaling the Co-founder Relationship
The Founders Sandbox
Tim He checks many boxes as a guest on the Founders Sandbox- a 3x founder, now advisor, professor, creator, writer and coffee snob. Tim’s newsletter, "Cherrytree", allowed him to keep teaching entrepreneurship while the pandemic closed the classroom. By providing a newsletter, Cherrytree now offers consulting and coaching to cofounders. In Tim's own words; "I want to actually change how people become cofounders. And then how they stay cofounders." It is a tough decision to “divorce a co founder” and we find on this episode with Tim He sound advice on getting the pre nuptials in place for...
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Season 3, #13- Scaling AI with Ruthless Compassion
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, Brenda speaks with David Hirschfeld, owner of 18 year old business , that boasts a hyperexceptional development team building high “ticket” products in the B2B space. They speak about ways in which AI is a gamechanger, how Tekyz backs their work for clients with relentless pursuit of quality, and how Tekyz practices ruthless compassion,to protect the company and enable it to grow Having collaborated with over 90 startups, he developed the Launch 1st Method—a systematic approach that minimizes risks and accelerates software company...
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Season 3, #12 - Purpose: Preserving Family Wealth
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, Brenda speaks with Alexa Steinberg – a corporate and transactional attorney for middle-market companies and entrepreneurs. Acting as outside general counsel, Alexa represents privately held companies in a wide range of general corporate and transactional matters, including entity formation, structuring, and commercial transactions. With a focus on mergers and acquisitions, she offers clients guidance on structuring deals and ensuring compliance with relevant laws and regulations. Brenda and Alexa discuss her journey from working at a small,...
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Season 3, #11 - Purpose: Bridging Gaps for Better Governance
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, Brenda speaks with Dr. Keith Dorsey – Keith is joining to announce the launch of his book on May 6, 2025 “The Boardroom Journey Practical Guidance for Women to Secure a Seat at the Table”. Dr. Keith D. Dorsey is an internationally recognized governance expert and NACD Directorship 100™ honoree who equips senior leaders with proven strategies to secure and excel in board roles. With over 25 years of corporate leadership experience and active board service spanning private, municipal, university, and nonprofit sectors, he delivers engaging...
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Season 3, #10 - Resilience: Human Rights in Fashion and Entertainment
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, Brenda speaks with Shivani Honwad – founder of her own law firm, who specializes in immigration and business law for the creative industries. Shivani is a business and immigration lawyer, and trailblazer in supporting the Freelance and Free Act, as well as a professor at LA campus teaching Entrepreneurship for creatives. “I could not keep hearing it and not do anything about it” Shivani says, speaking about immigration as a major issue for freelance fashion workers. Shivani set out to get smarter. Ten 10 years later, The Law...
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Season 3, #9 - Resilience: Deeptech, Female, Veteran, Bipoc
The Founders Sandbox
On this episode of The Founder's Sandbox, Brenda speaks with Chasity Lourde Wright. Chasity is inventor and founder of Infiltron operates in the cybersecurity space; a Service disabled-Veteran owned and women-owned small business. Infiltron offers quantum-resistant cybersecurity solutions for decentralized digital identity, digital assets, and AI governance, utilizing proprietary post-secure encryption. Its patented technology integrates AI, blockchain, and quantum-resistant encryption to provide advanced cyber resilience, compliance enforcement, and real-time threat mitigation across...
info_outlineBrenda A. McCabe, MBA's personal experience has contributed to the work at Next Act Advisors. The Growth Strategies of NAA clients are always informed by current regulations and the understanding of why things have evolved to where they are because of the regulations and how they might change in the future. Enjoy this special Founder's Sandbox Podcast episode of Brenda reading one of her published blogs, "Data, Data, Everywhere" ; Now that all our data – private and enterprise, is out there, how can enterprises uphold trust?
You can read along to this blog with your NAA subscription at : https://nextactadvisors.com/data-data-everywhere/