Libsyn Directory

#114: Leading When Nothing Is Certain

Release Date: 08/20/2026

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

In Episode #114 of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause is joined by Cathie Saroka, Level 52 Coach and Facilitator and CEO of Goldray Glass, for a conversation about leading through uncertainty without carrying the weight alone. Cathie has spent decades leading through recessions, business volatility, personal challenges, the pandemic, and constant change. Her experience has taught her that strong leadership in uncertain times is not about projecting certainty or having every answer. It is about building a team that can think, challenge, adapt, and solve problems together. Jayson and Cathie...

#113: Resilience Is Not Toughing It Out

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

In Episode #113 of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause is joined by Level 52 coach and facilitator Lara Koretsky for an honest exploration of resilience, adversity, and growth. Resilience is often described as the ability to bounce back or keep pushing when life becomes difficult. Lara challenges that definition. True resilience is not about returning to who you were before adversity or ignoring the toll it has taken. It is the ability to learn, adapt, recover, and create something stronger from the experience. Drawing from profound personal loss, family challenges, burnout,...

#112: How Transparent Leaders Build Trust in Tough Times

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

In Episode #112 of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause is joined by experienced entrepreneur, former CEO, and TEC Canada Chair Mark Terrill for a candid conversation about transparency in leadership. They explore why transparency is essential for building trust, particularly during difficult periods, and why employees create their own explanations when leaders fail to communicate clearly. Mark also explains why effective transparency does not mean sharing everything. Leaders must balance openness with confidentiality, timing, focus, and empathy. When handled poorly, transparency can become...

#111: The Practice of Curiosity and Why Leaders Default to Certainty

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

A 360-degree review told Tyler Chisholm exactly what was wrong with his leadership: he filled every room, jumped to conclusions, and never let his team finish a sentence. His team had stopped contributing. They were just waiting to be told what to do. In this episode of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause talks with Tyler Chisholm, CEO and author of Curious as Hell, about the moment that feedback forced him to rebuild how he leads. Tyler unpacks the difference between the leader he was in the boardroom and the host he'd become on his own podcast, and how closing that gap turned curiosity from...

#110: Your Empathy Might Be Making You a Worse Leader

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

Empathy gets treated like a personality trait: you either have it or you don't. Roxana Radulescu, Level 52 coach and facilitator, argues that's wrong. It's a muscle, and most leaders are either overusing it, avoiding it, or using it to avoid the hard conversation instead of having it. In this episode of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause talks with Roxana about what empathy actually is (her definition: care plus trust), what it isn't (sympathy, agreement, an excuse to skip feedback), and where it goes wrong at the top of organizations. They dig into a Yale psychologist's argument that...

#108: Why Burnout Isn't a Workload Problem

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

Most leaders think burnout comes from too much work. So they respond with wellness programs, lighter workloads, and lunch hour yoga. Then nothing changes. In this episode of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause sits down with Dr. Tianne Foster, physician, burnout researcher, and author of Reality Check, to unpack what actually drives burnout and why most organizations are solving the wrong problem. Trained across Canada, the US, and the UK, Dr. Foster became obsessed with burnout after a senior physician told her entire class to get out of medicine while they still could. Her conclusion:...

#109 MML What does high performance actually look like?

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

Welcome to The Meaningful Leader — July Edition. This month, we’re looking at the invisible forces that shape how leaders and teams actually perform: the standards we fail to define, the belonging we misunderstand, the thinking environments we create, and the warning lights we ignore. Three of this month’s sections were sparked by great conversations I had on with Level 52 coach and facilitator - Jessica Heafey, Flow state advisor - Dr. Murray Heber, and author of Reality Check - Dr. Tianne Foster. Links to each full discussion are below. But the thread running through all of...

#107 Why Belonging Is Not About Being Nice

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

Belonging gets mistaken for everyone getting along. But what if a team with no conflict is the clearest sign that belonging is missing? In this episode of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause sits down with Level 52 coach and facilitator Jessica Heafey to explore belonging, what it is, what it isn't, and the mistakes leaders make trying to create it. Drawing on a career that began in professional theatre, Jessica explains why being hired is not the same as belonging, why the difference between kind and nice matters more than most leaders realize, and why real belonging asks...

#106: The Science of Flow State and Peak Performance

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

Most leaders think better performance comes from working harder. Dr. Murray Heber argues that mindset may be a much bigger factor than effort. In this episode of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause and Dr. Murray Heber explore the science of flow state, why high performers burn out, and how leaders can create the conditions for peak performance without relying on constant pressure. They discuss the difference between playing to win and playing not to lose, why curiosity is one of the most powerful tools available to leaders, and how confusion can sometimes be the pattern interrupt needed...

#105: Most Leaders Don’t Have a Motivation Problem

Executive Commute With Jayson Krause

Most leaders are waiting to feel ready before they act. That mindset may be the thing keeping them stuck. In this episode of The Executive Commute, Jayson Krause unpacks four leadership ideas from this month’s Meaningful Leader newsletter and explores the deeper patterns underneath them. He breaks down why high-performing leaders struggle to stop carrying other people’s work, why motivation follows action, how leaders mislabel emotions under pressure, and why “just be yourself” is often terrible leadership advice. This episode is about leadership under pressure, internal...

More Episodes

Cathie has spent decades leading through recessions, business volatility, personal challenges, the pandemic, and constant change. Her experience has taught her that strong leadership in uncertain times is not about projecting certainty or having every answer. It is about building a team that can think, challenge, adapt, and solve problems together.

Jayson and Cathie explore why uncertainty creates fear and unproductive stories, how leaders can create clarity without pretending to know what comes next, and why values, trust, collaboration, and scenario planning become critical when information is incomplete.

They also examine the danger of theatrical certainty, the difference between composure and competence, why leaders need to make decisions with minimal viable information, and how to create an environment where people feel safe enough to surface the ideas and concerns that leaders need to hear.

Episode timestamps:

00:52 The myth of leading through uncertainty alone
03:12 Building a company in constant uncertainty
06:29 Choosing what deserves your focus
08:52 Cathie’s experience as a “wartime CEO”
09:43 Leading Goldray Glass through the pandemic
12:20 What worked and what Cathie would change
14:28 Defining leadership through uncertainty
17:20 Creating conditions for adaptability
18:14 When following the plan becomes the problem
24:15 The danger of theatrical certainty
25:45 Cathie’s biggest leadership mistake
29:02 Trusting your gut under pressure
30:21 What leaders misunderstand about control
33:08 Warning signs a leader is struggling
35:07 Scenario planning through best, worst, and likely outcomes
39:19 Building the team before uncertainty arrives
45:04 Composure, transparency, and vulnerability
47:56 Making decisions with minimal viable information
50:56 Using values to make decisions in chaos
54:13 Why the team matters more than having all the answers
59:56 Cathie’s final lesson for leaders

Follow Jayson Krause
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3Voc2qOmcqGKfqy6CDiZOw
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayson-krause/

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