Patrick Gordon, a veteran, found himself repeating a pattern of relying on alcohol, making a bad choice and then wanting to do better again and again after leaving the service. A moment of clarity four years ago helped him realize how he didn’t want to repeat what he experienced growing up and how he wanted to find a way to have a positive impact on his community. Going to war changes a person, but in this case, it started Patrick on a path to change the lives of so many children.

Do you feel like, over the last couple of years, you’re avoiding certain places on the internet more and more? Are you worried as a business owner and entrepreneur whether the digital marketing you’re putting out in the world is negatively impacting people? If your life is full of trolls, you need to listen to our guest Katrina German. 

Is your banker invested in wanting to see your business have a positive impact on your community? Does your financial team try to find ways to get you access to funding or better financial products based on what your company's goals are? To anyone out there that is saying, "That's not what bankers do.", you need to listen up.

Lars Boggild of Vancity Community Investment Bank (VCIB) joins us to talk about how they are Canada's first impact bank with B Corp status and what that all means. Credit unions have always been about community, but the approach from VCIB also prioritizes impact for good which opens doors to people who may not be the traditional big banks' ideal customers.  

How do you bank? Do you find you've hit issues with getting access to funding or products from traditional big banks? 

Dr. Sarah Gander is a Social Pediatrician, and beyond her various medical responsibilities, she is also adding to her skill set by taking a coaching certification. She’s the Co-founder of NB Social Pediatrics Inc., a non-profit focused on breaking down barriers so children and their families have the support they need regardless of their life situation. She shares with Dave and Greg how she’s facing complex issues head-on and not shying away from the reality that terrible things can and do happen in our communities. 

As entrepreneurs, we all know that we don’t always have access to the same resources as large corporations. For example, you might not be able to afford to have a business consultant with 10+ years of experience helping you identify your goals. But that’s precisely the problem Andy Clark set out to solve. 

Andy joins us to tell us about his Whole PIE Management System, which helps small businesses identify their goals within the areas of Profit, Impact and Enjoyment. Andy’s methodology takes a systemic approach fuelled by a passion for helping small businesses succeed. So if you’re a small business struggling with maintaining business focus, listen in to Andy’s perspective.

Taking care of our environment and tackling climate change head-on is a step we all need to take. Some companies are tackling this by changing the perspective from “rock throwers” to finding collaborative methods to work with industries we all know have significant environmental impacts. Enter our guest Chris Kallal and his company Wild and Pine, making a difference more than one tree at a time.

Chris started his company in university, which is a big undertaking, as all of us entrepreneurs know. Over the last 10 years, he’s been able to grow his business, pivot as needed to stay on top of changing focuses in forestry management, and tackle environmental impact by being upfront and honest about potential impactful activities while maintaining a solution-focused positive attitude. For anyone passionate about how business can work with the environment, you need to hear all about Wild and Pine!

Are you curious about how feasible being a Digital Nomad actually is? Worried about missing out on career growth or opportunities in your personal life? You need to listen to our guest, Steve Anderson, who shows how being a Digital Nomad does not mean you miss out on career success or community networking. It’s all about building the lifestyle and career path that interests you.

Are you looking to change your work-life balance by shifting to digital work, but you are past the point of wanting to be a Digital Nomad to roam the world living out of a backpack? Instead, you might be looking for the life of a Digital Independent. Intrigued? You need to listen to our guest this week, Glen Hicks. 

Glen followed a typical 9 - 5 corporate career for most of his life but reached a point where he had the opportunity to make a change, and he took it. Now he can spend more time with friends, family and other life pursuits while still working. This conversation brings out many topics about work-life balance and how we should be doing more to value the time we have with friends, families, and our passions as a culture. 

Have you gotten in a disagreement with someone online recently? Or have you seen the downfall of a public figure through an online movement? How do you feel about these interactions? 

A returning guest to The Boiling Point, Dorothéa Bozicolona-Volpe, who has worked in the digital and social media space for over 17 years, joins Greg to discuss “Cancel Culture” and how we interact with each other in the online world. No matter your background, political affiliations or personal beliefs, we have all been influenced by our engagements in online channels. But how do we make the most of the global interconnectivity that social media channels offer?

If you’re a filmmaker, artist, actor, or another type of creative professional, do you consider yourself an entrepreneur? Many of those roles aren’t 9 - 5 jobs and require you to work in a freelance or contract environment where you are essentially your own boss. So why don’t we automatically consider those creative professionals entrepreneurs? As a creative professional, why don’t you think of yourself that way?

Today, our guest, Jimmy Matlosz, is a filmmaker and an entrepreneur who thinks we need to better prepare young professionals and students in creative industries. He hits on a point that resonates well with Dave & Greg that if you’ve never grown up with someone in your family running a business, you may not even know where to start and assume you have to be an employee to gain security and stability. Jimmy talks about how he hopes through mentorship and changes to education, up and coming creatives can stop thinking of themselves as employees and realize their freedom when they start adopting the entrepreneurial mindset. An excellent discussion to highlight for anyone in a creative profession driven by passion is that “business” is not always a bad word. 

Over the last year, we've had to learn how to connect and engage with each other in a nearly entirely virtual setting. We've all seen reports highlighting the impact this has had on the mental health of so many people. For business leaders, they've had to balance their employees' physical wellbeing, mental wellbeing and the everyday work of keeping a business running. It's been stressful for everyone, especially people offering services connected to the travel industry. So how do you give people that in-person connection experience virtually without it being just another video call they have smile through? Our guest faced those challenges as a business leader taking care of his employees while operating a company that couldn't offer services without travel. 

Sean Hoff and his team at Moniker Partners, who offer creative corporate retreats worldwide, were able to turn their internal challenges of staying connected into a successful pivot that's not just allowed their business to survive but grow. While the world and travel start to open back up, this conversation helps to highlight the digital pivots we've all made out of necessity and how we can integrate them long-term.

With over 200 countries and territories in the world and even more distinct cultures that make up each one, we have a near endless amount of cultural experiences powering our world. Diversity brings strength and understanding into communities that helps to break down prejudice and discrimination. Individuals who are building social enterprises that help level the playing field and promote people's talent from different cultural backgrounds should be celebrated and highlighted. Today's guests, the co-founders of Sankara Online Multicultural Marketplace, Lily Lynch and Chinweotito (Otito) Atansi, are individuals we want to celebrate and highlight. 

Growing your business from a local footprint to a large regional enterprise with national and international recognition is no small feat. Many entrepreneurs, they may see that as the goal that keeps them moving forward. But our guest today, Ralph Stephen, educates us on how achieving that goal takes more than just focusing on financial and business growth. 

If you are an entrepreneur currently struggling to find motivation and feel like chasing the money drives all of your choices, listen to this chat with Ralph. You'll get a perspective from a successful business leader about why we all need more values to focus on and help guide us to our goals. 

Being passionate about your work, invested in your company's mission, knowing you are creating a positive impact and loving the people you work with sounds like the ultimate career, doesn't it? Well, today, we spoke with a mother-daughter team Kim Hickman and Katie Thompson, who have spent the last few years building that ultimate company. It all started with Kim asking a simple question to her daughter Katie, do you have a good backpack? 

Elect Handsome Dave! Wait….that doesn’t sound right? No, despite the signs that seem to continue to appear every election, Dave hasn’t decided to pursue a political path. We are fortunate to have someone that is running in the upcoming Saint John municipal election join us to share what motivated him to throw his hat in the ring, our guest Chris Daigle. 

Dave and Greg have both worked with Chris in his day job at BDC and know personally the passion they all share for the city of Saint John. This episode gave Dave and Greg a chance to ask Chris about what motivates him to get involved, his views on diversity and growth for the city, and where he thinks the balance is for fiscal responsibility and quality of life. We want to wish Chris the best of luck in the election on May 10th! 

An episode bonus, if you listen to the end, you might just learn the identity of the Elect Handsome Dave prankster….

The B Corp community is full of businesses who are industry leaders while putting the idea of doing business with a purpose at the forefront of their culture. Our guest today Karen Hoskin, is a B Corp leader who, over the last 13 years, has overcome the barrier of a rum distillery not being something people expect to find in the mountains of the USA, the gender bias that comes along with being a woman in a predominantly male-dominated industry and being seen the outlier when pushing to be as sustainable as possible in all aspects of her business and life. Karen shares her story of growing a business, her views on doing business with a purpose and the wonderful feeling when finding her people in the B Corp community. Giving back to the B Corp community and mentoring other female entrepreneurs in the rum industry who are just starting on their journeys are a few different ways that Karen is taking actions that make a massive impact. 

Speaking of impact, she may have also inspired Greg to figure out a plan to bootleg some of her company @Montanya Rum rum back to Atlantic Canada in a true Maritimer tradition. Dave Veale was unable to be there for this episode, but he’s already setting aside the bail money. 

No matter what device you are using to read this right now, you couldn’t do it without electricity. But as we all try and figure out how we lessen our carbon footprint on the globe, where will we get that sustainable power from so we can keep listening to The Boiling Point Podcast? Luckily for us, folks like our guest Mark McAloon of The Smart are taking the lead on making sustainable electricity choices available to businesses in New Brunswick. 

Mark gives us the rundown on how his company, The Smart Energy Company, has been working to bring solar power to New Brunswick, focusing on the B2B market. He gives us insider knowledge about how they are trying to win against their biggest competitor, The Price of Electricity. Showing off his Boiling Point Podcast knowledge, he ties back into our recent episode with Kristy O’Leary of Decade Impact to talk about how the B Corp methodology is mirrored right now in solar energy efforts. It’s about not waiting for change but being a leader and taking any step toward sustainable solar energy.  

Are there some business tasks you do that drain your energy? Maybe you believe there’s a problem you can’t overcome that’s stopping you from getting away from that task? If you feel like your business is a little chaotic for you right now because of these feelings, we think you need to meet our guest who loves playing in the chaos, Dolores Hirschmann. 

Dolores’ perspective has Greg and Dave, two self-proclaimed chaotic entrepreneurs, wanting to talk to her more about projects they could pursue together because what she shared with them resonated fully with their entrepreneurial experiences. The group talks about the energy and drive a startup entrepreneur full of ideas has and believes they can do it all. Over time, as they accomplish their goals, they start to develop limiting beliefs that prevent them from achieving their next stage. Whatever it is that their limiting believes are preventing them from achieving, Dolores works with people to make clarity in the most chaotic situations.

Sometimes there are people in your life that grow with you as you explore and find your path. Kristy O'Leary is not just one of those people for Greg, but for our podcast, as a frequent guest we love to catch up with. And catching up with Kristy means hearing all about how she is helping to lead the way in getting businesses to stop making excuses, better understand what doing business with purpose means, and help them achieve their B Corp Status. 

What is your value? It’s a simple but complex question all at the same time, especially for those who lean a little more on the creative side like musicians, artists and yes, entrepreneurs. Knowing your value and sticking to your narrative of what is key to you can be all the difference in making your way through the world. If you are an aspiring musician and need a little help and guidance on that path, our guest this week Steve Waxman, can help. 

Steve worked his way up in the music industry from the mailroom to managing promotions for major record labels. He’s been in the room when acts like Billy Idol worked on some of their most well-known hits. Greg and Dave geeked out to some of the acts that Steve mentioned, and Greg dropped the news of his recent sighting of Maestro Fresh Wes right in the City of Saint John. Beyond the music history that Steve brings, he also brings a perspective on making it in the music industry that isn’t always about chasing fame. Instead, he talks about chasing your narrative and sticking to what matters most to you. 

If you love this episode, make sure to check out Steve’s podcast, The Creationists. 

If you are a listener of The Boiling Point, you know that music is a huge part of Greg’s life. You’ll also know that we are massive advocates of improving mental health. Last year we launched a partnership series, Shifting The Employee Experience, that saw Dave joined by Dr Bill to share his mental health expertise in the workplace. Today’s guest is bringing the two worlds of music and mental health together in a series of projects we couldn’t be more excited to learn about. 

In his day job, he works with Deloitte Canada, but Terry Stuart co-founder of The Awesome Music Project opens our eyes to how music should help improve mental health. He and his co-founder Rob are not just putting that idea out there. They are selling a book and using other methods to raise funds to support research led by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health to get the scientific data to prove what every music lover knows. Music can evoke emotions to help us through our mental health struggles. The Awesome Music Project has even started another piece of their efforts called AMP4LIFE that is bringing music therapists virtually into long-term care, schools, and other locations being so harshly affected by the pandemic's mental stress.

Poverty plays a huge role in children's experiences in the arts, culture, recreation, or sports as they grow up. But as today's guest helps to explain to us, being a part of a team can help children learn the life skills needed to pull themselves out of generational poverty. Jen Brown joins us to educate Dave and Greg on the P.R.O. Kids Saint John program.