The Lift cover art

The Lift

The Lift

By: Editaudio
Listen for free

About this listen

Welcome to The Lift, the show about leadership, growth, and getting what we want. On The Lift, we pull up to see the bigger picture from accomplished leaders who know how to get things done in a rapidly changing world. Host Ben Brooks dives deep into a relevant leadership topic each episode and connects the dots to leave you with powerful distinctions that you can use as a leader.

© 2025 Edit Audio Inc. Economics Leadership Management Management & Leadership
Episodes
  • Civil disobedience as a leadership strategy: Housing Works' Charles King on using every tool at your disposal to influence change

    Civil disobedience as a leadership strategy: Housing Works' Charles King on using every tool at your disposal to influence change
    Apr 14 2026

    Charles King has been arrested more than 300 hundred times. Not because he's reckless – quite the opposite, in fact: because he's strategic. As the CEO of Housing Works, he's spent 35 years cycling between courtrooms, legislative offices, protest frontlines, and memorial services, doing whatever it takes to pull whichever lever of power any given moment demands.

    His thesis: it's all advocacy. It's just “in front of different judges.”

    Topic Highlights:

    – Why civil disobedience is a calculated leadership tool, and how to know when to use it

    – The "different judges" framework: how to map your forms of influence to the situation

    – What the Housing First model actually does for drug users

    – How Housing Works landed the first cannabis store license in New York

    – Why Charles, now 70, still lives in one of Housing Works’ residential facilities

    Guest Bio

    Charles King is a lawyer, an ordained minister, an activist, the co-founder and CEO of Housing Works, the nation's largest community-based HIV/AIDS and homeless services organization.

    Episode Links

    Housing Works

    ACT UP Oral History Project

    Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson

    Connect with Us

    theliftpod.com

    Let’s stay in touch

    Subscribe to The Lift

    Find Ben online: LinkedIn | Instagram


    See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
    Show More Show Less
    43 mins
  • Clarity over cool: Éva Goicochea on building maude and a category-defining brand

    Clarity over cool: Éva Goicochea on building maude and a category-defining brand
    Apr 7 2026

    Most brands don’t fail because they’re ugly. They fail because they’re unclear about the most fundamental question: what is our purpose?

    Éva Goicochea has built a category-defining company, maude, in one of the most taboo industries in business: sexual wellness. She did that by stripping the “brand” down to one thing: clarity.

    Simply put, if you can’t say what you are in one sentence, you don’t have a brand. You have noise.

    Topic Highlights

    – Why aiming for “cool” is a trap, and what offers the real competitive edge in branding instead

    – The difference between a brand, a product, and a commodity

    – What maude did right to make sexual wellness feel…ordinary

    – The right (and wrong) way to partner with a celebrity

    – Why saying “no” might be your most valuable growth lever

    Guest Bio

    Éva Goicochea is the founder and CEO of Maude, the modern intimacy brand that brought sexual wellness into mainstream retail, including Sephora.

    Episode Links

    maude

    Our Bodies, Ourselves

    Forever and Everlane, Amen

    A Century of Flight (Delta documentary)

    Connect with Us

    theliftpod.com

    Let’s stay in touch

    Subscribe to The Lift

    Find Ben online: LinkedIn | Instagram

    See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
    Show More Show Less
    37 mins
  • Managing Yourself First: Margaret Andrews on Self-Awareness and Leadership

    Managing Yourself First: Margaret Andrews on Self-Awareness and Leadership
    Mar 31 2026
    In this episode of The Lift, Ben is joined by Margaret Andrews, Harvard and MIT professor of executive education programs on leadership, emotional intelligence, and self-management, founder of The MYLO Center, and author of Managing Yourself to Lead Others.Key takeaways: Self-awareness is the foundation of great leadershipEmotional intelligence matters more than many leaders realize, particularly when it comes to communication, trust, and feedbackThe best bosses stand out for their interpersonal skills, not just IQ or technical expertiseFeedback and emotions are data, and leaders who learn to interpret both can make better decisions and build stronger relationships at workIf you want to change how people think, you have to change how they feelLeadership growth starts with self-reflection: understanding your values, your definition of success, and the people and experiences that shaped you What makes someone a truly effective leader? According to Margaret Andrews, it starts with a skill that many business schools and workplaces still undervalue: self-awareness.The core idea of this conversation is simple but powerful: before you can lead other people well, you have to understand how you think, feel, behave, and impact others. That sounds obvious, but in practice, many leaders skip this step. They focus on strategy, process, execution, and technical skill while overlooking the emotional and interpersonal habits that shape every meeting, every relationship, and every decision.Margaret’s own path into this work started with difficult feedback. Early in her career, a boss told her she lacked self-awareness. It was painful to hear, but it became a turning point. Instead of dismissing the comment, she began asking deeper questions about why she showed up the way she did, how others experienced her, and what she needed to change in order to become a more effective leader. That journey led her to develop a framework for managing yourself before leading others.In the conversation, Margaret shares six essential questions leaders can use to better understand themselves:Who and what ideas shaped you?What life events changed you?How do you define success?What are your core values?How well do you understand your emotions?What feedback have you received over the course of your life?These questions get at the heart of leadership development because they force people to examine the beliefs, experiences, and emotional patterns they bring into the workplace every day. Margaret makes the case that leadership is not just about getting results through others. It is also about understanding the forces inside yourself that affect how you listen, react, communicate, and influence.Margaret asserts that people are not nearly as rational as we like to think. If you want to change the way people think, she says, you first have to change the way they feel. That insight has huge implications for managers, executives, and founders. You can have the smartest strategy in the room, but if you do not understand the emotional reality of the people around you, your message may never land.Margaret also shares a practical exercise she uses in executive programs: think about the best boss you ever had, then identify the top reasons they were effective. Across years of teaching, she has found that most people’s answers do not focus on IQ or technical brilliance. Rather, they focus on interpersonal skills: things like listening, trust, empathy, communication, calm under pressure, and the ability to make others better. In other words, the qualities that make someone memorable as a leader are often the very ones organizations treat as secondary.This episode is especially valuable for leaders who have relied on competence, speed, achievement, or hard-driving standards to succeed and are now realizing those strengths may not be enough. Margaret offers a more sustainable model – one rooted in emotional intelligence, reflection, and behavioral change. She also draws an important distinction between personality and behavior. You do not have to become a different person to grow as a leader, but you may need to change how you behave.For anyone trying to become a better manager, a more grounded executive, or a more thoughtful human being at work, this conversation is both practical and deeply personal. It is about more than leadership theory. It is about how your inner life shapes your outer impact.If you want to lead others more effectively, start here: know yourself better, manage yourself more honestly, and build from there.Links: Margaret AndrewsThe MYLO Center Managing Yourself to Lead Others (Margaret’s book Harvard Executive Education programsInternational House at UC Berkeley The Lift is hosted by Ben Brooks. Find out more about Ben Brooks and his company, PILOT, here. The show is made by editaudio. Follow Ben on LinkedIn and Instagram.For even more fun, follow along on Ben’s adventures with his puppy, Jetson.See Privacy Policy at...
    Show More Show Less
    35 mins
No reviews yet