The Art of the Jedi Mind Trick

Posted on September 1, 2020September 1, 2020 by Michael Roderick

This is a transcript from my “Story Slam” presentation for IDEO U. It’s an excerpt from my longer talk. I’ve wanted to give this talk for years! Actually, it’s been percolating since I first began teaching. I thought about all my favorite things and realized that I could use my love of Star Wars to teach Personal Branding. I even foreshadowed this talk at the conclusion of my first TEDx “The Price of Pleasing.” So What is the Art of the Jedi Mind Trick? Before I get to that let’s go back A Long Time Ago…. to 1978. I was three […]

Tales from the Script

Posted on September 1, 2020September 1, 2020 by Kevin Urban

Carlo Proietto, Pericoli Nascosti, 2007 Pyrography, 39.5_ x 47.5

When I was a kid I used to stay up late to watch the show Tales From The Crypt. For those of you who are unfamiliar, it was a series on cable hosted by a character named The Crypt Keeper who looked like a cross between Skeletor and David Spade in the movie Joe Dirt and featured many well-known actors. Every episode was a different story that focused on the idea of twist endings which I really loved and most of the time the story involved a character who thought they were getting one over on someone or something (the show […]

Jeffrey Madoff on Self Reflection, Creative Journeys, and Risking Failure

Posted on July 31, 2020September 3, 2020 by Pregame Magazine

In The Interview: Episode #15, Ciara Pressler interviews B. Jeffrey Madoff, filmmaker, brand strategist, and author of Creative Careers. Jeffrey and Ciara talk about… His work with legendary brands like Ralph Lauren and Victoria’s Secret Exploring and staying curious Staying true to your brand Myths of entrepreneurship The benefits of having a team, structure, and support behind success Building and expanding a network The discoveries and themes of a successful creative career B. Jeffrey Madoff is the founder of Madoff Productions, based in New York City. His company produces branded content for major brands such as Ralph Lauren, Radio City […]

My Career Story: Michael Roderick, SuperConnector

Posted on June 1, 2020May 31, 2020 by Pregame Magazine

Name: Michael Roderick Current Job: Founder of Small Pond Enterprises LLC and host of the Access To Anyone Podcast Current Place: New York City Hometown: Providence, Rhode Island Age: 41 What I wanted to be when I grew up: A Teacher College degree: Double Major in Theatre Performance and Secondary Ed. English from Rhode Island College, then a Masters in Educational Theatre from New York University. What do you love about what you do? I love helping people see more in themselves and finding new and innovative ways to help them spread their message. What is the biggest challenge? Entrepreneurship […]

Join Pregame: Virtual Membership Now Open!

Posted on April 1, 2020April 1, 2020 by Pregame Magazine

Pregame is all about helping you achieve your goals with the support of a team. We’re excited to open Pregame Membership to players everywhere. [learn more] Virtual membership has always been part of our long term game plan, but thanks to the coronavirus, we stepped up and moved everything online overnight. The silver lining? Now we can welcome you to our team, no matter where you are. For the past four years (plus five years of events before that), we’ve exclusively held our daily workshops in person. Nothing matches the magic of live interaction… or so we thought. It turns […]

Performative Reciprocity

Posted on November 1, 2019November 4, 2019 by Michael Roderick

I have a friend who really loves to do calls where we get into the weeds of relationship-building methodologies. He enjoys digging deeper into the frameworks I’ve developed and in all our calls he gets me to go even deeper into the work that I do. And before I get into the topic he brought up, I’ll also add that having someone like this in your circle can be incredibly valuable to the rigor of your work. There are those who will take your ideas at face value and then there are those who will challenge your ideas with questions. […]

Owning a Third Place

Posted on August 1, 2019July 31, 2019 by Michael Roderick

When I was in high school, a large portion of the focus of the funding was on sports. Our teams always had new uniforms and the best equipment, we had pretty big pep rallies, and there was always money for trips, etc. The English Department was another story entirely. We had books that were reused year after year, very few actual trips, and even fewer actual supplies, so as a student I decided to do something about that. At the time, I had a band that I was singing in and I knew a lot of great musicians and other […]

Culture Guru: Be Authentic. Also Culture Guru: But Not Like That.

Posted on August 1, 2019July 31, 2019 by Uma Kleppinger

Have you ever looked in the mirror and been surprised that the person staring back at you was so much OLDER than you feel inside? That cognitive dissonance could be the result of a poorly defined self-image, but more often that not it’s because our core being doesn’t really age. Even as time passes and life presents new challenges and opportunities, who we are at our core remains unchanged, timeless. I call this the Authentic Self. The term authenticity is overused and hackneyed, yet it has always been and continues to be the bedrock of my ethos. My work as […]

The Lonely Ballad of The Someday Guy

Posted on June 3, 2019June 3, 2019 by Michael Roderick

The other day I was having coffee with someone who is in the field of video production and he brought up an interesting question. He asked: “What do you do when you’re meeting people and they keep telling you that they don’t need your service right now, but to send your information because they could use it someday?” He explained how this dynamic was causing his business to have a lot of hills and valleys. He’d have a big project and then nothing for a while and then a medium project or no project for months and the inconsistency was starting […]

Pitch, Please.

Posted on March 1, 2019February 28, 2019 by Michael Roderick

A question I get a lot is: “How do I pitch myself to ___________ podcast, article, investor, etc.?” And this for many people is the holy grail of attention. If you can get someone to share your ideas with their audience or invest in you it certainly does help. But I see many people going about this process all wrong. So here is my most important rule about pitching anything: Create curiosity first. Most pitches fall flat because the person doing the pitching spends all of their time telling us everything we need to know about them, the product or the […]

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