S4E1: When Good Programs Stop Growing: The Leadership Development Gap Nobody Talks About

On this episode of Real Talk, Catalyst Food Leaders cofounders Tia Glave and Jill Stuber discuss about why "food safety is important" is not enough for culture shift, which behaviors leaders need to agree on in advance, and where collaboration ends and compromise begins in food safety and other parts of your organization.   Download Culture Gap at www.catalystfoodleaders.com

You handle pressure like a pro. High stakes? You are locked in. Decisive. In control. Lower stakes? Personal goals? The thing you have been meaning to start for six months? Suddenly you are circling, stalling, doing literally anything else. Same person. Completely different behavior. And there is one belief underneath both of them. On this episode of Real Talk, Marilyn Rosa-Green, Executive Coach and Licensed Professional Counselor, is joining Catalyst Food Leaders cofounders Tia Glave and Jill Stuber to name that pattern and talk about what it actually takes to interrupt it. This is not surface-level leadership tactics. This is the work underneath the work.  Download Culture Change Starts with Me here: https://www.catalystfoodleaders.com/culture-starts-with-leadership Connect with Marilyn on LinkedIn and marilynrosaconsulting.com where you can take her free  Pressure Paradox Assessment

Meat and poultry is one of the most demanding environments in food — high pressure, high turnover, compliance-first by necessity. The leaders operating inside it are often asked to carry more than they were ever developed to hold. Casey Gallimore and Megan Lynn Gifford see this across hundreds of companies. They join Catalyst Food Leaders cofounders Tia Glave and Jill Stuber in this episode of Real Talk, where they talk about what the industry's best companies do to develop their people deliberately — and what it costs when they do not. It weaves in the real value of mentorship programs like The Women's Meat Industry Network (WMIN) while naming honestly what mentorship alone cannot do. Honest, forward-looking, and built for the leader in food who is ready to do something different. Download Catalyst's Culture Gap Guide here: https://www.catalystfoodleaders.com/food-safety-culture   Learn more about the Meat Institute: LMS: https://www.meatinstitute.org/foundations-of-listeria Food safety for the Executive Toolkit: https://www.meatinstitute.org/food-safety-executive-toolkit Events: https://www.meatinstitute.org/Events WMIN: https://wmin.org/

Sarah Smith Simpson did not take a straight line into food safety. She started in sensory science — the world of texture, taste, and consumer perception in baby food — and then made a deliberate choice to go deeper, earning an MS in food safety from Michigan on top of her PhD from Rutgers. She joins Real Talk with Catalyst Food Leaders cofounders Tia Glave and Jill Stuber to talk about the journey: what pulled her toward this work, what she wishes she had learned sooner, what leadership has required of her that no degree prepared her for, and what she wants the next generation of food safety professionals to know before they find out the hard way. This one is for anyone who is early in their career and trying to figure out what they are building — and for anyone who has been in it long enough to know how much the path can surprise you. Download Culture Change Starts with Me at catalystfoodleaders.com. It is for the leader who is ready to look at themselves first.

There is a real and growing frustration with culture work in organizations — and it is not because belonging and leadership development are bad ideas. It is because culture initiatives have almost always been designed to change other people. The survey measures what others think. The training tells others what to do differently. The plan describes the gaps in others. The leader who commissioned it all was never the subject of the work. Nobody asked them to go first. That is not a personal failure. It is a systemic gap in how culture change has been taught and sold to organizations. This episode of Real Talk with Catalyst Food Leaders cofounders Tia Glave and Jill Stuber, names that gap directly — inviting the exhausted leader into a reframe rather than pointing blame — and makes the case that the missing piece was never another initiative. It was the leader's own behavior, and the willingness to look there first. Schedule a Culture Conversation at catalystfoodleaders.com/contact

Briana Lorenzo did not take the expected road into food safety. She came from clinical lab and biotech research, found her way into food, and has held Director-level roles across some of the most demanding food environments in the industry — all before most people have figured out what they want their career to be. She joins Catalyst co-founders, Tia Glave and Jill Stuber, on Real Talk to talk about the journey, the gaps she keeps seeing, and what she thinks the food industry needs to do differently if it wants to keep the next generation of leaders actually leading. This is a conversation for the early-career professional who needs to hear that the path does not have to be straight — and for every senior leader who needs to hear what their next generation is actually thinking.

Culture surveys measure what people say. Culture plans document what organizations intend. Neither one tells you what actually happens when a leader is in a moment that counts. This episode is about the three behavioral signals that reveal exactly where a culture stands — and what leaders can do with that information. Catalyst Food Leaders co-founders, Tia Glave and Jill Stuber, are bringing this framework to BRCGS Connect Americas in October. This is the conversation before the room.

Sharron Northern has spent her career building leadership capability inside some of the most recognized names in food and CPG — General Mills, Hershey, and now kdc/one. She joins Real Talk with Catalyst co-founders Tia Glave and Jill Stuber, to have the conversation most L&D leaders never say out loud: what happens when a program works, and then stops working, and nobody wants to name it. This one is for every HR leader, L&D strategist, and VP who has built something they are proud of — and quietly knows it is not reaching everyone who needs it.

On this episode of Real Talk, Catalyst Food Leaders cofounders Tia Glave and Jill Stuber are getting into something that most food companies know is true but rarely say in a budget meeting. Your culture might not be broken. It might just be costing you far more than you realize. And you would never know it until you did the math. We are bringing in a special guest, Craig Stevenson, who has seen this from the inside of a food organization. The employee turnover that compounds. The non-conforming product that traces back to a leadership gap. The talent that quietly stopped raising their hand. And the other side of that conversation: what becomes possible when culture actually works. No matter what function you support, if you lead in a food company, this one is worth your time. Watch Real Talk live on Mondays at 11a ET / 10a CT https://www.catalystfoodleaders.com/real-talk

You love what you do. You love the people around you. But the organization? Some days, it feels like it is actively working against you. The endless hours. The feeling of juggling fifty things while finishing none of them. The "Sunday dread" that starts creeping in around 4pm. The "I just need to shut work off" feeling that follows you into evenings you were supposed to have for yourself.This episode of Real Talk is for the food leader who is not ready to quit but is absolutely exhausted by the chaos. Catalyst Food Leaders co-founders Jill Stuber and Tia Glave get honest about what it actually takes to lead well when the culture around you is a hot mess, and give you three tools you can use this week. Watch Real Talk live on Mondays at 11a ET / 10a CT https://www.catalystfoodleaders.com/real-talk