Leadership Decanted

Hosted by Paul Garcia & KG Butler

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Episodes

104

Latest episode

Sep 2026

Language

EN-AU

About the show

Curious about leaders, leading teams, or leadership? So are Paul Garcia and Kerry "KG" Butler. In fact, they turned their periodic happy hour chats about life and leadership into the Leadership Decanted Podcast. Join Paul and KG as they discuss all things leadership. Each episode of Leadership Decanted asks fascinating questions about leadership and keeps the conversation flowing over a nice bottle of wine.

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60 recent

September 27, 2026Episode 81 hr 10 min

(6.08) The Mule and the Tightrope Walker: Lessons in 'Both/And' Leadership

Message us! What if the tension we keep trying to fix is not meant to be fixed? It takes a mule, a tightrope walker, a bottle of Shiraz and a mild disagreement over whether paradox is an 'invitation' or a 'demand' to get anywhere near an answer. (Paul votes 'demand'.) KG and Paul spent time in the Podcave with Wendy K. Smith , a professor of management and co-author of Both/And Thinking , who has spent 25 years playing with paradox - from IBM's move to the cloud to career decisions and political polarisation. She also writes about it on her Substack at It's Not an Either/Or . Thanks to our generous friends at Annandale Cellars , this episode's bottle was the 2017 Vinea Marson Jozza Shiraz from Heathcote in Victoria, and you've got to get yourself some of this wine. Deep purple, dark and brambly fruit with a herbaceous edge, bitter chocolate and spice, and vanilla from the French oak. Get at least half a dozen of these (or half a dozen of any of Annandale Cellars' amazing wines) and get a 20% discount by using our code at checkout: DECANTED Sláinte friends! Great to see you again!! Useful resources from this episode Wendy K. Smith on LinkedIn It's Not an Either/Or, Wendy's Substack Both/And Thinking by Wendy K. Smith and Marianne Lewis Fogo Island Inn and Shorefast Polarity Partnerships (Barry Johnson) KO Insights (Kate O'Neill) Cheeky Half 41: Human dignity in the age of AI Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

September 20, 202615 min

Cheeky Half Episode (43): Values don't 'trickle down' so easily.

Message us! Does a founder's carefully curated set of values survive a growing business, especially as the distance from founder to frontline staff increases? Paul's barely digested thought for this 'cheeky half' is that it doesn't always, and he's calling it 'trickle-down values'. KG has seen it too, and we'd like to know whether you have. Cheeky Half episodes are short. So rather than spending your precious minutes on any further explanation, we definitely encourage you to listen. Sláinte friends! If you are interested in a written reflection of this discussion and its themes, you can find our brief article here. Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

August 30, 2026Episode 71 hr 4 min

(6.07) Leadership and Technology, for the Wider Human Experience

Message us! Every keyboard you've ever typed on started life as an assistive device. That's not just a factoid, it's the whole thrust of this episode. If you design for the people the market usually treats as 'niche,' you tend to build something better for everyone else too. This goes from wheelchairs to closed captions to AI training data, and gets more interesting at every stop. KG and Paul spent time in the Podcave with Pete Horsley , founder of Remarkable , the disability tech accelerator built by the Cerebral Palsy Alliance, talking about what happens when you design technology for the people the market usually leaves out. It's an impressive conversation. We hope you can join us. Once again, thanks to our friends at Annandale Cellars for the bottle: the Motherblock 2023 Red by the Chalmers family, a blend out of the Murray-Darling region created from Nero d'Avola, Sagrantino, Teroldego and Sangiovese. It pours a deep, almost violet cherry-red, with chocolate and dark cherry on the nose, fine tannins, a proper Italian dryness through the middle, and a long plummy finish that had both hosts reaching for a second pour. Get at least half a dozen of these (or half a dozen of any of Annandale Cellars' amazing wines) and get a 20% discount by using our code at checkout: DECANTED Sláinte friends! Great to see you again!! Useful resources from this episode Remarkable Pete Horsley on LinkedIn Cerebral Palsy Alliance NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

August 16, 202619 min

Cheeky Half Episode (42): Can you be a good leader AND a bad person, at the same time?

Message us! KG recently noticed some conflicting attitudes toward a leader: some people seem to be willing to defend them to the death, and others wouldn't follow them into a fire drill. Same person, same behaviour and two completely different verdicts, which suggests the disagreement may not really be a verdict on the leader at all. Maybe it's about where each of us privately draws the line around a moral or ethical position, and how wildly that line shifts between one person to the next, for reasons most of us have never actually examined. Paul suggests a similar question shows up whenever a talented, difficult or controversial artist gets discussed. Can the work stand on its own once you know what the person behind it was actually like? Somehow that question feels easier to answer when it's Picasso than when it's your own manager, mostly because your manager is unlikely to have an entire art gallery named after them. And maybe the harder question isn't about any specific leader at all. It's about whether we actually agree, any of us, on what crossing a line even looks like, or whether we've just been blindly nodding along this whole time. Join Paul & KG as they get into this Cheeky Half episode on whether a good leader can also be a bad person. Spoiler alert, we're not sure they know either. Sláinte friends! If you are interested in a written reflection of this discussion and its themes, you can find our brief article here. Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

July 26, 2026Episode 61 hr 13 min

(6.06) 97 Ways to Get What You Want.

Message us! There's a fairly persuasive myth about power: that once you have enough of it, everything else follows. This episode makes a decent case against that, using nothing more dramatic than a chief executive who can restructure an entire division and still can't get their own kid to tidy their room. If you've ever wondered why some very senior people still don't get listened to, or why some people with almost nothing get listened to constantly, this one's for you. Join KG and Paul as they chat to Jen Overbeck about why having power and having influence turn out to be two genuinely different things. As usual episode's wine comes from our friends, Annandale Cellars , and it's the 2025 Schmölzer & Brown Beechworth Merlot , a straight varietal from Tessa Brown and Jeremy Schmölzer's high-altitude vineyard. It pours a deep, dark garnet and opens with blackberry, cinnamon and dark fruit on the nose. On the palate it's fruity and balanced, with fine tannins, good body for a Merlot, and a bit of cherry and spice that lingers. Get at least half a dozen of these (or half a dozen of any of Annandale Cellars' amazing wines) and get a 20% discount by using our code at checkout: DECANTED Sláinte friends! Great to see you again!! Useful resources from this episode: Jen Overbeck's website: jenoverbeck.com Jen Overbeck on LinkedIn Pathways to Politics for Women , the non-partisan political leadership program where Jen volunteers Melbourne School of Business Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

July 12, 202624 min

Cheeky Half Episode (41): Human dignity in the age of AI.

Message us! Paul's been reading something unexpected: Pope Leo XIV's first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas , arguing that AI should be judged against human dignity, not efficiency. It's a genuinely different take on a topic that mostly produces unreflective panic or unquestioned evangelism. Join Paul & KG for this Cheeky Half episode. And if you haven't yet listened to their earlier conversation on this in Cheeky Half 40 , it makes a good companion listen. Cheeky Half episodes are short. So rather than spending your precious minutes on any further explanation, we definitely encourage you to listen. Sláinte friends! If you are interested in a written reflection of this discussion and its themes, you can find our brief article here . Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

June 28, 2026Episode 51 hr 10 min

(6.05) Leading with an Open Heart

Message us! Most leadership conversations happen above the neck. Steve Ray , a groupwork facilitator and open-heart practitioner, thinks that's only half the picture, and arguably the less interesting half. This is an episode about the inner critic, the community of selves, and what happens when a podcast host attempts a live meditation mid-episode and immediately starts contending with his own inner critic. Join KG and Paul as they chat to Steve , a groupwork facilitator at Group Work Centre and practitioner at The Natural Way of Living , about heart consciousness, the community of selves, and whether the parts of yourself you've been suppressing might actually be trying to help. Thanks as always to our friends at Annandale Cellars for supplying this episode's wine. This time we're drinking the 2021 Yal Yal Estate Yal Yal Road Pinot Noir from the Mornington Peninsula - a light, clear red that opens with raspberry and a hint of strawberry on the nose, picks up a little tartness as it breathes, and finishes with very soft tannins. Good body, nothing overworked, and as Paul put it - it warms the heart. The cockles, even. Get at least half a dozen of these (or half a dozen of any of Annandale Cellars' amazing wines) and get a 20% discount by using our code at checkout: DECANTED Sláinte friends! If you are interested in a written reflection of this discussion and its themes, you can find our brief article here . Useful resources from this episode: Steve Ray on LinkedIn Group Work Centre — Steve's facilitation practice The Natural Way of Living — the open-heart practice organisation Steve references throughout this episode Episode 6.03 — Leading through Consciousness: Seeing Things 'As They Are' with Marti Spiegelman — a companion listen for anyone who wants to follow this thread further Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

June 14, 202619 min

Cheeky Half Episode (40): AI is not just a tool. It's a reflection of who we are.

Message us! KG has spent considerable time carefully avoiding the AI conversation on Social Media. His reward for finally joining that conversation is also our reward - a 'hot take' that turns out to be much more interesting than either the unreflective panic or unquestioned evangelism the hosts have frequently encountered on this topic. Join Paul & KG as they follow that thread in this Cheeky Half episode. And if you haven't yet listened to their conversation with Dr. Jay Spence in Episode 6.02 , "Is AI coming for our brains?!?!" , it makes a good companion listen . Cheeky Half episodes are short. So rather than spending your precious minutes on any further explanation, we definitely encourage you to listen. If you are interested in a written reflection of this discussion and its themes, you can find our brief article here . Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

May 31, 2026Episode 41 hr 1 min

(6.04) A Kaleidoscope, Not a Recipe: Systemic Leadership in Polycrisis

Message us! Something has seemed fairly obvious in the field of leadership development for a while now: the gap between what people learn and what they're able to apply when they return to their organisations. It shows up as disillusionment, stalled change efforts, and the recurring question of why things that seem so clear in a programme setting become so resistant in practice. It's a gap Liz Skelton has been sitting with, and working on, for over two decades. Join KG and Paul as they chat to Liz about systemic leadership, polycrisis, and the conditions that either allow or prevent new ways of working to take hold. Liz is a leadership practitioner, co-author of Lost Conversations , and PhD candidate at the ANU School of Cybernetics, and her work sits at the intersection of adaptive leadership, systems change, and the question of what it actually takes to shift entrenched dynamics. As always, the conversation is 'facilitated' by our friends at Annandale Cellars . On this episode we very much enjoy the 2024 Mastroberardino Mastro Bianco , a white blend from Campania in southern Italy, made by a historic family winery known for preserving ancient indigenous grape varieties. On the palate it's beautifully rounded and textured, with tropical notes of white peach and melon giving way to clean citrus and a freshness that keeps it from tipping into anything overtly fruit-driven. Paul also detected banana. The official tasting notes did not. We encourage you to weigh in. Get at least half a dozen of these (or half a dozen of any of Annandale Cellars' amazing wines) and get a 20% discount by using our discount code at checkout: DECANTED Sláinte friends! Great to see you again!! Useful resources from this episode Liz Skelton on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liz-skelton-3160834/ The Adaptive Practice: https://www.theadaptivepractice.com.au ANU School of Cybernetics: https://cybernetics.anu.edu.au Lost Conversations , book. If you are interested in a written reflection of this discussion and its themes, you can find our brief article here . Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!

May 24, 202625 min

Cheeky Half Episode (39): Did you experience A LOT OF stress yesterday? You aren't alone.

Message us! Gallup publishes its State of the Global Workplace report once a year. This year it's 251 pages of data on engagement, emotions, wellbeing and the general mood of the global workforce. One of its headlines on the 2026 edition? "Global employee wellbeing improved for the first time in three years." Paul and KG have questions. And Paul calls BS. Cheeky Half episodes are short. So rather than spending your precious minutes on a written explanation, we definitely encourage you to listen. You can find the Gallup State of the Global Workplace: 2026 Report at gallup.com/workplace/349484/state-of-the-global-workplace.aspx If you are interested in a written reflection of this discussion and its themes, you can find our brief article here . Please feel free to send us your thoughts, comments and suggestions any time by leaving us a text/voice message via the link at the top of these show notes! Or talk to us through either of the options below. Email: askus@leadershipdecanted.com Website episode comments: www.leadershipdecanted.com Disagree or agree with anything we've said? How wrong are we?!? Are there any leadership topics you'd like us to discuss, or people you'd like us to talk to? Maybe you'd like to recommend a favourite wine! Whatever tickles your fancy, we'd love to hear from you!!