Episodes

  • Coach Jim Johnson | Why Relationships Win You Championships

    Coach Jim Johnson | Why Relationships Win You Championships
    Jun 9 2026
    (00:00:00) Welcome to ROC Vox — Introducing Coach Jim Johnson
    (00:01:03) Getting Cut and Getting Fired — A Humbling Start to Coaching
    (00:02:45) Becoming a Leadership Junkie — Zig Ziglar Jim Rohn and the Personal Growth Pivot
    (00:06:06) The One-Hit Wonder Problem — Staying at the Top Is Harder Than Getting There
    (00:07:03) Lead by Respect Not Fear — The Wrong Way to Lead
    (00:08:36) Relationships Relationships Relationships — The Three Rs of Leadership
    (00:10:06) The Intentional Trust Plan Most Leaders Have Never Built
    (00:11:24) Always On Stage — Leading by Example and the Tie Story
    (00:17:48) Advice for New Coaches — Are You In It for the Right Reasons?
    (00:21:06) How Coaching Young People Has Changed in 35 Years
    (00:23:51) Purpose Self-Reflection and Personal Mission Statements
    (00:25:21) The J-Mac Story — February 15 2006 and the Speech Career It Started
    (00:27:04) Become the Chief Storyteller — Warnings Examples and Reading the Room
    (00:34:42) Staying Fresh — Intentional Personal Growth and Servant Leadership
    (00:43:15) What's Next — Books Podcast and How to Find Coach Jim Johnson

    Coach Jim Johnson spent 35 years coaching high school basketball in Rochester with 428 wins, three programs turned around, and one game on February 15, 2006 that landed him in the Oval Office. In this episode, he gets into what it actually looks like to build trust on purpose, why the leaders who sustain success are doing something most teams never think about, and how the lessons from a gym floor translate directly into any room where someone's trying to lead people.

    CONNECT

    Coach Jim Johnson → https://coachjimjohnson.com
    ROC Vox → https://rocvox.com

    New episodes every Tuesday.

    Recorded at ROC Vox Recording & Production in Bushnell's Basin, NY. Learn more at https://rocvox.com.
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    48 mins
  • Debra Ross | Mobilizing for Totality: How an Eclipse Built a Community

    Debra Ross | Mobilizing for Totality: How an Eclipse Built a Community
    Jun 2 2026
    (00:00:00) Cold Open: What is the Eclipse Effect?
    (00:00:45) Welcome Back and the Non-Conformist Oath
    (00:03:47) Ella's Five-Year Plan and the 2017 Missouri Eclipse
    (00:06:00) Building Rochester's Eclipse Task force: 750 Volunteers, No Budget
    (00:12:00) Co-Chairing the National Eclipse Task Force
    (00:14:27) The Dreadful Lack of Agency and What To Do About It
    (00:17:21) Bonding vs. Bridging: The Two Kinds of Social Capital
    (00:21:09) The Network Graph: Making Invisible Connections Visible
    (00:28:51) Stories From the National Eclipse Effort
    (00:39:09) On Failure, Grade, and Raising Kids Outside the System

    Deborah Ross watched the 2017 solar eclipse from a field in Kimmswick, Missouri and came home convinced of two things: Rochester needed to be ready for 2024, and it was going to be her job to make that happen. What she built with 750 volunteers, no budget, and six years of monthly meetings became both a defining moment for this region and the foundation of a book.

    In this episode, she breaks down how an eclipse becomes a community organizing tool, what servant leadership actually looks like when you're asking hundreds of people to work for free, and why the principles behind The Eclipse Effect apply to any catalyst, a natural disaster, a federal funding cut, or the Olympics coming to your town.

    CONNECT
    The Eclipse Effect → https://theeclipseeffect.com
    Kids Out and About → https://kidsoutandabout.com
    ROC Vox → https://rocvox.com

    New episodes every Tuesday.

    Recorded at ROC Vox Recording & Production in Pittsford, NY. Learn more at https://rocvox.com
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    45 mins
  • Melissa Suchodolski | Firing Bad Clients and Building Great People

    Melissa Suchodolski | Firing Bad Clients and Building Great People
    May 19 2026
    Melissa Suchodolski told someone once that getting into construction was "absurd." That was 25 years ago. Today, she runs USC Builds, a 140-person Rochester contracting firm, and a workforce development nonprofit that Governor Hochul wants to replicate across New York State.


    In this episode, she gets into what it actually looks like to build a company culture most firms won't even try, what it cost to fire a client who represented a third of her annual revenue, and why the construction industry's labor crisis is a competitive advantage for anyone who started this work early.


    CHAPTERS
    00:12 Welcome and the Non-Conformist Oath
    01:09 How Fitz and Melissa Met at the Jewish Home of Rochester
    11:25 Why More Americans Should Travel Abroad
    12:23 Meet USC Builds: 25 Years Building People Through Construction
    13:31 From History Major to Construction President
    16:26 Why a Skilled Trade Can Never Be Taken Away
    19:33 What a Trauma-Informed Workplace Looks Like in Construction
    27:43 Why She Fired Her Second-Biggest Client Over Racism on the Job Site
    30:42 The Construction Labor Crisis and Who's Already Positioned to Win
    34:39 Ascend Workforce Solutions and the Governor's Attention
    41:20 Trauma as a Superpower
    42:51 This or That


    CONNECT
    USC Builds → https://uscbuilds.com
    ROC Vox → https://rocvox.com


    New episodes every Tuesday.


    Recorded at ROC Vox Recording & Production in Pittsford, NY. Learn more at https://rocvox.com.
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    51 mins
  • Chad Marks | He Wrote The Argument That Freed Thousands From His Cell

    Chad Marks | He Wrote The Argument That Freed Thousands From His Cell
    May 12 2026
    Chad Marks was sentenced to 40 years in federal prison at 24 years old — and from his cell, he wrote the legal argument that freed thousands.

    Chad Marks — Rochester native, published author, paralegal, and founder of Blood on the Razor Wire — joins Fitz at ROC Vox to tell the full story: growing up poor on Lyle Avenue, the drug dealing, the 40-year federal sentence, the First Step Act argument that no attorney believed in, and what he's built since walking out — a paralegal practice, a sober living house, a YouTube channel, a book, and a possible Netflix series.

    In this episode: how federal prison actually works, what a 40-year sentence does to your psychology, 14 months in solitary, the PTSD nobody talks about, what's most broken in the system, and why your worst day on the outside still beats your best day in there.

    CHAPTERS
    0:00 Cold Open and Introduction
    2:10 Growing Up Poor in Rochester: How It Started
    3:19 The First Step Act and the Argument That Freed Thousands
    6:26 The Reality of Federal Prison: Big Sandy and the Violence
    10:18 The 40-Year Sentence and Judge Larimer
    15:49 Life After Release: Giving Back to the Community
    19:01 Writing Motions From His Cell and Getting 20 Out
    24:40 The Mission: Blood on the Razor Wire
    28:11 What's Most Broken in the Prison System
    34:24 Misconceptions: What Prison Actually Does to You
    35:14 PTSD, Counseling, and Relearning Normal Life
    43:49 The SHU: 14 Months in Solitary

    CONNECT
    Blood on the Razor Wire (book) → https://www.amazon.com/Blood-Razor-Wire-journey-through/dp/B08N9DP62B
    Blood on the Razor Wire TV → https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2BfsAN7eb-76zlPmVbetgQ
    Freedom Fighters PC → https://www.freedomfighterspc.com
    The First Step Act ruling → https://www.criminallegalnews.org/news/2020/may/15/federal-judge-issues-order-reducing-40-year-stacked-924c-sentence-based-first-step-act-changes-compassionate-release/
    ROC Vox → https://rocvox.com

    New episodes every Tuesday.

    #BloodOnTheRazorWire #FirstStepAct #FederalPrison #PrisonReform #JailhouseLawyer #CriminalJusticeReform #PositiveBlatherings #ROCVox #PositivePodcast
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    55 mins
  • Raeanne Lacatena | Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) Stops Burnout

    Raeanne Lacatena | Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) Stops Burnout
    May 5 2026
    EFT tapping might be the most powerful business tool your competitors have never heard of — and Raeanne Lacatena has been quietly putting it to work with billionaires, burned-out founders, and entrepreneurs who've run out of runway on the grind-and-push model.

    Raeanne Lacatena — licensed clinical social worker, certified professional coach, reiki master, and five-time #1 bestselling author of The Integrated Entrepreneur — joins Fitz at ROC Vox to explain why burned-out entrepreneurs aren't failing because of bad strategy. They're failing because nobody ever taught them how to manage what's happening inside their own nervous system.
    In this episode: what EFT tapping is and why it works, how Raeanne gets skeptical clients — including billionaires — to try it, why stress literally shuts down your best thinking, the Maslow tier most people have never heard of, and what it cost Raeanne personally to put her full story into a book.

    CHAPTERS
    0:00 Cold Open: Tapping in Traffic
    1:17 Raeanne's Path: From Helper to Integrated Coach
    7:50 What Entrepreneurs Struggle With Most
    9:00 EFT Tapping: What It Is and Why It Works
    13:02 Raising Self-Regulating Kids With EFT
    15:26 The Lizard Brain: Why Stress Kills Clear Thinking
    19:37 EFT Meridian Points: Nausea, Anxiety, and Golf
    26:04 Writing the Book: Vulnerability and Bestseller
    28:55 Self-Transcendence: Mission Over Ego
    36:37 Pediatric Palliative Care: Where Reiki Began
    40:50 What Schools Don't Teach: Emotional Intelligence

    CONNECT
    The Integrated Entrepreneur → https://www.theintegratedentrepreneur.com
    ROC Vox → https://rocvox.com

    New episodes every Tuesday.

    #EFTTapping #EmotionalFreedomTechnique #Burnout #EntrepreneurMindset #NervousSystemRegulation #SelfTranscendence #PositiveBlatherings #ROCVox #PositivePodcast
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    48 mins
  • Peter Conners | The Deadhead Running the Poetry Press That Put Rochester on the Map

    Peter Conners | The Deadhead Running the Poetry Press That Put Rochester on the Map
    Apr 29 2026
    Before Peter Conners ran one of America's most respected poetry presses, he was following the Grateful Dead across the country in a van.

    Conners is the Publisher and Executive Director of BOA Editions — a Rochester-based nonprofit that has quietly won Pulitzer Prizes, national awards, and the respect of the entire literary world for 50 years, while most Rochesterians have no idea it exists. He joins Fitz at ROC Vox to talk about how a self-described troublemaker from Sutherland High School ended up running an institution — and why, at its 50th anniversary, losing its federal funding isn't going to stop it.
    In this episode: BOA's controversial first book by a Pulitzer Prize winner no one else would publish, why nonprofit publishers are the only thing standing between the world and the end of new poetry, the brutal economics of audiobooks (sell 1,000 copies, make $100), and what a decade of sobriety taught Peter about what publishing is really for.

    CHAPTERS
    00:00 Welcome to Positive Blatherings
    00:56 Meet Peter Conners and BOA Editions
    02:18 The Founding Story: First Book to First Pulitzer
    07:44 Why Poetry Needs Nonprofit Publishers
    09:09 20 Years of Publishing's Digital Revolution
    13:28 The Hard Truth About Audiobook Economics
    18:28 From Troublemaker to Writer: Peter's Origin Story
    22:00 A Family Defined by Service
    25:20 How Peter Became BOA's Publisher
    31:49 Going Public: Writing His Own Story
    36:38 Sobriety, Recovery, and Giving Back
    42:05 BOA's Future: Surviving the NEA Cut

    CONNECT
    BOA Editions → https://www.boaeditions.org
    Peter Conners → https://www.peterconners.net
    Growing Up Dead: The Hallucinated Confessions of a Teenage Deadhead → https://www.amazon.com/Growing-Up-Dead-Hallucinated-Confessions/dp/0306817330
    Merch Table Blues → https://www.amazon.com/Merch-Table-Blues-Peter-Conners/dp/1945665319
    Box of Rain documentary → https://www.amazon.com/Grateful-Dead-Box-Rain/dp/B0D19TCPPM
    Writers & Books Rochester → https://wab.org
    ROC Vox → https://rocvox.com

    New episodes every Tuesday.

    #BOAEditions #Poetry #IndependentPublishing #Rochester #RochesterNY #LiteraryPublishing #PoetryBooks #NonprofitArts #GratefulDead #PeterConners #PositiveBlatherings #ROCVox #Memoir #BookPublishing #IndependentPress #ArtsAdvocacy #SmallPress #WritingLife #AuthorInterview #BookCommunity #LiteraryWorld #ReadMorePoetry #RochesterArts #Deadhead #GratefulDeadCommunity #NEAFunding #PoetryLovers #WritersAndBooks #Sobriety #PublishingIndustry
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    46 mins
  • Keith Greer | The Neuroscience of Motivation and What Leaders Get Wrong

    Keith Greer | The Neuroscience of Motivation and What Leaders Get Wrong
    Apr 28 2026
    Most conversations — at work, across the dinner table, across the political divide — are failing. Executive coach Keith Greer says the reason is simple: we're all addicted to being right.

    Keith Greer, Executive Coach and leadership development specialist, joins Fitz at ROC Vox for a return visit six years in the making. With 40+ years spanning clinical social work, family therapy, and executive coaching, Keith brings the full weight of his career to one question: why do most conversations miss the mark — and what actually works? In this episode you'll hear the neuroscience behind why certain leadership behaviors destroy team trust, how Conversational Intelligence explains what happens in your team's brain during that conference room pitch, and why the single most powerful thing any of us can do right now — in the office, at the Thanksgiving table, or across the political divide — is stop talking and listen.

    CHAPTERS
    00:00 Intro: Keith Returns After Six Years
    01:23 The Grandpa Gig: Love, Fun, and Three Grandsons
    07:50 Building a Coaching Practice on His Own Terms
    10:00 Why Technical Brilliance Doesn't Make a Leader
    14:51 Family Businesses: Where Bloodlines Meet Business
    20:44 Why You Can't Inject Motivation Into Someone
    22:38 Conversational Intelligence and the Neuroscience of Trust
    26:23 The "Addiction to Being Right" Kills Conversations
    33:50 Self-Awareness Is Courageous Work, Not "Touchy-Feely"
    35:04 Shut Up and Listen: The #1 Conversation Strategy
    38:40 Productive Disagreement Across the Political Divide
    46:21 Finding Common Ground Through Shared Humanity

    CONNECT
    Keith Greer Coaching → https://www.keithgreercoaching.com
    ROC Vox → https://www.rocvox.com
    Fresh doses of Positivity every Tuesday and Wednesday.

    #ConversationalIntelligence #LeadershipDevelopment #ExecutiveCoaching #MotivationalInterviewing #LeadershipSkills #FamilyBusiness #SelfAwareness #ActiveListening #NeuroscienceOfLeadership #PositiveBlatherings #ROCVox #Rochester #CommunicationSkills #TeamBuilding #LeadershipCoaching #PersonalDevelopment #MindsetShift #WorkplaceWellness #ProductiveConversations #EmotionalIntelligence
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    1 hr
  • My Cousin Meg | She Lost Her Son Then Found the Secret to Living

    My Cousin Meg | She Lost Her Son Then Found the Secret to Living
    Apr 27 2026
    She heard a voice say "pain is coming" — and ten days later, her seven-year-old son was gone.

    Meg Fitzgerald joins her cousin Scott Fitzgerald at ROC Vox to talk about what happens when you decide grief is going to mean something. In this episode of Positive Blatherings, Meg shares the story behind her new book Don't Miss the Magic — a twelve-year journey through loss, spiritual awakening, synchronicities that defy explanation, and the daily practices that kept her alive when survival felt impossible.

    You'll hear how Meg built a personal prescription for grief that anyone going through a hard season can use, how she discovered that internal energy changes outcomes in ways that words and body language alone cannot, what it felt like to receive undeniable signs from her son Ryan across multiple mediums and years, and how a voice at a stoplight — and a seven-year-old's dream of a million stuffed animals — shaped the rest of her life.

    CHAPTERS
    0:00 Welcome Back to Positive Blatherings
    1:37 Meet Meg Fitzgerald
    5:01 Ryan's Story: The Accident and the First Night
    7:47 The Voice That Said Pain Is Coming
    10:00 The First Signs: Ryan's Name in the Lake
    11:51 Searching for Meaning: Spirituality and Survival
    17:00 The Daily Prescription for Grief
    23:00 The Ryan Batchelder Foundation and Little Hugs
    25:00 Energy, Intention, and What Changes Outcomes
    28:20 Sending Love to Every Situation
    35:38 Don't Miss the Magic: About the Book
    37:30 How a Medium Told Meg She Was Writing a Book
    43:30 What's Next: Speaking and a Book for Young People
    45:50 Celebrate Your Life Conference and Lisa Williams
    56:08 The Pink Tutu Meditation and Tina's Daughter Mia
    58:13 How You Win the Game

    #interviewpodcast #tragedy #tragicloss #lifelessons #grief #losingachid #movingforward #boatingaccident
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    1 hr