Catalytic Leadership
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Each episode brings you real conversations with high-performing entrepreneurs and agency owners, sharing their personal experiences and valuable lessons. From overcoming stress and chaos to elevating team performance and achieving ambitious goals, discover practical strategies that you can apply to your own leadership journey. Dr. Attaway, an Executive Coach specializing in Mindset, Leadership, and and Productivity, provides clear, actionable insights to help you lead with confidence and clarity.
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Catalytic Leadership
He Used AI to Reclaim 10+ Hours and Stop Micromanaging His Team with Spencer Whalen
As a founder, it’s easy to become the bottleneck your team quietly works around. In this episode, I sit down with Spencer Whalen to explore how he used AI tools to free up over 10 hours a week — not by cutting corners, but by evolving how he leads internally.
We talk through the systems, mindset shifts, and intentional decisions that helped Spencer stop micromanaging, increase his team’s autonomy, and create more space for strategic thinking — the kind of space most agency owners are starving for. If you’ve ever felt like the only way to maintain control is to stay involved in every little task, this conversation will challenge that assumption and offer a smarter path forward.
Whether you're buried in fulfillment, managing a small team, or scaling toward seven figures, this episode will equip you with practical ideas to simplify operations and lead with clarity — all while keeping your best people empowered and engaged.
Connect with Spencer Whalen
Want to continue the conversation? You can find Spencer on LinkedIn or read his latest insights on the OneDigital blog.
Books Mentioned
- Getting Naked by Patrick Lencioni
- The Go-Giver by Bob Burg & John David Mann
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I'm so excited today to have Spencer Whalen on the podcast. Spencer is a benefits professional who truly understands the nuances of employee benefits for a wide range of organizations varying in size, industry and overall complexity. With over a decade at One Digital, spencer's honed his expertise in supporting nonprofits, associations, government contractors and really all types of employers. With an MBA from Georgetown and the Certified Employee Benefits Specialist designation from IFEBP, spencer's dedication to the HR community is evident in his board work with DC SHRM and HR Virginia over the past several years, as well as his superior work for his clients. Spencer, I'm so glad you're here. Thanks for being on the show.
Spencer Whalen:Dr Attaway, it's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me.
Intro / Outro:Welcome to Catalytic Leadership, the podcast designed to help leaders intentionally grow and thrive. Here is your host author and leadership and executive coach, dr William Attaway.
Dr. William Attaway:Spencer, I would love to start with you sharing a little bit of your story with our listeners, particularly about your journey and your development as a leader. How did you get started?
Spencer Whalen:Sure, it's a great question. I think, quite honestly, I have to rewind the tape pretty far back and I think that when I really look at how I've landed where I am today, it's all thanks to family. Family has been something that's always been super important to me. One thing I would be remiss not to mention is we've had our fair bit of struggles, but from that, you know, I think kind of like the story of the Phoenix, like rising from the ashes, I think you know, despite all the challenges we had, there were plenty to be had, trust me, and I don't think I need to go into too much detail.
Spencer Whalen:But the fact that I was raised by a single mom and my grandmother those two, along with my next door neighbor who was like a second mom to me, I think that the three of them really showed me what you know leadership was like, you know, from a very young age and you know your character is really defined by what you're doing, when nobody's looking, kind of thing. That was kind of what got me to how I am, in terms of just personality, I think, but in terms of my actual career trajectory, it's really funny because I never thought I'd be doing what I'm doing today, working in benefits. Going back to college, I studied chemistry and Spanish, so I have people constantly ask me how I made the leap into what I'm doing today and, to be quite honest, it was kind of by luck and just a lot of happenstance. I have been really lucky that the people that I've been surrounded by have, in a lot of instances, seen a lot more of me than I've seen of myself, and it's been an amazing evolution, because I think that having good people around you really sets the stage for success moving forward. And actually, as I mentioned a little bit ago, I heard one of your podcasts I'm really disappointed I can't remember exactly who had said this that was guested on your podcast earlier saying something to the effect of show me your friends today, I'll show you where you're going going future, going going tomorrow.
Spencer Whalen:And I think that is so true because you know, looking around me today are all the people that were with me yesterday and they've got me to where I'm at. And you know, I think that just taking the mindset of constantly being willing to learn and take feedback, I think is also just paramount when it comes to being a good leader, and one thing that I'll probably say repeatedly today is my biggest key to success in leadership has been the ability to listen, and I think a lot of us lose sight of the fact that. You know, listening is something that we all need to do a little bit more of, because it's so much fun to talk, it's great to be in the spotlight, but it's, you know, just equally as important to take time to sit back, listen to what other people have to say.
Dr. William Attaway:That's so well said. You know, I think listening is one of the most powerful tools in a leader's tool bag, and I watch too many leaders who are, frankly, so in love with the sound of their own voice. They are always talking and it's interesting to read the body language of their team because you can see it. You can see in the body language their frustration. You can see they're just so tired of not being heard. You can see they're just so tired of not being heard.
Spencer Whalen:You know, as you have seen this and you have seen the power of listening. Can you think of a time where you saw that just on full display? That is a great question. Yeah, and sad to say, I think a lot of instances where that's played out you know we've lost talent as a result of it of instances where that's played out you know we've we've lost talent as a result of it. You know people like when they're not feeling heard, not feeling seen, I think you know you're not bringing value to them and I think that's that's a big thing when you're.
Spencer Whalen:You know, a lot of my success I also should make mention of is, once again, not not just being surrounded by good people that are building me up, but also also building the business up as well. And if you're not pushing that as a team, yeah, the door's right there, they're going to walk right out of it, and so I think, unfortunately, a lot of it. It's hard to rectify or write that ship if people aren't feeling like they're being heard. There was one instance in particular where this person's now at a different agency knocking it out of the park. They had said time and time again what they needed to succeed and they just weren't getting heard, weren't getting the tools they needed, and they hit the door.
Dr. William Attaway:It's so true Because they don't have to put up with that.
Dr. William Attaway:You know, especially today there's so many opportunities where they can go Right In your work with SHRM. You know I've spoken in a number of different SHRM groups. Conversations that I have after the talk, after the meeting, are so fascinating to me Because people are talking about how the world of HR has shifted so much that the change in this field has increased dramatically, particularly over the last five, 10 years. Has that been your experience and where are some of those changes that you have seen and you maybe you've experienced?
Spencer Whalen:That's a great question and I think, like a lot of conversations, that goes back to COVID and I think that has been, for like a better words, biggest catalyst of change in recent years. But you know, it's not, it's not the first instance of it. I mean, go back to great recession, go, go, go back even further, 9-11. So there have been what I guess we call watershed moments where there's been a lot of change and it's tough. And I actually think that it might actually be in your book talking about adaptability and just the importance of that in success and leadership, the importance of that in success and leadership, and with SHRM specifically, I think it's been proven that only those that are able to change are able to survive, and I also see that a lot too across the board, whether it's sales, whether it's HR, just business health, overall Adaptability is really really critical and it's something that's been actually really hard for me to learn.
Spencer Whalen:You know people think, oh, it's so great that you've been with OneDigital for 12 years, but I would be lying if I didn't say a lot of it's because of the stability and the comfort of you know, the familiar of it's because of the stability and the comfort of you know the familiar, the familiar and I think that you know, especially as I've kind of evolved I started off as an account manager and now get into business development and kind of making more of a niche for myself and, um, learning how to change with the market is. It's not easy, Uh, and it's something that takes a lot of practice, I think, and a lot of you know failing forward, if you will.
Dr. William Attaway:That's really true, you know. I think the adaptability quotient is a significant indicator of success and it sounds like you have surfed those waves at One Digital. One of the things that I'm hearing a lot of discussion around with my clients, whether it's people in the digital marketing world or in the corporate world, is AI. I think AI has become for a lot. Gallup some results that Gallup research had just posted, saying that less than 10% of people are using AI daily as part of their job and that a very large portion of people are not using it at all. I'm curious in your perspective, working in benefits and in the HR world, what are you seeing and how important do you think AI is and is going to be in the days to come?
Spencer Whalen:You know, this is one of those things where I think One Digital did a really good job of picking the name that it has and I'll actually confess, the shirt I have on today is actually our dated name One Digital, health and Benefits, because now we do so much more than that and we actually brand ourselves as workforce solution advisors. But going back to the one digital name, with digital very present there, I think, speaking to just once again, adaptability, keeping up with technology, that's one of our biggest differentiators in the marketplace and you know it's. You know, I think. 10% today, yeah, it seems low, it's changing every day and I think it's only increasing. Like I can't even imagine what the actual rate of adoption is, but I talked to my mom the other day who, you know, she barely knows how to use an iPhone, but now she's already got the ChatGPT app down. That's fantastic, I saw. So you're speaking of Gallup, I think it was. I think it was.
Spencer Whalen:The New York Times had an article about AI recently and it was talking about AI also is being used differently across generations, which is fascinating how for millennials it's more of a search engine, whereas for Gen Zers it's more of an interface that they're using to actually do tasks for them. So it's interesting how? So we have the 10% that are adopting or using AI, but it's how are they actually using? It is another number that I'd be curious to see.
Dr. William Attaway:That's true.
Spencer Whalen:I think that AI it's here to stay. It's not going anywhere. And I remember, and when it first came out, people said oh, we got to stop AI, we got to get rid of it. Like it's going to destroy society, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know that term somebody threw out was like all right, these are just the Luddites speaking, and I'm not going to 100% get the story right, but you know the term Luddite, I think came from around the time of the advent of the Industrial Revolution and people that were basically running around town destroying machines because they thought if they destroyed the machines, they were going to stop continuing to be built. But we all know how that turned out.
Spencer Whalen:Machines are more present than ever and a lot of them are run by AI. Sure, you can slow the trickle, but there's a big flow behind it, so it's not a force that's going to be easily contained. But AI is something I'm really excited about. One digital actually is a company. I've really been an industry leader on that front too, and I don't intend this to be a commercial by any means, but it's something that we're doing that is super cool and that AI is not only powering our strategy that we're putting forward with our clients, but it's also being something that our the employees of our clients are able to interface with. So it's just there's so many different facets to how AI can be used. I'm really excited about where it can go. That being said, too, I think that we do have to be very careful about how it's implemented. You know the edits that are around it, the code that goes into it, to make sure that you know it is there to do good. So I do want to have that caveat added on to the record as well.
Dr. William Attaway:I think that's well said. You know, I watch so many leaders who are wary of it, sometimes companies who are wary of it. I'm so glad to hear One Digital is leaning into it. I think that is a differentiator for you guys and definitely something to be proud of. I think it was Kerry Newhoff that said that companies that refuse to change will become museums to a bygone era. That's good. I don't know any company that wants to be a museum to a bygone era. Nobody has that in their mission statement, right. And yet when we resist progress, when we resist change in the Luddite way, that is exactly what we become.
Dr. William Attaway:I was talking to a recruiter a few weeks ago and this was fascinating to me that's not the world that I'm in and he was telling me that he is watching more and more people in their 40s and 50s who are being laid off from companies because they are not staying abreast of what's going on with AI. They're being laid off and they're being replaced with people who have the skills, the prompting skills, the experience with learning and just their willingness to learn it. And these are not junior people, you know. Some of these are senior executives. That, to me, is pretty telling that there is an indicator, an early indicator light. This is not a fad, this is not something we're going to see fade away, and our job as leaders is to move toward it and say how can we do it, as you said, ethically, how can we utilize this in such a way that is the right way to use it, instead of what we have all seen can be some very unethical ways to utilize it?
Spencer Whalen:Oh, absolutely, and it's funny. I'm not sure if you intended to say, or if I took it to me, that AI is not a world you're familiar with or part of, but hey, we're, we're all in this world now.
Dr. William Attaway:We're 100%.
Spencer Whalen:Yeah, um, yeah, that is kind of scary. I mean once again going back to you know, adaptability and, um, just constant willingness to learn. I think the the learning curve has, you know, kind of steepened its incline for all of us, steepened its incline for all of us. And I think that what can often be difficult when that happens is the piece of, you know, being ethical and, you know, having laws keep up with AI, having, you know, not even just laws but ethical policies that align what's right by people, right by society. It becomes increasingly difficult.
Spencer Whalen:But what is interesting and I don't remember which company this was recently they laid off a very significant portion of their workforce, only to come back and realize that they actually need a rehire. I think it was actually almost the same number of people that they had laid off to recruiters for their AI department. I mean, I don't think that's going to be the case for every company. I think, unfortunately, jobs will be lost, but I think jobs will also change. I'm hopeful for, but I do think that there is going to be some friction and it's going to hurt some people, unfortunately.
Dr. William Attaway:Let's say, I show up in your job. How are you utilizing this? You know I signed up for a Chad GPT account a year and a half ago, right, and last year ended up springing for the team account for the rest of my team to join in, and so we are building GPTs now. You know we are doing things that I two years ago couldn't even have thought about. You know it's become part of our daily rhythm. What does it look like for you?
Spencer Whalen:And I'll keep it to just me, because OneDigital well, I'll talk a little bit about OneDigital as well, but it'll be easier for me to focus on my day-to-day um where, yeah, I've created my own, my own gbts that are able to help with everything from responding to emails to making sure that my schedule has like the right balance of you know, sitting down, having my head down doing work, versus like out out about meeting with people, um, and it's it's fascinating because I've been able to really almost like reinvent my calendar to to make sure that I have time to do the things that are most important to to bring value and more dollars in the door, if you will, yeah.
Spencer Whalen:And so we've been also really fortunate at one digital, and this is going back to what I was talking about. How we're leading the way is that we have these in-house tools that can help from everything from rfp writing to um how to fine-tune strategy with our clients to optimize spend for for employee benefits programs. And then we do have employee-facing tools that are essentially benefits counselors, people that back when I was an account manager able to answer questions that took me two or three years to learn how to respond to, these chatbots were able to do in real time immediately, once given the right inputs. So it's been great because I have more time back in my day. And you know, even all the way up to the highest rungs or leadership, they've said what's? You know, there's nothing wrong with giving people more time back in their day. I mean, if we can make you work more efficiently and get paid the same like that's everybody yeah 100%, 100%.
Dr. William Attaway:It is such a game changer for me because it Like, that's everybody, yeah, a hundred percent, a hundred percent it. It is such a game changer for me because it is an accelerator, it's an amplifier. A friend of mine says it's an amplifier of what you have learned and what you know how to do. This gives you the ability to amplify that and to increase your efficiency in some ways that I think we really could not do before. I love to hear how you're leveraging that. I think we really could not do before. I'd love to hear how you're leveraging that. I think that's fascinating.
Spencer Whalen:I think one of the coolest ways is just the ability to kind of be everything for everyone all at once, which before was not true and we heard the exact opposite for all our lives, I think, until now. And now there's a little bit of and not to speak in absolutes, but there's almost this, this feeling of being able to be everything for everyone with with ai, and the way that shows up is, you know, using ai to be able to touch people, like in multimodal fashion. So, whether it's by email, whether it's over LinkedIn, or it's over X or Twitter, being able to use AI to help you do things that previously you'd only think, oh, I only have the energy to do email today, or oh, I only have the energy to do LinkedIn today, and it's like, no, actually you can do all this at the same time and you can change the tone across the platforms because, goodness knows, there's a different tone that you have to set for each mode of communication. So that's been great, especially, like all of us, I have a very full calendar and being able to define the time to do all those, and it takes energy.
Spencer Whalen:It the time to do all those, and it takes energy. It takes time to think of a content that you're pushing out. So it's been. It's been really refreshing to be able to simplify things, become more productive, and almost more productive, with less energy required. I love that.
Dr. William Attaway:Let's talk about that for a minute. I love that. Let's talk about that for a minute, about the rhythm that you have as a leader. You know your business. Your clients need you to lead at a different level today than they did five years ago, and that same thing is going to be true five years from now. One Digital is going to demand more of you. Your clients are going to need more from you. So is your team. How do you stay on top of your game? How do you level up with the new leadership skills that your clients, your team, onedigital, are going to need you to have in the years to come?
Spencer Whalen:Oof. See, I think you know, always staying humble is the big thing. I think always staying humble is the big thing. Realize you need the people around you to help build you up, and I think that being able to build a team that can make your operations scalable is also critical. And learning how to delegate that was one of the toughest things I've learned in leadership.
Spencer Whalen:And it's funny too, because like I had to learn that lesson through the way I've kind of climbed the ranks is, you know, I do not function well if I'm being micromanaged and I and I was realizing, like I was kind of doing that to people that were supporting me is doing I was micromanaging that and it was just it has evolution of like one day sitting down and I'm a big fan of journaling and just realizing like the themes that are kind of reappearing and you know, oh whoa, like I needed to step back and kind of re-figure out how we can, how we can make everybody work and work to to the best of their ability, and a lot of it is very far from being a micromanager, but I think staying on top of my game is just constantly working on yourself.
Spencer Whalen:I can't speak enough to just trying to be better every day, I think getting up, working out, making sure that you're eating well, that you're maintaining good relationships with your family. One big thing that I love about your podcast is the concept. There's a regular theme of religiosity and the role that God can play, and I'll say I'm not particularly religious myself, but what I would like to say is very spiritual and working for something that's much bigger than yourself is another thing. I've heard a lot, too, and I think that also can can make sure that you always have a guiding light in terms of where you want to go, and I, I think that you know, with that, it's really hard to go astray.
Dr. William Attaway:That's so well said. I think the rhythms of the leaders that I respect, that I look up to and that I learn so much from as I look at their rhythms, they're characterized by healthy and sustainable. Those are the two words that I use a lot and that's what I just heard in your description there. You know healthy, you're thinking about your physical body, you're thinking about your health. You know exercise, the diet, the food that you eat, you know movement. These things are important because they have a dramatic impact on your productivity as a leader and sustainability. You know and that has been a theme that I've heard several times in this conversation that you know you want to be able to keep this going for the long haul. You want to operate in a high performance level beyond just today, and that requires a certain rhythm. It requires, you know, focus, determination, drive, initiative, intentionality, but it also requires downtime, you know, and I think both are important.
Spencer Whalen:I think one thing that actually really sticks with me, that this kind of reminds me of, is very, very early on in working Spencer's career and this was before I was, you know, working a nine to five as an intern I remember just being in this position where I felt like I had to just constantly try to impress the superiors and hope that maybe this would land me that 9 to 5 job after graduating from college. And there was this lady and I remember her name was Pamela and I was staying until like no, it wasn't that late after 5 o'clock when I was supposed to clock out, it was like 6 or 6.30. And she walked over to me and she saw me just like furiously typing away I'd probably skip lunch that day. And she's like you know, sponsor, you probably got 40 years of this left. She's like work's always gonna be there and yeah. She's like, yeah, you're doing this now. She's like there's, there's no way that you're going to make it that far and not burn out.
Spencer Whalen:She's like go home, have dinner, watch a good show, decompress. She's like come back, do tomorrow and you're going to do your work better and honestly, that's kind of what I've taken to heart and it's been very true of my career.
Dr. William Attaway:That's a gift and I love that she did that, that she took the initiative to come to you and tell you that Because she was thinking about you and your long-term success. And I imagine I'm just guessing here this is something that you have paid forward to other people on your teams when you have seen similar things that you have taken the initiative to have that conversation because somebody first had it with you oh, absolutely.
Spencer Whalen:And you know, today, present day and I'll do a shout out to my boss, her name is nancy grasso she, she set the entire trajectory of the rest, the remainder of my career, and I think having a good leader empowers you to be a good leader yourself. And it, you know, I think, is also really nice too in our relationship, because leadership isn't going down, it's not going up, it's going both ways. That's right, and I think that that's what makes the best businesses as successful as they are. Well said, the best businesses as successful as they are.
Dr. William Attaway:Well said. Is there a book that's made a big difference in your journey, as you have continued to learn and grow from other people?
Spencer Whalen:Oof, I think early on in my career. One that really sticks out is I'm trying to blank on the author right now, but Getting Naked. It's about consulting and just you know, vulnerability and how to um be your authentic self, for how to work, um, but I'd say, most recently, there's one called go giver. Um, that I meant so good, yeah, that's yeah, that's a really, really good one. That one, I think it's um John Berg and I think you know Bob Berg and John man, I think, is his name. Uh, and I think that one, that book, particularly because it breaks it down into like basically five different laws, if you will, of how to be successful and the biggest takeaway is the more you give, the more you get, mantra, and I love that, especially because one of the most rewarding aspects of my job is being a connector and getting people to other people. That can make us all better, and I think that book speaks a lot to that. I love that, that a lot to that.
Dr. William Attaway:I love that. That's a fantastic book. Definitely recommend that one. We'll have a link to that in the show notes. Let me ask you one last question, spencer Sure, thinking about your job, your business, as it exists today. If I could snap my fingers and solve one problem, what would you want that problem to be?
Spencer Whalen:I have to ask a clarifying question.
Spencer Whalen:So, for our clients or for me internally Either one you get to decide. For our clients, um, because this is something that gets me out of bed every day and will probably get me out of bed for the remainder of my career, unless something dramatic happens is, you know, some sort of fix to this perpetual health care crisis that we're dealing with, where it's just increasing costs, getting, you know, less for more money, and it's um, it's tough, because I like, I like having a hypothetical of being able to snap your fingers and there's a magic fix, and keeping it in those very vague terms, because I can't imagine what fix we need to to to fix this problem. And, um, right now it kind of feels like playing whack-a-mole with the, the solutions that we bring forward to our clients, and, you know, moving the needle, even a little bit, feels super rewarding, but we need to to boil the needle off the browner, to to really, uh, make the move that we need to help do right, what's best for people in this country, so good.
Dr. William Attaway:Spencer, I could talk to you for another hour about this. You have so much insight and wisdom in this area and I know our listeners have benefited greatly from that today. I want to thank you for your generosity. I know they're going to want to continue to learn from you and learn more about what you're doing over at One Digital. What's the best way for them to connect with you?
Spencer Whalen:So hey, first of all, thank you, dr Attaway, for having me. I would love to stay in touch with your listeners. I think the best way would be to find me on LinkedIn, spencer Whalen. In touch with your listeners, I think the best way would be to find me on LinkedIn, spencer Whalen Aren't too many folks with that name? But also too, if you just do a search, spencer Whalen, one Digital. We have regular blogs out that I've been fortunate enough to write for, so you should be able to find me there. And then, of course, instagram. Just look me up there as well, so I'd love to hear from anybody. It's always good to you know, make more friends.
Dr. William Attaway:Perfect, we'll have all those links in the show notes. Spencer, thank you for your time today and your generosity of insight and wisdom.
Spencer Whalen:Okay, thank you, dr Attaway.
