Notes on Resilience
Notes on Resilience explores how human experience, including adversity, shapes leadership, innovation, and culture. Host Manya Chylinski talks with people whose work, research, or lived experience reveal how we adapt, care, and create after challenge—what these stories show about the systems we build, and what must evolve.
These conversations are rooted in a simple idea: the goal isn’t resilience for its own sake, the goal is well-being. Resilience is what makes recovery and growth possible.
The show serves as field research on how people and systems recover, rebuild, and move forward.
Episodes
176 episodes
176: Beyond Resilience, with Keith Erwood
Most organizations don’t fail because they don't have a plan. They fail because they can’t imagine they would ever need a plan.We sit down with Keith Erwood to talk about what real risk looks like and why business continuity and crisis m...
175: The Gap After The Crisis
The strange part of a crisis is not the first week. It’s the months after, when the debris is cleared, the headlines move on, and your body finally stops running on adrenaline. That’s when many people begin to notice the insomnia, anxiety, irri...
174: Resilient Leadership Starts With You, with Chris Harris
Would you follow someone up the hill if they’ve never taken one themselves? That question sits at the center of our conversation with executive coach and keynote speaker Chris Harris, whose warrior mindset approach strips leadership...
173: How To Talk To Your Doctor, with Dana Sherwin
Doctor visits can feel like a high-stakes performance: you get 15 minutes, you are anxious, and you only remember the perfect question after you leave. We sit down with Dana Sherwin, a healthcare management consultant and speaker sp...
172: Hidden Wounds Of Surviving A Public Crisis
A bomb explodes across the street, and you walk away with both your legs. People call that fine.But your body tells a different story for years. On the 13th anniversary of the Boston Marathon bombing, I share what that day felt like from...
171: Lead Without Losing Yourself, with Robin Goad
What if leadership were less about being impressive and more about being useful? Robin Goad joins me to get painfully honest about how most of us learn leadership the wrong way, then spend years unlearning it. She’s a technology exe...
170: The Servant Leader Mindset, with Daniel Tataje
The strongest leaders change what people believe about themselves. That’s the thread running through my conversation with Dr. Daniel Tataje, founder and CEO of Mercy Dental Group and author of The Leader Humanity Needs, a l...
169: The Recovery Gap
The finish line gets repainted, the cameras come back, and the speeches sound certain: we’re stronger, we’ve recovered, we’ve moved forward. But what happens when a community’s timeline keeps marching and a person’s nervous system d...
168: Ready Already, with Allister Frost
Your boss doesn’t know what’s coming next. Neither do you. That’s not a crisis; it’s the new starting point for modern leadership, where real agency can finally show up.We sit down with ...
167: When Clear Messaging Still Misses
Good intentions can still break trust. After a crisis, many leaders speak with calm certainty, hoping to steady the room, only to discover it doesn't work the way they thought.We unpack why offering reassurance can backfire, how timing a...
166: Resilience Is Motion, Not Stillness, with Kenyada Meadows
Balance isn’t the finish line. It's the pendulum that’s almost never centered, the butterfly that needs resistance to fly, and the swimmer who learns to win with water in his goggles.We sat down with coach, author, and financial services...
165: The Quiet Phase After Crisis
When the headlines fade and the urgent meetings stop, most leaders exhale—and miss the most important phase of recovery. We unpack the quiet phase, that deceptive calm where people finally feel the impact and disengagement takes roo...
164: Leading Through Unrest, with Ayme Zemke
When a crisis engulfs your community, the urge to go quiet can be powerful—and costly. We sit down with Ayme Zemke, Chief Client Officer and Certified Crisis Communication Leader at Beehive Strategic Communication, to break down how...
163: Resilience Is The Real Infrastructure, with Tony Crescenzo
Pressure tests every organization, and Tony Crescenzo believes resilience isn’t a perk—it’s the infrastructure that keeps the mission alive. We sit down with the Marine veteran turned CEO of Intelligent Waves and founder of Peak Neu...
162: Back To Functioning - Steadiness or Speed?
What happens when the crisis is no longer in the news?We dig into that uneasy stretch when calendars fill back up and leaders feel the urge to get back to normal. And why that push can cause mistrust and leave people alone with their pai...
161: Resilience Without The Buzzwords, with Kemia Sarraf
What if we stopped treating trauma like a forbidden topic and started treating it like a leadership skill set? That’s the spark for a candid, practical conversation with physician and public health expert Kemia Sarraf on how to show...
160: Resilience With Boundaries, with Kathryn McEwen
What if compassion without boundaries is the very thing burning leaders out? We sit down with organizational psychologist and executive coach Kathryn McEwen to unpack resilience at work as a living system.Kathryn leads the Working with R...
159: Stronger Together At Work, with Peter Turner
Real care at work isn’t about saying yes to everything. It is about designing a culture where people can struggle together and still deliver. We brought Pete Turner, partner and senior executive coach at 2B Limitless, to talk about ...
158: Resilience Without The Hype, with Shaun Murphy
Ever wish you had a steady rhythm to move you through doubt, fatigue, and fear? We sit down with Shaun Murphy—Mr. Motivation—to explore how a veteran turned educator, musician, and author uses leadership and motivation to transform ...
157: Year Three, Clearer And Kinder
Resilience shows up in the small choices that restore steadiness after a hard season, and in the rare moments when private truth reshapes public policy. As we mark three years of the show, I share the unexpected chapter that changed my professi...
156: Unexpected Moments That Make Us
What if the choices that define you arrive sideways—on an ordinary day, without a plan, and ask you to cross a threshold you never imagined existed? We pull together standout moments from season three to explore how our identifies c...
155: Breaking The Silence On Workplace Bullying, with Kim Williams
Silence protects bullies.We sit down with Kim Williams—veteran HR executive, survivor of workplace abuse, and founder of the Fair Path Project—to unpack how brilliant jerks get shielded, why moral injury cuts deeper than most leaders rea...
154: Empathy That Works, with Dr. Helen Riess
What if the fastest path to better outcomes is a renewed commitment to empathy you can actually teach, measure, and scale? We sit down with Dr. Helen Riess—Harvard Medical School psychiatrist, founder of Empathetics, and author of T...
153: Truth In The Eye Of The Storm, with Samantha Montano
Crisis leadership is about recognizing reality faster than everyone else. And telling the truth when it’s hardest. We sit down with Samantha Montano—associate professor of emergency management and author of Disasterology—to unpack w...
152: Leading Without Fear, with Melissa Agnes
Fear rewires leadership in the moments that matter most. We sit down with Melissa Agnes, keynote speaker, author of Crisis Ready, and a shaper of ISO 22361, to explore how leaders can move from survival mode to creation mode when th...
