Underneath The Title: When High Achievers Start Questioning the Success They Built
You did everything right. Built the career. Earned the title. Hit the number. And somewhere along the way, you stopped recognizing the person doing it.
Underneath The Title is a podcast for executives and senior leaders who have experienced a significant exit and are starting to ask the questions they've been too busy to ask: Who am I when the role goes away? What was I actually building toward? Is this it?
Host Kevin Simcock spent 25 years leading creative work for some of the world's most recognized brands at global ad agencies like Y&R, Havas and Ogilvy. He was furloughed from a global VP role at 50, turned down the replacement offer, and chose to figure out what success actually meant to him. What he found changed everything.
Each episode goes beneath the surface of professional identity to explore what drives the decisions we make, the success we chase, and the fulfilment we keep expecting to arrive. Kevin draws on his own experience, his work with senior leaders and business owners navigating major transitions, and his framework, The Dance, which holds that your professional and personal identity were never meant to be separate.
If you're in the middle of a transition, questioning what comes next, or simply wondering why the success you've built feels quieter than you expected, this show was made for you.
New episodes bi-weekly. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.
Kevin is also the author of Whose Ladder Is This? and an executive advisor working one-to-one with high-achievers navigating identity and transition.
Purchase Kevin Simcock's Book: Whose Ladder Is This?
Available on Amazon Kindle, paperback and hardcover HERE
Barnes & Noble here
Indigo Books here
Visit kevinsimcock.com for more information
LinkedIn Profile https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-simcock/
Underneath The Title: When High Achievers Start Questioning the Success They Built
Who Is Your Inner Critic?
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There's a voice in your head that shows up every time you're about to do something that matters.
It arrives right on cue. You've thought the decision through. The logic holds. You can see the path. And then it starts. What if this goes wrong? What if you're not ready? What if people think you've lost your mind?
You've probably spent years assuming that voice is just you. The honest, realistic part of you doing due diligence. The part that keeps you grounded.
But what if it isn't you at all?
In this episode, Kevin Simcock explores one of the most misunderstood forces shaping your decisions: the inner critic. Not as a concept to manage or push through, but as something with a specific origin, a real psychological explanation, and a much older source than most of us have ever considered.
Drawing on the work of Sigmund Freud and Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, Kevin unpacks where the inner critic actually comes from, why it sounds so convincingly like your own voice, and what it's really been protecting you from. You'll learn the difference between the inner critic and the Ego, two things that are commonly confused, and why that distinction changes everything about how you respond to self-doubt.
Kevin also shares something personal: the moment he traced his own inner critic back to a locker room at fourteen years old, and how recognising that a voice from the past had been quietly shaping decisions in the present was the beginning of something genuinely different.
This episode covers:
- What Freud's model of the Id, Ego, and Superego actually means in plain language, and which part is responsible for the voice in your head
- Why Carl Jung's concept of complexes explains how a single experience can create an autonomous inner voice that runs for decades without your awareness
- The difference between the inner critic and the Ego, and why confusing the two keeps people stuck
- A simple but powerful three-step practice for working with your inner critic when it shows up at a critical decision point
- Why the inner critic doesn't just affect individual choices. Left unchallenged, it can quietly build an entire life and identity around conclusions that were never fully yours
This isn't a theoretical conversation. It's a practical one, built from Kevin's own experience navigating a significant professional transition after a 25-year global advertising career, and from the work he does with clients who are rebuilding their identity and direction after their own defining moments.
If you've ever felt held back by a voice you couldn't quite explain, this episode is for you.
Kevin Simcock is an executive advisor, author, and host of Underneath The Title. His advisory practice works with high-performers who have built success but feel misaligned with the identity and life they've created. His book, Whose Ladder Is This?, is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Indigo.
Connect with Kevin: Website: https://kevinsimcock.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-simcock/
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@kevinsimcock
Get the book: Whose Ladder Is This? Amazon: https://www.amazon.ca/s?k=whose+ladder+is+this
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/whose-ladder-is-this-kevin-simcock/1148111984
Indigo: https://www.indigo.ca/en-ca/whose-ladder-is-this/9781069695413.html
