The Balancing Act with Andrew Temte, PhD, CFA

What if the problem isn’t that you’re distracted, but that nobody ever trained you in the one thing you can actually control? 

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Dr. Justin Anderson, founder and CEO of Premier Sport Psychology and author of Intentional Attention: The Science and Practice of Focus Under Pressure, a licensed psychologist and certified mental performance consultant who has spent more than twenty years with NFL quarterbacks, Olympians, and executives. 

His case is that attention is more controllable than confidence or emotion — a trainable skill rather than a fixed trait — and that for people who never really stop, the question is no longer how to find work-life balance but how to recharge while running. 

Tune in to episode 258 to hear the job Justin didn’t get that redirected his entire career, what context switching is quietly costing you on a day spent bouncing between projects and new tools, and why a book about training focus ends with renewal — and what that actually looks like for someone who can’t simply take more time off. 

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What if the fastest way to fail at AI is to treat it like a race? 

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Don Gregori, Chief Operating Officer of First Factory and author of The Emergent Leader: A Guide to Brand Building, Leadership, and Self-Mastery. 

Don makes the case that leadership starts on the inside and that most AI failures are leadership failures wearing a technology costume — that empathy is operational rather than soft, that bolting AI onto a process you have never questioned is the fastest route to the pile of projects that quietly fail, and that the leader who runs on four hours of sleep is not being tough, just expensive. 

Tune in to episode 257 to hear the rocket-booster moment Don credits to his wife rather than to any career move, the advice he gives a newly promoted manager who is terrified of breaking the very thing that made them good, and why a book about building durable companies ends with the durability of the leader. 

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With a wave of accountants heading for retirement and AI reshaping the profession, is accounting still a smart career bet? 

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Hugh Martin — founder of Procountancy and a CIMA Case Study specialist who prepares finance professionals in more than 45 countries to earn the CGMA designation. 

Together they get behind the acronyms to management accounting itself — the “business partner” role, why a U.S. CPA might add the CGMA, and the human skills no algorithm can replace. 

Tune in to episode 256 to hear why Hugh tells a nervous twenty-year-old that accounting is still worth it, how the CGMA builds the business acumen that earns a bigger seat at the table, and the two-euro rounding error he’d tell his younger self to stop losing sleep over. 

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What does a country actually lose when it makes it harder for the world’s top talent to build a life there? 

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Vasanthan “Vas” Ramakrishnan — founder and principal consultant of Ascend HSI Advisory Partners, who helps high-skilled scientists, engineers, researchers, and founders navigate the extraordinary-ability pathways into the U.S., and who earned his own green card the same way. 

Together they draw the line between wage arbitrage and genuine talent mobility — and make the case that a freer flow of skilled expertise tends to make economies stronger, not weaker. 

Tune in to episode 255 to hear how Vas turned a job lost during COVID into an award-winning global nonprofit, why he tells anxious American workers that keeping talent out won’t protect them, and the reframe at the heart of his work: he doesn’t make his clients extraordinary — they already are. 

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What if you've been chasing success backwards? What if joy isn't the reward you earn after hitting your goals — but the foundation that makes hitting them inevitable? 

In this episode of the Balancing Act podcast, Andy speaks with Bose Akadiri — motivational keynote speaker, corporate trainer, and founder and CEO of Goal and Grind LLC, where she's known as “The Joy Amplifier.” 

After a decade leading corporate social responsibility at Boeing, Salesforce, and JPMorgan Chase, she wrote The Stay Joyful Method to make the business case for joy — not as a feel-good perk, but as a strategic advantage that drives retention, sharpens clarity, and moves the numbers leaders actually care about. 

Tune in to episode 254 to hear why the strongest performers spend time backstage before they take the main stage, how the “joy bubble” becomes a force field when work gets hard, and what it looks like to lead with joy that has a spine — joy that's results-driven and impossible to dismiss as soft. 

AndrewTemte.com