In this episode of Steal From the Best, we sit down with Steven E. Orr, the Founder and CEO of Quasar Markets and one of the most distinctive voices in fintech, trading, and digital assets. With more than 34 years of experience in finance, media, government, and sports, Steven brings a uniquely broad perspective to the future of markets and technology. Steven shares the story of his career, from his early days in finance to leadership roles at Money.Net and Benzinga, and how these experiences shaped the vision behind Quasar Markets. He explains how Quasar is built on Google's Web3 backend and how the platform integrates a massive range of data sources, more than 18 AI models, and personalized tools to create a unified hub for traders, investors, and institutions. The conversation covers trading psychology, cryptocurrency strategies, collective intelligence, and the growing role of machine learning in predicting market behavior. Steven also talks about his long-term mission to use technology to improve global education, financial literacy, and access to opportunity. If you are interested in fintech, artificial intelligence, global markets, entrepreneurship, or the future of digital assets, this episode is packed with insights worth stealing.
In this episode of Steal From the Best, we sit down with Adam Olenn, Founder of Rustle & Spark and a leading expert in story-driven branding, communication, and human connection. Adam brings over 25 years of experience helping organizations around the world craft powerful narratives that inspire action, build trust, and elevate brands. Adam shares the early influences that shaped his storytelling lens — from his mother's anti-smoking campaign to his father's courtroom narrative strategies — and walks us through his journey into branding, education, entrepreneurship, and keynote speaking. We dig into the science behind why stories move people, the art and rigor of naming a brand, and how organizations can use story to differentiate in crowded markets. We also explore the evolving role of AI in creative work, including where it helps, where it falls short, and why human connection and emotional resonance still sit at the centre of great communication. If you're interested in branding, leadership, communication, creativity, or simply becoming a better storyteller, this conversation is packed with insights worth borrowing.
Katie Duarte is the founder of Action Potential Solutions and is a leading expert on feedback dynamics and organizational psychology. She's on a mission to revolutionize how feedback is handled in the workplace. Leveraging an MSc in Organizational Psychology, where she conducted her own research on feedback dynamics, and professional certifications in both training and development and organizational development. Katie brings a fresh and insightful approach to critical organizational challenges. Her work focuses on fostering greater connection and trust within teams, ultimately enhancing organizational effectiveness and success. In our conversation, Katie shares her unique journey, from working with wildlife in Australia to leading sales teams and how these experiences have shaped her understanding of what makes feedback truly effective. She also dives deep into the complexities of feedback, the importance of trust and clarity, and why it's essential to view feedback as a two-way street.
Mark Brender is National Director of Partners in Health Canada, a global health and social justice NGO relentlessly committed to improving the health of the poor and marginalized. Starting from a one-room clinic in Haiti more than 30 years ago, Partners in Health today serves millions of patients each year across 11 countries, working to deliver high quality health care, address the root causes of illness, train service providers, advance research, and advocate for global policy change. Mark opened the PIH Canada office in 2011 and is passionate about raising awareness and funds for this effort, and empowering Canadians to join the movement for global health equity. He previously held leadership positions with national and international charitable organizations. Prior to his career in the non-profit sector, he spent more than a decade as an award-winning hockey journalist, writing about those who practice a different kind of justice. We discuss how Mark left his previous career and lifestyle behind to enter the world of NGOs. Mark talks about the transition and how it filled his life with more purpose. You'll be inspired by the numerous success stories shared by Mark.
Coach Joey Greany has over two decades of experience working with elite professional athletes. He's currently one of the Major League Strength and Conditioning Coaches with the Tampa Bay Rays where he's been for almost 7 years. Outside of the Rays, he provides performance coaching for athletes and teams, executive fitness coaching, and corporate fitness consulting services. With the Tampa Bay Rays, he trains the elite of the elite MLB baseball players. When it comes to strength and conditioning coaching, Joey is as good as it gets. We talk about the importance of having a strong mindset and remaining focused. In order to get the best results from those that he's coaching, he develops personal relationships and builds trust. It's a necessary step in the quest to achieve peak performance. Joey offers some workout advice for those who aren't professional athletes and stresses the importance of getting a good night's sleep and staying hydrated.
Tim Bakker, a former professional football player discusses his transition from a competitive athletic career to the corporate world. The Discussion touches on the specialization of sports in youth, the challenges of balancing multiple sports, the pressure on young athletes, the CFL draft experience, the business aspect of professional sports, and the adjustment period from Canadian collegiate to professional football. Tim discusses the lessons learned from football and how they have helped him in the corporate world. He emphasizes the importance of honesty, constantly seeking new wins, learning from failures, and being accountable. He also mentions the mental aspect of football and the ability to quickly adapt and make decisions on the field. He shares his journey from working at RBC to becoming an equity partner at Lloyd Sadd. "Always be the hammer, not the nail." - Tim Bakker
Raymond, a multi-talented individual, embraces the roles of an entrepreneur, musician, and co-founder of Podcast Connection. When the COVID pandemic led to the indefinite suspension of live music shows, Raymond faced the necessity to shift away from the music entertainment industry. Undeterred by his lack of prior experience and capital, he embarked on a bootstrapped journey to establish a company from scratch. Through his relentless efforts, Podcast Connection not only achieved profitability each year but also created employment opportunities for numerous South Africans. This enabled Raymond to overcome the burden of personal debt amounting to $35k within a year. Since inception, Podcast Connection has served close to 100 clients and Raymond and his team of agents have successfully booked a number of guest speakers on over 900 podcasts. Raymond offers some candid advice to podcast guests on what it takes to be successful and we also dive a bit into politics discussing the current landscape in South Africa.
We chat with Eric Saumure, Principal at Zenbooks, an online accounting firm. He's not your traditional accountant. While he's formally trained as an accountant (CPA, CA), he has experience advising C-Suite executives and business owners on all areas of business finance, including succession planning, restructuring, building processes, and managing remote teams. Eric was tired of the big firm feel and decided to change the way people see their accountant and started Zenbooks which is an online Canadian accounting firm that is 100% remote and leveraging the latest cloud-based tools to advise small business owners across Canada Eric offers some sage advice in our podcast including, setting up a recurring money date in your calendar. We also talk about the importance of getting the right people on your team while hiring slowly and firing fast. Eric addresses making good long-term business decisions and building a profitable business and then growing it out.
Matt Haycox's story is one of a mistake-maker turned hugely successful entrepreneur. From starting in business at age 16 to becoming the UK's biggest strip club owner by 27, with businesses in leisure, property, retail, and finance, then bankrupt by 28! Matt went on to rebuild his life and business as a lender and investor using lessons learned from his failures and now provides funding to SME businesses across the UK. Matt shares a bunch of nuggets from his wild ride. We touch on the balancing of profitability with sustainability and avoiding the sexiness of growth. We also look at the importance of partnerships. It's better to have a smaller piece of a huge pie versus having a large piece of a small pie.
Christopher is the President and CEO of Storewise, Inc., a technology company that builds automation software for food retailers. Christopher authored the book, "8 Steps to Overcoming Everyday Adversity," which was endorsed by several leaders including the former Vice Chairman of the US Join Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Bill Owens. In 2022, Christopher's book received The Maxy Award's runner-up in the inspirational/self-help category. He holds an MBA from Florida International University (Miami) and has completed 4 triathlons including a 70.3 Ironman, and lives in the Kansas City area with his wife, two kids, and a rescue dog. Chris shares some of his tips for overcoming adversity. We also dive deeper into what makes a successful leader and also look at what it takes to develop a strong team culture. "Culture eats strategy for breakfast."
Chris Dreyer is the CEO and Founder of Rankings.io, an SEO agency that helps elite personal injury law firms land serious injury and auto accident cases through Google's organic search results. His company has the distinction of making the Inc. 5000 list 5 years in a row. In addition to owning and operating Rankings, Chris is the Wall Street Journal and USA Today best-selling author of "Niching Up: The Narrower the Market, the Bigger the Prize." Chris's journey in legal marketing has been a saga, to say the least. A world-ranked collectible card game player in his youth, Chris began his "grown up" career with a History Education degree and landed a job out of college as a detention room supervisor. The surplus of free time in that job allowed him to develop a side hustle where he managed over 100 affiliate sites simultaneously, allowing him to turn his side-gig into a full-time one. When his time in affiliate marketing came to an end, he segued into SEO for attorneys, while also having time to become a top-ranked online poker player.
Carl Orsbourn is a global retail executive and board member whose experience spans blue-chip companies, disruptive start-up ventures (Juicer Pricing & Kitchen United), and restaurants (Alfa Co). Carl has been recognized as a power player by Nations Restaurant News and Business Insider for his thought leadership in supporting restaurants to adapt to the challenges and opportunities offered through digitization, technology, and automation. Meredith Sandland has created and driven disruptive growth at both Fortune 100 and start-up companies. She has spent a decade navigating changing consumer demands and restaurant real estate environments. Meridith is the CEO of Empower Delivery, a SaaS company that enables delivery-centric restaurants to manage end-to-end deliver transactions from brand development to logistics through one platform. We discuss the recent launch of their book Delivering the Digital Restaurant and explore the world of off-premise food and the massive disruption facing restaurants. They are savvy food industry veterans and their insight on the future of restaurants is eye-opening.
Maggie Kolkena, MSOD is the author of Today for Tomorrow: A Field Guide to Scenario Planning. She is the founder of Third Thought Consulting and brings over 25 years of expertise in providing leadership development experiences. Enabling innovation has been a strong theme in Maggie's work. Her first career was in performing arts which helped shape her entrepreneurial journey. Maggie has a distinct competence in helping leaders manage the future. There are many books out there about scenario planning, but her recently published book, Today for Tomorrow gives the framework for how to DO scenario planning. She shares some of these tips including adding trendscanning to team meetings to help look at what the future may bring. Maggie loves supporting leaders and believes that businesses can be powerful agents for positive change in the world.
In this follow-up episode, we again talk with Mike Orr. The first episode with Mike was released back in January 2020. Since then, lots has changed for Mike as he's currently enjoying a sabbatical after a 10 year run co-founding, building and successfully exiting Grapevine6 the SaaS leader in Social Selling in the Wealth Management, Banking and B2B Sales Space. In his last role at Seismic, the acquirer and an industry leader in Sales Enablement technology, he was the GM of LiveSocial. We discuss some important considerations for entrepreneurs looking at making an exit. He offers some sage advice from his experience including building the next level of management team to grow the business so it won't fail if the owners leave. You need to run the business, but the business must be able to run without you. The team of co-founders at Grapevine6 set expectations and had conversations along the way to ensure all were aligned for a successful exit. We are excited to be bringing you this follow-up episode with Mike and hope you're inspired by our conversation.
Lindsay Knowlton has a long history in golf. Her dad got her interested in the sport when she was 14 (because he needed a friend to play with!). Shortly after taking up the game (and finally getting the ball off the ground), Lindsay got the golf bug. Lindsay started playing in competitive events which earned her a full scholarship to Ohio State University where she was the captain of the team and earned All American Honours. She was a 3-year member of Canada's National Team, 3 time Ontario Champion and won a silver medal at the 2004 World Championships. After years of competitive golf, Lindsay moved into the corporate workforce realizing that she wanted to help more women "say yes" to the golf invitations that they were getting. She started Iron Lady Golf to help empower women and build their confidence out on the golf course. To date, Iron Lady Golf has taught over 20,000 women how to play golf. Lindsay is a PGA of Canada Class A Professional, Taylormade Golf Advisory Board Member, Ontario Golf Association Ambassador and most of all, passionate about building community. Lindsay's sage advice for being the best you in business and life is to "Just keep going!"
Alyson Walker is the Chief Commercial Officer at OverActive Media, a global esports company focused on building winning franchises and creating unrivaled fan experiences. Alyson has extensive experience in the sports & entertainment industries and a proven track record for success and leadership as demonstrated in her previous roles. Alyson was part of the team that brought the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Games to Canadians in her role leading digital sales and brand partnerships with Canada's Olympic Broadcast Consortium. In 2021, Alyson was named Woman of the Year by Bay Street Bull for her role in building the future of esports. We talk about the importance of bringing solutions and not just identifying problems. Alyson has a very positive attitude and shares some important lessons for business and life including: being firm but fair, do the hardest things first, and always do your due diligence.
Wylie McGraw is a former Star Pitcher, Competitive Bull Rider, and 3-Tour Combat Veteran. It was through those intense experiences that he discovered his crazy superpower of being able to expose blind spots, erupt and eradicate stress, and fully unleash the untapped potential of high achievers. He's the founder of Radical Performance Acceleration and for well over a decade now he has built his business by being the elite behind-the-scenes force providing life-altering work to powerful CEOs, Entrepreneurs, Leaders, and Public Figures, accelerating their performance both personally and professionally. We have an amazing conversation about achieving success and the attitude of success vs. failure. There are so many valuable nuggets and we can assure you that you'll get extensive takeaways from our conversation. Sit back and enjoy this ride, as it's an episode that you don't want to miss.
Jonathan Fodera is the Founder, Director, and CEO of Integrated Business Financing. He primarily works with small businesses helping owners grow and scale their businesses. His experience took him from Wall Street to the world of entrepreneurship and he shares the tales of his journey. Jonathan is highly skilled in banking, business development, entrepreneurship, and business planning. We talk about failed partnerships and what can be learned. Jonathan discusses the importance of helping others and the benefits gained by assisting without expectations.
Jacob was the 9th overall draft pick in the 2009 MLB draft by the Detroit Tigers. He spent the next 11 years playing professional baseball and spent time at the MLB level with 5 MLB teams. Upon transitioning out of baseball, Jacob founded JL Strategic Wealth. They focus solely on helping clients such as athletes, entrepreneurs, and second-generation navigate sudden wealth. We discuss Jacob's baseball experience, investing, and the importance of communication and always keeping your foot on the gas.
Since 1988, Hal Johnson has been encouraging Canadians to lead a healthy and active lifestyle under the umbrella of BodyBreak. Anybody who grew up watching television in the 80s and 90s would be familiar with both Johnson and his wife, Joanne McLeod. They recorded over 300 90-second episodes of BodyBreak. The show focuses on how exercise can be incorporated into daily life. The program was conceived by McLeod and Johnson after meeting in a gym. It was designed to be different than other fitness shows of the era: friendly, representing the sexes equally, and showing both racial and physical diversity, a result of Johnson's experiences of racism, which helped push him to create BodyBreak as a countermeasure. Johnson is a serial entrepreneur conducting speaking engagements and has their name on many different product endorsements including a recently launched branded clothing line. He shares some sage advice including the importance of time and taking advantage of it while you can. Although you can't see it by listening to the podcast, you really are able to experience Johnson's gigantic smile and positive energy and attitude.