Third Act with Liz Tinkham

Thank you for following Third Act this season. We're taking a break for the summer, and will return this Fall with a new roster of inspiring guests pursuing passion and purpose in their third acts.

On today’s show, Liz talks with Shari Greco Reiches – The Life Maximizer. Shari’s adoptive father gave her a great piece of advice early in her life: “You can have anything you want, but you can’t have everything you want.”  Shari has taken that advice and used it as the foundation for how she advises her clients as the founder of Rappaport Reiches Capital Management. Her firm’s motto: “How can we help you maximize your return on life?”, builds on that early advice by helping clients figure out their core values and then balancing their wants against those values and their financial portfolio.  While Shari is still actively involved in running her firm, she is creating her own third act within the firm, distilling all the valuable lessons she’s learned and giving them back through a blog, book, and podcast.

Introducing Voices of Athena, a new podcast on Athena Radio. Priscilla Brenenstuhl interviews Athena members on how they achieved their professional success. Today, she interviews Liz's friend and Puppet CEO Yvonne Wassenaar on her interesting journey through birth, death, and the things that happen in between.

At the end of his first act, Jerry Palmer found himself out of shape, divorced, and without friends. Deciding to regain his lifelong connection to athletics was the turning point as he began training for an Ironman. After solidifying extreme sports as his passion, Jerry set his sights towards his most ambitious feat yet: crossing the entirety of the United States on foot.  Follow along as Jerry shares his life lessons, from a career of consulting with Accenture to the innate kindness of approaching a stranger. Traversing on foot gave him front-row seats to the turmoil of the country as he witnessed the prevalent inequalities still plaguing our society. Through it all, Jerry’s admirable mental fortitude encouraged him to persist, despite the challenges in his way.

On today's show, Liz talks with David Harry Stewart — The Super Ageist. David is the founder and face of Ageist, a new media company and agency that champions the vitality and influence of the modern 50-plus. David's second act was as a professional photographer, but he eventually realized that there was something just not right in photographing 20- and 30-year-olds for products targeting people over 50. So he and a friend launched media agency Ageist to represent the mindset and aspirations that drive this influential demographic. Today, he is a passionate champion and leading authority for those in the modern 50-plus age group.

In part two of a two-part series, Erica Duignan Minnihan—founder of 1000 Angels—continues her master class on the fundamentals of Venture Investing. In this podcast, she talks about the different stages of venture investing and how to think about the investment amounts and vehicles, term sheets, valuations, due diligence, and returns needed at each stage. Whether you’re a founder seeking funding or an investor who wants to add early-stage private equity to her portfolio, this informative podcast will get you up to speed on understanding the exciting opportunities in startup investing and how it can launch your own third act.

In this encore episode, we revisit our conversation with Jack Henneman, whose love of history began with his father—a medieval French history professor at the University of Iowa. With a firm belief that history needs to be accessible and interesting, Jack aims to depoliticize American history through his podcast, “The History of Americans”. In this episode, Jack shares why private school was harder than Princeton and why history should not be cast onto the stage of good vs. evil. Most significantly, Jack highlights the importance of making history fun!

Today’s guest, Cheryle Jackson, describes her life as a series of ‘firsts’ — as the only woman and woman of color in corporate hallways and boardrooms. As the first female president and CEO of the Chicago Urban League, she led the 100+-year-old organization through transformational change.  As the first woman and African American to serve in the role of communications director for the Governor of Illinois, she survived the tumultuous administration of Rod Blagojevich, and was asked by Barack Obama to run for his Senate seat. She’s gone onto several C-suite and Board positions, but the double whammy of divorce and breast cancer in 2012 caused her to step back and allow herself to think about herself.  In 2018, she founded Grit and Grace, The Movement, a women’s empowerment organization to help advance the ambition of women through coaching, conferences, community, and content designed to inspire and empower. Join Liz for her conversation with the extraordinary Cheryle Jackson.

On today’s show, Liz talks to Geraldine Keogh, the Bien Lady. Geraldine is in the chocolate business, but she didn’t start in that business—nor in food at all. As a young mom, Geraldine ran a preschool primarily so she had a place for her own kids. After she grew and sold that business, she teamed up with local friends as part of a dessert catering business. Within a year, she was running the business with her daughter and looking for ways to expand. They started to produce chocolate truffle centerpieces referred to as Biens Chocolate Centerpieces—a big hit among her local customers. But, as Geraldine describes it, both she and her daughter have ADD and the ideas on what to do with Biens just kept growing. Today, Geraldine and her daughter have built a national dropship business for Biens, as well as continuing their local work with the Dessert Ladies. And she’s not done yet with her expansion plans. If you’ve ever thought about running your own business, you will love Geraldine’s story of determination and ambition.

On today’s show, Liz talks with Laura Stachel—the light of maternal health. What do you do when you’re born with an abundance of intellectual curiosity? If you’re Liz’s guest Laura Stachel, you become a pianist, OB/GYN, and doctorate in public health. She also founded of a non-profit that provides critical light to African hospitals and clinics so women can safely deliver babies.  And, Laura’s not done yet. Her nonprofit, We Care Solar, is working to light every birth in 5 countries in Africa with clean solar power. That’s in addition to the over 9 million mothers and newborns they’ve already served with their solar suitcases. Impressed? Keep listening for this extraordinary interview with Laura Stachel.

On today’s show, Liz talks with Mike Harmon — the distressed lecturer. Mike graduated from college with dreams of going to Wall Street, but it was 1991 and a recession caused brought the party to an abrupt halt. He landed at a bank working on distressed loans, finding his calling in the distressed asset business.  But after 20+ years in the business, his “turkey thermometer popped” (as he puts it) – he was burned out, not seeing his family, and needed to move on. Sound familiar?  Luckily, a happiness lecture on the Okinawans at his Harvard Business School reunion prompted him to find his “ikigai” — or reason for waking up in the morning. He discovered a passion for public radio and teaching in that search. Today, he is a happy part-time lecturer at Stanford Business School. Join Liz as she talks to Mike about how he made the journey to his third act.

Today Liz talks with Kerry Hannon – the Consummate Writer. Kerry’s a longtime journalist and author, having written for Forbes, Money, US News and World Report, and USA Today, and having published more than seven books. Most interesting for this show, though, is that Kerry began writing about second acts in the early naughts long before any other publications. She’s an expert in issues related to the future of the workplace, particularly for our aging population. On today’s show, she talks about where the workplace is headed, her new book In Control at 50+ How to Succeed in the New World of Work, and why dogs are very good teachers.

On this week’s episode, Liz talks with Susan Lyne – The Career Legend. Susan’s resume reads like the magazine cover story of someone who you want to be…. from her early days dropping out of UC Berkeley, to her work on a magazine with Francis Ford Coppola, to greenlighting Grey’s Anatomy and Desperate Housewives while at ABC, to being the CEO at Gilt Group (one of the first online shopping and lifestyle websites featuring designer clothing).  But, she says the legacy she leaves for her daughters will be what she’s doing today… founding and running Built By Girls Ventures, an early-stage fund backing female founders. And, to top all that off, she’s a Forbes 50 over 50 Impact winner! Join Liz for this discussion with the fabulous Susan Lyne.

Third Act crossed a big milestone — 60 episodes and still going strong with fabulous guests! On today’s show, Liz talks with Third Act producers Lexie Banks and Evelyn Wong about what they’ve learned from the show’s guests, their favorite episodes and who their dream third act guest would be. Liz also talks about what she’s learned from guests Bradley Schurmann, Michael Clinton, Lori Trawinski, Stela Lupushor, Chip Conley, and Paolo Gaudiano about aging and, of course, what’s happening with her third act!

On this episode, Liz talks with Marcella Johnson – Founder of the Comfort Cub. Marcella’s story is a bit different than the show’s usual guests in that Marcella didn’t follow the path of school, big career, and then pretiring into her passion project. Her third act was literally born the day her fourth child, George, was born in 1999. George was born with a rare disease and died the day he was born. Marcella left the hospital the next day without a baby in her arms, and over the course of the next few weeks developed symptoms similar to a heart attack – achy arms and heart, but nothing a doctor could diagnose. A few weeks after George’s death, she picked up a planter and instantly felt better having the weight in her arms. She went on to learn that moms all over the world who had lost children were substituting weighted objects to ease the ache created by the lack of a baby. With this insight, she created a teddy bear — now known as the Comfort Cub — which she began to distribute to hospice centers and hospitals throughout her hometown of San Diego. Today, The Comfort Cub is a non-profit organization that donates thousands of Comfort Cubs to moms all over as well as to anyone seeking therapeutic comfort. Join Liz for this very special episode as she talks to Marcella about her third and likely forever act to honor the legacy of her son, George.

Today Liz talks with Paolo Gaudiano -   The DEI Data Scientist.   How does a guy who studied Aerospace Engineering connect the dots to lead the field of simulation modeling to determine Inclusion? As a college student, Paolo Gaudiano took a class on the cognitive functions of the brain which led to a lifelong academic and professional interest in neural networks, AI and statistical modeling.  While working for Icosystems doing simulation modeling, Paolo had the opportunity to look at why inner city kids in Baltimore dropped out of high school.  The experience of working with these kids made Paolo realize how privileged he was as a white, cisgender male.  He subsequently devoted his life’s work to DEI, specifically looking at the issues of inclusion, which he believes most companies don’t understand.  Today he combines academic research, with both a nonprofit and for profit company to advance the mission of improving DEI in companies.

In part one of a two-part series, Erica Duignan Minnihan—founder of 1000 Angels—begins her master class on the fundamentals of Venture Investing. This series covers the basics you need to know to build a solid portfolio as an angel investor.   Dive into this primer on startup valuations, and what to look for in due diligence materials like investor decks, financial models, and the company’s cap table. Whether you’re a founder seeking funding or an investor who wants to add early-stage private equity to her portfolio, this informative podcast will get you up to speed on understanding the exciting opportunities in startup investing and how it can launch your own third act.

In this episode, Liz talks with Frances West - The Wisdom Whisperer. Frances left Taiwan to go to college in the United States and was fortunate to land a job with IBM after graduation. She quickly moved up the ranks, working in both the US and China. Wanting a change, she applied for a job at IBM Research thinking she would be working in their Availability Center—before finding out that it was actually in their Accessibility Center. In her role, she helped IBM lead the transformation of products and services to be accessible to all types of people.  In her third act, Frances continues to advance her knowledge and interest in accessibility by advising and investing in startups focused on accessibility technologies. She’s also the author of a book, Authentic Inclusion, where she talks about how diversity is at the core of disruptive innovation. 

In this episode, Liz talks with Shelli Brunswick – The Space Advocate. Shelli Brunswick spent 29 years in the Air Force focusing on what she calls the “on Earth” jobs for the space program. She wasn’t quite sure what she would do when she retired, but her vast network paid off: she founded the Space Foundation, a nonprofit advocacy organization offering a gateway to education, information, and collaboration for space exploration and space-inspired industries that define the global space ecosystem, where she is now COO.  On today’s show, Shelli shares her infectious enthusiasm for the booming career opportunities in space as well as why 2022 is going to be the best year yet for space exploration.

On this episode of Third Act, Liz talks with Stela Lupushor — The Work Reframer. Stela is a career HR professional who interestingly got her start in the field by implementing SAP HR because, as she says, “she was the girl on the project”. She parlayed those HR skills into bigger jobs across PwC, IBM, TIAA-Creff, and finally retiring from Fidelity in 2016. But it was a NY Times article on the unemployment of women ages 50-65 that launched her into her third act. As an HR professional, she saw how the systems and processes were unintentionally designed to prevent these women from getting jobs. So she decided to do something about it.  Today, she is what she calls the Chief Reframer in several roles — first as the head of a nonprofit (Amazing Community) that helps women get back to work, second as a lecturer on this topic at NYU, and third as the head of her own consulting company that helps companies design age-friendly workplaces. Join Liz’s lively conversation with Stela as she offers great advice on how to work through ageism in the workplace, whether you are an employer or woman seeking work.