Winners' Circle

Winners’ Circle is where award winners and volunteer judges step out from behind the recognition and tell the stories that made the win matter. Hosted by Business Intelligence Group, each episode brings together the people behind standout work in cybersecurity, customer service, sales, marketing, sustainability, AI, innovation, and business excellence. Our guests share what they built, what they learned, what changed after being recognized, and how their teams turned achievement into momentum. You will hear from winners who used recognition to build credibility, open doors, strengthen team morale, earn customer trust, and create new growth opportunities. You will also hear from judges who have reviewed countless nominations and know what separates a strong story from a forgettable one. These are not acceptance speeches. They are honest conversations with the people doing the work. Winners talk about the campaigns, products, decisions, setbacks, breakthroughs

Winners' Circle is a business podcast hosted by Unknown Host, with 100 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Unknown Host hosts Winners' Circle, a business show with 100 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  Winners' Circle

  Amanda McGuckin Hager on True Dialog, RCS, SMS, and the Future of Messaging

  Aug 20, 202623 min

  Amanda McGuckin Hager is helping brands use business texting as a high-value, high-trust marketing and customer engagement channel. At True Dialog, Amanda works with colleges, universities, retailers, financial services companies, and brands across many industries to connect with people through SMS, RCS, CRM integrations, APIs, and emerging AI-driven messaging tools. True Dialog recently won a SAMI Award for its work in SMS and business messaging. In this episode, Russ and Amanda discuss why SMS has become such a powerful channel. Unlike email, text messaging lives next to messages from family, friends, and the people consumers trust most. That makes the channel incredibly valuable, but only when brands respect the opt-in, keep lists clean, and send messages people actually want. The conversation explores RCS, or Rich Communication Services, and how it is turning messaging into a more interactive, branded, visual experience. Amanda explains how True Dialog built a no-code RCS visual composer so marketing and growth teams can create rich messages without relying on developers or API work. Russ and Amanda also discuss lessons from analyzing more than a billion brand text messages, why customers who opt in usually want to hear from brands, how True Opt Out uses AI-powered sentiment detection to catch non-standard opt-out requests, and why list hygiene is both a compliance issue and a customer experience issue. The episode also covers MCPs, AI agents, TrueConnect, verified sender, first-party data, RCS engagement, publisher sponsorship opportunities, compliance, global opt-out expectations, and why now is the time for marketers to start building their owned messaging lists. Topics Covered: [00:00] Welcome and intro, Amanda McGuckin Hager and True Dialog [00:58] What True Dialog does as a business texting platform [01:30] RCS and the rise of richer messaging [01:51] No-code RCS visual composer for marketers [03:12] Building RCS messages like rich email experiences [04:00] Lessons from more than a billion brand text messages [04:45] Why opted-in consumers usually want brand messages [05:16] MCPs, APIs, AI, and vibe-coded messaging apps [06:19] SMS as a critical notification and communication channel [07:03] True Opt Out and AI-powered opt-out detection [08:46] Sentiment analysis, compliance, and list hygiene [09:46] Why opt-outs are part of healthy marketing [10:28] TrueConnect and using phone numbers as unique identifiers [11:38] RCS as a richer alternative to crowded email channels [12:17] Engagement rates for RCS versus plain SMS [13:23] Early customer results and RCS adoption [14:00] Verified sender and branded RCS messages [15:31] Why verification helps keep the channel clean [16:41] Carrier blocking, TCPA pressure, and opt-out compliance [17:34] Where messaging goes after RCS [18:35] Publishers, first-party lists, and sponsored alerts [20:14] SMS open rates, click-through rates, and return on ad spend [21:26] Advice for marketers getting started with text messaging [22:30] Final thoughts on RCS, SMS, AI, and the future of messaging

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  Winners' Circle

  Roger Brown on Allstate Protection Plans, Staples, and Device Trade-In Sustainability

  Aug 18, 202629 min

  Roger Brown is helping consumers give phones, laptops, tablets, and other electronics a second life. At Allstate Protection Plans, Roger works at the intersection of device protection, trade-ins, reuse, repair, and sustainability. Allstate Protection Plans recently won a 2026 Sustainability Award for its program with Staples, which makes it easier for customers to trade in old devices and instantly receive value through a Staples gift card. In this episode, Russ and Roger discuss why so many consumers say they want to do the right thing with old devices, yet only a fraction of phones make it into reuse programs. Roger explains that the gap usually comes down to three things: convenience, trust, and incentive. People need the process to be easy, they need to know their personal data will be protected, and they need a clear financial reason to act. The conversation explores how Allstate Protection Plans and Staples redesigned the trade-in experience around customer choice. Customers can use a traditional mail-in process or choose an instant option that provides value up front through a Staples gift card, backed by a short-term credit card hold. Roger explains why offering both options matters, because customer preferences were nearly split between instant value and the traditional process. Russ and Roger also discuss why trade-ins and protection plans are becoming more connected, how device leasing and anytime upgrade programs are changing consumer expectations, why right to repair is a tailwind, and how reuse can extend a device’s life across multiple owners. At its core, this is a conversation about building a sustainability program that works because it also works for customers, retailers, and the business. Roger’s message is clear: the best circular economy programs remove friction, create trust, reward action, and make reuse part of the normal buying experience. Topics Covered: [00:01] Welcome and intro, Roger Brown and Allstate Protection Plans [00:38] What Allstate Protection Plans does [01:14] Why protection plans matter as devices get more expensive [02:11] Why consumers do not always trade in old devices [03:55] How protection plans and trade-ins became connected [05:35] Leasing, financing, and the future of device ownership [07:25] Why trade-in programs were clunky for so long [09:16] Data security, trust, and device wiping [10:29] How phone trade-ins became simpler [11:19] Building the Staples trade-in experience [12:50] Instant value versus traditional mail-in trade-ins [14:10] Staples gift cards and customer convenience [15:01] Using credit card holds to reduce trade-in risk [16:13] Launching nationwide and across Canada [16:55] Measuring trade-ins as part of new device sales [17:46] What surprised the team after launch [18:53] Sustainability and device chain of custody [19:10] How traded-in devices get a second life [20:53] Right to repair as a tailwind [21:30] Extending device life across multiple owners [23:09] Closing the gap between idle devices and reused devices [24:19] E-waste, affordability, and economic value [25:52] Why right to repair may expand in North America [27:08] Making sustainability part of retail culture [28:20] Final thoughts on Staples, customers, and sustainability

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  Winners' Circle

  Chris Shyrock on Atlantic.Net, Support Transformation, and Cloud Customer Trust

  Aug 13, 202628 min

  Chris Shyrock is helping Atlantic.Net strengthen customer support in one of the most demanding environments in technology: cloud infrastructure and data centers. As Director of Support Services, Chris leads the team responsible for supporting customers who rely on Atlantic.Net for cloud services, colocation, dedicated hosting, managed services, and infrastructure they cannot afford to have fail. In this episode, Russ and Chris explore how Atlantic.Net transformed its support organization while also completing a major data center migration with no customer impacts attributed to the move. Chris explains how the company improved queue ownership, daily governance, shift handoffs, escalation paths, and customer communication while maintaining 24/7/365 service for clients in high-stakes industries like healthcare. They also discuss what it takes to turn technically strong support staff into customer-ready communicators. Chris shares how he reviewed calls and emails, re-onboarded the team, trained people to own the call, and encouraged support professionals to de-escalate concerns, explain issues clearly, and meet customers at their level. Along the way, Chris discusses Trustpilot reviews, customer feedback, team empowerment, regulated customer environments, AI cloud infrastructure, NVIDIA GPU hosting, continuous improvement, and why support is often the trust layer between a technology provider and the customers who depend on it. Topics Covered: [00:01] Welcome and intro, Chris Shyrock, Atlantic.Net , and the Excellence in Customer Service Award win [00:45] Atlantic.Net ’s long history in cloud and infrastructure services [01:23] What Atlantic.Net provides for cloud, colocation, dedicated services, and managed infrastructure [02:58] Why Atlantic.Net focused on customer service transformation [04:00] Teaching technical support teams to communicate with customers more clearly [05:21] Aligning staffing, mindset, and shift coverage [06:30] Queue ownership and daily governance in support operations [07:26] Managing customer change, technology change, and internal change at the same time [08:45] Training the team to own the call and de-escalate urgent customer issues [09:25] Why practice matters in customer support training [11:00] Getting support teams comfortable with doing the harder thing for customers [12:10] Why leaders need to be reachable during high-stakes incidents [13:40] Transforming the support team during a major data center migration [14:46] How the support organization contributed to a no-impact migration [16:10] How major operational events can elevate a team [16:44] The hardest habit to change in a long-running support organization [17:44] Using Trustpilot reviews as evidence of support quality [19:34] Why moving review scores is hard and meaningful [20:00] Turning customer problems into trust-building opportunities [22:36] Upskilling support teams for new infrastructure and AI workloads [23:32] Advice for technical support leaders with inconsistent customer experience [27:22] Final thoughts on Atlantic.Net ’s transformation and continuous improvement

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  Winners' Circle

  Selva Murali on AMD, AI Chips, and the Future of Semiconductor Design

  Aug 13, 202640 min

  Selva Murali is helping design the chips that power AI factories, data centers, laptops, and the connected devices shaping modern life. As a staff-level engineer at AMD, Selva works on leading-edge semiconductor technology nodes, circuit design, physical implementation, and the use of AI and machine learning to improve chip performance, power, and area. In this episode, Russ and Selva discuss what it really takes to build faster, smaller, more power-efficient chips in an AI-driven world. Selva explains how physical design sits between architecture and circuits, why power is becoming one of the biggest bottlenecks for AI infrastructure, and why data center scale computing depends as much on heat, energy, and layout as it does on raw performance. The conversation explores how machine learning is changing semiconductor design by running thousands of layout iterations faster than a human team could manually test. Selva explains how ML can improve timing, reduce gates, save engineering time, and help teams make better decisions with data. Russ and Selva also discuss the differences between Samsung and AMD, the shift from mechanical to semiconductor-driven industries like automotive, the growing importance of chip packaging, and why the semiconductor field needs more young engineers willing to work at the intersection of hardware, software, and AI. As one of BIG’s all-star judges, Selva also shares how judging innovation, cybersecurity, AI, and customer service nominations has changed the way he thinks about customers, internal teams, and the real-world impact of technology. Topics Covered: [00:01] Welcome and intro, Selva Murali, AMD, and BIG judging [00:58] Selva’s work on leading-edge semiconductor nodes [01:30] AI and ML for circuit design [02:23] Where digital meets physical in chip design [03:05] Front-end design versus back-end physical implementation [04:38] Making chips faster, smaller, and more power efficient [05:08] Explaining semiconductor design in simple terms [05:34] How chips became part of nearly everything [06:31] Comparing Samsung and AMD design environments [10:10] The real AI infrastructure bottleneck [10:34] Why power may be the biggest limit for data centers [11:57] Heat, cooling, and data center scale [12:20] What happens when power, performance, or area targets are missed [13:47] Why chip layout is harder today than 10 years ago [15:52] Foundry rules and avoiding unusable silicon [16:27] Using machine learning to automate physical design [16:44] Testing thousands of chip layout iterations [19:08] How ML reduced manual work from days to minutes [21:32] Building trust in ML-driven design with data [22:52] Power, performance, and area tradeoffs [23:23] Why CPUs and GPUs prioritize different design goals [25:13] What it takes to move a chip from design to shipping [27:00] Packaging, boards, skilled labor, and semiconductor bottlenecks [28:52] What makes an innovation submission truly strong [30:24] What semiconductor growth feels like inside engineering teams [31:40] Training the next generation of chip designers [35:51] Why students are showing more interest in circuit design [36:46] How judging customer service changed Selva’s perspective [39:11] Treating internal customers with more care and urgency [40:48] Final thoughts on judging and the BIG community

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  Winners' Circle

  Chris Schueler on Cyderes, Meridian, and Proactive Cyber Defense

  Aug 11, 202630 min

  Chris Schueler is helping large, complex organizations rethink cybersecurity for an AI-accelerated threat environment. At Cyderes, Chris leads a pure-play cybersecurity company focused on managed security, transformation, operations, identity, non-human identity, and proactive threat defense. Cyderes recently won a Fortress Cybersecurity Award, with Chris recognized as an executive leadership winner. In this episode, Russ and Chris discuss how his early military experience building one of the first Army security operations centers still shapes how he builds security teams today. Chris explains why trust, buy-in, autonomy, and execution matter when security teams need authority to act quickly across complex environments. The conversation also explores Cyderes’ Meridian platform and how it connects traditional cyber threat data with identity and non-human identity signals that are often siloed across technology stacks. Chris explains why the future of security depends not just on reacting faster, but on stitching together context so organizations can prevent threats before they spread. Russ and Chris also discuss why the old mindset of “not if, but when” can become an excuse. Chris argues that security leaders need to keep turning over every stone, especially around identity, access, blast radius, and non-human users. As AI compresses the time between vulnerability discovery and exploitation, security operations need to move from hours to minutes. The episode also covers agentic SOCs, zero trust, third-party risk, patching, unpatchable vulnerabilities, privileged access, dynamic recertification, budget pressure, AI-driven efficiency, and why thought leadership may now be the real barrier to building better cybersecurity systems. Topics Covered: [00:00] Welcome and intro, Chris Schueler and Cyderes [01:00] What Cyderes does as a pure-play cybersecurity company [01:30] Meridian and connecting threat data with identity signals [02:11] Chris’s Army background and building an early SOC [02:27] Bringing network operations and incident response together [03:30] Why trust is earned in drops and lost in buckets [05:15] Opportunity spotting in military versus enterprise environments [05:54] Public sector speed, private sector speed, and different stakes [08:52] Building analyst-recognized cybersecurity companies [09:05] Staying aligned with customers and the direction of the market [11:27] How Chris thinks about future-looking strategy [13:36] Why “not if, but when” can become an excuse [14:16] Turning over every stone again and again [15:30] Why identity is becoming central again [16:27] AI adversaries and compressed attack timelines [16:54] Breakout time dropping from 61 minutes to 25 minutes [17:52] What SOCs need to do in minutes [18:30] Reducing blast radius before attacks happen [20:10] Stitching telemetry together across silos [20:40] Moving toward pre-crime security [21:12] Massive patches, zero days, and proactive defense [21:53] Why some vulnerabilities may be unpatchable [23:00] Third-party breaches and shared business risk [23:50] Why patching still matters [24:42] Access rights, copy-paste permissions, and just-in-time controls [25:37] Using existing controls better instead of adding more tools [25:54] Questions CISOs should be asking now [26:19] Budget pressure during AI investment cycles [27:30] Data exposure fears around frontier models [28:44] Using AI to do more, not just spend less [29:22] Why building is easier when vision is clear [30:02] Final thoughts on service, leadership, and cybersecurity’s future

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