Unlocking Potential Through Self-Directed Challenges Ep. 9

This episode of the podcast took us to Atlanta where Aram sat down with Paul Zani, a Senior Leader at one of the World’s top 5 largest Medical Device companies, to discuss unlocking personal and professional potential. Often, we focus on the hard times to teach us the big lessons about what we’re made of, however more can be unlocked through the challenges we choose to take on and lean into. Paul shares his unique approach to unlocking potential through self-directed challenges and how he’s brought this practice into his professional world. He shares the benefits he’s seen as a result for himself, his team and his organization. Paul talks about his professional and personal journey and how pushing his limits physically landed him in a 100-mile race and at the Grand Canyon with his team running rim to rim. Finally, Paul shares with us his next big challenge and the actionable steps anyone can apply when taking on challenges.

On this episode we talk about:

• Paul’s personal and professional journey
• How he got involved in endurance running
• He shares a difficult experience he had with a bad investment
• How he proactively takes on challenges to help focus and generate better results
• Finding comfort in discomfort
• What happened when he introduced this practice into his work life
• His experience leading teams across the Grand Canyon, rim to rim.
• The way these experiences impact an organization and the way people look at themselves and what they could be
• What he learned about himself as a leader

About our guest:
Paul Zani is a Senior Leader at Beckton Dickenson, one of the top 5 largest Medical Device companies in the world. Over 27 years, he’s advanced through several different leadership roles at BD. In his current role, he’s responsible for a team of 150 people made up of sales and clinical representatives covering the U.S.

He’s a family man with four kids and a wife of 26 years. In his free time he likes to test his limits through endurance events. He’s spent time with Navy Seals completing a 50hr mini version of the SEALs famous “Hell Week”. He’s run several 100 mile foot races always finishing inside the top 10% and has won his age group. He’s taken 49 people from his organization to the Grand Canyon and helped them go from rim-to-rim; a 26 mile journey ending with a 5 mile, 6,000 foot climb out.

He believes that everyone has a unique purpose and untapped potential. He believes that proactively taking on personal and professional challenge is the way to discover our purpose and unlock more potential.

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