IDD Leader

Nate Beers
  • 5.0 (3)
  • Management
  • Updated Weekly

For IDD Providers: Tired of the revolving door of staff? Join host Nate Beers as he and other industry leaders share loads of actionable advice on how you can retain and grow your DSP workforce. Just because there's a nationwide DSP workforce crisis doesn't mean that your organization has to churn through staff. Listen to innovative solutions to increase your staff retention and give your organization a competitive advantage so that at the end of the day you provide the best quality care for those you serve.More effective supervisors. Stronger workforce. Lower turnover.

  1. 3d ago

    Ep. 99 - The One-Line Definition of Culture That Sticks - (w/ Dr. Manny Rodriguez)

    If some version of this story sounds familiar, you're not alone: There's a rebranding effort — new logo, new shirts, new colors, the whole thing — that lasted about a month before nobody could find the shirts anymore and half the company forgot it ever happened. Most change efforts in most organizations follow the exact same arc: a lot of energy at the launch, and then silence six months later. Dr. Manny Rodriguez has spent his career studying exactly why that happens — and more usefully, what separates the initiatives that actually stick from the ones that quietly die. In this half of the conversation, you'll hear a one-line definition of culture blunt enough that you'll probably start using it yourself, a story about a workplace ritual that started almost by accident and ended up cutting turnover by half, and a simple reframe on retention that reveals why "they didn't leave" is a much lower bar than most leaders realize. If you've ever watched a good idea fizzle out in your own organization and wondered why, this one's for you. Learn More --Dr. Manny Rodriguez — https://www.linkedin.com/in/mannyarodriguez -- Free resource — 7 Quiet Warning Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: iddleader.com/burnout TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – The culture definition that says it all in one line 01:06 – Meet Dr. Manny Rodriguez, back for part two 02:28 – Why does change fail to stick? 05:55 – The book that changed how he thinks about "sticking" 07:39 – Big antecedents in your face 10:09 – The welcome ritual that started almost by accident 11:12 – The turnover drop nobody planned for 12:03 – The blunt definition of culture, straight from the source 13:26 – What a problem-centered culture actually sounds like 15:24 – Why "they didn't leave" is too low a bar 16:54 – The leadership habit called reciprocity 18:41 – The billboard sentence for every human services exec 21:45 – Two upcoming books, and the compass that inspired one of them 🎵 Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: LFMLKJE1CAKMAIL3 Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

  2. Aug 17

    Ep. 98 - How One Org Cut Turnover From 60% to 20% w/ Dr. Manny Rodriguez

    Turnover was sitting at 60% year after year, and Dr. Manny Rodriguez says the first question nobody was asking wasn’t “how do we fix this,” it was “why do we assume we already know why people are leaving?” You’ve probably felt this tension yourself: exit interviews that never quite tell you the truth, and a gut sense that pay alone can’t be the whole story. Manny is a behavior scientist and organizational performance consultant who’s spent decades working inside organizations to figure out exactly that. In this conversation, he walks through what actually turned a 60% turnover rate into 20% — without a single change to pay or bonus structure. He also shares something heavier: a story from outside human services about what happens when an organization’s stated priorities and its actual attention quietly drift apart, and why that gap matters just as much in a group home as it does on a factory floor. If you’ve ever suspected there’s a real answer buried under your own turnover numbers, this one’s for you. 🔗 Dr. Manny Rodriguez — https://www.linkedin.com/in/mannyarodriguez 📥 Free resource — 7 Warning Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: https://iddleader.com/burnout TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – The alarm nobody wants to hear 01:04 – The retention myth this episode debunks 02:37 – What pattern are most leaders missing? 05:24 – The accidental start to a 26-year career 10:00 – Meet the godfather of organizational behavior management 14:32 – A story that makes it all tangible 15:01 – The retention problem everyone thought they understood 16:16 – Why exit interviews rarely tell you the truth 19:19 – The stay interviews that revealed what was really happening 21:21 – The turnaround: from 60% to 20% 24:54 – What a chemical company taught him about priorities 30:30 – The alarm that changed everything 32:40 – What this means for rapidly growing organizations 35:36 – This week's action move Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: LFMLKJE1CAKMAIL3 Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

  3. Aug 10

    Ep. 97 - The Leadership Bench Every IDD Org Needs w/ Wes & Kristy Mast

    Take a full two weeks off — no email, no check-ins, phone off — and watch what happens to your organization. If that thought makes you a little uneasy, you're not alone, and Wes and Kristy Mast built their entire leadership system around exactly that discomfort. They lead a multi-state home inspection company, a world away from human services, but the problem they solved is one you'll recognize immediately: how do you build something that doesn't quietly depend on you holding it all together? In this half of the conversation, they get specific about how that actually works. You'll hear the test they run to find hidden bottlenecks before those bottlenecks find them, why they treat "replaceable" as a compliment instead of a threat, and a three-part framework for difficult conversations that keeps them from turning into either avoidance or a blowup. There's also a moment where a leader on their team was convinced her staff had stopped caring — until the data told a completely different story. If you've ever wondered whether your organization could actually thrive during a season without you, this one's for you. 🔗 Learn more about Wes and Kristy — https://www.levelup2lead.com/ 📥 Free resource — 7 Warning Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: https://iddleader.com/burnout TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – The line that reframes what leadership ROI really means 00:55 – Would your organization survive if you got hit by a bus? 02:54 – How do you turn a good leader into a leader-maker? 03:59 – The highest ROI move any leader can make 07:02 – The two-week test that reveals your real bottlenecks 10:08 – The silly bottleneck almost nobody thinks to fix 11:02 – Why "replaceable" is actually a compliment 12:30 – What tolerating incompetence really costs your culture 16:01 – The art of a difficult conversation 18:31 – The scheduling story that changed how she read her own team 22:08 – When Nate's own assumption turned out to be wrong 23:24 – The trick for making sure people actually understood you 26:14 – Why performance issues are almost never really about performance 29:10 – The legacy lesson Wes & Kristy hope their team remembers 🎵 Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: LFMLKJE1CAKMAIL3 Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

  4. Aug 3

    Ep. 96 - Why Great Leaders Stop Solving Everyone’s Problems w/ Wes & Kristy Mast

    Wes Mast used to call himself the "chief everything officer." Answering phones, doing inspections, handling marketing, driving to job sites, and eating lunch in the car — all at the same time. Somewhere in there, he was also picking up dead chickens at chicken houses just to keep the lights on. That's not where the company is now. It's a multi-state business, and the difference wasn't hiring more people — it was building an actual system for growing leaders, instead of just promoting whoever happened to be best at the job. Wes and Kristy Mast aren't leaders within human services--but they are experts at developing people and businesses that don't just run from one crisis to the next. In this conversation, they walk through the mindset shift that gets a leader out of the bottleneck, a surprisingly cheap benefit that outperforms their 401k match in staff loyalty, and the specific test they run before anyone gets promoted into leadership — because they learned the hard way that wanting the job and being ready for it aren't the same thing. If you've ever felt like every decision in your organization somehow finds its way back to your desk, this one's for you. 🔗 Learn more about Wes and Kristy — https://www.levelup2lead.com/ 📥 Free resource — 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: https://iddleader.com/burnout Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: LFMLKJE1CAKMAIL3 TIMESTAMPS 00:00 – From chicken houses to "chief everything officer" 01:17 – Meet two leaders who never planned to teach leadership 03:08 – The mindset shift that gets you out of the bottleneck 03:47 – Why most leaders assume everyone can problem-solve like they do 05:33 – Slow down to speed up 09:14 – The moment they realized handwritten notes weren't going to cut it 13:30 – The bold bet they made when COVID nearly killed the business 16:12 – Why they're not actually passionate about home inspections 19:59 – The $50 bet nobody could win 22:09 – The benefit that beats their 401k match 25:18 – Becoming the "Chief Repeating Officer" 26:30 – Why raising your hand isn't enough to get promoted 27:06 – Inside the leadership academy anyone can take 30:41 – The Peter Principle, and the promotion that backfires Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

  5. Jul 27

    Ep. 95 - What No Executive Director Is Allowed To Say (w/ FCS & AADD)

    There’s a sentence Amanda Elder says almost every executive director is thinking, but nobody actually says out loud. Amanda leads Frontier Community Services in rural Alaska. Kim Champney leads the state’s disability provider association. In this half of their conversation, they get honest about something most leadership content skips past entirely: what it actually feels like to run an organization when you don’t have all the answers, and what you say to your own team when the numbers stop adding up. You’ll hear how a housing crisis and an aging population are colliding into a math problem no provider association can out-strategize its way through. You’ll hear why one of these leaders finally stopped pretending she wasn’t overwhelmed, and the one sentence that changed how she carries it. And partway through, host Nate Beers steps out from behind the mic to share something he wasn’t planning to say either. If you’ve ever felt like you’re supposed to have it all together and don’t, this one’s for you. 🔗 Frontier Community Services — https://www.fcsonline.org/ 🔗 Alaska Association on Developmental Disabilities (AADD) — https://aaddalaska.org/ 📥 Free resource — 7 Warning Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: iddleader.com/burnout TIMESTAMPS 00:16 – What Amanda says every executive director is thinking 01:35 – The workforce problem no provider can out-strategize 02:27 – Why the numbers in Alaska "just don't add up" 04:08 – Rethinking what independence actually looks like 06:36 – Inside the scheduling model built for burned-out DSPs 09:19 – When 24/7 care isn't actually what someone needs 10:42 – The pilot project that let leaders "dream ten big dreams" 14:38 – Giving yourself permission to not have all the answers 16:34 – The moment one leader realized she'd become the problem 18:59 – The quote that changed how Amanda carries being overwhelmed 19:35 – Nate shares something he wasn't planning to say 24:49 – The sentence no executive director is allowed to say 26:19 – An old cartoon's lesson about failure and success 28:35 – What both leaders refuse to give up on Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: LFMLKJE1CAKMAIL3 Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

  6. Jul 20

    Ep. 94 - When Innovation Isn't Optional in Rural IDD Care (w/ AADD & FCS)

    If you're leading in this field, chances are you already know: there's no real playbook. No one handed you a map for the exact situation you're in right now. Amanda Elder and Kim Champney lead in rural Alaska, where that's not a metaphor — parts of their state aren't even on a road system. But the bigger truth is one you'll probably recognize: they've had to build the way forward themselves, one hard decision at a time. You'll hear what happened when Amanda got kicked, hard, by someone she supports — and why she says it's the best thing that ever happened to her leadership. You'll hear how a promotion gone wrong became the blueprint for a completely different kind of job, and the $250 benefit that came out of it. And you'll hear how direct support professionals in Alaska got something almost no one in this field has: an actual seat at the table when policy gets made. No map. No excuses. If you're figuring it out as you go, this one's for you. 🔗 Frontier Community Services — https://www.fcsonline.org/ 🔗 Alaska Association on Developmental Disabilities (AADD) — https://aaddalaska.org/ 📥 Free resource — 7 Warning Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: iddleader.com/burnout Timestamps 00:00 – Why the standard workforce playbook doesn't work here 01:13 – Meet two leaders working without a map 02:26 – What made them choose a different path 03:15 – "There's not even a road system" 03:55 – The conference that changed how Kim saw her career 08:55 – Why Amanda never wanted this job in the first place 11:11 – Giving yourself permission to innovate when the house is on fire 14:23 – The moment that changed everything about how Amanda leads 19:42 – Meet Kyle — hired for the hot dogs, not the job 22:07 – The promotion that didn't work, and the job that did 23:40 – "I think that's a cop out" 25:17 – The $250 benefit that came from one hard conversation 28:21 – How Alaska gave DSPs a real seat at the policy table 🎵 Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: LFMLKJE1CAKMAIL3 Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

  7. Jul 13

    Ep. 93 - How One Provider Cut Reports From 2 Weeks to 1 Hour w/ Daniel Caridi

    One organization used to spend three staff members and two full weeks writing their quarterly reports. Now it takes one person about an hour. That's the kind of number Daniel Caridi, co-founder of Kibu, mentions almost casually — and it's just one of several moments in this conversation that reframe what's actually possible inside a disability services organization. Daniel talks candidly about building trust as a VC-backed outsider in an industry that has every reason to be skeptical of tech companies, a mistake he's made more than once by growing faster than his product could support, and a leadership habit he's had to unlearn as his company scaled past thirty employees. He also lays out, in plain language, where AI is actually headed inside compliance work — and shares two statistics about the health outcomes of people with IDD that he believes deserve far more attention than they're getting. If you've ever felt like you personally have to touch every decision for things to go right, or if your team is buried in reporting that doesn't need to exist, this one's worth the time. 🔗 Kibu — https://kibu.com/ 📥 Free resource — 7 Warning Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: iddleader.com/burnout Timestamps 00:00 – The line Daniel wants every executive in America to hear 02:27 – How do you earn trust as an outsider in this industry? 03:16 – Why staying profitable mattered more than raising another round 04:59 – The mistake Daniel admits Kibu made more than once 06:35 – The lesson in choosing to "grow better, not bigger" 09:08 – The three types of organizations that adopt Kibu 12:06 – The report that used to take two weeks, now takes one hour 13:51 – What it means to give your team real permission to speak up 21:43 – What Daniel's had to unlearn as a leader 22:28 – The moment he realized he'd become the bottleneck 24:20 – What's coming next for Kibu 26:19 – A plain-language walkthrough of agentic AI 30:55 – Two statistics about IDD health outcomes most people haven't heard --------- 🎵 Music licensed through Soundstripe. Code: LFMLKJE1CAKMAIL3 Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

  8. Jul 6

    Ep. 92 - How Dodgeball Launched an IDD Tech Startup w/ Daniel Caridi

    A volunteer dodgeball class for five people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. That's where Daniel Caridi's company started — and somehow it turned into an EHR platform now used by over 400 disability service providers across the country. Daniel isn't a DSP. He doesn't have a family member with IDD. He stumbled into this world by accident, and that outsider's perspective is exactly what let him see something the rest of the industry had missed: if you design software around making things easier for the person actually entering the data — not the administrator pulling the report — everything downstream gets better. In this conversation, Daniel walks through how a Zoom dance class during COVID turned into a full compliance and content platform, why he thinks compliance culture has quietly pulled the sector's focus away from the people it serves, and the surprisingly simple feedback mechanics — including a running joke about confetti — that helped staff satisfaction with their own documentation jump from 18% to 81%. If you've ever wondered whether there's a better way to get your team to actually want to do their paperwork, this one's for you. 🔗 Daniel Caridi & Kibu — https://kibu.com/  📥 Free resource — 7 Warning Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Staff: iddleader.com/burnout Timestamps 00:00 – The stat that made Daniel rethink everything about EHR design 01:00 – Meet Daniel Caridi, the founder who never planned to work in this sector 02:39 – How a volunteer dodgeball class turned into a tech company 04:07 – The first provider partnership that changed everything 05:48 – The real estate major with zero software background 07:11 – The insight most of the industry never saw 08:56 – Why Daniel says the whole platform is built on listening 09:46 – "Nobody gets into this job to make Uncle Sam happy" 12:15 – Turning 30 minutes of paperwork into a few minutes of talking 16:53 – Why generic AI tools miss the mark in this sector 18:23 – Inside the dashboard that shows exactly who's behind 20:06 – The police car analogy that explains why visibility works 21:18 – The gift card habit most providers never hear about 22:48 – The stat: satisfaction jumps from 18% to 81% Send us Fan Mail Quick Question: Do your frontline supervisors sometimes unintentionally contribute to staff turnover? It happens so easily because... Most supervisors were never trained to lead.  Get The 7 Quiet Danger Signs Your Supervisors Are Burning Out Their Teams and learn how high-retention agencies spot — and fix — these issues fast. https://iddleader.com/burnout

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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
3 Ratings

About

For IDD Providers: Tired of the revolving door of staff? Join host Nate Beers as he and other industry leaders share loads of actionable advice on how you can retain and grow your DSP workforce. Just because there's a nationwide DSP workforce crisis doesn't mean that your organization has to churn through staff. Listen to innovative solutions to increase your staff retention and give your organization a competitive advantage so that at the end of the day you provide the best quality care for those you serve.More effective supervisors. Stronger workforce. Lower turnover.

Information

  • Creator
    Nate Beers
  • Years Active
    2024 - 2026
  • Episodes
    97
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 IDD Leader
  • Show Website
    IDD Leader