Project Candor: Ordinary People. Unexpected Stories

Jeanne Andersen
  • 5.0 (3)
  • Personal Journals

Everyone has a story worth telling. On Project Candor, host Jeanne Andersen sits down with entrepreneurs, veterans, educators, creatives, leaders, and everyday people to explore the moments that shaped who they became.  Through thoughtful conversations and our signature Two Truths and a Lie segment, guests share authentic stories filled with unexpected turns, hard-earned lessons, humor, resilience, and hope.  Learn more at ProjectCandor.com

  1. 16h ago

    The 42-Year Voyage with Chris Donaldson | Ship’s Log #41

    “Home is where the bike is!” — Chris Donaldson  Episode Summary  In 1979 a 21-year-old Chris Donaldson pointed a café-racing Moto Guzzi out of Belfast—a city of checkpoints and bomb scares, where his family’s furniture shop got blown up on the regular—and aimed it at Australia. He never got there. The Iranian revolution closed his road east, and what was meant to be a four-month, 10,000-mile ride became a year and a half and more than 50,000 miles the “wrong” way: across the Sahara on a road bike never built for it, down through Africa to Cape Town, a hitched ride on a yacht race back to Europe, then Canada all the way down to Buenos Aires.  Forty-two years later, Chris is climbing back onto the very same bike to finally finish the ride—this time with Parkinson’s, an old friend named Liam, and a phrase he lives by: “adventure before dementia.” He and Jeanne talk about the Aboriginal walkabout that shaped him, why an unmapped, pre-GPS world made for richer adventure, and the strangers across four decades who fed him, fixed his bike, and once filled his petrol tank for free in Iran and waved off the money.  They close with Two Truths & A Lie—the Sahara, a scooter to Antarctica, and crossing Iran with a canceled visa—and with Chris’s quiet reframe of a lifetime of detours: “It wasn’t the wrong way at all.”  Guest Bio  Chris Donaldson is an adventurer and author from Belfast who set out in 1979 to ride his Moto Guzzi to Australia—and ended up going 50,000 miles the wrong way instead. His memoir of that trip, Going the Wrong Way, is an Amazon best-seller with more than 1,200 five-star reviews. Now in his sixties, he’s back on the same 1977 bike, finally pointing it toward Australia—because it’s always adventure before dementia.  Guest Links Website:  https://chrisdonaldson.world Book:  Going the Wrong Way (Amazon) — https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1838012761 LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisdonaldson1 Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/goingthewrongway.book X / Twitter:  https://twitter.com/ChrisDo69411982 YouTube:  Video on file: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAEPhkadGbc  Guest CTA If you’d like to follow Chris’s journey or read his book Going the Wrong Way, you can find everything at https://chrisdonaldson.world. Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    The 42-Year Voyage with Chris Donaldson | Ship’s Log #41

  2. 3d ago

    No Structure. No Problem, with Joanna Zhang | Ship's Log #40

    “Don’t limit yourself with your past experiences. Every challenge is happening for you, not to you. Each experience carries a life lesson, once you’ve learned it, it’s served its purpose.”  — Joanna Zhang  Episode Summary  Joanna Zhang didn’t set out to become a consultant. As a self-employed financial planner drowning in back-office work, she cycled through virtual assistant after virtual assistant and couldn’t find a model that fit — so she built one. That became The Operations Genius and what’s now recognized as the world’s first Fractional VA Service: a whole team of specialists a founder can dial up or down instead of one impossible hire. In 2024 it won a Stevie International Business Award, and in 2025 it was named Company of the Year for the Australia region.  This conversation covers the practical and the personal in equal measure. Joanna explains why “nothing is perfect, but there can be a perfect team,” how she builds a business into an asset in four layers, and why the real job of a business owner is to hold the pivotal parts and let go of the rest. She and Jeanne also get into AI as a “double-sided sword,” the case for a human-plus-AI team, and Joanna’s move to build a fractional C-suite advisory board for small businesses.  Then it turns unexpectedly tender: Joanna describes a three-day “soul awakening” four years ago that moved her from running a business on fear and desire to running it on love — a shift she traces to a single question from her mentor that left her in tears. The episode closes with Two Truths & A Lie, where Jeanne sniffs out the motorcycle story on the first guess (Joanna dropped the bike on her foot and never rode again) and the two of them land on Joanna’s own words: every challenge happens for you, not to you.  Guest Bio  Joanna Zhang is the founder of The Operations Genius and the creator of the world’s first Fractional VA Service. She started by building an operations team to rescue her own business, then opened that model up to other entrepreneurs who needed high-level support without a full-time hire. Her work has been recognized with a 2024 Stevie International Business Award and a 2025 Best in Business “Company of the Year” award for the Australia region. A global speaker, she leads with both systems and soul — helping founders scale sustainably without burning out.  Guest Links  Website:  https://operationsgenius.net  Website 2:  https://entrepreneursoulmate.com  All channels (Linktree):  https://linktr.ee/joannazhang  LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/zhang-joanna  Instagram:  @entrepreneursoulmate  —  https://www.instagram.com/entrepreneursoulmate  Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/share/1Go1CPV7nc  Email:  operationsgenius@entrepreneursoulmate.com  Guest CTA  Listeners can find all of Joanna’s channels for connection in one place: http://inktr.ee/joannazhang Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    No Structure. No Problem, with Joanna Zhang | Ship's Log #40

  3. Sep 3

    The Dog That Led Me with Dr. Andy Neillie | Ship's Log #39

    Pets don’t respond to titles; they respond to consistency. Turns out, people aren’t much different.” — Andy Neillie  Episode Summary  Dr. Andy Neillie has a doctorate, a bestselling book, and five million frequent-flyer miles spent coaching leaders across Fortune 500 firms — but he’ll be the first to tell you his real education came from a string of rescued dogs. In this conversation, Andy traces his leadership philosophy back to two early bad bosses (one with an anger problem, one with an ego problem) and forward to The Golden Principles, the book a boutique publisher coaxed out of him after hearing him tell a story about a dog named Redford rescued from a puppy mill.  Jeanne and Andy dig into what it actually takes to be “a leader worth following” — the three imperative conversations every leader must be able to have, why managers have easy conversations while leaders have hard ones, and the humbling story of the first person Andy tried to fire. Along the way they talk about “confident uncertainty,” the leader’s hour, and why the best leaders sit at the bottom of the pyramid, not the top. Andy is refreshingly candid that he’s not sure he was ever a great leader himself — just a determined student of it.  Recorded a week after Andy and his wife lost their beloved golden Sawyer, the episode carries a tenderness that sneaks up on you — and a reminder that the day you rescue a dog, you promise to love them well, even at the end. The conversation closes with a loose, funny round of Two Truths & A Lie that proves even a man this thoughtful can still keep you guessing.  Guest Bio   Dr. Andy Neillie is a bestselling author, award-winning speaker, and leadership coach who teaches in Concordia University’s MBA program and has worked with leaders across Fortune 500 companies and small businesses alike. He’s the author of The Golden Principles, a set of life and leadership lessons drawn from the rescued dogs he and his wife have welcomed home over four decades. He lives in Austin, Texas, where his “love language is fur.”  Guest Links  Website: neillieleadership.com  LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/andyneillie  Facebook: facebook.com/andy.neillie  X / Twitter: twitter.com/drneillie  YouTube: youtube.com/@andyneillie1779  eSpeakers: espeakers.com/marketplace/profile/5312  Guest CTA  Contact Andy to learn how The Three Imperative Leadership Conversations help leaders become powerful communicators and lead their teams well. Start at neillieleadership.com. Andy also offers a free 8-page ebook with worksheets on the three conversations. Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    The Dog That Led Me with Dr. Andy Neillie | Ship's Log #39

  4. Aug 31

    Normal Was Not Being There with Jim Sabellico | Ship's Log #38

    "Live in such a way that you would not be embarrassed to sell your parrot to the town gossip."   EPISODE SUMMARY  Jim Sabellico built businesses at a level most people only read about — seven figures, eight figures, the cars, the house, the bank account. Then one night he came home late to find his son's birthday cake already half gone. His six-year-old wasn't devastated. He wasn't even surprised. That was just normal. And that quiet, ordinary moment cracked something open.  In this conversation, Jim talks honestly about the gap between external success and internal life — being on the edge of divorce, being overweight, having kids who didn't really know him, all while the business looked great from the outside. He shares what it took to stop hiding from that truth, find a mentor who showed him a different picture of possibility, and start redefining what success actually meant.  Jim also shares the story behind his now-signature quote about the parrot, his daughter on the diving board, and why so many high achievers are still that little kid waiting for someone to look up and notice. Plus — Two Truths and a Lie: did Jim really learn Mandarin to expand his business in Asia?   GUEST BIO  Jim Sabellico is an entrepreneur, marketing expert, and host of the No Half Cakes podcast. After building multiple 7- and 8-figure businesses, he discovered that real success means building a life you won't regret — not just a business you're proud of. He now helps high achievers simplify their growth and align their business with their purpose.   GUEST LINKS  Website:  https://nohalfcakes.com LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimsabellico/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/jimsabellico Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/jsabellico Twitter/X:  https://x.com/JimSabellico YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/@JimSabellico TikTok:  https://www.tiktok.com/@jimsabellico Threads:  https://www.threads.net/@jimsabellico Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    Normal Was Not Being There with Jim Sabellico | Ship's Log #38

  5. Aug 27

    Where Peace Anchors with Dr. Alphonso Buie | Ship's Log #37

    “Do it right or don’t do it at all.”  - Dr. Alphonso Buie Episode Summary Becoming an interior designer “wasn’t on my bingo card,” Alphonso Buie says. Yet here he is in his 40s, building a new career in Atlanta, running Place of Peace, and loving it. The name came from his grandmother, who always told him that a home should be a place of peace—“and if it’s not, you need to figure it out.” For years, Alphonso didn’t fully understand what she meant. Then he created a home of his own that finally felt calm. Now he helps other people find that same feeling. His conversation with Jeanne moves easily from why your bedroom—not your office—should be your sanctuary to the healing that can come from letting go. Alphonso shares the story of a client who finally released child-support paperwork she had carried for 27 years. They also talk about mixing metals and colors because “anything matches if you design it right,” Peppercorn accent walls, grasscloth wallpaper, and fabric-and-furniture pilgrimages to Gayle K and High Point. Beneath the design talk runs a deeper theme: reinvention, letting go, and making room for other people to succeed. As Alphonso puts it, “There’s more than enough for us to eat.” The conversation gets candid, too. Alphonso opens up about the panic attacks and medical leave he experienced after a workplace rumor involving—of all things—a Beyoncé concert spiraled into an investigation. Then it’s time for Two Truths & A Lie. Alphonso’s three stories involve teaching in Beijing, being fired over Beyoncé, and winning a million-dollar penny-slots jackpot. One of them isn’t true. You’ll have to listen to the end to discover which one. Guest Bio Alphonso Buie is an Atlanta-based interior designer, entrepreneur, and former hospitality professor who once taught business in Beijing. His design career began unexpectedly when an accidental Instagram post grew into a thriving business. As the founder of Place of Peace, Alphonso specializes in creating “museum-style” homes that allow the art to tell the story. He also does much of the hands-on work himself. Part designer and part therapist, Alphonso helps his clients decide what to keep, what to release, and how to create a space that finally feels like home. Guest Links Website: www.placeofpeace.co LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/drbuie Instagram: @place_of_peace_llc Guest CTA Let’s figure out what we can do to get you to a Place of Peace.  Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    Where Peace Anchors with Dr. Alphonso Buie | Ship's Log #37

  6. Aug 24

    No Ramps. Just Stairs. No Way In. | With Ken Kunken | Ship's Log 36

    Guest Quote “Some men see things as they are, and say why. I dream of things that never were, and say why not.” (Originally attributed to George Bernard Shaw; frequently cited by Senator Robert Kennedy. Ken received this quote inscribed on a glass paperweight from Senator Edward Kennedy following his Senate testimony.) Episode Summary In 1970, Ken Kunken was a junior at Cornell University, studying engineering and playing lightweight football. A single tackle during a kickoff play broke his neck, leaving him paralyzed from the shoulders down. He spent the next nine months and twenty days in hospitals and rehabilitation centers. The Rusk Institute’s career guidance for someone with his level of injury: sell magazine subscriptions over the telephone. Ken couldn’t even dial a rotary phone. That pamphlet became the fuel. What happened next is one of the most quietly staggering stories you’ll hear. Ken returned to Cornell—a campus with no ramps, no curb cuts, no accessibility—being pulled up and bounced down nearly 100 steps on his first day back. He earned his engineering degree, then two master’s degrees from Cornell and Columbia, then a Juris Doctor from Hofstra Law. He mailed over 200 resumes and was rejected by everyone. He was the first quadriplegic to graduate from Cornell, the first to earn a graduate degree there, and the first to serve as an assistant district attorney on Long Island. He practiced law for more than 40 years. The DA’s office later named its annual award for outstanding prosecutors after him. Then there’s the personal side. In his fifties, more than 30 years after his injury, Ken married Anna—the woman who had originally been hired as his personal care attendant. She proposed. And it was her idea to try for children through in vitro fertilization. On January 24th, 2005, Ken watched from his wheelchair as triplets—Joey, Jimmy, and Timmy—entered the world. The Two Truths and a Lie segment lands with a twist: the story everyone assumed was the lie turned out to be the most complicated truth of all. In 2023, Ken published his memoir, “I Dream of Things That Never Were: The Ken Kunken Story.” Guest Bio Kenneth James Kunken is a Cornell-educated engineer turned attorney who practiced law in Nassau County, New York for over 40 years—as a quadriplegic, after breaking his neck in a college football game in 1970. He was the first quadriplegic to graduate from Cornell and the first to serve as an assistant district attorney on Long Island. In 2023, he published his memoir, I Dream of Things That Never Were: The Ken Kunken Story. Guest Links •       Website: https://kenkunken.com/ •       Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61566473121422 •       Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ken.kunken/ •       LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenneth-j-kunken-b4b0a9a8/ •       YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdUUa2hyQF8ubUmEARY9WKA •       Memoir on Amazon: https://a.co/d/1t1UWIN Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    No Ramps. Just Stairs. No Way In. | With Ken Kunken | Ship's Log 36

  7. Aug 20

    Too Soon to Abandon Ship with Jay Setchell | Ship's Log #35

    “Sweat dries, blood clots, and broken bones heal. Suck it up.”  — Jay Setchell  Episode Summary  Jay Setchell grew up on a working farm where nothing came free — up before sunrise mixing powdered milk to feed calves, sorting eggs by lantern for the candling plant, learning that time is money and a job left half-done isn’t done. That foundation of urgency and responsibility is the thread through everything that followed: the Marine Corps, a string of businesses, and a life that kept testing him.  And it tested him hard. Jay has died more than once, survived more than 70 surgeries, and broken his neck at 31 in a drowning accident that left him, by every medical prediction, paralyzed for good. He walked anyway — for seventeen years on braces and a cane — before three rare spinal conditions eventually put him in a power wheelchair. Through all of it he leans on faith, family, and a refusal to quit, telling Jeanne plainly that the day he decides he can’t move is the day he stops moving. It’s mind over matter, and he means it literally.  The conversation ranges from the death of small-town farm life to grief he says he’ll never fully make peace with, to the moment he teared up imagining walking again. It lands on hope: a national business going international, eight-year-old twins to raise, another book taking shape, and a note from an 88-year-old reader now planning her 95th birthday. Then the signature Two Truths & A Lie — where one of Jay’s three headlines is a whopper you won’t see coming.  Guest Bio  Jay Setchell is a Marine Corps veteran, author, and speaker who has turned a lifetime of extraordinary adversity into a message of resilience. After multiple near-death experiences, more than 70 surgeries, and a broken neck doctors said would leave him paralyzed forever, Jay refused to quit — and built businesses, coached others, and kept moving. His guiding truths are simple: “If it is to be, it is up to me,” and “It’s always too soon to quit.”  Guest Links  Website:  https://neverquittrying.com Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/JaySetchellTSWY YouTube:  Search “Jay Setchell” to find his guest podcast appearances (no dedicated channel handle on file). Guest CTA  Read Jay’s book and learn more about his story at neverquittrying.com. It’s ranked #1 in two categories on Amazon. Click here for Jay's book:  Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    Too Soon to Abandon Ship with Jay Setchell | Ship's Log #35

  8. Aug 17

    Still Making Waves at 92 with Jim Paulk | Ship's Log #34

    “I am FEARLESS, willing to take on any project and get it done. I’ve lived by this my whole life (92 years old), whether I knew it or not.” — Jim Paulk  Episode Summary  At 92, Jim Paulk has lived enough lives for several people — Naval Academy graduate, submarine engineering officer, 26-year Procter & Gamble executive, marine conservationist, and published author. In this Ship’s Log, he traces a path that started in Depression-era Brunswick, Georgia, where a teenager who loved hunting, fishing, and golf set his sights on Annapolis — and got in only after two years of trying, with a phone call that came while he was mid-round at a golf tournament.  From submarines that ran silent on battery power to a five-month campaign that banned destructive gillnets across California, Jim tells stories most people have never heard. He explains how a ragtag committee of retirees “created the perception of success,” flew the state dark-to-dark to win a ballot initiative, and helped launch a white-seabass restoration program still running today. Along the way he shares the love story behind nearly six decades with his late wife, Pat, and how a chance Cracker Barrel encounter with The Platters became a chapter in one of his books.  The episode closes with Two Truths & A Lie, where Jim reveals that the most cinematic claim of all — three days on the moon with Apollo 16 — was the lie. The truth behind it is even better: that’s astronaut Charlie Duke’s story, which Jim wrote for his book of 81 Naval Academy stories, interviewing Duke alongside his own granddaughter.  Guest Bio  Jim Paulk is a 1957 Naval Academy graduate, former submarine officer, and 26-year Procter & Gamble executive who later spent nearly a decade leading marine conservation efforts on the California coast. After retiring, he became an author, writing books that collect remarkable true stories — including one featuring 81 stories from 59 of his Naval Academy classmates. At 92, he’s still writing and still chasing the next project. He lives near Kingsland, Georgia.  Guest Links  Book — Shaking Up the World:  https://a.co/d/KyS3rh  Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/share/16FQCN7Kjg/  Guest CTA  Get a copy of Jim’s book Shaking Up the World:  https://a.co/d/KyS3rh  Who do you know who'd make a great guest for the show? Please let us know. Email: info@projectcandor.com Website:   https://www.projectcandor.com Social Media Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/ProjectCandor/ LinkedIn:     https://www.linkedin.com/company/projectcandor/ Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/project.candor/ YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@ProjectCandorPodcast

    Still Making Waves at 92 with Jim Paulk | Ship's Log #34
See All (42)

Trailer

5
out of 5
3 Ratings

About

Everyone has a story worth telling. On Project Candor, host Jeanne Andersen sits down with entrepreneurs, veterans, educators, creatives, leaders, and everyday people to explore the moments that shaped who they became.  Through thoughtful conversations and our signature Two Truths and a Lie segment, guests share authentic stories filled with unexpected turns, hard-earned lessons, humor, resilience, and hope.  Learn more at ProjectCandor.com

Information