Long Life Learning

About Long Life Learning

Yale SOM Executive Education talks with top scholars and experts about how to adapt and thrive throughout your career and life.

Publisher

Yale SOM Executive Education

Category

business · society & culture

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

27 Sept 2024

Latest episode

21 Sept 2026

Latest episodes

27 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   21 Sept 2026

   Bill Pullen on Coaching to Cultivate Leadership

   This week, Kavitha is joined by sought-after leadership coach Bill Pullen, who will serve as Program Director for the forthcoming Certificate in Coaching Program. Bill explains how his early career as a physical therapist launched his journey into coaching, leading to a rich set of experiences helping leaders navigate transition, transformation, and team relationships. Bill shares with Kavitha his three-part process to cultivating the coach-coachee relationship, describes how leaders can benefit from a mindset of "hosting" their employees, and discusses how to reframe times of transition as an opportunity to grow one's repertoire rather than "let go" of past strengths. Kavitha and Bill's conversation ends with powerful gratitude for two coaching mentors who exhibited fierce love, held the bar high, and accepted all sides of their coachees with grace. As Bill says regarding the paramount importance of human-to-human contact, "Our growth as human beings happens in relationship with other human beings." Transcript S3Ep11—Bill Pullen Transcript Links and Resources Information on YGELP and Yale SOM Executive Education: Yale SOM Executive Education Homepage Certificate in Professional Coaching Program Homepage Sign up for program updates Resources and Individuals Mentioned in Today's Episode: Unlocking Leadership Mind Traps by Jennifer Garvey Berger Leading in Chaos by Amy Elizabeth Fox and Nicholas Janni About Today's Guest Bill Pullen is a leadership coach and consultant with Cultivating Leadership based in Palm Springs, California. A greatly in-demand coach, consultant, teacher, and facilitator, Bill specializes in working with C-level executives and global leaders, particularly in times of transition and transformation. His clientele includes organizations and leaders across Fortune 100 companies, tech startups, government agencies, foundations, and trade associations. He is the former Director for the Institute for Transformational Leadership and former Program Director of the Leadership Coaching Program at Georgetown University.

2. 

   8 Jun 2026

   Eriona Gjinukaj on a Coachee's Testament to the Value of Professional Coaching

   Our final guest for the main portion of season three brings an indispensible perspective to conversations about the state of professional coaching today: what value does a coachee get out of the experience? Eriona Gjinukaj, longtime COO of Dompé during its growth from Milan-based pharmaceutical to global biotech firm, has plenty to share with Kavitha on the topic. Eriona emphasizes the ways in which her coach—Cameron Smoak, featured in episode 2—engaged in both team coaching and one-on-one sessions at a time when the company was rapidly expanding its markets, revenues, and team size. For company leadership, having a coach in the boardroom led to improved cooperation and innovation. For Eriona personally, it meant transitioning from a problem-solving strategy consultant to a confident, effective manager of a 15-person team. She and Kavitha discuss the value of learning to prepare for difficult conversations with role-play, finding the right balance between listening and speaking, and why it is so critical that coaches lead with questions which allow their coachees to come to the realization that they already hold the answers they need within themselves. Transcript S3Ep9—Eriona Gjinukaj Transcript Links and Resources Information on YGELP and Yale SOM Executive Education: Yale SOM Executive Education Homepage Certificate in Professional Coaching Program Homepage Sign up for program updates Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode: Dompé Homepage Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI by Yuval Noah Harari Harari on The Ezra Klein Show About Today's Guest Eriona Gjinukaj started her career as a consultant with Bain & Company in Rome, rising to the role of Principal Strategic Consultant over the course of ten years. Her areas of specialty included consumer goods, healthcare, and pharmaceuticals. In 2018 she took on the role of Chief Operating Officer for what was at the time a small, Milan-based pharmaceutical company called Dompe Farmaceutici. Over the next eight years, she and her team succeeded in growing this regional primary care company into a global biotech firm. During Eriona's tenure as COO, she oversaw a sevenfold increase in revenues, grew the company to more than 1,000 employees, honed the company's focus on targeting rare diseases, and expanded into US markets.

3. 

   1 Jun 2026

   Neha Gupta on AI-Powered Coaching

   This week, Kavitha is joined by Neha Gupta, CEO and founder of Breakthrough AI, which recently launched a practice-first coaching platform powered by role play scenarios with AI voice tools. Neha explains that part of her vision was to provide real-time quantitative and qualitative feedback on effective communication: particularly for individuals who may be highly technically skilled, but need targeted practice to improve the soft skills that win over clients. She and Kavitha discuss empathy as a cornerstone of client relations, the role of gamification for incentivizing user engagement and self-improvement, and why Neha feels it is imperative to "keep a human in the loop" when interacting with AI coaching tools. In particular, Neha emphasizes the importance of pushing back on the "quick fix" and "life hacks" culture that is rapidly developing around AI-human interactions. Instead, she encourages Kavitha to see AI coaching tools as an opportunity for engaging in unique, targeted practice to prepare employees to meet high-stakes scenarios with confidence and meaningful preparation. Transcript S3Ep8—Neha Gupta Transcript Links and Resources Information on YGELP and Yale SOM Executive Education: Yale SOM Executive Education Homepage Certificate in Professional Coaching Program Homepage Sign up for program updates Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode: Breakthrough AI Homepage (https://joinbreakthrough.ai/) The Way of Excellence by Brad Stulberg About Today's Guest Neha Gupta is the founder and CEO of Breakthrough AI, a practice-first AI coaching platform helping teams master the high-stakes conversations that shape performance, client relationships, and career growth. Combining AI role-play, behavioral science, and manager visibility, Breakthrough AI is reimagining professional development by turning communication skills from "soft skills" into measurable business capabilities. Her vision is to make personalized coaching and deliberate practice accessible at scale. Prior to founding Breakthrough AI, Neha built her career across startups, nonprofits, and global consumer brands, with experience spanning growth strategy, brand marketing, product marketing, and business development. She held leadership roles at SaverLife and previously worked at Clorox and Unilever, gaining experience in brand strategy and customer engagement at scale. She also founded BellyFire Branding, where she and her team advised mission-driven and early-stage organizations on growth strategy, positioning, and sustainable growth. Known for blending sharp strategic thinking with deep empathy for users, Neha has spent her career building brands and systems that create meaningful behavior change. The daughter of immigrants and a first-generation corporate leader, Neha's work is deeply informed by her own experience learning the unspoken rules of professional communication and leadership. That perspective fuels her belief that confidence, executive presence, and communication should not be advantages reserved for a select few. She holds an MBA from Yale School of Management and a BA from Stanford University.

Who has been a guest on Long Life Learning

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Woon Shiu Lee
• Mondo Mazwai
• Josh Geballe
• Saad Omer
• Erin Gianopoulos

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

6 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

2 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 43 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

73

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

32

Contact Long Life Learning

Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

Shows with a similar audience

• 

  Health & Veritas

• 

  The Daily

• 

  Pivot

• 

  Huberman Lab

• 

  Pod Save America

• 

  This American Life

Questions about Long Life Learning