What does it really look like to build a career from nothing, and what happens when you finally get there?

In this episode of CEOs & ABCs, Joe Cannon, SVP at Hyperice, shares the full arc of his journey, from graduating into a brutal job market with no clear path, to piecing together freelance work, sleeping in his car, and chasing any opportunity that could get him in the room.

Joe opens up about the uncertainty and pressure of those early years, applying to hundreds of jobs with little response, and the resilience it took to keep going when nothing seemed to be working. That period didn’t just shape his career, it shaped how he sees people, opportunity, and leadership today.

Now at Hyperice, Joe sits at the center of one of the fastest-growing brands in wellness, helping drive partnerships, cultural moments, and global expansion. From the Super Bowl to SXSW, he’s been part of building a brand that’s redefining how everyday people think about recovery, performance, and health.

But this conversation goes far beyond business.

Joe reflects on what it means to navigate a high-performance career while raising two young children and the constant tension between ambition and presence. He shares the realities of modern fatherhood, the guilt, the trade-offs, and the small intentional choices that matter most.

At the heart of it all is a simple but powerful truth: your kids don’t care about your job title, your deals, or your wins. They just want you.

This is a conversation about hustle, perspective, identity, and redefining success, not just by what you build, but by who you show up as along the way.

In This Episode

• From post-college rejection to breaking into the industry
• Sleeping in his car and saying yes to any opportunity
• How Craigslist hustles led to career-defining moments
• Building Hyperice through partnerships and cultural activations
• The explosion of the wellness industry and consumer behavior
• Lessons from early struggle that shaped his leadership style
• The reality of balancing a demanding career with two young kids
• Why being present matters more than being perfect

Key Takeaways

• Hustle creates opportunity, but relationships sustain it
• Early career struggles build resilience and perspective
• You don’t need a perfect path, just momentum
• Success at work means less if you’re absent at home
• Kids don’t care about your title, they care about your presence
• Being a parent is a constant evolution, not a perfect game
• Curiosity and humility are superpowers in business
• The best leaders remember what it felt like to be overlooked

About the Guest
Joe Cannon is the Senior Vice President at Hyperice, a global leader in recovery and wellness technology. He has played a key role in scaling the brand through major partnerships, cultural activations, and experiences across events like the Super Bowl, The Masters, and SXSW. Before Hyperice, Joe built his career through unconventional paths, freelance work, startups, and sheer persistence. Joe brings a unique perspective to leadership, growth, and opportunity.

What happens when a high-achieving career is working on paper, but no longer feels aligned in real life?

In this episode of CEOs and ABCs, Kevin sits down with Charisse Hughes, a senior marketing and growth executive who has led at some of the world’s most iconic consumer brands, including Estée Lauder, Pandora, Kellogg, and Kellanova. But this conversation goes far beyond titles and career highlights.

Charisse opens up about being raised by a single mother and grandmother who instilled in her the values of education, independence, faith, and community. She reflects on the years she spent on the fast track, getting promoted, traveling the world, and building an impressive career, while realizing that work had quietly become her entire identity.

She shares the pivotal decision to step away from a successful role without another one lined up, the fear that came with it, and the clarity she found on the other side. Kevin and Charisse also talk about leadership, ambition, bonus motherhood, and why presence is not something anyone gives you. It is something you have to choose.

This is a conversation about success, identity, reinvention, and building a life that reflects what truly matters.

In this episode

• How Charisse’s mother and grandmother shaped her values around education, independence, faith, and service

• Why starting in finance gave her an edge as a marketer and business leader

• What she learned from moving into beauty, luxury, and global brand leadership

• The hidden cost of life on the fast track and how achievement became her whole story

• Why she left a successful role without another job lined up and what that season taught her

• How Pandora and Kellogg helped shape her leadership and confidence at the highest levels

• What becoming a bonus mom taught her about love, values, and showing up for family

• Why clarity, balance, and presence are not given to us, they must be chosen

Key takeaways

• Success on paper is not always the same thing as success in alignment with your values

• Career momentum can become addictive if you do not stop to ask what it is costing you

• Taking a step back is not always career suicide. Sometimes it is the clearest move forward

• A background in finance can make marketers stronger, more commercial, and more influential leaders

• Leadership is not just about functional excellence. It is about adaptability, conviction, calm, and the ability to influence others

• Children reflect back what matters most and can keep us grounded in what is real

• You do not need to stay locked into a path just because it once made sense

• Nobody is going to hand you the clarity or balance you want. You have to choose it

Guest Links/Show Notes

• Virtuosi League (⁠https://virtuosileague.com/⁠),
• Equal Justice Initiative (⁠https://eji.org/⁠)
• Howard University (⁠https://giving.howard.edu/ways-give⁠)

About Charisse Hughes

Charisse Hughes is a senior marketing and growth executive who has held leadership roles at some of the world’s most recognized consumer brands, including Estée Lauder, Pandora, Kellogg, and Kellanova. She has served as Chief Marketing Officer, led major brand and business transformations, sat on the board of Crocs, and was named CMO of the Year by Consumer Goods Technology in 2022. Known for combining commercial rigor with bold leadership, Charisse brings a powerful perspective on career growth, reinvention, and leading with purpose.

• (00:00:00) - A single boss's decision to leave her job
• (00:00:28) - CEO and ABCs: Parenting Wins and Fails
• (00:01:49) - How Did Your Mother's Success Shape You?
• (00:06:59) - The Influencers of Luxury
• (00:11:00) - How CMOs Can Connect with CFOs
• (00:13:31) - The Making of Estee Lauder
• (00:16:42) - Ex-Estee Lauder CEO on The Cult of Productivity
• (00:21:37) - If You Had Advice For Your Younger Self
• (00:25:11) - What's Motherhood Like For Bonus Parents?
• (00:29:24) - As a Bonus Mother
• (00:31:45) - What values did you want to help instill in your children as
• (00:35:54) - Pandora's Take a Leave of Absence
• (00:41:35) - Have You Changed Pandora's Direction?
• (00:44:59) - What Does a Leader Need to Know to Lead Today?
• (00:47:09) - What are some ways to develop your leadership skills?
• (00:49:36) - In the Elevator With Kellogg
• (00:53:29) - Sharice Jones on Choosing the Right Balance

In this episode of CEOs & ABCs, Kevin sits down with Tariq Hassan, former Chief Marketing Officer of McDonald’s, to unpack a belief that shaped his entire leadership philosophy: you cannot get to incredible outcomes when fear of failure is baked into the system.

Tariq shares how growing up dyslexic quietly wired him for fear and overcompensation, and how that same “paralysis” shows up inside companies as the ideas people never share, the risks teams never take, and the opportunities no one even knows they missed. From Petco turnarounds to leading at one of the most iconic brands in the world, he explains why psychological safety is not a soft concept. It is a performance advantage.

You will hear the simple cultural shift Tariq used to make risk-taking real: celebrating “Amazing Almosts”, the best failures of the quarter, so teams could learn, pivot, and build confidence without losing accountability. Kevin and Tariq also bring this conversation home, exploring parenting, long-distance seasons, two high-performing careers under one roof, and the daily practices that help a child keep talking, especially when the stakes get higher.

This is a conversation about fear, trust, standards, and the environments we create, at work and at home, so people feel safe enough to grow.

In this episode:

• Why fear of failure becomes invisible, but still drives behavior in high-performing cultures

• What psychological safety looks like in real meetings, not in theory

• How to build “risk with guardrails” instead of chaos or blame

• The “Amazing Almosts” practice, and why celebrating the right failures changes everything

• Repairing after you miss it as a leader, and why it only feels awkward the first time

• The parenting parallel: when to catch, when to let them fall, and how trust is built

• Long-distance parenting, presence vs quantity, and choosing the moments that matter

• Why this mindset matters even more in an AI-driven world of continuous learning

Key takeaways:

• You can’t talk a team into psychological safety. You have to prove it through actions and rituals.

• Fear shows up most in what doesn’t get said: the risks avoided, the debates not had, the ideas withheld.

• The goal is not celebrating constant failure. The goal is learning fast, staying accountable, and building confidence to take smart swings.

• Cultural change feels unnatural at first. Keep going until it becomes normal, and the language becomes part of how the team operates.

• At home, psychological safety is often measured by one thing: they keep talking.

• Presence is less about quantity and more about intentional moments your family remembers.

• The best leaders repair quickly, build truth-tellers around them, and stay open to feedback even when it stings.

About Tariq Hassan:
Tariq Hassan is a senior marketing leader who most recently served as Chief Marketing Officer at McDonald’s. Prior to McDonald’s, he held executive leadership roles at Petco, Bank of America, and Hewlett-Packard, building a career across some of the world’s most recognizable brands. Known for blending performance with humanity, Tariq focuses on the cultural conditions that unlock high-performing teams, especially psychological safety, trust, and the ability to take smart risks without fear.

• (00:00:00) - Introduction
• (00:02:00) - Creating Psychological Safety in Organisation
• (00:11:42) - Cultural Implications of Fear in Organizations
• (00:21:35) - Celebrating Failures: The Amazing Almosts
• (00:31:35) - Balancing Risk and Responsibility in Leadership
• (00:33:08) - Navigating Parenting Challenges
• (00:37:49) - Creating Psychological Safety at Home
• (00:42:47) - Balancing Ambitious Careers
• (00:48:24) - Maintaining Connection During Absence

In this episode of CEOs & ABCs, Kevin Rice sits down with Seth Goldman, the founder of Honest Tea, which he built from a home kitchen concept into a category-defining brand and sold to The Coca-Cola Company in 2011. Today, Seth is the CEO and co-founder of Just Ice Tea, co-founder of PLNT Burger, Chair of the Board at Beyond Meat, and Chair of Tony’s Mission Lock at Tony’s Chocolonely.

Seth shares what it really takes to build and rebuild an iconic company, including why Honest Tea was ahead of its time, what it felt like to watch it eventually be discontinued, and how that unexpected ending created the opportunity to launch Just Ice Tea into a market with a massive vacuum. He also breaks down the difference experience makes in entrepreneurship, from having no relationships early on to now being able to scale faster because trust and credibility are already established.

The conversation goes behind the scenes of leadership and parenting. Seth opens up about launching Honest Tea while raising three young sons, including a major family health scare that happened the same day as his first Whole Foods presentation, and the reality that balance is not always possible. He shares how parenting shaped his leadership philosophy, why you cannot manage people the same way, and how focusing on outcomes over process can unlock performance in teams.

If you are building something big while trying to show up fully at home, this episode is both grounding and practical.

• How Seth went from a mission-driven mutual fund career to founding Honest Tea with a breakthrough brand idea

• What it was like building a startup while navigating a major family medical crisis

• Why Seth believes balance is not always real, and how he stayed grounded anyway

• The story behind launching Just Ice Tea after Honest Tea was discontinued, and how to spot opportunity inside loss

• How parenting shaped Seth’s leadership style, including managing people based on how they learn and operate

• Why purpose-driven businesses must scale to create meaningful impact

• Startups and family life rarely move in neat seasons, life and business happen at the same time

• Your relationships and reputation become your unfair advantage the second time you build

• Great leaders focus on the outcome, then adapt the path based on how people work best

• Purpose is not just values, it is a strategy that strengthens teams, trust, and resilience

• The real legacy is not the exit, it is the impact you build and the family culture you leave behind

Seth Goldman is the co-founder and CEO of Just Ice Tea and the founder of Honest Tea, which he grew into a leading organic beverage brand and sold to The Coca-Cola Company in 2011. He is Chair of the Board at Beyond Meat, co-founder of PLNT Burger, Chair of Tony’s Mission Lock at Tony’s Chocolonely, and serves on multiple mission-driven boards focused on ethical sourcing and sustainable food systems. Seth is widely known for building purpose-led consumer brands that scale without compromising values, with a leadership philosophy grounded in transparency, long-term stewardship, and real-world impact.

• (00:00:00) - Seth Goldman's Current Ventures and Personal Life
• (00:04:35) - The Birth of Honest Tea
• (00:07:30) - Emotional Journey of Selling Honest Tea
• (00:10:08) - Transitioning to Just Iced Tea
• (00:12:54) - Family Life and Balancing Work
• (00:15:48) - Teaching Resilience to Children
• (00:18:44) - Health Perspectives on Plant-Based Products
• (00:25:44) - Teaching Resilience Through Adversity
• (00:27:41) - Navigating Learning Differences: A Personal Journey
• (00:30:26) - Leadership Lessons: Supporting Employees
• (00:32:28) - Building Relationships for Business Success
• (00:34:49) - Scaling Impact: A Vision for Change
• (00:38:00) - Avoiding Past Pitfalls in Business
• (00:40:00) - Evolving Parenting Styles: Lessons Learned
• (00:42:06) - From Authority to Friendship: Evolving Relationships
• (00:43:43) - Board Roles and Intentions

• (00:00:00) - Introduction
• (00:05:53) - Transitioning to Consulting: Embracing New Opportunities
• (00:14:19) - Love in the Workplace: A Personal Story
• (00:17:38) - Navigating Early Parenthood and Career
• (00:21:56) - Setting Boundaries Between Work and Family
• (00:26:39) - Being Present: The Key to Parenting
• (00:36:52) - Personal Responsibility in Career Management

Anncy Rowe has spent decades building iconic beauty brands, but this conversation goes far beyond titles and milestones. In this episode of CEOs & ABCs, Kevin Rice sits down with the Chief Commercial Officer of Rodan + Fields to explore what it really looks like to grow into leadership over time while navigating identity, motherhood, ambition, and legacy.

Anncy reflects on rising through the ranks at L’Oréal without ever chasing a specific end goal, driven instead by passion for the work itself. She opens up about navigating imposter syndrome at every new level, being the only one in the room who looked like her, and learning to trust that she belonged. From loving the craft of brand building to leading a major omni-channel transformation at Rodan + Fields, Anncy shares how purpose and confidence are built through experience, not certainty.

The conversation also moves deeply into parenthood and seasons of life. Anncy shares the emotional reality of red-eye flights for birthdays her son would never remember, the wake-up call of burnout, and the moment of dropping her daughter off at college that felt like an “extraction.” She reflects on what it means to redefine yourself as your children grow more independent, asking the powerful question, “Who are you when you’re no longer caring for someone?”

This is an honest, thoughtful episode about ambition without a blueprint, leading with care, modeling behavior for teams and children, and preparing for the next chapter with intention. It’s a conversation for anyone navigating growth, change, and the evolving definition of success.

In This Episode You'll Learn

• Why Anncy never chased titles but still rose to the C-suite

• How passion builds confidence faster than career planning

• What imposter syndrome really looks like at senior levels

• Why over-sacrificing can lead to burnout

• How to rethink presence in parenting and leadership

• What changes emotionally when your child leaves for college

• How to model boundaries and behavior for teams and family

• Why legacy is about how you make people feel

Top Takeaways

• Confidence is built through doing, not knowing

• Imposter syndrome often signals growth, not failure

• You don’t need a 10-year plan to build a meaningful career

• Over-functioning eventually comes at a cost

• Children learn more from what we model than what we say

• Leadership and parenting require the same self-awareness

• Preparing for the next life chapter is an act of leadership

• Legacy is rooted in care, kindness, and impact

About Anncy Rowe

Anncy Rowe is a seasoned beauty industry executive and currently serves as Chief Commercial Officer at Rodan + Fields, where she is helping lead the brand through a major omni-channel transformation. She previously held senior leadership roles at L’Oréal, including on the Maybelline brand, and served as CMO of StriVectin. A passionate advocate for helping women feel confident at every stage of life, Anncy is also a mother of two and a leader deeply committed to purpose-driven growth, culture, and legacy.

Chapters

00:00 Loving the work without chasing the title
02:31 Rising through the ranks at L’Oréal
06:02 Confidence, tenacity, and imposter syndrome
10:07 Passion, purpose, and finding your industry
13:53 Leading Rodan + Fields through omni-channel change
18:56 Immigration, upbringing, and resilience
25:17 Over-sacrificing, burnout, and red-eye wake-up calls
27:35 Self-care, faith, and filling your cup
32:51 Modeling boundaries for teams
36:29 Dropping a child off at college
39:43 Redefining identity and...

• (00:00:00) - The Secret to Success in Career
• (00:00:48) - CEO and ABC: Real Stories From Executives
• (00:01:56) - What gave you the confidence to climb the ladder at L'O
• (00:06:48) - Have You Got Imposter Syndrome?
• (00:10:16) - Passion and purpose in the makeup industry
• (00:13:18) - Ulta Beauty's Big Change to Direct-to-Consumer
• (00:18:36) - The Importance of Stories From Your Parents
• (00:21:05) - Married Parents Talk About The Sacrifice They Make
• (00:27:26) - The Secret to Taking Care of Yourself
• (00:29:41) - The Secret to a Happy Holidays
• (00:33:27) - The Importance of Modeling
• (00:35:50) - Have You Cried When Your Daughter Goes To College?
• (00:39:33) - The Next Chapter in Your Life
• (00:42:35) - Tim Ferriss on His Legacy
• (00:44:45) - CEO and ABCs: Ansi and Kevin