Gap to Gig is the podcast for dads who want to crush it at work and still show up at home.
Each week, host Michael Jacobs talks with dads, founders, career experts, and creators about what it really takes to balance meaningful work and active fatherhood. From navigating career transitions and side hustles to staying present for hockey games and bedtime stories, Gap to Gig helps you create a life that feels steady, fulfilling, and built to last.
Whether you’re a stay-at-home dad reentering the workforce, a working dad craving more purpose, or a creator building your own path, you’ll find stories and systems to help you move forward with confidence.
Expect honest conversations about:
Work-life balance that actually lasts
Career change and meaningful work without losing yourself
Parenting and productivity that fit real life
Fatherhood, identity, and growth in the modern world
Mindset and systems that keep both business and family running smoothly
No fluff. No hustle-culture noise. Just real stories, practical tools, and genuine conversations about being a dad who wants both: meaningful work and a meaningful life.
If you’ve ever felt pulled between your career ambitions and your kids’ soccer schedules, you’re not alone. Each episode offers ideas you can apply right away, whether that’s a way to structure your week, handle burnout, or rethink what success really means for you and your family.
The show blends personal storytelling, expert insights, and actionable takeaways from guests who are building careers, companies, and creative projects that fit their lives, not the other way around.
Recent episodes feature:
Entrepreneurs who’ve built businesses around their families
Career coaches helping dads find work that fits their values
Creatives balancing passion projects with parenting
Productivity pros teaching how to reclaim time and focus
Everyday dads sharing their journeys from burnout to balance
If you’re ready to rethink success, build balance that lasts, and create space for what matters most, this podcast is for you.
Gap to Gig: Helping dads build the life they’re working for.
New episodes weekly on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, and wherever you listen.
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David Shar on Passion, Burnout, and Work-Life Balance for Working Dads
Episode 25
Tuesday, April 28, 2026 • Duration 53:30
Why does work that once energized you start to feel like something you can’t turn off?
Dr. David Shar studies what happens when people fall out of love with their work and why that shift often happens long before anyone notices. His research shows that for working dads, the challenge is not just workload. It is how work connects to identity, purpose, and the life you are trying to build at home.
This conversation reframes passion in a way most people never consider. Not all passion is healthy. Some of it quietly creates burnout, tension, and distance from the people who matter most.
David shares how to:
• Understand the difference between healthy passion and the kind that leads to burnout
• Recognize when guilt at home or at work is a signal of misalignment 
• Identify when your work is integrated into your identity versus competing with it
• Shift from obsessive work habits to a more sustainable, balanced approach
• Influence culture and energy at work even without a leadership title
• Align your impact at work with who you are as a parent
• Create meaningful work without sacrificing presence at home
We talk about fatherhood, identity, and work-life balance that actually holds up under real pressure. Not less ambition, but better alignment between who you are, how you work, and how you show up at home.
Alan Lazaros on Meaningful Work, Work-Life Balance, and Living from the Inside Out
Episode 24
Tuesday, April 21, 2026 • Duration 39:50
What if the biggest gap between your work and your life is not your schedule, but how you define success?
Alan Lazaros built what most people would call a successful life. High income, fast growth, and clear upward momentum. But after a near-fatal car accident at 26, he was forced to confront a harder question. Was any of it actually meaningful?
For working dads trying to balance ambition, work-life balance, and presence at home, this conversation reframes what meaningful work really means and how easily success can drift away from what matters most.
Alan shares how to:
• Shift from chasing external success to building a life from the inside out
• Recognize when your goals are driven by validation instead of values
• Avoid building a life that looks successful but feels empty
• Focus on long-term growth instead of short-term approval
• Close the gap between your intentions and your daily actions
• Redefine meaningful work in a way that actually fits your life
This conversation is not about abandoning ambition. It's about aiming it in the right direction so your work, your values, and your life are moving together instead of pulling you apart.
David Marcus on Fatherhood, Emotional Presence, and Raising Kids in a Stressed World
Episode 23
Tuesday, April 14, 2026 • Duration 53:59
Why do so many working dads feel disconnected from their kids even when they are physically present?
Modern fatherhood comes with pressures that did not exist a generation ago. Constant work demands, two-income households, packed schedules, and technology that never turns off have pushed many families into reactive mode. And when stress builds, connection is often the first thing to break.
Dr. David Marcus, a clinical psychologist with over 40 years of experience working with families under stress, explains what is really happening beneath those moments of disconnection and how dads can show up differently.
David shares how to:
• Become a calming, steady presence when your child is overwhelmed
• Understand why kids fear their emotions will push parents away 
• Avoid reactive parenting patterns that get passed down unconsciously
• Help children develop an emotional language instead of acting out
• Respond in a way that allows your child to open up rather than shut down
• Handle conflict without damaging trust or connection
• Repair moments when you lose your temper and rebuild respect
• Stay emotionally present even when work stress is high
• Recognize when you are “filled up” and shifting into reaction mode
• Create a home environment where kids feel safe expressing themselves
This conversation is for working dads trying to balance fatherhood, work, and emotional presence in a world that rarely slows down.
Scott Maderer on Aligning Work, Fatherhood, and What Matters Most
Episode 22
Tuesday, April 7, 2026 • Duration 51:30
What happens when you realize the career you built doesn’t actually align with the life you want?
Scott Maderer built a successful career in finance, checked the right boxes, and did the things ambitious professionals are supposed to do. But eventually he realized something important was missing. The work that once looked impressive on paper no longer felt connected to his values, his purpose, or the kind of impact he wanted to make.
That realization led Scott to step away from corporate finance and build a new path helping leaders and entrepreneurs align their work with what truly matters.
Scott shares how to:
Recognize when external success no longer matches internal fulfillment
Navigate the uncertainty that comes with major career shifts
Design work that supports family, relationships, and long term priorities
Avoid chasing titles, money, or status that don't bring real satisfaction
Loren Silverman on Reclaiming Your Identity Beyond Productivity
Episode 21
Tuesday, March 31, 2026 • Duration 43:31
What happens when your self-worth quietly becomes tied to your output?
After nearly two decades leading digital transformation work for major brands, Loren Silverman realized that success on paper didn’t equal fulfillment in real life. The titles, the grind, the constant responsibility all looked right from the outside. But underneath, something felt off.
That realization didn’t lead to a dramatic overnight reinvention. It led to something much simpler and far more powerful: pause, awareness, and small, repeatable shifts.
Today, Loren helps high-responsibility professionals untangle identity from productivity, align actions with values, and build healthier boundaries without losing ambition.
Loren shares how to:
• Recognize when your reaction is bigger than the moment
• Separate your identity from your professional output
• Align daily actions with personal values
• Protect energy, not just time
• Use small, consistent changes instead of heroic life overhauls
• Practice active listening to improve presence at home
• Create boundaries that actually hold under pressure
• Reframe slowing down as strength rather than weakness
• Catch burnout before it becomes depletion
• Pause long enough to make better decisions
This conversation is thoughtful, grounded, and practical for any dad who feels stretched between responsibility and presence, and wants a steadier, more intentional way forward.
Julia Toothacre on Redefining Meaningful Work Through Life’s Seasons
Episode 20
Tuesday, March 24, 2026 • Duration 50:29
What does meaningful work actually look like once you become a parent?
For many professionals, the answer changes. Priorities shift. Energy changes. The things that once felt exciting or important can suddenly feel disconnected from the life you want to build.
Career strategist Julia Toothacre works with high-performing professionals who look successful on paper but quietly feel stuck, burned out, or misaligned. Her work focuses on helping people take ownership of their careers while navigating the pressures of family, ambition, and changing priorities.
Julia explains why meaningful work is often misunderstood and why the answer usually isn’t a dramatic career overhaul. More often, it comes from understanding the season of life you are in and aligning your choices with what matters most right now.
Julia shares how to:
• Understand why meaningful work means different things to different people
• Recognize when feeling “stuck” is coming from internal pressure rather than external reality
• Think about career risk differently once kids enter the picture
• Identify when a job is temporarily demanding versus fundamentally misaligned
• Manage career transitions without making emotional or reactive decisions
• Spot the early warning signs of burnout before they escalate
Alex Tuck on Timeboxing Your Way to Meaningful Work and Present Fatherhood
Episode 19
Tuesday, March 17, 2026 • Duration 51:53
What if the key to balance is not working less, but working with intention?
Alex Tuck runs a remote-first consulting firm from a farm in Vermont while raising four young kids with his wife. His approach is simple but disciplined: block the time, protect the priorities, and design work to fit life, not the other way around.
From quarterly OKRs to daily timeboxing, Alex has built both a company and a family rhythm around clarity and structure. But beneath the systems is something deeper. A belief that work matters. Health matters. Relationships matter. And none of them should consume the others.
Alex shares how to:
• Use timeboxing to reduce overwhelm and increase focus
• Break big goals into daily commitments that actually get done
• Protect personal time with the same intensity as client work
• Build a remote culture that values flexibility over utilization
• Model boundaries so your team feels safe taking time off
• Create phone free zones that increase connection at home
• Adjust work rhythms when kids, travel, or life get chaotic
• Invite your kids into decision making so they feel ownership
• Replace guilt with intentional tradeoffs
• Design meaningful work that supports, not competes with, family
This conversation is practical, honest, and full of real world examples for dads trying to build something worthwhile without losing the people they are building it for.
Merry Korn on Turning Professional Loss into Purpose-Driven Work
Episode 18
Tuesday, March 10, 2026 • Duration 46:17
What happens when the job you thought would carry you to the finish line disappears overnight?
Two months into what she believed would be her final role, Merry Korn was let go. She was a single parent with two teenagers, college tuition looming, and no clear path forward. The fear was real. The pressure was immediate. Staying in bed was not an option.
What followed was not an overnight success story. It was a series of hard conversations, informational interviews, small courageous steps, and a refusal to surrender. From those early survival decisions, Merry went on to found and scale a for-profit social enterprise that employed more than 1,300 people across 30 states, prioritizing jobs for people with severe disabilities, disabled veterans, and individuals living in the most impoverished communities.
Merry shares how to:
Move forward when fear feels paralyzing
Use informational interviews as a career and business growth strategy
Align work with purpose instead of contorting yourself to fit the wrong environment
Build a mission-driven company that attracts high-quality talent
Create simple rituals that protect presence at home
Lead with values when rebuilding after a professional setback
Turn survival mode into meaningful, scalable impact
Tony Berardo on Redefining Success Around Time, Health, and Fatherhood
Episode 17
Tuesday, March 3, 2026 • Duration 01:03:06
What happens when health scares, job loss, and family tragedy collide all at once?
After having part of his lung removed, being laid off during the pandemic, and losing his father-in-law the same day he was discharged from the hospital, Tony Berardo was forced to confront a hard truth: work was taking up too much of the wrong space in his life.
Instead of chasing security, status, and a bigger paycheck, Tony rebuilt his life around something far more valuable: time.
Today, he’s the founder of Human Dad, a content creator, and an entrepreneur who prioritizes presence over prestige. He makes less money than he once did, but he has more clarity, more intention, and more time with his daughter.
Tony shares how to:
• Reevaluate success after health scares and job loss
• Shift from “work-life balance” to protecting time as your most valuable asset
• Build a side hustle before making the leap into entrepreneurship
• Lower financial stress by living below your means
• Model discipline, boundaries, and healthy habits for your kids
• Choose presence over prestige
Tony’s perspective is raw, direct, and deeply practical. For any dad questioning whether the grind is worth it, this conversation offers a clear reminder: your time is the real currency.
Brad Leeman on Leading at Home Through Presence, Play, and Preparation
Episode 16
Tuesday, February 24, 2026 • Duration 01:03:29
What does leadership look like when the mission is your family and the stakes are emotional, not tactical?
Brad Leeman is a retired U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel, combat aviator, and F-35 test pilot who spent nearly two decades leading in environments where preparation, clarity, and execution were non-negotiable. After transitioning out of the military, Brad became an entrepreneur and founder of SwingSesh, a company built around a simple belief: parents should not be spectators in their kids’ lives.
This conversation explores how elite performance principles translate and sometimes fail to translate into fatherhood. Brad shares why presence matters, how small daily rituals create connection, and why modeling behavior shapes a child’s inner voice far more than lectures ever could.
Brad walks through how he and his wife intentionally design family rhythms, why play is a serious leadership skill, and how dads can rethink fitness, work, and ambition.
Brad shares how to:
Build daily rituals that anchor presence and connection with kids
Use play as a tool for bonding, modeling health, and emotional regulation
Shape a child’s inner monologue through actions, not instructions
Recognize when to lead and when to follow inside a partnership
Rethink comfort, resilience, and decision making during hard seasons
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