Seth Johnson
Some topics seem to stifle conversation. They’re hard to talk about, so little productive conversation happens. That is why businessman John Crossman is starting his new radio show on Saturday.
“It’s super exciting,” Crossman said in a phone interview. “It gives us another ability to scale things up, talk about hard subjects and really hope to reach more people.”
With his new show, Crossman said he wants to help people by giving actionable information on topics like suicide, depression and race.
“I’ve really always gravitated toward talking about hard subjects, and this is just another step towards that,” Crossman said.
The half hour show starts at 1:05 p.m. on Saturdays on The Shepherd Radio Network, which has three stations around Crossman’s home turf―Orlando, Ocala, The Villages and Gainesville.
Crossman started his career in commercial real estate, but has since branched out into other areas. He lectures, teaches and consults on topics of leadership and team building through his company Crossman Career Builders.
He also wrote the book “Career Killers, Career Builders” from a series of lectures he gave at UF.
Though Crossman never attended, UF named him an honorary alumni, and he and his wife joined the alumni association as lifelong members.
Crossman said he typically lectured on real estate topics at the UF Bergstrom Real Estate Center, but he broke the mold once and gave a speech outlining the top five ways to get fired and prevent getting fired.
It turned into his most requested lecture, and he would give it every year at UF. The series also turned into his book.
For his radio show, “The Crossman Conversation,” he said the goal isn’t just to present the information but connect people to resources and spur action on the topics.
In the first episode, mental health takes center stage. Crossman speaks with John Martinez and dives into his restart on life.
“No one dreams of the day they’re turning 39 and moving back in with their parents with their kids,” Martinez says on the show.
Crossman said the topics he deals with are more than theory. He’s dealt with clinical depression and had a close friend die by suicide.
“But what a lot of people didn’t know was that, inside, I was starting to have this experience―and I didn’t know at the time―of depression and anxiety,” Crossman says in the opening of his first episode.
The show targets 18- to 35-year-olds and those who employ them, Crossman said, though a lot of the material applies equally to people 55 years old.
To find the show live, listeners can tune into 1430 AM or 96.3 FM in Gainesville, 720 AM or 103.5 FM in Ocala and 1270 AM in Orlando. Or listen live on the Shepherd Network’s website.
The show will also air as a podcast on Apple, Spotify and Google podcasts.