May 20, 2026
He was 33, healthy, building a mental health company from scratch, and a routine mole check came back stage three cancer. Four years later, it came back stage four. What he built in the middle of that will change how you think about leadership, faith, and what you're actually standing on.
Buddy Clay is the founder of New Hope Institute, a multi-seven-figure mental health and addiction recovery organization, and he built it while battling cancer twice, delivering his daughter on his kitchen floor two weeks before opening his doors, and learning to lead a team through the most vulnerable season of his life. After corporate norms, health crises, and moments of pure overwhelm, he chose to stop performing and start leading from the truth of his story.
This conversation is about what it actually looks like to lead through the fire, build with faith, and come out on the other side more whole than when you went in.
If you're scaling a business while carrying something heavy, wondering if your team can survive without you, or just trying to stay anchored when nothing feels stable, this one is going to shift something in you.
In this episode, you'll learn:
- Why minimizing your first crisis almost guarantees a bigger one, and what to do differently when the storm first hits
- How a stage four cancer diagnosis forced Buddy to stop being the bottleneck and finally build a team that runs without him
- The difference between motivational speaking and real authority, and why the people you lead can always tell which one you are
- What stress does to cancer, cortisol, and your company at the same time, and why "pushing through" is often the most dangerous choice
- Why identity isn't something you find, it's something you surrender to, and how crisis strips away the performance to reveal who you actually are
- How to show up for your team when you don't have the answers, don't have the energy, and aren't sure of the outcome
- The three steps Buddy uses to lead through any crisis: authenticity, boundaries, and building the foundation before the storm arrives
Connect with Buddy Clay: Website: buddyclay.com
Follow Stephen Scoggins: Website: stephenscoggins.com Instagram & TikTok: @stephen_scoggins
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