181: Transitioning to New Life Phases | Harvard Professor Emerita Teresa Amabile

Teresa Amabile, Professor Emerita, at Harvard Business School, is one of the world’s foremost scholars of creativity. She’s received multiple lifetime achievement awards and is one of the all-time top management scholars by citation count. She’s presented her work at companies and conferences all over the world, including Apple, IDEO, and the World Economic Forum. She is also the author of several books, including her most recent book, Retiring, which examines how people transition to retirement.

Originally educated and employed as a chemist, Teresa received her Ph.D. in psychology from Stanford University. I hope you enjoy learning from Teresa Amabile today.

In this episode we discuss the following:

• People have their best days at work, feel the most creative and productive, when they make progress on meaningful work.
• People transitioning into new life phases, for example, retirement, are at risk of not feeling productive, if their meaningful work comes to an end.
• After interviewing 120 people, Teresa found that those who successfully transition to new life phases do the following: they take action to align their identities with some sort of structure, they strive to be aware of what’s working, and then they adapt accordingly.

 

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