Curious Minds at Work

Is there a certain type of leader whose management approach gets more from their teams? Gartner, a research and advisory firm, recently conducted a study of thousands of managers and employees. They wanted to find out if there were certain types of management practices that had the greatest impact on employee growth and development. In this interview, Sari Wilde, co-author of the book, The Connector Manager: Why Some Leaders Built Exceptional Talent – and Others Don’t, shares their findings. Sari explains that what the researchers learned surprised them: not only did one management type have an outsize impact, but it was also a type they never would have predicted. They named it the Connector Manager. According to Sari, this type of leader not only provides targeted feedback and coaching, but also readily “connects employees to others, either within the team, or across the organization, who might be better suited to provide the right kind of coaching and development.” Sari also shares key characteristics of Connector Managers, as well as some of the tools they use in their work. For example, she describes one tool managers can use to assess employee motivation. It’s one Sari found so insightful that she used it with her team. Today, it frames how they do their work: “[The team’s] top five motivators were things like growth, achievement, transparency, inclusion, so that has changed the way that I communicate, the way I run my team meetings.” Sari is a Managing Vice President at Gartner where she leads global teams focused on creating research and products to improve outcomes. She’s been studying organizations for more than 15 years, advising executives at hundreds of Fortune 500 companies on their leadership and talent management practices. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links The Fearless Organization by Amy Edmondson Sari Levine Wilde Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for Curious Minds on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

Does college have a greater impact on the lives we lead than we ever imagined? Is college still a tool for upward mobility or is the system engineered to advance the wealthy? Paul Tough, author of the book, The Years that Matter Most: How College Makes or Breaks Us, answers this question and more. For example, he explains differences in how many rich and poor students choose their colleges and how those choices impact lifetime earnings. He also discusses how financial aid really works: “College wants us to think that financial aid is this very linear process where colleges decide who they want to admit, and then they give them the aid that they need and it’s a very straightforward process….But that’s not true.” Though he discusses how the system of higher education is broken, he also offers insights on how to fix it. He explains that a hundred years ago, the U.S. government saw how technological advances made it necessary for young people to have a high school education to compete for jobs. They tackled that problem by creating a system of free, public high schools. Paul sees parallels today: “Clearly a high school degree is not enough to compete in the current labor marketplace….Kids need more education. But we have not … pulled together to say well we’re going to solve that problem. Instead we’re saying to these young people, you’re on your own.” Paul is a contributing writer to New York Times Magazine where he’s written extensively about parenting, education, poverty, and politics. His writing has also appeared in the New Yorker, the Atlantic, Esquire, and on the op-ed page of the New York Times. Paul’s previous books include: Helping Children Succeed: What Works and Why, and How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links @paultough Raj Chetty and article about him: The Economist Who Would Fix the American Dream Caroline Hoxby and articles on her work: The College Board Tried a Simple, Cheap, Research-Backed Way to Push Low-Income Kids into Better Colleges. It Didn’t Work and The Nudges That Didn’t Work Anthony A. Jack and his book: The Privileged Poor: How Elite Colleges are Failing Disadvantaged Students Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by Caroline Criado Perez David Laude and his interventions to support college students at the University of Texas The High School Movement in the U.S. Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for the Curious Minds podcast on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

What if advice we get to “follow your passion” is more complicated that it seems? Steve Magness is co-author with Brad Stulberg of the book, The Passion Paradox: A Guide to Going All In, Finding Success, and Discovering the Benefits of an Unbalanced Life. Steve coaches some of the world’s top distance runners and has propelled numerous athletes to Olympic trials, world championship teams, and the Olympics. He has been a featured expert in Runner’s World and the New York Times. When faced with the choice of what to do with our lives, we’re often told, “follow your passion.” Steve believes this advice can be overwhelming, incomplete, and, ultimately, defeating. That’s why he and Brad decided to study the topic. They wanted to demystify it. Along the way, they learned that passion not only fuels big accomplishments, but it can also be problematic. They share that, “passion and addiction are close cousins.” In this interview, Steve shares ways to develop our passion and insights on how failure can play a role in our search. He also gives tips on how to sustain our passion for the long haul by doing things like focusing on what we can control, rather than what our competitors are doing. He contends, “We can’t control what other people do and where that bar is. But what we can control is making the comparison point a previous version of yourself.” The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net Episode Links @stevemagness and https://www.scienceofrunning.com/ @BStulberg and https://www.bradstulberg.com/ Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein Instead of “Finding Your Passion,” Try Developing It, Stanford Scholars Say Les Passions de l’Ame: On Obsessive and Harmonious Passion Shalane Flanagan Obey the 24-Hour Rule Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for Curious Minds on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

What if our IQ scores reveal far less about intelligence and reasoning than we think? We often assume that people with high IQ scores are more intelligent. We may even believe they’re able to think more critically and make wiser decisions. But is that true? In this interview, David Robson, author of the book, The Intelligence Trap: Why Smart People Make Dumb Mistakes, reveals that people with high IQ scores can actually be more prone to mental mistakes and that they don’t necessarily make wise decisions. He compares their intelligence to a car with a fast engine and tremendous power that, without “…a GPS, and good steering and reliable brakes…could actually be quite dangerous. It can drive you in the wrong direction. It can drive you off a cliff. It could just drive you around in circles.” David explains the origins and limitations of IQ testing, particularly how it overlooks other forms of intelligence, like creative, practical, and cultural intelligence. He also shares the evolutionary dynamics that explain poor decision making, as well as the advantages of measuring people’s ability to engage in wise reasoning: “The wise reasoning scores were actually very good at predicting how happy [people] were, how likely they were to suffer from depression, whether they were satisfied with the people around them – you know all of these really important things in their life.” David is an award-winning science journalist who specializes in psychology, neuroscience, and medicine. He was a features editor at New Scientist and is currently a senior journalist at BBC Future. His writing has also appeared in The Guardian, The Sydney Morning Herald, and The Atlantic. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links @d_a_robson davidrobson.me Kary Mullis Lewis Terman Flynn effect Robert Sternberg Cultural Intelligence and Soon Ang Keith Stanovich and dysrationalia Daniel Kahneman Dan Kahan Curse of knowledge Farsighted by Steven Johnson Igor Grossmann and wise reasoning Philip E.Tetlock and superforecasting Silvia Mamede Adam Galinsky Richard Feynman Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for Curious Minds on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

How is our lack of social empathy affecting millions of people in surprising, unexpected ways? To maintain and deepen our relationships with other individuals, we need empathy. To craft policies that effectively serve entire groups, we need what Elizabeth Segal, author of the book, Social Empathy: The Art of Understanding Others, refers to as social empathy. Yet for most of us, social empathy is a blind spot, one with often devastating consequences when it comes to public policies in areas like, education, healthcare, and politics. For example, Elizabeth points to Hurricane Katrina as an example of how a lack of social empathy delayed fixing the collapsed levees: “The public policies were never put in place because the people who had the power to make those policies didn’t live in those neighborhoods, particularly the poorest neighborhoods.” To counter this blind spot, Elizabeth explains that we need to understand what social empathy is and how it operates. In this interview, she shares how our biology and experiences influence and shape this capacity, along with what we can do to cultivate it. For example, she describes a teaching experience that sparked social empathy in her students: “They started to learn in a small way that life is different when you’re poor than when you’re not.” Elizabeth is Professor of Social Work at Arizona State University. She’s also author of the book, Social Welfare Policy and Social Programs: A Values Perspective, and co-author of Assessing Empathy. The Team You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links Outgroup Bias The Power of Human by Adam Waytz The War for Kindness by Jamil Zaki How Toyota Turns Workers into Problem Solvers by Sarah Jane Johnston Social Empathy Center Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for the Curious Minds Podcast on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

What if you design a product or service that prevents certain people from using it? These kinds of mismatches are everywhere: a computer mouse that works only for the right-handed; credit-card-only payment systems that exclude those without credit; and even game controllers for gamers who can’t use their hands. Inclusive design advocate, Kat Holmes, explains, “The design of the controller is an indicator of who gaming is for and who it is not for…to think that one little piece of plastic shaped in a particular way is a gateway requirement to who can and can’t participate…starts to become a really absurd idea.” When this kind of exclusionary design scales, it can shape entire industries and markets. And for many designers, these outcomes are unintended. That's why Kat Holmes, UX designer and author of the book Mismatch: How Inclusion Shapes Design, is a champion of inclusive design. In fact, she's developed a framework for design teams, so that more people can participate. Kat argues that inclusive design should be a priority, not an afterthought. In addition to all the ways it helps people, it’s often been a smart business decision. To that end, Kat shares all the ways design teams can make this an ongoing part of the creative process: “…whether it’s the team…the work environment, the tools…the assumptions, all of these things are…opportunities for either balancing towards exclusion or towards inclusion.” Kat served as Principal Director of Inclusive Design at Microsoft and in 2017 was named one of Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business. Today she serves as Director of User Experience Design at Google. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links @katholmes The Laws of Simplicity by John Maeda World Health Organization on disabilities John Porter, UX Designer at Microsoft Susan Goltsman and the Emergence of Inclusive Design A Brief History of Closed Captioning (it all started with Julia Child) Pellogrino Turri and The Technology of Compassion Vint Cerf Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for the Curious Minds podcast on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

What’s the cost when women are left out of healthcare, education, and public policy data? Data drives decision making in critical areas. Yet, in most cases, as Caroline Criado Perez, author of the book, Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men, points out, women are simply absent from the data. Why is this? Because we operate in a world where deeply ingrained cultural biases treat men as the data default and women as the exception. Caroline explains, “If we look at politics . . . news media . . . films, women represent about 20 percent of the people we see and hear about. . . we are taking in that information and thinking that this is what the world looks like. . . it creates this sense in our heads that we don’t have to collect data on women.” This data gap leads to bad decisions with devastating consequences. What’s even more shocking is that these gaps are hidden in plain sight, in places where it would seem like gender couldn’t possibly matter. For example, when one Swedish town studied which roads got cleared first following a snowstorm, they were surprised to learn their decisions were based on male commuting patterns. The result was that women were getting hurt, and the town was losing money. Caroline reveals that . . . “the cost of the accident and emergency admission was three times the cost of the winter road maintenance. And just by doing this simple switch of the order in which they do the snow clearing, that cost went down dramatically.” Caroline Criado Perez is a writer, broadcaster, and feminist activist and was named Liberty Human Rights Campaigner of the Year. Her first book was titled, Do It Like a Woman. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links Pierre Bourdieu Why Sweden Clears Snow-Covered Walkways Before Roads by Angie Schmitt The Work that Makes Work Possible by Anne-Marie Slaughter Women Lack Access to Private Toilets Around the World Do the Math: Include Women in Government Budgets Gender Budgeting in OECD Countries Why Women Are No Longer Catching Up to Men on Pay by Ben Casselman Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for the Curious Minds Podcast on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

What if achieving our goals is not about willpower but about gratitude, compassion and pride? It’s natural to experience negative emotions, like discouragement, frustration, and even fear when we’re working on something hard. And every time these feelings arise, we may be tempted to overcome them with willpower. But rather than dismissing our emotions, what if we put them to work on our behalf? In this interview, David DeSteno, author of the book, Emotional Success: The Power of Gratitude, Compassion, and Pride, explains: “Emotions push people to do hard things. And if we’re not utilizing those tools in the right way, we’re kind of fighting this battle with one hand tied behind our back.” In particular, the three emotions David champions are gratitude, compassion and pride. He explains that they not only fuel perseverance, but also “…reduce people’s blood pressure. There’s evidence they will help you sleep better at night. They will increase immune responses. In general, they basically act to destress the body.” David is a Professor of Psychology at Northeastern University and a Fellow of the American Psychological Association where he served as editor in chief of the journal, Emotion. His work has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Atlantic. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links @daviddesteno http://www.davedesteno.com/ and his Social Emotions Lab at Northeastern University Psychologist Walter Mischel The Grateful Don’t Cheat: Gratitude as a Fount of Virtue by David DeSteno, Fred Duong, Daniel Lim, and Shanyu Kates Hal Hershfield Episode 124 with Liz Fosslien on Emotions at Work on her book Tom Denson, Professor at UNSW in Sydney; he studies aggression David Brooks and resume vs eulogy virtues When Students Feel They Belong, They Thrive by G. M. Walton and G. L. Cohen Classroom Belonging and Student Performance in the Introductory Engineering Classroom Nilanjana Dasgupta, Social Psychologist at UMass Amherst Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Some Places Where You Can Find Curious Minds Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

In a world where empathy is in decline, how can we learn to care more? If you’re sensing that people are less empathetic today than decades ago, your instincts would be right. We are. Though human beings are wired to care about each other, we need the right conditions for those feelings to grow. Jamil Zaki, author of the book, The War for Kindness: Building Empathy in a Fractured World, argues that an increase in online interactions and urban living has made relationships more “…narrow, transactional, and anonymous.” He explains that in this kind of environment, it’s “…really not great soil for empathy to grow.”   His research reveals that empathy is a skill we can develop through training and that this training can leave people feeling not only more empathetic, but also kinder. In addition, Jamil shares that this kind of training can change the brain, that it can grow “…parts of the brain often associated with the experience of empathy.” Jamil is Professor of Psychology at Stanford University and Director of the Stanford Social Neuroscience Lab. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The New Yorker, and The Atlantic. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links @zakijam The Influential Mind by Tali Sharot Carol Dweck Tania Singer London taxi drivers and brain science Gordon Allport Contact hypothesis Emile Bruneau Nicholas Epley When Cops Choose Empathy by Jamil Zaki Jason A. Okonofua Elizabeth Levy Paluck Jeremy Bailenson Intensive Care Nursey UCSF Eve Ekman, Ph.D., MSW Kari Leibowitz Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for the Curious Minds podcast on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast

Can we achieve greater success in life by choosing to generalize rather than to specialize? If you want to be the best at something, the story goes something like this: Begin as early as you can. Focus on nothing else. And practice as if your life depends on it. It’s the story we associate with sports heroes and chess grandmasters. But David Epstein, author of the book, Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World, argues that this story is incomplete. It never mentions the fact that activities like chess and golf take place in “kind” learning environments, where learners have perfect information, operate with clear goals, and experience immediate feedback. In contrast, most of us operate in what are called “wicked” environments. There, as David explains, “…not all information is clear. People don’t wait for each other to take turns. . . Goals may be unclear. Feedback may be intermittent, nonexistent . . . it may be inaccurate and it may be delayed.” David also reveals that many top performers were not, in fact, specialists from an early age. They were generalists who took the time to explore multiple paths, and many delayed choosing a focus until they found the right fit: “They pinballed around . . . They didn’t focus on the long term . . . Instead, they said here’s who I am right now, here are the skills I have, here’s what I want to learn, here are the opportunities in front of me right now…” David has worked as an investigative reporter for ProPublica and a senior writer for Sports Illustrated. His first book was the bestseller, The Sports Gene. The Host You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net. Episode Links David Epstein and Malcolm Gladwell on 10,000 Hours vs The Sports Gene What the Childhood Years of Tiger Woods and Roger Federer Can Teach Us about Success by David Epstein The Two Settings of Kind and Wicked Learning Environments by Robin M. Hogarth, Tomas Lejarraga, and Emre Soyer Gary A. Klein Daniel Kahneman on adversarial collaborations Flynn effect Does Professor Quality Matter? Evidence from Random Assignment of Students to Professors by Scott E. Carrell and James E. West Recent Research on Human Learning Challenges Conventional Instructional Strategies by Doug Rohrer and Harold Pashler on spacing, interleaving and testing Structure Mapping in Analogy and Similarity by Dedre Gentner and Arthur B. Markman Integrated Science Program at Northwestern University Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader by Herminia Ibarra Beware the “Inside View” by Daniel Kahneman Here is What It Takes to Become a CEO, According to 12,000 LinkedIn Profiles How Scientists Think by Kevin Dunbar Drop Your Tools: An Allegory for Organizational Studies by Karl E. Weick You Don’t Want a Child Prodigy by David Epstein on headstarts and falling behind The Darkhorse Project What You’ll Wish You’d Known by Paul Graham includes concept of premature optimization Research: The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder is 45 by Pierre Azoulay, Benjamin Jones, J. Daniel Kim, and Javier Miranda Jhumpa Lahiri on Writing in Italian by Cressida Leyshon Simple Ways to Support the Podcast If you enjoy the podcast, there are three simple ways you can support our work. First, subscribe so you’ll never miss an episode. Second, tell a friend or family member. You’ll always have someone to talk to about the interview. Third, rate and review the podcast wherever you subscribe. You’ll be helping listeners find their next podcast. Look for the Curious Minds podcast on: Spotify iTunes Tunein Stitcher Google Play Overcast