Curious Minds at Work

If you are going to have a boss (or be a boss), make it a Superboss. Why? Because a Superboss leads individuals, teams, and organizations in ways that move the world. Sydney Finkelstein, bestselling author of Super Bosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent, shares these insights in our interview. Sydney is Professor of Management and Faculty Director of the Tuck Executive Program at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth where he specializes in business leadership and strategy. In this episode, we talk about: why working for a Superboss may be the best thing you ever do for your career what sets Superbosses apart when it comes to hiring why Superbosses dismiss textbook approaches to leadership how Superbosses leverage collaboration and competition in teams how losing incredible talent only strengthens Superbosses and their organizations what you can do right now to become a Superboss how Superbosses pursue deep passions outside of work Sydney shares incredible stories from his research and captures how Superbosses often act in fascinating and counterintuitive ways. Episode Links @sydfinkelstein Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent by Sydney Finkelstein NFL, Bill Walsh, 49ers Lorne Michaels and SNL, Tina Fey, Jimmy Fallon, Mike Myers Norman Brinker and Chilis, Steak and Ale Jon Stewart Ralph Lauren Larry Ellison Marc Benioff and Salesforce.com Julian Robertson Jay Chiat Bill Sanders George Lucas and Skywalker Ranch, Industrial Light and Magic Pixar Alice Waters and Chez Panisse Chase Coleman, III General Electic (GE) Harvard Business Review and Why Chief Human Resource Officers Make Great CEOs Network effect Thomas Frist and HCA If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

Abraham Lincoln, Lucy Stone, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Steve Jobs: What set them apart and helped them achieve such world-altering success? In his latest book, Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World, Adam Grant  shares the research on the mindsets, behaviors, and emotional resilience that lead to incredible breakthroughs in innovation and creativity. He also explains how we can apply these findings to our own lives. Adam Grant is the youngest tenured, highest-rated professor of management and psychology at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a contributing writer for the New York Times, and he’s consulted with organizations like Google, the United Nations, and the U.S. Army. He is also the bestselling author of Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success. In this episode, we talk about: why Originals rarely accept the status quo breadth versus depth -- which one drives innovation and creativity? the role of risk in the mindset of Originals what Originals do differently when faced with the same fears as everyone else why we are the worst judges of our own ideas and who can help us the importance of status over power in rallying others around our ideas why enemies can become our biggest advocates what really causes groupthink and prevents innovation the power of getting pulled into leadership roles role models versus mentors and how it can be easier to find them why we need to rethink optimism, happiness, and contentment for achievement and innovation why your first 15 ideas are less original than your next 20 Adam also shares how he uses these ideas in his classroom. Episode Links @AdamMGrant Adam Grant website Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World by Adam Grant vuja de Albert Einstein Tiger Mom Galileo Galilei Dean Simonton Segway Steve Jobs Jerry Seinfeld and Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee Frenemies Basecamp David Heinemeier Hansson Abraham Lincoln Martin Luther King, Jr. Michelangelo Irving Janis and Groupthink Devils advocates and Charlan Nemeth at University of California, Berkeley Mark Cuban and Shark Tank and Mavericks Elon Musk Peter Thiel Lord of the Rings Sheryl Sandberg Jeff Bezos A Wrinkle in Time Mark Zuckerberg Enders Game Disney Michael Eisner The Lion King King Lear Hamlet Bambi Uber TED Talk If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

Every day we have problems to solve and decisions to make. Too often, the steps we take to address them result in more complexity, rather than less. That is where simple rules come in. Donald Sull, bestselling author of Simple Rules: How to Thrive in a Complex World offers a six-step framework for better decision-making that has been tested with individuals and with organizations. An expert in global strategy, Don is a senior lecturer at MIT and a former professor at Harvard University and the London Business School. Using vivid examples and powerful stories, Don helps us see the creative impact of developing and applying simple rules. In this episode, we talk about: ways simple rules support strategy and encourage innovation the ways simple rules beat out one-size-fits-all rules the six-part framework to make simple rules of your own why we need to involve the users of the rules in the creation process how feedback only makes rules better over time how simple rules can support personal and organizational agency and ownership Episode Links @simple_rules donsull.com Simple Rules: How to Thrive in a Complex World by Donald Sull and Kathleen Eisenhardt Oakland As Billy Beane The Gates Foundation Why the French Do Not Get Fat Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think by Brian Wansink Collin Payne Pierre Chandon Murmuration Craig Reynolds Orcs Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien Zipcar and Robin Chase Votorantim Contagious: Why Things Catch On by Jonah Berger Young Presidents Organization Elmore Leonard Tina Fey and 30 Rock If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

What does it take to pursue your dream? For Miki Agrawal, it took a catastrophic event that had a direct impact on her work and her life. It woke her up to three goals she had always wanted to achieve. And it led her to become the serial entrepreneur she is today. Along the way, Miki has been upending industries and winning all kinds of awards, including the Tribeca Film Festival 2013 Disruptive Innovation Award and Forbes 2013 Top 20 Millenials on a Mission. Just this past year, she received the 2015 World Technology Summit Social Entrepreneurship award for her company, THINX, a stain-resistant line of sustainable underwear for women. In this episode, we talk about: the event that prompted Miki to rethink her life the wish list that led her to entrepreneurship the secret to asking others to participate in your dreams how freelance work primed her for working for herself how passion and ignorance go a long way in risk taking the role trial and error play in building a new product Miki shares the ways she is disrupting an industry and prioritizing social responsibility. She also talks about her passion for rethinking culture and confronting cultural taboos. Episode Links Do Cool Sh*t  WILD Tao Restaurant and Rich Wolf Alex Koren Toms Warby Parker AFRIPads Tushy If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

We all want to do meaningful work that gives our lives purpose and lets us be creative. And yet, the very tools that help us stay organized and connected can cause the kind of distractions that erode time spent on meaningful work. Jocelyn Glei, bestselling author and editor of Manage Your Day-to-Day, Founding Editor-in-Chief and Director of Behance’s 99U and the 99U Conference, talks about this and more in this episode. And she helps us rethink what we know about creativity, meaningful work, and happiness. In this episode, we talk about: why creative work is so important how being busy can distract us from doing work that matters the creative rituals and routines that result in more meaningful work why we need to redesign and manage our relationship with technology the positive roles of productive procrastination and anxiety in creative, meaningful work short-term happiness versus long-term purpose and meaning Jocelyn also gives us a glimpse into her upcoming book on the distractions of email. She is the author of two additional books, Make Your Mark and Maximize Your Potential. Episode Links @JKGlei Brene Brown Jonathan Adler Zine MIT Press The Acceleration of Addictiveness by Paul Graham Hooked by Nir Eyal The Achievement Habit by Bernie Roth Out of Sheer Rage by Geoff Dyer Miranda July Evernote Scrum The Gift by Lewis Hyde The Concept of Anxiety by Soren Kierkegaard Seth Godin If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

Artificial intelligence, robotics, and automation technologies are fulfilling (and surpassing) predictions from the most creative science fiction. While the possibilities are exciting, these changes force us to ask what this means for the future of work. What jobs will they replace? Which industries will they decimate? What impact will they have on how we live and work in what many are calling a post-industrial age? Martin Ford explores these questions and more, in his bestselling book, Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future. Named 2015 Business Book of the Year by the Financial Times and McKinsey, his book is helping to drive a much-needed conversation around the dark side of innovative technologies. As a software company founder who has worked in the industry for over 30 years, Martin saw how automation was eliminating more and more jobs. This led him to research the impact of cutting-edge technologies on labor, wages, and productivity. In this episode you will learn: why this time is different when it comes to the impact of automation on jobs the important role education will play in how we respond and adapt why we need to rethink income and healthcare policies to ensure a healthy economy the pressing need to raise awareness around this issue and to incentivize solutions Episode Links @MFordFuture Luddite Martin Luther King, Jr. Triple Revolution Machine learning Deep Learning Artificial intelligence The Three Breakthroughs That Have Finally Unleashed Artificial Intelligence on the World by Kevin Kelly Everlaw Long tail distribution Ray Kurzweil Basic or guaranteed income Single-payer healthcare X Prize Peter Diamandis If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

When we operate in silos, we narrow our perspective in ways that can limit, and even destroy, innovation. So where have we seen silos before and what can we learn from them? In this fascinating conversation with Gillian Tett, award-winning journalist and U.S. Managing Editor of the Financial Times, she explains how silos reversed decades of innovation at Sony, limited innovation in a world-class hospital, and played a key role in the 2007 global financial crisis. Drawing on insights from her bestselling book, The Silo Effect: The Peril of Expertise and the Promise of Breaking Down Barriers, she helps us see the patterns that create these tendencies, and the simple steps we can take to avoid or overcome them. In this episode you will learn: what makes smart people do apparently stupid things how rewards and incentives can reinforce a silo mentality why success can lead to silo perspectives steps we can take to overcome mental and organizational silos the value of an insider-outsider perspective Also in this interview, Gillian encourages us to recognize how the silos begin erected in the information technology industry have begun to mirror those that led to the 2007 global financial crisis. She is the other of two other bestselling books, Saving the Sun and Fools Gold. Episode Links @GillianTett Octopus Pots British Press Awards Cleveland Clinic Pierre Bourdieu Mental Maps   Securitizations Sir Paul Tucker Paul McCulley PIMCO Shadow banking Zoltan Poszar Nicolaus Copernicus Cultural anthropology Brett Goldstein Open Table Toby Cosgrove Robin Dunbar It is Complicated by danah boyd Liquidated by Karen Ho If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

Why do most people want to live in walkable cities and towns? What's the impact on innovation and well-being? Jeff Speck, city planner, urban designer, TED Talk speaker, and bestselling author of Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time, offers fascinating and fact-filled responses to these questions. Along the way, he tells us the changes needed to make cities the thriving places that most people want. In this episode you will learn: what is a walkable city how walkable cities drive innovation by attracting talent what makes cities safer than suburbs how more traffic signals actually make cities less safe why the most popular solutions to congestion actually increase it what the cheapest solution is for making a city more walkable how great urban design trumps weather every time Jeff also shares a fascinating insight regarding a possible downside of self-driving cars. Episode Links @JeffSpeckAICP The Walkable City TED Talk by Jeff Speck Externalities Millenials Seek Walkable Cities Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam Single Family Housing Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett Induced demand and traffic Free Good Donald Shoup Prospect-refuge Theory and Jay Appleton Charrettes for Design Andres Duany Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design by Charles Montgomery Inclusionary zoning Granny flats Wyandanch, New York Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Jeff Speck Jarrett Walker - Human Transit If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

Why do certain products, services, or stories go viral? How can we make our own work contagious? These are questions Wharton Professor, Jonah Berger, answers in his bestselling book, Contagious: Why Things Catch On. In this fascinating interview, he explains his six-part framework and discusses the behaviors that drive us to make certain ideas, products, and services contagious. In this episode you will learn: how to apply these techniques to your own work what made the video for a seemingly humdrum product - a blender - go viral which emotions drive us to share and which ones do not what makes us spread the word for free why you might suffer from the curse of knowledge and how you can avoid it the critical difference between social media and word of mouth Jonah also gives us a peek into his upcoming book on all the ways social influence drives our behavior. Fascinating stuff! Episode Links Beta testing Social psychology STEPPS Framework Hooked: How to Build Habit-forming Products  Geico ad for Hump Day Curse of knowledge Trojan Horse Social influence If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!

If you are one of the millions of people who struggle to stick with an exercise program, Michelle Segar has a secret for you: It is not your fault; it is a faulty system. After years of studying the science of motivation, Michelle Segar, Ph.D., Director of SHARP -- the Sport, Health, and Activity research and policy center at the University of Michigan -- has created a framework for rethinking exercise, one that replaces a prescriptive mindset with one more aligned with human behavior and emotion. Filled with practical tips and strategies, Michelle’s bestselling book, No Sweat: How the Simple Science of Motivation Can Bring You a Lifetime of Fitness, is informed by years of putting these findings into practice with people just like you. In this episode you will learn: how to short-circuit the vicious cycle of failure why fitness apps are not enough why willpower is not the answer the science of decision making and reward the power of self-determination theory - initiating behavior because you should versus because you find it meaningful the more moderate recommendations for physical activity - which are known by less than 1 percent of physical activity professionals Episode Links Paulo Freire Dan Ariely Behavioral economics Reward Substitution Self-determination theory No Sweat Resolutions Quiz 2015 USA Best Book Awards If you enjoyed the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. Thanks for listening!