Listen to Kurt and Tim’s spooky Halloween Special about some common biases that can seem a bit scary. But don’t fear, the scariest thing about this episode is actually Kurt and Tim’s jokes! Find out why some biases are a bit spooky, what makes us susceptible to them, and most importantly how we can overcome them. Thanks for taking the time to learn a bit about how to overcome the biases you may find impacting your life. If you’d like to support our work further, please consider donating a treat ...
Oct 31, 2021•19 min•Ep 259•Transcript available on Metacast Rudeness is contagious, in a similar way to a virus. When experiencing a rude encounter, our brain perceives it like a threat. And once we’ve tuned in to this low-level threat, we’re more likely to notice it around us, and therefore more likely to display rude behavior ourselves. Our guest on this episode is Dr Trevor Foulk PhD, Assistant Professor of Management & Organization at the University of Maryland. His well published research on deviant workplace behaviors and workplace power dynamics, ...
Oct 27, 2021•1 hr 11 min•Ep 258•Transcript available on Metacast How do we make decisions? What factors influence the final outcome? Do default settings change our preferences? Every decision we make; from choosing something on a menu to deciding whether to be an organ donor, is influenced by our environmental context and the default selections presented to us. Professor Eric J. Johnson has distilled the latest behavioral science research into his newest book, The Elements of Choice: Why the Way We Decide Matters, and we are thrilled to talk with him about it...
Oct 24, 2021•1 hr 18 min•Ep 257•Transcript available on Metacast Anxiety in the workplace has always been present, even pre-pandemic but rates of anxiety, particularly among young employees, have worsened since 2020. So what obligation do organizations have to their employees' mental health? How can managers recognize the signs of anxiety, and how can we help our colleagues with those feelings? Following our incredibly popular first episode with Chester Elton in July 2021, on showing gratitude (episode 238), we are thrilled to be talking with him again about ...
Oct 17, 2021•1 hr 5 min•Ep 256•Transcript available on Metacast What life habits keep our brain healthy? How does our mind respond to trauma? And why does the way we talk about suicide and mental health make such a difference to those who are struggling? We discuss all these topics with neuroscience researcher Dr Daniel Almeida. To mark World Mental Health Day on Sunday, Oct 10, 2021, we decided to delve into the science behind mental health. And who better to help us with this topic than Daniel who has been named as one of Forbes 30 under 30 in science. His...
Oct 10, 2021•59 min•Ep 255•Transcript available on Metacast The clearest indicators of our financial solvency are based on the behaviors we exhibit with our investments. Dr. Daniel Crosby PhD is a psychologist, behavioral finance expert, asset manager and bestselling author of four books including “The Behavioral Investor”: https://amzn.to/3Bl4s3t . We examine with him the question of whether financial success ultimately brings us happiness? Surprisingly it can, but not in the ways that we think it does. Having studied the growing list of 200 odd behavio...
Oct 03, 2021•57 min•Ep 254•Transcript available on Metacast To be influential you do not require power, but wielding your influence is powerful. Vanessa Bohns, social psychologist and professor of organizational behavior at Cornell University, joins us to discuss her enticing new book “You Have More Influence Than You Think”: https://amzn.to/39vCDIN . She draws from her research to illustrate why underestimating our influence can lead us to miss opportunities or worse yet, to misuse our power. Vanessa challenges us to examine our powers of persuasion and...
Sep 26, 2021•1 hr 9 min•Ep 253•Transcript available on Metacast Employee burnout, The Great Resignation, Office Covid Regulations; these are all major concerns for leaders in the workplace right now. But how can managers successfully navigate these stresses, while still maintaining productivity among staff? At the start of the pandemic, Behavioral Grooves began a series of podcasts with researchers and practitioners to understand the organizational shifts we were seeing. Over the course of our interviews, we discovered big changes in the way business was bei...
Sep 19, 2021•19 min•Ep 252•Transcript available on Metacast [NOTE: This episode is republished from #178 in October 2020.] Kwame Christian, Esq. is the author of “Nobody Will Play With Me: How to Use Compassionate Curiosity to Find Confidence in Conflict.” He is the host of two podcasts, “Negotiate Anything” and “Ask With Confidence.” He is a professor at The Ohio State University Law School and is the director of the American Negotiation Institute. Kwame’s educational background combines an undergraduate degree in psychology, a masters in public policy,...
Sep 12, 2021•1 hr 21 min•Ep 251•Transcript available on Metacast How can behavioral science aid the mammoth task of vaccination the world against Covid? What common barriers cause vaccine hesitancy in populations around the globe? And how can behavioral design overcome them? Born out of frustration, while trying to eliminate Polio from Pakistan, the global behavioral design agency Common Thread ( www.gocommonthread.com ) was born. They use findings from psychology, anthropology, economics and sociology, to identify and analyze behavioral insights. Bringing a ...
Sep 05, 2021•55 min•Ep 250•Transcript available on Metacast Few psychologists in the world have contributed more to scientific discovery than our guest Richard E. Nisbett. He joins us to discuss his latest book, the title of which embodies one of his favorite activities: Thinking: A Memoir. Thinking weaves Richard’s personal story through his research journey, painting a richer sense of the thought process behind his discoveries. Richard E. Nisbett is the Theodore M. Newcomb Distinguished Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Michigan. Many...
Aug 29, 2021•1 hr 16 min•Ep 249•Transcript available on Metacast Can we control our unconscious behavior? How much does the situation we’re in control us? Can we prime people to behave a certain way? Is it even ethical to try? To what degree do cultural identity and stereotyping impact the automaticity of our actions? Following on from our discussion with Dr Philip Zimbardo PhD, in our last episode (#247) about the Stanford Prison Experiment, we reached out to our friend and previous guest (episode #155), Dr John Bargh PhD, social psychologist at Yale Univers...
Aug 22, 2021•1 hr 17 min•Ep 248•Transcript available on Metacast The Stanford Prison Experiment has been the topic of movies, newspaper articles, textbooks and TV shows. Extensively published controversy has surrounded the social psychology experiment ever since it was conducted in 1971. Now on the 50th Anniversary, we invite you to listen to a very unique interview with the man who orchestrated it all; Dr Philip Zimbardo PhD. Was the Stanford Prison Experiment designed to measure the corruption of power? Were participants influenced by the context of the exp...
Aug 15, 2021•40 min•Ep 247•Transcript available on Metacast The truth is we divulge more information to Google that we do to our friends, our family or even our doctors. Our social media persona can paint a very different picture to what we secretly search for on Google. So what do search trends in Google tell us about ourselves and our society? Does it matter that we are different on Google than in person? Author of bestseller Everybody Lies ( https://amzn.to/32ULlgD ), Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, tells us how data can unlock the keys to happier relations...
Aug 08, 2021•1 hr 1 min•Ep 246•Transcript available on Metacast This follow-up episode is a free-flowing Grooving Session where Tim and Kurt chat about their discussion with Seth Stephens-Davidowitz (Episode 246). You’re more than welcome to listen to this as a stand alone episode, but we recommend first tuning in to our interview with Seth, and then joining us here for some banter about Seth’s work. Questions we discuss: Are we more likely to be untruthful in certain contexts? Is lying a useful delusion? Can we ever justify lies? How do the connections we m...
Aug 08, 2021•30 min•Ep 245•Transcript available on Metacast What link is there between happiness and income? Does winning the lottery make you happier? What does the research say about poverty and our mental health? Our guest on this episode has researched the psychological effects money has on our wellbeing and on our society. Johannes Haushofer is the Assistant Professor of Economics at Stockholm University and has taught at Princeton University for the past six years. Johannes realized that not enough research on these topics has been conducted outsid...
Aug 01, 2021•52 min•Ep 244•Transcript available on Metacast Kurt and Tim discuss the links between poverty and mental health, how higher income is linked to better well-being, and the idea of a Universal Basic Income. This is a free-flowing discussion delving into the insights from their most recent interview with Johannes Haushofer (episode #244), Assistant Professor of Economics at Stockholm University. While you are welcome to listen to this episode as a stand-alone, we recommend you download our interview with Johannes first before joining us here. T...
Aug 01, 2021•25 min•Ep 243•Transcript available on Metacast What does your customer want but can’t tell you? What effective marketing techniques use behavioral economics? If only you had a way of understanding how your customer’s brain made decisions. Well our guest, Melina Palmer sits down to discuss exactly that. Melina Palmer is the founder of The Brainy Business, which provides behavioral economics consulting to businesses of all sizes from around the world. She also hosts a podcast, The Brainy Business, and has recently published her first book What...
Jul 25, 2021•39 min•Ep 242•Transcript available on Metacast How can your organization improve its marketing messaging using proven behavioral science techniques? As part of our series on Marketing & Employee Engagement this month, we were joined by Melina Palmer on our latest interview episode (#242). Melina Palmer is the founder of The Brainy Business podcast and author of “What Your Customer Wants and Can’t Tell You: Unlocking Consumer Decisions with the Science of Behavioral Economics”: https://amzn.to/36Rm88I . She is an expert on both marketing and ...
Jul 25, 2021•24 min•Ep 241•Transcript available on Metacast Do honest people steal? Our guest, Kelly Paxton investigates and researches low level crimes such as book-keeping fraud; also known as Pink Collar Crime. She discusses how a hostile work environment and the prospect of financial difficulties at home can lead “good” people to rationalize dishonest behavior. Kelly Paxton is a former federal agent who was used to dealing with “bad guys.” Once she started working embezzlement cases, she quickly realized that honest people steal. The term pink-collar...
Jul 18, 2021•57 min•Ep 240•Transcript available on Metacast Continuing our series on Marketing and Employee Engagement this month, we were joined by Kelly Paxton on our latest interview episode: Why Good, Honest Employees Really Do Steal With Kelly Paxton (#240). Tim and Kurt discuss their fantastic conversation with Kelly who has authored Embezzlement: How to Detect, Prevent, and Investigate Pink-Collar Crime: https://amzn.to/3i57hN1 and is also the podcast host of Great Women in Fraud: https://podcast.greatwomeninfraud.com/ . Kelly investigates and res...
Jul 18, 2021•16 min•Ep 239•Transcript available on Metacast When did a colleague last thank you for your work? Managers generally underappreciate their employees, but more importantly, they tend to undervalue the benefits of expressing their gratitude. Best-selling author, speaker and executive coach, Chester Elton has a lighthearted discussion with us about the value of expressing gratitude. What makes gratitude different to recognition? And how do you create a grateful work environment? Chester, along with his co-author, Adrian Gostick, have sold milli...
Jul 14, 2021•1 hr 1 min•Ep 238•Transcript available on Metacast What is the science behind capturing people’s attention? And what do you do after you have someone’s attention; what is your intention? Is our attention fleeting and fickle, like a goldfish? Or is it something that can be recaptured and rekindled easily? Our guest today, Ben Parr cleverly uses a great Bonfire Analogy to describe how we ignite, build and rekindle attention. Ben Parr is an award-winning entrepreneur, author, investor, and journalist. He is the author of the best-selling book Capti...
Jul 11, 2021•51 min•Ep 237•Transcript available on Metacast Continuing our series on Marketing and Employee Engagement this month, we were joined on our latest interview episode (#237) by Ben Parr, author of “Captivology: The Science of Capturing People's Attention” https://amzn.to/3ejByXB . His insights and research have valuable applications in marketing and entrepreneurship. We’re also doing things a little differently this month on Behavioral Grooves. Instead of discussing Ben Parr’s interview in our Grooving Session at the end of the episode, we’ve ...
Jul 11, 2021•27 min•Ep 236•Transcript available on Metacast Welcome to our series of episodes on Marketing and Employee Engagement. We'll be sharing insights into how to apply behavioral science in business. And we’ve started the series off with award-winning marketer, Matthew Willcox. He understands the fundamental importance of using behavioral insights to help organizations align with how people choose. He is one of the pioneers of applying behavioral science in marketing. In this episode, Tim and Kurt speak to Matthew about his book The Business of C...
Jul 05, 2021•40 min•Ep 235•Transcript available on Metacast We’re doing things a little differently this month on Behavioral Grooves. Instead of discussing Matthew Willcox’s interview in our Grooving Session at the end of the episode, we’ve decided to make it a separate episode. We suggest you listen to Matthew’s interview first (episode #235), and then join us on this episode where we discuss practical applications of Matthew Willcox’s fascinating work. At the start of our series on Marketing and Employee Engagement, Kurt and Tim discuss how we can appl...
Jul 05, 2021•23 min•Ep 234•Transcript available on Metacast We’re doing things a little differently this week. Instead of discussing Katy Milkman’s research at the end of our interview (Episode 232), we’ve decided to make our Grooving Session a separate episode. We suggest you listen to Katy’s interview first in the previous episode, and then join us here where we discuss how Katy's work will help you find your behavior-changing groove! In this Grooving Session we will learn to: Look for the obstacles that are preventing you from adopting new behaviors. ...
Jun 27, 2021•28 min•Ep 233•Transcript available on Metacast We all appreciate a fresh start. Time to start again. A clean slate. Maybe we want to go to the gym more often, eat more vegetables, or read more books. But why do we often fail to maintain our new healthy habits? Our guest today, Katy Milkman PhD, believes that we often focus too much on the final outcome, rather than the steps that will get us there. Thinking about what is going to trigger our actions and what barriers are going to get in the way of our new behavior, are much more effective te...
Jun 27, 2021•49 min•Ep 232•Transcript available on Metacast Today's guest is Dr. Larry Senn, PhD, a pioneer in the field of corporate culture. He founded Senn Delaney as a culture shaping firm back in 1978, based on his principle that organizations become shadows of their leaders. Larry works with CEO teams and organizations from top to bottom to create the behaviors needed to support strategies and enhance business results. And he was recently named “The Father of Corporate Culture” by CEO Forum magazine. Larry is also author of The Mood Elevator: Take ...
Jun 23, 2021•57 min•Ep 231•Transcript available on Metacast Dolly Chugh is an award-winning associate professor and social psychologist at the Stern School of Business at New York University. Her research focuses on the “psychology of good people”. How and why most of us, however well-intended, are still prone to race and gender bias, as well as what she calls “bounded ethicality.” Dolly sits down with Kurt and Tim on this episode, to talk about the concept of “good-ish” which is a central theme to her book The Person You Mean to Be: How Good People Figh...
Jun 20, 2021•1 hr 5 min•Ep 230•Transcript available on Metacast 
