Sheila Heen is the Founder of Triad Consulting Group and a Lecturer at Harvard Law School. Besides teaching at Harvard, Sheila has worked with the biggest companies in the world, helping their executive teams work through conflict, repair working relationships, and make sound decisions together. She has also spent the last twenty years with the Harvard Negotiation Project, developing negotiation theory and practice. Sheila specializes in particularly difficult negotiations – where emotions run h...
Sep 22, 2020•45 min•Season 1Ep. 36
This week we're reviewing the 2020 Iowa Democratic Caucus reporting malfunction. In case you missed it, here are some headlines about that night: - Iowa caucus app ran into issues when reporting results ( https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/04/politics/iowa-caucus-voting-app/index.html ) - 'It was a total mess': Caucusing is long over, but Iowa still doesn't have a winner ( https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2020/02/04/iowa-caucus-delayed-results-mean-no-winner-ye...
Sep 15, 2020•25 min•Season 1Ep. 35
Andrea Waltz is a professional speaker, trainer, and author. She calls herself a "Failure Philosopher" and "Reject-ologist" and she's an expert on achieving breakthrough performance through increasing failure rates. Andrea is the co-author of Go For No! A brilliant, tiny book outlining a new way to think about failure and rejection. The book has sold nearly 1 million copies and has 1,500 five star reviews on Amazon. This conversation is action packed with tips! Thanks for listening and be sure t...
Sep 09, 2020•36 min•Season 1Ep. 34
Whatever you think you know about the story of Kodak not capitalizing on their own invention of the digital camera, the actual story is so much better. This After Action Review is with Steve Sasson, the original inventor of the digital camera and 35 year employee of Eastman Kodak. Steve will break down the two pivotal moments in Kodak's past when they had the technology and opportunity to get into the digital camera business and chose not to. And you'll learn for the first time that their big mi...
Sep 01, 2020•40 min•Season 1Ep. 33
Kristen Ulmer is a fear/anxiety expert. Her education on this subject comes from practical, real- world experience, starting with being a mogul specialist on the US Ski Team. Kristen then became more recognized as being the best female big mountain extreme skier in the world, a status she kept for 12 years. Known for big cliff jumps and you-fall-you die descents, she became sponsored by the likes of Red Bull, Ralph Lauren, and Nikon, and was inducted into the Hall of Fame September of 2019. Her ...
Aug 25, 2020•44 min•Season 1Ep. 32
Hello and welcome to the Season Finale of Professional AF. Today, my husband Jason and I are discussing The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F^*K. First published in 2016, the book has sold over 6 million copies and topped every best seller list. The book's premise is that we spend way too much time worrying about things that don't really matter and learning how to let that go is the secret to happiness and personal growth. There are so many great pieces of advice woven throughout the book that Jason ...
Feb 10, 2020•47 min•Season 1Ep. 31
Today I'm discussing the book Rising Strong by Brené Brown with my therapist Candy Smith. Candy was my guest earlier this season when we talked about shame and vulnerability. Candy has been a licensed therapist for several decades. She specializes in working with adults, and children with trauma, that's how I met her. And every time we talk, I learn so much about the world, about people, and about myself. In Rising Strong, Brené shares a simple truth. If we apply her previous lessons and are bra...
Feb 03, 2020•47 min•Season 1Ep. 30
For the past 25 years, Liane Davey has researched and advised teams on how to achieve high performance. Known as the “teamwork doctor,” she’s worked with hundreds of teams, including 26 Global Fortune 500 companies (and counting). Today we're discussing Liane's book, the Good Fight, about creating productive conflict with your team. Conflict has become a “dirty word.” The truth is that our teams and organizations require conflict to get things done. But, as humans, we avoid conflict and build up...
Jan 20, 2020•53 min•Season 1Ep. 29
Michael Ventura is the CEO and founder of Sub Rosa, a strategy and design firm that has worked with some of the world’s largest and most important organizations like Johnson & Johnson, Adobe, The TED Conference, Delta Airlines, and The Daily Show. Michael's first book and the subject of our discussion today is Applied Empathy. Empathy is a squishy word. Sometimes it’s confused with sympathy or misinterpreted as “being nice.” That isn’t empathy. Empathy is about understanding. Empathy lets us...
Jan 13, 2020•33 min•Season 1Ep. 28
My guest this week is Kelly McGonigal. Kelly is a health psychologist and lecturer at Stanford University who specializes in understanding the mind-body connection. She is the best-selling author of The Upside of Stress – the book we discuss in part one of this show. Kelly's TED talk on the topic, "How to Make Stress Your Friend," is one of the most viewed TED talks of all time, with over 20 million views. And I can't stress enough how much her perspective, and research, have altered my relation...
Jan 06, 2020•33 min•Season 1Ep. 27
My guest this week is Kelly McGonigal. Kelly is a health psychologist and lecturer at Stanford University who specializes in understanding the mind-body connection. She is the best-selling author of The Upside of Stress – the book we discuss in part one of this show. Kelly's TED talk on the topic, "How to Make Stress Your Friend," is one of the most viewed TED talks of all time, with over 20 million views. And I can't stress enough how much her perspective, and research, have altered my relation...
Jan 06, 2020•38 min•Season 1Ep. 26
BJ Fogg is a Social Science Research Associate at Stanford, author, and the founder and director of the Stanford Behavior Design Lab. In February, 2018, Wired Magazine claimed Fogg's "Stanford lab created the formula to make technology addictive." The article said that Fogg’s lab "was a toll booth for entrepreneurs and product designers on their way to Facebook and Google. Students included Nir Eyal, the bestselling author of the book, Hooked, Ed Baker, who would later become the Head of Growth ...
Dec 30, 2019•50 min•Season 1Ep. 25
Today, I'm discussing Brene Brown's book Dare to Lead with my therapist Candy Smith. You remember Candy from earlier this season when we talked about shame. (incredible episode, if you haven't heard it, you've got to make that your next listen) Candy has been a licensed therapist for several decades. She specializes in working with adults, and children with trauma. That's how I met her. And every time I talk to her, I wish I had a pen and paper handy to write down her insights. In Dare to Lead, ...
Dec 16, 2019•36 min•Season 1Ep. 24
Research shows that self-awareness—knowing who we are and how others see us—is the foundation for high performance, smart choices, and lasting relationships. There’s just one problem: most people don’t see themselves quite as clearly as they could. While 95% of us identify as self-aware, only 10% to 15% actually are. Dr. Tasha Eurich, a New York Times best-selling author and organizational psychologist has spent the last five years studying self awareness. Her clients include organizations like ...
Dec 09, 2019•38 min•Season 1Ep. 23
Celeste Headlee is an award-winning journalist, professional speaker and author of We Need To Talk: How To Have Conversations That Matter. In her 20-year career in public radio, she anchored programs including Tell Me More, Talk of the Nation, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition. Celeste’s TEDx Talk sharing 10 ways to have a better conversation has over 19 million views. As an NPR host and journalist, Celeste has interviewed hundreds of people from all walks of life. Through her work, she...
Dec 02, 2019•41 min•Season 1Ep. 22
The reason you need to know and understand Psychological Safety is that study after study has demonstrated that it is the highest predictor of team performance. Google conducted a 2 year study in which they analyzed over 150 different factors to understand what created successful teams and they found psychological safety to be the number one predictor of success. A Gallup study found that psychological safety can lead to 27% reduction in turnover, a 40% reduction in safety incidents, and a 12% i...
Nov 25, 2019•39 min•Season 1Ep. 21
Today, my guest is Tim Larkin. A former military intelligence officer and creator of the Target Focus Training, Tim has a 25 year career in which he has trained people in 52 countries in how to deal with imminent violence. A New York Times Bestselling author, Tim has trained over 10,000 clients on how to use physics and physiology to injure any human(s) trying to attack you. Tim and I are going to talk about: Why most programs that teach self-defense make a huge mistake in what they teach Why yo...
Nov 18, 2019•52 min•Season 1Ep. 20
My guest today is Kristen Holmes, Vice President of Performance at WHOOP. As you know, whoop is a sponsor of the show, but that's not why Kristen is here. I wanted to talk to an expert about sleep and actually understand much more about the analytics I've been getting from my whoop band, and I was so excited to talk to Kristin. I used to think that sleep was something you had to endure to be able to function, but I've learned that sleep is an amazing miracle process that makes you function at yo...
Nov 11, 2019•44 min•Season 1Ep. 19
I've stayed away from productivity books and talks like they were the flu. I just didn't think I needed efficiency in my life. I didn't want to hear their email hacks or their prioritization matrix. And then I came across the work of Laura Vanderkam and understood just how wrong I had been all this time. Productivity isn't about being a more efficient cog at work. Productivity is about managing your life in such a way to significantly increase how much fun you're having and how much growth you'r...
Nov 04, 2019•46 min•Season 1Ep. 18
Did you know that every interaction you have with someone releases chemicals in their brain? And if you can release the right chemicals, you can increase, trust, cooperation, performance in significant ways? Paul’s two decades of research have taken him from the Pentagon to Fortune 50 boardrooms to the rain forest of New Guinea. His latest book, Trust Factor: The Science of Creating High Performance Companies, uses neuroscience to measure and manage organizational cultures to inspire teamwork an...
Oct 28, 2019•56 min•Season 1Ep. 17
This weeks wisdom comes from the most unlikely places. Just about 150 years ago. If you're anything like me you've heard of or sampled the works of Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Susan B. Anthony, Mark Twain, and you thought, I should really make time to read more of those books. And that time has never really come around. Well, my friend John Jantsch has done us all a solid and put together a new book with a daily excerpt from each of these authors and many more. John is a very succe...
Oct 21, 2019•43 min•Season 1Ep. 16
Today's episode is about the number one thing that prevents us from being the person we want to be; the number one way we hurt ourselves and the people we love. I'm talking about Shame. As Brene Brown states: "Shame corrodes the very part of us that believes we are capable of change." I tried to get Brene Brown on the show and wasn't able to this season, but I wasn't going to let that stop me from having what I believe is the most important conversation we need to have. So I invited my therapist...
Oct 14, 2019•59 min•Season 1Ep. 15
Jennifer Petriglieri is a Professor of Organizational Behavior at INSEAD, and the author of Couples That Work. A book that’s coming out this week on making a dual career relationship successful. Prior to joining INSEAD, she was a Post-Doctoral Fellow of Organizational Behavior at the Harvard Business School. Having lived and worked on three continents, she is now settled in France with her husband and their two children. Jennifer has spent the last six years studying over a hundred couples in a ...
Oct 07, 2019•46 min•Season 1Ep. 14
Kim Scott is the author of the NYT bestseller Radical Candor: Be a Kickass Boss without Losing your Humanity. Kim led AdSense, YouTube, and Doubleclick Online Sales and Operations at Google and then joined Apple to develop and teach a leadership program. Kim has been a CEO coach at Dropbox, Qualtrics, Twitter, and several other tech companies. Kim received her MBA from Harvard Business School and her BA from Princeton. She is the author of three novels; she and her husband Andy Scott are parents...
Sep 30, 2019•39 min•Season 1Ep. 13
Denise Shull is a decision coach and performance architect for hedge fund managers, traders and professional athletes. She is the Author of Market Mind Games - book on the radical psychology of making decisions and risk. And she is the inspiration for the character "Wendy Rhodes" in the Showtime show, Billions Denise's thesis is that there's a common mis-belief that you should "set your emotions aside when making a decision" and she will explain why this is an ineffective way to make good decisi...
Sep 23, 2019•36 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Everywhere she goes, people ask Esther Wojcicki for parenting advice. That's because each one of her three daughters has a crazy awesome job: Susan is the CEO of YouTube, Janet is a professor at UC San Francisco, and Anne is the co founder and CEO of 23andMe. Ester has also been a journalism teacher for more than 35 years at Palo Alto High School. The students that swear by her method include actor and director, James Franco and Jeremy Lin, a Harvard graduate and point guard in the NBA. So what ...
Sep 16, 2019•40 min•Season 1Ep. 11
Most people know Annie as a professional poker player. She’s won numerous poker championships and millions of dollars in prizes. I got to know her in 2004 when I really got into poker. My first book was actually a business novel that took place at the world series of poker and used poker hands to teach important innovation lessons. So when I saw Annie, one of the few women who were even competing in the tournament, keep winning, keep being the only woman at one final table after another, and kee...
May 20, 2019•1 hr 8 min•Season 1Ep. 10
This week I sat down with Sally Helgesen. Sally is one of the premier experts on women’s leadership. She has been a best-selling author, speaker and leadership coach for thirty years. Her mission has always been to help women recognize, articulate and act on their greatest strengths. Her latest book is called How Women Rise and it explains how the behaviors that served you so well at the beginning of your career, that got you promoted, are many times the same behaviors that keep you from big lea...
May 13, 2019•53 min•Season 1Ep. 9
This week I sat down with Amy Morin, a psychotherapist turned “accidental” author. You’re going to hear Amy share her very moving, personal story, but I just wanted to brag on her for a second. Amy gave one of the most popular TEDx talks of all time—The Secret of Becoming Mentally Strong. It’s been viewed more than 8 million times. She’s a regular columnist for Forbes, Inc., and Psychology Today and a parenting expert for Verywell. Her articles reach more than 2 million readers every month. And ...
May 06, 2019•56 min•Season 1Ep. 8
This week I spoke with Brad Staats, a professor at the UNC Business School and author of Never Stop Learning: Stay Relevant, Reinvent Yourself, and Thrive. Brad also works with companies around the world to develop their learning and analytics strategies. He has won numerous teaching and research awards, including an award as one of the 40 most outstanding business-school professors under 40 in the world, and the Prize for best article in Harvard Business Review on leadership, and I learned abou...
Apr 29, 2019•1 hr 1 min•Season 1Ep. 7
