As one of the world’s leading experts on customer centricity, Peter Fader noticed that many businesses were making a critical mistake: they were treating all customers the same. Peter argues that customer centricity means focusing on the customers who matter most—those who are truly driving value for your company. His work is reshaping how businesses think about growth, loyalty, and strategy. In this episode, Dart and Peter talk about why not all customers are created equal, how to measure true ...
Jul 22, 2025•1 hr 16 min•Season 1Ep. 160
Ashley Whillans has spent years studying how time, money, and workplace culture shape our well-being. As a behavioral scientist at Harvard Business School, she’s found that time poverty is more than a personal stressor—it’s a leadership challenge, an organizational blind spot, and one of the biggest barriers to well-being at work. In this episode, Dart and Ashley talk about why traditional perks miss the point, why more control over your time can matter more than a raise, and what it looks like ...
Jul 15, 2025•1 hr 14 min•Season 1Ep. 159
Stephanie Reuss and Victoria Stuart noticed that companies were making big decisions about jobs, teams, and strategy without really knowing what people were doing. So they built Beamible, a platform that maps work at the task level. It helps organizations see what is working, what is slowing people down, and what actually creates value for the business. In this episode, Dart, Steph, and Vic talk about why visibility is the first step to meaningful change, how AI is transforming job design, and w...
Jul 08, 2025•1 hr 6 min•Season 1Ep. 158
Most of us don’t realize how much fear shapes how we live and show up at work. But Amon Woulfe sees it clearly. As the founder of 432Hz, he has spent over a decade helping leaders understand the deeper fears that silently drive behavior, limit growth, and erode connection. In this episode, Dart and Amon explore how fear shapes leadership, why change agents often burn out, and what it takes to shift from protection to presence. They also discuss the limits of personality tests, the illusion of co...
Jul 01, 2025•1 hr 6 min•Season 1Ep. 157
Michael Cholbi approaches work not just as a function of economics or management but as a deep philosophical question. He brings a rare lens to the topic, one that connects ancient wisdom, contemporary ethics, and the day-to-day experience of workers today. In this episode, Michael and Dart explore how work shapes us and how it might be reimagined to serve us better. From Plato and Marx to Bullshit Jobs , dignity to autonomy, they ask what makes work just, and whether companies are morally respo...
Jun 24, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 156
Anthea Roberts began her career in international law. But after years of studying global conflict and power, she realized the real problem wasn’t policy—it was perspective. People weren’t just disagreeing on solutions; they weren’t even seeing the same problems. This realization led Anthea to develop "Dragonfly Thinking," a framework designed to help individuals and organizations view challenges through multiple lenses. She is now creating AI tools to apply this methodology to real-world decisio...
Jun 17, 2025•1 hr 10 min•Season 1Ep. 155
Lisa Kay Solomon sees design everywhere—not just in products, but in conversations, strategies, systems, and futures. As a futurist and strategist, she has spent her career helping leaders and organizations think long-term, navigate uncertainty, and drive meaningful change through intentional design. In this episode, Lisa and Dart talk about how to lead with imagination in uncertain times, why good strategy needs emotional engagement, and how design can be a form of applied hope. They also explo...
Jun 10, 2025•1 hr 1 min•Season 1Ep. 154
Nubank is the largest digital bank outside of Asia and one of the fastest-growing companies globally, recently surpassing 119 million customers across Brazil, Mexico, and Colombia. Much of that growth has been fueled by an obsessive focus on customer experience. Now, Suzana Kubric and Jessica Matsumoto are bringing that same mindset to employees. In this episode, Dart talks with Suzana and Jessica about what it means to design HR as a product, why Nubank brought in PMs and designers from other d...
Jun 03, 2025•1 hr 8 min•Season 1Ep. 153
If work is a product, and employees are customers of that product, then every company is a multi-sided business, one that must serve both consumers and workers. According to platform economist Andrei Hagiu, how companies design that experience, how they structure control, pricing, and participation, matters more than we realize. He has spent his career studying the world’s most influential platforms, from Uber and Airbnb to Apple and Amazon. In this episode, Dart and Andrei explore what platform...
May 27, 2025•1 hr•Season 1Ep. 154
At its best, work is co-created. It’s not something companies hand out—it’s something employees help build by showing up fully and taking risks. But that kind of courage requires something we don’t talk about enough: audacity. Anne Marie Anderson has built her career on it. She’s worked in 20 countries, broken ground as one of ESPN’s first female sideline reporters, and navigated some of the most high-stakes environments in sports broadcasting. For Anne, audacity isn’t about fearlessness—it’s ab...
May 20, 2025•1 hr 1 min•Season 1Ep. 153
When we talk about what makes a great leader, we tend to focus on confidence, decisiveness, and maybe even charisma. Less often do we talk about humility. And yet, humility, according to psychologist Dr. Simon Moss, may be the trait that unlocks the most growth, resilience, collaboration, and trust. In this episode, Dart and Simon talk about why humility isn’t the opposite of confidence, how future clarity increases self-awareness, and how organizations can be structured to reward groundedness i...
May 13, 2025•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 152
Oscar Trimboli has spent his life helping people hear what’s not being said. As a listening expert and advisor to some of the world’s largest companies, he’s discovered a surprising truth: most of us only catch a fraction of what’s being communicated. We hear the words, but miss the silences, emotion, and meaning beneath them. In this episode, Dart and Oscar explore the five levels of listening, what it takes to make someone feel truly seen, and how listening can be taught, measured, and embedde...
May 06, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 151
What do the drafters of the U.S. Constitution, 19th-century industrialists, and a modern defense contractor have in common? According to economic sociologist Joseph Blasi, they all believed in one powerful idea: that democracy itself depends on ownership, and that ownership should be broadly shared. He argues that if we want work to truly work for humans, we need to think beyond job design to a more fundamental question: Who owns the value that work creates? In this episode, Dart and Joe tell th...
Apr 29, 2025•1 hr 10 min•Season 1Ep. 150
From an early age, John Truby knew that stories are not just something that happens on a page. Story is all around us. It structures how we interpret events, and even how we decide how to live. For John, story forms explain the way the world works. John is a screenwriter and the founder and director of Truby’s Writers Studio in Los Angeles, where he teaches novelists, screenwriters and TV writers the deep secrets of what makes a great story. His students have generated more than fifteen billion ...
Apr 22, 2025•1 hr 7 min
As a journalist, Nick Romeo has interviewed people doing remarkable things, from running worker-owned companies to redesigning gig work as public infrastructure. These experiences shaped his new book, The Alternative: How to Build a Just Economy , and led him to one big insight: a better economy isn’t just possible—it’s already here. In this episode, Nick and Dart talk about the difference between market wages and living wages, why mainstream economics underestimates people, and how everything f...
Apr 15, 2025•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 149
For centuries, the work ethic was used to justify inequality, but it also fueled a powerful movement for justice. In the final part of this series, Elizabeth Anderson and Dart Lindsley explore the progressive work ethic, a vision of labor rooted in dignity, equality, and shared prosperity. They trace how thinkers like Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill, the Ricardian Socialists, and Karl Marx inspired reforms in education, labor rights, and social insurance, laying the foundation for social democracy....
Apr 08, 2025•1 hr 18 min•Season 1Ep. 148
The work ethic began as a religious principle before evolving into an economic theory. But by the 18th and 19th centuries, it had taken on a new role: a justification for social inequality. Thinkers like Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill saw work as a path to dignity and opportunity, while economists like Thomas Malthus and Nassau Senior argued that keeping wages low and limiting aid would encourage self-reliance. This perspective had real consequences, especially during the Irish Potato Famine, w...
Apr 01, 2025•53 min•Season 1Ep. 147
Elizabeth Anderson is one of today’s leading political philosophers and has spent years studying how the work ethic shapes our economy, society, and politics. In her latest book, Hijacked , she explores how hard work, a principle originally intended to advance the virtue of helping others, has been used by parts of society in ways that harm workers. This is the first of a three-part series tracing the history of the work ethic, from its religious roots in Martin Luther and the Reformation to its...
Mar 25, 2025•57 min•Season 1Ep. 146
Luke O’Mahoney is one of the leaders of the movement to reframe work as a product that every company sells to employees. In particular, Luke has gone deep into the implications of recognizing work as a subscription product, and brings an absolute wealth of ideas to bear on how to create the kind of work experience product that employees want to buy every day. People don't stay in jobs because of free snacks, ping pong tables, or flashy recruiting campaigns. They stay because work works for them ...
Mar 18, 2025•1 hr 14 min•Season 1Ep. 145
This is the third in a series of episodes with world-leading product management experts about how we might build product management best practices into team leadership. Alex Komoroske spent years as either a Product Manager or Director of Product Management for platforms that most of us use every day: Chrome, Google Maps, Google Earth, and others. He then went on to lead corporate strategy at Stripe, another platform \most of us use every day. While at Google, Alex wrote an internal how-to calle...
Mar 11, 2025•57 min•Season 1Ep. 144
Most employees need some form of support to thrive at work, whether it’s flexible hours to care for a loved one, mental health resources, or a quieter space to focus. But asking for help can feel risky. That silence holds people back and costs companies more than they realize. Charlotte Dales is trying to fix that. As the co-founder and CEO of Inclusively, Charlotte is building a platform that helps employees easily and privately access the support they need to do their best work. From mental he...
Mar 04, 2025•54 min•Season 1Ep. 143
When Josh Fryday’s wife was evacuated from Japan after the 2011 Japan disaster, he stayed behind. As a Navy officer, he joined Operation Tomodachi, one of the largest humanitarian relief efforts in history. Working alongside people who thought differently, he learned that service brings people together around a common mission to accomplish amazing things. Now, as California’s first-ever Secretary of Service, Josh is helping build the largest state-run service corps in the U.S. Through programs l...
Feb 25, 2025•55 min•Season 1Ep. 142
At eight years old, Kate Griggs sat in a parent-teacher meeting and heard the words, “She’s not very bright.” The school had already written her off. But she wasn’t struggling because she lacked intelligence. She was struggling because the system wasn’t designed for the way she thinks. Today, she’s proving that dyslexia isn’t a disadvantage, but a superpower that the world is only beginning to understand. As the founder of Made By Dyslexia, Kate is leading a global movement to challenge outdated...
Feb 18, 2025•1 hr 2 min•Season 1Ep. 141
With a career in a stable industry and a solid plan for retirement, Matthew Rutledge’s father expected to retire on his own terms. But when he was suddenly laid off at 59, the financial impact was crushing. Watching his father struggle to bounce back at that stage of life made Matt realize how fragile retirement security really is, even for those who plan ahead. Now, he researches why millions of people are working longer but still struggling to retire and what we can do to fix it. Matthew Rutle...
Feb 11, 2025•1 hr 11 min•Season 1Ep. 140
Howard Behar barely graduated high school and spent just two years in community college. Yet, he became a key leader at Starbucks soon after joining the company. From the start, he saw that Starbucks was not just about coffee but about people. With no formal business degree or global experience, he relied on persistence and a deep belief in servant leadership to guide him. He rose to president of Starbucks International and helped transform the brand from a small regional chain into a global pow...
Feb 04, 2025•1 hr 17 min•Season 1Ep. 139
For many people, the mention of government work conjures images of endless red tape and bureaucracy. In reality, though, federal employees are doing life-changing work every day. They fight hurricanes, advance cutting-edge research, protect children, and manage millions of acres of public lands. But with leadership turnover, political transitions, and cultural challenges, the system often struggles to attract and retain the talent it needs. Cameron Kober is working to change that. Cameron Kober ...
Jan 28, 2025•52 min•Season 1Ep. 138
Sam Schlimper is the Managing Director at Randstad, the largest HR service provider in the world. Largely anchored in talent acquisition, she has over two decades of experience working with global organizations to link human potential, AI, and measurable outcomes. Over the years, Sam has witnessed countless leaders struggle with a trade-off mindset, treating business success as a zero-sum game. Determined to change this, she advocates for an alternative system where all stakeholders thrive—provi...
Jan 21, 2025•51 min•Season 1Ep. 137
As co-founder of The Design Gym consultancy, Andy Hagerman has spent over a decade tackling the challenge of aligning employee needs with business strategy—an issue that can make or break organizational success. Working with clients like Marriott, Cisco, HP, and Kellogg’s, he has honed his craft by addressing complex organizational needs. In this episode, Andy unpacks a large case study with a major retailer, revealing how understanding the employee experience can create new opportunities for bo...
Jan 14, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 136
Companies have long treated employees like children, micromanaging their tasks and monitoring every move, hoping to boost productivity. The problem is that this approach undermines trust and stifles innovation, parenting employees instead of supporting them. Sammy Burt, author of What Is a Grown-Up Anyway , is working to shift this mindset. She helps organizations embrace a “grown-up” approach that fosters autonomy, confidence, and more empowered, innovative workplaces— treating employees as the...
Jan 07, 2025•51 min•Season 1Ep. 135
Award-winning entrepreneur and author Robert Glazer has identified a core issue in today’s companies: the traditional “growth-at-all-costs” mindset is unsustainable. After a decade of relentless expansion, many companies are struggling to grow without burning out their employees along the way. Robert believes there is a better way—one that brings teams along on the growth journey to benefit employees and the company alike. Robert Glazer is an award-winning executive, speaker, author, and the Fou...
Dec 31, 2024•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 134
