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Apr 20
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1147: How to Optimize Your Space to Thrive with Leidy Klotz

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Leidy Klotz shares simple shifts for creating more spaces that improve well-being.

You’ll Learn

  1. The three core needs that well-designed spaces meet
  2. How to feel in control of spaces you can’t control
  3. How to harness the “home turf” advantage anywhere

About Leidy

Leidy Klotz is a behavioral scientist and engineering professor at the University of Virginia who studies how and why humans design. He has written for the Washington Post, Fast Company, Scientific American, and Harvard Business Review; has published his work in top journals like Nature and Science; and has been interviewed on Hidden Brain, Freakonomics, Mindscape, and The Atlantic’s How to Build a Happy Life. Klotz has advised clients ranging from the Departments of Energy and Homeland Security to CapitalOne and Amazon.

Resources Mentioned

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Leidy Klotz Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Leidy, welcome back!

Leidy Klotz
Thanks, Pete. It’s great to be here.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to talk about your latest work, In A Good Place. Last time, we were talking about subtraction and how that can enrich our lives. Now we’re talking about locations. Could you kick us off with a particularly surprising or fascinating discovery you’ve made about this stuff?

Leidy Klotz
One of the things, when I was going through the research for location, that just struck me was there’s a study of nursing home residents, and they found that in the study that they did, one group of residents was able to, like, customize their space and another group was not.

And then they came back to the people 18 months later, and of the people who couldn’t customize their space, they were 50% more likely to be dead. Like, we all know that space is important, right? But the degree to which it was important in that case was really striking to me.

Pete Mockaits
Yeah. Well, that’s so fascinating and alarming. And what’s interesting is that customizing your space, boy, it’s almost like that’s hitting multiple key human needs all at once, you know? Like, autonomy, agency control, as well as, like, beauty and mobility.

Leidy Klotz
Growth and, like, learning, right? You’re learning how you like it. You’re learning that you can move things around in the world. So, yeah, all of those things. I think that probably with the nursing home study, a lot of it had to do with kind of agency and feeling like you still have a say in the world around you. But, yeah, so it’s not a trivial thing to be able to interact with your surroundings.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, and part of me is wondering, and I’m sure we’ll get here, many of us have the ability to customize our space, but maybe we haven’t thought to bother much. Can you make the case? So if we’re not in nursing homes, we’re living our lives in homes whether owned or rented, as well as workplaces, offices, what’s kind of at stake with us thoughtfully optimizing these spaces versus just going with the flow?

Leidy Klotz
Yeah, I think it really comes down to whether or not our core psychological needs are met. And like you said, these core psychological needs, basically agency, growth or competence, and connection. And these are all things, right, that we hope we get at work and everywhere else.

And we think about them as important, but we often think about them in terms of, you know, tasks that we’re doing. The original way that we met these needs was through our interactions with our surroundings, right?

If you think back to our ancestors trying to survive against predators and the elements, the ones that were compelled to shape their surroundings to provide shelter, the ones that were compelled to figure out how their surroundings work, were more likely to survive and become us.

So these are like long-standing, deep-rooted psychological needs that we have, and we can meet them in other ways, not just in our surroundings, but we still can meet them right there in our surroundings. So that’s the case. It’s like here’s this amazing opportunity that we have all around us that we can take advantage of to thrive.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, let’s talk about these three needs. This reminds me of self-determination theory. I’ve heard of different adjectives used for these three components. Tasha Eurich talked about some of this in her book Shatterproof, which was rather potent. So can you expand on these?

Leidy Klotz
Yeah, and I’m so glad you brought up self-determination theory. Sometimes people don’t want to know the theory. The theory is really important here because this isn’t just Leidy’s research figuring this out. This is decades of people studying this across different contexts in different cultures. And self-determination theory is, like, the best understanding of motivation that we have and agency.

So this is our ability to have a say in our surroundings, so the ability to do something about the world around us, that’s agency. Competence is actually doing it, right? So competence is showing other people that we can affect change in the world around us or that we can interact with the world around us.

And then connection is maybe the easiest one to understand, you know, connecting with other people, but also just connecting with something bigger than ourselves. And that’s, you know, spaces are part of that.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, could you tell us a story of someone in a professional context who had an okay space, but they thoughtfully put some effort into making it extra awesome and what happened for him?

Leidy Klotz
I’ll give you an extreme story. So Nelson Mandela, we know that he was imprisoned on Robben Island. And one of the things that I learned he did there, obviously, you’re incredibly constrained with your agency when you’re imprisoned.

But when he was in prison, he found a space on the roof that was bathed all day in sunlight, he wrote. And he negotiated with the guards to be able to have a garden up there and then go up and tend to the garden.

And obviously, Mandela is one of these people who you think of never getting rid of his agency no matter what, right? Even when he was in prison, he was still campaigning and getting information out, but he also exercised the agency in his surroundings, right?

And I think we’re not, hopefully, imprisoned but when you find your agency being constrained in one way, like, I’m like everybody else. I’m in an office. I can’t just go tell my boss that I want a different office or that I want my space renovated overnight.

But if I’m frustrated by that, I can realize it and then find adjacent freedoms, right? I can go work somewhere else if it’s nice outside, or I can move the arrangement of my desk to face the window. And now, all of a sudden, I’m taking back control in that environment.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, can you share with us, what are some key shifts that can make a boatload of difference in our spaces?

Leidy Klotz
For me, the biggest one is, and this seems to resonate with people when I talk about it, is to make use of the spaces that we have available to ourselves, right? I’ll use myself again because this is a self-depreciating example.

I live in a house, I could work anywhere in that house, and I find myself sitting in the same chair and typing on my computer no matter what the task is, right? But if I think about it, I’m like, “Well, I could move over to this desk that’s facing the window, and write on a notebook when I need more creative ideas.”

I could shift my seating based on, you know, how my body feels. I could move throughout the day based on how the light’s moving. So there’s this example where I have all this space available to me, and just by my tried and true habits, I’m only using a small slice of it. And I think that’s a principle that can help everybody.

And we immediately jump to, “Okay, how do I change this space? How do I renovate this space?” And before we’ve thought about like, “Well, here are all the spaces where I could go. Let me make use of those before I start changing things.”

Pete Mockaitis
You know, I like that a lot. It’s funny, I have a camping chair that has a little bit of a recline and a swing, a rocking to it. But what’s really fun about it is, sure enough, you can put that anywhere in terms of, like, a park, by a window, in different zones of a backyard or front yard.

And I don’t often think that I have that option available to me. Although, there was a season in which it just lived in my trunk, and from time to time I was like, “You know what, I’m going to do my work over here now because I can.” And it’s a good feeling.

Leidy Klotz
Yeah, yeah, it’s good, because you’re comfortable, but also you made it, right? Like, you’re making the world how you want it to be. So I love that story because it’s very small, but you’re making your space in all these different places.

Pete Mockaitis
And sometimes, I’ve also had the experience, I’m thinking about, I’m just tidying up an area that’s long been untidy, and it really does feel like it’s meeting deep psychological needs because it’s, like, I’m finding like a deep sigh of rightness and peace.

And I’m not like a neat freak by any means. My wife and others can attest to this. And yet, when I go there, it’s often I’m surprised, like profoundly edifying. And I think Marie Kondo, she wrote a book with title, right, “The Life-changing Power, Magic of Tidying Up.”

Leidy Klotz
Yep, “The Life-Changing Magic.”

Pete Mockaitis
So, yeah, can you speak to this notion?

Leidy Klotz
There’s a lot going on there, but I think the number one thing is probably back to this, like, agency and competence, right? That psychologists, and I’m not a psychologist, but like one of the things that they’ll prescribe for depressed people is to say, like, “Hey, you just reorganize a room,” or, “Tidy up a room.”

And it’s not necessarily that the tidy room makes you less depressed. It’s that the act of feeling like you have control over some aspect of your life starts to make you feel better. And then, hopefully, that feeds on itself, so you feel you have control in tidying.

And then you realize, “Okay, I have control in these other ways,” and then you start to kind of get yourself back. So that’s probably the main thing that’s happening there. I also think that there’s some small bits and pieces.

You know, a tidy space is going to have less distraction, less cognitive load on you so you’re not coming in every time even if you’re not noticing. In my house, it’s shin guards and boxer briefs strewn about.

And even if you’re not noticing them, they’re, like, taxing you a little bit mentally. But the main thing is just, “Hey, I can do something about my situation.”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Okay, so first point, principle, just use all the space available to us. We might just totally be forgetting, “Oh, yeah, I have all these options available, and I just never use them.” Where do we go from there?

Leidy Klotz
Well, and also I’ll just give one more. At work, right? Like, so many of our offices are designed to, you know, there’s your office or wherever you’re supposed to sit, but then there’s all these spaces that are meant for other things. And I think that, you know, we’re not fully taking advantage of those a lot of times.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, those architects and contractors were paid a pretty penny to get those in there and we’re not using them.

Leidy Klotz
And your bosses are thinking about it, right? They’re like, “How do we make this space so that people like it?” And yet, we never get past that barrier of, “No, you can actually use it.” Even something as simple as the conference room, right?

Like, every time you go into the conference room, technically, you could set it up differently for the meeting at hand. And yet, how often does that happen? Usually, you’re just accepting it the way that it should be.

But if you showed up 15 minutes early and set that conference room up, you’re getting a hit of agency, plus you can make sure that you’re sitting next to the people that it’s important to sit next to in the meeting. So there’s just a lot there.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Well, while I’m visualizing a conference room, what are some little tweaks that can enhance my experience of being in that conference room?

Leidy Klotz
Well, I mean, I think like there’s all the power dynamics stuff, you know? But I think everybody knows the kind of, “Put yourself in the position of power, and sit at the head of the table.” And I think most of what we’re trying to do in a conference room is, typically, kind of put people on equal footing.

And so, say you’re a boss, and you want to get people’s input in the meeting, don’t sit at the head of the table and maybe set up the room so that it kind of makes everybody feel like they’re sitting around a campfire where we’re all kind of equal. And then you will be more likely to get that input from people, right?

The conference room can be an example of this principle where, like, you’re saying one thing, and the space is saying something totally different. You’re saying, “Oh, we want all your input. It really matters.” And then you march in, sit at the head of the table, everybody else is just staring at you, and you control the slides. And do you really want people’s input? So I think that is one example.

Pete Mockaitis
So, Leidy, I should stop making every other seat in the conference room way shorter than my own? Because that’s what I do every time I go into a meeting. I should stop doing that?

Leidy Klotz
That trick is so hilarious. I mean, do it if you want to. It just depends. So it’s, like, move among the spaces we have access to. I think there’s another principle that’s, like, align the space with your goals. And sometimes the goal in the conference room is to be dominant.

Sometimes the goal in the conference room, hopefully, more often, is to have an exchange that helps everybody’s ideas move forward and get better. And so thinking about what those goals are and then lining the space up to suit it.

One of my favorite studies that’s, like, along these lines, there’s a study of negotiations and they wanted to see like Home Field versus Away turf negotiating. And this is, we know that location matters in negotiations. Diplomats will negotiate the location before they negotiate the treaty.

But the study was brilliant in its simplicity. All they did, they had two groups, the control and experimental group. In one group, they had sit in a room for 20 minutes, and then they had the other group come into that room to negotiate.

And the group that had been in the room for 20 minutes achieved better outcomes in the negotiations. That’s something that anybody can do. You can show up 20 minutes early for the meeting and just feel more at home. And, apparently, that is going to help. So, yeah, it’s powerful.

Pete Mockaitis
I have had that experience when I’m doing keynote speeches. It feels very nice to get into the room early, not just for the sound check, you know, AV stuff, all that, but even before those people are there, and to just walk through the whole space, and the seats, and just behold that large, empty space, and to feel like it is mine.

I don’t have any hard scientific evidence on it, but I really do feel more comfortable, confident, and ready to own the stage and the whole auditorium because it’s, like, “Oh, well, you are my guests because I was here first.”

Leidy Klotz
Yeah, no, that’s a great example. And you’ve probably done more of these than I have, but if I can’t do that, if I can’t have enough time to, like, totally take in the space, I’d rather be dropped in right at the end.

The worst situation is when you’re there for, like, 30 minutes and you’re watching the person before you, and you’re sitting in the audience and you don’t have enough time to kind of, like, fully appreciate the space, and then you have to run and jump up on the stage.

So the other option, I call it just kind of getting off the bus and play. Like, you go to the green room and then you just come out on the stage, and you know you’ve done your talk so many times that then you’re not, like, kind of inundated by these external forces in the space.

There’s science here. Probably the best science for yours and getting acclimated is, I mean, it’s not a scientific study, but all these sports teams, right? Their whole profession and livelihood and success depends on winning or losing. And they will all get there at least a day before the game and do a walkthrough on the court and try to make it as familiar as possible.

And then, on the other side, where if you don’t have time to kind of fully take it in, try to avoid the awkwardness of what’s happening when you come into a new space, is you’re trying to figure out the new space, right? Your brain is going to that.

And our brains have limited resources. And if our brain is trying to figure out the space while trying to think about how to deliver a keynote, it’s not going to go well. And so we want to not have the space taxing our mental resources when our job is to connect with other people, whether it’s from the stage or whether it’s in a conference room.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. What else should we be thinking about here?

Leidy Klotz
Growth. I think that growth or competence. So we’ve talked a little about agency and then connection. But growth is, like, we grow from interacting with our spaces. We learn. We were talking about kids earlier.

When you watch kids, as a parent, one of the most freeing things was to realize how much they were learning from the world around them, because I was worried that, “Okay, I’m going to have to describe to them how all this stuff works,” right? They just watch and they watch you, and then they interact with the world.

And so, maybe kids playing with a sand castle on the beach seems like they’re innately drawn to it. But, like, when my daughter is building a drip castle, for example, she’s learning about the fluid mechanics of the drip of the water.

She’s learning about material properties of sand and water mixed together. She’s learning about herself, right? She’s learning that, you know, if there’s some adversity, like her brother knocks down the castle, she can build it back and she’s going to feel good from overcoming that adversity. So this is, like, how we learn by interacting with the world and seeing what happens.

And I think we talked about screens last time. I think one of my favorite stories was yours, talking about subtracting TVs from the bedroom. And you can go back and listen to the subtract episode about why you would want to do that.

But so much of our life is on screens now which is convenient in a lot of ways, but when you’re navigating with your phone, for example, you’re not really taking in the city the same way you would be if you were trying to find it based on street addresses or just trying to walk based on directions that somebody gave you. And so we’ve engineered out a way that we might, otherwise, kind of learn about the world around us.

And I get that that’s probably an example where I’ll keep using my Google Maps because I want to just get there as quickly as possible. That’s convenient. But we’re also, then, engineering out these kind of opportunities to stretch our brains, and to work that learning muscle. And so I think growth through our spaces is something that we need to pay attention to.

Pete Mockaitis
So just the navigation in and of itself. What are some other ways we grow by interacting with our spaces?

Leidy Klotz
There’s the navigation. There’s the renovations that you talked about before, where if you are kind of setting up your space, and you’re realizing that, “Okay, that doesn’t work. I don’t like it, and I can change it back.” So now you’re learning things that you like and don’t like, but you’re also learning about yourself and that you can do these things.

Pete Mockaitis
You know, I’m thinking a little bit back to my conversation with BJ Fogg on the show, and we’re talking about making things easier for behavior design. Like, if we make something easier, we’ll do more of it. And I notice, it’s so funny, in my office, which I really love, I found myself having a little bit of resistance to just going down and sitting in the chair and doing the work, even though, “Hey, I’ve got a great monitor. I’ve got a sit-stand desk.” It’s so good.

It’s like, “What’s the deal? This should be like the top place I want to sit and do work, instead of over on the couch on my sort of smaller screen laptop situation.” And I realized that my wheeling office chair, you know, the wheels on it, were getting kind of stuck in the carpet a bit, and so it requires a little bit of, “Ugh!” like, awkward effort to shimmy it out of the ruts to get into where I want.

Well, it’s funny because it’s a visceral thing. It’s a little thing, and yet, it’s something that can pass right through my conscious awareness, but have these associations. And so I said, “Well, by golly, I got to get a mat.”

And so I did, I got the mat. And now there is less resistance. And so I’m more likely to get in my battle station with all the goodies and the big monitors because, “Oh, there was a tiny thing missing, a mat under the rolling chair.”

Leidy Klotz
I’m so glad I couldn’t think of a story and you chimed in with yours that was much better than what I would have said. You’re also illustrating this beautiful concept of, like, how these principles that were originally physical principles.

Like, friction, right? How many people are talking about friction in the workplace when they’re talking about task completion and like removing friction or adding friction. You, literally, identified physical friction on the chair as the thing. So I think, yeah, and that’s a great tip that was one of the other ones is just like kind of removing constraints, right?

Like, thinking about your space and what are the constraints that are holding you back in that space. And that’s something. If you walk into the office on Monday morning, whether you’re an employee or the boss, you will find things that are constraining you that you can then remove immediately. In your case, you removed the friction and make your space better. That’s a beautiful example.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Well, I like that a lot. And so now I’m thinking about, you know, it could be the temperature, it’s like, “Can I adjust that, or can I hold a cold bottle of water, or, like, have a little hot pad under my butt?” Or it could be the lighting, the temperature, the sound with noise canceling headphones and/or earplugs. What are some other constraints that show up that we might want to do something about?

Leidy Klotz
I think there are unwritten constraints, too, where you kind of assume that this space is for that thing, and then you don’t question it. This is probably less about in your home, but more at the office. Like my editor actually, she had a space in her office that was supposed to be a flex space. It was a super nice flex space.

But the problem was there was, like, an executive in her office who would use it periodically. And it wasn’t like all the time, but it was enough that people were like, “Is that actually flexible space or am I going to…is the exec going to think that I’m trampling on their territory or invading their territory?”

And so I think if you’re in a position where you can articulate to people, like, “These spaces are for these things, and we really want you to use them,” but then also, if you’re willing to experiment yourself and kind of like try things out in your office, then go use spaces for different things and to be a leader, right? If there’s a room, a conference room, or a flex space that’s never being used, try using it and see what happens.

So that one is more about like just having more clear definitions about what can be done in the spaces and not assuming. So the constraint there is in our heads.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, certainly. Or, we just have these assumptions, like, “Well, the conference room is for conferencing, and so it would not be appropriate for me as an individual solo person to get up in there.” It’s like, “Well, that may or may not be true based upon the needs of the organization and the space.”

Leidy Klotz
Exactly, yeah. And, I mean, there’s all this work trying to make offices more flexible and suitable for different tasks. And again, part of that is in the physical world, but part of it is in our heads, right? Have we tried using it for the task and seeing how it works?

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Well, one thing that’s coming up a lot is in terms of like our own needs and desires and what works for us and customizing. I’m curious if you had any discoveries about, like, universal good things for a space in terms of is it light or nature? Or is there anything that just about all humans do better when these components are in the space or are not in the space?

Leidy Klotz
I have another example from my editor’s office. She’s going to have to listen to this podcast. But she said that they wanted to bring more nature in, so they put like AstroTurf on the steel columns to try to make it feel more natural.

But that’s not the kind of nature that’s helpful. So it’s less about, like, bringing nature inside, and more about trying to mimic the patterns that are found in nature. And one thing that’s in nature a lot is this kind of balance between order and complexity.

So there’s this classic interior design advice that’s, like, kind of layering the materials and textures and fabrics, but also having kind of, like, an underlying, “This is the idea.” And I think the kind of the way that that design advice has been backed into, and the way it works, and the reason it works is because we like being surrounded by things where there’s, by the natural world.

And in the natural world, there’s like, you know, a pine tree, the way it grows. It’ll grow in fractal patterns where little small pieces of the pine tree look very similar in terms of like the shape as the larger scale. And so there’s this regularity, but it gives rise to something that looks more complex.

And if you look at, like, a brick facade, for example, I mean, it’s the same thing. It’s this big, massive facade that you don’t pay much attention to and, generally, feels pretty natural and soothing, but there’s also an underlying pattern, whether it’s the bricks are staggered by one half on each level, or maybe one is stretched long ways and one is stretched short ways and then you keep repeating the pattern.

So there’s complexity but it’s resulting from a simple pattern. Is that too abstract or is that okay?

Pete Mockaitis
No, I hear you. And then I’m thinking about, I’m just looking at a bookshelf right now. And I had a buddy, once we were at a party. He was looking at the bookshelf, he said, “What’s up with women organizing their books by color?” which is a huge generalization. I’m sure men do it, too. But I thought it was kind of funny because both he and I have bookshelves and plenty of books and do not organized by color.

But yet, I got to say, when I was beholding this bookshelf, visually, it looked quite lovely. But if you can’t recall what a book spine looked like, you might have a harder time fishing it out of that bookshelf. But I think that speaks a bit to the pattern, is there is a certain order and beauty that is peaceful to having the books organized by color.

Leidy Klotz
Yeah, that’s interesting. That’s totally an example, right? You can see that this looks aesthetically pleasing and it’s because, “Okay, I see that there’s some logic here to the pattern.” And if you do it by a rainbow, then that’s something that’s actually found in nature. So that’s the kind of the deepest one.

I would say the other kind of general rules about what we like is we like where we’ve been. There’s this research on mirror exposure in the most extreme. The most interesting study, I think, is one of the original ones.

They put chicken eggs that hadn’t hatched yet and played music. And then when the eggs hatched, they had the ones that had heard the music and hatched chicks that hadn’t heard the music, and they put them in a pen and played music from one end. And the chicks that had heard the music went to the music.

So what’s happening, it’s like this demonstration of that, like, familiarity breeds liking. So if you’ve been surrounded by certain things throughout your life, you’re probably more likely to like them in the future. Like, I live in a house that has angled bedroom ceilings, a gravel driveway, and a kick wall for a soccer ball.

And that’s like some of the same features as the house I grew up in, right? And so the things that we’re kind of familiar are going to just take less cognitive effort and then we’re drawn to them as a result.

And then the last little piece is, this is, I think, the most freeing one, is that we’re also wired to like what we’ve chosen. So if you’ve picked the thing, like if you organized the books the way that you want to organize the books, Pete, don’t change it, right? Like, you are going to kind of justify it and like it because it’s you who did it.

And I think that’s as many kind of general rules as I think are worth thinking about when we’re thinking about our spaces.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, there can be a certain delight in that. And I think you maybe see this in maybe couples arguing about how to load the dishwasher. It’s, like, each way feels very right to each of them. And you can argue, I don’t know if dishwasher engineers would have a point of view on what’s optimal from a cleansing perspective.

But we can get really, really attached to how we’ve arranged things. And I guess, as you opened us up with everything, it could be life or death, potentially, in terms of the ability to be able to arrange things to our liking.

Leidy Klotz
Yeah, I mean, we’re laughing about, well, not laughing, but, the nursing home study is an extreme example. But in some of these studies of self-determination theory in the office and in large scale in, like, across different examples, they correlate agency, growth, and connection and, like, health outcomes. And there’s a correlation there, so it’s a big deal.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, is there anything we should talk about with regard to connection in our spaces?

Leidy Klotz
I think that we’ve talked a little bit about, like, home and away, right, and thinking about how the space is going to make you perform. Is it an away space? Is it a home space? I think, “How can you make it a good space for connecting?” is maybe something that we should just hammer home because, most of the time, what we want to do in the space is have meaningful interactions with the other people who are in it.

And so if you think about people coming to your office, you don’t want them maybe distracted by a mess in the space. And the mess could be, like, the mess that our parents talk about, but also it could be a mess where the space is just not easy to navigate, right? It’s hard for them to get around and, therefore, they’re worried about that, and, therefore, they’re not being able to focus on you.

So I think, you know, how do we make the space as kind of neutral as possible? And sometimes, I think, that’s, for me, the thing that works is, you know, I’ll go outside my house and then just open the door and say, “Okay, I’m coming into this as a visitor would and now I’ll start to notice some of the things,” and then I can remove them and make it so that my guest is able to connect with me and vice versa.

Pete Mockaitis
Very nice. Well, Leidy, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we hear about some of your favorite things?

Leidy Klotz
Just one really powerful thing, I guess, is that the space is a really awesome way to advertise your values, and it’s advertising that never turns off. We think about how we present ourselves with our clothes. We think about how we, like, articulate what’s meaningful to us. And yet, our surroundings are also sending messages about those things.

And so I’m not telling you what your values should be, obviously, but I’m saying your surroundings are a way to share those values. If you’re the company that says you care about employee input, and yet there’s cubicles for certain people and, like, nice executive offices around the outside, well, your space is saying something different than your mission statement. And it’s the same on an individual level.

So I would just say that this is an opportunity to, like, put your values into the world, and it’s an opportunity that never, never stops broadcasting once you’ve got it right. So just some motivation for people.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, now could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Leidy Klotz
One of my favorite quotes are different versions of that it’s less about what happens to you, and more about how you react to it. I guess a Viktor Frankl version of that most recently about life, like, it all being in the space between the stimulus and the reaction. But I really like those.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite book?

Leidy Klotz
The Power of Moments by Chip and Dan Heath.

Pete Mockaitis
And is there a key nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with people, they quote it back to you often?

Leidy Klotz
I think the biggest key nugget is that people find it empowering to take advantage of the spaces to which they have access. And I think people realize that they do, in fact, have more options than they thought.

Pete Mockaitis
And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Leidy Klotz
LeidyKlotz.com, and then the book In a Good Place is available wherever you buy books. All the good stuff is in the book, but if you want to learn more about me, I’m easy to find on the internet.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Leidy Klotz
Notice. So take in the spaces around you and just pay attention to how they’re affecting you, and get some joy out of them, too. There’s beauty in the world around us, and something as simple as just the way the light reflects off the wall in different times of the day can be a source of joy. And that’s something that our screens, fundamentally, can’t give us. So notice and enjoy.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Leidy, thank you.

Leidy Klotz
Thanks, Pete.

Mar 30
0

1141: How to Stop Burnout Before It Starts with Guy Winch

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Guy Winch shares the simple strategies for taking back control of your mind, energy, and attention from work.

You’ll Learn

  1. How to stop rumination loops
  2. The trick to dealing with difficult situations beyond your control
  3. The overlooked key to build into your weekly schedule

About Guy

Guy Winch Ph.D. is an internationally renowned psychologist who advocates for integrating the science of emotional health into our daily lives. His science based self-help books have been translated into 30 languages and his 3 viral TED Talks have garnered over 35 million views. 

He advises start-ups in the mental health space, worked with the US and UK governments, and has created emotional health programs for fortune 500 companies. His work has been featured in the NY Times, WSJ, the Boston Globe, CNN, Time, Psychology Today, and other major outlets. He is the co-host of the Ambie Nominated Dear Therapists podcast. He lives and maintains a private practice in Manhattan.

Resources Mentioned

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Guy Winch Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Guy, welcome!

Guy Winch
Thank you for having me.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to chat about Mind Over Grind. Could you kick us off with your dramatic story about being stuck in an elevator?

Guy Winch
Yes. So this is actually a story of how I learned, or figured out, rather, that I had burnout because I was a year in to my career, one year. So it’s not exactly what you tend to think of when you think about burnout. But it occurred to me when I was, that was a Friday night, I was coming back from work. I was in the elevator with a neighbor and the elevator stalled and shuddered and just stopped between floors.

And the neighbor actually happened to be a physician in an ER, used to emergencies, one would think, started hitting all the buttons, pounding on the door, and going, “This is my nightmare! This is my nightmare!” And I was so depleted, what came out of my mouth is I just looked at him, and I said, “And this is my nightmare.” And it was such a cruel, unempathetic thing to say.

I am a psychologist, I do know the right thing to say, “Here’s a person in distress. This is literally what I trained for,” and that’s what came out of my mouth. And so when you act out of character in a very substantial way, at least for me, you ask yourself, “What’s going on? Why would I do something like that?” And then when I got home, I realized, “Wow, I am just so drained. I feel like I’ve been doing this for 50 years. I just had nothing left.”

And I realized, “Wow, I’m a year in. That is a major problem.” And the thing is, you don’t learn about burnout in graduate school. At least I didn’t. You know, the PhD never mentioned. So it’s not as if it was something I was alerted to. It just wasn’t something that occurred to me. But that’s what was going on. I was totally burnt out.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s a nice alert right there. So when we act out of character in kind of a snippy, snappy, unkind, impatient sort of a way, that could be a clue, “Oh, I’m not a jerk. Well, maybe. Maybe I am.”

Guy Winch
No, you qualified with the out of character part when you said that.

Pete Mockaitis
Out of character, right. So that could well be an indicator, a little sign, “Hmm, there may be burnout afoot here.”

Guy Winch
Burnout, you might be depressed, but there’s something going on, is the thing. Something is going on. If it’s that uncharacteristic for you, you have to ask yourself, “What’s happening?”

Pete Mockaitis
Well, tell us, that’s one sort of dramatic illustration, like, “Oh, something’s going on here.” Could you give us a couple other signs that, “Oh, maybe I need to pay attention here”?

Guy Winch
Well, with burnout, I mean, the primary symptom is exhaustion. And it’s the kind of bone-tired, this kind of deep feeling of exhaustion that, you know, it’s not a good night’s sleep will remedy that. Neither will a good weekend remedy that. It feels like every day is a slog.

You feel very jaded about what you’re doing. You don’t know if you’re doing a good job. You don’t necessarily care all that much anymore. And you feel so overloaded that every new thing that comes down the pike, every new, like, for me, it was like, I was, to the point where any new request someone, you know, I hadn’t seen for a while, “Oh, do you have time for a session?” I would get so angry or resentful.

Like, “No, I don’t. Just leave me alone. I’m doing enough.” It was that kind of feeling of like, I am taxed beyond what I have and I can’t. But you have to keep going. So you keep going, there’s this kind of numbness that develops.

And it impacts you inside the workplace and without. It’s not as if you can’t be burnt out, totally burnt out at work and be absolutely jovial at home. That doesn’t happen. So it’s impacting you in every area of your life.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, we’re going to dig into a lot of potential interventions, strategies, things you can do. But maybe, first, could you share with us any particularly surprising discoveries that you’ve made in the world of burnout that maybe a lot of folks haven’t heard?

Guy Winch
Well, one thing that’s interesting to me, and this is part of what I got when I decided to actually really start to look into this more seriously. I mean, obviously from year one in my career, I was alerted. But the pandemic was an interesting time because the pandemic, especially the shutdowns that happened at the beginning, there was a moment for emotional health in the workplace.

Like, all the companies were like, “Oh, my goodness, we’re so worried about now everyone’s virtual.” I was giving like, I don’t know, like 15, 20 talks a week to companies about how to maintain emotional health at work in teams when you’re all virtual. All the companies were flooding, their resource pages were here, resources and help, and everyone was aware.

And the discussion of work-life balance came into the picture. People were going on job interviews and asking, “What’s the work-life balance in this company?” Nobody would have dared ask that before. It’s like, “Why? Are you planning to slack off? That’s not necessarily making us want to hire you.” But, suddenly, that became legit. So awareness went up.

Companies were putting a lot of resources into it. And individual workers, both with quiet quitting and their own prioritizing, were trying to do something about work-life balance. And yet, as that was happening, as that moment was happening, work stress and burnout were peaking and have remained at all-time highs in the workplace. And that’s a paradox.

How is it everyone is so aware, everyone on both ends, both the employees and the employers, are trying to do something about it, and it keeps going up? That’s the thing. And so what got me interested is that. And what I found and why I wrote my book, Mind Over Grind, is that the answer is that it works a little bit like a pinball machine.

The work stress shoots out, but then it starts dinging around in your life within and outside of work. And so it makes it harder to, you know, you get home, you’re more likely to have a conflict with your partner, which is going to make you more stressed the next day, which is going to make you come home and ruminate about the bad things that happen, which is going to impair your sleep, which is going to make you more susceptible and more irritable, so more bad things will happen.

It just keeps digging around back and forth. And the ball of stress, as it were, remains in play for much, much longer, and that’s why the burnout is happening and the stress is so high, because it’s escaped the workplace. It’s now operating outside the workplace in our lives in all kinds of ways, some of which we’re aware of, many of which we’re not. And that’s why things keep getting bad, because unless we turn off all those dingers, not just at work, then it will remain problematic.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s a spooky, scary picture there in terms of the cascade, the doom loop that one thing begets another and another and another, like an avalanche, snowball going downhill. So then what do you recommend? If we find ourselves in the early or the later stages of this kind of situation, what are the top things that we should be doing?

Guy Winch
So, first of all, I don’t think it’s a big if. In other words, the workplace right now is really difficult. It’s very demanding for many people. You don’t have to be burnt out to be susceptible to some of these things that are going on. And I’ll give you just one example.

If you have a very difficult day at work, something went wrong, you had a conflict with a co-worker, your boss treated you really poorly, you were one of the many people who were subject to either harassment, or bias, or bullying, or truly even incivility, which is incredibly common in the workplace, just rudeness, you are likely to come home and stew about that.

Ruminate is the word we use professionally. To ruminate means to chew over. You’re likely to come home and chew over about those things because they’re going to bother you, and you’re like, “Why would they say that to me? And why would they do that? And I wish I wouldn’t.”

And then you’re starting to, you’ll spend the evening like imagining having this fantasy conversation with your boss that you actually never have because he’ll fire you, but you’re like, “I wish I could say this to her. And I wish I could say that to him,” and all these mic drop moments that you imagine. It is going to be extremely difficult after those kinds of days to switch off and be present in whatever your family life, personal life is that evening.

Work will hijack your thoughts, and that is extremely, extremely common. And when it does, we are not aware that we’re being hijacked. We think, “Well, we’re processing. Isn’t that a good thing? Wouldn’t a psychologist say processing is good?”

Pete Mockaitis
That sounds wholesome. PhD approved.

Guy Winch
“Sounds wholesome. I’m thinking things through.” You’re not thinking things through. You’re churning. You’re spinning. You’re in an emotional hamster wheel. Thinking things through, by definition, means that there’s a start point and an end point. That end point is a takeaway, a conclusion, an insight, an action item.

But what you’re doing is, again, when you’re doing fantasy conversations about how you’ll tell someone off that you’ll never have, there’s nothing. You’re not doing anything there. But what you are doing, mind you, when you’re ruminating, is, number one, you’re flooding your system with cortisol. You’re stressing yourself out. You are picking the scabs off whatever emotional wounds that left.

So all the irritation, the annoyance, the upset, the insult that you experienced during the workday, by replaying it, you are re-experiencing all those things. You are adding hours of unpaid overtime into your evening. You are checked out from whatever it is and whoever is around you. So you’re actually doing a significant amount and you’re impairing your sleep. You’re more likely to eat unhealthy foods.

There’s just this list of things that are bad when you’re ruminating, and most people are not aware when they’re doing it, but it’s actually quite damaging.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, so very clear. Rumination, bad. So how do we knock it off? Sometimes that’s easier said than done.

Guy Winch
First all, it actually is a little bit easier said than done, but it has to start with the awareness that what you’re doing isn’t useful. And the way you know that is, because when you’re trying to figure something out, that’s a mental process. You’re in your head. You’re strategizing. You’re thinking. You’re analyzing.

When you’re ruminating, you’re in your chest. It’s visceral because you’re upset again, you’re charged again, you’re angry again. And so you know it because, A, you’ve had that thought for the tenth time. You’re not actually getting anywhere.

You’re just replaying how upsetting something was, or your fantasy arguments, or like just imagining, or remembering all the other times they said the insulting thing to you, just literally replaying the greatest hits. That’s when you’re ruminating.

So, first of all, step one, catch it. Label it as rumination. Label it as unuseful and damaging thought. There’s two kinds of self-reflection. There’s more, but just for the sake of argument. There’s healthy and unhealthy. Productive, unproductive. This is unhealthy and unproductive.

The solution, therefore, is to convert the ruminating into healthy and productive self-reflection. Healthy and productive self-reflection has a point. It has a goal. So, in this case, whatever it is that’s troubling you, ask yourself, “What is the problem I need to solve here? Is it, do I need to speak to that co-worker who was so dismissive of me, etc.? Should I go to Human Resources to talk about the bias or the harassment or the bullying?”

“Do I need to get support from somebody else, etc? Do I need to address this rudeness? How do I avoid that coworker who constantly upsets me when I see them?” You’re asking questions that you actually need to figure out and answer. Now, what you’re thinking is actually productive because you’re trying to actually figure something out and know how to handle it and have takeaways from that.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s a really useful distinction there. We’re thinking it through, so we’re landing somewhere. It’s a plan, a decision, a next to action. I think some of the trickiest parts for me with rumination, because I love figuring stuff out, strategizing, and problem solving, getting to the bottom of stuff. But I think what I have the hardest time is when it seems like there’s not really a solution to the external circumstances.

Guy Winch
Give me a “for instance.”

Pete Mockaitis
So, I guess, but perhaps the for instance would be you have had conversations with a manager or colleague about the matter at hand multiple times. And they have demonstrated a fundamental unwillingness to adjust their behavior in a manner that you would like.

So, in a way, you’re kind of stuck. And I guess, in a way, we always have a choice, “Well, you could leave. You could find a new workplace.” And I guess that’s true, but sometimes, at least in the short term…

Guy Winch 
That’s a nuclear option, for sure.

Pete Mockaitis 
Yeah, in the short term, we find ourselves somewhat stuck like, “Well, you know what, at the moment, I need this job, I need this income. Boss is not responding to my previous requests to adjust their behavior in a way that would accommodate me. He’s done this again and again, and it makes me angry again and again. So it’s not as though I’m going to arrive at a solution or a magical script. All right.”

Guy Winch
No, but here’s what you can arrive at. Yes, but here’s what you can arrive at. There are numerous things you can do. Number one, you can look around and say, “Who does this boss not do it to? Why do they not do it to them? Is there something I can learn from that?”

Number two, “If they’re doing it to everyone, it’s something about the boss. Is there a way I can understand why the boss does this that would make it easier for me to tolerate? Because I have a little bit of understanding, insight into what’s going on with them. Are they simply obtuse, so they’re not aware that they’re being insulting or annoying?”

“Is it that that’s what they get from their manager and, therefore, they’re just passing that down the line? Is it that they have a really difficult home situation, and so they just take out their frustrations and anger on their subordinates at work?”

You can try and reframe the situation so that it’s less activating for you. If you’re stuck there, “How do I make this feel less annoying? It’s going to occur. How do I avoid some of it? And how do I think of it in a different way?”

For example, some people – I’m just giving this as an example – literally do not have the emotional intelligence to recognize and realize when they’re doing something that’s rude and offensive. They literally don’t get it. You can try and point it out, it doesn’t stick. It’s not something that crosses their radar in that way. It’s just they don’t have the apparatus to.

And so it’s not necessarily on purpose. They don’t realize they’re being that difficult. And if you think about it that way, for example, then it’s like a blind person who just like stepped on your foot because they didn’t see it. Like, it’s hurtful, it’s annoying, but there’s only so angry you can get.

So, in other words, I’m just giving examples of you, if you can’t change it, then change how you feel about it so that you don’t have to live in that anger and resentment as much as you have been. Do you know what mean? So there’s always something that you can do to try and better your situation.

Pete Mockaitis
Can you give us some cool examples of reframes that have been really transformational for folks and within their situations?

Guy Winch
Look, it can be as simple as, “I’ve tried so many ways to manage the situation and I’m not managing. Therefore, this is the sign that I actually do need to look at the nuclear option because I’ve done everything before.” But, again, that’s a nuclear option of leaving.

But another one is to understand, you know, people sometimes when they get the backstory of who the person is, why they’re behaving the way they are, develop some empathy for them. They understand that, “Oh, they have a sick kid at home. They’re stressed out beyond belief.”

“They got passed up for this promotion and they’re really, really hurting. And, no, they’re certainly not managing it well, but they’re not, you know, skipping through the tulips while they’re making all of us eat crap.” You know, that’s not the case. Empathy, perspective taking so that you get some kind of empathy and insight for the person and why they’re doing it often helps mitigate the feelings of frustration and anger.

But often it is something that’s more workable because, you know, again, if you see the person doing it to everyone, then it’s about them, but sometimes it’s just, it’s not to everyone, “So what’s different? What am I doing to step on someone’s toes to make them, to make me a target for them?” I’m not talking about bullying, but just about a boss who’s not treating you nicely or respectfully.

Is it bias? And if it’s bias, you can’t do anything about it. You can think of collecting other incidences of it, finding people who will join with you, and consider going to HR. But, again, that can be dangerous and iffy depending on the company.

But just look first at your behavior. Because a lot of people will say to me sometimes, “You know, I realize that every time I come up with an idea, my boss shoots it down. But the only place I come up with these ideas are in these meetings. And he doesn’t like it when people come up with great ideas in the meetings because they’re supposed to be about his ideas, not our ideas.”

“I need to go to him on the side. And then when I go to him on the side, he’s actually, one-on-one, he’s much nicer than in the public forum.” You know what mean? Like, you have to try and figure out the method behind the madness, and that can really transform your perception and your strategy and your handling of the situation.

Pete Mockaitis
Could you share a specific story of a person who had a transformational reframe?

Guy Winch
In my book, I follow five characters, you know, clients of mine throughout. And this is a reframe in the other direction, mind you, but the first person I talk about is a guy called Tony. He’s a trader and he’s in this political fight… he’s the number one trader on the desk with the number two trader on the desk.

And he keeps thinking that the number two trader on the desk is just jealous of him and tries to sabotage him or tries to kind of turn people against him. And so he kind of doesn’t take it seriously enough. When he understands what the number two person on the desk is trying to do is actually oust him entirely, literally sabotage his entire career, that’s transformational for him.

He suddenly looks at everything with very different eyes, with very different levels of alarm, which are appropriate. And sometimes we don’t fully understand the reasons other people at work are doing what they’re doing. And we really need to, because that will reveal a chess game that we might not be aware of.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s really powerful. And I’m thinking about movies like “Fight Club” or “The Sixth Sense” where there’s a big reveal that sort of recasts your understanding of everything. It’s like, “Oh, now I have to watch this movie again.” And so that is big in terms of uncovering those things really does bring new things to light.

And what’s so interesting is when, I think a lot of times, when someone’s behavior just doesn’t make any sense to us, it seems there’s often another element that when you understand that, it is that unlock. Like, “Oh, so that’s why you do what you do.” “Oh, you’re trying to oust me.” “Oh, you have a super stressful home life situation.” “Oh, you’ve always learned that had to be tough in certain situations.” “Oh, you think this meeting is about you looking like a brilliant, innovative, creative genius. Okay.”

So it’s like when we’re flummoxed by others’ behavior, there may very well be just a missing piece of the puzzle that can put everything into the right perspective.

Guy Winch
Right. Another example is, “Oh, your self-esteem is so fragile, you are so incapable of owning a mistake that you will, literally, look to blame the most ridiculous people rather than take any ownership or responsibility because you’re constitutionally too threatened by that notion,” let’s say.

Pete Mockaitis
You might not say that out loud to your boss, unprompted.

Guy Winch
No, but it would be useful to understand because then any kind of effort to try and make them see or make them get is like it’s going to be useless and a waste of energy because they cannot, they will not take ownership of that.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, this is useful. Thank you. Well, in your book, you’ve got a fun structure in terms of chapter one, Monday morning, chapter two, Monday afternoon, kind of like moving through a work week. Can you share with us what are some of the most transformational practices, not just in the moment when, oh, rumination is striking, but, in general, to have our mind over grind?

Guy Winch
So when we have a difficult and demanding job, when we’re very, very busy, our tendency is, for most people, is, you know, anyone who’s gotten up in the morning are like, “I just need to get through this day,” or, “I just need to get through this week. There’s just so much going on. I just need to get through it.”

That kind of thought, or that kind of strategy, is problematic because what it’s going to do, what that means is it means you’re putting your head down and you’re going from task to task to task. You’re just getting through. What it means you’re not doing is you’re not actually looking at the week more strategically and more intentionally planning out, “How do I manage my energies through this week?”

“How do I utilize my time out of work to recover from this very, very difficult and demanding week? How do I break up the day? If I have 10 minutes here and five minutes there..” you know, some people literally running all the time “…where can I schedule those 10 minutes? What can I do within them that will refresh me a little bit rather than just keep grinding through and just praying for the end of the day to arrive?”

“How can I be more intentional in the breaks that I choose, where I choose to take them, what I choose to do in them, because the default is going to be serve social media or distract myself in some way, as opposed to doing something that will actually revitalize me even in five minutes?”

In the book, I have this whole section about mini breaks, like two minutes here, five minutes here, what you can do that will actually be useful, as opposed to what most people do that is not. So how we curate the rest period, the break period, the recovery options, is super important and it’s the last thing we think of doing when we need it most because we just put our head down and let’s just get through it.

But we need to be more strategic and more deliberate in how we do that. And that makes a huge difference because when we just get through, by the second part of the day, our creativity, our decision-making, our attention to detail, most of our executive functioning is depleted, is on the decline because we don’t, you know, we’re not computers, we don’t keep going at the same level until we crash.

There’s a downward slope that happens quite quickly. So unless you’re really planning for breaks that will refresh you and will revitalize you and kind of restore your functioning to a higher level, you’re not going to do as good work as you might if you are more thoughtful about doing that.

And the second part is what happens after hours. The more stressed and pressured you are at work, the more essential it is to use those times to recover. And the research shows the less likely we are to do that in any way that’s effective.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s a huge nice bright light for us there. If you’re having the thought, “Ooh, just got to get through this day,” it’s like, you know, “Time out, you know, that is probably exactly the wrong thought to be having,” versus, “Where do I get my energy replenished? And I’m going to have to look harder for those opportunities given that there is a whole lot competing for my hours in this day.”

So share with us what are some of the most rejuvenating mini breaks that really go a long way for people?

Guy Winch
So, for example, if you’re sitting all day, and then stand up, go up and down some stairs, do some push-ups if you’re inclined to do that, do something physical for a few minutes, number one. Number two, you have 10 minutes. If you can take a walk around the block, if there’s any nature to be parked in, nature is very restorative. Just sitting among trees, even if it’s for 10 minutes, can really kind of refresh.

If you have a very difficult, you know, say, some people say to me like, “Oh, I have three hours of the most obnoxious client meetings. They always are so hostile and so tense and I have to smile through it because they’re critical clients. I always feel so like, you know, yucky afterwards.”

I’m like, “Great. That’s after those meetings is when you need to make a plan with a coworker to go so you can vent, so you can get support, call your grandmother with a smiling face. If you’re working from home, that’s when you bring the puppy over to get some cuddles. Like, do something to help you recover from the tension of those meetings.”

Meditation can be done in five minutes. If you have a very, very difficult day, like, “Wednesday’s going to be hump day. I just need to get through Wednesday,” what’s your favorite thing you can make yourself for lunch and take it to work on Wednesday?

So even though that’s the hardest day, you can look forward to, “But you know what, I’m going to have this thing at lunch and take 15 minutes and I really enjoy this thing that I’m bringing, and so I’m going to look forward to having that over that day and give myself the treat at lunch that day.”

Be thoughtful about what you can do so it’s not torture all the time, because that’s how the stress happens. We go into fight or flight, the workplace is a modern-day battlefield. Even though it’s not a battlefield, it’s a conference room, but it’s same thing. It’s a cubicle, it doesn’t matter. It’s like we’re on alert all the time. Our bodies are activated in fight or flight. You need to have breaks from that.

And if you come home and you’re ruminating about stuff, you’re still in fight or flight. Or if you come home and you’re so tense that, you know, everyone’s avoiding you, you’re still in fight or flight. So we have to be aware that that’s how burnout happens.

Our systems did not evolve. Our mental and physical body systems, you know, functioning, did not evolve to be activated like that for many, many hours, for most of the day, day after day after day after day. That’s never our evolution. Even in times of war, there was R&R. Nobody stayed at the front forever. And now we are at the front forever.

Pete Mockaitis
You know, I really resonate with what you said about lunch. I have actually had days where, “Oh, my gosh, this day is so brutal. But you know what? I’ve got those delicious chicken pineapple meatballs from Costco. And, really, it’s like a bright light.”

Guy Winch
It is though, right?

Pete Mockaitis
Yes. Okay. Well, so you mentioned social media is the default. Guy, is your good doctor’s opinion that that is not an efficacious means of rejuvenation?

Guy Winch
No, it’s the researchers’ opinion that it’s not an efficacious means of rejuvenation. There are studies done about it. And, look, when you’re working, if you’re going to, if your social media, there’s two kinds, really, right? It’s your social, actual social media, what your friends are doing.

Tell me how many friends you have that post pictures of them looking absolutely harassed during the workday, looking miserable in a cubicle, crying in the toilets after they got chewed out by their boss. No one posts that. What you will see, they’re drinking Mai Tais on the beach or the time they went out with their coworkers and they’re all semi-drunk and having a great time.

Whatever the thing is, it’s going to make you feel like, “Oh, wow, everybody’s living except me.” It’s not going to make you feel good. That’s one type. And the other type is news and all kinds of things like that. And those algorithms, all of them, are slanted toward getting your attention and activating you and making you upset and outraged and angry, is what will get your attention.

And so they will feed you content that you’re going to be like, “I cannot believe that happened. I can’t believe this.” It will, literally, be activating in all the wrong ways. Relaxing, it will not be. No one’s feed shows like a Philharmonic playing casual classical music with aromatherapy wafting through your phone. We don’t get that. So that’s not going to be useful.

My phone, I don’t, you know, like I post on social media. I have somebody who does it for me, but what I use my phone for, I have trained my algorithm so that if I am going to do that, it is going to show me stuff that is going to make me smile.

And I can show you my phone, you can go to the search, the only thing it will show you is stand-up clips and puppies. That’s it. That’s all you’re getting. In other words, I’ve trained it, I’m not interested in anything else. If I’m coming to you, it’s for like a few seconds of relief. So that’s what it knows to show me. You can train your algorithm.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I was just going to ask, because I find that sometimes when I turn to social media or news, what I’m really after is a quick hit of, like, a palate cleanser. Like, I want something that’s interesting, that’s stimulating, that makes me go, “Hmm.”

Guy Winch
Can you see that you’re going to get that on the news?

Pete Mockaitis 
And is novel and different. Well, I guess usually I don’t but sometimes I do. I think that’s the thing. It’s like the gambler, like pull on the the slot machine one more time. It’s like, “Oh, maybe this time, you know, I’ll hit something makes me go, ‘Huh, that’s really interesting.’”

But I’m gathering, from my own experience and from all the research that, yeah, this isn’t really a great place to to get what I’m after. So one approach is, you’ve just trained it, “Give me puppies and comedy and nothing else.” Are there perhaps superior substitutions? We’ve talked about nature and having a walk and some exercise. That’s cool. Any nice intellectual substitutions for social media?

Guy Winch
Yes, but what you want to do on break from work is you actually want to use the intellectual muscles that are not the same ones that you’ve just used. So, if you’re in a job that’s just very rote or analytical, you might want something that stimulates your feelings of creativity, right?

If you’re in a creative job that’s just very, very artistic, you might want something that gives you puzzles, or something that just uses different, you know, it’s like you want to use a different area of the brain. If those muscles are tired, let’s use other muscles and give them a little bit of a workout.

If you’re working from home, you know what’s great to do for five or 10 minutes if you can? If you play a musical instrument, play it for five or 10 minutes. If you’re a singer, sing for five or 10 minutes. If you’re a dancer, dance for five or 10 minutes.

Like, I know that’s not a lot of time, but it’s enough time to kind of, really, it does two things. Number one, it’s so different from what you’re doing probably for work. And secondly, it’s giving some oxygen to other parts of your personality and your identity that you don’t really get to express that much. So that’s quite refreshing to do.

Pete Mockaitis
I dig it. Well, Guy, tell me, anything else you really want to make sure to mention before we hear about some of your favorite things?

Guy Winch
Yes, one other thing. I talked about the recovery after work, too. Our brain doesn’t distinguish that well between physical exhaustion and mental exhaustion. So a lot of people get home after eight, nine hours, let’s say even in the office where they sat all day and they feel, “I am wiped out. All I can do now is veg four to five hours of TV or shows or screens in some kind of ways, but I couldn’t move because I’m wiped out.”

You’re not wiped out physically. You’re drained mentally. And, in fact, doing something physical or doing something, and so they rest for four or five hours, right? They over-index on resting. Resting is half the equation. Resting doesn’t deplete your batteries further, but it doesn’t recharge them.

To recharge your batteries after work, you actually need to do something that you can’t do on a couch. Again, if you’re creative, you need to do the creative endeavor. If you’re a social person, you actually need to meet people and interact.

If you’re athletic, you have to work out in some kind of way. If you’re artistic, you’ve got to practice your art, you’ve got to practice your music, you’ve got to practice your writing, you’ve got to tinker in the garage, you’ve got to organize if you’re an organizer.

You have to do the thing that recharges you. Not every night is that possible. And people say to me, like, “Well…” I have an example of somebody in the book who used to do improv. And they’re like, “Well, I can’t do it. I can’t join a troupe, I can’t perform. I don’t have that kind of time.”

I’m like, “You don’t need a lot of time to do it for 10 or 15 minutes a day with your kids. Ask them what character they want you to be and be that character to fool around.” Like, you play the violin, 15 minutes of, and, again, it’s not a lot, it’s not enough, but picking it up and doing something is enough to kind of make you feel recharged again, remind you that it’s not all about work.

You know, the life part of the work-life balance is the you part as well. It’s not just add an hour of yoga. It’s about live. Be present in the life that you do have. Be present in doing homework with the kids and putting them to bed and having a date night with your partner. Hanging out with your friends. Be present in that.

But people are like, “No, I’m too drained.” So you have to remind yourself that you’re not physically tired. You’re mentally tired. Your body is deceiving you. Your mind is deceiving you into thinking that you’re physically tired.

And everyone has done that and forced themselves up from the couch and forced themselves to then do the recharging thing has come back with a second wind in which they actually expended energy but now they feel more energized.

Everybody knows the ROI is significant but you have to remind yourself of that because if you don’t, if you just veg all evening, you’ll wake up tired the next day, you won’t feel recharged or refreshed. So that’s the biggest mistake. And the more stressed you are at work, the more likely you are to fall into that trap. So you really have to override it.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well. now could you share your favourite quote, something you find inspiring?

Guy Winch
So I forget who said it, maybe it was Carl Sagan who said, “The human brain might be the most brilliant machine in the universe.” And so that’s the quote.

“So the human brain might be the most brilliant machine in the entire universe…” Here’s my addition, “…but it requires adult supervision.” In other words, we have to be mindful. We have to be intentional. We can’t just let our mind be on autopilot because it’s smart and it’s brilliant, but not when it comes to emotional and psychological sophistication. It defaults to easy solutions.

It’ll distract us by just, “Go to social media. Just zombie out on the couch.” It’ll tell us all those things, and we have to be able to be the adult and to make the managerial decision about, “That’s not what I need. Here’s what I need. I have to get my ass off the couch and do this. I have to get the chicken pineapple thing from…” I forgot now what it was.

Pete Mockaitis
Hell, yeah, chicken pineapple meatballs.

Guy Winch
But, yes, chicken pineapple meatballs from Costco. “I need to get up and heat that up because that’s what’s going to put a smile on my face, even though I don’t feel like it.” You know, we have to do the adult thing and we have to manage our mind and not just let it be because it doesn’t make the best decisions for us when it’s on autopilot.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And can you share a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Guy Winch
One of the studies that really caught my attention when working on this book is that when one person in a relationship is really stressed out at work for a long period, their partner will start to develop symptoms of burnout because it transfers that substantially to the other people in the house.

And people, most people think like, “No, no, no, I keep it under wraps. I don’t stress everybody out.” Even when you don’t intend to, we do. So there’s one. I’ll just throw in one other one of the same example. When one person in their job is really stressed out, their partner is likely to lose their sex drive, because, you know, again, those things cross over and they impact our loved ones way more than we realize.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And could you share a favorite book?

Guy Winch
Here’s one on topic. And I don’t know if this person has been on your podcast, Mita Mallick. Has she been on your podcast? She wrote a book that just came out a few months ago. It’s called The Devil Emails at Midnight. And it’s about difficult bosses and how to handle them, and that she had fallen into the trap of being a difficult boss herself, but it’s a great book about the workplace that’s also quite funny.

One that’s not on this topic at all, but just one that I read recently that I absolutely loved, it’s called Eve. It’s a New York Times bestseller, how female evolution drove 200 million years, how the female body drove 200 million years of evolution. It looks through at evolution, starting literally 200 million years ago, through the lens of women and the female body. And it’s remarkable.

As much as you think as you know about the female body, as much as women think they know about their own body, you will learn so much from this book. And it’s written in such a way that almost every page you want to pause and call someone and say, “Look what I just found out,” you know? It’s great.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Guy Winch
One of the tools that I use daily is gratitude exercises. I really believe in them. And the gratitude exercises is that you really write a paragraph about something that you’re grateful for every day. If something bad happens, you deal with it, you process it, but you also try and find some good in it.

It’s a great balancing act. We’ve evolved to be predisposed to notice the bad, the danger, the difficult stuff that’s coming on the horizon. We need to counterbalance that by intentionally looking for the good and the positive because that comes much less naturally to all of us.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And could you share a key nugget you share that seems to really connect and resonate with folks, you hear them quoted back to you often?

Guy Winch
It’s from earlier in my work, but that nugget is that we need to treat psychological and emotional wounds the same way that we do physical wounds. When we are upset, when we are injured emotionally or psychologically, there’s a wound there a lot of the time that we actually have to be informed about and do something to treat.

Much as we would put a bandaid, or a bandage on something, or an ice pack on a sprain, there are ways we need to recover from experiences like rejection and failure. And little exercises that we can do, that will be those bandages and ice packs and pain relievers. And we need to get sophisticated enough to be able to recognize when we’re injured and apply these small little tools and techniques to feel better more quickly.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Guy Winch
GuyWinch.com is my website, that’s G-U-Y-W-I-N-C-H.com, where they can get links to all my social media, my books, and my newsletter on Substack. It’s only every two weeks, so it’s not too burdensome, but GuyWinch.com is the place to go for all of that.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Guy Winch
Yes, I would like you to be much more thoughtful about how you are managing yourself during the work day. Make informed decisions. Be deliberate. Don’t be on autopilot. Autopilot will fly the plane into a cliff without you realizing it. So just be much more mindful.

Lift up your head and ask yourself, “What do I need this day? What do I need this week? How do I make this intentionally? What do I need to get from Costco that will put a smile on my face?”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Guy, thank you.

Guy Winch
Thank you.

Sep 22
0

1095: Keeping Your Productive Groove through Movement, Thought, and Rest with Dr. Natalie Nixon

By | Podcasts | No Comments

Dr. Natalie Nixon discusses how to develop strategic thinking, prevent burnout, and enhance creativity through her move, rest, and think framework.

You’ll Learn

  1. The inner skills that make us more strategic and effective
  2. The neglected skill that makes us more strategic
  3. How to prime your best ideas in 90 seconds

About Natalie

Dr. Natalie Nixon, creativity strategist and CEO of Figure 8 Thinking, is known as the ‘creativity whisperer to the C-Suite’ and is the world’s leading authority on the WonderRigor™ Theory. She excels at helping leaders catalyze creativity’s ROI for inspired business results. She is the author of the award-winning The Creativity Leap and the forthcoming Move.Think.Rest. 

With a background in cultural anthropology, her career spans global apparel sourcing with The Limited Brands and a 16-year career in academia, where she was the founding director of the Strategic Design MBA at Thomas Jefferson University. She received her BA from Vassar College and her PhD from the University of Westminster in London. She’s a lifelong dancer and a new aficionado of open water swimming.

Resources Mentioned

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Dr. Natalie Nixon Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Natalie, welcome!

Natalie Nixon
Thank you. It’s good to be here.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes. Well, I’m excited to hear some of your wisdom from your book, Move, Think, Rest. Can you share with us one of the most surprising, or counterintuitive, or wildly fascinating discoveries you’ve made in investigating this stuff and putting together the book?

Natalie Nixon
I think one of the most interesting learnings I got was to really leaning into this idea of emotional recovery. I think that we spent a lot of time thinking about physical fitness and endurance so that our cognition is nice and sharp.

And we think, obviously, about mental agility and sharpness. It’s really the emotional dimension of ourselves that kept coming up over and over as I was building out this “Move, Think, Rest” framework. And I think that really matters in a time of ubiquitous technology. It’s really interesting to me.

Pete Mockaitis
Emotional recovery, that’s a nice turn of a phrase. Can you share with us, well, one, a definition and, two, maybe just paint a picture of what the opposite of emotional recovery looks like, and then what emotional recovery things one does to emotionally recover?

Natalie Nixon
Emotional recovery is our capacity to feel the feels internally, to be self-aware in terms of where our barometer is emotionally, as well as that emotional intelligence, that outward external ability to identify where people with whom we’re having conversations, people who are leading or managing, where they are emotionally, but we actually are not good at the external identification of that unless we are whole emotionally.

And I learned this turn of phrase through someone named Scott Pelton. I interviewed Scott Pelton, who’s the co-founder of an executive leadership coaching practice called Tignum. And in a time with a lot of economic instability, a lot of uncertainty in the markets, where we’re hearing of downsizing, where managers are having to do layoffs, where people are observing their friends, their colleagues, family members going through these sorts of things, to expect a manager or a leader to show up at work, like, “Nothing to see here. Everything’s great, and I’m feeling great.” That’s not true.

And so, the ability to recover emotionally after one has had to deliver really harsh news, bad news, to a team, to colleagues, is essential actually for your clearer thinking and for your ability to rebound and maintain momentum. And one of the things I’ve been saying for quite a while is that, in the future of work, work will increasingly become inside-out work.

And what I meant by that, and it’s now even more grounded in my learning about emotional recovery, is that the companies that will be able to attract and retain the best talent will be those that are curious about who you are as a person and want to integrate those assets, those capabilities, those abilities into the ways that you are doing your work and your job, instead of shying away from that.

And I’m not, I’m not saying that leaders should have a good cry with their team. That’s not what I’m talking about because there is still this need to feel that the person who is leading has it together. But there’s also this need to trust that leaders get where we are. And we trust that when leaders reveal, in a more vulnerable way, their own uncertainty, when they’re self-reflexive in the types of questions that they’re raising about a strategic decision that has been made.

So, another person I interviewed for Move, Think, Rest is Carla Silver who is the co-founder of a really great nonprofit organization called Leadership + Design. And one of their taglines is “Be more curious than certain.” And when we are curious about how we are feeling, how we are doing, how others are feeling, how we are doing, that actually is the on-ramp to so much discovery. So, the emotional recovery component to work is essential now more than ever.

Pete Mockaitis
And that’s an interesting notion. And we might find ourselves emotionally taxed. Or, what would you say? What’s the opposite of being emotionally recovered? Emotionally drained, depleted?

Natalie Nixon
Burnt out.

Pete Mockaitis
Burnt out, yeah. Certainly. And I guess, as I think about that experientially for myself, so I’m thinking about just my young kids at home, in terms of, I mean, sometimes it’s just a delightful, wonderful, happy, joyous, relating communal experience. And other times it’s just brutally exhausting, like, oh, so much whining, so much, you know, “Oh, we got a diaper to handle over here, but, oh, there’s a mess over there,” and sort of all the things in rapid succession.

Natalie Nixon
How old are your children?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, so right now, they are seven, six and two.

Natalie Nixon
Wow, full house.

Pete Mockaitis
So, yeah, it feels like, I do, I feel like sort of activated in terms of like the nervous system and my emotions. And I could feel it, it’s like, “Oh, I’m still irritated about what happened 30 minutes ago over there.” And yet I need to be, you know, Mr. Insightful Curious podcast, you know, moments later.

Natalie Nixon
Yeah, I love that you referenced the nervous system just now, because the other part of emotional recovery, the gift that it gives us is a self-awareness. Instead of just pushing through, plowing ahead, if you don’t pause to have a personal check-in about how you are feeling, then you actually are not fully present. And if you’re not fully present, then you actually will not be able to do your job well.

So, it’s a combination of being able to check in with oneself personally, be really honest. It doesn’t mean that you’ll have a solution to be able to go from frustration to jubilation right away, but even acknowledging it is really important in order for us to be able to do our best work, in order to able to start to put things in perspective.

And when you mentioned the nervous system, man, there were so much. There’s so much more research on the neuroscience of how our brains work best that was so fundamental to how I was putting together this “Move, Think, Rest” framework. One of the experts that I really have enjoyed learning from, I’ve listened to her podcast interviews, read her book, is Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett, who’s written a great book called How Emotions Are Made.

And it turns out that emotions are not reactionary thoroughly, they’re actually constructed. And the reason why that matters is a lot of the way we have thought about how to show up publicly, how to show up socially facing in the West and Western cultures is we really take our nod from Descartes, “I think therefore I am,” right?

The ways that you can judge me, evaluate me is by my thinking, which is true. And it turns out, based on Dr. Feldman Barrett’s research, that emotions are actually a bit more predictive than we give them credit for. They’re not just reaction, but they are predictive. So again, that ability to be aware of where our nervous system is at, how we are feeling, is really important.

And another thing I learned about is something called interoception. And the book that I wrote, prior to Move, Think, Rest is a book called The Creativity Leap. And the subtitle of The Creativity Leap is “Unleash Curiosity, Improvisation and Intuition at Work.” And when I wrote that book, that book came out in 2020, I just had this nudge, and through my interviews, I was piecing together my thinking that there are a lot of connections we can draw between intuition and strategic decision-making.

Now, there’s actually a lot more research that connects the dots between the two. And so, there’s something that all of us have, which is called interoception not “introception,” but interoception. Interoception is that self-awareness of how I’m feeling, “I feel sad. I feel excited. I feel tired. I feel hungry. I feel satiated.”

And it turns out the interoception, that awareness which is linked to the nervous system internally, is powered by the vagus nerve, which is the longest cranial nerve in the body. It extends from the brain down through the heart and the lungs, into the gut. It’s a really interesting complex system of nerves. So, when we say things like, “My gut is telling me,” it literally is. We have this superpower highway that helps us with sensemaking, that helps us with pattern recognition.

And I’ll just share one small research study that I learned about, which shows the connection between interoceptive awareness, intuition, and strategic decision-making, was as follows. The experiment was to ask people to sit on a chair with their feet planted on the ground and their hands on their lap, and to tap out on their lap the rhythm of their heartbeat, not by touching the pulse on your wrist, by just being still and beginning to tap out the rhythm of your heartbeat.

Some people found that ridiculously challenging. Other people were like, “Yeah, okay,” then they would just tap out the rhythm of their heartbeat. That’s called interoceptive awareness, and then also interoceptive accuracy. And that same research study was extended to show a link between people who have high interoceptive awareness, powered by the vagus nerve intuition, also have really great strategic decision-making, which was music to my ears.

Because every successful leader has this moment in their origin story where they will say something like, “Something told me not to do the deal,” or, “Something told me to work with her or not him even though her pedigree wasn’t as snuffy.” And that something is intuition.

So, the nervous system, emotional recovery, the ability to intuit and be self-aware is increasingly important in a time of ubiquitous technology.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s really interesting and totally makes sense in so far as, when we make strategic decisions, or really any decisions, there is an emotional dimension at work inside of us. And if we’re just blithely oblivious, unaware of that and its impact, we can very well, it makes sense, not have the fullness of the information set to consider and, thus, make suboptimal decisions, like, “Ooh, I did that thing.”

And I think few of us have this self-awareness or humility to admit, it’s like, “Oh, actually I did that because, in the moment of decision, I was really angry about this totally unrelated thing. And that probably wasn’t the move. Oops.”

Natalie Nixon
Yes, that’s right. That’s right. You know, athletes, for example, elite performance of athletes are very aware of their emotions. And a lot of what their coaches do is to recreate the feeling when you hit the ball that way, if you’re a baseball player, or if you’re a tennis player. During the Olympics, I love track, and you’ll see the sprinters, they’ve got their headphones on and they’re doing all this big envisioning work and self-affirming talk.

And they are envisioning that path of running around the track, or whatever, if it’s a shorter sprint. But we take it for granted that, “Okay, yeah, in their work of performance, they have to be attuned to their emotions and to visualize and to recreate.”

And it turns out that is an equally useful tactic as we strategically build leadership, “To remember what it felt like when I made that decision, to work with someone, to partner with someone or to not end up collaborating with this group, or to decide to go ahead and do this product development work.”

One of the other people I interviewed for Move, Think, Rest is Ivy Ross, who is the head of design at Google. Ivy is also the co-author of an incredible book called Your Brain on Art. She co-authored it with Susan Magsamen. And Ivy likes to share this statistic that 95% of our decision-making is happening at the subconscious level. Only 5% is happening at the conscious level.

And she shared that statistic in a meeting where she was challenged about deciding. She was proposing what color of story to be using in a product launch. And some of her colleagues, who were also in the C-suite said, “Well, where’s the data on that?” And she said to them, “The data comes from my awareness of culture. It comes from the signals that I’m getting.”

And then she shared, “You know, 95% of the sense-making that we do is at the subconscious level,” because, these are now my words not Ivy’s, we’re sentient beings. We do a lot of sense-making throughout the day. And to not be aware of that, to not acknowledge that, because it’s problematic. And neither Ivy nor I are saying, you know, throw out the quant, we need both, is really the point here.

The quantitative research and data show us patterns. It gives us the bird’s-eye view. We see an aggregation of data at point T90 and not over at point B3. Why is that? If you only make decisions based on quantitative data, you’re only getting part of the picture, because quant doesn’t tell you why people chose to behave in that way.

You’ve got to dive down to the worm’s eye view, through qualitative research, to understand the why. And I would even then take it another further. There’s a tertiary dataset, which we get through our sense-making and sentient intelligence.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, and I love that picture, that vignette there with going through a color story, presenting to executives who want data. It’s funny because colors and design, in general, is just that totally different part of the human experience in terms of. And so, you could, it’s like, “Okay. Well, hey, we have five color options. We presented them to a panelist of prospective consumers who meet the target demographic, and 71% of them liked the orange. So that’s why we’re doing orange.”

But you can’t just, unless you have a huge budget and timeline, just test everything with data. That’s the way I think about it. It’s, well, first you have to generate some outstanding finalists based on something else internally, creatively, before you can even get to that point because it’s impractical to test, “Hey, we tested 800 different colors. Yeah, it costs $8 million and it took us six years.” But rather than we’ve got someone who really understands the vibes associated with the colors, and the feels, and the associations, and the rich history of color theory, and all that design stuff.

Natalie Nixon
It’s both-and. Part of my background is working in the fashion industry. The fashion industry is excellent at incorporating the value and the role of beauty, aesthetics, and desire in consumer decision-making. And it has to because fashion designers, fashion buyers and merchandisers, the fashion sector knows that as soon as we launch this, it will be knocked off.

So, there’s always this level of urgency and need to discern what’s around the corner, what’s coming up next. And you can’t only get that through the quant. So, there’s a lot of shopping the market. There’s a lot of tapping into what’s called the street and the elite, and really understanding what’s happening among subcultures, and the way trends work.

Trends start as signals. And you get signals, as Ivy Ross says that you get a hit not by staying in your office. You get a hit, you identify signals by being in the world and observing, and being curious, and paying attention to that, I call it, the blurb on the radar screen, where something just catches your attention. You don’t know why, but that was interesting and just kind of following the breadcrumbs. So, it’s a combination of approaches that actually yield us the most innovative and resonating results.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, now this is fun. Talking about breadcrumbs, we’ve gone down some fun paths. Maybe let’s zoom out. The book Move, Think, Rest, what’s the big idea, the big promise of it?

Natalie Nixon
The big idea of Move, Think, Rest is that we will cultivate our best work when we integrate what I call movement hygiene, which is the movement part, back-casting and forecasting, which is the thought part, and intermittent resting throughout our work days so that we can navigate ubiquitous technology, unprecedented burnout, and new rules for remote work.

The whole point of the, what I call the MTR framework, or the “Move, Think, Rest” framework is to build our capacity for creativity, is to build creativity as a strategic competency so that we can consistently and sustainably innovate. If we don’t have means, tools, ways in, to build creativity as a capacity, as individuals, as teams, and as an organization, we will be working in a very myopic way.

We will miss opportunities and we actually will not innovate in a way that’s interesting, that makes it exciting and cool to show up for work, and that actually delivers meaningful value to the clients and customers we serve.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I think I’d like some more of that capacity. That sounds good. Could you share with us a story of someone who took on some of these approaches and saw a nifty transformation?

Natalie Nixon
One example would be my interview with Brendan Boyle, who is a toy designer. And I went out to the Stanford d.school where he teaches a course on play. Play is probably the ultimate MTR framework opportunity. And the challenge with play is that play has a horrible PR problem.

Play is dismissed, it’s thought of as an add-on, an addendum to the important things. But consider, and this is one of things that Brendan and I talked about a lot, consider that all the attributes of play, which are being able to actively listen, to being curious, having a great ability to negotiate, to collaborate. These are all of the same traits that we say we want in our leadership, that we say we want to hire for.

So, one way that Brendan has been really successful with the clients he works with to understand that, his definition of play is engagement. I mean, you want engaged employees, right? You don’t want them checked out because that’s a business cost. There’s a significant business cost when we don’t build these capacities through movement, thought, and rest. But play is the ultimate integration of movement and thought and rest.

So, when we are at play, we tend to be a bit more mobile. We have to think very differently. We have to be sometimes reflective, sometimes super imaginative, and the imagination and the curiosity and the dreaming is the forecasting piece I referenced. The reflection, the use of memory is the back-casting piece.

And it’s a rest. It’s a break from the typical cognitive load in our neocortex that we only associate with work. And someone I actually interviewed for The Creativity Leap, but her example was something I was reminded of in writing Move, Think, Rest is Gerry Laybourne, Geraldine Laybourne, who’s the founder of Nickelodeon.

And she would have recess, “No agenda. Step away from the desk and just come hang out for 30 minutes.” And Brendan built on that, and said, “You know, that’s really powerful and really important,” because you could have guard rails. Whenever we have things that sound pretty loosey-goosey or improvisational, remember improvisation has rules.

So, one of the rules could be, “No conversation or chat longer than three minutes so you don’t hog up the VP’s time,” right? But you begin to have just playful conversations about, “Oh, how did you prepare that sauce that you just described that you had for dinner last night?” You get to learn about another dimension of a person. Again, work becoming inside out.

And what’s happening when we are at play is that we are allowing the default mode network in the brain to take over. And the default mode network are those different neurosynapses that happen when we tap out of the world and we, as I like to say, get out of our head and into our body.

That might be through a walk. That might be through what I call, what I do every day, a daydream break. That might be through a rollicking, engaging conversation with an old friend, where you’re not thinking about the work at hand. But what’s happening is that different neurosynapses are at work, which are actually critical for what I call the juicy bits of productivity to happen so that when you then return to the screen, all of a sudden, that conundrum from this morning, some new ideas are shapeshifting into place.

All of a sudden, you have these lightbulb moments that happen when we’re awakening out of a really good sleep, that happens during shower moments. And I can share more about kind of the scientific terms for those too if you want.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, that’s fun. Yeah, we had a sleep doctor, Michael Breus, on the show who described the “just waking up” creative zone as groggy greatness, which I thought was kind of fun. And it’s true, I’ve lived it and felt it terms of I wake up, it’s like, “Oh, of course, just do this.” I was like, “Well, yesterday, it was so hard. What the heck?” So message received.

Natalie Nixon
Yeah, I love groggy greatness.I love that. And the science, I mean, Dr. Breus knows this, but when we’re starting to drift off into sleep, that’s called the hypnagogic state. So, Thomas Edison, for example, started observing that when he would suddenly wake up, just as he was drifting off into sleep, he would have these lightbulb moments. No pun intended, Thomas Edison.

But he started to then, as if he took a nap in the middle of the day, he would intentionally hold a heavy ball or orb in his hand, and as he was drifting off, the orb would fall down, he’d wake up. And something that he was pondering would make sense.

Now what you can start to do is you can plant seed, a question in your mind, before you go to sleep. And a lot of times, the clarity will come as you awake.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, and I also think that holding orbs just sounds like a fun, awesome thing to do, speaking of play.

Natalie Nixon
Why not?

Pete Mockaitis
It’s like I’m a mighty wizard. That’s it, was it “The Wizard of Menlo Park,” right? That was the nickname, that he’s holding orbs just like a wizard does. Well, so what’s the movement hygiene part of this?

Natalie Nixon
So, we all know we should exercise, but exercise could be a little triggering to people, because when we think about exercise, we think, “Oh, I’ve got to go to a 50 minutes long Pilates class. Ugh,” or, “I’ve got to go for a jog that’s 30 minutes long.” No, movement hygiene is about incorporating movement throughout the day.

And it could be things like incorporating a standing desk. So, right now, for example, I don’t have a standing desk, but I actually need to figure out the brand of this contraption. It’s this cool little contraption I put on top of my desk. It can rise. I can lower it. So, when I want to stand just to stretch my legs, I can.

I’m also on this really cool platform by this company called Fitebo. And it kind of rocks. It forces me to practice my balance and to make sure that I’m not leaning too heavily to one side of my body, which is an example of movement hygiene, making sure that you’re incorporating microbreaks throughout the day so that you stand up, empty the dishwasher.

When we also think about exercise versus movement, there seems to be more pressure about how long it should last, how intensive it should be. I have walks, I work from home. I have walks around my neighborhood that I know some walks are it’s going to take me three minutes.

There’s another walk I have that takes me seven minutes. And there’s one short walk in the woods I can take that takes me 16 minutes long.

So, depending on the amount of time you can budget during the day, there are so many opportunities that you have to incorporate this movement hygiene. And the reason that matters is because, as humans, we are designed to move. The spinal cord is an extension of the brain. It’s an extension of the medulla oblongata.

And if we are sitting, for more than, you know, Dr. John Medina, who’s the author of a series of books called Brain Rules, his research suggests that we shouldn’t be doing one particular task for longer than 30 to 40 minutes. If we’re cramped at the laptop for longer than 40 minutes, for two hours, we are constricting blood flow to the brain and, therefore, restricting oxygen, and, therefore, we’re actually not doing our best thinking, which is not the goal.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m curious with your research. Did you find any nifty random control trials associated with a modest amount of movement, hygiene, mixing it up, resulting in some cool thinking, creativity, smartness benefits?

Natalie Nixon
I mean, I can’t name a specific example right now, but over and over again, the research shows that when you are incorporating movement, integrate it throughout the day, and not waiting till you go to an exercise class, it affects more exponential creative thinking because you are activating the way the body is designed to work, and you are not treating the brain as a disembodied part of the rest of your body.

When you move, what’s happening? You do deeper breathing, right, which is important for alleviating stress. It reduces cortisol. It boosts serotonin and all the positive hormones that we actually need for these different neurosynapses to take effect in the brain. And one of the things you’re already hearing through, as I’m describing these examples, is that the MTR framework is not a siloed framework.

It’s not, “First you move, then you think, and then you rest.” A lot of the activity that I’m suggesting that we do more is integrative. So, when we move, we’re also taking a break. When we move and take a break, we’re also allowing the default mode network to begin to be activated so that our thinking is fresher and crisper and, dare I say, more innovative.

Pete Mockaitis
Beautiful. Well, tell me, Natalie, any key top takeaways you really want to make sure folks, looking to be awesome at their jobs, grasp when it comes to moving, thinking, resting?

Natalie Nixon
I want them to understand that the end goal here is to build your capacity for creativity. And the ways that I help people think about creativity is that creativity is our ability to toggle between wonder and rigor to solve problems. Creativity is not a nice-to-have. It’s not something that only artists are great at. When all of us dedicate and design more time and space to wonder and rigor, then we will be more creative, which means we will actually be more innovative in our work.

And so, movement, thought, and rest is one on-ramp to building up more wonder and more rigor into your day and into your life and into your work. Because wonder and rigor, which is kind of the umbrella category of my portfolio of work, movement helps you to be more wondrous. There’s so much that you can discover if you just go on a short walk.

If you take a daydream break, right, that is a wondrous time of your day for 90 seconds. When you decide, when you commit to rest, that’s a type of rigor, right? When you commit to be more imaginative and audacious in your thinking, that’s also a type of rigor. But also, it lends itself to greater critical thinking.

So, the movement, thought, rest framework is really an opportunity to build creativity as a capacity, which matters because people have been dying a slow death at work. They’ve just been kind of shut up in a copy-paste way. And so, I want people to shift the ways they’ve been thinking about productivity.

We have an either/or way of thinking about productivity. Either you’re at work or you’re not. And what I’m offering is a both-and model rooted in cultivation. So, I am provocatively saying we need to put productivity to bed. It doesn’t really serve us anymore. It’s rooted in the first industrial revolution where we only measure what we see. It’s based on speed, efficiency, output.

The cultivation model, which was really the MO during agrarian economies prior to the first industrial revolution, we have an opportunity to engage in cultivation 2.0, which is a both-and model. We value the solo practitioner and the collective. We value quick spurts of growth and slow. And we value, yes, we should measure what we see, but we also acknowledge that there’s a lot happening in the invisible dormant realm.

We need to sleep on it when we need things to percolate and marinate. So, the both-and cultivation model and understanding that all this work helps you to build your creative capacity.

Pete Mockaitis
And when you mentioned 90 seconds, was that 90 seconds for daydreaming?

Natalie Nixon
Yes, I will stand by it.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, that’s all it takes

Natalie Nixon
That’s all it takes. Sometimes I can afford a five-minute daydream break. But your prompt can be just watching clouds drift down across the sky or watching ants crawl on the pavement. If you work in a high rise, stand by a window and just kind of zone out and watch all the little people and cars down below, and then go back to the work.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, I was going to ask, since you mentioned a number and time, so moving, thinking, resting, I imagine it’d be kind of easy to fall into a groove or rut of doing too much or too little of either of them. Do you have any rough guidelines for what’s the right rough proportions of moving, thinking, resting to really light up this creative capacity.

Natalie Nixon
The first place I start as I’ve been doing more workshops and talks about this, is for people to check in and identify, “Of the three, which is the one that’s most challenging for you?” And so, if you are deficient in movement, that’s where you should be starting. If you’re deficient on rest, which is different than sleep, right, but if you’re deficient on rest, that’s where you should be starting.

So, this is not a cookie-cutter model. It’s not a sequential formulaic model. It is very much a model that requires you to be self-aware about, “What’s missing in my work habits? And what are the new habits that I want to start to develop and start there?”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And with that 90 seconds of daydreaming, do you, likewise, have any short prescriptions on the moving side?

Natalie Nixon
Yeah, I think walking is the easiest and best place to start, but I also, when I wrote this book, when I wrote The Creativity Leap, I wanted it to be as inclusive as possible. So, I interviewed, for example, Tyler Turner, who’s a paraplegic.

I wanted to talk about what does motor mean for people who are living with physical disabilities, people who may live in socioeconomic environments where they can’t just go out for a little jog at 6:00 p.m. because it’s actually kind of stupid. It’s not very safe. They don’t have access to parks and nature. So, what does that look like to them?

And so, one of researchers, whose research I learned about, is Dr. Yancey, who sadly died at age 50 of breast cancer, but her work, and her mission in her work, was to really catalyze movement in urban environments. She piloted a lot of programs, kind of micro movements that you could do in a small apartment, do it in the middle of a busy day, at UCLA and at UC Berkeley.

So, stretching, taking a dance break, maybe that’s not part of the culture of your team, but you can certainly do those sorts of dance breaks for yourself privately, if it doesn’t make sense for your team. If you can’t go for a walk outside, can you go up and down the stairs?

And, again, the author of the Brain Rules books, he talks about how the times that we are kind of static and doing more of that important work of the frontal neocortex shouldn’t be longer than 30, 40 minutes. And then peppering it with anywhere from five- to 15-minute breaks will really do the trick.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely. Thank you. Well, now could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Natalie Nixon
I think a lot about “Don’t let perfection be the enemy of good.” I think that’s a really important one for me to not overthink. And I also love the quote, “Comparison is the thief of joy.”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite book?

Natalie Nixon
I’m reading right now Abraham Vergese’s The Covenant of Water. Do you know his work?

Pete Mockaitis
No.

Natalie Nixon
I remember it’s pronounced Verghese, it’s V-E-R-G-H-E-S-E. He’s a true polymath, he’s a super accomplished surgeon, a medical school professor at Stanford. And he decided to kind of take a sabbatical and got accepted into the Iowa Writing program, and has multiple bestselling books of fiction. The first of his book that I read was Cutting for Stone. I’m also a big fan of J. California Cooper, her book In Search of Satisfaction.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Natalie Nixon
Right now, I use Otter a lot. I love a good dictation app. I love being able to just download my thoughts verbally. So, Otter is one of my favorite tools for work.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite habit?

Natalie Nixon
Stretching. I try to stretch 15 minutes every morning just to remain limber.

Pete Mockaitis
And is there a key nugget you share that people really dig and quote back to you often?

Natalie Nixon
“Wonder is found in the midst of rigor. And rigor cannot be sustained without wonder.”

Pete Mockaitis
And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Natalie Nixon
Figure8Thinking.com. That’s F-I-G-U-R-E, the number eight, Thinking.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Natalie Nixon
Have some self-compassion. Tap into what makes you uniquely human and maybe start by reading my book, Move, Think, Rest.

Pete Mockaitis
Alrighty. Natalie, thank you.

Aug 18
0

1085: How to Find More Fun at Work Every Day with Bree Groff

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Bree Groff shares the simple but effective strategies for finding more fun at work.

You’ll Learn

  1. The mind shift that helps us find more fun at work
  2. The 5-minute team practice that drastically improves engagement
  3. How to find joy during even the roughest work days

About Bree

Bree Groff is a workplace culture expert and author of Today Was Fun: A Book About Work (Seriously). She has spent her career guiding executives at companies including Microsoft, Google, Pfizer, Calvin Klein, and Hilton through periods of complex change. She is a Senior Advisor to the global consultancy SYPartners, previously served as the CEO of NOBL Collective, and holds an MS in Learning and Organizational Change from Northwestern University. Bree lives in New York City with her husband and daughter.

Resources Mentioned

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Jeff DeGraff Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Bree, welcome!

Bree Groff
Thanks for having me, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to talk about your book, Today Was Fun: A Book About Work. Could you share with us any particularly surprising or extra counterintuitive discoveries you’ve made about work and fun while putting this all together?

Bree Groff
I mean, the first, maybe most obvious is when I say work and fun, people are like, “So happy hour?” Like, a lot of times it, like, does not compute, “Wait, work cannot actually be fun. You must be talking about off sites, happy hours.” Or they think, “Oh, you’re going to tell me that fun is a driver of productivity and business performance in the bottom line.” That is true, but also not my point.

My point is that we should be valuing our days at work more highly, simply because they come from our finite bank of days that we get on this planet. And it is not only possible to have fun within the work itself, like when I’m actually creating or making something of value, but to do that is, actually, honors our brief time here, honors our lives in a way that I think we don’t often.

We often wish our way through the week, “Ugh, when can it be Friday?” So, I’m trying to correct that, swing the pendulum back a little bit, such that employee engagement and our own days at the office are seen as valuable just for themselves.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool. And so, you say it should be fun and we’re trying to correct. Can you give us a sense of what percentage of folks experience regular fun during the course of work versus find this to be a foreign concept when you speak with them or you’ve done the research, like, “Oh, you mean the ping pong table or the happy hour?” Like, “No, I don’t mean those things.”


Bree Groff
Yeah. I mean, the data is staggering on things like burnout, overworking. I’ll try and cite it correctly, but I believe it was 89% of employees have felt a sense of dread within the last month at work, 49% have felt a sense of dread within the last week. And like dread, that is such a big word. It’s not like, “Oh, I’m not having the most fun of my life.” It’s, “I’m actually dreading something.”

So, there’s a lot of headroom for us to go from what’s currently the state of affairs at work, which is something often work is something that we show up to that we get through. We almost show up assuming it’s not going to be fun and that’s not the point of work. So why even try to make it so? But I think it is. I think if we are going to be spending, they say one third of our lives or five sevenths of every week at the office or at the virtual office, well, that’s worthy of us figuring out how to have a better time doing it.

Pete Mockaitis
And I’d love it you could drop even more stats on us, I’m shameless here, because I guess I imagine that both things are true for me in the sense that, “Yeah, you know, I have fun at work and also there are elements that I dread.” And I think that is probably the case for nearly even the most dreamy of dream job havers in their lives. So, I guess I really want to know, like, how many folks experience, you know, near zero fun in the course of doing their work? Do we know that?

Bree Groff
Who experiences near zero fun? I mean, I imagine it’s kind of sizable. Anybody who’s looking for a new job is not maybe near zero, but is sort of approaching that asymptote of there’s very little to get from here anymore. I will say, though, like I’m not of the opinion that every day and all work needs to be fun. That’s just unrealistic, and it holds us to such a high standard.

Chapter one of the book is titled “Most Work, Most Days Should Be Fun.” And if we get most, I think, yeah, you’re killing it. Right? You’re doing a really good job.

Pete Mockaitis
And do we have a sense, very roughly, and maybe even just your gut sense of chatting with folks, if there’s not a perfect survey tool that’s assessed this, like, how many folks find themselves in that boat?

Bree Groff
Of most days most work is fun? My gut sense, and then I’ll try and whip you up some research, my gut sense would be 50% most work, most days is fun. Again, that’s off the cuff.

Pete Mockaitis
And I think, Bree, folks will likely push back on you, in terms of, “Well, you don’t know about my job. This is as dull as it gets.” So, could you perhaps share with us a story of someone who was not having so much fun at work and then made some adjustments and, behold, the very same job they were in became more fun?

Bree Groff
Yeah, I’ll give you a sitcom, “The Office,” right? Like, you’ve seen it, they’re selling paper during the advent of the internet. Like, the business is crashing. It’s probably the dullest possible job you can imagine. I love how the show was framed because it’s not at all saying that work is fun because it’s meaningful or purposeful. It’s to show that work can still be fun even when you have no purpose, no meaning, when your job is to sell reams of paper.

And the reason it was fun, the reason why people love watching it is because the humans in the office, the entry level employees, they made it so. They made their own fun. So, when I think about, like, “How can we as individuals make our days more fun?” there’s so many things that we can do at the local level.

So, for example, when I’m leading consulting teams, it’s me and, on average, maybe seven, eight people on a team for a client, we are our own little ecosystem. So, whoever out there is listening, is, “Oh, my job is terrible,” the question is, “Do you have a few people around you in your local team, or even like one work bestie, where you can make your own fun despite the elements of what’s happening out there?”

So, this could look like anything from, “Hey, we’re going to wear our animal print socks on Fridays.” It’s such a stupid example, but it’s a stupid example because, one, nobody at work probably cares about what socks you’re wearing. And, two, it’s a little bit of an act of mischief and subversion in a way. Like, how can you make your own fun there?

Or, let’s say you have to do expense reports or fill out some sort of soul-sucking spreadsheet. Well, you could do that under your fluorescent lighting hunched over your desk. Or, if you work in an office building where you can take a walk and sit on a bench outside. If you’re working from home, and you can go to a coffee shop and do it there.

There are always ways to get the same work done, but dressed in a little bit more fun. So, at best, we think of work like steak, like it’s juicy, it’s delicious. The work itself is interesting and captivating. But if it’s just not, if your work is broccoli, then your job is to get some cheese and smother it on. And, in the very least, find some camaraderie with the other people who are also suffering alongside you.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Okay, cool. Well, I think “The Office” is a fine example because you can see all sorts of good times had in the midst of very boring circumstances. So, could you share some stories of real people who maybe did not have the luxury of a Jim Halpert with all those hilarious pranks and fun-making activities in the mix and how they found some creative ways to upgrade their experience of fun at work?

Bree Groff
So, there was one client that I was working with. The remit was employee experience and sort of like the process of this function. There were about 150 people in the function, and one person in particular, as we’re doing these interviews, was telling me like she was out, she was not having any fun. She was ready to leave.

We proposed many structural changes, process changes, sort of to try and like lighten up the workload and do all these things. But the one thing that made more difference than, and then anything else, for this one woman in particular, we started introducing the concept of a check-in, which is, at the top of a team meeting, you could do it at a standup or, you know, once a week, you simply start the meeting by saying, “How is everybody on a scale of one to five? Put it on your fingers. Three, two, one, everyone puts up their fingers, it’s a four, it’s a two, it’s a one.”

And then you go around the room in 30 seconds, everyone says how they are at work or in life. So, it could sound like, “Oh, I’m a four. We got a new puppy, which is amazing, but the puppy kept me up all night, so I’m kind of tired.” “I’m a two. I’m actually super nervous about this meeting we have later this week. I don’t know if we’re ready for it, so excited to talk about that in the meeting today.” Or, “I’m a five. It’s my birthday tomorrow.” And then everyone says, “Happy birthday.”

It’s a very simple practice. It takes maybe less than five minutes to do within a team. And once we started introducing this practice, so now I’d say most days she was doing this with her team, she was able to share, one, she was a new mom, so she was able to share, like, “Oh, God, this is really hard. I didn’t sleep much last night. And I’m really excited about this event that we’re putting on tomorrow.”

She was able to open her humanity to her team. So, she felt seen in a way that she wasn’t seen before. Nothing actually really changed about the work in that period of time. We were still working on more structural changes, but just the simple fact that she could go into work and she knew that somebody was going to say, “How are you?” and listen, like that was enough.

And so, we will often do, like, a pre-post survey of belonging and engagement and all those things, and the numbers were incredible, just like even when we pulsed on that one intervention. And then, just anecdotally, like her ability to say, like, “Oh, my God, I finally feel like I can be part of this team and not hide my exhaustion.”

Because there’s so much about work that tells us we need to be buttoned up and professional and sort of have like one sort of presentable persona to the business. But just being able to say, “How are you?” and then have someone say that to her made all the difference. So often, when I’m working with clients, it’s the first thing, the first thing I’ll do.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s cool. Thank you. Yes. I remember when I was working at the Bridgespan Group, we did that practice of check-in, And it was so interesting because, you know, part of me was annoyed at first in terms of like, “Come on. Come on. We’ve a lot to cover, you know. I’m excited to get into it. And really like we’ve got, you know, 50 minutes scheduled for this meeting. How many minutes are we going to do with check-in?”

And it really fluctuated. Like, sometimes it was maybe a good third of the meeting was the check-in. I guess we didn’t have clear rules, but what was interesting is, in a way, that fluidity was kind of helpful. It’s like, “Oh, actually, that’s what was most needed. Go figure. It was not so much what was on the agenda proper, but spending some more time on this stuff.”

And what’s funny to this day, I mean, mercy, this was 16 years ago, but, like, I feel more, like, I don’t know, warmth, affection, interest, friendliness, and remembering of these people than I do like most other team settings. And it was interesting because there wasn’t that much to it. So, I came around to be a fan of the check-in, and it’s interesting.

And people can sort of choose just how vulnerable they are, how much they want to disclose with regard to their check-in. And I don’t think we ever were like derailed, even if it’s like hardcore, you know. I don’t remember what the most dramatic example was, but if someone were to say, “Oh, I’m distraught because my son has a…we thought he kicked his drug problem, but now he’s using cocaine again, and we’re really worried about his safety.”

Like, I’m just trying to imagine like what’s among the most intense things you might say in a check-in. So, one, folks tended not to share that, unless they felt comfortable enough in the team dynamic over time. And, two, when they did share bigger things, it didn’t tend to derail, you know, or take a long, long time. Folks just say, “Oh, that’s so hard. I’m so sorry. Please, let me know if I can support you.”

And it’s a little awkward to transition to the next person, “And I got a puppy.” But, you know, we get over it. In a way, it’s nice because, you know, these things are in the room, even if we’re not saying them, and just not acknowledging them does not make them disappear. Like, we are carrying the emotional whatever of that stuff into it.

And, in a way, it’s actually super helpful because it, like, demystifies stuff. Like, in ambiguous circumstances, I think we humans have a knack for just inventing stories as to what’s going on. Like, “Oh, she thinks my ideas are really dumb.” Like, “No, she’s super stressed about these life circumstances. That explains the low energy, the low mood, the short tip, any number of things.”

And it’s like, “Oh, well, I feel bad for them, but it’s a relief for me.” It’s like, “Oh, that’s just sort of what’s going on there.” And then it opens up opportunities for people to follow up, it’s like, “Oh, you know, hey, we got a new puppy last year, and we found this amazing YouTube channel, which was game-changing in terms of training or whatever.” And then, like, all these new opportunities for connection appear. So, I’m going on and on, Bree.

Bree Groff
I love it, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
But just to say, yeah, I think check-ins, at first, I was skeptical, but I became a believer that they do a lot of good, and you’ve got hard numbers on the back end there.

Bree Groff
Yeah, so, totally. And they do feel awkward at first. I won’t lie. Even after doing them for years, I’ll sometimes be like, “Oh, team, wait, can we do a check-in before we jump in?” And I have like a little spike of like, “Oh, is it okay?” And it’s always worth it. Because I remind teams that the goal is not to have an efficient team. The goal is to have an effective team. And in order to trust people, you have to know them. In order to like people, you have to know them.

So, yeah, the research behind this is also really good, in addition to like our own experiences of like, “That felt nice.” But it promotes psychological safety, because if you risk saying something, even 2% vulnerable at the start of a meeting and you’re met with support, now you’re more likely to share whatever you need to share, you know, your business idea, whatever it is, later in the meeting.

It’s great for cognitive offloading. So, there’s research that says if you write or say whatever is running through the back of your mind, you can then focus better on the next task at hand. It’s sort of like shutting down all the tabs on your computer. So, instead of just ruminating on like, “Oh, how’s the puppy? How’s the puppy? So, I got a new puppy. I hope they’re not destroying the apartment right now. Great. I’ve said it.”

Priming contributions. So, once you’ve spoken once in a meeting, now it’s more comfortable to speak again, as opposed to, we’ve all been in those meetings where one person doesn’t speak the whole time, or maybe that’s you, and you’re like, “Oh, God, am I going to jump in now? Is this the one thing I’m going to say the whole meeting?”

And then thwarting any sort of miscommunications, as you said. So, if one person’s camera is off, and you’re like, “What a jerk!” but they’re like, “Oh, I’m a two. I threw my back out. So, I’m going to be camera off this meeting,” now there’s empathy where there used to be resentment. So, so many good reasons to do the check-in, to fight through that initial like awkwardness, and, “Oh, is this going to take a few minutes?”

Because every team that I’ve done this with, which I’ve been doing this now for over a decade, like I know things about their lives and who they are that made me feel, just as you said, like warm and affectionate to them. I’ve had teams, even as they disbanded, continue to check in years later simply because we, like, essentially bore witness to each other’s lives in that time, to the degree the person wanted to share. So big fan is the bottom line.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s awesome. So, there’s one intervention, simple, powerful. I guess maybe one quick little footnote is like you mentioned the affirming, and maybe it goes without saying, but just to be explicit.

Bree Groff
“Don’t be a jerk.”

Pete Mockaitis 
During the course of a check-in, yeah, you would be affirming as opposed to, “A puppy. Why would you do that to yourself? You’ve already got three young kids. Are you insane?” Like, “Okay, that’s not how to respond to a check-in. Rather, you would…well, you tell me, someone shares a thing and then someone else is about to go, how does that transition or handoff work in practice?

Bree Groff
Yeah, if someone shares a thing, the rule is don’t be a jerk. Although, if you really like each other and know each other, and you know the person would laugh being like, “What the hell were you thinking? You got three kids,” you know, that’s cute. But, in practice, the way that it would functionally work, so I would usually start it off, or like a project manager could start it off, I’ll say, “How’s everybody?” Three, two, one. We put our fingers up in the air.

I’ll nominate someone to start. So, I’ll say, “All right, Pete, kick us off.” You would do your 30 seconds and then you would pass it to someone else. Like, “Okay, Bree, you go,” and then you just go around the room. It just avoids the whole, like, “Who wants to go next?”

And also, if you start at the top of the meeting, you end up getting into the meeting stuff around the same time as if you had just like chit chatted and done the whole, like, “Let’s wait for a few more people to join,” which is my corporate pet peeve.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. And so then, when someone shares, we mentioned acknowledgement or affirmation previously, they just stop and the next person goes, there’s no like, I don’t know, commenting or responding?

Bree Groff
Oh, yeah. I mean, maybe a little. So, like, “Oh, you got a new puppy. Like, oh, it’s so cute. Love it.” Something like that. If you’re on Zoom or remote, a lot of times people will just put things in chat to respond so that there’s a little bit of reciprocation, but, yeah, I mean, just no terrible back and forth, like, “Oh, I really threw out my back.” Someone would be like, “Oh, I’ll DM you my chiropractor later.” Something like that.

But I’ve had leaders ask me, like, “Well, what do I do with this information? Do I need to follow up if someone’s not doing?” I’m like, “No. The beauty of the practice is, like, this is literally saying, ‘How are you?’ and listening. Like, it’s so fundamentally human. So that’s all you have to do.” But, yeah, like a few, like, “Mm-hmm” kind of thing, that’s good.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, lovely. All right. So, the check-in right there is simple, powerful, fun-building. What is another one or two of your top practices you recommend?

Bree Groff
Sure. Another one that falls in that camp is the user manual, which is a document you would keep for your team or maybe your direct reports or a couple of people around you. That’s just a series of questions about who you are and how you work.

So, functionally, each person would have their own page, and the questions would read something like, “Who are the humans and animals who are important to you? How can you be misunderstood? How can someone help if you’re stressed or stuck? What’s important to you on a team? What other responsibilities or joys do you have outside of work? What are you trying to get better at, at work?”

So, it’s just all these sorts of questions called a user manual, is my cheeky way. It’s, like, if you get a blender, you’re like, “What are all these buttons do?” Well, it’s like, “Well, you just go look at the manual. There’s like some quick start guide.” So, this is just the human version of that. Because how often do we work with people? Maybe for years, and then you’re like, “Oh, you have a brother?” It’s like, “Yeah.”

But we just, like, never sort of have the opportunity to, or think to, or maybe we’re nervous to share about those things. Also, like, we learn so much in working together through trial and error, but it doesn’t have to be that way. So, for example, like, if I’m stressed, I want someone to talk it out with me. I’m a very verbal processor.

But other people want to be left alone, like, “Do not go near me when I’m stressed out. Give me a hot second. It’s going to…” But, like, why should we guess who’s who or like try and get it right and then mess it up? So, there’s a question, “How can others help when you’re stressed or stuck?” And you can say, “Oh, just give me an hour or two and I’ll figure it out,” or, “Ask me how you can help.”

So, it’s a really simple document. Actually, I have a template on my website. If people want to go, it’s BreeGroff.com/usermanuals. You can download it and create one for your team. And it’s just another way to sort of like lubricate our social interactions such that we’re having more fun with the people we’re working with and we’re more supportive of them as well. We’re more seen and when we’re seen, we’re also better liked.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s good. I also want to hear your comments. In your book, you mentioned a couple of the super tiny little things we can do to, like, give many treats to ourself or to enhance a very basic experience of drinking coffee or tea. Can you speak to these concepts?

Bree Groff
Sure. Yeah, so there’s something that I call thin-slicing your joy. If you are looking ahead at your calendar for the day, and you’re like, “Oh, God, this is going to be painful. Back-to-back meetings, I have to get this thing out, and my inbox is a mess.” Well, if you look at the whole day, sure, it might look hard and dreadful, but we don’t have to look at a whole day.

So, then thin-slicing looks like, “Well, is there one hour, is there one meeting where I know I’m going to have fun? That’s maybe a brainstorm meeting or there’s some people in there that I like.” Or maybe you’re like, “Nope, Bree, every hour looks rough.” And I say, “Okay, great. Thin-slice even further. Are there a few minutes throughout your day where you can squeeze a little extra joy from what you’re already doing?” So, things that take no time.

Smelling is a great one. So, if you’re going to go get yourself a cup of coffee, maybe you stash some cinnamon in the office or in your kitchen and put a little bit on your coffee or your latte, and then just take three seconds and, like, breathe it in. Sensation kind of things are really good for getting us out of our heads, out of sort of like ruminations and anxieties and your head spinning about work.

Another small thing, sometimes the best way to have more fun at work is to help someone else have more fun at work. So, you can send something I call a love bubble, which is just like a two-line text. It could be a text, a DM, an email to a colleague, to say like, “Hey, you totally rocked it in that meeting. I don’t know how you got everybody on the same page. It was so cool.” It’s just like a little note of “You’re awesome. Appreciation. Thank you. So cool that you did that.”

The trick is, like, don’t overthink it, don’t like craft the email. This is not like formal feedback. This is like, “I have a nice thought. I share a nice thought.” Because so often, I think we do have nice thoughts about our colleagues, like, “Oh, they’re so good at that,” we just keep them to ourselves. So, if you can spend 30 seconds shooting off a little love bubble, now you’ve made that person’s day and you sort of kickstarted this positive feedback loop. Now maybe they’ll think of doing the same.

Other, like, little silly things, like micro acts of mischief I really like because they get your adrenaline going a little bit almost office style. Once in a while, you could put Comic Sans in your presentation and see, like, who you can make twitch because it’s like such a terrible typeface. You could rearrange the office furniture. Maybe you play yourself some music. I will say, though, all of these things are, they’re like realistic hacks.

Like, “I’m not having a great time at work. I can’t quit my job and/or maybe I’m just having a bad day. Like, how do I find more joy?” And that’s fine. Like, sometimes we just need to get through things. But I will also say it’s also important to acknowledge, like, “Oh, am I just hacking it through my day every day?” In which case, then it’s a bigger conversation with yourself about, like, “Is there a different role that’s better for me out there?”

Pete Mockaitis
It’s funny, I’m thinking about the TV series “Severance” right now with their really lame, like sort of parties are fun acknowledgments, “And you get to select a style of music and an instrument. We’re having a melon party, and this melon party is not going to start itself.” And what’s funny is, I think that that’s kind of the joke, it’s like, “Oh, these are kind of lame incentives, but these people are like, in some ways almost like children, and so, they can appreciate them.”

But yet, I think there’s also great wisdom in there in terms of like, “We are kind of like children in terms of little things really can be quite delightful.” And I think, often, my sense is, sometimes the more that they violate norms or are weird, in some ways, the more delightful. I mean, I’m sure there’s exceptions, but like the silly socks, for example.

Like, I have, for instance, when I had to get through some stuff, and it was all kind of lame, I would say, “I’m going to celebrate aggressively even though I have very limited resources.” Like, it’s just me. I am in sort of a small office space here but, “I’m going to get a shot glass full of cold water and pour it over my head and pretend it’s like the Gatorade being dumped on the coach, you know, after the victory.”

It’s like, “Well, I had a victory,” and cold water just makes you go, “Ooh,” a little bit. So, I mean, it is so little and so silly, and yet, I guess our inner children, if you will, can find some delight and some fun in it such that it meaningfully transforms the experience of that day.

Bree Groff
Yeah, I mean, the trick here is just amuse yourself. Like, because it’ll look different for everybody. Like, some people are sitting and will be like, “I like my socks just the way I like my…” It’s like, “Great. Don’t do the sock thing.” That’s a very low-bar example. But I guess what I most hope is that people feel the confidence in the value of their days.

And when you feel like you deserve to have a good day, you’re in a position then to try and make that true, to amuse yourself. Because I think so many people will show up to work thinking, “This day is not even mine. I’ve sold it to some employer. I’m not expecting to have fun. I’m here to provide the shareholder value and get my paycheck.” And I get that that sometimes feels like a more honest assessment of work. And yet, I feel like, in that situation, we’ve given up too fast. We’ve settled.

Instead, I think it’s worthy to hold the belief that, like, “Today, whatever day it is, April 12th, this year, I get one shot at this day. This day is not coming back again. This is a day of my life, not just a day that I’ve sold to an employer. So then how do I want to take ownership of enjoying it?” And then it’s just a question of like, “What do you like? I don’t know. What amuses you? What do you find fun?” I think the Gatorade, like the little shot glass of Gatorade is hilarious.

It’s so good because it’s playful. I think there is something in that sort of childish sentiment. Because children realize that there’s value in play just because there’s value in play, not the corporate version of that, that there’s value in play because it drives innovation. No, it’s just simply fun. And now you’ve had that moment of joy and you’ve banked it and it’s yours in life.

I also think it’s important to amuse ourselves because it creates a culture where we give permission to other people to also amuse themselves. And so, sometimes this is sort of like accoutrement around the work, you know, like the socks or the Gatorade example, but also, I think it’s important to amuse ourselves in the work. So, even like when I’m doing client projects and we’re scoping work, I’ll often ask myself the question, like, “How do I want to shape the work or define the work that’s most fun?”

Because I could deliver like an 80-page client deck or like a PowerPoint deck to the client. I would probably do the job. Or, we could design this like two-day immersive offsite experience that’s way more fun to build and way more impactful. So, I think it even goes just beyond the day to day, but, like, “What’s the fun work we want to do and do we have enough belief in the fact that we deserve to be having good days to like risk looking a little silly or childish?” And I think it’s worth it.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. Well, Bree, tell me anything else you want to make sure to mention before we hear about some of your favorite things?

Bree Groff
I said a lot of things.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, well, we’ll do it. That’s fine. Can we hear about a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Bree Groff
Yeah, I mean, on this topic, I love the Annie Dillard quote, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite study or experimental or bit of research?

Bree Groff
Yeah, I’ve always loved the Marty Seligman, he’s a UPenn researcher in positive psychology, the learned helplessness studies. He did this study probably decades ago now, where he would put dogs in this room, would shock their feet, I guess, low shocks that dogs were okay.

In one setup, the dogs weren’t able to escape the shocks. In another setup, they were, they were able to walk off the place where they were getting the shocks. They took those two sets of dogs and put them in yet another trial with shocks. But now, both sets of dogs were able to escape. The dogs that could escape the first time were like, “Yeah, I’m getting out of here,” and they did.

The dogs that could not escape the first time just sat down and whimpered, even though they could escape. They just decided, they had learned, essentially, had learned helplessness, “There’s nothing I can do here. I’ve just got to take it.”

And I loved that study for what it teaches us also about, like, happiness and joy in the workplace. Because I think a lot of us over time, I know I have, at times, have learned, “There’s no fun to be had here. There’s nothing I can do to change it. I’m just going to lay down and whimper and collect my paycheck.” When, in fact, there is so much that we can do.

And in fact, what sort of broke the trance for those dogs who had learned, “I can’t escape this,” was the researchers picking them up and walking their paws off of the shock area to actually teach them, like, “Oh, no, you don’t have to accept this.” So, in some ways I’m hoping to do that for the corporate world as well.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, lovely. And a favorite book?

Bree Groff
Yeah. So, basically, all of Agatha Christie’s novels because they’re my version of being totally unproductive. In a world that teaches me that I need to be optimizing all the time, reading for pleasure feels delightful and subversive. And so, my favorite reading for pleasure is cozy mysteries, and I love all of hers.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Bree Groff
Yeah, I really love Trello.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite habit?

Bree Groff
Yeah. So, I love – would you call this a habit? – I love making a Moka pot in the morning. I really love the few minutes that takes me to make it. The minute I stare, I say, I’m just like staring at it, waiting for it to boil. It’s a good sort of sorbet palette cleanser for the start of my day and makes delicious coffee.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a Bree original quote that really seems to connect and resonate with folks?

Bree Groff
“When you overwork, you underlive.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Bree Groff
Yeah, come hang out at my website. So, it’s BreeGroff.com, B-R-E-E-G-R-O-F-F.com. And from there, you can order the book, you can subscribe to my Substack, you can find me on social media, but it’s a good first place to come say, “Hey.”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Bree Groff
My goal for you for today is to send a love bubble. Find one colleague or contact. You’re going to shoot them a two line note that says something like, “Oh, that design you did was so good. The plan you wrote up was awesome. Like, thank you so much for doing this thing. It really helped me.” And then make somebody else’s day. We’ll create a pay-it-forward kind of vibe for each other.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Bree, thank you.

Bree Groff
Thank you. That was fun.

May 08
0

1056: Winning the Mental Game of Leadership with Sébastien Page

By | Podcasts | No Comments

Sébastien Page explores how great leaders navigate failure, conflict, pressure, and purpose.

You’ll Learn

  1. How agreeableness holds you back
  2. How to know whether a goal is still worth pursuing
  3. How to make stress work for you

About Sébastien

Sébastien Page is Head of Global Multi-Asset and Chief Investment Officer at T. Rowe Price. He has more than two decades of leadership experience and has done extensive research on positive, sports, and personality psychology. He currently oversees a team of investment professionals actively managing over $500 billion in Assets Under Management.

Page has written two finance books: Beyond Diversification: What Every Investor Needs to Know, and the co-authored Factor Investing and Asset Allocation, and he has won six annual research-paper awards: two from The Financial Analysts Journal and four from The Journal of Portfolio Management. He appears regularly on CNBC and Bloomberg TV, and in 2022 was named a Top Voice in Finance by LinkedIn. He has been quoted extensively in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Barron’s. His latest book, The Psychology of Leadership, is on sale now from Harriman House. Page lives in Maryland with his wife and kids.

Resources Mentioned

Thank you, Sponsors!

Sébastien Page Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Sébastien, welcome!

Sébastien Page
Thank you. I’m very excited to do a podcast. I don’t get to do that many, and it’s a lot more relaxed than what we usually do on live national TV when we talk about markets.

Pete Mockaitis
I hear you. Well, it’s funny, you talk about markets a lot, but you got a book about The Psychology of Leadership. What’s that about, Sébastien?

Sébastien Page
You know, I get that question a lot, “Why would a finance guy write a book about self-improvement and high-performing leadership?” I’ve been a leader myself for about 25 years in business. And, to me, I started working on this because, myself, I felt very stressed at work, and I was beating myself up for being stressed. So, I was stressing about stressing.

And, Pete, I talked to a sports psychologist who introduced me to a lot of fascinating research, and that was the beginning. The first time I met him, he had this story because the sports psychologists, it turns out, is a pro-athlete as well, 40 national titles in the sport of handball. And so, that’s the sport that looks like squash but you smack the ball with your hands. Forty, four-zero, national titles, and he’s a sports psychologist. His name is Dr. Daniels Simmons.

This is the origin story of the book, “Why would a finance guy end up writing a book on self-improvement and leadership?” He tells me the story of his best match ever, and it’s a match that occurred 10 years ago but he remembers everything about it. He remembers every point, where he was at every point, where the ball was. He has a tear in his eye. At some point, he’s on his knees, he makes an extreme impossible shot.

And then, Pete, it’s an absolute letdown because he goes, “And then I lost the next two points.” And I go, “What? You lost the game?” And that’s the mindset of a sports psychologist, where you have 40 national titles, and your best match ever is one that you happen to lose, but that’s not really relevant. To him, that day he realized he could play at a higher level because he was playing a stronger opponent.

So, I became fascinated with this mindset of sports psychology. So, that’s how the book started. And then I just dug into the research.

Pete Mockaitis
So, it was it his best game ever in terms of his own performance or his delight in it because he realized that he had achieved at a higher level?

Sébastien Page
It was mainly the latter. It was the realization that he could play at a higher level. And, to me, it was the realization of a mindset, which, by the way, relates to money management as well. You can’t get everything right in money management. Sometimes you lose. It was an illustration of that mindset and how you handle it.

But, for him, it was, “Look, I’m now a stronger player. It doesn’t matter that I won or lost.” It doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about winning. It’s just a different way to approach uncertainty and failure.

Pete Mockaitis
No, it’s a good one. One of our guests, Michael Bungay-Stanier, who wrote The Coaching Habit and others, said his favorite quote is, “The purpose of life is to be defeated by ever-greater things,” or some of that notion of ever-greater things.

Sébastien Page
I like that.

Pete Mockaitis
And that you can feel good about that, in terms of “Okay, hey, I still lost but, wow, my golly, look at what it took to take me out. I’m really getting better. That’s awesome!”

Sébastien Page
I like that a lot. And I often think back on Roger Federer’s commencement address that went viral about six months ago. He was speaking to students. And Roger Federer is one of the top tennis players of all time, and he goes, “I’ve played 1500 matches in my career. I’ve won 80% of them.” But then he asked the students, “What percentage of points do you think I won?”

What do you think, Pete, is that percentage, percentage of points that Federer won in his career? Not to put you on the spot.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, I don’t know how tennis scoring works. I was going to wildly guess, 61, Sébastien.

Sébastien Page
So, you’re not far. It’s 54%. So, Roger Federer, top tennis player only won 54% of the points. And then he looked at the students, and he said, “Whatever game you play in life, you’re going to lose.” Effortless winning is a myth and it’s your mindset when you lose. You actually learn more in sports psychology, from losing than from winning.

In fact, I write this in The Psychology of Leadership, sports psychology is not about winning at all. It’s about losing and what you do with that loss. And I really liked what you said earlier about losing to ever-greater things or ever-greater opponents. That’s exactly the conversation that sparked my interest in sports psychology and how it can apply to leadership, to business management, and to money management as well.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, I was thinking about money things as well. It might’ve been Mark Cuban, who said, “You only have to be right once,” in terms of, like, your entrepreneurial career. Yeah, you can fill many things but your one big win, and, whoo, you’re doing awesome.

Sébastien Page
Yeah, that’s an analogy in venture capital, and it’s the same idea. You have to accept the fact that a lot of your bets are not going to work. As long as there’s one that goes 10X, you’re going to be a successful venture capitalist.

But in terms of self-improvement, we don’t like losing, and we have to kind of get over that. As leaders, when you look at business environments, accepting that you’re going to have setbacks, and just focusing on what you do with those and how you move forward. That’s where the mindset shifts.

And, look, I think, Pete, in general, sports psychology is greatly underrated. I wrote the book also because the positive side of psychology is kind of still on unexplored in business. If you go on Google Scholar, and you searched for articles in clinical psychology, you’ll probably get about the same number of articles as in positive psychology. To me, that’s fascinating. The business world has only scratched the surface here of the positive side of psychology.

Let me give you an example. Does the name Felix Baumgartner ring a bell?

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah, he got the red ball really high up stunt.

Sébastien Page
Yes. Here’s the stunt. He goes on a helium balloon, up 24 miles to the edge of space, he steps out of his capsule, and he skydives for 10 minutes, four minutes in freefall. The first human being to break the sound barrier. I mean, it’s amazing what he did. But what most people don’t know is Felix Baumgartner was coached every step of the way in preparation and through the day of that skydiving from space stunt by a sports psychologist.

So, I used this sometimes as an introduction to, yeah, psychology is super important to treat clinical anxiety and depression, but it’s also really important for ultra-high performance. And that’s where the business world hasn’t really come around to this much yet. And it just brings so much tools to deal with setbacks and the stress that comes with high performance, because it’s stressful to deliver high performance in any area of life.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. Well, you’ve got a number of really cool principles that you put out in your book, and I want to jump into speaking about these bits, about mindset. You said we should identify and manage our core beliefs. Tell us, why and how is that done?

Sébastien Page
So, a core belief is the way you interpret the world. Think of it as rules of thumb. They might not be entirely conscious but it’s how you interpret events, and how you tend to make decisions. In the research in psychology, it’s often about a traumatic event that changed your core belief.

So, imagine someone who was betrayed in a major way in their life. They might’ve developed a core belief that everybody is out to get them, and that’s how they’re going to interpret situations and go through life with that core belief.

Now, in business, we have core beliefs. “The consumer is always right,” is a popular one. In money management, we have core beliefs, “The trend is your friend,” or, “Buy low and sell high.” And the thing about core beliefs in business, in leadership, for yourself, is that they’re, oftentimes, unexamined.

Do you know, Pete, what your core beliefs are, how you tend to react under pressure, how you tend to interpret the world? Not necessarily. You might have core beliefs that you haven’t realized you’re using to make important decisions.

So, in that principle, I encourage people, for themselves, for their teams, for their company, to write them down, examine them, discuss them, “What do we believe in? How do we interpret the world?” And here’s the key. Some of them, you’re going to want to get rid of. Other ones, you’re going to want to foster within your team or within your organization. And that’s where you start managing core beliefs, and it’s incredibly powerful in setting the right culture for high performance.

I had a core belief earlier in my career, my boss used to say that I heard high frequencies, and this was about corporate politics. What he meant was, you know how dogs hear certain noises that humans don’t hear?

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah. I’m thinking about the Superman movie with Gene Hackman, and that dog with high pitch thing. But Superman and the dogs could hear it.

Sébastien Page
Yes. So, he would say, “You hear high frequencies, like you’re hearing political noise, or you’re worried about things that are really just high frequencies.” And he would remind me of this every time I get worried. And my response was usually, “Well, it’s not paranoia if they’re really after you.” That’s kind of a famous quote that people use sometimes, “It’s not paranoia if they’re really after you.”

But that was a bad core belief. It was a bad core belief to think that, to not assume good intentions. And I kind of managed and replaced that core belief with, “Start by assuming good intentions.” It’s just a good starting point, even if you’re wrong. It’s a better way to start when you’re managing team dynamics and corporate politics.

So, that’s an example of examining core beliefs, changing it for a better one.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, can you walk us through the practice in terms of how you identify a hidden core belief, and then if you see it, you say, “Ah, actually, I don’t like that. That’s not so helpful”? How do you jettison it? Because I imagine that’s perhaps easier said than done.

Sébastien Page
So, people in clinical psychology, when they might have really unhealthy core beliefs, they just go to therapy, and that’s a way, through discussion and through the therapeutic to identify your core beliefs but I think you don’t need to go to therapy to identify your core beliefs.

I think, as a team setting, say in a business environment, what you want to do is observe how people behave, think, make decisions, interpret events during moments of high pressure, during moments when it’s tough decision, and there’s emotion in the room. That’s usually where we default to some core beliefs.

And then what you do is you discuss these. Let’s take money management. Markets are crashing, “Are we prone to just sell and panic or buy more or sit tight?” And there’s probably a core belief behind that. And so, you identify those moments of pressure, and then you see how they come out, they surface, during those moments.

It’s also often written down in a company’s founding or there’s a lot of companies that will write, “We believe…” statements. And those are usually a bit cheesy and motherhood and apple pie, and they sit on a PowerPoint somewhere, and they’re cliché, and we don’t really read them or believe them. But you know what? These things really matter day to day.

Not necessarily the curated PowerPoint, but, “What do we believe as a team?” whether it’s a sports team, whether it’s a family. You’re a leader in your family. You don’t have to manage people in a business to be a leader. So, in The Psychology of Leadership, I give some examples of company core beliefs or team core beliefs, and just writing them down is very helpful.

Pete Mockaitis
So, let’s hear a real belief, written down, that’s powerful and has a galvanizing real impact on a team.

Sébastien Page
So, for us in business, if we’re disagreeing on something, the best way to win the argument, say it’s a product development or an investment decision, is to make the case on behalf of our clients. So, there is a core belief that everything we do, everyday we go to work, is to make money for our clients so they can get better retirements, pay their bills, put their kids through college.

That’s the mission of a money manager. You go to work and you want to make money for your clients. So, that’s a core belief. We write it down often, we talk about it, and we resolve disagreements with them, is that we’re acting as fiduciaries for our clients.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Very good. And then you also have a principle about “Be disagreeable sometimes.”

Sébastien Page
So, in personality psychology, we all know whether we’re introverts or extroverts, and that’s actually popular in the business world nowadays to talk about introversion, but there are these other traits, and agreeableness is one of the traits that I talk about in The Psychology of Leadership.

Agreeableness is a great trait to have. It just means that you like to get along, you’re a good listener, you tend to not confront people head on, but like any personality trait, it has downsides. If you’re too high in agreeableness, you’re a people-pleaser and you’ll put other people’s needs before yours, and that might not be productive for your own career and even for the benefit of the team.

So, some people score high in agreeableness, some people score low. In The Psychology of Leadership, I actually publish my own scores. I’m tempted to put you on the spot, Pete, to see if you would score yourself high or low in agreeableness.

Pete Mockaitis
I’m too agreeable, it’s a problem. I need to, sometimes, not give a “Good God, gosh, golly” about other people’s perspectives in order to do what’s optimal, yeah.

Sébastien Page
You hit the nail on the head. If you want to be a good leader, an effective leader, you can’t spend your days just trying to build consensus and making everybody happy. You’re going to have to make some decisions where you’re going to have to be disagreeable.

And I say 10% of the time in The Psychology of Leadership, this is a book that’s full of research. All the principles are research-backed but the 10% is my intuitive recommendation, know when to be disagreeable at the right moment, when you need to put your foot down. Only then you’ll be an effective leader.

You can’t just go through your day-to-day as a leader just constantly trying to make everybody happy. It’s a desirable thing, though. That’s why I say 10%, right?

Pete Mockaitis
Wel, it’s true. And as I think about, if you hear the stories of great leaders through history, there are often those moments in which all or many of the advisors around them are pushing them in one direction, and they say, “No, absolutely not. That could result in nuclear annihilation. So, we’re not doing that. We’re doing the opposite,” and they firmly, with backbone, go ahead and do the thing. And we’re still alive today, so thanks to good leadership backbone.

So, I guess the hard part, Sébastien, is how do we know, “When is that 10%?” How do you know, “You know what? I am, indeed, putting my foot down, and the perspectives I’m getting are incomplete or just plain wrong. And so, we’re going my way this time”?

Sébastien Page
Well, let me give you two cases. One is you, as the leader, have information because you’re connected to the board of directors or the clients. You might have information that you can’t share for one reason or the other.

But there’s an information asymmetry and you know what the right decision is, or maybe you have a unique talent, and only you. But be careful with that because that can turn into arrogance. But you have an edge in making the decision. Like, in your example. You’re going to be disagreeable.

The other part of it, number two, is that the job of the leader, often, is to resolve conflicts. And you’ll have people come at you with recommendations that disagree. So, one person wants the organization to go left, the other person wants the organization to go right, “Leader, what are we going to do?” It can be absolutely exhausting and counterproductive to just try to create some kind of consensus or keep everybody happy. If the organization needs to move fast, you have to use your 10% right there.

So, you use your 10% when there’s an information asymmetry or really convince you have the right decision and others don’t, and then you use it when, and maybe a bit more often, when you need to help resolve disagreements. Because if you don’t, over time, it builds, and it builds, and it builds, and it becomes your full time just dealing with the disagreements because they fester, they just keep going.

Pete Mockaitis
Understood. So, by taking a stand and resolving it, we sort of nip it in the bud.

Sébastien Page
Yes. And remember also, I talk about goal-induced blindness in the book. And with goal-induced blindness, people lose sight of what’s not related to their goals. They just focus narrowly on the goal, and they might sacrifice their health, their family, or their sense of ethics. So, they’re, famously, companies, business leaders, or sports leaders and athletes, that cheat because they have goal-induced blindness.

And so, when you as a leader, you really have to put your foot down, and say, “Okay, you need to go home and rest. This is perhaps a disagreeable way. I know you want to stay here and keep going,” or, “This is an ethical grey area and we don’t go nowhere near that. And, therefore, I’m putting my foot down.”

So, exercising leadership is a lot about inspiring people, is a lot about building consensus, is a lot about being agreeable, but 10% of the time, and that’s my own rule, 10% of the time it’s not, and that’s a crucial part of the job.

Pete Mockaitis
Goal-induced blindness is a fun turn of a phrase. And I’m curious if there are any early-warning signals you look for to see, “Uh-oh, it looks like we are starting to tip-toe into blind territory.”

Sébastien Page
You’re going to start seeing it through people getting exhausted, through morale, through customer feedback, but let’s just define goal-induced blindness clearly. It’s well-researched in psychology, and let me give you an example, Pete.

I was in front of about a thousand students, giving a talk, about two months ago. And I asked the students the following question. I’m going to ask you, too, although I think I know what you’re going to answer. Imagine I give you a bowl of a hundred gummy bears. Four of them are poisoned and they’re going to kill you. So, you have a 4% chance of dying.

And my challenge to you, Pete, is would you eat one gummy bear for $100,000?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’d have to run all the numbers but I’m guessing no because it would take vast sums for me to think it’s worth trading my life, and our numbers aren’t good enough here, Sébastien.

Sébastien Page
So, look, I offered the students, hypothetically, a million. That was my opening. And I saw 15-20% of the room raised their hands. And in surveys, when you ask Millennials, for example, there are good surveys on them, 81% of them say that their life goal is to become rich, which, by the way, is not a bad goal. Go for it. Like, measurable goals, traditional goals are motivating, go for it.

But the caveat about goal-induced blindness is that, I mean, what? Eating one of those gummies is complete goal-induced blindness. Like, no amount of money is worth doing this. And here’s why I used four gummies that are poisoned out of a hundred.

The literature in psychology refers to Mt. Everest deaths. If you want to summit Everest, you have a 4% chance of dying in the process. And when you read about psychology and goal-induced blindness, there are lots of examples of people who die on Everest because they have the summit in their sight, and they lose sight of everything else, the risk they’re taking.

So, at the end of one of my principles, I go, “If you’re going to take any advice from this entire book, take the following. If ever you feel like climbing Everest because it’s there or some other reason, my advice to you is ‘Don’t.’”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Well, it’s funny because Everest, we think about money, I suppose my frame of reference for even entertaining the gummy bears is that if I think about my life as a gift or contribution to family, nonprofit, others, like, “What is the impact I would like to give? What’s the impact I would like to create by putting my life in service of folks? And then what might be the comparable impact of a vast sum of funds going to, you know, starving or whatever, folks in need?”

So, I guess that’s how I’m thinking about it. Because we might say, “Would you eat a gummy bear if it meant you’d save many lives in the neighboring room?” And so, I guess that’s how I’m thinking about it. Whereas, Everest, yeah, I mean, one, I’m not that into mountain climbing, even though it’s kind of fun.

You’re right, I think that’s excellent to think about goal-induced blindness, is you just want it really bad, and you’re excited about it, and to heck with the risks.

Sébastien Page
Look, you found the perfect counterargument to what I was saying, which is you might have altruistic goals that you are behaving in a way that looks like goal-induced blindness but it’s a completely different framework, it’s to do something good. And there, we get philosophical. And there’s the theory of utility, and “How do you achieve the greater good for the greater number of people?”

Psychology is not much about philosophy. My son is 17, happens to be really interested in philosophy, so we talk about these things. But, Pete, you gave a really good counterargument there. My general recommendation is to pursue goals, go for it. Like, measurable goals work. They work. They motivate. We take people to the moon. We want to go to the moon. That’s the goal. And it works. And it’s okay to want to make money.

And I think, even better, if you want to make money for altruistic ends because, in that case, also research in psychology, in positive psychology, shows that that is much more likely to make you happy, Pete, to help others than making more money per se. And there’s a lot of research about “Does happiness increase with money?”

If you’re in poverty, it definitely does, but then it does not much after a certain level. That’s also well-published research. But the problem with goal-induced blindness is that it happens. So, I’m arguing for having goals, for being aggressive in pursuing them, but for being mindful of “Are you still taking care of yourself? Like, are you healthy? Are you sleeping? Are you eating okay? Are you exercising? And don’t cheat, ever. It’s not worth it. Yeah, you’re playing a long-term game.”

And recognize when you’re slipping into goal-induced blindness. That’s a risk for high performers, not for low performers.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, it’s good to note that, sometimes, as you pursue a goal, we realize the costs are much greater than originally anticipated. And it may be wise to pause, and say, “Hmm, new information has come to light. Perhaps this goal is no longer worth pursuing,” although that is a bummer, and make sure you don’t let your ego get into it, like, “I’m not a quitter.” It’s like, “Okay.”

Well, I think about that with Everest, in terms of folks, they get in that position where they pretty close to the summit, and they realize, “Uh-oh, we’re entering a high-danger situation,” and some folks will wisely turn back even though they were so close to the peak, and those who are like, “Doggone it, I’m so close, I can’t give up. I’m just going to go for it. I’m going for it.”

Sébastien Page
Look, quitting might be the most underrated skill in business. We think of leaders as those that never give up and stick to the goal, but there are plenty of occasions in business when the facts change and the future profits from your project have changed, and you have to quit even though you’ve invested a lot in that project.

Annie Duke has a fantastic book that she titled Quit, and it’s about how quitting is an underrated skill in business. And I refer to her research in The Psychology of Leadership as well. So, I’m glad you bring this up. Pete, the other example I like to use when talking about goals is my friend, Phil. So, that’s the story of my friend, Phil. Phil made a billion dollars.

Pete Mockaitis
Shout out, Phil.

Sébastien Page
Yeah, with his cryptocurrency company, and he decided to give everything away to charity. And the next morning, he was eating his cereal in his kitchen, and an angel appeared to him. So, this is usually where I disclose that it’s not a true story, but it’s illustrative.

Pete Mockaitis
“What an interesting life Phil has had. He earned a billion dollars. Sees angels.”

Sébastien Page
You might’ve been wondering where this interview was going.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, I bet, I’m an angel, Sébastien, so, okay, fiction with you.

Sébastien Page
It’s a made-up story but I use it to frame goals. So, the angel said, “Oh, you’re such a good person. I’m going to give you one of the following three gifts. I can give you infinite power, I can give you infinite wealth, or I can give you infinite wisdom.”

So, I don’t know, let’s encourage our audience to think about which one they would choose. Pete, which one would you choose – power, wealth, or wisdom?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m tempted to say, to paint how we define the terms, infinite wisdom may lead you to, if you so desire, infinite wealth and power in addition. So, it’s like a three-for-one deal with the wisdom.

Sébastien Page
Or it may lead you to not desire those things.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah, yeah.

Sébastien Page
Who knows? But that was the interesting part about that story, is that Phil chose wisdom. And so, for the first time in human history, someone had infinite wisdom. There was a giant press conference, cameras in his face, lightbulbs flashing. What would the person with infinite wisdom say? We’ve never heard from anyone with infinite wisdom.

And the story goes, Phil said, “I should’ve taken the money.” And this is the frame that I use to talk about goals and long-term goals, and how we think about, “Which goals will make us happy?” And this is where positive psychology comes in.

And Andre Agassi, for example, had the clear goal of being one of the best, or the best tennis player. He was miserable his entire career. His autobiography is one of the best books I’ve ever read, Open by Andre Agassi. He was absolutely miserable. He hated playing tennis. And when he left tennis, I think he became much happier.

So, we set these goals and we don’t take the time to think about “What long-term goal will truly make me happy?” So, positive psychology says, when they followed people for their entire lifetime over 80 years, eight decades, this is a study out of Harvard, and they go, “What makes people thrive over their lifetime? What makes them happy? Let’s ask them, on a regular basis, how they’re doing.” A bunch of questions, “How are you doing? How are you feeling? How’s your life going?”

And then there’s generations of researchers, as you can imagine. There’s no study like this. It’s fascinating. Eighty years running, it’s still running. Robert Waldinger out of Harvard, he’s fantastic, and he’s still running that study.

But what they found was people, during their lifetime, who climbed the social ladder, who were healthy, who made money, were not necessarily statistically happier than those who lost their job, who got sick, who went to prison.

It’s just so fascinating that all these traditional goals did not make people happy. And there was one dimension, though, that showed to be very powerful in people’s ability to thrive in the long run and feel happy with their lives.

I don’t know if you’d talked about it in your podcast with Robert, but it is those that had the most positive relationships in their lives self-reported the higher levels of happiness over their lifetime. So, relationships are important.

Now, we’re getting into notions of happiness and positive psychology, and here I am, a business guy, talking about these very abstract concepts. What does it mean in business? It means a ton. If you have a bad day at work, it’s probably because of a relationship issue. I would say, nine out of ten times, you’d come home and you just had a bad day at work, it’s probably relationship-related.

If you want to run a high-performing organization, a high-performing soccer team, a high-performing orchestra, a large proportion of the success of the team is going to be the quality of their relationships. And it’s not about being nice and feeling good every time, but it’s trust, it is mutual respect, it’s how you give feedback to each other. Those things are absolutely necessary for strong leadership and strong team performance.

So, we go from this theoretical, positive, nice-sounding positive psychology stuff to really practical business practices in terms of how you give feedback, how you receive feedback, how you talk about culture, why culture matters, how people interact within a team, why trust is so important.

And I say set goals that are longer term, that will generate organizational happiness, set goals for yourself that are positive in nature, and here’s how you go about executing against those goals.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, we talked about agreeableness a little bit. I also want to talk about neuroticism. You’ve got a bit about learning to love to worry. Tell us why and how do we do that?

Sébastien Page
We talked about why I wrote this book, initially, why I got interested, particularly in sports psychology. I felt stressed. And I was beating myself, well, for feeling stressed, I thought, “I’ve been doing this for 25 years. I’ve had more stressful jobs. Why do I feel stressed at work?” And there, sports psychology is incredibly helpful because you learn to embrace a certain amount of stress.

I explain in The Psychology of Leadership that optimal performance does not occur at a stress level of zero. In other words, stress can increase performance up to a point of optimal performance, after which, performance decreases, mental health gets impacted, you choke, it impacts your physical health as well.

But this idea of going through life trying to operate at zero stress, first of all, is absolutely impossible. And the top athletes, I guarantee you, speaking to a sports psychologist who trains them mentally, they get absolutely stressed. Now, sports psychologists like to reframe stress as activation or arousal. In the literature, there are different ways to define this.

I’m using the term stress loosely here. But this idea that there’s a curve, that stress to a certain amount, with activation, will improve, not decrease, your performance is super fascinating. And, by the way, those curves, they’ve been studied for almost a hundred years, and they are different for different people. So, your stress curve might be different from my stress curves, and they’re also different for different tasks.

For some tasks, you’ll perform really well when you’re really stressed, when you have the adrenaline pumping. If you’re going to run a 5K, you’re probably going to get your best time with a very high level of activation and some adrenaline coursing and some, yes, some stress before the race. You’re going to perform better.

If you’re going to do archery or something complex or solve math problems, you’re going to need some activation but your optimal performance is going to be at a lower-stress level.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that makes sense. As I think about when I’m really fired up, my hands are kind of shaky. So, precision archery isn’t the best. Well, you got me thinking about biathlon athletes which is the fun-nest sport. The funniest idea for a sport, “Let’s go cross-country skiing, and then pause and shoot, and then do it again and again.” And so, there you have it, they’re playing both games at the same time.

Sébastien Page
I love that example because, to ski, I mean, the technique is pretty straightforward. They got to be pretty activated. And then they need to bring it down really quick for the shooting. So, it combines two stress curves, and the ability to toggle between the two is part of that sport. That’s a great example, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
I want to hear your piece about thinking about death.

Sébastien Page
So, does that sound positive or negative to you if I just say that?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I mean, there’s some ancient stoic philosophy about the benefits of remembering, thinking about your death. So, yeah, on the surface, it feels a little spooky and unpleasant, yet there could be rich goodness under the surface.

Sébastien Page
Look, Stephen Covey has one of the best-selling self-improvement books of all time, The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People. One of the habits is “Begin with the end in mind.” And he does talk about thinking about what you want to reflect on at the end of your life.

And then Covey argues once you figure that out, it guides your values, and you bring that back to today and it’ll help you make better decisions that are more aligned with your long-term goals and long-term values. So, I love that.

In fact, one of the early titles of the book, instead of The Psychology of Leadership, was “The End in Mind.” I actually wanted to give a nod to Covey.

But so, you’d think about death, it helps you think about positive psychology. There’s a model in positive psychology that spells P-E-R-M-A, PERMA. It was developed by Marty Seligman, father of Positive Psychology. I hate acronyms because we use way too many of them in business, but I love that one. So, P stands for positive emotion, and then ERMA, E stands for engagement, R for relationships, quality relationships, M for meaning, and A for long-term accomplishment.

When you think about your death or when you think about what you want on your tombstone, what you’re going to reflect on has a lot more to do with ERMA – engagement, relationships, meaning, and long-term accomplishments – than what day-to-day you and I and everybody in our audience, we’re all seeking, which is basic positive emotions, a good glass of wine, a laugh, a like on social media. We’re all addicted to the positive emotions.

But if you put this in the context of thinking very long term, think about death, stoicism, the end in mind, however you want to frame that thinking, you introduce notions of positive psychology that are incredibly powerful. We don’t really talk about this in business, but there are lots of ways to think about applications of this in business.

For example, engagement. More than half of employees in surveys in our country are not engaged at work. So, how do you use research in psychology to improve engagement? And you introduce the notion of flow, how you set the goals, how you set the milestones to put people in flow, and so on. Meaning is incredibly important in business, and some are underrated sometimes.

So, I could go on but this whole idea of starting from the end point is a big part of The Psychology of Leadership, of goal-setting, and of executing against goals.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Sébastien, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we hear about your favorite things?

Sébastien Page
I would say, first of all, thank you for having me on your podcast. You know, I mentioned, in my day job as a money manager, I have to go and talk about financial markets in the space of two to ten minutes, and it is high pressure and it’s live national TV. I’m super happy that you got me on here, to have more of a conversation. It was a lot of fun. I hope our audience liked it.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, okay. Well, now let’s hear about a favorite quote.

Sébastien Page
Okay. Marcus Aurelius, “You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realize this and you will find strength.”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Sébastien Page
There’s some research that shows that social comparison is a more powerful motivator than positive encouragement.

So, here you go, Pete. If someone else has a podcast that you feel you’re competing with, and they’re getting more views, better ratings, it should be, theoretically, based on that research, more motivating to you than if I just called you, and say, “Hey, Pete, you’re doing a great job. Keep going.”

And so, it’s counterintuitive. We look down on social comparison but it’s actually very powerful. And if you can gamify it and enjoy competition, it could be a super powerful tool.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite book?

Sébastien Page
I got to go with David Goggins, either of his books, Can’t Hurt Me or the follow-up. And I read so many books but there’s no author like David Goggins that is going to motivate you to do something about your physical health and exercise.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Sébastien Page
Favorite tool in my day-to-day life, very underrated, I feel, is a calorie counter. I think it’s really hard to eat a decent diet. I don’t think we should all, like, try to be perfect. But counting your calories is pretty much, at least in my life, the only way that I could get a decent diet going, is to actually look at it and count it. So, those are, like, really helpful.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite habit?

Sébastien Page
This is going to sound unusual, I suppose. It’s important to me to have a streak for exercise, and I’ve basically exercised every day for more than 12 years, for at least 30 minutes. Sometimes, when I’m tired, I just go on a slow jog.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a key Sébastien-original soundbite that you’re known for, or people quote back to you often?

Sébastien Page
The most critical lesson in leadership that I’ve learned over the last few years, and I’ve been a leader for 25 years, is summarized in four words, “Talk less. Listen more.” We think leaders have to be outstanding communicators, and that is part of the job, but listening is what is going to really push your leadership skills upwards.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Sébastien Page
PsychologyofLeadership.net or LinkedIn.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for someone looking to be awesome at their job?

Sébastien Page
Set big goals.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Sébastien, thank you. This is fun.

Sébastien Page
Thank you. Likewise.