Meredith Arthur is a self-described recovering overthinker. She is chief of staff at TwoTwenty, a in-house incubator for new projects at Pinterest. She’s also a mental health advocate and author of the book Get Out of My Head: Inspiration for Overthinkers in an Anxious World.

Meredith speaks to host Morra Aarons-Mele about being diagnosed with anxiety at age 40, life as a product manager in the start up world, and how she manages anxiety now.

Your Anxiety Needs a Product Manager

Host Morra Aarons-Mele is on a mission to reframe how we think about anxiety and mental health in the workplace. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S. We desperately need better models for leadership and a more holistic view of mental health. Our culture tells those of us who suffer from anxiety and depression that we can’t succeed, but we tell a different story — without sugarcoating the tough stuff. We feature stories from people who’ve been there and experts who can help you thrive.
Listen in your favorite podcast app: https://pod.link/1480904163

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Mental Health

There was a time when everyone masked their mental and emotional struggles at work; or worse, didn’t even know that what they were experiencing might be anxiety, depression, or something similar. In this episode, host Morra Aarons-Mele first speaks with Kent Coules, co-publisher at Hawaii Business Magazine, about his long career in media, his path to sobriety, and what he learned about drinking and anxiety along the way. Then, she speaks with Donna Volpitta, co-founder of The Mental Health Literacy Collaborative, about how important it is for adults - and kids K-12 - to better understand mental health.

Mental Health Literacy Can Change Lives - and Careers

Just as members of a family have different roles to play and different patterns of behavior they keep, so too can our family dynamics play out in the workplace. We bring with us to work our feelings about how we should assert ourselves, ask for help, deal with failure and more - all behaviors we learn in our family system growing up.
Deborah Ancona, a Professor of Organization Studies, and the Founder of the MIT Leadership Center at the MIT Sloan School of Management, calls these behaviors “ghosts,”and they’re not all bad. Ancona shares her research and experience on how family systems affect us at work. 
Check out our previous episode on family systems theory: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5ZNknArKLeGB9JATPFZkJb
Read Deborah's Artile: https://hbr.org/2022/01/family-ghosts-in-the-executive-suite

Think Your Family Background Doesn’t Affect You At Work? Think Again

Anxiety rarely feels good, so it might feel counterintuitive to think about it as a positive thing. But in this episode, we revisit a conversation with Wendy Suzuki, an NYU neuroscientist who studies neuroplasticity. Anxiety can bring benefits to performance and work, and we can reframe our relationship with this challenging but necessary emotion. Suzuki is the author of the book “Good Anxiety: Harnessing the Power of the Most Misunderstood Emotion.”
Learn more about Wendy here: https://www.wendysuzuki.com/

Are You Harnessing Your Anxiety for Good?

In the quest to be a more empathetic and effective leader or manager, the lens of trauma-informed leadership might be helpful for you. It’s the idea that all people have various forms of trauma that they carry with them to the workplace, and that leaders should approach situations at work accordingly.
Matthew Cooke, partner at the coaching, consulting and investment firm Evolution, is a big proponent of this kind of thinking. He explains how a trauma-informed leader might view or act in situations differently, the skills and resources used for managing through tough moments, and how you can apply the concepts to your own work. 
Learn more about trauma-informed leadership: 

https://healthadministrationdegree.usc.edu/blog/trauma-informed-leadership
https://accelerate.uofuhealth.utah.edu/leadership/five-ways-to-practice-trauma-informed-leadership
https://www.fastcompany.com/90836621/we-need-trauma-informed-leadership-in-the-workplace
https://evolution.team/matthew-cooke

Trauma-Informed Leadership: Is it Right For You?

Heather Hansen challenges the notion of "good" and "bad" English. Good communication is about getting the message across. She’s based in Singapore and helps executives with their linguistic and communication skills. Hansen is helping us tackle a real problem in our increasingly globalized work world: accent bias. Hansen is on a mission to help increase awareness about our assumptions of what “perfect” English sounds like-- and what we think a good leader sounds like. She explains the negative impacts that accent bias can have, and how we can fight it. 

To learn more about Heather, check out her TedTalk: https://www.ted.com/talks/heather_hansen_2_billion_voices_how_to_speak_bad_english_perfectly

Your Anxiety Needs a Product Manager

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