In today's hybrid and digital workplaces, the instinct for many busy managers is to rely on quick tech tools like AI or generic emails to communicate care. Henna Pryor argues this approach is actually backfiring. She challenges leaders to recognize that we are living in an "age of doubt" where skepticism is the default posture, urging them to close their "signal gaps" by aligning what they say with how they actually show up.

Joe Mull sits down with Henna for a conversation about workplace trust and leadership skills. As a workplace performance expert, speaker, and author of Good Awkward and the upcoming book The Signal Gap, Henna brings a wide-ranging career background. From surviving the grueling hours of Big Four public accounting to spending fourteen years in executive search, she uses her front-row seat to team dynamics to help leaders build trust at work and become more believable and impactful.

Henna breaks down the difference between cheap and costly signals, explaining why simply expressing gratitude is no longer enough to make employees feel valued. She shares stories from her own career (including her first job at a diner and the sting of being ignored as a high-achieving employee) to illustrate the importance of leadership communication. She also warns against "intent smuggling" and the dangers of public microclaims in the digital age.

In this episode, you'll learn:

🔹 The difference between gratitude & appreciation.
🔹 Why leaders need to move past "cheap signals".
🔹 What a "signal gap" is & how it destroys a leader's believability in the modern verification era.
🔹 Why relying on AI to send quick, personalized responses can lead to "intent smuggling".
🔹 The reason you need to "choose your channel" carefully when recognizing & retaining high achievers.
🔹 How to avoid the "blast radius" of missing the mark on your searchable, public microclaims.

This episode is for managers and leaders focused on employee retention, employee engagement, and team building who want to foster genuine workplace trust, believability, and connection in an increasingly skeptical world.

Episode Resources:

Check out Henna's website: https://hennapryor.com
Pre-order her upcoming book The Signal Gap: How to Boost Believability and Influence in the Age of Doubt: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1646873092

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Timestamps
0:00 The Age of Doubt
0:22 Introducing Henna Pryor
2:03 Maximizing Bad First Jobs
4:29 Loving the Telemarketing Grind
8:06 The Public Accounting Crucible
9:37 Genuine Leadership Availability
11:00 Ignoring High Achievers
14:09 Gratitude vs. Appreciation
16:33 Choosing Your Communication Channel
19:58 Mastering the Career Pivot
22:18 Navigating the Signal Gap
26:51 AI & Intent Smuggling
31:13 The Danger of Microclaims
36:44 Secretive Workplace Rules
38:04 Banning Corporate Platitudes
38:53 Nobody Is Watching You
40:13 Micro Shifts for Leaders

When a workplace is moving a million miles an hour, the natural instinct is to rely solely on technology and efficiency to get things done. Mike Robbins believes this is a missed opportunity. He challenges leaders to prioritize human connection, leaning into the "analog" skills of authentic leadership and vulnerability to build high-performing teams.

Joe Mull welcomes Mike to the Boss Better Now podcast for a heartfelt conversation about building stronger and more connected teams. As a former professional baseball player, renowned speaker, and author of five books, Mike draws on a lifetime of teamwork experiences to help leaders cultivate environments where people perform at their best because they feel psychologically safe, valued, and connected.

Throughout the discussion, Mike outlines his Authenticity Equation and explains why giving people the space to be honest and imperfect is vital for driving trust in the workplace. He also shares compelling stories from his own life, from getting drafted right out of high school by the New York Yankees to a defining moment with his high school basketball coach, to illustrate the importance of celebrating effort over outcome and modeling the behavior you want to see.

In this episode, you'll learn:

🔹 The Authenticity Equation and how honesty, self-righteousness, and vulnerability interact to build trust.
🔹 Why "thawing" the virtual room is essential for fostering connection within remote and hybrid teams.
🔹 How leaders should navigate deep political and sociological divisions by finding common ground below the "waterline of the iceberg".
🔹 The two distinct ways you can influence others as a leader.
🔹 Why taking "baby steps" with vulnerability is a crucial part of developing a growth mindset.

This episode is for managers and leaders focused on leadership development and team building who want to build teams that thrive through authentic leadership, connection, and trust.

Episode Resources:
Mike's YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@mikerobbinsvideo
Mike's website: https://mike-robbins.com/

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Timestamps
0:00 Introducing Mike Robbins
2:33 First Jobs, Paper Routes and Restaurant Lessons
6:54 From Baseball Prospect to Career Ending Injury
10:06 Starting Over After Baseball
13:14 Discovering a Calling in Speaking
15:28 Authenticity Equation For Leaders and Teams
17:55 Why Vulnerability Feels Risky For Leaders
20:11 Baby Steps To Practice Vulnerability at Work
21:37 How Leaders Model Trust And Give Effective Feedback
24:22 Hustle, Effort, and Encouragement
26:32 Leading Hybrid And Remote Teams with Intention
29:21 Making Virtual Meetings More Human
32:28 Navigating Political and Social Division at Work
35:42 Setting Standards for Respectful Workplace Communication
38:40 Rapid Fire Workplace Wisdom
42:39 The Power of Voice Notes
46:19 Closing Thoughts

When leading a team, the natural instinct is to rely on efficiency, quick answers, and speaking more than you listen. But doing so erodes trust and productivity over the long haul.

Joe Mull welcomes Chad Littlefield, co-founder and Chief Experience Officer of We and Me, to the Boss Better Now podcast for an insightful conversation about the transformational power of asking better questions. From his early days working with teenagers in a group home and counseling in adult solitary confinement, to leading global conversations in conflict zones, Chad draws on a unique background to help leaders how to build trust and access each other's humanity.

Throughout the discussion, Chad explains why leaders must shift their focus from presenting information to actively inviting employee engagement strategies. He shares practical leadership tips for navigating remote team management, avoiding the trap of efficiency over connection, and leveraging curiosity to build psychological safety at work. He also shares compelling insights on AI in the workplace and the future of work without replacing genuine human care.

In this episode, you'll learn:

🔹 Why phenomenal bosses design meetings for "contribution, not consumption".
🔹 The magic of the second question and how it instantly builds rapport with your team.
🔹 Why "efficiency is the enemy of connection" in remote team management and how to genetically modify your meetings to fix it.
🔹 The reason you should ban the phrase "don't bring me problems, bring me solutions" forever and replace it with facilitation skills.
🔹 How to use AI tools to augment your work without losing the vital human element of "care".

This episode is for managers and leaders pursuing leadership development who want to move beyond superficial interactions and build deeply connected, engaged teams with strong workplace culture and psychological safety at work.

Episode Resources:
Chad's YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@chad.littlefield
We and Me website: https://weand.me/
We Connect Cards: https://shop.weand.me/

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Timestamps
0:00 Introducing Chad Litttlefield
2:21 Chad's First Work Experiences
7:02 Working In Group Homes And Juvenile Prisons
12:23 Discovering The Power Of Questions And Everyday Connection
15:01 Creating We Connect Cards
17:05 Designing Meetings For Contribution Not Consumption
20:18 Psychological Safety And How We Ask About Mistakes
21:51 Flipping PowerPoint to Real Engagement
24:12 The Magic Of Asking A Second Question
27:45 Building Connection In Remote And Hybrid Teams
32:44 Collaborative Journaling
34:21 AI Tools And Protecting Authentic Human Connection
38:10 Why Caring At Work Beats AI
39:00 How Adding "So That" Can Change Your Management Interactions
42:51 The Workplace Phrase Leaders Should Stop Saying
45:07 Career Advice About Following Your Curiosity
47:15 Closing Thoughts

When sudden change or adversity strikes a team, the natural instinct is to try and quickly return to business as usual. John Register believes trying to go backward is a trap. He challenges leaders to stop looking for comfortable adjustments and start committing to true transformation.

Joe Mull welcomes John to the Boss Better Now podcast for a powerful conversation about leading your team through change. As a military veteran, Paralympic silver medalist, and former executive, John draws on a lifetime of intense personal and professional pivots to help leaders develop leadership skills and unlock potential in themselves and their teams.

Throughout the discussion, John outlines his Resilience Action Model and explains why giving people space to learn is vital for long-term success. He also shares compelling stories from his own career to illustrate the importance of upholding core values and active succession planning.

In this episode, you'll learn:

🔹 The three steps of the Resilience Action Model and how they help professionals handle sudden roadblocks.
🔹 Why your ultimate goal as a manager should be training someone else to eventually take your job.
🔹 The danger of ignoring bad behavior from tenured employees and how to strictly enforce team values.
🔹 How ongoing feedback eliminates blind spots and renders the traditional annual performance review obsolete.
🔹 A practical script to use with your boss when you need to strategically subtract tasks from an overwhelming workload.

This episode is for managers and leaders focused on leadership development and management training who want to build teams that thrive through adversity.

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Timestamps
0:00 Introducing John Register
3:16 The Nine-Year-Old Entrepreneur
5:00 Early Work Ethic
6:26 When Hard Work Isn’t Valued Equally
7:49 Saving for a Schwinn Bike
8:42 The Bike and Racial Bias
10:56 The Power of Advocates
13:08 Leadership Lessons from The Military
14:00 Slowing Down To Learn
15:39 Succession Planning
19:31 Leading With a Mentor Mindset
21:10 From Amputation to Transformational Leadership
23:26 The Resilience Action Model for Navigating Change
26:33 Practical Ways Leaders Build Trust and Support Teams
30:39 Enforcing Company Values
31:14 Strategic Subtraction
32:43 Closing Thoughts

Every conversation about artificial intelligence eventually arrives at the same promise: once machines handle the tedious work, humans will finally be free to focus on what matters. Kate O'Neill thinks this is a flawed assumption, leading leaders to make decisions that serve neither their people nor their purpose.

In this episode of Boss Better Now, Joe Mull sits down with Kate O'Neill to discuss the intersection of technology and humanity. An early Netflix employee and author of What Matters Next, Kate has spent her career pressing organizations to ask better questions before they reach for faster tools.

Kate unpacks why the "future of work" is actually four nested conversations, jobs, the workplace, productivity, and tasks, that require separate consideration. She introduces "minimum viable skilling" as a modern leadership imperative and offers a counterintuitive argument on why AI might be our only realistic tool for mitigating climate damage.

In this episode, you'll learn:
🔹 Why the promise that AI will free workers for meaningful tasks ignores how businesses actually operate under capitalism.
🔹 What "minimum viable skilling" means, and why learning to prompt AI is essentially practice for managing human teams.
🔹 Why purpose is not a fluffy concept but a strategic asset leaders must keep front and center.
🔹 How treating the future of jobs and the future of work as the same topic produces overly simplified, useless strategies.
🔹 Why AI, despite its high environmental costs, is crucial for scaling solutions to reverse ecological damage.

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Timestamps
0:00 Introducing Kate O'Neill
2:21 How Joe and Kate Met
3:57 Kate's first job
5:22 Growing up in Chambers of Commerce
7:34 From Childhood to the UN
11:01 Early Days at Netflix
12:42 Bad Boss vs Great Boss Career Tradeoffs
15:01 Leadership lessons Netflix
17:29 Future of Work and AI
22:24 Purpose, Meaning, and Automation at Work
24:02 Capitalism, Productivity, and Worker Well-being
27:40 Rethinking Responsibility and Power
30:19 AI Ethics and Climate Change
36:33 Advice for Overwhelmed Leaders Adopting AI
38:27 Concluding Thoughts

Most companies say the customer comes first. But in meeting rooms across every industry, business decisions get made every day without a single thought about how they will land on the people paying the bills. Dan Gingiss has spent his career asking one question: what would happen if leaders simply kept the customer in the room?

In this episode of Boss Better Now, Joe Mull sits down with Dan Gingiss, a customer experience keynote speaker and author who led digital CX teams at Discover, Humana, and McDonald's. Dan traces his path from Domino's delivery driver to Fortune 500 executive and shares what each step taught him about the irreversible link between how leaders treat their people and how those people treat customers.

Dan unpacks why customer experience is not a department but a company-wide discipline, how a manager can build trust with a new team before anyone has earned it, and what he calls "collective lift," the undervalued skill of raising the performance of everyone around you. He also challenges one of the most reflexive assumptions in leadership: that your best individual performer is your best candidate for management.

In this episode, you'll learn:

🔹 Why making any business decision with the customer in mind leads to a better outcome, 100 times out of 100.
🔹 What delivering a pizza to Michael Jordan taught Dan about human dignity as a foundational leadership principle.
🔹 What "collective lift" means, and why the employee who makes your whole team better is more valuable than the one who outperforms everyone individually.
🔹 Why the relationship between employee experience and customer experience should be written with an infinity sign, not an equal sign.
🔹 How to start a new leadership role by giving your team full trust on day one, before anyone has done a thing to earn it.

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Timestamps:
0:00 Episode Preview
0:31 Welcome Dan Gingiss
3:22 Delivering Pizza to Michael Jordan
5:00 Early Jobs and Becoming the “Cruise Director” at Work
6:15 First-Time Manager Lessons
10:00 Leading With Trust From Day One
13:23 The Career Pivot Into Digital Customer Experience
15:00 Discovering the Power of Small CX Changes
20:00 Happy Employees, Happy Customers
22:55 "How Does This Impact Our Customers?”
25:00 Become a Customer of Your Own Company
27:16 People Leadership as a Superpower
30:00 Defining and Measuring Collective Lift
33:32 Why the Best Salesperson Shouldn’t Always Be the Manager
34:25 The Most Absurd Workplace Rule
35:00 The One Phrase That Should Be Banned Forever
35:18 Career Advice That Still Matters
36:28 Closing Thoughts

Leaders often complain about new employees or feel overwhelmed by constant change and employee feedback. But what if the key to retention and engagement is simply changing how we view our team's lives outside of work?

In this episode of Boss Better Now, Joe Mull sits down with Sandra Davis, Chief Human Resources Officer for North Mississippi Health Services (NMHS). Sandra shares her incredible insights on sustaining high employee engagement and why she reads thousands of employee survey comments to stay connected to the frontline of the largest non-metropolitan rural hospital system in the U.S.

Sandra shares her journey from working in an assisted living facility as a teenager to leading HR at the highest levels. She breaks down why leaders need to banish generational stereotypes, how to keep your team grounded in their purpose, and practical routines for staying connected with the people doing the work.

In this episode, you'll learn:

🔹 Why you should ban the phrase "this younger generation" from your workplace vocabulary.
🔹 How reading up to 6,000 employee survey comments keeps leadership grounded.
🔹 Why work is just a small intersection in an employee's life—and why employers should be grateful they choose to be there.
🔹 Practical habits to stay connected with frontline teams, including 90-day virtual check-ins with new hires.

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Timestamps
0:00 - Introduction
1:20 - Finding Meaning in a First Job at an Assisted Living Facility
3:12 - Building Trust and Connection with the Older Generation
5:18 - The Lasting Impact of Early Career Service Roles
6:16 - From Frontline Care to the Executive HR Suite
7:55 - The Secret to Sustaining Award-Winning Employee Engagement
10:00 - Optimizing an Already Great Culture
13:02 - Bridging the Gap Between Executives and the Frontline
15:54 - Reading Employee Survey Comments to Understand "Hassle Factors"
18:43 - Best vs. Worst Bosses
21:31 - The Devastating Impact of a Leader Without Integrity
24:22 - The Best Career Advice Sandra Ever Received
24:50 - The One Workplace Phrase Leaders Need to Ban Forever
29:30 - Why We Need to Stop Complaining About "This Younger Generation"
30:00 - Remembering Your Purpose When Work Gets Hard
32:11 - The Biweekly Ritual That Reconnects Executives to Their "Why"
35:00 - Unpacking the Virtual 90-Day New Hire Check-In
40:00 - Becoming a Change-Adaptive Leader
44:20 - Embracing Ambiguity and the "Next Normal"
45:06 - Closing Thoughts

We all make snap judgments about people — coworkers, bosses, even strangers. But what if those assumptions are dead wrong?

In this episode of Boss Better Now, Joe Mull sits down with Dallin Cooper, a collaboration expert who learned a life-changing lesson while living in China: the people you disagree with might not be crazy. They might just see the world differently than you.

Dallin shares his journey from Pizza Hut team member to leadership speaker, and breaks down how challenging our assumptions about others can transform team dynamics, reduce conflict, and make you a better leader.

In this episode, you'll learn:
🔹 Why your brain defaults to assuming the worst about people
🔹 The "They Might Not Be Crazy" framework for understanding different perspectives
🔹 How living in China completely rewired Dallin's view of collaboration
🔹 Practical steps to stop misjudging your coworkers and team members

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

Boss Better Now 3.0 arrives in March!

Joe shares why the podcast is shifting and why he’s excited about what’s coming. After reflecting on what has worked best over the years, the show is returning to conversations that center real leadership experience, encouragement, and practical wisdom for people who lead others.

New episodes are on the way, featuring thoughtful conversations with leaders, experts, and practitioners who care deeply about employee engagement, employee relations, and workplace culture.

Thanks for sticking with the show. The next chapter starts soon.

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.

What employees want most is not what many organizations are built to provide.

In this episode, Hall of Fame keynote speaker Joe Mull, CSP, CPAE, reframes a familiar question and explains why employee commitment is rooted less in perks or policies and more in whether work contributes to a joyous, prosperous life.

Joe explores how employee engagement, employee relations, and long-term retention are shaped by the daily realities of work, including economic pressure, workload, flexibility, and how people are treated by their leaders. He reflects on why minimizing unnecessary suffering at work and increasing fulfillment through meaningful contribution, belonging, and trust are central to building commitment that lasts.

The conversation also highlights the outsized role managers play in shaping the employee experience and why leadership behavior often determines whether a job becomes a stabilizing force in someone’s life or a source of ongoing stress.

If you want to strengthen engagement, improve employee relations, and build a workplace where people stay, care, and give their best effort, this episode offers a clear leadership perspective grounded in real workplace experience.

To subscribe to Joe Mull’s BossBetter Email newsletter, visit https://BossBetterNow.com
For more info on working with Joe Mull, visit https://joemull.com
For more info on Boss Hero School, visit https://bossheroschool.com
To email the podcast, use [email protected]

#leadership #management #toxicworkculture #teambuilding #workplaceculture #conflictmanagement #employeeengagement #motivation

Joe Mull is on a mission to help leaders and business owners create the conditions where commitment takes root and the entire workplace thrives.

A dynamic and deeply relatable speaker, Joe combines compelling research, magnetic storytelling, and practical strategies to show exactly how to cultivate loyalty, ignite effort, and build people-first workplaces where both performance and morale flourish. His message is clear: when commitment is activated, engagement rises, teams gel, retention improves, and business outcomes soar.

Joe is the founder of Boss Hero School™ and the creator of the acclaimed Employalty™ framework, a roadmap for creating thriving workplaces in a new era of work. He’s the author of three books, including Employalty, named a top business book of the year by Publisher’s Weekly, and his popular podcast, Boss Better Now, ranks in the top 1% of management shows globally.

A former head of learning and development at one of the largest healthcare systems in the U.S., Joe has spent nearly two decades equipping leaders—from Fortune 500 companies like State Farm, Siemens, and Choice Hotels to hospitals, agencies, and small firms—with the tools to lead better, inspire commitment, and build more humane workplace cultures. His insights have been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Harvard Business Review, and more.

In 2025, Joe was inducted into the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame (CPAE). This is the speaking profession’s highest honor, a distinction granted to less than 1% of professional speakers worldwide. It’s awarded to speakers who demonstrate exceptional talent, integrity, and influence in the speaking profession

For more information visit joemull.com.