Curious Minds at Work

By Gayle AllenBusiness Science Social Sciences Arts Books Management

Curious Minds at Work episodes

August 29, 2016 CM 051: Devora Zack on Singletasking for a Richer, Happier Life
Multitasking is a myth. And we are poorer for trying to do it.
The research shows that we have less productivity, more stress, diminished creativity, and poorer relationships when we try to do many things at once. And yet, in a hyper-connected world, we can often feel like we have no other choice.
And yet, if we honored how are brains are designed, we would see that singletasking is the answer. That is the message and the research that Devora Zack, author of Singletasking: Get More Done -- One Thing at a Time, wants you to hear. And she gives practical tips about how to do it even in the most frenetic of moments.
Devora is the author of two previous books, Networking for People Who Hate Networking and Managing for People Who Hate Managing, and CEO of Only Connect Consulting. She’s worked with clients at Cornell University, London Business School, and Deloitte, and is a visiting faculty member at Cornell University. Her work has been featured in Fast Company, Forbes, and the Wall Street Journal.
In this interview, we talk about:
The myth of multitasking
How single tasking ups our productivity and creativity and state of flow
Using time shifting to avoid a multitasking mindset
The price we pay for multitasking
The fact that excessive media multitaskers have trouble remembering
Why single tasking requires us to commit to a choice
Tips for starting small with single tasking
The three different ways most of us make sense of the world and why they matter
How accessibility and our need to please can prevent us from single tasking
Why single tasking lets us bring the best version of ourselves to what we do
The fact that some prefer to shock themselves than sit in silence
How device-free staff meetings can increase focus and productivity
A great tip for being more fully present with friends and family
Ways to build fences to prevent interruptions before they occur
The power of cluster tasking with tasks we do daily
What we can do and say when colleagues interrupt us
Tips for open plan offices and colleague interruptions
What team members think and feel about leaders who single task
The connection between happiness and single tasking
Episode Links
@Devora_Zack
http://www.myonlyconnect.com/
Deep Work by Cal Newport
People Prefer Electric Shocks to Being Alone with Their Thoughts
Slow Reading Club
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
33 min
August 22, 2016 CM 050: Julia Shaw on the Science of Memory
Can you trust your memory? Probably not.
Research shows that we can be convinced fairly easily that we are guilty of a crime we did not commit. We not only misremember information, but we can misremember information about the wrong person. Add to that the fact that when someone else tells us how they remember something, it can alter our memory of that same event, person, or situation.
These insights, along with many others from memory research, are changing how we think about law and order, learning, and what makes us human. False memory researcher and criminal psychologist, Julia Shaw, is one of only a handful of experts in the field. A senior lecturer and researcher in the Department of Law and Social Sciences at London South Bank University and author of The Memory Illusion: Remembering, Forgetting, and the Science of False Memory, she works with members of the military and law enforcement. She is also a regular contributor to Scientific American.
In this interview, we talk about:
What the blue-gold dress phenomenon revealed about how our brains work
Why we need less evidence to convict someone who looks less trustworthy
Why we form stronger memories when others are same race, age, or gender
Why we reminisce most strongly about moments from our teens and 20s
Why we have rosy memories of most of our firsts in life
What actually happens in our brains when we form a memory
How memories get stamped in our brains
The fact that we simply cannot multitask - it is humanly impossible - and why
Why it is that whenever we remember we also forget
How to get someone to think they saw Bugs Bunny at Disneyland
Why we should write things down rather than try to remember them
Why understanding how unreliable our memories can be is liberating
How attention is the glue between reality and your memory
The vital importance of sleep to build lasting memories
How we all suffer from overconfidence when it comes to our memories
Why there is a right way to ask questions when we need to gather information
How to avoid asking leading questions that may create false memories
How photos can prompt false memories
The fact that we implant false memories in each other all the time
How creating memories with others may ensure more accurate memories
How social media can result in muddled memories
Why we need to continually update memories to learn
Why the flexibility of our brains -- and our memories -- is a beautiful thing
How we can convince people they committed crimes that never happened
How false memory research can change the legal system
How we can mistake the false memories of others for lying
Episode Links
http://www.drjuliashaw.com/
@drjuliashaw
London South Bank University
The Dress
Own race bias
Reminiscence bump
Rohypnol
Retrieval-induced forgetting
The Honest Truth about Dishonesty by Dan Ariely
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
38 min
August 15, 2016 CM 049: Arun Sundararajan on the Sharing Economy
We all share, but today, millions get paid for it. Is this new trend just a fad or is it radical rethink for how we work?
When we catch a ride with an Uber driver or contract with someone on Upwork, we marvel at the convenience. What we often overlook is the amount of trust it takes to ride with a stranger or to work with someone we may never meet. Yet that level of trust is what is driving the sharing economy, a form of commerce that harkens back to the 11th-century Maghribi traders.
In his book, The Sharing Economy: The End of Employment and the Rise of Crowd-based Capitalism, NYU Stern Professor Arun Sundararajan provides the context and the history for how we got here. He also paints a picture for where we are headed, particularly when it comes to labor and safety policies and regulations. A recognized authority on the sharing economy, he has written for the New York Times, Wired, the Financial Times, and Harvard Business Review.
In this interview, we talk about:
What makes the sharing economy similar to 18th-century commerce
How we are making the shift away from corporate buying to peer purchasing
How the sharing economy is blurring the lines between personal and professional
How the pendulum is swinging back to relationships, connections, and gifts
How the sharing economy speaks to our yearning for making and connection
What the 11th-century Maghribi traders can teach us about trust and commerce
Ways the sharing economy encourages us to do a better job
Whether the sharing economy can reduce inequality
How the sharing economy requires different labor regulations and policies
How the government can partner with platforms to rethink regulations
How labor regulations were designed for an era of full-time workers
Why our economy will increasingly rely on stakeholders other than government
How blockchain tech promises a world where crowd is market maker
Why trust is embedded in this economic shift
How new forms of trust will enable new forms of commerce
What is it about digital cues that help us trust one another?
Episode Links
Arun Sundararajan
@DigitalArun
The Gift by Lewis Hyde
Robert Nesbitt
Sherry Turkle
Karl Marx
Emile Durkheim
Maghribi Traders
Capital by Thomas Piketty
The Inevitable by Kevin Kelly
New York University Stern School of Business
Upcounsel
HourlyNerd
Gigster
Upwork
BlaBlaCar
Blockchain technology
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
33 min
August 08, 2016 CM 048: Dacher Keltner on the Power Paradox
Is there a secret to lasting power? Yes, and Dacher Keltner has been teaching leaders about it for decades. And the secret is not the ruthless, manipulative approach associated with 15th-century politician and writer Niccolo Machiavelli. It is actually the opposite.
As a University of California, Berkeley, Professor of Psychology, and Founder and Director of the Greater Good Science Center, Dacher Keltner shares research-based insights he has gained. And in his latest book, The Power Paradox: How We Gain and Lose Influence, he discusses a new science of power and 20 guiding power principles.
In this interview, we talk about:
How the legacy of Niccolo Machiavelli continues to inform power
Why power is about so much more than dominance, manipulation, and ruthlessness
Why we need to question a coercive model of power
The short- versus long-term impact of different kinds of power
Why power is about lifting others up
Why lasting power is given, not grabbed
The important role that reputation, gossip and esteem play in who gains power
How, within days, group members already know who holds the power
What makes for enduring power
How our body language and words speak volumes about power
Why Abraham Lincoln is a fascinating study of empathetic power
The fact that great and powerful leaders are incredible storytellers
How feeling powerful makes us less aware of risk
How feeling powerful makes us less empathetic, attentive and responsive to others
How feeling powerful actually overrides the part of our brain that signals empathy
How drivers of more expensive cars (46 percent) tend to ignore pedestrians
How powerful people often tell themselves stories to justify hierarchies
The price we pay for powerlessness
Concrete ways we can cultivate enduring, empathetic power
Gender and power
Why the key to parenting is to empower children to have a voice in the world
Episode Links
Dacher Keltner
Greater Good Science Center
Frans de Waal
The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
Thomas Clarkson and the abolition movement
Why Civil Resistance Works by Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan
House of Cards
The 100-Year Life by Lynda Gratton and Andrew Scott
What Works by Iris Bohnet
Arturo Behar and Facebook
Greater Good in Action
Science of Happiness course on edX
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
38 min
August 01, 2016 CM 047: Todd Rose on the Myth of Average
Average is a myth, so why should it control our lives? We measure ourselves -- and others -- against averages all the time. Think GPAs, personality tests, standardized test results, performance review ratings. These are average measures that tell us little about what makes us unique. And this is not just a feel-good argument. It is a mathematical fact.
In his bestselling book, The End of Average: How We Succeed in a World that Values Sameness, researcher, professor, and president of The Center for Individual Opportunity at Harvard, Todd Rose, explains the history of average and how it became so embedded in our culture. He goes on to explain why now, more than ever, we need to move beyond its impact on our schools and our workplaces.
In this interview, we talk about:
How the concept of average has done us more harm than good
The courage of a brilliant scientist to question average for the greater good
What newborns and chubby thighs can teach us about the limitations of average
How innovative organizations are tapping into the wisdom of jaggedness for hiring
Why organizations are relying on CodeFu to find great programming talent
Why the personality test industry is bigger than ever and more bankrupt
Why personality traits are context dependent, not inherent or static
Why unlocking the context of behavior can be game changing in helping kids
The important connection between environment and self control
Why faster does not equal smarter
Why we need to get rid of fixed-pace learning in schools
Thoughts on competency-based versus grade-based learning
Shifting from diplomas to micro-based credentials
Giving individuals more say in their learning pathways
What Todd Rose thinks about personalized learning and personalization
Why we need to keep equity at the forefront
What dark horses may have to teach us
Episode Links
@ltoddrose
http://www.toddrose.com/
The Center for Individual Opportunity
Adolphe Quetelet
Francis Galton
Edward Thorndike
Peter Molenaar
Esther Thelen and her study on newborn stepping reflex
IGN
CodeFu
Matthew B. Crawford and The World Beyond Your Head: Individuality in an Age of Distraction
Yuichi Shoda
Celeste Kidd
Khan Academy
Equifinality
Ogi Ogas
Kevin Kelly and Wired
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
51 min
July 25, 2016 CM 046: Kevin Kelly On How Tech Shapes Our Future
Do we shape tech or does it shape us? Turns out it is both. And that is just 1 of the 12 big ideas Kevin Kelly explores in his latest bestseller, The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future. The Inevitable is a playbook to guide us through the seismic changes in life and work, caused by technologies becoming exponentially faster and smarter.
Kelly, Co-founder, former Executive Editor, and now Senior Maverick at Wired Magazine, takes us on a futuristic -- and highly believable ride -- from start to finish. Former publisher and editor of Whole Earth Review and Cool Tools, he is the author of other thought-provoking and visionary books, like New Rules for the New Economy, Out of Control, The Silver Cord, and What Technology Wants.
Kelly embodies what it means to be curious!
In this interview, we talk about:
Why continual tech upgrades will make us perpetual newbies
Why Kevin favors protopia, instead of utopia or dystopia
What it means to cognify
Why artificial intelligence is a feature, not a bug
Why we want and need the different kinds of intelligence that comes with AI
How we will work with robots to solve big problems
How robots will free us up to be artists, scientists, inventors, and creatives
How many of our jobs will be to invent jobs for the robots around us
How our technology places us in streams and flows that are dynamic, interactive, and chronological
Why personalization and immediacy will be better than free
How filters may negotiate on our behalf and sharpen our understanding of who we are
Why virtual reality is about presence and, more importantly, interactivity
Why one day anything that is not interactive will be considered broken
How interactivity will one day extend beyond our bodies to our emotions, facial expressions, voices, and more
Why if it matters, we will be able to tell whether it is human or nonhuman
Why tracking is inevitable and transparency around our data is a must
What Kevin means by covalence when it comes to our data
How we will come to a deeper, more nuanced understanding of privacy
Two things Kevin worries about
As AIs become more capable and integrated into our lives, how will we treat them?
As cyber conflicts and cyber wars continue, what rules will we establish?
How will our technology change us?
The importance of thinking much longer term than a generation or a corporate quarter
What a global government might look like and how we might get there
Episode Links
@kevin2kelly
http://kk.org/
Wired
Whole Earth Review
Protopia
Game of Thrones
The Third Wave by Steve Case
The Quantified Self
The Fitbit
Blockchain
Bitcoin
Boston Dynamics Quadrupeds
Star Trek
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
41 min
July 18, 2016 CM 045: Lynda Gratton on The 100-Year Life
Are you prepared to live to 100? Research shows that it is becoming the norm, but that few of us are planning for it. Many are surprised to learn that it not only requires rethinking saving and retirement, but also education, jobs, and relationships.
To guide us, London Business School Professor and future of work expert, Lynda Gratton, has written The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity. In addition to her many books, Lynda writes for Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, and Forbes. She points out the possibilities, as well as the challenges, associated with living longer lives. Lynda also encourages us to plan for what lies ahead, so that we can take full advantage of this opportunity.
In this interview, we talk about:
What learning will look like as we continue working into our 70s and 80s
Why working well with robots will decrease our odds of obsolescence
How generational markers, such as millennials, limit how we think about work and life
Why we will become age agnostic as people of all ages learn and work together
Are you building, maintaining, or depleting current skills?
The secret to increasing our adaptability and willingness to change
Three new life stages that are upending how we think about life and work
Are you spending your free time in recreation or re-creation, and why it matters?
The important role experimentation will play in our lives as we live longer
How marriage and friendships will change as we live longer lives
Why juvenescence holds the key to navigating a longer life
Why we should be worried about wealth disparity
Why living longer will push organizations to rethink work policies and expectations
Why individuals and families - not most organizations - will guide us in innovating
Episode Links
@lyndagratton
www.100yearlife.com
100 Year Life Diagnostic
London Business School
World Economic Forum
Andrew Scott
Future of Work Consortium
The Shift: The Future of Work is Already Here by Lynda Gratton
Stretch by Karie Willyerd and Barbara Mistick
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
36 min
July 11, 2016 CM 044: Jonah Berger on Hidden Forces Shaping Our Behavior
More than 99 percent of our decisions are shaped by others. From the clothing we buy to the cars we drive to the political candidates we vote for, our choices are the results of the invisible influence of those around us. And once we recognize that, we start to see our behavior -- and the behavior of others -- in a whole new way.
Jonah Berger, marketing professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, has spent 15 years studying the ways that influence impacts our lives. He wrote about it in his bestselling book, Contagious: Why Things Catch On, and, now, in his latest book, Invisible Influence: The Hidden Forces that Shape Behavior.
In this fascinating and compelling interview, he shares insights on:
Two reasons why we often overlook the power of influence
What animals can teach us about learned behaviors
When peers can improve our performance and when they can work against it
A common trait among most elite athletes
The power of the Goldilocks Effect when it comes to designing products and services
What cockroaches can teach us about performance and peers
The secret to changing behavior
The power of proximal peers in motivating ourselves and others
Episode Links
@j1berger
www.jonahberger.com
Contagious: Why Things Catch on By Jonah Berger
Livestrong
Monkeys Adept at Picking up Social Cues
The Goldilocks Effect
Segway
The Horsey Horseless
Robert Zajonc and Social Facilitation
Dan Yates and Opower
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
33 min
July 04, 2016 CM 043: Iris Bohnet on Finding and Keeping Great Talent
Want to hire, evaluate, and collaborate more effectively? The same design principles that are changing how we think about products and services can improve our talent management. Iris Bohnet, author of What Works and Professor of Behavioral Economics at Harvard University, tells us how.
In this interview, Bohnet shares fast and inexpensive ways we can de-bias our organizations. She pinpoints how simple improvements can provide big gains for managers and employees.
In our conversation, we talk about:
How behavioral design can help us hire and retain the best talent
Why interviews are a poor predictor of future performance
How work sample tests ensure better hiring
How blind employee screening widens opportunities for job candidates
What we can learn from how orchestras hire musicians
Why we need to stop holding group interviews
The challenges of employee self-evaluation
Why we need gender-neutral language in job descriptions
Why diverse groups are more effective and less enjoyable
What critical mass does for groups and organizations
How tokenism can overshadow expertise
The important role political correctness plays in resetting norms
How acting differently - or watching others act differently - can change behavior
Episode Links
Iris Bohnet
Heidi Roizen
Competence but disliked dilemma
Implicit association bias
Hannah Riley Bowles
Work Rules by Laszlo Bock
@ThereseHuston
How Women Decide by Therese Huston
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
48 min
June 27, 2016 CM 042: Matthew Crawford on Individuality in an Age of Distraction
What if our distractions are robbing us of our individuality? Philosopher-machinist Michael B. Crawford noticed just how much attention we give up -- often against our will -- to all the distractions strategically placed in front of us, from commercials on ATM screens to blaring airport televisions. He has written a guidebook to identifying the sources of lost attention, and he makes suggestions for how to get it back.
Matthew is a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia. He is also a fabricator of components for custom motorcycles. His first book, Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry into the Value of Work, prompted a rethinking of education and labor policies in the U.S. and Europe, leading the London Sunday Times to call him “one of the most influential thinkers of our time.” His latest book, The World Beyond Your Head: On Becoming an Individual in an Age of Distraction gets at the heart of what it means to be human.
In this conversation, we talk about:
Silence as a resource as important as air, food, and water
The high price we are increasingly forced to pay to avoid distractions
All the ways distractive tech makes us more alike
The connection between deep work and independent thinking
The overlooked intellectual side of hard labor
How personalizing experiences can make them unreal
How reclaiming the real requires submitting to something or someone else
Why doing and taking action results in knowing
The Maker Movement as an attempt to reconnect with what makes us human
How machine-based design can lead to addiction, compulsion, and loss of control
The fact that most schooling is disconnected from real-world learning
Why trust lies at the heart of deep learning
How traditions of learning offer opportunities for deep connections
Episode Links
Matthew B. Crawford
Reclaimed Fabrication
Cal Newport
Deep Work by Cal Newport
Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew B. Crawford
Addiction by Design by Natasha Dow Schull
Aristotle
Descartes
Michael Polanyi
If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review it on iTunes. For automatic delivery of new episodes, be sure to subscribe. As always, thanks for listening!
35 min

About Curious Minds at Work

From the publisher's feed

Want to get better at work? At managing others? Managing yourself? Gayle Allen interviews experts who take your performance to the next level. Each episode features a book with insights to help you…