Dan Hill's EQ Spotlight

Today I talked to Christine Kane about her book The Soul Sourced Entrepreneur: An Unconventional Success Plan for the Highly Creative, Secretly Sensitive & Wildly Ambitious (BenBella, 2020).

Sick of the frequent images of entrepreneurs as machismo, take-no-prisoner, Rambo-like action figures? Look no farther than this episode, in which Christine Kane admits that bulimia was her first business mentor as she had to learn to deal with her 10-year battle with binging and purging to fit an idealistic body image that wasn’t rooted in reality. One demon conquered gave her the fortitude to, first, enter the music industry on her own terms, and then in turn help thousands of (often female) fans become entrepreneurs on their own terms by offering advice. In a phrase from Kane’s book, Soft is Hard because the “human” or soul part of business is at least as important as focusing on strategy. The soft part IS hard, and yet it allows you to stretch and grow as a person and businessperson alike. If ready for some authentic, honest perspective, Christine Kane is a natural choice.

Christine Kane is the founder of Uplevel You, a multimillion-dollar business coaching company, which evolved from her 15-year career as a touring singer-songwriter with her own record label. Both businesses were built without any investors.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

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Today I talked to April Rinne about her new book Flux: 8 Superpowers for Thriving in Constant Change (Berrett-Koehler, 2021)

What’s your relationship to change? Do you embrace it, filled with hope for the future? Or are you somebody who’s more cautious, even worried about what change might portend? In this episode, April Rinne offers advice based on her 8 rules for navigating change more adroitly. Part of her advice has to do with slowing down, setting a sustainable pace to avoid burnout in ever more demanding careers. But there’s more. How may higher education change, including MBA programs, in a world where more of more of us will be part of the Gig Economy? And within companies, how can leaders create trust when inequality in pay between executives and rank-and-files members threaten even the possibility of a “we” identity? Listen in for Rinne’s unique perspective.

April Rinne is one of the 50 leading female futurists in the world, a Young Global Leader at the World Economic Forum and a Fulbright Scholar. She’s also traveled to over 100 countries as part of having a front-row seat to a world in flux.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

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Today I talked to Nika Kabiri about her new book Money off the Table: Decision Science and the Secret to Smarter Investing (Houndstooth Press, 2020).

Adam Smith not only helped to create the field of economics; the guy was also a moral philosopher who readily accepted the role of emotions in decision-making. How surprised he might have been to discover that it took decades upon decades for the field to come back to accepting the role that emotions and biases play in decision-making! My guest this week, Nika Kabiri, has no such blind spot. She knows that the Confirmation Bias is among the most important factors to weigh in helping her clients. Along the way, this conversation takes in the movie The Big Short and Jerome Powell and what may lay ahead for the economy. Five types of investors are also discussed, from the more-is-better investor to the what-has-always-worked investor. Like not to be poor? This episode is therefore worth a listen.

Nika Kabiri teaches Decision Science at the University of Washington, and is the founder and owner of Kabiri Consulting LLC, where she uses Decision Science to help businesses grow.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

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Today I talked to Michele Wucker about her new book You Are What You Risk: The New Art and Science of Navigating an Uncertain World (Pegasus Books, 2021)

Your risk fingerprint is a mixture of how personality traits, experiences, and social context have shaped how you approach risk and uncertainty in life. Also crucial is your risk empathy and the degree to which you are risk-savvy, both of which value reading your environment in analyzing the risk you and others face and how people are coping with unknowns. This episode explore risk in terms of a variety of situations and segments of the population. Are millennials risk-averse or risk savvy? Why are white male who are risk-takers people who tend to trust institutions and be anti-egalitarian? How should companies approach mergers and acquisitions when the two companies have very different risk cultures? And finally, which professions tend to be the most prone to over-confidence? In every case, “it depends” is a fair answer but by no means all that you will hear on these and other topics.

Michele Wucker has been honored as a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum and a Guggenheim Fellow. Her third book, The Gray Rhino, inspired a popular TED talk and has influenced world markets, government policy and business strategies.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/dan-hills-eq-spotlight

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Today I talked to Adam Kahane about his new book Facilitating Breakthrough: How to Remove Obstacles, Bridge Differences, and Move Forward Together (Berrett-Koehler, 2021).

You’re helping South Africa make the transition from apartheid to democracy under Nelson Mandela. You’re helping end a half-century civil war in Columbia. You’re working with the First Nations in Canada. That’s a small part of the scope that Adam Kahane has been involved in over the recent decades. It’s meaningful, enlightened work that recognizes that the two typical modes of reaching “agreements” don’t yield optimal results. The vertical approach leads to rigidity and domination by ultimately shutting down dissent. The collegial, horizontal approach can lead to fragmentation and gridlock. What’s the new, third way forward? For Kahane, that means doing what Martin Luther King, Jr. did and looking for inspiration in the work of the German existential theologian Paul Tillich. Love offers unity, power the opportunity for self-realization, and justice looks to ensure that power bring equity for all. If ever you’ve had to work out disagreements to resolve a conflict, this episode is for you.

Adam Kahane is the director of Reos Partners, an international social enterprise that helps people move forward together on their most important and intractable issues.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/dan-hills-eq-spotlight

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Today I talked to Sue Unerman about her new book, co-authored with Kathryn Jacob and Mark Edwards,  Belonging: The Key to Transforming and Maintaining Diversity, Inclusions and Equality at Work (Bloomsbury, 2020).

How is it that $8 billion a year gets thrown at diversity training and yet next-to-nothing changes? One person who isn’t giving up is Sue Unerman, who along with her co-authors Kathryn Jacob and Mark Edwards favors a full-court press of changes in order to improve the degree to which women get represented in the ranks of senior management at companies. From how meetings are run, to how teams are built, and of course who gets promoted and receives how much in compensation, the scope of this episode is broad. A particular focus is detrimental “banter” that’s hardly as light-hearted as it’s made out to be. Add to that the Glass Slipper problem of people trying to fit into a culture that should, instead, be blown wide-open and allow all types, and you’ve got a feel for how Unerman is urging reforms.

Sue Unerman is the Chief Transformation Office at MediaCom, the largest media agency in the UK with over 200 clients. Along with Kathryn Jacob, she is also the co-author of The Glass Wall.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com. 

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/dan-hills-eq-spotlight

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Today I talked to Jackie Fast about her new book Rule Breaker: Rebellious Leadership for the Future of Work (Kogan Page, 2021).

Imagine finding yourself in a career sector, sponsorship, because it’s the way to get a visa and stay in England. Well, that’s what happened to Jackie Fast. And as things turned out, she was very good at sponsorship work. In a few years her ability to put two brands together for a campaign, or more, a kind of temporary Merger and Acquisition, meant she was spending time doing work for Richard Branson on an island he owns in the Caribbean. From the vantage point of her highly successful, entrepreneurial career, what strikes Fast is, indeed, how fast the world is changing. Few if any older executives will manage the transition, she believes, to a world where the internet has democratized big business and where Millennials and Gen Z members favor a values-based approach that puts meaningful work you enjoy front and center in their career aspirations.

Jackie Fast is the founder of the venture capital firm Sandbox Studios, which invests in celebrity-owned brands and has worked with The Rolling Stones, Red Bull, Zoom, Formula One, Virgin, Allianz and Universal Music among others.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/dan-hills-eq-spotlight

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Today I talked to Soo Bong Peer about her new book The Essential Diversity Mindset: How to Cultivate a More Inclusive Culture and Environment (Career Press, 2021)

In 1967, bans on interracial marriages were finally declared unconstitutional in America. Only a decade earlier than that, merely 4% of Americans endorsed them. Today, the figure is 87% approval. So clearly, progress has been made in a country whose citizens are often multiracial as well as in interracial marriages and relationships. How can the momentum to accepting people as they are and not by dividing us based on race, gender and sexual orientation be reignited in these divisive times? Soo Bong Peer’s suggestions are of both a personal and systemic nature, ranging from practicing greater empathy to having leaders seek to be more open to dialogue with employees with distinctly different perspectives and experiences from theirs. One idea, inspired by this book: to cite Roger Ebert, movies “are like a machine that generates empathy.” So instead of movie night at home or lecture-style, lunch-’n-learn sessions at company headquarters, maybe movies-at-lunch should become a Friday feature!

Soo Bong Peer is a strategy consultant and executive coach for Fortune 500 companies. The daughter of a prominent South Korean general and ambassador to Mexico, she has lived in multiple countries, including the U.S. for the past 50 years.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/dan-hills-eq-spotlight

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Today I talked to Martin Reeves and Jack Fuller about their new book The Imagination Machine: How to Spark New Ideas and Create Your Company’s Future (Harvard Business Review Press, 2021). 

Since the 1990s, the fade rate (i.e., the inability of companies to stay out ahead of their closest rivals) has gone from sustaining a lead on average for 10 years to now merely a single year. So focusing on offer innovation alone won’t suffice. A company that will survive and thrive must re-imagine really every aspect of the company’s culture and operations to succeed. That move requires an open mind and an inquisitive spirit not averse to surprise but, instead, welcoming of them. Who better than these two authors to take on that task? Reeves is in his own words a “failed” musician and biologist turned businessperson, and Fuller likewise prefers to go “inside” people and organizations to understand how their minds and even their very “souls” perform. This is an episode devoted, in short, to how can a company re-humanize itself in an age when converging forces requires a wholesale change.

Martin Reeves is a Senior Partner and Managing Director at BCG, i.e., the Boston Consulting Group. He’s also the Chairman of the BCG Henderson Institute, BCG’s internal think tank. Jack Fuller is a former special project manager at the BCG Henderson Institute, and the founder of Casati Health, a company that reimagines mental and physical health. He’s a Rhodes Scholar with a background that combines neuroscience and philosophical theology.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/dan-hills-eq-spotlight

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Today I talked to Maya Hu-Chan about her new book Saving Face: How to Preserve Dignity and Build Trust (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2020)

There are so many sayings that involve the face, but perhaps none is more central to at least Asian culture than “saving face.” That’s because it represents retaining one’s dignity versus being embarrassed or humiliated in front of others. In truth, though, everyone wants nothing more than to be appreciated, as the psychologist William James recognized long ago. In this episode, Maya Hu-Chan puts “faces” into a business context for listeners. In a meeting between Western versus Eastern executives, for instance, how will a long silence be handled? Odds are usually that it’s the Americans who will jump in first, breaking the silence. Given more than 20 years of international business experience, Hu-Chan takes listeners through why regional, company and individual personality differences matter so much. Are you a high-context or low-context person? It’s time to find out by taking in this episode that involves the platinum rule, i.e., treating others they way they wanted to be treated.

Maya Hu-Chan is the founder and president of Global Leadership Associates and the co-author of Global Leadership: The Next Generation. She’s trained and coached leaders from Fortune 500 companies to non-profits around the world.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/dan-hills-eq-spotlight

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