Human Capital

This episode is a treat as Jeff interviews his son Hayden Everett, an accomplished singer-songwriter with over 5 million music streams and also found on the hit series Grey’s Anatomy. Jeff and Hayden discuss the importance of being present at work and life – with employees, jobs, and relationships. Hayden shares the leadership lessons he learned managing nine counselors at a summer camp in Yosemite. Jeff and Hayden translate these experiences to leadership lessons at work. They discuss pragmatic strategies for improving our presence at work, and how without strategies people can overly focus on the past, future, problems, or exaggerate the weight of the burdens they carry.

During the episode, Hayden shares one of his new songs titled “Still,” which embodies the importance of taking time to be still, and the benefits of this in work and personal relationships. Hayden shares his thoughts on how high trust is critical to providing someone with constructive feedback. Hayden and Jeff discuss how employees often don’t know what we need most in their jobs (rest, training, support, tools), and how communicating these needs well helps us in very material ways. They talk about how leaders must create a safe environment for employees to communicate their needs and hold them accountable for doing so regularly.

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Jeff’s guest Steve Roof has spent a career helping people, teams, and businesses, large and small, navigate the tricky space of conflict. Steve is a trained lawyer but focuses exclusively on mediation as well as overcoming conflict, especially in family businesses. He is trained in several psychological modalities which he uses to help his clients get unstuck in the midst of conflict. Steve received his bachelor's degree from Harvard University and his Doctor of Law from Michigan Law School.

Jeff and Steve discuss how unresolved conflict in family businesses spills over to family relationships, and how a third party can help with these complicated dynamics. Steve shares how to leverage curiosity to transform disagreements into solutions which improve respect, compassion, and empathy for one another. He talks about the different parts of our personalities that rise up in conflict to “run the show” even though their behavior is not productive. Steve discusses how to achieve healthy conflict, which leads to better decisions, better relationships, greater creativity, and innovation.

On this episode, Jeff and his guest Dr. Benjamin Ritter explore meaning and purpose at work. Ben is President of LFY Consulting, and is an executive, leadership, and career coach who runs corporate wellness workshops for LFY. He is an organizational development expert and has an MBA and master’s in public health from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and a Doctorate in Organizational Leadership and Education from Pepperdine. Ben is a TEDx speaker, and his impressive client list includes Amazon, Bloomberg, Door dash, Google, Pinterest, and Yelp.

Ben and Jeff discuss how leaders need to be the ones to empower their employees, and to hold them accountable for creating careers that they can love. Ben shares how one’s job description is not fixed, and how employers will often flex the description to allow the employee to be more productive and fulfilled.

They talk about why so many employees, managers, and executives today feel stuck in dead-end jobs that are not meaningful, or with companies that do not have a compelling and motivating purpose and core values. Ben shares his “TEAM” model of management which includes Trust, Environment, Actual work, and Meaning, and how nurturing these aspects can lead to greater engagement, performance, and culture.

Jeff’s guest Jeff Harry was named a Top 100 HR Influencer in 2020. He is an international speaker and has been featured in the New York Times, Mashable, Upworthy, Shondaland, and CNN. He has worked with Google, Microsoft, Southwest Airlines, Adobe, the NFL, Amazon, and Facebook, helping their staffs to infuse more play into the day-to-day. Jeff and Jeff discuss the benefits of empowering employees to be innovative, creative, and productive. Jeff shares how cultures of trust can lead to more playful environments and ultimately become a competitive threat. He talks about how one of the most deeply rooted aspects of our humanity at work is our need and desire to play and have fun in what we do. Jeff shares how we can do this while being highly productive, especially when we are in a state of flow. He challenges the old paradigm of the 8-hour workday and what to do instead.

Jeff shares how culture is often defined by the worst behavior tolerated in the workplace and how Gen Z employees are inspiring Millennials, Gen X’ers, and Boomers not to tolerate workplace cultures that don’t prioritize employee wellbeing and experience. He talks about building trust and psychological safety by understanding each staffer’s unique language of appreciation. Jeff talks about gaining respect by no longer having bad meetings.

Jeff explores how to address unconscious bias, microaggressions, and exclusionary behavior in the workplace – specifically using virtual reality. Jeff’s guest Myra LalDin, believes in the power of stories to create empathy, shape values, change behaviors, and share experiences. Myra studied cross-cultural business management, and later, cognitive science and behavioral theory in grad school at Harvard University.

Myra is the co-founder of VECTRE, a virtual reality development company that leverages the power of immersive technology and works with Fortune 500 companies. She also founded VRperspectives, which focuses on using VR storytelling to shine a light on the hidden dynamics of the social world through immersive experiences. Myra serves on the boards of Designed by Us (Amazon nonprofit), the National Small Business Association Leadership Council, and as an XR subject matter expert at MIT. Myra shares what the true costs are to leaders that don’t have inclusive cultures. She shares what an inclusive leader is and what their impact is on engagement, motivation, and turnover.

Myra and Jeff discuss how virtual reality can help employees gain empathy and compassion through immersive and experiential technology. She discusses how to change culture by entering the environment in the shoes of one who has experienced negative microaggressions or exclusionary behavior in the workplace.

Jeff’s guest Donna Hamlin is an executive with extensive corporate, governance, and strategy consulting experience. She is an Advisory Partner for the CHRO practice of the 2GO Advisory group and is CEO of Boardwise, which provides corporate board advisory, evaluation, certification, training, and board search services internationally. Donna is certified for governance by the National Association of Corporate Directors in the U.S. and in global governance by Harvard University.

Jeff and Donna discuss how employees are the ambassadors of corporate brands. They talk about how to navigate the difficult waters of allowing employees to be authentic but doing it in a respectful way, ultimately leading to corporate change, better employee experience, and improved brand equity.

Donna shares how in businesses today HR and management teams must sit down to set guardrails and establish policies that are clear and understandable. She talks about creating employee change action teams to improve problem solving. She and Jeff discuss unleashing the creativity of employees to contribute and give substance to what core values are. Donna shares research that shows boards with at least three women on them produce higher returns. They discuss how inclusion is a competency, and how when managers serve on boards, they become more effective by naturally implementing peer-based leadership styles.

Jeff’s guest Rebecca Ching is a leadership developer, coach, psychotherapist, writer, speaker, and podcaster. Rebecca shares the concept of the “unburdened leader.” Jeff and Rebecca talk about how culture is the ultimate differentiator for organizations. Rebecca shares what it looks like to lead from the healthiest place inside each of us. She talks about how microaggressions occur in the workplace, how curiosity and boundaries play a defining role in creating positive culture. Rebecca talks about leadership-based vulnerability which is based on risk, uncertainty, and emotional exposure. She shares 6-principals that create positive culture, including creating brave and safe spaces, building trustworthiness and transparency, working with peers for support, seeing things in a circle versus hierarchical, empowerment and choice, and understanding cultural, historical, and gender issues. Rebecca reminds us that trust is built on connection, and connection is feeling seen, understood, and respected.

On this episode, Jeff welcomes Loren Greiff who is the founder of Portfoliorocket, where she empowers creatives and marketers to love their work, be valued, AND be well paid. Loren speaks to business leaders and candidates about how to overcome some of the biggest challenges recruiters and job seekers face as we emerge from the pandemic. Jeff & Loren discuss how a crisis of long-term unemployment (LTU) is looming in the U.S. with more than 4 million people or 40% of the total unemployed workforce not finding work even after looking for 6-months or more.

Loren shares with Jeff from her deep knowledge of LTU and ageism. Loren and Jeff talk about the growing population of employers (at least 20 out of the Fortune 50) that are committed to hiring the long-term unemployed not just because it’s the right thing to do, but because it makes business sense. Loren shares how hiring long-term candidates leads to higher retention rates and are less costly for employers to acquire. She shares how LTU job seekers should make the critical shift of applying personal responsibility to their search, which always starts with the mindset. Loren discusses why the best talent isn’t always landing the job, the critical nature of networking, and how the conversation is the relationship.

Sean Fahey is the Founder and CEO of , a company specializing in video interviewing and recruiting technology. Sean and Jeff discuss specifically how employers can find passionate people who are great at their jobs. Sean shares the challenges of having too many or not enough candidates in the pool, and the need to apply consistent structure, processes, and workflows to the recruiting methodology. Sean shares how he pulled off hiring 200 people in 30-days and how this became a catalyst for starting his company. They talk about weeding out bias in recruiting and what methods can improve diversity, equity, and inclusion. Sean shares his thoughts on the lack of readiness of artificial intelligence to be embedded into recruiting technologies and associated pitfalls to be aware of.

Michelle talks about the emotional response to space and how the workplace setting and the story is very important. She and Jeff discuss the importance of having a deep understanding of how people inhabit space regardless of what space you’re designing. Michelle shares helpful statistics from the pandemic to show how people are working. She discusses the critical importance for companies to understand deeply what work activities each employee is engaged in, what drives and motivates them, and what they need to be successful. Michelle implores leaders not to be afraid to solicit and listen to employee feedback about what they need and want. Michelle and Jeff discuss how to use data to make workplace location decisions, and afterwards the importance of leadership modeling, investing in change management, and not underestimating how much time and effort it will take to implement your strategy. The payoff of the correct decision includes achieving your goals and helping your employees transition. Michelle shares the importance of messaging and the modeling of intended behaviors as well as tying these behaviors to business vision and objectives and ultimately the future of the company.