The Gen Mess with Tess

The Gen Mess with Tess

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The Gen Mess with Tess episodes

  • Ep 84: Why You Misunderstand Gen Z at Work (with Danielle Farage)

    Danielle Farage graduated from USC in 2020, watched her generation get locked out of entry-level jobs during COVID, and turned that experience into a career translating Gen Z for the rest of the working world. In this episode, Tess and Danielle unpack why organizations keep losing young talent before they ever get started, what the generational divide actually looks like from inside a company, and why curiosity may be the only leadership skill that genuinely bridges it. They explore the economic realities facing Gen Z, a growing “quiet AI revolt” inside the workforce, the cognitive cost of offloading thinking to AI, and Danielle’s framework called frentorship, a mutual cross-generational relationship built on what each person can learn, leave behind, and leverage. Listeners will walk away with a clearer picture of what Gen Z actually wants from leaders and the one move any leader can make this week to start closing the gap.

    KEY TAKEAWAYS

    • Only 12 percent of Gen Z had a job lined up at graduation this year. For millennials just 10 to 15 years ago, that number was three times higher.
    • The best leaders invest in new team members from day one with specific, personal attention that has nothing to do with workflow.
    • The corporate ladder still exists, but there is far less room on it than Gen Z was promised, and they can see that clearly.
    • Gen Z’s quiet resistance to AI is real and growing. Most organizations are not addressing it.
    • Offloading thinking to AI carries a cognitive cost. Mental capacity works the same way as physical capacity: use it or lose it.
    • When a new hire is not performing, the first question should be whether they ever clearly understood what was expected of them.
    • Leaders who criticize Gen Z for being “too sensitive” are often the same people who raised their own children the same way.
    • Frentorship is a mutual relationship between people of different generations built on three questions: what can I learn, what can I leave behind, and what can I leverage.
    • Saying the next generation will figure out today’s problems is a declaration of retirement, whether the speaker intends it or not.
    • Curiosity is the most accessible and immediate leadership move for closing the intergenerational gap.

      • TIMESTAMPS

      • 00:01 - Why Danielle chose Gen Z at work as her life’s focus
      • 02:07 - Graduating during COVID and the toxic first internship
      • 08:08 - What a genuinely great manager actually does differently
      • 11:04 - How Gen X and Gen Z see the workplace through different lenses
      • 17:10 - What the pandemic revealed about undefined workplace expectations
      • 21:12 - Is the corporate ladder dead?
      • 28:30 - The real numbers behind Gen Z’s job market
      • 30:44 - Gen Z’s quiet revolt against AI
      • 38:20 - Why “Gen Z is too sensitive” is the wrong question
      • 42:35 - What frentorship is and why it belongs in the workplace

        • Find Danielle Farage at https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielle-farage/

        Follow The Gen Mess for more weekly content.

        Visit tessbrigham.com to learn more.

        52 min
      • Ep 83: Why Good Employees in Caring Professions Leave (with Crystal Stokes)

        This episode examines why dedicated, compassionate professionals in veterinary medicine and other caring fields burn out and leave, and what leaders should be considering in the modern workplace.

        Crystal Stokes, a licensed marriage and family therapist and doctoral candidate who founded Full Circle Lab, brings a perspective shaped by her own unexpected path.

        What are the emotional and systemic forces pushing good people out of caring professions? What do generational differences actually look like inside a veterinary practice? And what specific leadership skills, onboarding systems, and feedback structures determine whether a new hire stays or leaves within the first year? Listeners will walk away with a clearer picture of why culture is a business strategy, not a soft extra, and what well-supported teams actually look like from the inside.


        KEY TAKEAWAYS

        • Burnout in caring professions
        • The corporatization of veterinary medicine
        • The generational difference in the workplace
        • The Seasons of Life
        • Why onboarding is not an administrative task
        • Why clarity is a leadership obligation
        • How employee assistance programs routinely fail caring profession workers

          • TIMESTAMPS

          • 00:01 - Why a pre-vet student left the field and accidentally became a therapist
          • 03:31 - How volunteering at a hospital led to the origin of Full Circle Lab
          • 05:46 - What is actually burning out veterinary professionals
          • 08:24 - When burnout escalates: suicidal ideation in veterinary medicine
          • 10:13 - Why culture change stalls at the leadership level, not the team level
          • 17:49 - How younger workers approach the workplace differently than older generations
          • 21:39 - Where the mental health awareness pendulum may be swinging too far
          • 25:36 - Why life in seasons beats work-life balance as a framework
          • 30:00 - What younger workers need from leadership that they are not getting
          • 33:07 - How onboarding and performance management directly drive retention

            • Learn more about Full Circle Lab: https://www.fullcirclelab.com/

            Follow The Gen Mess with Tess for weekly insights into the modern workplace.

            Join the free "Dear Gen Mess" community at tessbrigham.com/podcast

            Visit tessbrigham.com to learn more.

            50 min
          • Ep 82: Why You Feel Empty Despite Accomplishing Everything (with Neil Markey)

            This episode examines what it takes to heal when talk therapy and medication are not reaching the root cause. Neil Markey, co-founder and CEO of Beckley Retreats and a former U.S. Army Ranger who completed three combat deployments, shares how unresolved PTSD brought him to meditation and professionally facilitated psychedelic experiences, and how that personal path became a professional one.

            Tess and Neil explore why high-achieving professionals often feel empty despite accomplishing everything on paper, how trauma is stored in the body rather than just the mind, and why psilocybin retreats are gaining serious traction from the VA to bipartisan lawmakers. Listeners will come away with a clearer picture of what psychedelic-assisted therapy actually involves, how it differs from ketamine, and why developing a meditation practice may be the most important investment anyone can make in their mental health right now.


            KEY TAKEAWAYS

            • SSRIs and anti-anxiety medications reduce symptoms, but they do not address the root cause of trauma. Many people who rely on them alone remain stuck in a state of fight or flight.
            • Trauma is stored in the body, not just the mind. There are more neural channels running from the body to the brain than from the brain to the body, which is why body-based practices often reach what talk therapy cannot.
            • High-performing professionals are at particular risk of emotional disconnection. Years of operating in analytical, problem-solving mode can quietly cut off access to emotion, intuition, and genuine human connection.
            • The fear of losing your edge after a psychedelic or healing experience is almost universally unfounded. People who complete these programs consistently report gaining capacity, not losing capability.
              • The benefit of a psychedelic experience is not the experience itself. Without new habits and practices installed around it, most people revert to their previous patterns over time because the body returns to what it knows.
              • Psilocybin is non-toxic and non-addictive. The main risk is taking too much in an uncontrolled setting. In a structured retreat with trained facilitators, the risks are manageable and are often part of the process.
              • Ketamine is federally legal in the United States and psilocybin is not, though legal psilocybin programs exist in certain state and international contexts. Ketamine can be addictive and toxic at high doses. Psilocybin tends to amplify what is already present emotionally, making set and setting critical.
              • The VA has formally included the evaluation of psychedelic medicines in its strategic plan for the first time. The issue has rare bipartisan political support.
              • Healing happens in community, not just in individual clinical settings. Group retreat models provide therapeutic benefits that one-on-one therapy alone does not, particularly for veterans.
              • MBSR, Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, is the most clinically studied form of meditation and requires no spiritual framework. Committing to a structured course is one of the most accessible starting points for anyone looking to build a lasting practice.


                • TIMESTAMPS

                • 00:01 - How September 11th led a college student to become an Army Ranger
                • 02:27 - Why PTSD keeps the nervous system in fight or flight long after combat ends
                • 05:12 - How trauma lives in the body and why the mind cannot reach it alone
                • 10:16 - Who comes to psychedelic retreats and what they are actually looking for
                • 12:37 - Why high performers are especially prone to emotional disconnection
                • 18:03 - What Gen X professionals most want from this kind of work
                • 21:19 - How Beckley Retreats structures programs before, during, and after
                • 28:05 - Psilocybin versus ketamine: what the real differences are
                • 32:25 - Why group healing models work, especially for veterans
                • 41:03 - How the VA and bipartisan lawmakers are changing access to psychedelic therapy

                  • Learn more about Neil Markey and Beckley Retreats at beckleyretreats.com

                  Learn more about host Tess Brigham at tessbrigham.com

                  Subscribe to The Gen Mess with Tess for weekly episodes tackling the generational challenges and complexities of navigating life and work.

                  53 min
                • Ep 81: The Emotional Cost of Surviving Cancer (with guests Hollye Jacobs & Dev Meenagh)

                  This episode examines what happens after breast cancer treatment ends, and why the emotional, relational, and identity-based damage from a cancer diagnosis often goes unaddressed by the medical system. Tess Brigham, a therapist and breast cancer survivor, speaks with Hollye Jacobs, a nurse, social worker, and resilience coach who was diagnosed at 39, and Dev Meenagh, who was diagnosed at 28. Together they discuss the gap between ringing the bell and actually feeling better, what fear of recurrence looks like years after treatment ends, how relationships shift when a partner becomes a caregiver, and why connecting with people who have lived the same experience can be more useful than clinical support alone. Listeners will also hear practical grounding tools for managing anxiety and why the assumption that survivorship has an end date is itself part of the problem.


                  KEY TAKEAWAYS

                  • When genetic testing tells you that you do not have the breast cancer gene, it means you do not have one of the 12 to 15 genes currently being tested, not that the disease is not hereditary in your family.
                  • The emotional and relational damage from cancer treatment is just as real as the physical damage, and it often goes unaddressed once active treatment ends.
                  • Two people can go through the same cancer treatment and have completely different physical experiences, from working through chemo without missing a day of work to being hospitalized twice.
                  • When a partner becomes a caregiver during treatment, the equality and intimacy that held the relationship together can erode in ways that are hard to see in the moment.
                  • The hardest part of a cancer diagnosis is often not the treatment itself but the period after it ends, when support disappears and everyone around you assumes you are fine.
                  • Fear of recurrence does not go away with time. It can still arrive, without warning, sixteen years after treatment.
                  • The 5-4-3-2-1 grounding technique works because the brain cannot simultaneously process a structured sensory sequence and a fear spiral. Name five things you see, four you physically feel, three you hear, two you smell, one you taste.
                  • An app or support community made up of people who have been through the same experience provides a qualitatively different kind of support than clinical care or well-meaning friends and family.
                  • Survivorship is not a destination. It is an ongoing process that continues for years and sometimes decades after active treatment ends.
                  • Choosing to look for what a difficult experience is teaching you, rather than asking why it happened to you, is a learnable approach, not a personality trait.

                    • TIMESTAMPS

                    • 00:00 - Why cancer opens a club you never wanted to join
                    • 01:42 - What treatment looks like when it hits harder than expected
                    • 03:37 - Why a negative genetic test does not mean what most people think
                    • 09:42 - How the same treatment can feel completely different for different people
                    • 14:05 - What happens to a relationship when a partner becomes the caregiver
                    • 16:00 - Why finishing treatment can feel like a free fall
                    • 19:12 - What the now-what moment looks like from inside
                    • 27:28 - How Cancer Buddy helps survivors find people who truly get it
                    • 35:17 - Why finding meaning in hard things is different from toxic positivity
                    • 39:59 - Three practical tools for managing fear of recurrence



                      • 1 hr
                    • Ep 80: Reframe Your Relationship With Alcohol (guest: Vedant Pradeep)

                      For decades, there were two options when your drinking became a problem: a 12-step program or a residential treatment center. Both carries stigma, both requires a label, and neither fits the vast majority of people who weren't maybe physically addicted but were drinking more than they wanted to.


                      In this episode, Tess sits down with Vedant Pradeep, co-founder of Reframe, an app for helping people reduce their alcohol intake or quit drinking altogether. With six million downloads and research partnerships at Emory and Harvard, Reframe was built on a simple but powerful idea: you have agency over your behavior, and the path to change is built through neuroscience, habit loops, and self-efficacy, not shame and labels.


                      Vedant and Tess go deep on the 12-step model's core assumption, that you are powerless, and why it may be the very thing that keeps people stuck. They explore what it actually looks like when you stop avoiding triggers and start rewiring the loops underneath them. They also get into the surprising data on private drinking and loneliness in younger generations, why "Damp January" outperforms "Dry January" for lasting change, and what GLP-1 medications might do for addiction treatment the way SSRIs did for mental health.


                      What listeners will learn:

                      • Why the 12-step model's self-efficacy problem may be keeping more people stuck than it helps
                      • The difference between the "I can't drink" identity and the "I don't drink" identity, and why one word changes everything
                      • What loneliness, boredom, and stress data reveal about why Gen Z is drinking more privately than publicly
                      • Why small experiments like Damp January outperform total abstinence commitments for most people, including a stat that may surprise you
                      • How to use an app as a diagnostic: what it means if you try to cut back and genuinely can't
                      • What the 66-day habit change science says about why 28-day insurance-covered programs often fail
                      • Reframe Med: how the app now connects users with naltrexone prescriptions for people whose cravings need more than behavioral change
                      • Why Vedant believes GLP-1 medications could do for addiction what Prozac did for depression

                        • What listeners will learn:

                        CHAPTER TIMESTAMPS

                        • 00:00 Introduction: Who Is Vedant Pradeep and What Is Reframe
                        • 01:14 Origin Story: From OCD Research to Spotting a Gap in Alcohol Support
                        • 03:27 Why Reframe Chose Neuroscience Over the 12-Step Model
                        • 06:23 The Spectrum of Alcohol Use: Mindful Moderation vs. Abstinence
                        • 09:56 How Neural Pathways Drive Drinking Habits (And How to Rewire Them)
                        • 11:26 The Identity Shift: "I Don't Drink" vs. "I Can't Drink"
                        • 12:19 Gen Z, Loneliness, and the Rise of Private Drinking
                        • 17:07 The Moment That Starts Change: Relationship Crisis as Catalyst
                        • 22:10 Why Damp January Works Better Than Dry January for Most People
                        • 28:32 The Insurance Problem: Why 28-Day Programs Fall Short of the Science
                        • 35:12 What's Next for Reframe: Peak Human Condition and Reframe Med
                        • 43:00 GLP-1 Medications and the Future of Addiction Treatment


                          • GUEST AND RESOURCE CREDITS

                          Guest: Vedant Pradeep, Co-Founder, Reframe

                          App: Reframe available on iOS and Android

                          Download/site: reframeapp.com

                          50 min
                        • Ep 79: Why Gen X Wears Not Caring Like a Badge of Honor

                          Ask a Gen Xer how they're doing and watch what happens. They'll say they're "fine." Somewhere along the way, a generation turned that into an identity one that prides itself on low maintenance, toughness, and some who is never going to make a big deal out of anything.


                          Host Tess Brigham makes the case that this isn't actually who Gen X is. It's who they had to become. And the real cost isn't the armor itself. It's what happened when they started wearing it like a medal.


                          Drawing on research into latchkey kids, family systems theory, and Trevor Noah's concept that we can only dream in the shape of what we've actually seen, Tess unpacks where the "I don't need anything" posture came from, what it built, and how it impacts the day to day lives of Gen X and the people they care about.


                          What listeners will learn:

                          • What the 1984 research on latchkey kids actually found, and why self-reliance wasn't a philosophy Gen X chose
                          • Why the "I don't care" posture isn't indifference, it's armor that had a very specific job at a very specific age
                          • Murray Bowen's family systems research on over-functioning, and why staying constantly capable is often about managing anxiety, not just being responsible
                          • Why Gen Z doesn't actually irritate Gen X
                          • The difference between a person who is genuinely at peace and a person who has gotten very good at not showing you the alternative
                          • A single reflection question to carry into the week

                            • CHAPTER TIMESTAMPS

                            • 00:00 Introduction + Dear Gen Mess Newsletter Announcement
                            • 01:32 What It Really Means to Say "I'm Fine": The Gen X Identity
                            • 02:00 The Research: Latchkey Kids and What Self-Reliance Actually Built
                            • 03:42 You Can Only Dream in the Shape of What You've Seen
                            • 05:18 The Armor: Why "I Don't Care" Was Never Indifference
                            • 06:45 Bowen's Family Systems Theory: Overfunctioning and the Anxiety Underneath It
                            • 08:15 Why Gen Z Irritates Gen X (It's Not What You Think)
                            • 09:24 What Gen X Actually Cares About — And Never Got Permission to Say
                            • 10:15 When Do You Get to Put the Armor Down?
                            • 11:00 The Reflection Exercise: A Question to Sit With This Week


                              • Listen now, and subscribe to The Gen Mess with Tess for weekly episodes.

                              14 min
                            • Ep 78: How Too Much Information Is Paralyzing Younger Generation (with guest Dr. Suzanne Degges-White)

                              There's a name for what a lot of young people are doing right now, and it's not laziness. Dr. Suzanne Degges-White calls it life shelving: the decision to put the big stuff on hold because the weight of choosing feels like too much.

                              In this episode, Tess sits down with Dr. Degges-White, licensed counselor, professor of counselor education at Northern Illinois University, longtime Psychology Today contributor, and author of several books on relationships, including her upcoming title Was It Something I Said? Understanding Family Estrangement. With over two decades of teaching and clinical work, Dr. Degges-White brings a perspective on Gen Z that is both deeply researched and genuinely compassionate.

                              What follows is a wide-ranging conversation about why this generation struggles to decide, what the infodemic is doing to young people's ability to think deeply, what Gen Z actually learned by watching millennials burn out, and what both sides of a family estrangement need to hear before it's too late.


                              What listeners will learn:

                              • What life shelving is, why it's happening, and what it actually costs to keep delaying
                              • The infodemic effect: how drowning in information leaves people less equipped to make decisions, not more
                              • How identity development has shifted from adolescence to a decade-long process now expected to last until 26 or 28
                              • Why public lives and public mistakes have made risk-taking feel unbearable for a generation
                              • What Gen Z is actually asking for at work, and why it looks like entitlement but isn't always
                              • What Gen Z saw when they watched millennials work themselves into the ground, and why their response makes complete sense
                              • The trophy generation debate: the science behind it was wrong, but the blame landed on the kids anyway
                              • The 10 unspoken rules of friendship, what happens when one gets broken, and why intergenerational friendships matter more than most people realize
                              • What Dr. Degges-White's research on family estrangement reveals about both the person who leaves and the one left behind

                                • CHAPTER TIMESTAMPS

                                • 00:00 Introduction: Who Is Dr. Suzanne Degges-White
                                • 00:58 Origin Story: Happenstance Theory and the Path to Northern Illinois
                                • 04:31 What Is Life Shelving? The Paradox of Choice and Why Young People Are Stalling
                                • 08:18 Why Feeling Stuck Feels Like a Personal Failure (And Why It Isn't)
                                • 09:30 The Infodemic Effect: Too Much Information, Not Enough Wisdom
                                • 11:18 Identity Development in 2026: Why Growing Up Now Takes Until 28
                                • 18:25 Public Lives, Public Mistakes: The Fear That Keeps People From Taking Risks
                                • 22:48 Gen Z in the Workforce: Self-Care Days, Deadlines, and the Entitlement Debate
                                • 27:03 The Push-Pull: Validating Gen Z While Still Holding a Standard
                                • 31:00 What Gen Z Learned From Watching Millennials Burn Out
                                • 40:36 Friendships: Toxic Patterns, Intergenerational Bonds, and the 10 Unspoken Rules
                                • 51:43 Family Estrangement: What the New Book Reveals About Both Sides
                                  • 58 min
                                • Ep 77: Why Your Burnout Recovery Keeps Failing (Guest: Dr. Suzanne Bober)

                                  The burnout conversation has been missing something. Not willpower, not better habits, not the right morning routine. What's actually missing is the body.


                                  In this episode, Tess sits down with Dr. Suzanne Bober, chiropractor, nervous system educator, and founder of the Infinite Balance Blueprint, whose 25 years of clinical work led her to one conclusion: burnout isn't a character flaw, a motivation problem, or a generational weakness. It's a nervous system at capacity. And no amount of rest, yoga, or time off changes that if nothing physiological changes first.

                                  Dr. Bober is the author of Burnout Rewired, which reframes the entire burnout conversation around what she calls cognitive overload and the science of nervous system expansion. Her core message is one most leaders and young workers have never heard: you don't need to be less ambitious. You need a system that can actually support how ambitious you already are.


                                  What you will learn:

                                  • The difference between burnout and cognitive overload, and why that distinction changes how you treat it
                                  • Why stress leaves and rest periods often fail: nothing physiological changes, so people return to the same environment and immediately overwhelm again
                                  • Why Gen Z may be entering the workforce with the cup already three-quarters full before a single meeting
                                  • What nervous system overload actually looks like in the body: tension patterns, shallow breathing, brain fog, digestive disruption, and immune suppression
                                  • The electric car analogy: what it feels like to operate from expanded capacity instead of survival mode
                                  • Why five minutes of stillness is physiologically different from scrolling (and why the phone is always going to win on comfort)
                                  • The bed rotting trend decoded: what it actually tells us about the freeze stage of chronic stress
                                  • What managers can do at the onboarding stage to change the trajectory before it becomes a retention problem
                                  • Dr. Bober's four energy archetypes and where to find her free energy quiz


                                  CHAPTER TIMESTAMPS

                                  00:00 Introduction: Who Is Dr. Suzanne Bober

                                  00:58 Origin Story: From Chiropractic to Nervous System Education

                                  02:48 Cognitive Overload vs. Burnout: Why the Language Matters

                                  04:00 Signs Your Nervous System Is at Capacity (That Most People Miss)

                                  08:48 How Stress Shows Up in the Body: Tension, Breathing, and Immune Suppression

                                  13:05 Why Gen Z Enters Work With the Cup Already Full

                                  14:31 You Don't Need Less Ambition. You Need a Bigger Nervous System.

                                  22:37 Thrival vs. Survival: What Expanded Capacity Actually Feels Like

                                  28:49 Where Your Energy Actually Is (And Why You Can't Access It)

                                  33:16 Doing Less to Get More: Why Your Starting State Changes Everything

                                  37:21 Mental Load, Present-Moment Focus, and Why Multitasking Is a Myth

                                  41:28 Bed Rotting: What It's Really Telling Us About Gen Z


                                  Guest: Dr. Suzanne Bober, Chiropractor, Nervous System Educator, Founder of the Infinite Balance Blueprint

                                  Book: Burnout Rewired (contact Dr. Bober for a free chapter)

                                  Dr. Bober's Energy Quiz: https://thehub-api.mastermind.com/widget/quiz/6FP4OnNCOBAD3egZPgGu

                                  Learn more: https://harbourfrontchiropractic.com/dr-suzanne-bober


                                  Follow The Gen Mess with Tess for weekly conversations about generational challenges in the workplace and our daily lives.

                                  Visit tessbrigham.com to learn more.

                                  Follow for weekly episodes, and be sure to visit tessbrigham.com to learn more about Tess's work as a licensed therapist and certified coach.

                                  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

                                  58 min
                                • Ep 76: Why Authority Doesn't Work the Way It Used To

                                  For most of modern work, being difficult was something leadership could get away with if they were brilliant enough. We didn't just tolerate the tortured genius, we romanticized them. And there was a logic to it. If someone controlled access to knowledge, skills, or connections you couldn't get anywhere else, you put up with them, because the trade was worth it.


                                  That trade is over. And most leaders haven't noticed yet.


                                  In this solo episode, Tess breaks down why the authority structures that ran workplaces for the last century are collapsing, and why Gen Z didn't cause the collapse; they're just the first generation willing to name it out loud.


                                  Exploring how we got into the organizational psychology framework behind the shift (French and Raven's bases of power), what the Harvard Business School trust triangle actually looks like in practice, and the one sentence that explains why so many leaders are struggling with their teams right now: they think they have a respect problem, when what they actually have is a trust problem.


                                  What you'll learn:


                                  • Why expert power and legitimate power used to be enough on their own, and why they no longer are
                                  • The "tortured genius" mythology and the unspoken deal it depended on
                                  • Why Gen Z never agreed to the old deal, because there was nothing left in it for them by the time they arrived
                                  • The trust triangle (Authenticity, Empathy, Logic) and what happens when one leg is missing
                                  • Why leaders who reach for control when they lose deference make the problem significantly worse
                                  • One concrete move for each leg of the trust triangle to try in your next one-on-one


                                  CHAPTER TIMESTAMPS


                                  00:00 Introduction + Dear Gen Mess Newsletter Announcement

                                  00:40 How Information Used to Be the Ultimate Currency at Work

                                  02:24 The Tortured Genius Deal: Why We Romanticized Difficult Bosses

                                  04:00 French and Raven's Bases of Power (And Why Two of Them Are Failing)

                                  04:41 When Information Stops Being Scarce, Relationship Is All That's Left

                                  06:00 You Don't Have a Respect Problem. You Have a Trust Problem.

                                  07:00 Real Workplace Example: When Control Replaces Relationship

                                  08:00 Gen Z Never Agreed to the Old Deal

                                  09:45 The Trust Triangle: Authenticity, Empathy, and Logic

                                  11:00 One Practical Move Per Trust Leg for Your Next One-on-One

                                  11:36 The Bottom Line: What Leaders Actually Need Now

                                  Follow for weekly episodes, and be sure to visit tessbrigham.com to learn more about Tess's work as a licensed therapist and certified coach.

                                  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

                                  15 min
                                • Ep 75: Are We Losing Empathy in Our Connected World? (Guest: Mimi Nicklin)

                                  We've lost 48% of our empathy in the last 30 years. In a world that's more connected than ever, that's not a coincidence. It's a biology problem.


                                  In this episode, I sit down with Mimi Nicklin, bestselling author and founder of Empathy Everywhere, who has spent years traveling the globe training senior leaders to treat empathy as the competitive advantage it actually is. She's shared stages with Bill Gates and Steve Wozniak and reached over five million people worldwide with one core argument: empathy isn't soft. It's the hardest, most measurable skill in the room.


                                  What we get into in this episode is the reframe most leaders desperately need. Mimi breaks down what empathy actually is (it's not what you think), why our brains are physiologically less capable of it under stress, and what the FBI, the US Army, and the CEO of Chanel all have in common. Plus, the four stages of real empathy change, and why you can do this in under 120 seconds.


                                  What you'll learn:


                                  • What empathy actually is: it lives in the prefrontal cortex, it's a cognitive skill, and it's not about feelings
                                  • Why organizations led with empathy see 21% higher profits and 68% higher engagement
                                  • The neuroscience behind the empathy deficit: why stress and cortisol literally shut down your capacity for it
                                  • Why being more connected through technology is making us less empathetic, not more
                                  • Why empathy is not agreement, and how you can understand someone and still completely disagree with them
                                  • What both older leaders and younger workers are getting wrong about empathy right now
                                  • The four stages of empathy change: awareness, education, intention, and measurement
                                  • Practical tools anyone can use in under 120 seconds to build connection immediately



                                  CHAPTER TIMESTAMPS

                                  00:00 Introduction: Who Is Mimi Nicklin

                                  00:40 Mimi's Origin Story: From Senior Ad Executive to Empathy Advocate

                                  05:09 Why Empathy Is a Hard Skill (And the Data That Proves It)

                                  07:38 What Empathy Actually Is: Perspective Taking and the Prefrontal Cortex

                                  11:04 Why Being More Connected Is Making Us Less Empathetic

                                  16:20 Empathy Is Not Agreement: Why That Distinction Changes Everything

                                  20:04 The Generational Tension: What Older Leaders and Younger Workers Both Get Wrong

                                  26:17 Listening-Led Leadership and Why Assumption Is the Enemy of Performance

                                  32:26 How Mimi Works: Speaking, Content, and the Four Stages of Change

                                  35:25 Who's Actually Doing This Right: Satya Nadella, Chanel, and Jamil Zaki

                                  39:06 Practice Creates Permanence, Not Perfection

                                  41:03 40 Ways to Connect: Practical Tools Anyone Can Use Today


                                  Guest: Mimi Nicklin

                                  Organization: Empathy Everywhere

                                  Website: empathyeverywhere.co


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                                  51 min

                                About The Gen Mess with Tess

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                                Host Tess Brigham (licensed therapist, certified coach) tackles the generational challenges and complexities of navigating life and work. From the unique struggles of Gen Z to the evolving…