Geoffrey West didn’t set out to explain work. He was a physicist trying to understand why living things grow, age, and die. But when his questions expanded into biology, cities, and organizations, they offered a way to think about why growth changes how organizations behave and why success often brings new constraints. In this episode, Dart and Geoffrey discuss why work feels different as organizations scale, why cities keep renewing themselves while companies tend to burn out, and what these hidden constraints mean for the people doing the work.

Geoffrey West is a British theoretical physicist and Distinguished Professor at the Santa Fe Institute. He is a former president of the Institute and the author of Scale, which explores how size shapes growth, innovation, and lifespan across living and social systems.

In this episode, Dart and Geoffrey discuss:
- Why work changes as organizations grow
- How simple scaling laws shape complex systems
- Why larger animals live longer
- Why companies die younger than cities
- How scale speeds up innovation
- Why bureaucracy grows with success
- How innovation gets crowded out over time
- Why cities tolerate difference better than firms
- What keeps work alive inside organizations
- And other topics…

Geoffrey West is a British theoretical physicist and Distinguished Professor at the Santa Fe Institute, where he previously served as president. Earlier in his career, he led the high-energy physics group at Los Alamos National Laboratory and held faculty positions at Stanford University. His research focuses on universal scaling laws in biology, cities, and social systems, examining how size shapes growth, innovation, and lifespan. He is the author of Scale.

Resources Mentioned:
Scale: The Universal Laws of Growth, Innovation, Sustainability, and the Pace of Life in Organisms, Cities, Economies, and Companies, by Geoffrey West: https://www.amazon.com/Scale-Universal-Innovation-Sustainability-Organisms/dp/014311090X

Connect with Geoffrey:
Official website: https://www.geoffreywest.com/

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

After decades in education, Dr. Peter Liljedahl realized that many classrooms fail to engage the people inside them. Rather than accept that reality, he began challenging every classroom norm he could find, asking a single question of each one: does this increase thinking?

What followed was a decades-long effort to redesign learning environments from the ground up, dramatically increasing student engagement and understanding. In this revisited episode, Dart and Peter discuss how rethinking classroom norms can reshape learning, collaboration, and the design of work itself.

Dr. Peter Liljedahl is an author, researcher, and professor of mathematics education at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. His work focuses on increasing thinking, engagement, and collaboration through classroom design.

In this episode, Dart and Peter discuss:
- Peter’s redesign of the classroom and how it can be applied to work
- How to create an environment that cultivates thinking
- Transforming norms to achieve better results
- The importance of collaboration in work and learning
- The best ways to evaluate employee performance
- Deconstructing ideas into actionable points
- What creates “Aha!” moments
- The structure of a good task
- And other topics…

Dr. Peter Liljedahl is a professor of mathematics education at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada. His work focuses on increasing thinking, engagement, and collaboration through classroom design. He is the author of Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics and works internationally with educators, schools, and education systems. His work has been recognized with the Cmolik Prize for the Enhancement of Public Education and the Fields Institute’s Margaret Sinclair Memorial Award for Innovation and Excellence in Mathematics Education.

Resources mentioned:
Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics, Grades K-12, by Peter Liljedahl: https://www.amazon.com/Building-Thinking-Classrooms-Mathematics-Grades/dp/1544374836
Weapons of the Weak, by James Scott: https://www.amazon.com/Weapons-Weak-Everyday-Peasant-Resistance/dp/0300036418
A Pattern Language, by Christopher Alexander: https://www.amazon.com/Pattern-Language-Buildings-Construction-Environmental/dp/0195019199

Connect with Peter:
X: https://x.com/pgliljedahl
https://buildingthinkingclassrooms.com/

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

Ethical questions at work rarely show up as rules or compliance issues. They show up in the systems organizations design and the outcomes those systems produce. And even well-intentioned leaders can create harm without meaning to. In this episode, Dart and Ed explore legitimacy, responsibility, employees, power, and why acting ethically inside complex systems is so difficult, even when people know what the right thing is.

Ed Freeman is best known for stakeholder theory, which challenged the idea that companies exist only to serve shareholders. He argues instead that businesses are built on relationships, and that ethics and strategy can’t be separated.

In this episode, Dart and Ed discuss:
- Why stakeholder theory was never “shareholders versus everyone else”
- What legitimacy means and why companies lose it
- How ethics and strategy got separated
- Why values come before business models
- Managing stakeholders vs. building relationships
- Why interdependence matters more than primacy
- When trade-offs signal a lack of imagination
- How ignoring people can lead to harm
- Why ethics can’t be outsourced to regulation
- What it means to act ethically inside complex systems
- And other topics…

R. Edward Freeman is Stephen E. Bachand University Professor of Business Administration and Olsson Professor of Business Administration at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business. He previously taught at the Wharton School and the University of Minnesota. His work focuses on stakeholder theory, business ethics, and the role of purpose in strategy. He is the author of the award-winning Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach and numerous articles on ethics, value creation, and capitalism.

Resources Mentioned:
Ed’s Book, Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach: https://www.amazon.com/Strategic-Management-R-Edward-Freeman/dp/0521151740
Ed’s Podcast, The Stakeholder Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-stakeholder-podcast/id1526139352

Connect with Ed:
Darden faculty page: https://www.darden.virginia.edu/faculty-research/directory/r-edward-freeman
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/r-edward-freeman-98b8897/

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

Experience is brand. The experiences people have with a company shape how they feel, what they trust, and whether they stay. Creating those experiences is not just about interfaces or marketing. It requires rethinking internal processes, digital systems, and the everyday realities of work. Alder Yarrow has spent decades helping organizations understand experience from the inside out, and why lasting growth depends on getting it right. In this revisited episode, Dart and Alder talk about experience as brand and define experience design and experience modeling. They also discuss employees as customers and how companies can understand their specific needs.

Alder Yarrow is an experience designer, advisor, and writer. He has spent over 25 years creating customer experiences for some of the world’s leading brands.

In this episode, Dart and Alder discuss:
- How experience becomes brand over time
- What experience design really means
- What experience modeling is and why it matters
- Why employees should be treated as customers of work
- How companies can better understand employee needs
- Why in-context studies matter more than surveys
- The Manager Work Practice Study
- Grounded theory and its role in research
- Experience design versus user experience
- The Jobs-To-Be-Done theory
- The say do gap
- What changes when you redesign employee experience
- Trauma-aware management
- And other topics…

Alder Yarrow has spent over 25 years helping organizations understand experience from the inside out. He has led brand and experience work for companies including Google, Twitter, Home Depot, and Tesla, and previously founded the experience design firm HYDRANT. He later served as Chief Experience Officer at Cibo and is also the founder and editor of Vinography and the author of The Essence of Wine.

Resources Mentioned:
The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton M. Christensen:
https://www.amazon.com/Innovators-Dilemma-Technologies-Management-Innovation/dp/1633691780

Alder’s blog, Vinography: https://www.vinography.com/

Connect with Alder Yarrow:
Website: https://www.vinography.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alderyarrow/ 

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

While leading L&D at Creative Force, Aaron Horwath and his leaders began treating work as a product to be designed. That shift had wide effects, including something unexpected. Creative Force became one of the few companies to implement AI in a way that actually improved the experience of work. Instead of chasing tools, Aaron and his team started with people. In this episode, Dart and Aaron discuss why starting with people led to AI success, how work can be designed as a product, and what it takes to prepare humans for a fast-approaching future.

Aaron Horwath is the Director of AI Operations at Creative Force. He helps teams redesign work by starting with people and using AI to reduce friction and improve the experience of work.

In this episode, Dart and Aaron discuss:
- Why AI should start with people, not tools
- How treating work as a product changes everything
- Finding the work that drains people and removing it
- Using the bubble chart to redesign jobs
- The difference between human work and AI work
- How non technical teams are building real software
- Why AI shortens the relay race of work
- Why soft skills matter more in an AI world
- How AI can make work more expressive
- What leaders get wrong about AI adoption
- And more…

Aaron Horwath is the Director of AI Operations at Creative Force, where he leads the company’s move toward AI augmented work. He previously led Learning and Development at the company, where he began treating work as a product and focusing on reducing friction in how people do their jobs. His work centers on starting with real business problems, understanding what work people love or hate, and using AI to remove low value tasks. Aaron takes a people first approach to AI, helping teams spend more time on meaningful, value generating work.

Resources Mentioned:
Creative Force: https://www.creativeforce.io

Connect with Aaron:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronhorwath

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

Every building comes with a set of expectations. Students are quiet in a library, but loud on a playground. Adults are focused in their deckchairs yet chatty on bar stools. Witnessing the limitations of conventional building design, Jan Golembiewski began to leverage design psychology to improve the lives of different groups, from inmates to the elderly. As one of the world’s leading researchers in architectural design psychology, Dr. Golembiewski works to create spaces that prioritize health and overall flourishing.

In this revisited episode, Dart and Jan discuss how salutogenic design works, how the spaces around us shape the way we think and feel, and what it means to create workplaces and buildings where people can truly thrive.

Dr. Jan Golembiewski is an architect and researcher focused on the psychology of the built environment. He studies how design can support health, dignity, and human flourishing.

In this episode, Dart and Jan discuss:
- A unique design approach called salutogenesis
- Designing a workplace where employees can thrive
- Salutogenic architecture
- Balancing affordances and choices in design
- The narrative context embedded in architecture
- How money-driven architecture affects livability
- The key traits of salutogenic architects
- And other topics…

Dr. Jan Golembiewski is an architect and researcher who specializes in the psychology of the built environment. He is the director and nominated architect of Psychological Design and the co-founder and CEO of Earthbuilt Technology. His work explores how architectural settings affect health, behavior, and well-being, with a particular focus on salutogenic design. Golembiewski received his Ph.D. in architecture from the University of Sydney and has served as an adjunct professor and a judge for international design and health awards.

Resources mentioned:
Claus Raasted and Paul Bulencea on Work for Humans: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-art-of-transformation-experience-design/id1612743401?i=1000623034271
The Battle for the Life and Beauty of the Earth, by Christopher Alexander: https://www.amazon.com/Battle-Life-Beauty-Earth-World-Systems/dp/0199898073
Magic, by Jan Golembiewski: https://www.amazon.com/Magic-Jan-Golembiewski-ebook/dp/B07J5RNFWV

Connect with Jan:
Website: www.psychological.design
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jan-golembiewski-a4802a15/
Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=vwuUGOkAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

Ideas don’t grow on their own. Something has to amplify them. Universities amplify what they teach, consultants amplify what they recommend, and money amplifies the ideas it chooses to back. If we want to understand how work changes at scale, we have to look at how capital shapes which ideas take root. Virginie Raphaël is redesigning that amplifier. 

In this episode, Dart and Virginie discuss how venture capital amplifies ideas, how trust networks shape who gets funded, and why rethinking the incentives behind early-stage investing may be key to building a more equitable future of work.

Virginie Raphaël is the Founder and Managing Partner of FullCircle, a perpetual pre-seed venture fund. She invests in founders building a more equitable, sustainable, and prosperous workforce.

In this episode, Dart and Virginie discuss:
- How money amplifies ideas and shapes systems at scale
- Why traditional venture funds push short-term returns
- How a perpetual fund changes founder–investor alignment
- Why trust networks shape who gets funded
- The danger of capital crowding into the same ideas
- What pre-seed investing really means for founder risk
- Why geography still matters in early-stage innovation
- How AI hype is distorting investment decisions
- What she looks for in founders who want to change work
- Why impact and market returns don’t have to conflict
- And other topics…

Virginie Raphaël is the Founder and Managing Partner of FullCircle, a perpetual pre-seed fund focused on building a more equitable and sustainable workforce. Before founding the firm, she was a Managing Director at Tusk Ventures and previously worked in banking at Lehman Brothers and Barclays. She has spent her career supporting early-stage founders in complex and highly regulated sectors.

Resources Mentioned:
FullCircle: https://www.fullcirclefund.io/

Connect with Virginie:
Twitter: https://x.com/VirginieRaphael
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/virginie-raphael-7197271/ 

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

Dan Cable was doing his job and getting compensated for it, but there was a problem: he was going through the motions with no growth, learning, or sense of excitement. He knew he needed to make a change to excel. By exploring the neuroscience behind thriving at work, Dan has since used his experience to help companies like Coca-Cola and Twitter (now X) optimize employee conditions. In this revisited episode, Dart and Dan discuss the neuroscience of enthusiastic employees, the practices that shut people down, and what we can do to set them free.

Dan Cable is a researcher, author, and Professor of Organizational Behavior at the London Business School. He is the author of Alive at Work and uses his expertise to assist clients like Coca-Cola, Twitter, McDonald’s, and Prudential.

In this episode, Dart and Dan discuss:
- Dan’s book, Alive at Work
- The biology behind enthusiastic employees
- How Dan helped reduce a company’s turnover by 30%
- Why experimentation and play at work are essential
- Creating conditions for experimentation without risking company goals
- What stifles employee energy
- Playing to the strengths of your team
- The type of leadership that creates thriving employees
- How managers can create personalized work
- And other topics…

Daniel M. Cable is a researcher, author, and Professor of Organizational Behavior at London Business School. He uses his expertise to assist clients like Coca-Cola, Twitter, McDonald’s, and Prudential, among others. He has won the London Business School’s Excellence in Teaching Award and was selected for the 2018 Thinkers50 Radar List.

Dan holds a BA from Penn State University and an MS Ph.D. from Cornell. He has published three books – Change to Strange, Alive at Work, and Exceptional – as well as more than 50 articles in top scientific journals. His work has been featured in The Economist, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and CNBC.

Resources Mentioned:
Alive at Work, by Daniel Cable: https://www.amazon.com/Alive-Work-Neuroscience-Helping-People/dp/1633697665
Design for Belonging, by Susie Wise: https://www.amazon.com/Design-Belonging-Inclusion-Collaboration-Communities-ebook/dp/B0998BMN9H

Connect with Dan:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-cable-a0b581a0/
Twitter: @dancable1
Website: www.dan-cable.com

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

We experience the world through what we notice, how we feel, and what we remember. Yet most organizations still focus on products instead of the experiences those products create. Mat Duerden has spent his career studying how experiences work, why they matter, and what turns an ordinary moment into something meaningful or even transformative. In this episode, Dart and Mat discuss what makes an experience meaningful and how reflection deepens its impact. They look at how organizations can build experience playbooks that bring brand, culture, and design together into one coherent story.

Mat Duerden is the Department Chair of Experience Design and Management at the Marriott School of Business at Brigham Young University. He is the co-author of Designing Experiences and a researcher focused on how experiences become memorable, meaningful, and transformative.

In this episode, Dart and Mat discuss:
- Why attention drives every experience
- What makes experiences memorable, meaningful, or transformative?
- What designers of work can learn from studying leisure
- How core design principles travel across contexts
- Why experiences should be orchestrated, not staged.
- How hardship can make experiences more powerful
- How shared experiences build connection
- What Bach and river rafting have in common
- How telling the story helps learning stick
- And other topics…

Mat Duerden is the Department Chair of the Experience Design and Management program at the Marriott School of Business at Brigham Young University. His research examines how experiences become memorable, meaningful, and transformative, with a focus on reflection, storytelling, and attention.

He is the co-author of Designing Experiences, written with Bob Rossman, and teaches experience design across business, education, and leisure contexts. Prior to academia, Mat worked extensively in outdoor recreation and youth development, shaping his interest in how shared experiences create connection.

Resources Mentioned:
Designing Experiences, by Mat Duerden & Bob Rossman: https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Experiences-Columbia-Business-Publishing/dp/0231191685
Nicomachean Ethics, by Aristotle: https://www.amazon.com/Nicomachean-Ethics-Penguin-Classics/dp/0140449493
Experience Economy, by Joe Pine & James Gilmore: https://www.amazon.com/Experience-Economy-Updated-Joseph-Pine/dp/1422161978

Connect with Mat:
Faculty Page: https://marriott.byu.edu/directory/details?id=5773
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mat-duerden-8740969/

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.

In an ideal world, college would help students explore possibilities and imagine a future that fits who they are. Instead, many choose majors before they know themselves and get pushed onto a career conveyor belt with little space to discover what matters to them. Farouk Dey wants to change that. His work encourages students to pause, experiment, and learn from real experiences before deciding where they want to go. In this episode, Dart and Dr. Farouk Dey discuss how life design can help students find direction through experimentation, and how universities can create fuller, more meaningful journeys for the people they serve.

Dr. Farouk Dey is the President of Palo Alto University. He has spent more than two decades reimagining how universities help students prepare for life and work.

In this episode, Dart and Farouk discuss:
- The Imagine Center for Integrative Learning and Life Design
- How economic shifts drive national career changes
- The growing need to develop minds, not just careers
- Changing the outdated career service models of American universities
- Balancing competition and curiosity when choosing a career
- The importance of experiential learning for life design
- How universities can give students a higher return on their investment
- Farouk’s advice for companies who want to build a life design center
- How to construct your passion – not find it
- And other topics…

Dr. Farouk Dey is the President of Palo Alto University and the former Vice Provost for Integrative Learning and Life Design at Johns Hopkins University. He previously held senior roles at Stanford University and Carnegie Mellon University, where he led work in career and experiential education. His focus is helping students navigate learning, work, and meaning through applied design principles. Dr. Dey holds a PhD and EdS in Higher Education Administration, an MBA, an MEd in Counseling Psychology, and a BBA in Finance.

Resources mentioned:
Bill Burnett on Work For Humans: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/designing-your-life-how-to-use-design-principles-to/id1612743401?i=1000738307337

Connect with Farouk:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/faroukdey/

Work with Dart:
Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.