Thinkers50: Stop Being Your Own Worst Enemy, Start Being Your Best Friend

Starting June 5th, the Anxious Achiever is back to celebrate its tenth season. We’ll be diving into the topics and challenges you’ve asked about most: How to manage anxiety around AI and your job What is is like crafting a career while living with Tourette’s syndrome How to identify if you are a people pleaser (and how to change) Why your boss is or isn’t toxic Manage emotions through difficult situations  And much, much more. The new season launches next week - be sure to let us know what you think!

Leaders of organizations have a large responsibility when it comes to their own mental health, and of those in their organization. When they speak up about mental health, others can too. But vulnerability comes with risks. How can leaders model openness around mental health without bumping up against stereotypes and judgment? In this roundtable conversation, host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmonson – the pioneer of the concept of psychological safety at work; entrepreneur and best-selling author Peter Sims; and Megan Reitz of Oxford University and Hult International Business School about the leader’s role in speaking up and fighting mental health stigma. Learn more about Amy: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=6451 Learn more about Peter: https://petersims.com/ Learn more about Megan: https://www.meganreitz.com/ Learn more about Thinkers50: https://thinkers50.com/

Burnout doesn’t come on because of weakness, and it doesn’t come about overnight. Many of us are walking around with some degree of burnout! On the flip side, it takes more than a vacation or loving your job to solve the problem. In this special Thinkers50 episode, host Morra Aarons-Mele explores some of the ways companies and individuals can more effectively avoid burnout and put in place more mentally healthy systems. She speaks with Alyson Meister, a professor at IMD Business School, Jon Jachimowicz, assistant professor at Harvard Business School, and Basima Tewfik, assistant professor at MIT Sloan School of Management. Learn more about Alyson: https://www.imd.org/faculty/professors/alyson-meister/ Learn more about Jon: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=1175257 Learn more about Basima: https://mitsloan.mit.edu/faculty/directory/basima-tewfik Learn more about Thinkers50: https://thinkers50.com/

As part of a month long series with Thinkers50 and The Silicon Guild, in this episode host Morra Aarons-Mele explores constructive ways we can improve our relationship with ourselves, instead of always being our harshest critic. She’s joined by Duke Professor Sanyin Siang, Lenny Mendoca, Senior Partner Emeritus at McKinsey, and Palo Alto City Council Member Julie Lythcott-Haims to talk about ways to change your self talk and your work.  Learn more about Sanyin: https://centers.fuqua.duke.edu/cole/team_profiles/sanyin-siang/ Hear our past episode with Lenny: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-the-stigma-of-mental-health-for-men-in-business/id1480904163?i=1000601243370 Hear our past episode with Julie: https://podcasts.apple.com/in/podcast/how-to-stop-the-cycle-of-overachieving/id1480904163?i=1000479076732 Learn more about Thinkers50: https://thinkers50.com/

What are some of the most important management ideas out there in today’s world? Thinkers50 is an organization that aims to identify and share these important ideas day in and day out, and all month long host Morra Aarons-Mele is partnering with Thinkers50 and The Silicon Guild for a series of roundtable talks about mental health and work. In this episode, she speaks with Columbia Business School’s Rita McGrath, Copenhagen Business School’s Poornima Luthra, and entrepreneur Andrew Barnes, founder of the Four Day Week Movement, about rethinking how we work to improve mental health for everyone.  Learn more about Rita: https://www.ritamcgrath.com/ Learn more about Poornima: https://www.talented.dk/ Learn more about Andrew: https://www.4dayweek.com/andrew-barnes Learn more about Thinkers50: https://thinkers50.com/

Imagine you are having an anxious moment at work. Instead of letting yourself slip into old patterns of negative thoughts or self-criticisms, today’s guest says you can take a step back and try something new: maybe moving around, going out for lunch, drinking some water - but definitely not doom scrolling.  Emma Seppala is a lecturer at Yale and author of the book Sovereign: Reclaim Your Freedom, Energy, and Power in a Time of Distraction, Uncertainty, and Chaos. In this episode, she explains behavior changes that can make a big difference in your career.  Check out Emma’s book here: https://www.amazon.com/Sovereign-Reclaim-Freedom-Distraction-Uncertainty/dp/1401975062

Burnout culture is everywhere - case in point, a lawsuit brought against Goldman Sachs earlier this year by a former employee claiming that the relentless workload required by the firm led to heart problems and depression. The firm’s response was of particular note to Sarah Green Carmichael, a Bloomberg Opinion columnist.  In this LinkedIn Live, Sarah joins Morra as well as Cali Williams Yost, founder and CEO of Flex+Strategy Group, to discuss the interplay between company culture and individual experience and behavior, as it relates to our mental health.  For further reading, check out Cali’s book: https://www.amazon.com/Work-Life-Cali-Williams-Yost-ebook/dp/B001R9DHXK?ref_=ast_author_dp And Sarah Green Carmichael’s columns: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/authors/AUKfbdj7jH8/sarah-green-carmichael

There was a time when everyone masked their mental and emotional struggles at work; or worse, didn’t even know that what they were experiencing might be anxiety, depression, or something similar. In this episode, host Morra Aarons-Mele first speaks with Kent Coules, co-publisher at Hawaii Business Magazine, about his long career in media, his path to sobriety, and what he learned about drinking and anxiety along the way. Then, she speaks with Donna Volpitta, co-founder of The Mental Health Literacy Collaborative, about how important it is for adults - and kids K-12 - to better understand mental health.

Just as members of a family have different roles to play and different patterns of behavior they keep, so too can our family dynamics play out in the workplace. We bring with us to work our feelings about how we should assert ourselves, ask for help, deal with failure and more - all behaviors we learn in our family system growing up. Deborah Ancona, a Professor of Organization Studies, and the Founder of the MIT Leadership Center at the MIT Sloan School of Management, calls these behaviors “ghosts,”and they’re not all bad. Ancona shares her research and experience on how family systems affect us at work.  Check out our previous episode on family systems theory: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5ZNknArKLeGB9JATPFZkJb Read Deborah's Artile: https://hbr.org/2022/01/family-ghosts-in-the-executive-suite

Anxiety rarely feels good, so it might feel counterintuitive to think about it as a positive thing. But in this episode, we revisit a conversation with Wendy Suzuki, an NYU neuroscientist who studies neuroplasticity. Anxiety can bring benefits to performance and work, and we can reframe our relationship with this challenging but necessary emotion. Suzuki is the author of the book “Good Anxiety: Harnessing the Power of the Most Misunderstood Emotion.” Learn more about Wendy here: https://www.wendysuzuki.com/