Being Human Richard Atherton

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This week, I sit down with Roberto Martinez, co-founder of the software company Nearsoft.

As a follower of famous business radical Ricardo Semler, Roberto built a company culture based on:

No formal hierarchy
Meaning and belonging as foundations
Transparency and decentralisation

The number one message from Roberto that I took away from our conversation is that if you want a vibrant, humane culture, you've got to find ways to have everyone participate. We talk:


We talk:

Cooking for the team
High participation *and* fast decisions
Handling transparency in larger organisations
Letting go of hierarchical mental models

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This week, I sit down with Mick Spiers, long-time executive in the world of urban mobility and author of the new book You're a Leader, Now What?
 
We know that only 16% of people genuinely love their job and like their boss. People spend up to 1/3 of their lives in jobs and workplaces where they struggle to find meaning and purpose. 
 
Mick sees the way to change this as being through building competent, inspiring leaders. He's focused on helping leaders early in their careers. If you're a new leader, this episode could be the one for you.

We talk:

Building your own leadership model
The five factors humans need to thrive
The perils of using "actually"
Going beyond active listening
Leader as the architect of rituals

Links:
Mick's Website

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This week, I sit down with Meike Bartels, Professor in Genetics and Wellbeing at the Department of Biological Psychology at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. She's also the president of the International Positive Psychology Association.

Professor Bartels is one of the world's leading scholars of the science of well-being. She looks at what aspects of well-being are innate, what we can train and what's outside our control. 

We talk:

What we mean by well-being
The top external factors affecting our happiness
Habits for well-being
What we get wrong with well-being programmes
Bringing well-being awareness to your leadership

Links:
International Positive Psychology Association

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This week, I sit down with Rebecca Ward, author of The Paper Tiger Syndrome.

Can you remember a time when you felt genuinely fearless? When you knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that your world was safe? For the average person, consistently experiencing that kind of freedom sounds like wishful thinking. But what if that weren't the case? What if most fears and anxieties were just paper tigers?

Rebecca and I discuss how to deal with our pager tigers, including:

Why we hide our emotional pain
Grieving past injuries
Connecting to our Vegas nerve
The soul in the body
A new 'voo'

Links:
The Paper Tiger Syndrome - The Book
Rebecca's Website

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This week, I sit down with Diane Dreher, author of The Tao of Inner Peace.

Translated more often than any other book except the Bible, the Tao Te Ching has been a spiritual guide for centuries, helping millions find peace within themselves, with each other, and with the natural world around them.

Diane's The Tao of Inner Peace adapts the principles of Tao to today's world, showing us how to integrate the many facets of our everyday lives to create a balanced, dynamic, harmonious whole.


We talk:

The power of savouring
Healing society's divisions
Overcoming chronic stress
The abundance of nature
15 minutes in the forest

Links:
Diane's Website

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This week, I sit down with Kath Blackham, CEO of the revolutionary Australian digital transformation agency VERSA.

She has used VERSA as a platform to move the needle on the things she's most passionate about—mental health in the workplace, diversity, flexibility and using technology for good. She famously instituted a four-day week, anathema within the crazy-hours digital agency sector. By creating a swathe of people-first rituals in her business, retention has gone up, sick days and mental health issues are down, and profit has spiked.


We talk:

The experiments that failed
Happiness first
Mindful check-ins
Three o'clock walkies
Building culture remote-first


Links:
VERSA