David Burkus Presents

David Burkus
  • 4.9 (11)
  • Management
  • Updated Weekly

Helping leaders and teams do their best work ever. David Burkus is one of the world’s leading business thinkers and the author of five best-selling books about business and leadership. Episodes of the show include insights, strategies, tips and takeaways from David as well as in-depth conversations with other world renown experts to contribute ideas, opinions, and insights to help you level of your own leadership.

  1. 1d ago

    Why Pixar Deleted Toy Story 2 Twice

    In 1998, Pixar lost two months of Toy Story 2 to a stray delete command. A dozen people gave up a weekend to claw it back. Ten weeks later, four colleagues watched what they'd rescued and threw away more of it than the computer had. The interesting part isn't the accident. It's that the verdict came from people with no power to enforce it — and that's the reason it worked. Feedback research is uncomfortable here: across six hundred measurements, criticism made performance worse more than a third of the time, and what predicted the damage wasn't harshness. It was where the note landed. This is a case study in how one studio engineered its way out of that problem — the two rules that keep a hard note from becoming a referendum on a person, why stripping authority out of the room raised the quality of what got said, and what it cost the crew to learn it the expensive way. If you lead a team where someone can already see what's wrong and keeps saying the eighty-percent version of it, the fix isn't asking for more honesty. It's lowering what honesty costs. // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/youtube // LEADERSHIP LESSONS -Separate the note from the power to enforce it — the moment criticism arrives with a chain attached, people defend their standing instead of the work -Ask for the diagnosis, not the cure — where someone got lost is a fact about the work, while what they'd do instead is a verdict on your judgment -Declare the bad first version expected, so finding problems stops reading as an indictment of whoever made it -Watch where feedback lands rather than how it sounds — identical words can arrive as information or as a referendum on competence -Treat candor as a price you lower with structure, not a character trait you hire for -Build the room that surfaces the problem in March, because hearing it in December is courage, and courage is expensive // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. An organizational psychologist and professor at Columbia University, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

  2. Aug 17

    Netflix Learned The Cost Of Silence

    What happens when everyone on your team thinks the boss is wrong...but nobody says anything? That’s exactly what happened at Netflix. In 2011, co-founder Reed Hastings made a decision that cost the company customers, millions of dollars, and a massive drop in stock price. The surprising part? Dozens of Netflix leaders suspected the decision would fail before it happened. They just stayed silent. In this video, I break down the psychology of organizational silence, why smart employees don’t speak up even when leaders genuinely want feedback, and how Netflix turned one of its biggest failures into a leadership practice called “farming for dissent.” More importantly, I’ll show you how to apply the same idea to your own team. Chapters: 00:00 You're boss just pitched a bad idea...what do you do? 00:17 What Netflix Did In 2011 01:22 The Mistake That Started It All 04:24 Research Calls This "Organizational Silence" 05:13 Reed Hastings' "Farming For Dissent" 06:45 The Lesson From The Mistake 07:21 Reed Hastings' "Socializing An Idea" 08:41 What I Hope For You // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/youtube // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. An organizational psychologist and professor at Columbia University, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

  3. Aug 3

    Why Companies Get Worse As They Grow

    Does it feel like every business has gotten worse? Longer hold times, endless bureaucracy, frustrating customer service, and workplaces buried under layers of process. In this video, I explore why so many organizations feel broken—and why the problem isn't lazy employees or bad leaders. It's the systems we've built. Drawing on research in organizational psychology, I explain how concepts like suboptimization, Goodhart's Law, and goal displacement quietly shift companies away from serving people and toward serving metrics. From the Wells Fargo scandal to lessons from NVIDIA and KPMG, I'll show how even well-intentioned organizations drift into fragmentation, bureaucracy, and burnout—and what the healthiest companies do differently. We'll also explore why trust, psychological safety, meaningful work, and human-centered leadership matter more than ever in the age of AI. If you're a leader, manager, or simply someone who's tired of feeling like work has become more transactional and less human, this video will help you understand why—and what great organizations must do to stay human as they grow. // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/podcast // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. An organizational psychologist and professor at Columbia University, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

  4. Jul 20

    Protect Your Team From Toxic Leaders

    If you're managing under a toxic or chaotic senior leader, your job is more than just keeping projects on track. It's protecting your team. In this video, I share practical leadership strategies for managing up, shielding your team from unnecessary chaos, and building a healthy team culture even when senior leadership creates uncertainty. You'll learn how to act as a shock absorber instead of a stress amplifier, communicate with honesty without spreading panic, and create a strong micro-culture that keeps your team engaged and focused on meaningful work. I'll also explain when it's time to push back, how to give senior leaders feedback that actually gets heard, and when protecting your team may mean making a bigger career decision. Whether you're dealing with a toxic boss, poor executive leadership, constant organizational change, or workplace dysfunction, these research-backed leadership principles will help you lead with confidence and keep your team performing at its best. Chapters: 00:00 A Bad Leader Is All Too Common 01:00 Be The Shock Absorber 02:08 Be Transparent, But Know The Limit 02:56 Build A Micro-Culture 03:47 Keep Your Team Anchored 04:40 Know When To Escalate // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/podcast // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. A skilled researcher and inspiring communicator, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

  5. Jul 6

    The Real Challenge of Managing Freelancers

    A lot of leadership advice assumes everyone on your team actually works for you, but modern teams are often blended teams, full-time employees, freelancers, contractors, consultants, and fractional leaders all trying to move work forward with different schedules, incentives, and priorities. That can get messy fast. In this video, we’ll break down how to manage a blended team without wasting people’s time or creating resentment. You’ll learn why role clarity matters, how to protect contractors from unnecessary meetings, how to give fractional team members a reason to care, and how to address tension with your full-time employees before assumptions take over. Chapters: 00:00 Does your team look like this? 01:21 Meet Dr. David Burkus 01:32 Set The Foundation 03:13 Protect Their Time 04:41 Give Them A Reason To Care 06:12 Don't Ignore The Tension 07:57 Build Trust Through Small Actions // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/podcast // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. A skilled researcher and inspiring communicator, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

  6. Jun 22

    The Real Reason Your Team Procrastinates

    Is your team always waiting until the last minute...all the time? You'd be surprised. It’s not about laziness. It's usually about stress, unclear expectations, vague milestones, and bottlenecks leaders don’t always see. Now, don't you procrastinate here, I'm here to help! In this video, I’ll show you how to handle procrastination without micromanaging or becoming the boss nobody wants to work for. You’ll learn why teams stall, how psychological safety helps surface problems faster, and practical actions to take to create the best team ever. 00:00 Procrastination has infected the team! 00:13 Meet Dr. David Burkus 01:10 It's Not A Laziness Problem 02:17 Start A Conversation 03:15 Manage Each Person, Not Just The Project 04:42 Look In The Mirror 05:28 Break Down Deadlines Into Milestones 06:53 Make Timeliness A Team Value // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/podcast // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. A skilled researcher and inspiring communicator, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

  7. Jun 15

    You Have More Time Than You Think with Laura Vanderkam

    Most leaders treat time management like a logistics problem. Not enough hours. Too many demands. A calendar that's already full before Monday starts. So they grind harder—and still feel behind. Laura Vanderkam has spent two decades studying how people actually spend their time, and her research keeps arriving at the same uncomfortable finding: most of us aren't as busy as we believe. We're just zoomed in too close to see it. In this conversation, we dig into Laura's new book Big Time and the core insight behind it—that the way we frame time (in days, in tasks, in pressure) actively prevents us from seeing the abundance that's already there. We explore why high-earning leaders often feel the least in control of their schedules, what a dedicated weekly planning habit actually changes, and how leaders can model time abundance for their teams without it looking like bragging. If your people are burning out, and your answer is "we need to work smarter," this conversation will sharpen what that actually means. // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/podcast // LEADERSHIP LESSONS -Zoom out before you optimize. Most leaders experience scarcity because they plan in days. Shifting to weeks—and eventually to seasons and years—reveals space that the daily view hides entirely. -Busyness is often a framing problem, not a workload problem. The same week looks overwhelming in 24-hour slices and completely manageable across 168 hours. The math matters more than the feeling. -Leaders who hold the most power often have the most control over their time—if they choose to exercise it. Senior leaders frequently surrender schedule autonomy they technically have, out of habit or cultural pressure. -Track before you optimize. You wouldn't change a budget without looking at the numbers first. Time tracking—all 168 hours, not just work hours—gives leaders the data they need to make deliberate choices instead of reactive ones. -Modeling matters more than messaging. When you share how you spent your week, ask your team what they'd like to see you spend more time on, and visibly protect time for life outside work, you give your people permission to do the same—which is worth more than any policy. -Evening intentions are an underrated leadership tool. Encouraging your team (and yourself) to name one non-work, non-housework thing to do each evening changes how the whole week feels—less like a grind, more like a life. // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. A skilled researcher and inspiring communicator, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

  8. Jun 8

    What To Consider When Considering A Career Change

    Does something feel off at your job? The Sunday scaries creeping in harder and harder? Jealously bubbling up from other people’s work at other places? Or are simply bored? Well, it might be time for a career change. Before you make the leap to possibly brighter pastures that promise purpose and maybe even cure those Sunday scaries, take it from me, you’ll want to take a few strategic steps before doing so. In this video, I’ll tell you first hand why I made a career change a few times in my professional life and research backed steps to make it more effective. This is a big deal, and typically not an easy transition to make. But I can tell you, when done well, you’ll be looking back less and less and only regretting not taking that leap sooner. Chapters: 00:00 Does something feel off at your job? 00:18 Meet Dr. David Burkus 01:18 Why I Changed Careers 02:36 Investigate Why You’re Feeling The Pull 05:18 Making The Change 08:29 Give Yourself A Decision Deadline // NEWSLETTER Want to build your best team ever? Join 25,000+ leaders who receive these insights in my free newsletter: https://davidburkus.com/podcast // SPEAKING Like what you heard? Learn more or find out how to bring me to your company or event: https://davidburkus.com/keynote-speaker/ // ABOUT DAVID One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David’s forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach leadership, teamwork, and collaboration. A skilled researcher and inspiring communicator, Dr. David Burkus is the bestselling author of five books about business and leadership. His books have won multiple awards and have been translated into dozens of languages. Since 2017, David has been ranked multiple times as one of the world’s top business thought leaders. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been featured in the Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, CNN, the BBC, NPR, and CBS Mornings. A former business school professor, David now works with leaders from organizations across all industries, including PepsiCo, Fidelity, Adobe, and NASA. David’s keynotes aren’t just entertaining and enlightening—they’re evidence-based and immensely practical, offering leaders at all levels a set of actionable takeaways they can implement immediately. //CONNECT LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/ Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/davidburkus Facebook: http://www.FB.com/DrDavidBurkus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/DavidBurkus

See All (225)

4.9
out of 5
11 Ratings

About

Helping leaders and teams do their best work ever. David Burkus is one of the world’s leading business thinkers and the author of five best-selling books about business and leadership. Episodes of the show include insights, strategies, tips and takeaways from David as well as in-depth conversations with other world renown experts to contribute ideas, opinions, and insights to help you level of your own leadership.

Information

  • Creator
    David Burkus
  • Years Active
    2020 - 2026
  • Episodes
    225
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © David Burkus
  • Show Website
    David Burkus Presents

You Might Also Like