Leadership Lessons on the Go!

Jonathan H. Westover
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Want to listen to your favorite articles on the go?! We’ve got you covered! Catch all of your favorites right here in your podcast feed!

  1. 1D AGO

    Night Shifts, Stress, and the Hidden Cost to Your Brain

    This systematic review of 64 studies shows that shift work—especially night shifts—occupational stress, and prolonged working hours reliably impair attention, memory, executive function, and processing speed via circadian disruption, sleep loss, and stress-related neurophysiology. Evidence for sedentary work is mixed. Practical recommendations include optimizing shift schedules, limiting consecutive nights and long hours, reducing job stress through redesign and resources, and embedding recovery practices to protect cognitive health during working years and beyond. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    46 min

  2. 1D AGO

    The Personal Meaning Penalty: Uncovering the Hidden Costs of Meaningless Work

    Abstract: The pursuit of meaningful work has become a central concern in organizational psychology and career development scholarship, yet theoretical attention has focused disproportionately on the presence of meaning rather than its absence. This article introduces the concept of the personal meaning penalty—the cumulative psychological, motivational, relational, and developmental costs that individuals incur when engaged in work they experience as lacking personal significance, purpose, or value alignment. Drawing on self-determination theory, identity theory, conservation of resources theory, existentialist philosophy, career construction theory, and the psychology of working framework, I develop a multidimensional framework comprising six interconnected dimensions: (a) the alignment gap, (b) energy and motivation drain, (c) identity erosion and fragmentation, (d) temporal and developmental costs, (e) relational and social costs, and (f) existential and spiritual costs. The framework specifies theoretical mechanisms linking meaning deficiency to each dimension, articulates causal relationships among dimensions, and identifies individual, relational, organizational, and societal moderating factors with particular attention to cultural variation and structural constraints. Formal propositions guide empirical testing and establish discriminant validity from related constructs including burnout, alienation, moral injury, and psychological contract breach. Implications for organizational design, career counseling practice, public policy, and future research are discussed, with careful attention to ethical considerations and the risks of individual-level prescriptions. By illuminating what individuals forfeit through meaning-deficient work, this framework advances theoretical understanding of work's role in human flourishing while attending to structural constraints that limit meaningful work access. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    44 min

  3. 2D AGO

    When AI Becomes the Excuse: How Short-Termism Fuels Mass Layoffs

    This episode examines the surge of AI-justified layoffs and argues that managerial short-termism—not technology alone—is driving premature workforce cuts that erode demand and organizational capacity. Drawing on history and economic theory, it proposes a pragmatic policy path: graduated reductions in the standard workweek, income protections, and employer incentives to preserve employment and translate AI gains into broadly shared prosperity. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    48 min

  4. 3D AGO

    Compassion at Work: How Empathy Drives Performance

    This episode explores how compassion—recognizing, empathizing with, and responding to suffering—shapes employee wellbeing and organizational performance. It reviews evidence on the costs of compassion deficits (stress, burnout, disengagement) and the benefits of supportive cultures. Practical, evidence-based responses are presented: leadership development, psychological safety, team practices, flexible policies, and systems to prevent compassion fatigue. The episode concludes that integrating compassion into strategy and governance creates sustainable workplaces where people and performance thrive. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    48 min

  5. 4D AGO

    The Human Edge: Why Creativity, Resilience and Empathy Will Decide the Future of Work

    Human-centric skills—creativity, resilience, empathy, collaboration, and lifelong learning—have shifted from ‘soft’ extras to strategic necessities. Drawing on the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025 and global data from employers, educators, and learning platforms, this episode maps demand and supply, highlights regional gaps, and shows how education and hiring systems often fail to recognize these capabilities. The paper documents the surprising fragility of these skills (pandemic-era declines in resilience and teaching), their limited visibility in job postings, and their low automation risk under generative AI—making them both scarce and increasingly valuable. It also summarizes industry and regional patterns and the long time horizons many learners need to develop higher‑order human skills. Finally, the episode proposes a nine‑principle roadmap for assessment, development, and credentialing—emphasizing authentic performance tasks, psychologically safe learning environments, and portable digital credentials—and presents case studies (AWS, PwC, Tecnológico de Monterrey, Udemy, Majid Al Futtaim) that illustrate scalable, equitable approaches to make the human edge a measurable, portable asset. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 1m

  6. 5D AGO

    When I‑O Psychology Ignored Labor: A Century‑Long Blindspot

    This episode exposes how industrial‑organizational psychology has long sidelined organized labor, narrowing the field's theories and limiting its impact on worker wellbeing. It traces historical roots, documents practical harms—from incomplete voice mechanisms to inequitable outcomes—and outlines concrete pathways for repair: collaborative research, bargaining support, curriculum reform, and ethical standards that center workers as legitimate stakeholders. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    46 min

  7. 5D AGO

    When I‑O Psychology Ignored Labor: A Century‑Long Blindspot

    This episode exposes how industrial‑organizational psychology has long sidelined organized labor, narrowing the field's theories and limiting its impact on worker wellbeing. It traces historical roots, documents practical harms—from incomplete voice mechanisms to inequitable outcomes—and outlines concrete pathways for repair: collaborative research, bargaining support, curriculum reform, and ethical standards that center workers as legitimate stakeholders. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    42 min
  8. Emotional Dynamics and Work Performance: How Affective States Shape Daily Productivity Through Attentional Resources, by Jonathan H. Westover PhD

    12/13/2025

    Emotional Dynamics and Work Performance: How Affective States Shape Daily Productivity Through Attentional Resources, by Jonathan H. Westover PhD

    Abstract: Individual work performance fluctuates considerably within persons across days and even hours, yet traditional performance models focus primarily on stable between-person differences. This article synthesizes recent research demonstrating that momentary affective states substantially influence episodic work performance through their impact on attentional resource allocation. Drawing on affective events theory and the episodic performance framework developed by Weiss and colleagues, we examine how negative emotional states misallocate attention away from task demands, impairing concurrent performance, while certain positive affective states can enhance attentional focus. We distinguish between background core affect and discrete emotion episodes, showing that emotion episodes—characterized by heightened arousal, cognitive elaboration, and regulatory demands—exert particularly strong effects on attention and subsequent depletion. The article integrates evidence from experience-sampling studies across diverse occupations and discusses organizational implications for performance management, work design, and employee wellbeing. Practitioners gain insight into managing the affective climate of work, designing tasks with appropriate attentional pull, and recognizing that daily performance variability represents meaningful psychological processes rather than mere measurement error. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    6 min
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Want to listen to your favorite articles on the go?! We’ve got you covered! Catch all of your favorites right here in your podcast feed!

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