Better At Work with Cathal Quinlan

The final listener questions episode of Better at Work, Season 4.

This week is Cathal and Annette closing out the season's questions before next week's wrap, with the stories that stuck with them and a look ahead to Season 5.

Annette shares the story of Pauline Wald, a banking executive who walked 2,000 kilometres across France and Spain to find what her successful life had been missing.

Cathal gets honest about a habit a lot of us share, starting the day with the easy task instead of the hard one, and the idea from this season that made him rethink it.

We also revisit the biggest ideas from our recent conversation with Roger Martin, ranked the number 1 management thinker in the world, and the questions you have already sent us for next season.

What we cover:
• The banker who walked 2,000km to find what success had left out
• Why successful people do the hardest task first
• What you want us to cover in Season 5
• The Roger Martin strategy ideas that stuck, including: what would have to be true?
• How a former Sephora CEO scaled with the same framework

Got a career dilemma for Season 5? Send it to us at betteratwork.net.

Next week: our Season 4 wrap, recorded in person in London.

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Roger Martin is the world's number one management thinker, former dean of the Rotman School of Management, and strategy advisor to the CEOs of P&G, Lego, Ford and American Express. He is our final guest of the year, and we have split the conversation in two.

In part one, Roger takes apart what most people get wrong about strategy. We begin at his father's kitchen table, where an animal feed company and one unbreakable rule taught him more about business than Harvard did. From there he lays out the idea at the heart of his book Playing to Win: strategy is not a long planning document, it is a set of interrelated choices that compels a customer to act.

He explains why only 10 to 15% of big companies actually have a strategy, why the rest end up with a laundry list of initiatives, and how the strongest leaders set a clear outcome and then trust their people to find the way there. Along the way: the Strategy Choice Cascade, why strategy has to be made at every level of an organisation, and the difference between micromanaging and what the military calls commander's intent.

Book: Playing to Win: How Strategy Really Works, by Roger Martin and A.G. Lafley.

New episodes every Thursday at 7am.

More at betteratwork.net.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Roger Martin is the world's number one management thinker, former dean of the Rotman School of Management, and strategy advisor to the CEOs of P&G, Lego, Ford and American Express. He is our final guest of the year, and we have split the conversation in two.

In part one, Roger takes apart what most people get wrong about strategy. We begin at his father's kitchen table, where an animal feed company and one unbreakable rule taught him more about business than Harvard did. From there he lays out the idea at the heart of his book Playing to Win: strategy is not a long planning document, it is a set of interrelated choices that compels a customer to act.

He explains why only 10 to 15% of big companies actually have a strategy, why the rest end up with a laundry list of initiatives, and how the strongest leaders set a clear outcome and then trust their people to find the way there. Along the way: the Strategy Choice Cascade, why strategy has to be made at every level of an organisation, and the difference between micromanaging and what the military calls commander's intent.

Part two is coming soon.

Book: Playing to Win: How Strategy Really Works, by Roger Martin and A.G. Lafley.

New episodes every Thursday at 7am. More at betteratwork.net.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Annette is in London! She and Cathal are finally in the same studio for this listener questions episode.

First up, Annette's three takeaways from Cathal's conversation with behavioural scientist Leidy Klotz, author of In a Good Place. The headline: every workspace has to meet three psychological needs. Agency, growth and connection. They get into why hot-desking quietly erodes all three, the simplest confidence trick going (visit the room before a high-stakes meeting), and how to improve a workspace when no renovation budget is coming.

Then a question from listener Helen, whose husband is working around the clock. She can feel them losing connection, and he keeps telling her the same thing: you don't understand, I don't have a choice. Cathal and Annette have both been close to this one, and they share practical ways to help without trying to fix.
Plus: Annette's Camino de Santiago walk, two black toes and all.

Next week: Roger Martin, author of Playing to Win: How Strategy Really Works.

Got a work dilemma for a future episode? Get in touch at betteratwork.net
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Most workplaces obsess over paint colours, open-plan vs closed offices, and how many days people should be back at their desks. They skip the only question that actually matters.

This week Cathal sits down with Leidy Klotz, engineering professor and behavioural scientist at the University of Virginia. Leidy is the author of SUBTRACT (translated into eight languages) and his new book IN A GOOD PLACE breaks down the three psychological needs your physical surroundings either feed or starve: agency, growth, and connection.

They cover:
- The nursing home study where control over your space changed survival rates
- Why refugees in "half-finished houses" recover faster than those given fully built homes
- The boss who accidentally locked his team out of the only good conference room
- What the negotiation research says about arriving 20 minutes early
- The single most damaging mistake organisations make when designing workplaces
- Why space is one of the only things in your life you can actually change

Leidy Klotz, PhD is a behavioural scientist and engineering professor at the University of Virginia. His research has been published in Nature and Science. Before academia he played professional soccer and designed schools in New Jersey. His new book IN A GOOD PLACE: How the Spaces Where We Live, Work, and Play Can Help Us Thrive is out now.

Find Leidy: leidyklotz.com

New episodes of Better at Work every Thursday, 7am GMT. Real talk on work, careers, and how to make work actually better.
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