At Work with The Ready (Rodney Evans and Sam Spurlin)

Say (or sigh) it with us now: burnout. As a physic state, it can be hard to precisely diagnose but you know it when you see it—and when you feel it. As remote work becomes a larger presence in our lives, it’s more important than ever to recognize why and when we need meaningful breaks. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to Anne Helen Petersen, author of Can’t Even: How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation and the newsletter “Culture Study,” about the difference between setting boundaries versus guardrails, LARPing through your job, and what we can do to extinguish burnout. Learn more about Anne on LinkedIn, Twitter, or by subscribing to her newsletter. Read Anne's latest books: Can't Even Out of Office Mentioned references: Anne’s 2019 burnout article WHO’s classification of “burnout” as occupational phenomenon New York Times "Yolo Economy" article Cal Newport and "isolation from other minds" Ezra Klein John Herrman “LARPing your job” Anne’s 2021 "4 Day Work Week article" Charlie Warzel Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

It’s mailbag time! And while we know we said this last time, we really mean it that this was probably the hardest group of questions we’ve dealt with on the show yet! Rodney and Sam get out their thinking caps and answer some questions from listeners like you about non-traditional organizational leadership, workplace dynamics around project capacity planning, and more. Questions tackled: Are great teams and strategies impossible without traditional leadership? Can project capacity planning be done in a people-positive, complexity conscious way? Why do traditional orgs bias towards convergent thinking, especially around annual planning? How do you prioritize cross-functional initiatives between leadership and teams that avoids zombie projects and mutual disappointment? -------------------------------- Interested in learning more about Depthfinding and the ocean framework? Head here. Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here. Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery: LinkedIn Instagram -------------------------------- Mentioned references: the LinkedIn post asked about Rube Goldberg machine "MBT" (mission-based team): FoHR Miniseries Ep. 1 "DAO": BNW Ep. 96 with Chase Chapman "product mindset episode": AWWTR Ep. 23

Fact: We’re self-management nerds. (And if you’ve been hanging out with us for a while, you probably are, too.) We could talk and think about the how of work all day, every day. But it turns out that for some, getting into the nitty-gritty of roles, working agreements, and governance isn’t their definition of a good time. Which begs some bigger questions: Does working in self-management demand being jazzed about org design? Is there enough support for those showing up to the self-management party with curiosity about the what of work but not about the how? And can we imagine new and adaptive ways for more people to thrive in self-management? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans dig into these important questions and more. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

The relationship between structure and impact is an important one for organizations to explore. The same goes for social movements. The Sunrise Movement is a youth-led coalition on a mission to stop climate change—and recently, they placed their own OS under a microscope: How should the org make decisions? How should its principles evolve? How could it balance centralization and decentralization? Sunrise asked itself these questions to help design a structure capable of meeting our current climate moment. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans chat with Aru Shiney-Ajay and Dejah Powell from Sunrise Movement about the connection between internal and external change and how org design can help contribute to tackling the climate crisis. Learn more about Sunrise Movement's principles: https://www.sunrisemovement.org/principles/?ms=Sunrise%27sPrinciples Learn more about Sunrise Movement's DNA: https://www.sunrisemovement.org/campaign/sunrise-re-launch/ Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Any podcast that promotes busting bureaucracy and hobbling hierarchy is bound to stir up some questions. That's why this week we're going to let our listeners Ask Us Anything. For this episode, we took to Twitter and LinkedIn to find out what you're wondering about. And you came through big time. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans hear questions about check-in rounds, leadership, and the post-pandemic move back to work. If you ever feel a question percolating as you're listening, just drop us a line at podcast@theready.com and we'll include you in a future episode. Mentioned references: Arnold Palmer Maker's Mark Miranda Priestly, from The Devil Wears Prada Gordon Gekko saying "Greed is good" from Wall Street (1987) with Michael Douglas A Hitchhiker's Guide to a Permanently Flipped Workplace by Allison Baum Gates Starbucks store design Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com ------------------- 00:00 Intro + Check-In: If you were a beverage of any kind, what would you be? 03:00 Question 1 - Do check in rounds always need to be fun? Should I be making them more serious? 06:26 Question 2 - Why is the type of leader who only takes and is mostly interested in themselves typically over-represented in a company’s leadership, vs those who give and focus on collaboration? 14:07 Question 3 - What should leaders and teams be thinking about as they transition towards “return to office” discussions? 21:58 Wrap Up: Send us your questions!

Was it ever possible for our first AI episode to not be a two-parter? Probably not. So we’re back today with more thoughts on AI and the Future of HR. In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable. Last week, they dove into the AI pool to begin filtering out the noise about how this coming wave will impact all of us. Today on episode 9, Rodney and Sam keep swimming around the deep end. Which reminds us: If you haven’t yet listened to last week’s episode, do that first for some important context (and jokes)! On Part 2, they discuss: How AI tools could help HR finally make progress on historically un-winnable battles What automation really means for most jobs and how we perceive our value and identity in the workplace Experiments you can run on your own if your company isn’t already playing around with AI Mentioned references: "Meg's episode" (discussion actually takes place in Hebba's episode, starting at around 44:27) HR's new future of work skill episodes: Part 1, and Part 2 ChatGPT Midjourney -------------- Learn more about The Future of HR at our website. Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out! Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at fohr@theready.com. Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at fohr@theready.com or hello@theready.com. --------------- 00:00 Intro + Check-In: You’re going for a walk through the forest and see a big rock and flip it over. What are you hoping to find? 02:37 HR’s historically unwinnable battles AI will help with 08:53 Facing fears over your job being automated 14:14 Being “busy” and “productive” as avoidance to doing real work 17:40 Experiments to run on your own, independent of your company 21:15 Wrap Up: Share this episode with your HR friends!

Facing a pandemic, many of the world's institutions are finally giving remote work, agility, responsiveness, and basic human decency some deep consideration. Meanwhile, it's becoming clear that organizations who have already been prioritizing adaptivity and humanity at work are surprisingly well prepared to face this challenge. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans explore what we can learn from a moment like this, and why creating a culture built on autonomy, transparency, and decentralization makes sense with or without a crisis. In this moment of disruption and anxiety, it felt good to sit down and focus on what we can do, rather than second guessing the past, or predicting the future. Stay safe out there people. Mentioned resources: "Enabling and governing constraints" from Dave Snowden's Cynefin framework "Learn by Doing episode" - Ep. 9 with Ben Kaufman "Tom's episode" - Ep. 16 with Thomas Thomison Get more information about COVID-19 from the CDC and the WHO. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Any podcast that promotes busting bureaucracy and hobbling hierarchy is bound to stir up some questions. That's why this week we're going to let our listeners Ask Us Anything. For this episode, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans took to Twitter and the Brave New Work Wednesdays newsletter to find out what you're wondering about. And you came through big time. We plan on doing this every twelve weeks or so from here on out, so if you ever feel a question percolating as you're listening, just drop us a line at podcast@theready.com Resources mentioned: The Peter principle Essentialism by Greg McKeown Organize for Complexity by Niels Pflaeging The Little Book of Beyond Budgeting by Steve Morlidge Drive by Dan Pink Nonviolent Communication by Marshall B Rosenberg Team of Teams by General Stanley McChrystal Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson We the People by John Buck and Sharon Villines Many Voices One Song by Ted J Rau and Jerry Koch-Gonzalez Unboss by Lars Kolind and Jacob Bøtter 9 Lies About Work by Marcus Buckingham John Cutler's Twitter account Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

We often wait to talk about the hard stuff until the shit has hit the fan. But what if we made space for difficult conversations before they become difficult? That's the insight at the heart of Radical Alignment, a new book that introduces a four part conversation technique designed to get couples, teams, and groups on the same page. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak with Alex Jamieson and Bob Gower about how game-changing conversations—spanning our intentions, concerns, boundaries, and dreams—can transform our lives at work and at home. Learn more about Radical Alignment and get a copy from your local bookseller. Learn more about Alex on LinkedIn and Bob on LinkedIn. Mentioned references: "I Love Lucy" theme song ICBD instructions EasyRetro (formerly FunRetro) Mural Miro "blue Hondas everywhere" - frequency illusion Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

If you’re like us, you’ve binged all of Netflix’s docuseries about Formula 1 racing. And if you’re like Ready member Jurriaan Kamer, you’re not only steeped in the popular sport, but also often thinking about its overlap with self-management and org design. Turns out that when you peer under Formula 1’s hood, you find provocative organizational lessons about requiring room for reflection, distributing authority, clarifying purpose, innovating alongside intense regulation, and accelerating change at lightning-speed. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak with Jurriaan about why modern businesses can use Formula 1 as a blueprint for efficiency and inventiveness and how he translated the sport’s organizational insights in his own business fable, "Formula X: How to Reach Extreme Acceleration in Your Organization." If you want to learn more about Jurriaan's work his book, check him out here: https://www.jurriaankamer.com/ An F1 car in 2000: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrari_F1-2000 An F1 car in 2021: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrari_SF21 Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Hey, how ya feeling? Exhausted? Stressed? Like a rubber band that’s finally snapped? Same. These days, the burnout paradigm seems to have shifted from the micro to the macro: Individual burnout has ballooned into collective burnout—into an overwhelming sense of being out of control and out of moves to help make things right. So, what can we do with those feelings? In today’s episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk about: What the underlying drivers of collective burnout are How it’s showing up inside workplaces and teams (including at The Ready) How we can start to tackle burnout as a society-wide challenge What org design can do to address the root of the problem How we’re taking care of ourselves and each other during a time of non-stop tumult Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

We can draw connections between org design at work and org design IRL all day, every day. And today's no exception, as Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans unpack what playing music and playing video games has taught them about working in complexity. In this episode of Brave New Work, they dig into: The reflex for planning and prediction that kicks in when we try something new The instincts that may run counter to working in complexity, and how to develop new heuristics that serve us better The disorientation that comes with simultaneously thinking about, learning, and trying something new The difference between noticing muscles and planning muscles Why it’s worth wading into the complexity pool with playfulness and an openness to experimentation Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Patagonia’s purpose is clear: It’s in business to save our home planet. And that clarity’s been present almost since day one of the iconic outdoor clothing and gear company. But how and why was that anchoring mission adopted from the jump? And how has the nearly 50-year-old organization evolved its practices to support its resolute pledge to sustainability? Luckily, there’s someone with answers to these questions: Vincent Stanley is Patagonia’s Director of Philosophy and co-author with Yvon Chouinard of The Responsible Company. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak to Vincent about Patagonia’s better-known successes, lesser-known failures, the experiments it’s had to flex during the pandemic, and what a responsible company of the future can and should look like. Learn more about Vincent and Patagonia: On LinkedIn At Patagonia's website By reading The Responsible Company Mentioned references: X-Acto knife B Corp Yvon Chouinard tagua nuts beginner's mind greenwashing 9/80 work week Andy Rivkin, environmental writer Unilever Danone Let My People Go Surfing, book by Yvon Chouinard Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Over the last decade at The Ready, we’ve seen firsthand that the most significant organizational challenges are nearly all cross-functional. But most company structures? Very much not cross-functional. Adding more project managers, looking to external partners for one-and-done silver bullets, or assembling yet another task force just isn’t cutting it as the world changes faster than most organizations can keep up. Enter Depthfinding—an easy-to-grasp framework designed to help leaders and teams solve their gnarliest cross-functional challenges. In our new Depthfinding miniseries, Rodney and Sam will help you see your organization in a new way whether you’re individual contributor or a C-Suite executive. Ready? Let’s dive in. Download the Depthfinding guide to get the template and example Rodney mentioned in this episode. Want to learn more about Depthfinding? Head here: theready.com/depthfinding -------------------------------- Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here. Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery: LinkedIn Instagram -------------------------------- Mentioned references: The Ready's OS Canvas strategy pancakes: AWWTR Ep. 2 even/overs: BNW Ep. 44 essential intent: BNW Ep. 90 with Greg McKeown check-in round This episode's theme music is Yaggadang by BG & Coyote Radio. Sound engineering and design by Taylor Marvin of Coupe Studios.

Show us a podcast that gets better questions than ours, we dare you. Listeners, you’re crushing the question game these days—so we’re heading back to the mailbag (there’s just so much mail there!) to address three juicy ones. And please keep the queries and head-scratchers coming! Because we’ve got more AUA sessions lined up for the future. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans crack into: How does resourcing work in a world of consent and participatory governance? How do we bring two opposing cultures together (think large bureaucratic behemoth buys small, innovative business to bolster their portfolio) without getting stuck in a standoff? How can an operating rhythm help support and model more org-wide inclusion? Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

What exactly is OS coffee? It’s a specific meeting structure we use to explore topics related to our operating system (a.k.a. our OS). But OS coffee isn’t meant to be a formal, note-taking, let’s-finally-get-to-agreement-on-X kind of deal; rather, it’s about making space for different subjects to emerge and to do some shared sensemaking. In fact, it’s so casual that it’s less like a meeting and more like a gathering. In this caffeinated episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans break down how to OS coffee, including: How to keep OS coffee conversations informal yet impactful How to ground the gathering in a “Yes, and…” headspace How to stand one up inside your own system without it feeling like mandatory fun How to use default agreements to create new group norms Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Rebroadcast note: With everything happening in the world right now, we're taking a quick break from our miniseries to reshare this episode about layoffs. Because sometimes large layoffs are necessary, but they shouldn't be the norm and those being let go should still be treated like humans, rather than a line on a spreadsheet. If you listened the first time around, share this episode with someone in your network who might need it (especially if they're a government employee 😬). We'll be back in two weeks with a brand new episode. -------------------------------- We won’t mince words: Layoffs suck. They heap very real stress and chaos onto very real people’s lives. And as we’ve seen reported lately, big waves of layoffs are hitting several companies—and thousands of people—hard right now. This pile of not-good news sparked some questions for us, like: Why are layoffs a go-to cost-cutting lever? What pre-layoff org design decisions put employers and employees in this gnarly position? And why does every CEO letter announcing mass layoffs sound like it was written by the same robot? In today’s episode, Aaron and Rodney, who’ve been on both sides of the layoff aisle, spend time with these queries and dig into: The all-around messiness of the traditional layoff process Why companies default to short-term thinking when the boom times boom Dehumanizing layoff practices we should shelve for good Creating clear containers and agreements for handling layoffs How we could design a layoff moment that’s truly people-positive -------------------------------- Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here. Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery: LinkedIn Instagram -------------------------------- Mentioned references: "RIFs" ConvertKit episode: BNW Ep. 36 with Nathan Barry "life stress inventories": Holmes and Rahe stress scale Office Space, 1999 movie Up in the Air, 2009 movie

It's one thing to talk about what we'd like the future of work to look like—but what about the people who'll actually make up that workforce? Wha do they want out of their work, and how do they want to shape their organizations? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to lecturer Todd Jick at the Columbia Business School about his class on Advanced Organizational Change, and what his students want to see for the future of work. Learn more about Todd on LinkedIn and his Columbia staff profile. Learn more about the Columbia Business School on their website. Mentioned references: "Mr. Rodgers documentary" Selma Montgomery march Novartis Nucor Steel Morning Star: BNW Ep. 54 with Doug Kirkpatrick Frederick Winslow Taylor No Rules Rules by Erin Meyer and Reed Hastings "Humanocracy": BNW Ep. 47 with Michele Zanini Haier David Marquet: BNW Ep. 8 with David Marquet "systemic justice": BNW Ep. 50 with Xavier Ramey Jennifer Hirsch, Sparkworks at Janssen We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com

It's been many years since the release of Frederic Laloux's groundbreaking book Reinventing Organizations. In some ways the world is different—more ready, more radical—and in other ways, not much has changed. More adaptive and soulful ways of working are still fringe. The way forward isn't clear. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak with Frederic about where we stand, where we're heading, and why this moment feels like the last gasp of authoritarianism, extractive capitalism, and all the other -isms. Learn more about Frederic and Reinventing Organizations at his website and his Youtube video series. Mentioned resources: Ken Wilber, specifically stages of development, orange and teal organizations, and Spiral Dynamics The work of Parker Palmer Brave New Work by Aaron Dignan (if you haven't read it yet, now's your chance!) Brian Robertson's theory of "evolutionary purpose" Ricardo Semler, CEO of Semco and author/speaker Taylorism Douglas McGregor, management professor and author of The Human Side of Enterprise Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

We often talk about complexity and work, but complexity is everywhere: at our schools, sports teams, churches, families… you get the idea. Today, we’re looking at a different kind of complex system that’s as big—and maybe as broken—as it gets: U.S. politics. With the midterm elections around the corner, we wanted to take a closer look at the OS of U.S. politics, asking how its structure is designed, what it incentivizes (and disincentivizes), which levers voters can pull to start tackling some of our toughest problems, and how organizations should participate in the political process. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans are joined by Emily Amick, a political consultant behind the popular Instagram account Emily In Your Phone, to help them ponder what we can do to implement fundamental change—and to provide some hope. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

A diverse team doing important work is bound to disagree. But they’re also likely to avoid talking about it—because conflict makes many of us deeply uncomfortable. But, what if we simply lack the skills to do it well?  In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk about why disagreement is so hard, what healthy disagreement looks and feels like, and why it’s so critical to success in complexity. Later, they’re joined by Buster Benson, author of Why Are We Yelling, who teaches us how to have disagreements so productive we might actually seek them out and enjoy them. Learn more about Buster on his website, on Linkedin, or on Mastadon. Learn more about Buster's book Why Are We Yelling? The Art of Productive Disagreement -------------------- Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Ask anyone about organizational silos and they’re bound to tell you they’re bad. When we run Tension and Practice exercises with clients, “We work in silos” often shows up as Tension No. 1 holding a team back. Yet like a moth to a flame, we keep gravitating toward them, building walls that are higher and more insurmountable than ever before. What gives? In this episode of At Work with The Ready, Rodney Evans and Sam Spurlin dive into the bottomless ball pit that is organizational silos, exploring why we think they’ll solve all our problems, how they’re actually sabotaging organizations from being effective, and why trying to build bridges between them (rather than designing something new from the ground up) is one of the worst things we can do. Mentioned references: "Ready for Anything structure episode": BNW Ep. 23 "Hollywood Model episode": FoHR Miniseries, Ep. 1 The Ready's Tension & Practice Cards "the previous episode": AWWTR Ep. 4 value stream mapping Spotify chapters and guilds video Sam promised "IDM consent-based governance": BNW Ep. 43 "movies and studios" "retro": BNW Ep. 10 with Jordan Husney We’re on LinkedIn! Follow Rodney, Sam and The Ready for more org design nerdery and join the conversation around episodes after they air. Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox twice a month? Sign up for our newsletter. We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com. Read the book that started it all at bravenewwork.com.

When we begin to reckon with inequality in the workplace, a useful place to start is the concept of "epistemic injustice"—what we know, how we know, and who gets to decide and influence our reality. This concept goes deeper than simply who is in the room. This is about the stories we bring with us, the ones we build together, and how bias and representation shape the possibility of what can be. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak with Cat Swetel, a consultant specializing in data-informed coaching and increasing equity in organizations, about epistemic injustice—in the workplace and beyond. Learn more about Cat on her website, on LinkedIn, and on Twitter. Mentioned references: gaslighting Angel Street / Gas Light, 1938 play by Patrick Hamilton Judith N. Shklar, Latvian philosopher and political theorist "fishing stories" "sock puppet accounts" Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman?" speech Douglas Rushkoff episode: BNW Ep. 33 Bridgewater #oscarssowhite Research Your Own Practice, by John Mason Our book is available at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

In the past two weeks, Basecamp—a software company with a general track record of outspoken, progressive values—has lost a sizable chunk of its workforce. The reason? A memo from the company's CEO that banned "societal and political discussions" in workplace channels. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans break down what this all means—the (impossible) concept of "separating politics from work," and the privilege inherent in assuming that's possible. Mentioned references: Parkburger Basecamp podcast Basecamp book Coinbase "DHH's memo" George Floyd "JEDI episode": BNW Ep. 40 with Sharan Bal "consent-based decision making/participatory governance": BNW Ep. 43 Murmur: BNW Ep. 67 "principles episode": BNW Ep. 37 "compensation episode": BNW Ep. 32 "membership episode": BNW Ep. 30 "mastery episode": BNW Ep. 63 Hedonic treadmill 11 Madison Park "Bill Anderson/Roche episode": BNW Ep. 68 with Bill Anderson Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

We dedicate this episode to our favorite…excuses. That’s right, we’re cracking open the archive of reasons people frequently cite for avoiding or stalling new ways of working. Odds are you also know (or have yourself played) the top hits by heart—hits like “We just need buy-in from every stakeholder first” and “Let’s wait for the new COO to start,” and the classic of all classics, “If only we hadn’t just started a reorg…” It’s not that these different forms and flavors of resistance don’t resonate; it’s just that they’re all evidence of an already-dysfunctional OS—which (spoiler alert) yet another reorg won’t fix. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans teach us how to stop making excuses because if you want to fundamentally transform the way your organization works, there’s only one way to start: By starting. Mentioned references: "turtles all the way down" continuous participatory change: BNW Ep. 43 "OS": The Ready's OS Canvas "Greg and essentialism": BNW Ep. 90 with Greg McKeown Conscious Leadership Group Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

There’s a lot of “Looking for a job” energy in the world right now—but interviewing can be a nerve-racking experience. Folks on both sides of the equation want something—reliable gig, reliable colleague—and that can give way to performativity, misrepresentation, and hidden agendas. Because when an interview process doesn’t incentivize authenticity, negative patterns can pop off real quick. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans offer guidance on building better interviews, including: The importance for interviewees to self-assess skills already mastered and skills yet learned How both sides of the interviewing equation can create space for more curiosity and nuance The lies we tell ourselves about resumes and cover letters Why designing interviews that simulate real-life work are so critical The top four questions Aaron asks himself as an interviewer Do you have any cringeworthy interview stories? We want to hear all about ’em. Send us your goofs, your guffaws, and your facepalms at podcast@theready.com. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

If you won’t say it, we will: Making working agreements is dope. Doing so can give teams an equal opportunity to contribute; provide clarity where clarity is missing and causing friction; introduce new employees to an organization’s source of truth. We could go on. And because it’s not uncommon for us to hear, “But agreements can lead to inadvertent bureaucracy,” we did. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans are clearing the air on what the job of working agreements is, when they make sense, how they help teams pin down fundamentals to unleash creativity and go fast, and what could go in your own team’s agreement-making starter pack. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Why does it always feel like there aren’t enough hours in the day to get work done? How did we come to see time as a resource we could manipulate and exploit? Why does achieving “inbox zero” come with bragging rights? And how has the belief that we can command and control time totally warped not only our personal lives, but also our working lives? In today's episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans start to tease apart a few of the brain-expanding questions with guest Oliver Burkeman, the best-selling author of Four Thousand Weeks. Together, they explore what we don’t talk about when we talk about modern time management. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

For decades, face-to-face working has been the default way of working. Launching a new project; untangling an OS problem; updating a team on progress made in the last week—our classic go-to for all those different kinds of work is blocking off time on a calendar. When in doubt, just corral everybody into a room, real or virtual. But this “one-size-fits-all” approach is coming up short as work evolves. And while almost everyone dreads having a meeting-stuffed calendar, ideas for what to try instead can be in short supply. Plus, when 85% of leaders find it hard to trust that their employees are being productive, async work can look like a risky free-for-all. In this episode of At Work With The Ready, Rodney Evans and Sam Spurlin explore how our attachment to synchronous work is hampering performance and why asynchronous work is a mindset, not a tool stack. Looking for other ways to asynchronously enjoy this episode? Check out our Youtube channel for the live video version, or email podcast@theready.com to get a transcript for reading. Mentioned references: Loom Rodney's article on org debt: How to Tackle the Biggest Threat to Your Team's Growth Red, amber, green (RAG status) Tanisi's podcast episode: BNW Ep. 88 with Tanisi Pooran Miro Pitch Pomodoro method We’re on LinkedIn! Follow Rodney, Sam and The Ready for more org design nerdery and join the conversation around episodes after they air. Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up for our newsletter. We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com. Read the book that started it all at bravenewwork.com.

Ready for a wake-up call? Today’s episode of Brave New Work is all about conscious leadership—a way of showing up that asks us to be responsive rather than reactive, present rather than lodged in the past or the future, feeling-full rather than feeling-empty, and radically responsible rather than carelessly unaccountable. Sound hard? Exhausting? Wildly uncomfortable? It is. That’s why Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans called in Jim Dethmer, founding partner of the Conscious Leadership Group and co-author of The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership. They talk to Jim about why doing this self-work is so important, why transformational leadership depends on it, and how entire teams and organizations can become more self-aware. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

One of the most important aspects of organizational change and complexity is embracing fluidity. Rather than be mired in rigid lines and forced structure, we want to be dynamic, adaptive and—in a certain sense—poetic. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to Gayle Karen Young, an organizational development consultant and former Chief Cultural and Talent Officer at Wikimedia, about how she brings poetry into the workplace, the role of spirituality in her work, and what she calls the mythic and the mundane. Learn more about Gayle on LinkedIn and on her website. Mentioned references: Guanyin kōan The Wikimedia Foundation sangha David Whyte, poet Cynefin Susanne Cook-Greuter Viktor Frankl and Man’s Searching for Meeting Balcony perspective “tyranny of the quantifiable” Barry Johnson “polarity management” ”Let American Be America Again”, poem by Langston Hughes: ”Pushing Through”, poem by Rainer Maria Rilke ”Kindness”, poem by Naomi Shihab Nye "Working Together”, poem by David Whyte Ranier Maria Rilke Mary Oliver [Traveler, your footprints], poem by Antonio Machado Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

There are plenty of organizations that say they want to be “customer-focused”—but in practice? It’s easy to fall back on leader-driven opinions and assumptions about what customers really want. That’s especially true in big companies with entrenched processes and hierarchies that prioritize internal agendas. In those environments, staying aligned with customer needs can be an uphill battle—and organizations instead get stuck building solutions based on what leaders think customers should want, rather than what they need, leaving exciting opportunities on the cutting room floor. In this episode, Rodney and Sam dig into what it actually takes to adopt a product mindset. From navigating a “hammer looking for nails” ethos to designing flexible solutions that adapt to actual user behavior, they unpack how to bring customer-centricity into daily practice—and what to do when you start to veer off course. -------------------------------- Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here. Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery: LinkedIn Instagram -------------------------------- Mentioned references: Depthfinding psych safety ep: AWWTR Ep. 20 experimentation ep: BNW Ep. 62 founder mode ep: AWWTR Ep. 22 Josh Bersin ep: The Future of HR Ep. 12 with Josh Bersin revealed preference

It's not a question, but a fact: the conventional legal doctrine governing the 21st century workplace is woefully far behind. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to attorney Jason Wiener about the incredible disconnect between current legal norms and modern business, and how he works to ensure equitable business ownership to the forefront of the conversation. Learn more about Jason on his website, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram. Mentioned references: slap bracelet MC Hammer pants Blossom, TV show School of Industrial Labor Relations Clerky LegalZoom "organizational debt" "business judgement rule" DAOs: BNW Ep. 96 with Chase Chapman Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

We're opening up the mailbag. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans tackle the topics of some of your most fascinating questions, from gossip to peer feedback to all-hands meetings. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans dive into our mailbag and answer some of the top questions we're hearing from our listeners. Questions featured in this episode: Is back channeling good or bad in the workplace? How to get colleagues comfortable giving each other peer-to-peer feedback? What's a more participatory way to prioritize and commit to work? What's an all hands meeting actually good for? Talk more about self-set pay and what The Ready is experimenting with around money Mentioned references: "gossip and group dynamics" Alastair's episode: BNW Ep. 65 with Alastair Steward performance management episode: BNW Ep. 56 Kim Scott's episode: BNW Ep. 13 with Kim Scott "Shape up method" from Basecamp Theory Y Loom retreats episode: BNW Ep. 64 "essential intent" Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

It's been quite a week for the United States of America. And as Americans, we tried to do what we always do: keep working. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans discuss the volatile, unprecedented political situation we now find ourselves in, as well as ways to take a step back and recognize that some things might just be more important than business as usual. Mentioned References: Mouse Trap the 1963 Hasbro game J. Robert Oppenheimer, American physicist “working agreements” - BNW Ep. 103 We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com

[Rebroadcast note: This episode originally aired in March 2020.] Our job is to keep the organization safe, right? And in order to do that we need to predict the future, see around corners, and avoid unnecessary risk. We need to be able to list all the ways the idea we're considering can go wrong. Or... do we? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk about a concept The Ready calls "future tension," which is what happens when we let our worries about the future hijack the present. Later, we’re joined by Thomas Thomison, founding partner of Encode.org, who takes us deep into the origins of the concept and teaches us how to overcome it. Learn more about Thomas Thomison and Encode.org at https://encode.org/ Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Leading a team through change is hard, but leading a team to a place without traditional leadership is far harder. If you ask people to step up... will they do it? And can you really mandate self-management? In this episode of Brave New Work, we talk about what it takes to realize a new way of working within a team or organization, and why that's so hard for—and so dependent on—those of us in charge. Later, they're're joined by former submarine commander David Marquet, author of Turn The Ship Around! and Leadership Is Language, who talks to us about the power of stepping back, the way language shapes the workplace, and how to create a "can think" (and do) culture. Learn more about David and his books on his website, LinkedIn, and Twitter. Resources mentioned: Setting The Table by Danny Meyer ("the salt shaker") Getting Past No by William Ury ("the balcony") ---------------------- Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your guest ideas and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

This is the first episode in a crossover mini-series between Brave New Work cohosts Rodney Evans and Aaron Dignan and Chase Chapman, builder of DAOs and host of the On the Other Side podcast. Each episode dives into a specific topic related to organizational design for Web3. Today, they talk about different proposal types, the best ways to structure them, and the critical info that should go into each.

The one-on-one meeting, often between a manager and their "direct report" is among the most common and popular meetings in existence. But it may also be the most harmful. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans debate and discuss the best and worst ways to hold this meeting. Later, they're joined by the author of The Coaching Habit, Michael Bungay Stanier, to figure out how to show up to one-on-ones as a coach rather than a boss. Learn more about Michael and his work on LinkedIn and his website. Learn more about Box of Crayons on their website and on Youtube. Resources mentioned: The Ready's Tension and Practice Deck "Radical candor": Episode 13 with Kim Scott "Dunbar's number" "First 90 days of self-management": Episode 11 with Doug Seacrist "Rockefeller Habits": Mastering the Rockefeller Habits by Verne Harnish The Practice of Adaptive Leadership by Ronald Heifetz Immunity to Change by Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Work is all about agreements—policies, processes, principles, goals, workflows, etc. So if you're starting a company from the ground up, how do you give teams the power to align on all of these things in a clear and inclusive way? What if there's already a company out there that's documented the exact policy you're looking for? And when, inevitably, that agreement needs some tweaking, how do you iterate and grow? In today's episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk about the new software startup, Murmur, which aims to do for working practices what GitHub did for code. They talk about why Aaron started the company, what the initial product will deliver, and how every new startup can agree to work better together. Learn more about Murmur at https://www.murmur.com/ Mentioned references: murmuration of starlings GitHub sociocracy holacracy participatory change async work: At Work With The Ready Ep. 7 Clippy, the Microsoft Office assistant Five whys regret minimization framework Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

If we’ve said it once, we’ve said it a thousand times: Meetings are the worst. Instead of being a meaningful work tool to help teams strategize efficiently, meetings more often block things—anything—from actually getting done. At The Ready, we’ve got a different method: action meetings. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans invite longtime member Sam Spurlin on the show to dispense a step-by-step guide to implementing and scaling effective action meetings. They break down the best ways to “get people what they need” and reveal how to keep the action-meeting train chugging along into the future. (Editor's note: this might be Sam's first appearance on the show, but it won't be his last! He'll return to co-host the Future of HR miniseries with Rodney in 2023, and then Aaron formally passes the co-host baton to him at the start of 2024.) Get Sam's in-depth guide to Action Meetings. Learn more about Sam on LinkedIn, or at his website. Mentioned references: CARROT weather A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole Oura Ring Hacks, TV show Joan Rivers "tactical meeting" The Ready’s OS Canvas self-management: BNW Ep. 79 with Michael Y. Lee Around (Miro meeting tool): https://www.around.co/ "Tom Thomison episode": BNW Ep. 16 with Thomas Thomison Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

For decades, traditional consulting (think “management” or “strategy” varieties now synonymous with the Big Three) has been a go-to move for organizations looking for a shake up. Need a bulletproof vision for the future or a new org restructuring that’ll win over the C-suite and shareholders? You can’t beat their analytical prowess, strategy design, and slick presentation. But too often clients wind up stuck with expensive change plans they can’t execute on their own. Without real coaching, structure, and experienced guidance, these efforts stand a high chance of fizzling out and collecting dust on a shelf. Facing that reality time and time again lead The Ready to study and understand how organizations actually work and evolve. Yes, we’re also consultants—but the processes, outcomes, and experiences we create differ greatly. And that can lead to a whole bunch of confusion. In this episode of At Work With The Ready, Rodney Evans and Sam Spurlin delve into the stark differences between traditional consulting and how future-of-work firms like The Ready operate. Because not all consulting is created equal. Prefer to watch instead of listen? Check out the extended video cut of this episode, with even more Rodney and Sam moments, on our Youtube channel. Mentioned references: VUCA "participatory change": BNW Ep. 43 "cross-functional teaming": Future of HR Ep. 1 "strategy pancakes episode": AWWTR Ep. 2 We’re on LinkedIn! Follow Rodney, Sam and The Ready for more org design nerdery and join the conversation around episodes after they air. Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up for our newsletter. We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com. Read the book that started it all at bravenewwork.com.

What exactly does joy have to do with software development? If you ask Rich Sheridan, CEO and Chief Storyteller of Menlo Innovations, the answer is pretty simple: Everything. According to Rich, joy is central to inspiring, sustaining, and steering the Ann Arbor, Michigan-based software company, which has been experimenting with new ways of working for more than two decades. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak with Rich about the personal struggles that first led him to future-of-work thinking; how some of Menlo’s vital practices—like pairing two developers together daily and having them work on a shared computer—have evolved over the years; and why “Make mistakes faster” is a longtime Menlo mantra. Learn more about Rich Sheridan and Menlo Innovations: On LinkedIn Reading his books Joy, Inc. and Chief Joy Officer Visiting Menlo Innovation's website Mentioned references: Peter Drucker Tom Peters Peter Senge Kent Beck and "extreme programming" Nightline episode on IDEO Simon Sinek's "Start with Why" video Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

The world faces enormously complex and existential challenges. While specific solutions might feel elusive, it’s safe to say that in order to address the most polarizing issues of our time, we’ll need more and better collaboration—more and better tools to help us work together across deep differences and make progress. According to Adam Kahane, a director at Reos Partners, that means the world requires more and better facilitators. In his most recent book, Facilitating Breakthrough: How to Remove Obstacles, Bridge Differences, and Move Forward Together, Adam proposes a theory and practice of what he calls “transformative facilitation,” which focuses less on getting (or forcing) people to do things and more on removing obstacles to greater contribution, connection, and equity. In this episode of Brave New Work, Adam shares with Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans how he’s reimagining this work and who we think of as “facilitators” in the first place. Find out more about Reos Partners and Adam's work here: https://reospartners.com/ Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Odds are you’ve discussed quiet quitting with your colleagues, your friends, your barista, your aunt Barbara… you get the idea. Super-hyped-up conversations about quiet quitting are everywhere these days—but what’s the noise really about? What’s the alleged trend mean or point toward? And if we double-click on quiet quitting, what can we learn about the OS of our workplaces? In this episode on Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans turn up the volume on this phenomenon and talk about: What these conversations tell us about our ways of working and what needs to change How to start caring more about outputs and commitments and less about timesheets Why the common belief that “good performance = beating expectations” is trash How a lack of clarity stokes both the quiet quitting and quit firing fires Why we need better workflows around asking workers what they really need Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

While we often throw around terms like "the future of work" and "new ways of working," the reality is that much of the wisdom about how to self-organize and self-manage has been around for a long, long time. What we can learn from this is that there's really nothing new about this moment—except for the fact that more and more people are waking up to the fact that the status quo just isn't good enough. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak with Doug Kirkpatrick, author of The No-Limits Enterprise (and many others), about his origin story at The Morning Star Company and what he's learned about self-management in the decades since. Learn more about Doug on LinkedIn, Twitter, and from reading his book: The No-Limit's Enterprise. Learn more about The Morning Star Company on their website. Mentioned references: "Everything there is a season. Turn, turn": Turn! Turn! Turn! by The Byrds Chris Rufer, founder of The Morning Star Company Gary Hamel's famous "First, Let's Fire All the Managers" article from the Harvard Business Review The Winner Effect, by Ian Robertson Dr. Dacher Keltner, psychology processor at UC Berkeley Dr. Fernando Flores, author of "Conversations For Action and Collected Essays" Peter Koestenbaum, German-American philosopher We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com

We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming to bring you an exciting announcement. The Ready is hiring a first-rate Market Maker, someone who can orchestrate explosive growth in service of our purpose and steward The Ready’s approach to sales and growth. If creating a diverse pipeline of leads, building relationships with target clients, and reinventing the traditional craft of sales (among other related responsibilities) sounds like a party you—or someone spectacular in your orbit—should join, check out the full role posting and application below. We’re excited to meet you! Now let’s grow something together. Read all about the role here: https://www.notion.so/theready/Growth-The-Ready-6a9e364d59854874a9fbae8d1e3a01af Apply here: https://theready.typeform.com/to/mvh71Zb1

Whether it’s in front of clients or in front of a mic, we talk about change all day long. Having fewer, better meetings; learning to productively disagree; overhauling and evolving the HR function; exploring four-day work weeks—the podcast has covered miles and miles of transformational ground in 4 years. However we don’t often talk about how we’ve changed. And after six seasons and 162 episodes, how could we not be different? We used the show’s hiatus to reflect on where we’ve been and where we want to go—and we reached some bittersweet conclusions. But if we resisted change and all the learning and joy that can come with it, we wouldn’t be The Ready. In this very special episode, Aaron Dignan, Rodney Evans and Sam Spurlin talk about Brave New Work’s origin story, what they’ve learned making all these episodes (it was 162, right?), and what the show’s future may hold. Trust us, you won’t want to miss it. This episode was recorded with video, so you can see our smiling faces on The Ready’s Youtube channel. Mentioned references: Imoyoshi, home of the purple sweet potato soft serve Ira Glass The Ready's Spotify Wrapped LinkedIn post "Pop up and do less" scene from Forgetting Sarah Marshall Supermanage, from Murmur Labs The File Drawer Fields of Work The Future of HR miniseries "the Panera days": The Ready's first "office" was in a Panera near Bryant Park in NYC! Hear more about The Ready's early days in BNW Ep. 158. ------------------ Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com

Talking about compensation at a job (a.k.a. the total pay and benefits you get in exchange for your labor) can be excruciating. But why? It’s not because compensation designers are inherently evil, argues David Buckmaster, Nike’s Director of Global Retail Compensation. Rather, it’s because our system of pay is broken and neglected. When it comes to pay, Buckmaster believes the greater sin is inertia, not malevolence. That’s why he wrote a book—Fair Pay: How to Get a Raise, Close the Wage Gap, and Build Stronger Businesses—busting open compensation’s black box. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak to David about pay transparency, accessible data, exciting compensation experiments, and why the so-called labor shortage is really a wage shortage. Read David's book, Fair Pay. Learn more about David on LinkedIn, Instagram, or his website. Mentioned references: Oculus (now Meta Quest) "Wonderwall" Bracken Bower Prize Pave Carta The Ready’s OS Canvas Widgets, by Rodd Wagner Maslow’s hierarchy Fight for $15 movement The Good Jobs Strategy, by Zeynep Ton The Good Jobs Institute at MIT "Katie Porter and Jamie Dimon congressional testimony" "PayPal net disposable income" Dan Price of Gravity Payments Buffer: BNW Ep. 6 with Joel Gascoigne "Norway transparent pay" Morning Star: BNW Ep. 54 with Doug Kirkpatrick ”Wells Fargo fraud” Range, by David Epstein Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Odds are you’ve seen an article (or 20) about some company somewhere testing out a four-day workweek. And if you’ve scrolled past the story to the comments, you’ve probably spied a few cheers…and plenty of jeers. Punching in five days a week might seem like the natural working order—but it’s less a fixed and unchallengeable fact and more a human-shaped choice we can, you know, shape differently. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan asks Rodney Evans about lessons learned from her own four-day workweek experiment, how to navigate relationships with coworkers on different schedules, and why a four-day workweek is labor’s next evolutionary leap forward. Mentioned references: Wesley, from The Princess Bride Gilmore Girls S3E11 “I Solemnly Swear” Plinko boards Icelandic study around 4 day work week Anne Helen Petersen episode: BNW Ep. 77 with Anne Helen Petersen Henry Ford and the 40 hour work week Anne Helen Petersen article “Who’s Afraid of the Four Day Work Week?” op rhythm: BNW Ep. 118 retrospectives remote work episode: AWWTR Ep. 4 Joel at Buffer episode: BNW Ep. 6 with Joel Gascoigne Fosbury flop Atlantic “Kill the Five-Day Work Week” JEDI work: BNW Ep. 40 with Sharan Bal UBI (universal basic income) New Deal Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Has it really been almost three and a half years since this wild ride of a podcast began? We’ve been experimenting as we go (remember Rodney’s NPR-host impersonations in the early shows?)—and after releasing roughly one episode a week throughout the entirety of pandemic, we figured it was finally time we learned how to take a proper break and give BNW some TLC. So, we’re going on hiatus and won’t be making new episodes for a while. But that just means it’s a great time to revisit our back catalog. All those hot topics swirling around the news right now (burnout, dysfunctional hybrid work models, toxic hiring practices, you name it) are things we’ve been all over since 2019—and you’ve been right there with us. Some of these conversations might be a few years old, but they’re just as relevant as ever. Plus, now you can check out our Youtube channel, where we’re uploading older episodes weekly. They’re complete with updated show notes, links, transcripts, and video chapters so you can jump to your favorite episode moments. Until we’re back, please stay in touch by following The Ready on Twitter or Linkedin, and by emailing us at podcast@theready.com. We can’t wait to hear what you get up to while we’re gone. Now go change something.

There's a thing that often happens when we try to add complexity our systems: in an effort to implement procedure and reduce "risk," we often massively overcomplicate the system at its core. It seems the more we try to distance ourselves from the humans working in our systems, the more we ruin what made the systems work well in the first place. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans discuss how to solve our systems problems at the root, and how reducing inefficiency can't be entirely divorced from people. Mentioned references: "Toyota and the big red button" "Customer service at Bonobos" "the $2,000 Ritz-Carlton rule" We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com

The stories of self-management and decentralization from evolutionary organizations like Buurtzorg, Morning Star, FAVI, Haier, and others are often told breathlessly, as if it was "happily ever after." But, the truth has to be more... nuanced, right? Indeed it is. More adaptive and human ways of working are not without their own frustrations and tradeoffs. The question is: are they worth it? In this episode of Brave New Work, (technically the first "colleague-as-guest" episode though BNW is releasing it late), Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans are joined by Yehudi Meshchaninov to talk about what it's really like to work in a system like The Ready. Learn more about Yehudi on LinkedIn. Mentioned references: self-management holacracy sociocracy "the circles" [see "circle structure" in the holacracy link above] Roundabouts from the Brave New Work talk Dungeons & Dragons meritocracy Ali Randel, partner at The Ready Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com ----------------------- 00:00 Intro + Check-In: What is one way your work self is different than the way you are at home with your family and friends? 03:11 What inspired this discussion? 06:44 The hard parts of a self-managing system 16:02 Ways to replenish yourself and maintain discipline about how you show up 21:07 Patterns and persistent dynamics in self-managing systems 29:29 Role of fear in self-managing systems 36:58 Where the broader culture sits on the future of work and its shadow sides 41:54 Wrap up: Leave us a review!

One midnight scroll through LinkedIn is all it takes to be overwhelmed with AI stories and hot takes. There’s a massive amount of confusion, apprehension, excitement, and just general noisiness to make sense of, some which is created by AI tools themselves. But as more and more AI-powered solutions promising to revolutionize HR flood the market—and as more and more employees spiral with worry that the’ll be automated out of their jobs—how are we supposed to get caught up on some AI basics? Let alone actually use these tools at work? In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable. Today on episode 8, they explore how AI will help the most advanced HR teams move from Level 4 to Level 5 of our maturity model—and how it can be a positive force for change if we’re asking the right questions and trying to solve the right problems. In fact, Rodney and Sam had so much to digest, this episode became a two-parter. Today on Part 1, they dig into: How cultural takes on AI are already falling into old patterns Rodney and Sam’s own personal AI journeys How to start small and begin your AI exploration in a Mission-Based Team The AI-powered upgrades that take HR from Level 4 to Level 5 of our maturity model Mentioned references: Oops! All Berries (the Cap'n Crunch cereal variant) "Betamax vs VHS" ChatGPT MidJourney Law of requisite variety ("Ashby's Law") MBTs (Mission-Based Teams) Early AI research into Go and Starcraft The DAO arc: BNW Eps. 105-107, 109-111, 113-115, and 124-125 -------------- Learn more about The Future of HR at our website. Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out! Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at fohr@theready.com. Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at fohr@theready.com or hello@theready.com. --------------- 00:00 Introduction & Check-In: What is your favorite evidence that you have had a successful time off? 04:05 Level setting for the AI conversation 08:57 Rodney and Sam’s personal AI adventures 14:16 Exploring AI in Mission-Based Teams 20:01 Knowledge barrier to begin experimenting is low 22:12 AI and counterintuitive moves 25:41 AI’s role in the move from Level 4 to Level 5 30:59: Impact on human beings from atomized marketplace roles 32:40 AI in industrial-era org vs AI in evolutionary org 35:59 Wrap up: leave us a review and share with your HR friends

This is the fifth episode in a crossover mini-series between Brave New Work cohosts Rodney Evans and Aaron Dignan and Chase Chapman, builder of DAOs and host of the On the Other Side podcast. Each episode dives into a specific topic related to organizational design for Web3. Today, they talk about different mental models, choices, and mechanisms to consider when designing a compensation OS and why it can be tricky to atomize value in decentralized systems.

What's it like to onboard at a company where you don't have a boss? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to The Ready member Alastair Steward about his experience onboarding at the company, the concept of a "prologue," and how to situate yourself effectively in a self-managed organization. You can find Alastair here on LinkedIn. Mentioned references: "Oculus boxing game" imposter syndrome "adjacent possibles" "safe to try" "participatory governance": BNW Ep. 43 "authority": BNW Ep. 22 Shu Ha Ri "mastery": BNW Ep. 31 "OS Coffee": BNW Ep. 144 Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Psychological safety is a buzzy topic every company claims to want—but only a handful actually achieve. Sometimes, it’s misunderstood as being about “niceness” or “politeness”, but real psychological safety is deeper and more complex than that. It’s an ecosystem of behaviors that add up over time to impact how your team shows up day after day. Unfortunately, this misconception has a stranglehold on most leadership teams as well, who spend more time talking the talk than walking the walk. We’ve seen and worked with many executive teams over the years where people didn’t feel comfortable speaking up, challenging ideas, admitting mistakes, or sharing concerns without fearing retribution or embarrassment. When that’s happening inside the team responsible for some of a business’s biggest decisions, there are big consequences. In today’s episode, Rodney and Sam break down why leadership teams often feel the most psychologically unsafe, how to move the needle on developing trust, and why a ropes course can’t solve a team or organization’s culture problems. (Producer’s note: Ok, so we're zero for two this week with Sam's mic going rogue after Rodney's mishap last episode. Taylor's been working some major magic lately. Hopefully third time's the charm with episode 21 🤞) -------------------------------- Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here. Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery: LinkedIn Instagram -------------------------------- Mentioned references: What Google Learned From Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team (NYT, 2016) ”emperor has no clothes” ”leaders as org designers episode”: AWWTR Ep. 13 ”hard vs soft power” team charter working agreements ”mundane episode”: AWWTR Ep. 19

We’ve probably talked about the classic, old-school, hierarchical org chart hundreds of times on the show. Not because we love it (longtime Brave New Work-ers know it’s not really our jam), but rather because it’s one of the most recognizable organizational structures out there. Despite its everywhere-ness, the boxes-and-line org chart isn’t exactly an adaptive way to design an organization. So what’s an alternative? We head to Hollywood (metaphorically) to explore a different structural model: the talent marketplace. Where org charts break, talent marketplaces bend—offering greater flexibility and resilience. In Part 1 of this two-parter, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans dig into the many benefits of talent marketplaces, the sticky problems they help solve, and what can trip up companies when they first move toward this model. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com ------------------------- 00:00 Check-In: What is your ideal amount of novelty and rotation when it comes to your roles at work? 03:40 What is a talent marketplace? 10:27 What is the problem talent marketplaces solve? 13:39 One big winner can actually limit a talent marketplace 20:23 Managing success the rest of the system isn't ready for 24:58 The tipping point of scarcity

King-size is great when we’re talking about candy bars. But when it comes to designing impactful teams, we’re on team fun-size. That’s because the best teams share a clear purpose, have high trust, and are interdependent—which can be hard to pull off when you’re rolling 40 people deep. In today’s episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans size up how we think about team size and dig into: The new questions and contexts to weigh when trying to find an ideal team size What real team interdependence feels like—e.g., “I have an interest and a stake in what every member of this group does and works on” Designing teams that get stuff done without falling prey to groupthink or social loafing How to bust up big groups into smaller teams that organize around different flavors of work The dynamism and flexibility needed to team effectively in a hybrid-work world What sports and tarot can teach us about dream team size Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

In this miniseries, we’re exploring Depthfinding—an easy-to-grasp framework designed to help leaders and teams solve their gnarliest cross-functional challenges. This week, Rodney and Sam dive into the Sunshine Zone—the highly visible work of organizations, from strategy decks and OKRs to mission statements and financial targets. While these elements are easy to track and refine, spending too much time in the Sunshine Zone often leads to performative goal setting, misaligned priorities, and a disconnect from the deeper work that actually drives change. Leaders who want real progress—not just a well-polished plan—need to balance the visible with the essential. Cultivating adaptability, feedback loops, and space for creative, cross-functional work is the key to moving beyond surface-level success. Download the Depthfinding guide to get the template and examples of how to use it. Want to learn more about Depthfinding? Head here: theready.com/depthfinding -------------------------------- Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here. Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery: LinkedIn Instagram -------------------------------- Mentioned references: EBITDA ACT Matrix "womperjawed" "90% of executives failing to reach strategic goals" operating rhythm: BNW Ep. 118 Deming quote "Bach suite" SMART goals This episode's theme music is Yaggadang by BG & Coyote Radio. Sound engineering and design by Taylor Marvin of Coupe Studios.

[Rebroadcast note: This episode originally aired in August 2021.] Odds are you’ve seen an article (or 20) about some company somewhere testing out a four-day workweek. And if you’ve scrolled past the story to the comments, you’ve probably spied a few cheers…and plenty of jeers. Punching in five days a week might seem like the natural working order—but it’s less a fixed and unchallengeable fact and more a human-shaped choice we can, you know, shape differently. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan asks Rodney Evans about lessons learned from her own four-day workweek experiment, how to navigate relationships with coworkers on different schedules, and why a four-day workweek is labor’s next evolutionary leap forward. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Wait, haven’t we already covered retreats? Yes. But if the first one explored key dos and don’ts, this one imagines the retreat as a blank sheet of paper and invites you to ask: With unlimited options, what would you do? How would you take an off-site from good to great to transcendent? What’s the space where strategy meets luxury and how can you plan a rewarding experience that includes real work? Well, we’ve got a few ideas. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans dig into the logistical, emotional, and design considerations that went into our most recent retreat to help us overhaul old habits; provoke bigger questions and bigger bets; and use fun as a guide. And regardless of organizational size or budget, you can create that time and space, too. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

One of the toughest work tasks? Convince someone else to back your idea. And if you’re in HR, it’s exceptionally tough to get buy-in from other functions. Maybe your coworkers think they know better because you just handle “people” stuff—and how hard is that? Maybe the CFO will only open the company chest for something with ROI they can track. Or maybe the CEO is hyper-concerned with legacy or the company’s stock price and doesn’t see the value in engaging with your employee engagement survey results. If you’re wondering why so many HR change efforts fail before they even start, look no further than missing buy-in. In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable. Today, on episode 2, they discuss why it’s so difficult for HR leaders to get widespread buy-in, how to make the case for change, and how to manage complex relationships with the CEO and CFO from the jump. Welcome to the Future of HR. ----------------- Learn more about The Future of HR at our website Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out! Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at fohr@theready.com. Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at fohr@theready.com or hello@theready.com. ---------------- 00:00 Intro and Check-In: What is your most embarrassing injury? 03:36 Why buy-in is so difficult in HR 08:13 Building your case with business outcomes 12:46 Convincing your HR team 21:11 Getting the CFO and finance to the table 27:50 Dealing with the CEO 34:27 Hot take: Is Buy-in an excuse? 36:41 Wrap up: Send us your burning hot HR questions!

Whether your company is fully remote, fully in-person, or somewhere in-between, work in 2023 (and beyond) will require healthy and robust digital ecosystems—because that’s where so much work takes place day in and day out. Still, wanting a first-rate digital-first workplace and having one are two different things—and there’s no one-size-fits-all roadmap to follow. Every team has different needs, so we can expect different journeys. But that doesn’t mean we can’t learn from each other. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans reflect on The Ready’s early years (hat tip to Panera for providing O.G. office space), sharing advice and learnings from the growing pains of yesteryear. Then, as part of our partnership with Slack, they sit down with Kelsey Stevenson, Chief Product Officer at Bitly, to talk about how the growing company is evolving its own digital-first workplace and the experiments they’re running to build trust, culture, collaboration—and a very active pets channel in Slack. Learn more about Bitly: bit.ly Connect with Kelsey on LinkedIn: bit.ly/3WX2waV Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable. Last week, Rodney and Sam teamed up with Future of HR team member Meg Saxby to explore our new maturity model, assessment, and the six key capabilities every HR department needs to learn, strengthen, and evolve to succeed in the future of work. Today, on episode 4, Rodney, Sam, and Meg finish that two-parter. Which reminds us: If you haven’t yet listened to last week’s episode, do that first for a 101 overview of our maturity model. This episode focuses on the capabilities needed to succeed in Levels 3-5 (and our secret bonus level): Facilitation and Future of Work Coaching Solution Design and Market Management Data Literacy and Automation --------------------------- Learn more about The Future of HR at our website Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out! Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at fohr@theready.com. Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at fohr@theready.com or hello@theready.com. --------------------------- 00:00 Intro and Check-In: What is a language you would like to speak (or speak better than your currently do) and why? 03:03 Why these are Varsity 2.0 level skills 04:31 Key Capability 4: Facilitation and Future of Work Coaching 08:04 What Future of Work coaching looks like in practice 11:34 Key Capability 5: Solution Design and Market Management 15:31 Why solution design is such a big shift for HR 18:18 Key Capability 6: Data Literacy and Automation 19:56 Big potential wins for automation in HR right now 23:32 Impact of AI on capacity planning 24:58 Holding our predictions lightly 26:51 Wrap up: Send us your burning hot HR questions!

Brave New Work is a podcast about reinventing our organizations and the search for a more adaptive and human way of working. But what does that really mean? In this brief introductory episode, we set the stage for what’s to come—covering everything from our theory of change to our reasons and plans for the show. Our first full episode is also available now. ---------------- Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com. Have an idea for an episode, or the perfect guest? Reach out to podcast@theready.com. Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com. --------------- 00:00 Introduction and why we're making BNW 01:19 Getting to know Rodney 05:21 What is The Ready and what do they do? 09:55 Connection between Brave New Work and The Ready 16:00 How we're organizing the show

Sometimes, Rodney and Aaron stop by other people’s podcasts to nerd out on the hits we know and love: new ways of working, self-management, breaking down the binary between chaos and bureaucracy, the future of work—the list goes on and on. So today, we’re actually bringing one of those awesome conversations right to your ears. Aaron recently joined Morra Aarons-Mele on her show, The Anxious Achiever, for an epic chat about mental health, the workplace, and disrupting the systems that can reward and reinforce unhealthy behavior. We hope you enjoy the exchange and we’ll return with a fresh episode of Brave New Work soon. To tune in for more episodes of Morra’s show, head to her website or search for "The Anxious Achiever" wherever you get your podcasts. ------- This episode originally aired on October 26th, 2022 on The Anxious Achiever with Morra Aarons-Mele, presented by LinkedIn. Aaron Dignan is founder of The Ready - an organizational transformation and coaching practice. He focuses on how to prioritize adaptivity and autonomy over efficiency and control - which you can pretty quickly extrapolate into upsides for mental health of workers and leaders. He’s also the author of the book Brave New Work - and cohost of the podcast of the same name.  Host Morra Aarons-Mele speaks with him about he helps organizations and individuals realize they need to change, and how he guides them through that transformation.  About The Anxious Achiever: Host Morra Aarons-Mele is on a mission to reframe how we think about anxiety and mental health in the workplace. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S. We desperately need better models for leadership and a more holistic view of mental health. Our culture tells those of us who suffer from anxiety and depression that we can’t succeed, but we tell a different story — without sugarcoating the tough stuff. We feature stories from people who’ve been there and experts who can help you thrive.

Work in 2022 felt…a little messy. Or a lot messy: Back-to-office ultimatums; wages not keeping up with inflation; waves of layoffs in the tech industry; handwringing over quiet quitting. So… will this year be better, worse, or same old same old? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans look into a crystal ball with Sheela Subramanian, friend-of-the-pod and co-founder of Slack’s Future Forum, to explore what this new year might have in store for us and the future of work. We explore many juicy questions—”Is 2023 the year we finally retire the 9-to-5? Why do executives continue to live in a separate world from their employees about building work culture? What will AI actually do to dozens of different gigs and industries?”—and offer our own hopes, predictions, and intentions for shaking up the status quo this year. Follow Sheela Subramanian: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sheelasubramanian/ Slack's Future Forum: https://futureforum.com/ Previous Sheela episode: Ep. 129 - How the Future Works with Slack’s Brian Elliott and Sheela Subramanian Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

In the nearly five years since launching this podcast, our inbox has received one type of question more than any other: “If I’m trying to change a system that just doesn’t want to change, how do I keep going? When should I admit defeat and leave?” As people who function as “professional resistance” in organizations all over the world, this questions always hits us hard—because change itself is hard and often can lead to burnout. So we’re finally having this conversation out in the open to tackle why the people who care the most are the ones who leave. Rodney and Sam dig into why burnout is so common among change agents, how to identify signs of meaningful progress, and when individuals and leaders should see the writing on the wall and throw in the towel. Oh, and we're on Instagram now! Check us out there for fun behind the scenes stuff and extra things you won't find anywhere else. To see the video version of this episode, head on over to Youtube. Mentioned references: "orthogonal" "wasta" "emotional labor of change": AWWTR Ep. 6 "Sisyphean" "the maze and the mouse" "see through The Matrix" Mission-Based Team: FoHR Ep. 1 "the yips" Rick Rubin EMDR Therapy Basecamp scandal: BNW Ep. 71 Want future of work insights and experiments you can try? Sign up for our newsletter. We’re on LinkedIn! Follow Rodney, Sam and The Ready for more org design nerdery and join the conversation around episodes after they air. We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com. Read the book that started it all at bravenewwork.com.

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before: A company hires a change agent (think anyone with “org effectiveness,” “change management,” or “strategy and efficiency” in their title) with promises of how they’ll be the one to revolutionize the company’s future. Several months later, the change agent realizes the company is fighting them at every turn. Despite all the talk, these roles often have minimal authority and autonomy, so those lofty dreams of change? They end up unfulfilled. But for HR departments heading toward Level 4, The Marketplace, of our maturity model, these roles need to step off the sidelines and into the game as Market Designers. In this reimagined role, they facilitate a dynamic network of talent and Mission-Based Teams that enables HR to get after its thorniest and most valuable business objectives. And this transformation isn’t one-and-done: Newly empowered Market Designers continually change and evolve the company to meet new moments and challenges 🚀 In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable. Today on episode 7, they explore why Market Designers are ready to make the change their predecessors couldn’t realize, what their relationship with HR Business Coaches looks like, and how they’re instrumental for building the HR marketplace of the future. Mentioned references: Valve, the video game developer Haier, the appliance manufacturer “Chapter of market designers” “Volun-told” DAOs Brave New Work’s episodes on Talent Marketplaces: BNW Ep. 160 & Ep. 161 -------------- Learn more about The Future of HR at our website. Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out! Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at fohr@theready.com. Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at fohr@theready.com or hello@theready.com. --------------- 00:00 Intro + Check-In: What’s an award you received as a child you were prouder of than you probably should have been? 04:26 Why change agents have trouble changing the organization 07:43 Changing the org chart first usually isn’t the right move 12:25 Day-to-day of a Market Designer 15:11 Transferring skills from consultants to Market Designers 18:15 Difference between HR Business Coach and Market Designer 20:29 How many Market Designers does a company have? 24:17 Future of CPO/CHRO in Level 4 and beyond 27:56 What a healthy HR talent marketplace looks like 33:26 Sam’s adventures into DAOs and unregulated marketplaces 38:32 Why HR is ideal for a talent marketplace 40:54 Wrap Up: Send us your burning HR questions!

We’ve covered feedback before on the show, because learning how to give and receive it is a key part of team growth and success. But establishing an entire system that lets different flavors of feedback flourish? That’s a different can of worms. So, how do we cultivate feedback-related agreements and norms in a self-managing culture? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans have some solid ideas—and some spicy questions: Why creating a feedback-rich culture is hard—and why not having one is harder Why experiences in and around feedback can feel so perilous and panicky How to build containers in which intense, even critical feedback can happen safely The three different types of feedback we most often run into at work How power dynamics and personal preference play a part in this game Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Spoiler alert: Your organization already has a Digital HQ. Because whether you’re back in an office Monday through Friday or working remotely in your fluffiest slippers, every team now operates with a mesh of digital tools and systems that constitute where real work gets done day in and day out. But how can you help your already-existent Digital HQ unlock greater team flexibility, collaboration, and productivity? Cue insights from Ali Rayl, Slack’s SVP of product management. As part of Slack’s sponsorship of Brave New Work, Ali tells Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans all about the Digital HQ: what it is, how it can incentivize more human ways of working, and how you can start intentionally building a digital-first workplace today. Visit slack.com/dhq to learn more.And if this week’s convo sparks a big question of your own, we’re all ears! Please send it to podcast@theready.com with the subject line “Q about Digital HQs” for a chance to have your query answered in a future episode. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Why can it feel tough to get people hype about self-management and the Brave New Work-ness of it all? How can we build buzz and momentum around new ways of working to get folks excited about playing and committing to an entirely different game? How can we meaningfully communicate these ideas to overcome the fatigue and fear that often accompanies big change? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk about the difficulty of introducing new mental models to those still swimming in the status quo and why it’s important for orgs to align and agree on the problems that need solving before leaping to solutions. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

In a complex and dynamic world, sharing information on a "need to know" basis is misguided, because it perpetuates ignorance and bias. No one needs to know everything all the time, but we need the right (and the ability) to find what we need when we need it. And while many teams and organizations are coming around to the principle of transparency, when it comes to sharing more sensitive data—like compensation—many people freak out and start to backpedal. In this episode Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk about why traditional organizations and teams (and even the two of us) covet and hoard information, and what it looks and feels like to let information flow. Later, they’re joined by the cofounder and CEO of Buffer, Joel Gascoigne, who shares how Buffer made "defaulting to transparency" a core value and never looked back. Learn more about Buffer and their commitment to transparency at https://buffer.com/ and https://buffer.com/about#transparency Learn more about Joel at his website or via LinkedIn or Twitter. Resources mentioned: Dave Snowden's Principles for Managing Knowledge ----------------------------- Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

The role of HR Business Partner is often a tale of two experiences. On the one hand, HRBPs are some of the most empathetic and passionate people you’ll ever meet. On the other hand, they’re stuck on the hamster wheel of busywork, bouncing from crisis to crisis without the authority to prioritize their energy—and without the respect from leadership to make a real difference. Look up “burnout” in the dictionary and odds are you’ll find a picture of an HRBP. In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable. Today on episode 5, they explore how this critical role took a hard left turn from it’s intended purpose, what its future-of-work glow-up (hello, HR Business Coach) could look like, and how HR Business Coaches + Mission-Based Teaming = unlimited potential. References mentioned: Mister Rogers' Neighborhood Episode 1481 "Talks about Competition" (1981). "How People Make Crayons" begins at 05:20. American Gladiators Dave Ulrich, of the Ulrich HR model -------------- Learn more about The Future of HR at our website. Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out! Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at fohr@theready.com. Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at fohr@theready.com or hello@theready.com. -------------- 00:00 Intro + Check-In: What was your favorite show to watch as a small child? 04:05 Why the HRBP role isn’t working 10:41 Why Future of HR requires rethinking the HRBP 12:53 Skill overlap between HRBP and HR Business Coach 21:03 Shifting from “service mindset” to “product mindset” 25:07 HR Business Coach’s point of view 27:20 Recap of Level 3 and what’s changed 29:26 Who does the HR Business Coach report to? 34:55 Wrap up: Send us your burning HR questions!

Don’t be alarmed by the title of Ginny Hogan’s book: Toxic Femininity in the Workplace is the comedian and writer’s satirical collection of whip-smart pieces poking fun at the flavors of male bravado and egotism that show up in the office. (A pitch-perfect example from the book: “Appropriate Thank-Yous for the Man Who Generously Informed You That You Need to Negotiate Your Salary.“) If you’ve ever had a run-in (or several dozen) with the bro-y energy that tends to dominate and shape the average workplace, then you’ve probably also wondered how we can abolish that culture altogether. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to Ginny about how her former jobs in tech and data science surprisingly launched her comedy career, why sexism can be so present in start-ups, and how we forge ahead with a more inclusive, less toxic work culture. Learn more about Ginny here: https://www.ginnyhogancomedy.com/ Get in touch with Ginny here: https://twitter.com/ginnyhogan_ Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

We’re back with part two of our conversation about talent marketplaces. Last week, Rodney and Aaron explored what talent marketplaces are and the types of organizational problems they can help address. (Pro tip: If you haven’t yet listened to that episode, hit pause and check it out now!) This week, they’re moving past the big picture and getting into the nitty gritty of what makes talent marketplaces work…or not. It’s not just about how to move pieces around a chess board, but rather about disrupting old-school organizational power plays. Today, Rodney and Aaron take a closer look at: What it takes to maintain a transparent marketplace that matches the right people with the right opportunities without resorting to shady, backroom dealings How traditional performance management systems penalize (instead of promote) moving talent around What experiments a company can try to give these principles a shot How compensation works when people aren’t tethered to a traditional role with clear benchmarks or boundaries ---------------- Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com ---------------- 00:00 Check-In: What are you looking forward to this weekend? 01:42 How do talent marketplaces work for people participating in them? 05:50 How traditional organizations prevent and penalize mobility 10:16 What you learn when you let people leave teams and move around 16:02 Experiments with talent marketplaces for companies to run 21:38 Compensation structures for talent marketplaces 25:08 Who pays for cross-functional teams? 27:45 Fine tuning and maintaining the system 28:54 Why these teams are the best places to learn new ways of working

The past two-plus years have been defined by uncertainty and upheaval—so it’s safe to say that we’ve been having some feels. Specifically, big feelings—feelings like anger, despair, and burnout, all of which are often pegged as “negative” or “bad.” We tell ourselves lots of stories about these emotions: that we should be strong enough to override them; that our feelings are more intense than others’; and that they have individual (versus structural) solutions. But in the new book Big Feelings: How to Be Okay When Things Are Not Okay, co-authors Mollie West Duffy and Liz Fosslien rewrite that narrative. According to them, the more we can name and understand our toughest emotions, the more we can use them to fuel larger-scale transformation. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans chat with Mollie about why becoming more feelings fluent in the workplace is critical for realizing a more human future of work. Order Mollie and Liz's book here: https://bookshop.org/books/big-feelings-how-to-be-okay-when-things-are-not-okay/9780593418239 Learn more about Mollie's work here: https://molliewestduffy.com/ Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Rebroadcast Note: Some things never go out of style, which is why we resurface this foundational episode year after year. Plus, our BNW community has grown by a few thousand new listeners since it last aired! If you’ve already heard this episode, check out our back catalog, leave us a review, or email the podcast to let us know what topics you’d like us to cover this year. If this is the first you’re hearing of “Brave New Work 101,” happy listening. [This episode originally aired on September 14, 2021.] Today’s episode is a foundational survey class; we’re mapping the territory of the work we do, why we do it, what we’re all about—and why we’d love to talk to your boss. Whether you’re a systems design nerd like us or a newcomer who knows in their bones that work sucks but doesn’t have to, we’ve got answers to your big questions—about implementing self-management at your own organization; about assuaging fears of team effectiveness or brittleness; about leader’s becoming more power-literate and less ego-filled; and a whole lot more. So…how does this apply to you? We’ll put it this way: If you’re involved in a complex system with more than two human beings (spoiler alert: you are!), you’re already doing this work—and we’re here to help make it awesome. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Why are “Ask Us Anything” episodes our favorite ones to make? Because our listener questions are never not inspiring, provocative, moving, sharp…just insert your favorite emoji here. What can we say? Y’all are the best. In today's episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans head back to the mailbag (and try to break their record of answering only two questions per episode). They offer their hot takes (naturally) and dig into: Why workplace rituals matter and how to develop ones that are legit meaningful What to do when leaders at the top say they’re hungry for change…and then block it left, right, and center How to help teams transition to new tools, especially when that adoption requires brand new skills and brand new levels of (currently non-existent) trust Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

This is the seventh episode in a crossover mini-series between Brave New Work cohosts Rodney Evans and Aaron Dignan and Chase Chapman, builder of DAOs and host of the On the Other Side podcast. Each episode dives into a specific topic related to organizational design for Web3. Today, they talk about centralization’s downsides (it can create hurdles and sludge), its upsides (it can let people at the edges move quickly), and how a system can be deliberate about its tradeoffs.

Every time something changes at work, someone’s bound to be upset. Digital transformations take resources from analog teams; restructuring a department can take authority from one group and give it to another; removing a step from a workflow can eliminate a role altogether. Any change, including those meant to make things better, will create winners and losers and that’s bound to kick up a hornet’s nest of feelings. Here’s the puzzling part: Despite years of research showing us that surfacing and processing these feelings is key to unlocking a company’s ability to be adapt, many workplaces often treat emotions as taboo. They’re messy, unpredictable, and nobody wants to touch them—even when ignoring them does more harm that good. Playing pretend isn't getting us anywhere. In this episode of At Work with The Ready, Rodney Evans and Sam Spurlin explore why we have negative feelings about big feelings and how it’s holding our organizations back from evolving into the places they could be. We're on Youtube! An extended video version of this episode (with extra Rodney and Sam moments) is available to watch there. Mentioned references: Tabea's Meet The Ready post "unconsciously protecting the status quo": Immunity to Change, 2009 book by Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey "protection state": On Point of Relationship podcast episode with Frederic Laloux "complicated vs complex": Brave New Work keynote The unpaid emotional labor expected of women at work, 2024 BBC article What Rodney said at SXSW last year: BNW 162: Live from SXSW with Brian Elliott Love the show? Leave us a review and share this episode with your coworkers! We’re on LinkedIn! Follow Rodney, Sam and The Ready for more org design nerdery and join the conversation around episodes after they air. Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox twice a month? Sign up for our newsletter. We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com.

2024 felt like a bit of a rollercoaster—and while we’re ready to close the book on this year, we wouldn’t be first-class org designers if we passed up the chance to hold a retrospective. Add in the fact that this is Rodney’s 200th episode and BNW + AWWTR have crossed the one million download milestone, and a little celebration feels like the right thing. In today’s episode, Rodney and Sam reflect on the show’s 2024 season—including the episodes they loved, the episodes they want a do-over on, and what they hope for the show in 2025. We want to know what you think! Take our 2024 Listener Survey. -------------------------------- Want future of work insights and experiments you can try delivered to your inbox? Sign up here. Follow us on your favorite platforms for more org design nerdery: LinkedIn Instagram -------------------------------- Mentioned references: The Future of HR Miniseries The Ready's OS Canvas RACI episode: AWWTR Ep. 10 Leaders as org designers episode: AWWTR Ep. 13 "McGillicuddy" All the small things episode: AWWTR Ep. 19 "video about the woman who doesn't use a calendar" Jason Fox episode: AWWTR Ep. 17 with Jason Fox Dual Transformation, book from 2017

This is the ninth episode in a series devoted to teams in transition due to the Novel Coronavirus. It's about more than simply adapting to remote work—it's about adopting (in the midst of this chaos) a way of working that will make you ready for anything. Today's episode explores the area of meetings and the role that will play in navigating this uncertainty. This Brave New Work miniseries with Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans is based on The Ready's OS Canvas which is featured in Brave New Work. Resources mentioned: The Ready's OS Canvas Cynefin framework Dan Kim's episode: Ep. 4 with Dan Kim The retros episode: Ep. 10 with Jordan Husney Spotify daily health check Send the questions you'd like to see answered in this series to podcast@theready.com Does your team need help navigating this moment? Email us at hello@theready.com

We won’t mince words: Layoffs suck. They heap very real stress and chaos onto very real people’s lives. And as we’ve seen reported lately, big waves of layoffs are hitting several companies—and thousands of people—hard right now. This pile of not-good news sparked some questions for us, like: Why are layoffs a go-to cost-cutting lever? What pre-layoff org design decisions put employers and employees in this gnarly position? And why does every CEO letter announcing mass layoffs sound like it was written by the same robot? In today’s episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans, who’ve been on both sides of the layoff aisle, spend time with these queries and dig into: The all-around messiness of the traditional layoff process Why companies default to short-term thinking when the boom times boom Dehumanizing layoff practices we should shelve for good Creating clear containers and agreements for handling layoffs How we could design a layoff moment that’s truly people-positive Mentioned references: "RIFs" ConvertKit episode: BNW Ep. 36 with Nathan Barry "life stress inventories": Holmes and Rahe stress scale Office Space, 1999 movie Up in the Air, 2009 movie Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Where do our systems for organization and prioritization come from? How do we build discipline around new workflows? When and how do we learn how to work? And what happens when our systems have to gel with others’? Answers to these questions vary from person to person—and they should. Because when it comes to managing our time and tasks, it’s worth challenging “best” practices. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans unpack their own relationships to productivity and productivity culture, exploring: What people-positive and complexity-conscious workflows can look like The difference between work that’s important and work that’s urgent Why tools should fit the shape of your work and not the other way around The connection between the techniques you use and the tensions you feel The big costs that come with having too much work in progress Why thinking about what you do and how you do it is a critical use of your time

Kevin Kelly, the founding editor of WIRED Magazine, has spent years documenting and photographing life in the furthest corners of the Asian continent—and in the process, he's recorded a way of living that is quickly disappearing in the face of the continent's bracing visions for the future. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to Kevin about what we, in our work, can learn from the varied and disparate cultures he's spent much of his life experiencing. Learn more about "Vanishing Asia" on Kickstarter. Learn more about Kevin: On his website On his Instagram By reading The Technium Blog By subscribing to the Recomendo newsletter. Mentioned references: Kevin's previous appearance: BNW Ep. 34 with Kevin Kelly H-Mart David Hockney Asia Grace, Kevin's earlier photography book Kodak Brownie Shenzhen Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Haier "org debt" Single's Day Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com

Let's talk about succession. No, not the show, but the concept. How do progressive, human-centric organizations deal with succession, and role changes, and new management, all while maintaining a high level of success? In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to Michael Bungay Stanier and Shannon Minifie of Box of Crayons—about Michael stepping down and handing the reins of the organization to Shannon, the roadblocks the transition ran into, and how to go about it all without rocking the boat. Learn more about Shannon on LinkedIn, on Youtube, or by visiting Box of Crayons. Learn more about Michael on LinkedIn, on Youtube, or from listening to his previous episode of Brave New Work about 1:1s. Mentioned references: Bruce Springsteen E Street Band ABBA "Hotel California" Coaching Habit, by Michael Bungay Stanier Fierce Conversations, by Susan Scott "participatory governance": BNW Ep. 43 Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the American legal landscape instantly changed. So did the business landscape, since more than half of Americans rely on their employers for healthcare—and that includes reproductive healthcare. Abortion as a critical workplace issue is now top-of-mind for organizations coming to grips with how they can and should respond to a post-Roe world. Emma Goldberg covers the future of work for The New York Times and has been asking big questions about abortion since the Supreme Court’s decision came down: “How will this decision reshape workplace policies? What influence will it have on the job market? How do employees want their employers to respond? How do consumers want businesses to respond? Why does this issue in particular feel so fraught?” This week on Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans ask Emma about the answers she’s been hearing. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

Retailers around the country—and around the world—are facing complex challenges. One of the industry’s main reckonings: Many job openings; very few applicants. Recruitment has also been top-of-mind for CAMP, a toy and family experience store that looks to hire artists, actors, musicians, magicians, singers, and camp counselors rather than those with traditional retail experience. So…how do you reinvent the landscape to attract and keep that talent? On this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to CAMP’s cofounder and Chief People Officer, Nikki Kaufman, about recent work CAMP did with The Ready to design and launch new boundary-pushing hiring and compensation practices—like making pay 100% transparent, ditching resumes, and creating crystal-clear career paths. You can explore CAMP’s progressive principles in action—and its current open positions—at camp.com/careers. Learn more about Nikki on LinkedIn. Mentioned references: goldendoodle Ben Kaufman CAMP episode: BNW Ep. 9 with Ben Kaufman role charter Firms of Endearment, book of Raj Sisodia, Jag Sheth, and David B. Wolfe Action Meeting episode: BNW Ep. 80 with Sam Spurlin check-in Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

It’s no secret things haven’t been working in HR for… a while. When you include the last few years of navigating a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic, dysfunctional hybrid work policies, rounds of layoffs, and unprecedented economic churn, it’s easy to see HR has been pushed to a breaking point. Human Resources? They feel anything but human. Trapped between competing mandates to mitigate risk while also transforming office culture and the employee experience, it’s no wonder HR can’t steward the change it so desperately wants to. But what if there was a way out? In this new miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can actually become more resilient, efficient, and equitable. Today, on episode 1, Rodney and Sam talk about why HR’s time to shine is right now, what HR leaders around the world are telling us, and preview the goodies to come on in future episodes. Welcome to the Future of HR. ----------------- Learn more about The Future of HR at our website Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out! Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at fohr@theready.com. Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at fohr@theready.com or hello@theready.com. ----------------- 00:00 Aaron and Rodney intro 02:47 Welcome to the show & Check-In: What’s your favorite physical activity or exercise? 06:19 Why HR and why right now? 12:20 The Future of HR in a nutshell 18:35 How to find and identify your first missions 26:03 The pill in the hotdog - Mission Based Teams (MBTs) and new ways of working 29:24 The right people, on the right team, in the right environment 32:44 Developing the FoHR 35:25 Rodney’s learnings from the development process 38:27 What’s coming up in future episodes 38:53 Wrap Up: Send us your HR questions!

We’re coming at you with part two of the intimate conversation Rodney and Aaron cracked open last week. (Haven’t listened to part one yet? Go back and check out that episode now!) Today on Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans continue exploring the ups and downs of their professional partnership; why they chose to start working with a coach; the big lessons and lingering worries they both sit with; and why seeking out help isn’t necessarily a sign that something’s broken, but rather that you’re actually ready to dig deeper. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

[Rebreoadcast note: This episode originally aired in September 2021.] Patagonia’s purpose is clear: It’s in business to save our home planet. And that clarity’s been present almost since day one of the iconic outdoor clothing and gear company. But how and why was that anchoring mission adopted from the jump? And how has the nearly 50-year-old organization evolved its practices to support its resolute pledge to sustainability? Luckily, there’s someone with answers to these questions: Vincent Stanley is Patagonia’s Director of Philosophy and co-author with Yvon Chouinard of The Responsible Company. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans speak to Vincent about Patagonia’s better-known successes, lesser-known failures, the experiments it’s had to flex during the pandemic, and what a responsible company of the future can and should look like. Learn more about The Responsible Company here: https://www.patagonia.com/product/the-responsible-company-what-weve-learned-from-patagonias-first-forty-years-paperback-book/BK233.html Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

When we decide to start working differently, it often begins with just one or two teams taking the leap. For everyone involved, the first weeks and months are a rollercoaster of highs and lows. Not everyone has the courage to see things through. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk about SLAM teams (self-managing, lean, audacious, multidisciplinary), the early days of a transformation, and why leaders should stay the course even when the going gets tough. Later, they’re joined by Doug Seacrist, from Bloomin’ Brands, who shares his story of reinventing the technology support function inside a huge system of restaurants. Learn more about Doug and his work on LinkedIn. Learn more about Bloomin' Brands at their website. Mentioned resources: "Philosophy problem replacing wood on a boat": The Ship of Theseus User manuals to me: Brave New Work, Episode 159 Scrum teams and Agile "Perspectives in a retro": Brave New Work, Episode 10 Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

This is the second episode in a crossover mini-series between Brave New Work cohosts Rodney Evans and Aaron Dignan and Chase Chapman, builder of DAOs and host of the On the Other Side podcast. Each episode dives into a specific topic related to organizational design for Web3. Today, they talk about some of the blurriness between DAO customers and contributors, and how to design and define roles inside these nascent communities so emergence can you-know-what.

This is the sixth episode in a crossover mini-series between Brave New Work cohosts Rodney Evans and Aaron Dignan and Chase Chapman, builder of DAOs and host of the On the Other Side podcast. Each episode dives into a specific topic related to organizational design for Web3. Today, they talk about instantiating marketplaces as one way to enable greater resource-allocation, decision-making, collaboration, and cross-contribution within decentralized systems.

[Rebroadcast note: The Ready gathers for its next retreat next week, so there’s no better time to re-air this episode from December 2021.] Wait, haven’t we already covered retreats? Yes. But if the first one explored key dos and don’ts, this one imagines the retreat as a blank sheet of paper and invites you to ask: With unlimited options, what would you do? How would you take an off-site from good to great to transcendent? What’s the space where strategy meets luxury and how can you plan a rewarding experience that includes real work? Well, we’ve got a few ideas. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans dig into the logistical, emotional, and design considerations that went into our most recent retreat to help them overhaul old habits; provoke bigger questions and bigger bets; and use fun as a guide. And regardless of organizational size or budget, you can create that time and space, too. Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

It's a time-honored tradition: the company retreat. But when that conjures the specter of Ramada Inn basements and conference rooms and three-hour presentation blocks, it's clear that an update is in order. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans strategize the most efficient and effective ways to reconnect and recharge with your organizations, as well as ways we might go about planning company retreats in the new age of remote work. Mentioned references: "IDM-ing": BNW Ep. 43 Loom Tony Robbins "escape room in Charleston" Oculus Quest (now the Meta Quest) Spacial Beat Saber Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

There are elephants in the room, and then there are "Moose Heads on the Table." This book, by Lisa Gill and Karen Tenelius, describes the concept as workplace taboos that are simultaneously ingrained and incredibly toxic for getting things done. In this episode of Brave New Work, Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans talk to Lisa about how to embrace this discomfort at work, and what self-managing organizations can do to empower their employees to speak up when things aren't working. Get Lisa's book, Moose Heads On The Table. Learn more about Lisa on her website, LinkedIn, or by listening to her podcast, Leadermorphosis. Mentioned references: "Basecamp episode": BNW Ep. 71 "fuddy duddy" Reinventing Organizations: BNW Ep. 18 with Frederic Laloux "ASCATS": BNW Ep. 65 with Alastair Steward The Ready's Tension and Practice Cards Jorge Silva, from 10Pines Frederic Laloux's "Insights for the Journey" videos Liberating Structures: BNW Ep. 49 with Keith McCandless Reinventing Work's global community Our book is available now at bravenewwork.com We want to hear from you. Send your thoughts and feedback to podcast@theready.com Looking for some help with your own transformation? Visit theready.com

This is the second episode in a series devoted to teams in transition due to the Novel Coronavirus. It's about more than simply adapting to remote work—it's about adopting (in the midst of this chaos) a way of working that will make you ready for anything. Today's episode digs deep into the area of purpose and the role that will play in navigating this uncertainty. This Brave New Work miniseries with Aaron Dignan and Rodney Evans is based on The Ready's OS Canvas which is featured in Brave New Work. References mentioned: The Ready's OS Canvas Mira Shani, Rodney's yoga teacher Send the questions you'd like to see answered in this series to podcast@theready.com Does your team need help navigating this moment? Email us at hello@theready.com