How I Work

Do you want to get more out of everything you read? Well, join the club! Or, you could join Booktopia CEO Tony Nash and start listening to more audiobooks instead.   Tony shares why he doesn’t stress about taking notes while he’s listening, and instead prefers to absorb the information into hismental “DataBank”.   He says it improves his ability to act quickly and automatically when it matters mos...

Last week marked a very special kind of anniversary for me: being a Melbournian, I have now clocked up over 200 days in lockdown. For most of those 200 days, I feel like I've coped pretty well. But last week, things felt really hard. I didn't feel like myself and people close to me were struggling too. And I was just sick of hearing the same old advice for how to cope. So I reached out to someone...

How are you coping with this whole global pandemic thing? I'm in Melbourne in lockdown 6.0 and it's pretty tough going. I feel like I'm more reliant on my devices than ever before - it's like a window to the outside world. But I have a feeling that checking ABC news 10 times a day isn't very good for my mental health. So in today's show, I have an alternative to share. Try out Amantha's favourite...

Being a CEO is tough… Being CEO of two companies? That’s a whole different game.    For Nicky Sparshott, CEO of Unilever ANZ and Global CEO of T2, the trick to staying on top of everything is sometimes as simple as a post-it note.    She shares how she filters her priorities from a five-year horizon all the way down through yearly, quarterly, monthly and daily to-do lists. She also highlights the...

You’ve got a huge decision to make - the common advice would be to ‘sleep on it’.   Carsales CEO Cameron McIntyre says even if ‘sleeping on it’ actually looks more like lying awake in bed thinking about it all night, taking 24 hours before you make a crucial decision, or reply to a frustrating email, is worth it.    According to Cameron, leaders don’t get the benefit of throwing their hands up in...

Hear me out - what if you stopped trying so hard to be productive? Most of us only get a total of four thousand weeks on this earth. Do you really want to spend them answering emails?   Oliver Burkeman is a “recovering productivity geek” and he wants you to make peace with the reality that you'll never get everything done. He says once you’ve accepted that hard truth, you’ll finally be free to foc...

Yep, harsh feedback can sting like a rotten tomato right to the face, so how can you tell which criticism is ripe for the picking?   Sam McMillan is a musical comedian, satirist, writer and radio presenter who performs under the stage name Sammy J.    Sammy knows that not all feedback is created equal. He shares why he takes on every bit of feedback from his team at ABC Radio, and why he’s more se...

What if you’re sabotaging yourself without even realising it?     You know that feeling, when you’ve got the skills, the reputation and the experience, but you just can’t land that top job?   Just three letters could be standing in your way.   According to comedian, writer, podcast and radio host, and self-described “probably pretty bad” Buddhist Meshel Laurie, it’s time to say “YES.” You ARE inte...

How can you inject a bit of humour into your work day?   And why does the work feel so much better when you’re able to share a few laughs with your colleagues?   Naomi Bagdonas teaches humour as part of a purpose and leadership course at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. She also coaches top executives in the art of comedy.    She shares some comedy one-on-one that will give you a simple fra...

How do you make big decisions - especially when the outcome affects the people you love?   When it falls on you to make a really big choice - should you take that new job, what school should your kids go to - I bet you’ve wished there was some kind of decision-making framework you could apply. And it’s so much easier to weigh up the pros and cons when you actually have some information to hand.   ...

“You’re on mute, Dave!” How are you supposed to build chemistry and work effectively with colleagues when you’re rarely in the same room anymore? Organisational psychologist Adam Grant says it is possible to make your time with them energetic and bursting with ideas that move the work forward effectively. “I don't think there's anything about human psychology that leaves me convinced that we have...

Since opening a small pheasant farm and restaurant with her husband back in the 70s, Maggie Beer has become the master of making the most out of every opportunity.  She’s no stranger to creating new and hugely popular new food products from excess harvest, and shares how to look for inspiration in something that can, at first, appear to be a problem.  Maggie has been helping us up our game in the...

If deciding what to have for breakfast each morning does your head in, why not outsource the decision to the best - top Melbourne restaurant owner, Ben Shewry? The Attica chef says, “It takes just as long to make a bad breakfast as it does to make a good one.”  So what are Ben’s top tips for making a great breakfast?  Omelette, poached or scrambled… No matter how you take your eggs, Ben Shewry is...

A tip just for you - you’re doing too much, friend.   You’re probably conditioned to think the harder you work, the better the results...    And you might have even hit burnout once or twice along the way.    Leadership and business strategist Greg McKeown wants you to fight against that conditioning.    Instead of wondering “How can I work harder to get more done?”, Greg wants you to ask yourself...

How does someone as busy as Adore Beauty co-founder Kate Morris nail her unique and polished look at every event?   Spoiler - it’s not by pulling everything out of the cupboard!     As the leader of a publicly listed e-commerce beauty empire, the pressure is ON when Kate steps out of the house.    Kate shares her secret, which she says is “the best thing I ever did” and a total shortcut for always...

On today's BEST OF episode, my guest is Laura Mae Martin. Laura is the Executive Productivity Advisor at Google. So how did this happen? Laura Mae Martin started at Google almost 10 years ago in the Ann Arbor office. Shortly after joining she started a 20% project and developed an internal training on how to manage your inbox effectively. Her continued passion for productivity has developed into a...

When Simon Griffiths chose to cover your toilet paper stack with a cheeky sense of fun and delight, the Who Gives a Crap founder cracked open a whole new world of creative possibilities for the business.  For Simon, that meant delivering something unexpected to his customers and creating a culture of quirky fun in the workplace, all while delivering decoration to your dunny. That sense of humour h...

In today's BEST OF episode, my guest is Rahul Vohra. Rahul is the founder and CEO of Superhuman, the fastest email experience in the world. Users get through their inbox twice as fast — and many see Inbox Zero for the first time in years! Previously, he founded Rapportive, the first Gmail plugin to scale to millions of users. Rapportive was acquired by LinkedIn. In our chat, we cover: Rahul’s appr...

***Complete the 2021 How I Work Listener survey to go into the draw for a $100 Visa gift card and a spot in Inventium's Workday Reinvention program, valued at over $500: https://bit.ly/3fEMiAG . *** Visit amanthaimber.com/podcast for full show notes from all episodes.   Connect with me on the socials: Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanthaimber Twitter: https://twitter.com/amantha Instagram...

***Complete the 2021 How I Work Listener survey to go into the draw for a $100 Visa gift card and a spot in Inventium's Workday Reinvention program, valued at over $500: https://bit.ly/3fEMiAG . ***   How did Victoria Devine convince hundreds of thousands of millenials, mostly women, to stop hitting snooze on their finances?   The award-winning financial advisor and Founder of She’s on the Money s...

***Complete the 2021 How I Work Listener survey to go into the draw for a $100 Visa gift card and a spot in Inventium's Workday Reinvention program, valued at over $500: https://bit.ly/3fEMiAG . ***   Do you struggle to speak up in a meeting and share your ideas?    Developing your authority as a leader while still remaining approachable can be super tricky.  Ebay Australia's Managing Director Tim...

***Complete the 2021 How I Work Listener survey to go into the draw for a $100 Visa gift card and a spot in Inventium's Workday Reinvention program, valued at over $500: https://bit.ly/3fEMiAG . ***   Before you click ‘add’ on another vaguely familiar face on LinkedIn - not so fast!    But the larger your social or professional network, the larger your influence, right?   Organisational psychologi...

***Complete the 2021 How I Work Listener survey to go into the draw for a $100 Visa gift card and a spot in Inventium's Workday Reinvention program, valued at over $500: https://bit.ly/3fEMiAG . ***   Now everyone has had time working from home, is it time to return to ‘normal’?    Remote.com’s Founder and CEO Job van der Voort says now we've tasted the freedom of remote work, companies are going...

***Complete the 2021 How I Work Listener survey to go into the draw for a $100 Visa gift card and a spot in Inventium's Workday Reinvention program, valued at over $500: https://bit.ly/3fEMiAG . ***   What are the routines and habits of a happiness guru?   Gretchen Rubin has spent the last ten years dedicated to researching and exploring how to be happier.    She’s the host of popular weekly podca...

My guest today is Kevin Kelly. Kevin is Senior Maverick at Wired magazine. He co-founded Wired in 1993, and served as its Executive Editor for its first seven years. His most recent book is The Inevitable, which is a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller. He co-founded the Hackers’ Conference and also the Quantified Self movement. He writes one of my favourite newsletters, Recomendo, h...