The Elephant in the Org

Send us Fan Mail Neurodiversity in the workplace isn’t an accommodation issue. It’s a design issue. Paula Brockwell returns to The Elephant in the Org — following her Season 1 appearance, which remains one of our most downloaded episodes — to go deeper into the structural realities of neurodiversity at work. In this conversation, we move beyond awareness and compliance to examine workplace archite...

Send us Fan Mail Your team isn’t maybe neurodivergent. It already is. In this episode, we’re joined by Tara May , CEO of Aspiritech , to explore what it actually looks like to design workplaces that are welcoming by default —not just compliant when someone asks for help. Tara leads a tech services company where more than 90% of the workforce is autistic , and she brings a deeply practical perspect...

Send us Fan Mail We say we want innovation. We reward compliance. And then we wonder why nothing changes. In this episode of The Elephant in the Org , we dig into a quiet but damaging contradiction inside modern organisations: the employees leaders like most are often the least innovative. Our guest, Mark Murphy—New York Times bestselling author, Forbes senior contributor, and founder of Leadershi...

Send us Fan Mail S3E13 — Cute Survey. What Are You Going to Do About It? with Jeffrey Fermin (Host of People First , tech founder, advisor) If your org runs surveys but never closes the loop, people don’t just get annoyed — they stop telling the truth. Silence becomes the culture. In this episode, we get brutally practical about what happens after the survey: Why surveys often become “listening th...

Send us Fan Mail BONUS EPISODE — and somehow, our 75th. Your main event today is our conversation with Radhika Dutt , so if you only have time for one episode, go listen to her burn OKRs to the ground first. This bonus drop is the after-party. Now… for everyone still emotionally recovering from HR in 2025, here’s our annual debrief: Battery Hens, Bullshit & Burnout — HR’s 2025 “You’ve Got to B...

Send us Fan Mail What if the problem isn’t how you set goals… but the fact you’re using goals at all? In this episode of The Elephant in the Org , we declare 2025 the year we fire OKRs — and we’ve brought exactly the right arsonist. Author, entrepreneur, and product leader Radhika Dutt joins Danny, Marion, and Cacha to explain why traditional goal-setting, targets, and OKRs were built for 1940s as...

Send us Fan Mail The HR Breakdown: Dr Jo Burrell on Why the Function That Fixes Everything Is Falling Apart HR isn’t “a bit stressed.” HR isn’t “managing fine.” HR isn’t “designed to be everyone’s emotional shock absorber.” The latest data finally confirms what every HR human already knows in their bones: The profession responsible for everyone else’s wellbeing is quietly falling apart. In this ra...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when flexibility stops being a perk and becomes the backbone of inclusion, well-being, and high performance? In this episode, we sit down with Michelle McDaid , founder of The Leading Place and long-time engineering leader across FinTech and HR Tech, to unpack how trust, autonomy, and psychological safety reshape the modern workplace. Michelle brings over two decades...

Send us Fan Mail What if “success” wasn’t someone else’s checklist—but a life that actually fits ? In this uplifting, reflective conversation, Dan Smolen —Executive Producer & Host of What’s Your Work Fit? and fellow member of the Future of Work Alliance—joins Danny, Marion, and Cacha to explore how purpose, passion, and fit overlap (and don’t), why agency over your day matters, and how “soft...

Send us Fan Mail When crisis hits, clarity collapses — and HR is often left holding the mic. In this episode, Marion, Danny, and Cacha sit down with Alison Arnot , award-winning consultant, trainer, and author of Internal Communication in Times of Crisis: How to Secure Employee Trust, Support , and Advocacy in Crisis Situations . From her early-career baptism during the 2007 Glasgow Airport terror...

Send us Fan Mail Want Inclusive Workplaces? Listen Up — and #HirePaul This special episode of The Elephant in the Org isn’t just a conversation — it’s a call to action. Meet Paul Meyer , a Deaf HR professional and inclusion advocate with extensive experience in talent acquisition, onboarding, and culture building. Paul has spent his career helping organizations make work truly inclusive, from hiri...

Send us Fan Mail Episode Description: ⚠️ Trigger Warning: Suicide, grief, and trauma. In this deeply human episode of The Elephant in the Org , we confront one of the hardest workplace conversations: suicide, loss, and mental health at work. Our guest, Don Ryan — author of The Secret Struggle: Surviving the Suicide of a Loved One and veteran social worker — brings both professional expertise and p...

Send us Fan Mail When AI does the homework but skips the hard work, businesses will be the ones picking up the tab. In this final episode of our AI trilogy, we’re joined by Mark Evans — serial entrepreneur, Fractional Chief AI Officer, and strategic advisor who’s spent 30 years building, scaling, and exiting tech ventures. Now, he helps leaders navigate AI adoption without outsourcing the very thi...

Send us Fan Mail “AI will make your job easier.” Translation: Here’s a shiny new tool — now do 10x more with half the resources. In Part 2 of our AI Trilogy, we’re joined by Felix Mitchell (Co-CEO of Instant Impact, host of We Need to Talk About HR ) to unpack how leaders are spinning AI as a miracle cure — while quietly restructuring work, cutting jobs, and pushing employees harder than ever. We...

Send us Fan Mail We’re back, baby! 🎉 Season 3 of The Elephant in the Org kicks off with a bang — and a little chaos. Marion, Danny, and Cacha dive into: The HR scandal everyone’s pearl-clutching over (while ignoring the real workplace issues). Why HR burnout is at crisis levels — and nobody’s talking about it. What’s coming in our AI Trilogy: three straight episodes on how AI is reshaping trust,...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when ChatGPT decides you’re not a Black woman… but a 40-year-old white man named Ralph? That’s exactly what happened to attorney and entrepreneur Aubria Ralph , who turned an AI glitch into a full-blown LinkedIn social experiment. She flipped her name, posted as “Ralph Aubria,” and watched the offers, DMs, and algorithm love roll in. The results? Both hilarious and de...

Send us Fan Mail If your DEI strategy can’t even get someone a standing desk, we’ve got bigger problems. In this bold and unfiltered episode, host Danny Gluch sits down with three powerhouse professionals who know what it’s like to advocate for equity — not just in theory, but in real life, in real workplaces, with real consequences. Together, they unpack the systemic ignorance disabled employees...

Send us Fan Mail It’s the final episode of Rethink Ability , and we’re wrapping the series with reflection, laughter, and a whole lot of heart. Hosts Marion Anderson, Danny Gluch, and Cacha Dora are joined by Greer Procich and Lia Seth to revisit the mic-drop moments, hard truths, and big feelings from the series. From allyship to HR’s blind spots, from policy pitfalls to psychological safety — we...

Send us Fan Mail What do you do when your body doesn’t follow the calendar, and neither does your capacity? In this episode of Rethink Ability , co-hosts Danny Gluch and Cacha Dora are joined by Greer Procich, Lia Seth, and Megan Rees for a candid, humorous, and deeply validating conversation about the unpredictable nature of working while living with a disability. We talk about surprise flare-ups...

Send us Fan Mail What’s the most common workplace stereotype about disabled people? According to our live “Family Feud”-style panel game: "They’re not as capable as their peers." In this fiery and funny episode of Rethink Ability , host Danny Gluch is joined by five powerhouse advocates and professionals to unpack the lazy assumptions, outdated beliefs, and quiet biases that disabled fol...

Send us Fan Mail They say the system is broken. But for many of us, it was never built with us in mind in the first place. In this raw and powerful episode, we explore the realities of invisible disability in the workplace — the ones you can’t see, the ones people don’t believe, and the ones we’ve been forced to explain, downplay, or hide to get by. From masking and microaggressions to inaccessibl...

Send us Fan Mail In this candid kickoff to Rethink Ability , co-hosts Marion Anderson, Danny Gluch, Cacha Dora, and Lia Seth unpack the personal journey that sparked this series — born from lived experience, late diagnoses, awkward conversations, and the realization that HR wasn’t trained for this. What began as DMs and shared frustrations turned into a collaborative effort to rethink how we talk...

Send us Fan Mail What happens after the diagnosis? In this raw and revelatory episode, co-hosts Marion Anderson and Danny Gluch sit down with guests Lia Seth and Don Ryan to explore the emotional whiplash of becoming — or realizing you’ve always been — disabled. From the relief of finally having an answer to the quiet rage of having to justify your needs again and again, this conversation unpacks...

Send us Fan Mail Stack ranking is back, y'all — and we’re not clapping. In our Season 2 finale, we’re calling out the lazy leadership, performative culture, and warped sense of “objectivity” fueling the comeback of rank-and-yank reviews. HR strategist Greer Procich joins Marion, Danny, and Cacha to unpack why stack ranking never really went away — it just got rebranded. From AI-driven “calibr...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when the one holding it all together starts to fall apart? In this powerful episode, we’re joined by Nicole DuBois—HR exec, mom, author, and walking proof that vulnerability is leadership. Nicole takes us behind the scenes of her journey: managing a chronic illness, surviving divorce, raising a child, and leading a people function—all while hiding behind a mask. We ta...