Working Conversations

Episode 151: 7 Things to NEVER Do in AI Generative AI can be incredibly beneficial in many aspects of your life and it is tempting to think it can do it all, but there are a few places you should absolutely not be using ChatGPT and its counterparts. In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson explains where relying on ChatGPT or Google’s Bard will lead you astray. Join her on this reality check so you can...

Episode 150: 7 Things to Try in AI Generative Artificial Intelligence has a multitude of uses in everyday life, not just at work. In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson explains how ChatGPT, Google’s Bard, and other similar tools can be of great use across a great many areas of your life. From boosting creativity to improving your technical understanding of complex concepts to learning a new language...

Episode 149: The Power of Generative AI to Transform Meetings Imagine showing up 10 minutes late to a meeting and instead of wondering what you missed, or worse yet, having the meeting facilitator catch you up, the meeting platform’s Generative AI bot catches you up as soon as you enter the online meeting room. It shares all the details that are the most relevant to you, including Amy in the marke...

Episode 148: Is the Return to Office War Over? A recent headline declared that the return to office wars are over. Dr. Janel Anderson says, “Not so fast.” One of her predictions for 2024 is that hybrid work will become the norm, but she believes the battleground between work from home and return to office is not behind us yet. In this episode, she offers a two-fold explanation of why senior leader...

Episode 147: The Epidemic of Loneliness at Work It's not uncommon to make friends at work. Your coworkers become your work friends and your work friends become your real friends. But these days, that is happening far less frequently. We have emerged from a global pandemic and found in its place a global epidemic of loneliness.   In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson shares what caused the epidem...

Episode 146: My Digital Detox Results If you’ve ever thought about doing a digital detox where for a set period of time, you significantly cut back on your screen use – especially smartphones, then this episode is for you. Six weeks ago, Dr. Janel Anderson shared on this podcast her plan to do a digital detox. Now she’s back with the results of her experiment. Tune in to this episode to find out a...

Episode 145: The Dos and Don’ts of Performance Reviews Performance reviews: the annual ritual that brings a mix of anticipation and anxiety to employees worldwide.  We’ve all been there – the dance of feedback that includes the good, the bad, and the sometimes downright awkward! In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson shares practical and informed techniques for what TO DO in the performance review an...

Episode 144: Do This Instead of New Year’s Resolutions Every year, millions of people make New Year's Resolutions, only to have them fail within a few days or a few weeks. They simply don’t work. In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson shares a different ritual for the beginning of the year. It’s called Your Life: An Annual Inventory. This is a time-tested process she developed for being complete...

Episode 143: My Predictions for Work Life in 2024 In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson looks into her crystal ball and predicts the future of work in the coming year. Thinking about the future can help us understand the present and be ready for what’s coming next. Dr. Anderson’s predictions address whether the era of remote work is coming to a close or not, companies doubling down on employee well-...

Episode 142: Hits or Misses? A Review of My 2023 Workplace Predictions At the start of each year, I make predictions about what the future of work holds for us in the coming year.  In this episode, I take inventory of my predictions and score myself on how accurate those predictions played out as the year unfolded. From the labor shortage to return to office (or not) to generative AI to generation...

Episode 141: On Turning 25 – An Interview with My Oldest Son In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson catches up with her oldest son, Apple Crider, on his 25 th birthday. He’s an entrepreneurial young man making his mark on the content creation industry. In this wide-ranging conversation, they discuss career advice, leadership, life choices, and not being limited by conventional career choices.  The id...

Episode 140:  My Version of a Digital Detox  Have you ever thought about doing a digital detox? It’s the idea that, for a set period of time, you give up the mobile devices that most of us are so addicted to. It turns out that unplugging entirely for a period of days (or even weeks) doesn’t do much good in the long run. What does work? Moderating your screen time and being intentional about when y...

Episode 139:  How to Stop Phubbing Have you ever felt like someone wasn’t giving you their full attention while you were talking to them because they were also taking a peek at their phone? Or maybe they were completely distracted by their phone and not present with you. It’s known as Phubbing. Snubbing someone by splitting your attention between them and your phone.  Snub + Phone = Phub. In this...

Episode 138:  How to Prevent Misunderstandings If you’ve ever spent 20 minutes carefully crafting a three-sentence email, carefully word-smithing it to include all the subtleties needed to convey your message to this person, only to still have it result in a misunderstanding, this episode is for you! In the current era, workplace communication relies heavily on text-only mediums: think email, text...

Episode 137:  85% Productivity is the Sweet Spot Productivity is always a hot topic – and maybe never more so than now, with some people claiming more productivity working from home and others saying it’s easier to be productive in the office. While we won’t solve that dilemma in this episode, we will talk about how to be productive without burning out. Research suggests that operating at 85% maxi...

Episode 136:  STOP Multitasking Many people mistakenly believe that they can multitask. What neuroscientists have been telling us for years however, is that the human brain is a single processing system and that our brains are not set up to multitask. Instead, when you think you are multitasking, the brain is actually switching rapidly between tasks. This switching taxes the brain and has long-ter...

Episode 135:  Quiet Hiring: How to Make it Work For You Have you heard about quiet hiring? Quiet hiring is also a bit of a misnomer. It doesn’t necessarily involve hiring. Instead, quiet hiring is a term used to describe a practice of shuffling staff around to meet immediate business needs, typically without adding headcount. Often that means stretch assignments or additional training for existing...

Episode 134: What Happened to Office Etiquette? It seems there is no end to the breaches of office etiquette these days. Has working from home for the past few years left us so out of practice we don’t know how to behave professionally in an office environment anymore? Or perhaps the offenders joined the workforce during the pandemic and didn’t benefit from learning office etiquette through osmosi...

Episode 133: Six Books You’ll Love In this episode, Dr. Janel Anderson shares the six books she’s currently reading.  Yes, she’s one of those people who reads multiple books at the same time! The books she’s currently reading range in genre from biography to entrepreneurship to United States history to philosophy and self-help. And of course, there’s some fiction thrown in for good measure. She sh...

Episode 132: FOBO Is On the Rise (Fear of Becoming Obsolete) In the age of generative AI, automation, and all manner of technological advances, FOBO, or the fear of becoming obsolete is the latest phenomenon to sweep through the workplace. The most notable rise in concern is with two different groups: the first being those 18-34 years old with a college degree and the second being professionals ea...

Episode 131: The Great Unretirement A full 25% of Americans age 65 to 74 are still participating in the workforce. A growing number of them once were retired and have come back to work full-time or part-time, a trend that’s been dubbed “The Great Unretirement.” And it’s not just happening in the United States. Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, Japan, France, and Italy are all experiencing older...

Episode 130: A Typical Week in My Life + My Morning Routine (Version 2) In this episode we deviate from our typical programming and instead, I answer two questions that I get frequently: What does a typical work week look like for you? and What is your morning routine? This episode is a revision of an episode from 18 months ago (Episode 37). My morning routine has varied considerably since that ep...

Episode 129: The Explosive Growth in Green Jobs For the first time in a very long time, nurses are not the most in-demand job. Green jobs, or those that benefit the environment or conserve our planet’s natural resources, have edged out nursing for the most needed and sought-after occupation.  Green careers have been gaining momentum in recent years, and they offer a promising outlook for the job m...

Episode 128: Why People Are Rude (and Worse!) Online Have you ever wondered what makes people act strangely online, being far more aggressive or snarky than they ever would behave in person? If you’ve ever had a colleague harshly criticize you in an email or become overly hostile in a virtual meeting (or maybe you’ve done so yourself), the answer lies in the disinhibition effect. In short, people...

Episode 127: How Labor Day Can Help Predict the Future Labor Day, celebrated on the first Monday of September in the United States, is more than just a three-day weekend marking the unofficial end of summer. It carries a rich history that echoes the struggles, victories, and aspirations of the American workforce. As we honor the past on this day, we also have the opportunity to draw valuable lesso...