Dr. Laura Gallaher joins me from Serbia, where she is part of Remote Year, a community that travels to twelve locations within a year with a cohort of people working remotely.  Laura is an organizational psychologist who studied humor and communication in the workplace and notably completed a dissertation with “that’s what she said” in the title (office fans, anyone?).  With a title like that it was probably clear that Academia would be too limiting for her.

We talk a bit about humor and how it can be helpful or destructive in an organization.  She first points out that “aggressive” humor – even if you mean well is rarely a way to strengthen bonds.  We then talk about how leaders can embrace humor, especially to show their vulnerability, and give their teams more freedom to make mistakes, be open and be themselves.

After getting her Ph.D., she worked with NASA after the Columbia explosion and worked on some of the toughest “they fell victim to the same thing that could happen in any organization.”  She notes that these factors are prevalent across many organizations, but the stakes are often not life or death.  Her work with a small tech company found that two key elements can help companies transcend hierarchy.  First, the leader is willing to be vulnerable and second, the leader demonstrates both through words and actions that they care deeply about all the people in the organization.

“We hire people for what they think….what we care about is your ability to learn, your ability to think, your ability to grow…creating an environment where the employees opinion and input has value and you ask for it and you seek it out and you actually listen to it, this is where really, really engaged organizations are born and powerful cultures are created”

Links:

• Check out Laura’s Free 3-Part Culture Course
• Gallaher Edge
• Remote Year

41k+ Sold! (Top 1% Book) The Pathless Path is Paul's book about walking away from a "perfect" job with a promising future and starting over again. Through painstaking experiments, living in different countries, and a deep dive into the history of our work beliefs, Paul pieces together a set of ideas and principles that guide him from unfulfilled and burned out to what he calls "the pathless path" - a new story for thinking about work in our lives. Learn More & Buy The Book Here

The post Dr. Laura Gallaher on humor at work, leadership at NASA after crisis, and building a business traveling the world appeared first on Boundless by Paul Millerd.

Amma Marfo is a thoughtful yet incurably silly independent higher education professional, writer, and editor based in Boston, MA. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Communication Studies from the University of Rhode Island, and a Master of Education from the University of South Florida. Amma is a dynamic and sought-after speaker on topics such as leadership, group dynamics, learning and optimizing the temperament of your organization, cultivating environments that encourage creativity, and incorporating your values into your work and larger goals- and has written three books on those topics since 2014. She speaks on college and university campuses across the country, at regional and national conferences, and has partnered with organizations like HubSpot, Wayfair, Startup Institute Boston, and General Assembly. She is an outspoken advocate for creativity, believes strongly in the power of humor, and looks forward to helping you find the way you live and work best. Her other interests include live comedy, surfing, trivia, and gluten-free cooking/baking. You can follow her on Twitter @ammamarfo.

How she defines success:

“Success is the ability to do stuff that I really like with people that I have a lot of fun with and know a lot of cool things — ideally things I don’t know — and also being able to have fun. So having enough money to have a roof over my head, have insurance and have a little fun — that’s all I really need.”

Amma

Links:

• Amma’s 2017 Reading List and The 2018 Reading List
• Netflix – The Standups
• Podcast: The Imposters
• Book Recommendation: Hamilton The Revolution
• Book Recommendation: When They Call You A Terrorist
• Twitter: @ammamarfo

41k+ Sold! (Top 1% Book) The Pathless Path is Paul's book about walking away from a "perfect" job with a promising future and starting over again. Through painstaking experiments, living in different countries, and a deep dive into the history of our work beliefs, Paul pieces together a set of ideas and principles that guide him from unfulfilled and burned out to what he calls "the pathless path" - a new story for thinking about work in our lives. Learn More & Buy The Book Here

The post Boundless Podcast: Amma Marfo on Combining Humor, Creativity & Writing (Episode 8) appeared first on Boundless by Paul Millerd.