Episodes
Listen to Fixable’s first live show at TED2024! Anne and Frances sat down with NYU professor, entrepreneur, best-selling author and celebrity podcaster Scott “Prof G” Galloway for a fascinating conversation on loneliness, resilience, inclusion in the workplace, raising healthy boys and what it takes to be personally and financially successful. Stick around to the end to hear how Scott learned to cry and moving answers from an unexpectedly emotional audience Q+A. To hear more from Scott,...
Published 05/06/24
Published 05/06/24
What do you do when there’s too much work but not enough people to do it? Bring in some support! This week, Anne and Frances talk to a listener whose expert sales team can no longer keep up with everything the company offers. Together, Anne and Frances outline ways to simplify work for a stressed out team—including the use of AI to reduce complexity and increase capacity. They also offer advice for any leader moving through a shift as radical as introducing AI into the workflow. What...
Published 04/29/24
This is an episode of The TED Interview, another podcast from the TED Audio Collective, that we think you'll enjoy. To get a free copy of the Infectious Generosity book, visit ted.com/generosity Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft and the co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is one of the top ten richest people in the world. But since 2008, he has traded his day-to-day role with Microsoft to focus full-time on his foundation's work to expand opportunity around the world....
Published 04/22/24
Bullies can’t bully alone – they need other people to participate in their campaigns to shame, discredit, and exclude their targets. This means that we often have more power than we realize to stop bullying in the workplace. In Part 2 of Anne and Frances’s conversation with Master Fixer and social psychologist Amy Cuddy, they explore smart, simple actions all of us can take to prevent bullying and shut it down in its earliest stages. If you haven’t listened to Part 1 of this interview, make...
Published 04/15/24
(Note: This is an updated version of this episode – if you previously downloaded audio and got a different podcast, thanks for your patience as we deliver you the right episode, which is this one! The original episode is also updated and you can find it in this same feed.) Where do bullies go when they grow up? New research shows they just move from the playground to the workplace. This week, Master Fixer and social psychologist Amy Cuddy joins Anne and Frances to walk us through the...
Published 04/09/24
Where do bullies go when they grow up? New research shows they just move from the playground to the workplace. This week, Master Fixer and social psychologist Amy Cuddy joins Anne and Frances to walk us through the strikingly stable patterns bullies follow to undermine and ostracize their targets – patterns that are way more common than you might think. Stay tuned for part two where Cuddy details actions you can take to stop bullies in next week’s episode. What problems are you dealing with...
Published 04/08/24
Multiple deadly crashes, a door flying off mid-flight, a CEO forced to step down Boeing has had more than a few disasters. And in case anyone at Boeing is listening, Anne and Frances have some advice to offer for our first ever “Unsolicited Advice” episode. How can a company redeem itself after so many appalling headlines? Where does the leadership team go from here? Listen for valuable takeaways anyone can learn from on taking “radical responsibility” for an organization’s performance....
Published 04/01/24
How do you retain good people – and set them up for success in a dynamic, fast-moving environment? Promotion, job design, and clear career pathways are all part of the answer. This week, a pastor leading a growing church wants to know when is the right time to promote people and how to make sure they don't burn out. Anne and Frances deliver advice to help leaders embrace uncertainty and chart a course for success, whether they’re in the pulpit or the C-suite. What problems are you dealing...
Published 03/25/24
Whatever happens off-the-job comes with us to work, including our mental health. And having the right tools to talk about it is crucial to improving our experience of work. In this episode, Master Fixer and Harvard Business School professor Lauren Cohen joins Anne and Frances to deliver some surprising statistics on mental health and why it’s vital to have conversations about wellness in the workplace. Whether you’re worried about an employee who lost a loved one or don’t know how to bring up...
Published 03/18/24
Do ideas have the freedom to run in your workplace, or do they get caught in internal complexity? As companies grow, they tend to have more processes and stakeholders slowing down change. So what can you do to get things done? In this week’s episode, Anne and Frances help a rockstar Chief People Officer avoid her company’s bureaucratic tendencies and stay on the fast track to success. Tune in to learn how empowerment, reframing and intention can help accelerate your organization’s way of...
Published 03/11/24
Do you feel like you’re hitting a wall at work? This week, Anne and Frances are joined by Master Fixers Bob Sutton and Huggy Rao. Bob and Huggy are professors at Stanford University and authors of “The Friction Project: How Smart Leaders Make the Right Things Easier and the Wrong Things Harder”. Together, the four discuss how anyone can eliminate the obstacles to doing their best work—and create constraints that make work even better. Transcripts for Fixable are available at...
Published 03/04/24
You have a fantastic idea, but you're going to need help with execution. Thankfully, that’s what your network is for. In this week’s episode, a listener who developed her own pilates equipment business comes to Anne and Frances for advice on how to turn a successful product into a scalable company. With a little help from Anne and Frances, Bree learns actionable ways to ask the right people for help and make her goals a reality by focusing on what she’s great at! Transcripts for Fixable are...
Published 02/26/24
You know what they say about unsolicited advice (don’t give it!) but when it comes to SOLICITED feedback, author and executive coach Kim Scott says: bring it on. Kim believes that when it comes to improving your life at home, work, and anywhere in between, it helps to ask for – and provide – kind, but radical, candor. In this episode, Kim shares what she’s learned about embracing candidness and care in the workplace, gives tips on how to engage in constructive conversations, and opens up...
Published 02/19/24
Have you ever been caught in the middle of a tricky work dynamic, struggling to please everyone? Sometimes, the only solution is to realize it’s not your job to fix everything. This week, Anne and Frances talk to a listener who’s struggling to manage relationships with multiple bosses with competing priorities. Together, they chart a path for this superstar employee to make it clear she can’t solve every problem while also safeguarding her career. Transcripts for Fixable are available at...
Published 02/12/24
Sure, we all want our work to speak for itself… but who will make sure your impact is truly seen and valued? This week, Anne and Frances are joined by Master Fixer Carla Harris. Carla Harris is a Senior Client Advisor at Morgan Stanley, the bestselling author of books like Expect to Win and Lead to Win, and an expert on building relationships at work. This week, she brings her wisdom to Fixable to discuss why it’s impossible to have a true meritocracy – and why strong relationships are the...
Published 02/05/24
Have you ever felt like something about your identity was getting in the way of your success? This week, a listener needs help pushing through the resistance she’s facing as a woman navigating a male-dominated workplace. Anne and Frances discuss what you can do when someone else’s bias is standing in your way. Together, the three uncover how you can find your agency in unexpected places – and why you must use it unapologetically. Transcripts for Fixable are available at...
Published 01/29/24
How do you find common ground with skeptical audiences? Robin Steinberg is the CEO of The Bail Project, an organization that advocates for abolishing cash bail and reforming the criminal justice system. She knows her work is vital, but public anxiety about crime and safety often gets in the way of lasting change. Robin Steinberg asks Anne and Frances how to communicate her mission to people who don’t understand what she does or why she does it. They help Robin craft a new outreach strategy...
Published 01/22/24
What kinds of writing gets people to take action? In his book, “Writing Effectively for Busy Readers,” Harvard professor and this week’s Master Fixer Todd Rogers discusses his extensive research into the most effective writing styles. Todd talks with Anne and Frances about what it means to be "radically responsible" to your audience. Then he shares the best (and seemingly counterintuitive) writing techniques to stir your readers into action. Transcripts for Fixable are available at...
Published 01/15/24
How can you communicate confidence when the future is uncertain? Claire manages communications at a transportation company that’s going through major changes, and she’s tasked with making sure everyone—from C-level corporate executives to people out in the field—get the information they need. However, she finds herself competing with industry news cycles and word-of-mouth speculation to get people’s trust and attention. Anne and Frances discuss the importance of authenticity and trust at work...
Published 01/08/24
Hi everybody, new episodes of Fixable are back next week! In the meantime, we are bringing back this episode in case you missed it. Anne and Frances are joined by their first “Master Fixer," author Claire Hughes Johnson, who’s here to help you fix your meetings! Her book Scaling People: Tactics for Management and Company Building draws on her executive experiences at Stripe and Google and reveals her techniques for getting the most out of the people she’s leading – especially while they’re...
Published 01/01/24
This is an episode of one of our favorite shows, What's Your Problem? hosted by former Planet Money host Jacob Goldstein. Each week, Jacob talks to entrepreneurs and engineers about how they’ll change the world -- once they solve a few problems. We hope you enjoy Anne and Frances in conversation with Jacob while we're still on a short break. Find more about What's Your Problem at pushkin.fm And remember — if you want to be on next season Fixable, call Anne and Frances with your workplace...
Published 12/25/23
This is another episode of one of our favorite shows, Leading Up With Udemy, hosted by Alan Todd, the Udemy Vice President of Leadership Development. We hope you enjoy it while we're on a short break! Roberta Matuson is a talent consultant and author of several incredible leadership books, including international bestseller Suddenly In Charge, Can We Talk?, and The Magnetic Leader. She discusses how to manage up and how to have difficult conversations at work. If you're looking to become a...
Published 12/18/23
Trust is the foundation for everything we do. So what do we do when it's broken? In this episode of TED Business, a familiar voice gives a crash course on the essential components of trust, and how to build them. Plus TED Business host Modupe Akinola explains how to apply those principles of trust with Black colleagues and others in the minority. And remember — if you want to be on next season Fixable, call Anne and Frances with your workplace problems at 234-Fixable (that’s 234-349-2253)....
Published 12/11/23
This is an episode of a podcast we hope you'll love. On After Hours, Harvard Business School professors Mihir Desai and Felix Oberholzer-Gee discuss and debate current events that sit at the crossroads of business and culture. In this episode, Felix and Mihir discuss how Sam Altman was fired and reinstated over the course of just a few days. Was the board right to dismiss Altman? Does the turmoil change how we think about hybrid organizations that combine nonprofit and for-profit motives?...
Published 12/04/23