A New Approach to Thriving at Work: The Biopsychosocial-Spiritual Model for Wellbeing

0:00 The topics and opinions express in the following show are solely those of the hosts and their guests and not those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We make no recommendations or endorsements radio show, programs, services, or products mentioned on air or on our web. No liability explicit or implies shall be extended to W FOURCY Radio or its employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing W FOURCY Radio. What's working on Purpose? Anyway? Each week we ponder the answer to this question. People ache for meaning and purpose at work, to contribute their talents passionately and know their lives really matter. They crave being part of an organization that inspires them and helps them grow into realizing their highest potential. Business can be such a force for good in the world, elevating humanity. In our program, we provide guidance and inspiration to help usher in this world we all want working on Purpose. Now, here's your host, doctor Elise Cortes.

1:04 Welcome back to a Working Purpose program which has been brought to you with passionate and pride since February of twenty fifteen. Great to have you with us again this week. I'm your host, doctor Earlis Cortes, and if we've not met yet and you don't know me, I'm an organizational psychologist and logal therapists, speaker and author. My team and I at Gusto now help companies to enliven and fortify their operations by building a dynamic, high performance culture and infra social leadership activated by meaning and purpose. You can learn more of best and how we can work together at gustodashnow dot com or my personal site at least Coortes dot com. Before we get into today's program, I'm thrilled to announce that registration is now open for a fabulous new conference for women for which I'll serve as the MC. It's called Thrive in twenty five and it's a jam packed few days in Chicago, June twenty fifth through the twenty eighth. Twenty twenty five designs to develop women as whole selves, from bolstering your mindset to your financial acumen, to leadership, to incorporating nature and art into your life to raise consciousness, and so much more. You can visit Thrive dash In twenty five the number for information and to register. Use my promo promotion code of Gusto all caps to gain access to the free books and programs. I'll be also gifting registrates registrants. See you there getting in today's program. We have with us today Matt Schenker, who is the chief solutions Architect, the chief operations officer and co founder at Mattermore, where they're working to empower the future of work, what they call work four point zero. He joins us today from New York. Matt, Welcome to Working.

2:29 On Purpose, Alice. Thanks so much for having me so great. As I said before we got on air, I love what you're up to, and I absolutely love the name of your company. Before we get into any of that, though, let's just let our listeners and viewers who don't know you yet yet the way that I do, just hear a bit about your background and how you found your way into the work you do today. Absolutely so. I've been a licensed therapist for over a decade. I got into that work because I was an addict who struggled. I had ADHD as a kid. I still hold the record for most suspensions given to a kid at the elementary school I went to so I hold that with pride, and you know, I fell into a teenagehood and early adulthood where I was really lost and overwhelmed, and that led me down a path of becoming a therapist and then a trainer of other therapists, and then working with schools to help them utilize the best of behavior science. And then while I was doing all of that, a whole bunch of my best friends kept calling me, and they kept asking me questions anytime they had a challenge with their employees. And finally I was like, what kind of training did you guys get? And they were like, what do you mean training? And led me to really working with organizations and leaders and transforming L and D systems.

3:39 And I was lucky enough to do that in a place where I met a whole bunch of people doing interesting things with AI. And since then we've been exploring how do we build an AI product that transforms how we lead and learn at work. That was incredibly succinct. Let's peel back that just to smanch here math first, kudos for being able to dive into your own aim to be able to help others. One of the things that I've learned in my purpose work, Matt and you probably have figured this out too, is when I curated this collection of stories and women around the world of how they discovered their purpose and are now serving mightily from it. I discovered in their stories that's four known paths to purpose, and one of them is what's ailed you in life? What has what have you struggled within your own life that in the struggling of it, that you've learned a way to help other people.

4:26 That sounds like your path. It's also mine. I had a meaning crisis in my twenties. That's what led me down the path of really studying meaning and purpose. So I just want to commend you for finding a way to take all of that struggle into not only helping yourself, but creating this whole path to help other people. It's amazing. Yeah, thank you. You know, for a very long time, when I was still seeing clients as a therapist within the at some point in the first session we would get into starting to explore what really matters most to you, and one of those key questions is always when are your greatest heartbreaks and what was most missing in them? Because those pains are what really lead us to our passions and that's even true for me.

5:07 Mm hmm, so beautiful. And then the next thing I wanted to go to drill down deeper on is you know, you found your way specifically into behavioral science. So how did you find that niche and why is that working so well for you? Yeah? I found that niche sort of just continually chasing an answer to a question, which is how do we as people work? You know? And undergrad I studied philosophy, psychology, and education, and then I got a master's in counseling. And while I was in grad school, I found this book by doctor Stephen Hayes about acceptance Commitment therapy, which is mindfulness based, values driven very much aligns with you know, the work and much of the conversation we'll be having today, But at that time it really hadn't disseminated into the curricula in grad school programs for psychologists, social workers, counselors.

5:56 So I had to travel all over the world to learn more about it and learn about meditation, and that led me to learning more and more about behavior science. And then when I started to then take that work and apply what I knew into therapy centers where I would work as a therapist or in schools. I would walk into these places and I would see the way people were operating, and I sort of felt the way I would imagine a surgeon would feel if we sent them back in time two hundred years ago and they saw people doing surgery without washing their hands. So I was really just chasing this question of how do we work and what sort of research have we gained to answer that question of how are humans wired? And why do we live the way that we do? And that led me through philosophy and psychology and education, and then really I stumbled into behavior science and fell in love with all of the answers and questions that really have been explored there through the last few decades.

6:52 It's always so amazing to me how people find their way right and really what they find compelling. Another thing that I'm intrigued with with what you're focus on, is, of course, this idea of well being. And I feel like I really only started noticing this showing up in the world of work and among leaders during the pandemic. And I don't know if you have a different perspective about that, but you know, I was a made for example, when Gallup put out a book on well being, you know, after all these years of being in strengths, and so I thought, well, Gallups twinting something out on wellving, it must be something here. So I would love for you just to comment on where you when you feel like it showed up as something of import especially inside organizations and leaders and why did it short when it did?

7:36 Sure, So I think for me what happened was I started going into these schools, and then these therapy centers, and then into workplaces, and I could see all the ways that we weren't applying what we knew in the behavior science were practices and processes for empowering performance. And so for me, it started with performance. And if you look at any elite sports team that is really well meaning professional sports teams and really high performance college teams, what you'll find is most of those coaches are applying the learnings from behavior science from the last few decades. And it just so happens that when you really care about empowering humans to do well, that means that you have to optimize towards well being, because, especially if you want to be a high performer through a season, one week isn't enough, you have to figure out how do we create sustainable high performance. And if you're a coach, you don't just want one season, you want multiple seasons.

8:31 Your dream is to create a dynasty so you can leave a legacy behind, and we haven't been applying those principles at work. So what we've found is in the early two thousands, as tech companies really started to surge and become so huge and the internet came online line, there became bigger questions as the borders around when and where do we work started to erode, we had to really answer some questions of how are we supposed to manage people so they can get work done across such great distances within this world where it seems like these borders around information and content that are flowing in are eroading and people are getting more and more stressed, and we're not really sure why that's happening. But in order for people to perform well here, we need to make sure that they are well, that they are healthy enough to be motivated, to stay focused, to actually continually show up to work. So I think the problems are what led us to exploring well being in the workplaces and the best workplaces in the world that have sustainable high performance.

9:26 They've been able to take what we've learned in the organizational psychology work and across all behavior science to actually apply them into systems, and now other workplaces are just saying, oh, we need to do that too, and if we want people to really be high performing, we have to focus on well being. You know, I find myself you and I were talking before we got on air that we see more and more of the preponderance at the convergence of some really great consultants, thought leaders that are really pushing the envelope on well being, on me, on purpose, on things like that, even you know, spiritual intelligence in the workplace, which I have the last chapter of my latest book, The Great Vitization, has a whole chapter devoted to that which really stakes to those higher values like you know, compassion and passion and purpose and things like that. So for me, this feels like it's just so obvious and natural, and yet Matt, there's still so much work to do in the world to be able to elevate the idea of well being and all the things that we're talking about in an organization.

10:28 So there's so much opportunity to matter and matter more and make a difference. That's right, And I hold both a frustration and a compassion when I'm talking with leaders and see sort of the obvious solutions and processes that really just aren't being woven into how people operate, because ultimately, people don't know what they don't know. And the reality is what's happened to our society through the last few decades as technology has continued to innovate, and again those borders around and when we work have really transformed. We've seen this like continuous partial attention really expand for people. We've seen rates of stress skyrocket, especially since twenty twelve when the majority of teenagers then had a smartphone, and so the ways that we relate with ourselves and each other have really transformed, and people are just more overwhelmed than they've ever been.

11:21 And very few kids grow up where they learn about how to regulate their emotions, let alone then how to regulate their emotions and relate well with others, And so you have folks that don't learn those skills that then as they go through manager development or as they become a leader in their organization, they aren't given that skills or understanding, and so they just don't know what they don't know when it comes to the skills that are really needed to manage people. Well, beautifully said Matt. And I also want to echo your point about having compassion for leaders. And it's a really, really tough job. This has got to be hard, Yeah, the hardest time perhaps in our history to be a leader because so much is expected of you and and workforce is incredibly discerning these days, and you've got a business to run and you're just trying to make things happen.

12:07 And I really want to extend that compassion too, And I'm sure you feel the same way when we when we work with our with our with our clients, that that sacred space of getting to be in their lives where we understand and we're right there with them for their greatest fears, their hopes and their concerns. Can I actually do this and it is sacred work to get to do. And so I just wanted to echo what you said about extending the compassion and that people don't know what they don't know, right, That's part of our job is to make it accessible. One of the things that I thought I really love reading over your whole list of talks that you give, mat, I mean you are You've got a man. You are a man with a lot of message to share. And given that I am unschooled in positive psychology, existential psychology, developmental psychology, those are all my jams. I thought it was fascinating that you have a talk on mas logo got wrong about our needs? So if you talk about that perspective, what's missing from Maslow and the needs?

13:06 Yeah? So, Abraham Maslow is a brilliant guy who has radically impacted what we know about psychology and behavior science. Even if folks haven't heard their name, they have come across his work or been impacted by behaviors that were inspired by his work. So really want to highlight that the real tragedy within Maslow's work is that it has become a copy of a copy of a copy, which is, if you really dig into Maslow's work, never in it has he ever created a hierarchy. That hierarchy that he created was from a few organizational psychologists actually and consultants who then wanted to make his work more accessible. And what you have with that triangle that puts food and air and shelter and money before belonging is really a representation of a cultural mythology at work. It was a projection of people taking what they believe to be true and imposing it and then using some of Maslow's concepts to really decorate it. But there's a really interesting book by Scott Barry KAUFMANZ. Yeah, no, amazing work. So he did some really interesting research around gifted and talented programs and children that went through there in the real markers for what creates a genius and the impacts of psychology of those sort of programs. But then he really got inspired by wanting to dig into Maslow and he wrote this whole book, and he went and he found Maslow's personal diaries and journals, and nowhere did he find a single mention of a hierarchy. So the whole point I

14:38 make there is that we have that hierarchy wrong. That really, when you dig into the research from the last century, what is abundantly clear is that belonging is not our middle need, it's not our third need, it's our base needed to what makes us most human. For the vast majority of the time that Homo sapiens have been on this planet, we existed as hunter gatherer nomads and tribes of people. One man doesn't stand a chance against a lion, tiger, or bear, oh my, but ten might and one hundred certainly do. So we are deeply wired to belong and look for reinforcement evidence of our belonging. And when we can understand that, everything else that we've learned about how humans work suddenly falls much more into place.

15:21 Matt, that was stunningly beautiful. Thank you for that. That really was I aligned with that. I had never thought of it that way, and I really appreciate that that perspective. Speaking of belonging, that's something also too, along with mattering, that I find to be such a wonderfully emerging concept. And I've had a couple of really amazing people on my podcast talking about belonging, including Jerry Koluna, who you if you've not met him before. He is a beautiful, beautiful soul. So all right, let's let our listeners and viewers just kind of percolate and chew one what you just shared about the centrality of belonging while we take our first break. I'm your host, doctor Elis Cortez, Wh've got on the air with Matt Schenker, who is a licensed professional counselor, meditation teacher and behavioral scientists who's trained thousands of therapists, educators, and managers on how to harness the greatest learning through behavioral science through the last century.

16:10 We'll be right back, and when we come back, we'll talk more about what he's doing at his organization called matter More, as well as the wellbeing theory that he has discovered in his practicing. Be right back. Doctor Elise Cortez is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite a last to speak to your organization, please visit her at eliscortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to a lease ALISEE at elisecortes dot com. Now back to working on Purpose.

17:27 Thanks for starting with us, and welcome back to Working on Purpose. I'm your host, doctor Elise Cortes, as I'm dedicated to helping create a world where people realize their potential at work, are led by inspirational leaders that help them find in contribul their greatness, and we do business at Better's the world. I keep researching and writing my own books, so my last one came out in March of twenty twenty three. It's called a Great Revitalization, How activating meaning and purpose can radical in liven your business, and I wrote it to help leaders understand the needs of today's discerning workforce and then offer twenty two best projices to fold in your culture to create that. You can find my books on Amazon or my websites at least Coortes dot com or Gustardeshnau dot com if you are just now joining me. My guest is Matt Schenker. He's a sheet solutions architect, chief ompreating officer and co founder at Mattermore, where they're working to empower the future of work, what they call work four point zero. So here, Matt, now, I want to get into some of the really interesting work that you're doing with your team at Matamore. But at first I have to have you situate what you're doing with this empowered wellbeing theory, a transdisciplinary bio psychosocial, spiritual model for understanding human wellbeing that sounds so incredibly inclusive and amazing.

18:37 Yes, Well, ultimately this theory was born out of a frustration that I had. The deeper that I went into the behavior science, the more questions I had about, well, how does Kristin Nef's concept of self compassion relate to stages of change theory? And how does attachment research relate to something like psychological flexibility? And where does motivation come in? And so anybody that begins their self development journey sort of also inevitably stumbles upon this question, which is what sort of concepts am I supposed to be learning about? Is it empathy? Is it emotional regulation? Is it mindfulness? Should I be meditating? Should I be reading more David Goggins?

19:19 What should I be doing here? And part of the challenge is we don't really have a solid framework that pulls all of these things together and tethers them with cords that makes it all clear. And so that's what I've done with the empowered well being theory is pulls all of that together. Essentially, there are six dimensions and a lot of it is a tipping of the hat sort of to Abraham Maslow himself. Rather than having a pyramid hierarchy, he had something that was more like a sailboat, where there is a sail and there's a boat. And so I've done the same sort of thing. It can be shaped as like a hexagon, where it's this cool like geometric shape. But there's essentially six dimensions that have six core psychological drives, and there are our growth needs and their grounding needs, and so we've got belonging. Every human being is wired to seek out connection. I need to feel that I am seen and valued. Somewhere there is insight. We are story creating creatures. We are driven to seek out coherence, and so that dimension is we cultivate insight, then we are feeling creatures. We use our sensations to make sense of the world around us. That is a core intrinsic drive within us. When we cultivate that drive, that dimension is embodiment. I am able to feel and function within my body. We are also wired to seek out orientation where and when am I? I have to be able to cultivate mindfulness in order to have some power over my attention. And as tribal beings that evolved that way, we are wired to seek out autonomy.

20:49 We need to feel powerful within our environment. And in order to cultivate our autonomy, we have to define what matters to us. We have to cultivate purpose. And then that six strives is we are wired to seek out mastery and that dimension is accomplishment. Accomplishment is the Latin word to fill with. And so when you understand those six dimensions, if you focus on those six dimensions, you will spiral yourself upward. You will cultivate a sense of fullness, you will cultivate well being in your life, and you'll be able to perform in whatever dimension you want to. That's amazing, Matt, Wow, I so align with what you've created. That's so beautiful, and I love the completeness of it.

21:30 That's just astounding to me, so refreshing. Yeah, thank you, And I'm hoping that as I sort of lay that out, you can even then imagine if you were to throw that up on an infinite sized bulletin board, you could see how all those different concepts that we've learned about and heard about, whether it's self development, organizational psychology, or positive psychology, or anything in the health research from the last century, you could see how you can really mix and match and plug all of those in somehow within that framework. Mm hmmmmm. Yeah, I definitely want to learn more about what you're doing here, and who knows. Like we said before, maybe there's some other ways for us to partner. But what I definitely want to do next, I think this now makes sense. We've laid to such a great groundwork here. I do want to hear more about the worker doing it matter More. But before we even get there, you know, I have to ask you about the name of your organization.

22:17 I love it, and I know it has probably many intended meetings, but let's let you situate why you decided to call it matter More. Sure. So, when I met my co founder, his name is also Matt. His name is Matthew Lazarus. When he and I got together, I was running three different businesses. I was working as a private practice therapist, I was traveling all over the world working as a L and D consultant, and I was doing a lot of speaking and coaching for leaders, and I was really exhausted, and I was seeing something across all of those spaces that was very similar to what my co founder was seeing, which is we were coming across people in their twenties, thirties, forties, fifties that were telling us the same story, which is essentially, I followed the rules, I played the game. I've built the big, bright, shiny life, and yet it feels hollow on the inside. Yes, but like they were getting achievements, but they weren't necessarilysarily feeling full in their lives. They weren't feeling like they mattered. And when you look at the data that really stacks up, especially through the last two decades, you see, especially young people, but not just young people, every single age group has more and more loneliness that is skyrocket and is at pandemic levels, and less and less of a sense of purpose. So we're lacking both belonging and purpose. We don't feel like we matter.

23:35 And again, if our base need is to belong like we did in a tribe, what we are driven to do is to feel like we are contributing somehow, and so ultimately, if we do nothing else, if experience with our product, with our business, within any conversation with us helps somebody feel like they matter more in their life, in their workplace and their family and their relationships, that's success for usautiful man. And let me situate and share that since you brought the way you did so beautifully. Is when I mentioned earlier that I found my way into the meeting and purpose path through the ailing experience in my mid twenties, what that was. And I want listeners and viewers to think about this for themselves, because we need a lot of these people that have what seems to be from out the external service an amazing life, but yet they don't have that. They don't think they have an emptiness.

24:25 There's something missing there. And I learned that even in my mid twenties, I was twenty six years old, I had been living in Spain and Brazil for I was just starting the process there that I did it for total of three years. I was going all over the world and I had a living maid, chauffeur gardner. I didn't have a visis, I wasn't working, so I was studying and I was very grateful for all those experiences. But after about a year of being into that. I found myself into a really deep depression. And what I realized back then I didn't have the words for or the access through the education that I had learned that it was an existential c It was like an early onset midlife crisis. And what I discovered is just what you said, Matt, is that we humans are wired to be of service to matter. And I was just consuming life.

25:12 That's all I was doing. I wasn't giving, wasn't I wasn't serving. I was just consuming And that's incredibly empty. Yeah, And so I just I'll situate that so that our listeners and viewers can also think about where they're sitting in relation to what you're sharing and what I just shared for themselves, because it's so important to get clear about where you are in that space for your own mental health, wellbeing, vitality and even later success. Yeah, and at least I'm with you, you know. Like I mentioned, I spent my teenage in early adulthood as an addict, and so literally I took consuming as far as I possibly could, just trying to consume anything that could dull the pain of what I was feeling inside that I didn't know how to hold. And the harsh piece of turning that programming around is that we can't flip from consuming to contributing without figuring out what matters to us. And there's all sorts of skills and experiences that are part of that, but we have to be able to figure out what actually matters to me? What does a full life mean for me? No one can actually hand you that compass. You have to figure it out for yourself, because no one can hand you a blueprint to your own fulfillment.

26:24 Yeah, and from the vantage point of logo therapy, So logo is, as you know, is Greek for meaning, and then therapy so healing through meaning. We recognize that meaning is our chief concern in life. It's our chief sense of motivation and energy as well. And then we have three sources of meaning available to us. But all of the the all of the meaning is registered through our values. So what you find meaningful will be different from what I find meaningful. So what I would add to what you just shared is that when we when we when we learn what it is that we value. And I have an exercise that to take people through experience simple to discern what are your top ten values, and then you also consider, as you're saying, well, what does a fulfilling, meaningful life look like for me? Well, now is something to work with. And I would say most of us for a long long time don't have the answers of those questions.

27:14 Yeah, in a lot of ways, you can live your entire life just continually going through that exercise, and that can be the only real source of reorientation that you really need. And what I continually find when we work with organizations, it's very much the same. Most dysfunctions within organizations are from either a dysfunction of being able to really clearly identify what matters here, what values really do you want to have happen here, or a failure in being able to audit what is happening in comparison to what we want to be happening. So, really, if you can get very good at that skill of identifying within yourself by auditing your own experience, by taking your emotions as data signaling to you what your needs are, and then clarifying your values to understand your personal story for how you get your needs met, then you can actually take that same skill set and you can turn it towards the organizations that you're a part of, and you can ask what do we need here to accomplish our particular mission whoever we're generating value, and how are we stacking up? What are the behaviors that are happening that we want to continue happening, what are the ones we might want to start happening, And what are the behaviors you want to stop happening because of how they either serve or undermine the values of how we want to be acting here.

28:32 Yes, we'll say hard to do absolutely right. And one thing that I always like to echo with what you just said is the importance of that unlearning because we do have to constantly keep learning, which we have to replace ideas, mindsets, behavior sets that no longer serve us. And I just think that's so important to frame and reiterate as well. And what you just shared there, Yeah, and that's really hard to do without having hope at the end of the tunnel. Grief is a really dark tunnel to move through, and any behavioral pattern that we're letting go of we have because it serves some sort of function, and that means it's going to be kind of hard to let go of it. It's been anchored into this identity. We've seen ourselves doing that behavior, and so in order to let go of a behavior, you have to have some sort of hope at the end that pulls you out of that tunnel towards the new behavior. And that's where again defining your values in your purpose really become crucial.

29:32 Mm hmm, totally agree with that. So it was all of that that we just spoke about was really the answer to why did you call your company matter more? So? Now tell us what are you doing at matter more? Yeah, so said really simply, the modern workplace is a data rich platform and so so much communication happens digitally, whether it's on Slack, on email, or on calls, and that gives us a very unique possibility. We can now harness that data to better answer that question what is happening here, so that we can better evaluate what do we want to have happen. And so ultimately what we've started is we've built out an AI manager copilot. So every manager that has one on ones over say Zoom, they can add a note taker just like any other AI note taker, and it will give them summary and action items, but it will also give them precise feedback based on who they are, what matters to them, what skills they need, based on who they are, their role in their organization, and then they're able to also share that data upward so that everyone throughout an organization can get some visibility on what skills are happening and progressing, so that coaching or learning development don't have to be gauzy and ambiguous and unmeasurable. Instead, just like we've had things like TikTok create incredibly personalized entertainment experiences, we can make learning an incredibly personalized experience that meets us within the flow of work. And that's what we're building.

30:57 Amazing, absolutely amazing. Let our listeners and viewers think about that for a second, maybe even check out your site, Madamore dot ai. While we take our last break, I'm your host, doctor Elise Cortes. We'll go on the air with Matt Schenker, who is a licensed professor, professional counselor, meditation teacher, and behavior scientist and who has trained thousands of therapists, educators, and managers and how to harness the greatest learnings from behavior of science from the last century. I've been getting into some of the work that he and his team are doing at Matamore. After the break, we're going to also drill a little bit more deeper into the leadership crisis and AI is rolling helping to solve it. We'll be right back.

31:47 Doctor Elise Cortez is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for a greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning fuse cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite a lease to speak to your organization, please visit her at Elisecortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on Purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to a lease a LISEE at eliscortes dot com. Now back to working on Purpose.

32:39 Thanks for stating with us, and welcome back to working on Purpose. I'm your host, doctor Elise Cortes. I mentioned in the first break that my last book came out in March. Three. It's called The Great revitalization, how activating any purpose canretically eligator business. I wanted to add that I gave you a three page assessment that you can download off of my website to assess the extent to which your organization is meeting the needs of today's discerning workforce. So you can find it at gustodashnow dot com. It's on the homepage at the bottom. Just scroll down and you'll be able to get it from there if you are just now joining us. My guest is Matt Schenkerk. He's the chief solutions architect, chief operating officer and co founder at matter More, where they're working to empower the future of work, what they call work four point zero. So a couple of things that I want to dive into here. You mentioned a little bit about the leadership part of the organizations, and I'm very very curious to hear your perspective on what you refer as to as the leadership crisis. Yeah.

33:35 I mean, it's a real tragedy of the modern age that we know so much, yet we use so little of what we know, and that's really at the heart of the crisis that we have today right now, at this moment, in time. We're living in an overwhelm crisis. That's the fertile ground of everything that our technology has innovated so rapidly, particularly over the last two and a half centuries, that socio culturally, we have not been able to adapt how we live with that technology to keep pace. What that means is we are tragically overwhelmed, which is why loneliness is skyrocketing. It's why mental health disorder, addiction, deaths of despair, mass violence are all skyrocketing. People are overwhelmed, and what that means is what we need more than ever are leaders that can take responsibility of the systems and organizations that we are a part of to help us cope with that overwhelm. And we have been trying to invest in developing leaders. We've seen spending on leadership development continue to go up year over year through the last twenty years, and yet satisfaction with one's manager at work continues to go down, which means again, it's another example of not using what we know in the right ways at the right times. And so that's the real crisis that we need leaders more than ever, and yet people don't experience that they have real leaders that they can trust. We've seen since the Nixon years trust and institutions has gone down into the right. So people are trusting institutions less and less. They're feeling more and more dissatisfied with their leaders despite the fact that we're spending

35:06 more on leadership development. Very crisply delineated. Now, you had already talked to us before we went on the break about how your model you're offering helps managers capture some of the sumer information and data, etc. To be able to personalize training. Sure, but I wanted to see if there was more you had to say about how AI's role can help solve this leadership crisis. There's more to it than what you already said. Yeah, when we think of ourselves as one example of how to harness AI to really try and solve this massive problem. And so if we zoom out a little bit, our core thesis that we really started with was, well, a question what's causing all of this overwhelm? And again, like I mentioned, you know, our technologies innovated, innovated so fast up until you know, the nineteen seventies, there was a real limit to how much content you could you have access to that you could consume, and nowadays we're sort of drowning in content. Any person today that has Wi Fi access has access to more content than any human being throughout history, no matter how rich they were.

36:13 We have access to so much content that any one human could sit down and spend their entire life and wouldn't consume all of it. And that content being deployed by the largest companies in the world to compete for our attention is contributing massively to this overwhelm. So what we need is a recreation of structure in our lives. Well, how do we do that? How do we figure out how to move through all this communication technology? Well, for too long, we focused on innovation of our technology to be about speed of communication, speed and spread, and that's really what it was about for a very long time. And what we've learned now is that that's not enough. In the nineties in the early two thousands, we heard tech innovators telling us about how the Internet software was going to bring freedom and well being to everyone because we're going to be able to communicate so far so fast that we're going to create more and more convenience, and with that convenience, people will have more free time, and with that free time, people will naturally make their lives better. But that's not true. We have to design technology to help us in every single aspect of our life from the way that it is designed at its foundations to help us live in ways that are well for us. And so AI is this opportunity because suddenly we have a technology that can help us reorganize our relationship with all of this information that we're drowning in.

37:38 And so that's the big of Oh wow. AI can do all of these things, and it can do that in very specific ways. One thing I would love is to not have to keep track of a thousand passwords for websites, where then I have to pressure password at least once a week. Great, that's something AI can solve. We can have more integrations between platforms so I don't have to have twelve tabs open just to do my job as a salesperson. And so getting to cut down on the amount of spaces that we pay attention, getting to bring more autonomy into the algorithms that we shape that then really inform how information is distributed to us. Those are just two examples, but the core opportunity here is finally we have a technology that can help us reorganize what is causing our overwhelm.

38:25 I really appreciate that because overwhelm is definitely a huge part of today's life. It really is, and you've really distilled it so succinctly as to what that issue is. I'm wondering next, then, I think this might actually fit. You have another talk that I thought was interesting. I think it might situate nicely into what you just now shared. It's called organizational mindfulness Beyond the self onto the system. Yeah. Yeah, So ultimately everything I've talked about, if somebody's listening, the next question is, Okay, well what do I do? What can I do differently? What does this look like really practically? And that's where organizational mindfulness comes in, where we talk about taking the concepts of empowered well being and creating an empowered organization or being an empowered leader, and so really simple frameworks that again easy to say, hard to do, but one simple way is to think about an organizational system. And that could be anything. It could be a classroom, it could be a family, it could be a workplace. I work mostly with workplaces, so let's go there. You're at a workplace, Ultimately, any business is a collection of people communicating and collaborating to create value for another group of people, and so the ways that we collaborate matter. For far too long, we have managed people and created ways of collaborating that focus on short term results at the expense of sustainable, regenerative performance.

39:50 We don't see this with elite sports teams because they have understood that that actually undermines their long term success. So if you want to have more sustainable, if you actually care about the wellbeing of your people, you take these concepts and you apply them. And there's three principles, purpose, processes and people skills. Can you communicate the purpose of what you're doing and why it matters to you? And can you understand what drives each of the people why are they there to work there? Can you connect who they are to the work that you're doing and help them feel recognized and acknowledged for that. And then people skills, can you show up with people in ways that build trust through all of your touch points, which helps to expand their window of tolerance of how much stress that they can actually handle so that they can do creative and difficult work and so information can flow throughout the organization, like every healthy organization needs. And can you build processes that help to optimize that regulation, that allow for recovery, not just optimize for people working like their foot is glued to the gas pedal. And so you focus on those three pieces, you can build an empowered culture. Again easy to say, how to do?

41:00 Oh, just such good stuff, such good stuff. Okay, now what I want to get to And you may have been speaking about this throughout the show, but since we I've now introduced this a couple of times, and how I've talked about you situate for us about what it is creating work four point zero. Sure, so work one point zero is the majority of human history, agrarian life. Before that, we were nomads, you know, and then suddenly we really developed a whole lot of knowledge about how do we grow things in a particular area. Before we had agriculture, we had to keep moving because if you use up all the resources, now suddenly can't stay alive. Once agriculture got involved, then you saw whole economies around that, around farming, and then people that were making supplies for the farmers, and then trade really started to explode, and then you have the industrial age, which is Work two point zero. And you have the digital age with the birth of the Internet, which is Work three point zero. What's important now is that we're in a time of transition. We have three massive supercycles happening right now. With the invention of with the surge of the Internet of things, the datification of everything, whether it's smart watch, smart mattress, or a neuralink going into your brain, we have access to more data and that is surging right now. The innovations we've had in the last few years are ridiculous. And the third is well being science, what we know about behavior and biology and the science that we've uncovered through the last few years. And those are three converging supercycles amidst a society that is more lonely and overwhelmed than we have ever been. And so we're in this weird time of transition, and so Work

42:30 four point zero we call the Empowerment Age because that's the optimist take. Ultimately, we don't know what Work four point zero could be. It might end up being something really sad and tragic. We certainly hope not, and we don't believe so because we meet so many people like you and I were just talking that are doing such amazing work that are trying to take what we know to build better systems. And so what we do is we have conversations with as many people as we can who we think are doing that work, and we're trying to build tools that help to empower organizations and leaders to be part of building the our work four point zero that we believe is possible. That's I'm right there with you in those trenches. Matt. This is so great, and I appreciate how you delineated the history. It's so interesting. I've had that. I've seen that done in other perspectives and other lenses. But I love the idea of the empowered workforce. That's also what I'm out to bring about.

43:17 Thank you, Oh, thank you. One other thing I'll say on that is, you know, sort of a hot take that I sometimes have is humans have always worked right, and we will always work. That doesn't have to be a dirty thing. That if you talk to an artist or a musician and they want to share what they've made with you, you know what they say, Hey, check out my work. Work can be something that helps us become more and more of ourselves. It doesn't have to be a place that is cold and gray and cubicled. I completely agree. In fact, when I'm out speaking about this very topic, I position that you know, I was raised by first farmers and then entrepreneurs, restaurant entrepreneurs. Wow. And what I was raised with, Matt is and this is what I'm helping. This is what I'm also to create in organizations help them create, is that work was never something that you know you had to do. It was a way of living, it was a way of being.

44:08 It's a way of serving the world. It's how you live your life really in many ways. So finding finding ways to make that an optimal experience that makes you feel that you matter, that you've contributed something that's important to you is the game that I'm out to play, and I'm happy to be in the trenches with you doing it as well. My friend. This is just so riveting what you're doing, and I think your approach to adding adding AI into all this is just so smart and timely and perfect. Maybe two things before we go our separate ways here on this one is what would you really like to see, you know, in terms of you talk about the empowered workplace, empower workforce, what does the ideal world look like for you when we've solved what we've had to solve and we do business the way we really want to do it.

44:57 Yeah, I think of one building better bridges between how we teach and learn from birth to death, and really making better bridges between schools and workplaces so that we can take everything that we know about how we help people perform and we implement it into how we design all of those systems. And to me, when I get really granular in workplaces, what that looks like is we use the best of our technology to bring out the best in people, not just to push things as fast as we possibly can, and we're not just focused on short term results, but we actually ask the question of how can we use all of the resources that we have at our disposal to create immense value and whatever our mission is in ways that also help the people here become more of who they want to be. And my dream is that we turn every workplace into a place that asks that question and has the tools and the knowledge edge to be able to explore and answer that question specific to what their business is.

45:58 I'm totally and called those places destination workplaces. So the next thing I want to take you to really quickly is that if could you share just maybe one example of a leader or organization that you've worked with and just you know, with how you've helped steward their journey, and like say, in a minute. Or so, sure, one really powerful example. There was a medical AI company that began using our product and we did a few trainings with them to really help the managers understand sort of what they were looking at and then really helped build some skills and understanding. But then what was really amazing was the feedback that they were getting. In particularly this one team, which was their sales team, saw how recognition was distributed for themselves. So these managers got to see that there were some people on their team they were delivering a lot of recognition too, and not a whole lot of others. And what we actually did was by giving them specific examples of how they could be delivering recognition better, more authentically, more timely, and more relevant ways for the players on their team. One we saw recognition go up by ten, so they were recognizing delivering that positive reinforcement ten times more than the quorder before we started working with them, and we saw the results go up by five hundred percent that quarter, and so we see this impact really meaningfully and that those are real business results we're talking about. And all of those people also reported higher levels of trust with their leader, and that leader reported less stress, and so that's a win in my book. And I'll also highlight

47:29 that that recognition behavior so far seems to be the one that when we work with employees, that's the one that they consistently call for more. What a beautiful finish, Matt, And that is just extraordinary work. Talk about mattering more. That is wonderful. I want to give you the chance to close the conversation, as you like, say, in maybe twenty seconds, what would you like to live our listeners and viewers with. Really it's a message of hope that right now, no matter how you feel about the world, we have a huge call of opportunity. We needeople to step up as leaders, to take responsibility for the relationships that they are a part of, to help empower people to be able to live fuller, to feel more recognized, to have access to more trust so that we can solve the greatest challenges and crises that face us. And we know everything that we need to. It's a matter of pulling together with people and using what we know works, and there are people out there doing that and you can be one of those people.

48:24 Beautiful finish, Matt. I am so grateful to know owe you and to share your work with viewers across the world. Thank you so much for being on working on Purpose. Thank you so much for having me, and great to know you too. Thank you listeners and viewers. You are going to want to learn more about Matt Shanker and the working and his team are doing it matter More to empower the future of work, so visit their website It's Mattermore dot AI. Last week, if you missed the live show, you can always catch a be recorded podcast. We were on air with doctor Josi Amrem. He's a dedicated distinguished psychologist, an executive coach catering to CEOs, entrepreneurs and other influential leaders, and a pioneer researcher in the field of spiritual intelligence. We talked about his new book, Spiritually Intelligent Leadership, How to Inspire by Being Inspired, which aligns with much of my message and the work that I do to develop inspirational leaders. Next week will be on the area Christopher Wung, Michaelson, and Jennifer Tosti Carras talking about their book is Showing Work Worth It? How to think about meaningful work. See you there and remember that work is inspiring. An educational way to be able to live your life and be able to realize your potential. And I will see you next week for another nourishing conversation. Let's Work on Purpose.

49:38 We hope you've enjoyed this week's program. Be sure to tune into Working on Purpose featuring your host, doctor Elise Cortes, each week on W four C. Why Together, We'll create a world where business operates conscientiously. Leadership inspires and passion performance and employees are fulfilled in work that provides the meaning and purpose they crave. See you there, Let's work on Purpose.