The Modern Manager

427: The Meeting Portfolio Every Manager Needs

Planning an agenda feels like it takes forever, so too often, we skip it or do it poorly at the last minute. But that’s often because we treat each meeting like we’re sta

426: How Tiny Habits Rewire Your Identity with BJ Fogg

Most of what happens in a workday, from how you open a meeting to how you respond to bad news, runs on autopilot. Habits, not decisions, are doing the heavy lifting. Beha

425: 4 AI Tools I Use Every Single Day (And the Friction They Remove)

Most AI tools promise to make you more productive, but few actually remove the friction hiding in your daily grind. This episode breaks down four AI tools used every sing

424: How to Manage Up, Down, and Across with Kristen Harcourt

Most leaders pour all their energy into managing the people who report to them and forget the other two-thirds of the job: managing up to their boss and across to the pee

423: How AI Can Help Us Show Meaningful Appreciation (And Be More Human at Work)

Most of us have an instinctual positive response to great work.“This is amazing, thank you so much.” It feels warm and authentic, but could have been said about anyone or

422: Turn Uncomfortable Conversations into Just Conversations with Amy Jacobson

That stomach-drop feeling before a hard conversation? It's not weakness. It's your brain doing exactly what it was designed to do. Emotional intelligence expert Amy Jacob

421: The Difference Between Consensus and Agreement That's Costing You Decisions

Picture a room stuck for three weeks on one sentence for a new policy. Half the team wants a rule tight enough to enforce, the other half wants it loose enough to survive

420: The Hidden Force Pulling Your Team Apart (and How to Reverse It) with Matt Poepsel

Your team isn't falling apart because something went wrong. It's falling apart because that's what teams do by default, drifting toward disconnection unless someone activ

419: What It Really Means to Have Integrity

You say yes to the small stuff: the draft review, the book recommendation, the shampoo run. Then Thursday comes and none of it has happened. No one complains, but somethi

418: Insights on Effective Leadership from the LGBTQ+ Community with Dr. Joel A. Davis Brown

Some of the best leadership lessons don't come from business books. Throughout history, different cultures have developed wisdom for how we can interact with and lead oth

417: Why Hitting Your Goal Doesn't Always Mean You Were Successful

Hitting the goal doesn’t always mean the project was a success. A project can finish on time, hit every target, and look like a clear win on the dashboard while quietly

416: Stop Difficult Conversations From Going Wrong (Before They Even Start)

Difficult conversations are rarely difficult because we don't know what to say. More often, they fall apart because we have the conversation at the wrong time, in the wr

415: The 30-Day Onboarding Plan Isn't a Welcome Packet

Most onboarding plans focus on helping new hires feel welcome and settled in their role. But the real purpose of onboarding isn't orientation; it's creating clarity befo

414: How to Create Space for Strategic Thinking with Howard Tiebel

Most managers know they should spend more time thinking strategically. The problem is that strategy often gets crowded out by urgent tasks, endless decisions, and the pre

413: What to Do When a Meeting Gets Heated

When a meeting becomes tense, your natural instinct might be to calm things down. But when emotions start rising, the real problem usually isn’t the conflict itself. It’

412: How Great Managers Create Accountability Without Micromanaging with Molly Rodau

Managers often say they want more accountability on their teams. But accountability often feels like micromanaging people, chasing updates, or constantly correcting mista

411: 3 Types of Team Conflict and How to Resolve Each One

Some team conflicts seem to get resolved quickly. Others keep resurfacing in meeting after meeting, leaving everyone frustrated and no closer to a solution. In this epi

410: The Simple Coaching Habit That Changes How Teams Think with Laura and Dominic Ashley-Timms

Most managers think their job is to have the answers. But the managers who create the strongest teams often do the opposite: they ask better questions. The challenge is

409: The Feedback Conversation Managers Avoid (And How to Finally Have It)

Most managers think difficult feedback conversations are hard because they don’t know what to say. But often the real problem is that the conversation they’re preparing

408: Why AI Makes Human Thinking More Valuable, Not Less with Dr. Vivienne Ming

AI can now answer questions faster, cheaper, and sometimes better than humans. So where does that leave managers and teams? For many leaders, the instinct is to use AI t