The Science of Happiness: Unlock Human Performance with Jessica Weiss

We can all create more happiness in our life, but we need to be intentional and deliberate about it. We need to use tools, we need to use information and organizations are in a wonderful position to bring that to the people that work for them.

Hey there friends. Welcome to Happiness Squad. This is the podcast dedicated to helping you unlock your full potential by mastering the art and science of happiness. We bring on the best leading experts on these topics to help you unlock your true potential and live with more joy, health, love and meaning in your life. Your host is no other than the star combo of Ashish Kothari and Anil Ramjiani who are both on a mission to provide you with an unfair advantage to be the masters of your experience and leaders in your industry. Get ready to be moved, challenged and enlightened on this podcast. It may change your life. Thanks for being here and joining the squad.

Hey Happiness Squad. It's great to have you with Ashish and I as we host guests who are industry leaders helping individuals and organizations to unlock their inner happiness and flourishing. What if I told you that happiness should be the science of human performance as an inner game? Leveraging happiness as a means through habits that can truly unlock your ultimate potential both at home and at work. Our latest guest tells us how Meet Jessica Weiss. She spent over 15 years doing endless research, speaking thousands of people all about happiness. Jessica is a consultant who teaches businesses how to find more happiness, fulfillment and satisfaction at work. She has experience working with global brands like Coca Cola and is a trusted source for those who are searching for tangible research based strategies to create happier workers. As a TEDx speaker and organizational leadership expert, Jessica uses her humor and tell it like it is style to teach companies across the country why work can and should be a source of happiness and how to create spaces where people love to work. During this energizing conversation with Ashish, Jessica and I, we discuss tangible tips that you can leverage from today at an individual or as a leader with your team. You'll learn how adapting how you journal the importance of friendships at work and perhaps even using poker chips in team meetings may increase engagement of all participants. Are you ready to flip the script and see how the happiness is the means and not the outcome? Then let's get started. Please join Ashish and I as we welcome Jessica to the Happiness Squad and rewire together. Hey Jessica. Hey Ashish. It's such a pleasure to have you on the Happiness Squad podcast. You know Jessica, while preparing to meet you with Ashish, I looked into your background, watched your TED Talk. Amazing. Totally inspired by it, you know, and one thing that my wife and I, we were chatting about was what's her definition of happiness? You know, has her definition of happiness changed or is it the same? So my first question to you is what is your definition of happiness and how has it changed from you since your early years till now?

That's a great question. To be honest with you, it's sort of a constantly evolving question. Right. Because I feel like I'm always adding something in and subtracting something. So the evolution of my definition of happiness, probably like a lot of people, is we all assume that happiness is this idea that it's all about positive emotions and being continuously cheerful and happy and all of that, which is all great. If we could do that. Kudos to you. But what I'm after is a much more of a long term lasting and sustainable happiness, right? So it's something that's much deeper and it's something that we can really work on and with information we can actually grow that lasting, sustainable contentment. So for me at this moment, my definition of happiness is happiness is made up of three things. It's around friends and relationships. It's around this idea of enthusiasm and engagement. And the third one is getting happiness and satisfaction from our work. So if we can grow those three areas of our life that will impact our long term lasting happiness for our overall life.

Yeah, I love those, Jessica. And so much in sync, you know, with our thinking and the work we are doing here in Happiness Squad. That's why I love engaging with you and your posts on LinkedIn. You know, it is true. So I mean, there are two reflections that I come from that, you know, one is there is a fourth that we often include and talk about and that's implicit in your work. I know that. Which is just, you know, overall, well, being physically, mentally and spiritually. Because if we are struggling physically, it's as I am right now. I literally hurt my back on Sunday and so there is real pain and suffering. I needed my wife to literally get me out of bed at 1:30 on Sunday night because I couldn't, I couldn't move my legs to get out.

Sorry, we're laughing now. It wasn't laughing then, but yeah, it was that.

But I think there is this notion of like, you know, keeping. We are living longer than ever before. Sure. But we are not necessarily enjoying the quality of life. We could because of, you know, as much that we put on ourselves to quote unquote, chase happiness. Right. We are taught early. And I loved your three because all three that you outlined are about happiness from within.

Yes, absolutely.

But that's not what we are taught growing up. Right. We are taught happiness is an end. We pursue through long hours, hard work, promotions, falling in love, finding the perfect partner, all of that.

Absolutely, absolutely.

And I loved your three because they are about happiness from within and it is so in sync. You know, one of the things that we get excited about, and I know you do too, is really helping people flip the switch. Flip the switch from making happiness be the means through which you can achieve any end, versus happiness being the end I pursue through suffering right now.

Yeah.

So it's beautiful. It's beautiful. Tell me this, Jessica. You know, I came to this when I was 43, 44, right. After a 25 year career and consulting and at McKinsey, you came to this very early on. I mean, you've been on this journey for the last 12, 13 years.

Yes.

You know, so tell me about your journey. How early on did you fall into. Listen, I want to make my life's work be about happiness and helping people and organizations be happy. Walk us through that insight.

Sure. So, you know, my background is actually quite similar to yours, you'll be surprised to hear, with a few diversions along the way. So the truth of the matter is I actually came to this happiness work very young. Right. So when I was an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania, I was lucky enough to take a class with Dr. Martin Seligman. And it was one of the most popular classes on campus. I was lucky enough to get into the class, and that class changed pretty much the way I thought about everything. And little did I know it would change the way what I would do with the rest of my life. But the truth of the matter is, in that class, for those people who don't know, Dr. Martin Seligman is the pioneer behind this entire science of happiness movement. And he said, I remember this, on the first day of class, he said, we spend all of our time studying unhappiness and ailments and illness and all the things that go wrong. Instead, let's flip it, right? Let's flip the switch and let's study happiness and all the ways we can grow it. And when he said that, I was like, oh my God, why aren't we doing that? And to be honest with you, at that time, I was fascinated by psychology and all of that, but that perspective was so refreshing to me and offered such a wonderful way to think about everything. So that set me on a very personal journey around happiness. Right. So that was me at 18. I had no clue how on earth I could make a career out of it. But it was, you know, something that I would like, voraciously consume. So anything I could read or watch or anything like that. So my journey started there. But truth be told, I too was an mba. I too became a management consultant. And I did a lot of work around organizational design and culture. And a lot of my beginning work was around innovation and creativity and how we could help these big Fortune 500 companies like American Express and all of those, you know, how can they bring more innovation and creativity into their work? And I worked with teams and individuals, and as we peeled back the layer on how they could, like, fuel growth within these big, huge, behemoth organizations, the truth of the matter is always what the kernel question was was how can I find more happiness in my job? How can I have more satisfaction from my work? You know, and that could come in a million different ways. How do I find more purpose? How do I define my contentment? You know, how do I achieve on a greater level at work? And when I realized that, that was the question that everybody was asking, that's when I realized that I could marry this idea of my personal passion around happiness. And then I could coach individuals, teams and organizations around finding happiness at work, which nobody wants to believe that they can do, right? So once I could marry those two things, I was like, okay, I have found it. I have found my Zen moment. So that's how it happened.

That is amazing. I've been heavily influenced also by Dr. Seligman. You know, I've read almost all his work as well as so many others like Tal Bin Shahar and Emma Seppla and others that came after. And I love it, friends. So you notice, you know, from as Jessica said, creativity and innovation are not possible. Think about it, right? Creativity and innovation are not possible when you're sad, depressed, anxious, fearful, right? You need a way of being which is the happy way of being, right? That allow these things to emerge, by the way. So is true for everything else about us, productivity. We are more productive when we are joyful versus under the gun connection with each other. We feel more connected. We are kinder, we are much better able to give. We are less stressed through these elements. And that's why for me, happiness should. The science of happiness. It's not just an emotion. As Jessica started our podcast with saying, it is not just an emotion. You can never ever be happy every single minute of your day. It is a lot deeper way of being but happiness is really. There is a science behind it. Right. There is a seriousness around this. And that's why happiness should be called the science of human performance.

Yes. I love that.

It really, it's important. If we want to be at our most creative, most productive, truly in the service of something bigger, we can choose to be happy. And research is pointing it as such. Right. There was recent paper at Oxford. I would invite you to look at Professor Yan Emanuel's work.

I just posted a book correlation.

Yeah, right. Jessica just posted on her LinkedIn, go check it out. Around the correlations between return on assets, shareholder returns on wellbeing, and from our own work research, we find, right, those teams that are happy are more creative, are more productive, almost 20% more productive. Who doesn't want that? More profitable. Who doesn't want that? And higher shareholder returns. So, Jessica, this is something that Dr. Seligman has been talking about for 20 years. You know, this is what Tal's been talking about for a while. In your last 12 years as you have engaged with companies on this topic, what is the biggest resistance that you come up against? What is the biggest questions you face? And how do you convince leaders? Because I'm hoping for some of the leaders who are listening here, your voice and your way reaches them and they pick up the phone and call you.

Sure. The biggest resistance that I find, and I'm sure you find this as well in your work, is this idea that happiness is some kind of frivolous notion that not substantive and doesn't really serve a purpose in the workplace. So that's the biggest obstacle that I often come up against. We don't have time for this. We have to do the real work. And this is work. And I'm not here to babysit people and to be sure that they are happy and content at work. And to a certain degree, I absolutely understand and can empathize with that point of view. But the truth of the matter is we all need to have agency over our own happiness. And that is something that we can all bring to the workplace. But I think that leadership and management is in a unique position to value this idea that happiness at work is something that an organization that leaders, supervisors, whomever it is, need to facilitate. And it's not something that will happen by accident. I think so many of these ideas, happiness, friendship, whatever it is, have been romanticized by society. Right. That it just will fall into your. Your lap and you'll be lucky enough to have it. And the truth of the matter is all of this can happen we can all create more happiness in our life, but we need to be intentional and deliberate about it. We need to use tools, we need to use information. And organizations are in a wonderful position to bring that to the people that work for them.

Beautiful.

Do you know, Jessica, as I hear what you and Ashish are saying about this, so I am the novice, right? And what resonates with me of what you just said is most people that know me see me as an incredibly positive guy. And I only in the last couple years. This is going to sound silly, but learn the difference between what it means to be optimistic versus being positive. So I'm Mr. Positive. I come in the room, I'm a, you know, burst of energy. But obviously I have my down days too. And I'm like, yeah, things aren't as good as I'd like them to be, you know, as equal of a high, I can have a low. And it's only after speaking to and meeting Ashish just over a year ago where the whole science of happiness started to come into my life. And I'll tell you, to this day, I'm still learning daily that this is truly a science, this is truly possible through habit formation. And you know what, yourself, Ashish and the others that you've, you've referred to, our prior guests have referred to, I truly believe that. Yes. As you, I love how you said it, Ashish. You know, happiness, the signs of happiness should be, you know, the signs of human performance because when we are happier, when we are joyful, we are more creative, we are more innovative. And I've noticed that in myself. And so on the back of that, Jessica, what I'd love to know is you have an arsenal of tips of habits that you, I'm sure, coach one to one clients on organizations on. Could you maybe share with Asha, Shania and our listeners, what are your, let's say, top three tips or habits that you love to share with your clients or your organizations that you partner with?

Okay. I'll try to keep it limited because I have way more than three, but I'll pick three.

Why don't you go with your whatever number of tips and then we will write it down and we'll pick three to kind of go deep into.

I love that. Yes, let's do that.

Perfect. Okay. So coming off of what you just said, right. You said that you're learning the difference between being positive and being optimistic.

Right.

There's two very different things there.

Yes.

And there have been some wonderful studies around optimism that I think is something that A lot of people overlook. And I think that we kind of need a fresh perspective on optimism. So my first thing I would say is let's learn how to be optimistic. And I am not somebody who is very like, I'm sort of not very. I'm a terrible meditator. I'm not very good at being Zen or any of that. Right. I'm a real New Yorker. But what I love about this perspective on optimism is this. So There are about 20 studies now that have told us that optimists live six to eight years longer than pessimists. Okay. And when I'm talking about optimists, I'm not talking about this illogical, irrational sense of looking at the world with rose colored glasses and everything is wonderful. That's not what being an optimist is at all. Right. What being an optimist is, is understanding that you have agency and control over things. That problems are not these huge overwhelming things. They're isolated events that we can all solve. Optimists are people who continually try harder. They're persistent, they're funnier, they have more friends. People want to be friends with them, they're funnier. So one of my really big one on one coaching tips and even coaching tips in terms of teams and organizations is to incorporate more optimism into your life. And everything that I talk about, when I talk about happiness, I like to say is this. I provide a buffet. Right here is your smorgasbord. You take what works for you. If you want a double portion of this and you want to leave something else behind, you do that. Because that's the way I do, you know, that's how I look at life. But optimism is a wonderful character trait that needs to be incorporated. So that's the first one just coming off of what you just said.

Love it.

The second one is this. This is not unique, but it is super effective. It works extremely quickly within two weeks, to be honest. And I talk about this in my TEDx and it's this idea of keeping a joy journal. So a joy journal is different than journaling and it's different than a gratitude journal. It's a slightly different perspective. It's around at the end of a day, every single day. And this one really needs to become a habit. I like to tell people that it's really important that you take pen to paper because it seems to activate neurons in your brain a little bit differently. So take pen to paper. But if you can't do that, write it in your phone. That's okay too. But at the end of the day. There you go. At the end of the day, I want you to write three things that brought you happiness that day and why. So the reason why this works, and it works within two weeks, which is really wonderful, is it forces you to notice the good things, right? It forces you. You find yourself looking for it all day long. But because you know you have to write down three things, right?

Yes.

So it, it focuses your attention on the good stuff because we as human beings are constantly looking at the bad stuff and ruminating on the bad stuff. So that's the first thing. The second thing is when you write it down, it allows you to re. Experience it, right? So it's this whole idea of savoring. I love this idea of savoring. You want to take the good stuff and you want to let it soak in and you want to redouble that experience. So by writing down three things. And it literally can be anything. It can be that you had a great sandwich for lunch, or it can be that you had a wonderful conversation with your best friend. You know, it can span the spectrum. But I say the joy journal, or.

My favorite one you said in the talk, I'm sorry to interrupt you, or that meeting got canceled because we all have back to back meetings. Thank God I got that extra hour back in my day. Sorry, keep going.

Yes, of course. No, no. That's what's one of the best ones. Okay, so anything suffices and it's completely personal. So you can do whatever you want. But what I love about a joy journal different than journal. And I'm by no means saying that you need to spend your entire life journaling. You choose how you want to journal. But I do think there's a little bit of a tendency to journal the bad stuff, right? You want to get it out of your head and onto the paper. So this journaling becomes a little bit of a negative experience. And for me, the joy journal focuses you on the wonderful stuff. So that's why I love the joy journal. And the third one is this. And this one is definitely pertains to work. And I think it's something that we're all. We all fall victim to this badge of busyness, right? We all have the bit. The busyness thing. So we're all super busy. And when you're really, really busy at work, what are you really doing? You're either jumping from meeting to meeting or you're spending hours answering emails, or you're not doing anything meaningful or anything that is giving you a Sense of accomplishment. So this is what I say, and I mentioned this in the TEDx. In order to have a wonderful day at work, in order to feel like you had a really great day, you need to build time into your day. And here we go again around this idea about being deliberate and strategic and on purpose. But you need to build time into your day where you are working on something that is meaningful to you. So in other words, it's important that you have really big goals and you should be working towards the goals. But you need to celebrate the small wins along the way because the small wins are gonna make you feel great every single day. So if you do those three things, those three things, and you can start to do them immediately, those will actually have a huge shift in your lasting happiness.

I love them. Isn't that so cool? A joy journal. I love your take. That actually so synced up, you know, also with some of the things we're doing in Rebuyer. But I love it. Do you have your own joy journal? Can we get from Jessica Weiss, Jessica's joy journal? Or if you haven't, are you planning to create one?

It's a very good idea and I should create one a hundred percent. But I certainly have a joy journal. But I don't market a joy journal. But I should. I should put it in a product.

Yeah, I think you should. I think you should put a pattern on it. I think there needs to be a Jessica Wise joy journal. And my friends, even though we are doing audio podcasts, if you could see Jessica, she just emanates joy. She just emanates joy.

Thank you. I appreciate that.

Just on the journal and the reason why I think you should. So I have shown the both of them on the video. My journal.

Right.

And I only started this last week and Ashish encouraged it and so I've done it. What's interesting about it though is majority of the page is around today's tasks and notes and there's only one line at the bottom. Great things that happened today. So what's interesting is one, you're right, Jessica. I've jotted down three good things, but not the why. Like what was special about it. To relive it, I am now going to actually cross a line in the middle of the page and I'm going to save half the page going forward with the why on the good stuff and not focus as much on today's tasks and notes. So, yes, there is a niche. Jessica, we're ready for you. So great suggestion. And then I'm going to do that from tomorrow. Sorry, from tonight.

And it will work within two weeks. So within two weeks of doing it every single night, you will start to feel the difference. So I feel like a habit that works within 14 days is kind of miraculous. And it's so easy. It's so easy. So I look forward to hearing how it goes.

No, for sure. I know you gave us three, but I do want to say I love how Ashish's idea of you can give us a few more and then maybe what we can do is Ashish and I can pick one or two and go. Can you tell us a bit more about this? So do you have any others that you want to add before maybe we probe into a bit more?

Sure.

Hi friends. We hope you're enjoying the tips discussed in this episode. If you're on the career treadmill, seeking the next promotion, experiencing stress and anxiety, or reach the top of your career and wondering if the sacrifices to get there were worth it, Ashish and I have been there and we're ready to support you. The Happiness Squad rewire program is designed to integrate the nine hardwired for happiness practices into your day. Within five minutes form proven habits to experience more success, resilience, satisfaction and creativity. You won't be alone in your journey. Check out the rewire link in the show notes. Make happiness your competitive edge to achieve your goals. Now back to the episode.

And maybe what I ask is Jessica actually think about. So I think these are three wonderful ones that are individual tips. Right. Even the busyness one is an individual tip. Tell me, then share with our listeners. If you have two or three tips that are for leaders, you know, who are leading teams, what are some tips that they can do to make sure their teams are actually happier and hence more productive, more profitable, more creative, leave less all of that wonderful stuff.

Sure. So I'll come at this from two different angles. The first one is, I think it is the leader's responsibility to foster, facilitate and grow connection on their teams. Okay.

Yes.

So this is something that actually needs to come down from the very top and needs to cascade throughout the entire organization. But on the other hand, this is something that an individual manager can take ownership over in their specific team, even if the rest of the organization is not valuing it. Right. So you can become your own little microcosm where you can spread. Read this idea. But this idea of connection within a team is critical. Right. We all know about friendship and how imperative friendship is. Friendship at work. I'm sure you've seen the gallup study that says those people who have a best friend at work are more satisfied, more productive, more likely to stay, more likely to recommend their organization. I mean, a whole host of things. Even if they decide to leave the organization, they'll still recommend the organization. So it is the leader's responsibility to facilitate connection and friendship on their team. And that can come in in a number of different ways. Right. So it begins at the very beginning when you're interviewing for new team members. You need to be aware of this, right? You need to be thinking about, will these people have chemistry? Will these people get along? Are these personalities that will mesh? That by no means. Means that you're supposed to be hiring all of the same people, but you're supposed to be hiring people who you see, who you can foresee all getting along in a group. So it can start from that very beginning point. And then I think leaders have a responsibility as their team grows and as the team stays together, they have a responsibility to facilitate true connection. And that is not around silly exercises and icebreakers and whatever or team, you know, building exercises. This is around real connection and real friendship. So that is my first one. I'm a huge believer in that. Right. I think that people look at work entirely wrong. I think that they look at work as, where should I work? It really should be who am I working with? Because that is going to be a better indicator of satisfaction. So that's the first one.

I love that. Jessica and folks who are listening, if there is a really powerful exercise I invite you to do to build this real connection, because it's not fake connection. It's about bringing. And so seeing the people on your team in their full beauty, in their full beauty of their greatness, but also in their brokenness or imperfections and sufferings that we often don't like to talk about. And this exercise is this. Next time when you have a team event, you can do it just at your work, or if you go out, sit down and ask your team members to share with you their origin stories. And the exercise is as simple as this. Tell us about three experiences in your life that have shaped you into who you are today.

Yes, I love that.

And just go around and have people share that, and all of a sudden you will notice things. You know, every time I've done this exercise with clients, people who work together for 10, 15 years Discover New parts of each other, that connection, that thing that. Oh, my God, I didn't realize. Did you grow up on food stamps worried where the next meal was going to Come from. This was a CFO having a conversation to somebody else who was a financial analyst. I always thought you always had all the money you want. Now I understand where you come from. Right. I mean, it creates real connection because we see each other.

And what's really interesting, I also do a similar exercise to that, and it's a brilliant exercise to do in a group situation where you would think that people might not really want to share, but the truth is, and maybe you found this similarly, people share incredibly personal things.

Yes.

Incredibly personal things in a work environment. And it's. It works magic. Magic.

Yeah. What is your question, Jessica? I'm curious. What is the exercise? What question do you ask people to talk about?

So I don't say origin story. I say, tell us about Three Peaks and Three Pits. So we go around the room and we do Three Peaks and Three Pits. And really, it's around, you know, what are those momentous experiences that you really feel have built you to who you are?

I really, really like it. Three Peaks and three Pits.

Yeah.

My biggest learnings have come from when I have actually stumbled.

Yeah, me too.

Right?

Yeah.

And then the other thing that it does so beautifully, I love it. The second reason I love it. Right. Jessica, what you just said, three pits. Is when we fail, sometimes feel we're the only one failing.

Right.

When it is a shared experience of all around us. And I think it's allows us, when we feel, even when we fail, that we are connected in that shared humanity with everybody. It makes it easy to ask for help.

Yes.

It makes it easy to not feel I gotta solve it by myself. And frankly, it just makes it easy to be compassionate to your own self.

Yes. And I think it makes it much, much easier to connect with people who seemingly seem perfect to you. And when they expose, you know, whatever it is that has happened to them, their. Their parents are divorced or they had an eating disorder, whatever it is, first of all, the fact that they're willing to expose it, and then the shared connection in that story, that's where you really start to kind of develop real, true friendships.

Yeah. Because we see each other not based on the armors and the masks that we hold, but we see into our souls. Yeah. I love that. Thank you for sharing that. I'm actually going to use that if it's okay with you. Please do one of my workshop that's coming up. Thank you, Jessica.

So the start of our leadership team meetings where I work, one question we ask, we try to ask, is like an icebreaker.

Right.

You know, and hey, you know, what was one great thing about last week or the one question that came up that I loved? But here's the pit of it. Who are three people you would invite to dinner? Anyone in history, anyone in time, athlete, male, female, whatever. Who would you invite? And. But what's. What I love about what each of you have just shared from your examples is again, the why or the what, the depth, the context. Because if I say, hey, I'd love to have Michael Jordan, John Elway, and you know, Tom Brady, okay, great, cool. We love, he loves football, he loves basketball. Great, cool. Move to the next person. But when you actually really ask a question that is personal, what's powerful about that is you're getting the context, you're reliving that experience that either you're writing about, but now you're able to narrate it and connect with your peers. I think that's really powerful. So I do love again, the further depth that your questions that each of you kind of posed to your groups really generate and garner amongst the team. So back to the tips for the leaders.

Right? Okay. So the first one was around this idea about connections, and the second one feeds into this idea. So once we kind of are facilitating, and the truth of the matter is the connection piece is an ongoing and continual battle, and I do call it a battle, but it is something that we need to be working at constantly and continually. But the second thing that I think is the leader's responsibility is fostering this idea, idea of trust amongst the group. Right. This whole idea, and I'm sure both of you know about this, the whole idea around psychological safety. But the psychological safety piece is critical in finding happiness, in being able to have contentment, in being able to do everything that you need to do at work. So it is fully the responsibility of the leader to both foster connections and create that trust amongst the team. And I think that what's wonderful about it is that can really be like your little capsule and you can really feel that you're making an impact on the people on your team. You're making an impact, quite honestly on the entire organization. But it can really begin with just the things that you have control over.

Yeah. And so powerful. Right. I mean, the research is very clear on that. Right. Project Aristotle, the work done at Google showed that the highest performing teams, what differentiated them was psychological safety. Dr. Amy Edmondson's work around psychological safety. She actually coined the work psychological safety. And she coined it because she found this counterintuitive finding around higher performing teams Having higher number of errors reported.

Yes.

And it wasn't that they made more errors. They just made it safe to talk about the errors so they could learn from it.

Exactly right.

How powerful. It's beautiful. And it is true, Jessica. I mean, it's something, as you said, both connection and psychological safety. It's an ever evolving field. You have to keep at it. You can't do one thing and say, okay, I talked about it once and now we're good.

Exactly. We're connected. Done.

Yeah. But this is one of those concepts, Jessica, if I may. It's psychological safety. You know, it's the most band need around Wood. Everybody talks about psychological safety. Psychological safety. What are some ways in which leaders actually can build this from your experience.

Yeah. So a really basic one, like super basic and can be instituted without even any necessarily back planning or anything. I think it is around this idea that you, as the leader or as the person who's running the meeting. Right. It is your responsibility to be sure that everybody speaks in that meeting. Right. Because there are certain personalities that are more likely to speak just as a function of who they are. Right. Just their personality traits and others who are going to be more quiet. But you want to create an atmosphere and an environment where everybody can speak. So there's a number of ways that you can do this to be sure that everybody in the room is speaking. And it can be. I mean, this one is going to sound so basic, but it works, is you give people chips, three chips, two chips, whatever it is. And when you speak, you have to give your chip into the center. So someone who speaks constantly and continually gets two or three chips and that's it. And someone who doesn't speak at all has three chips that he or she hasn't used yet. But everybody has to use their chips so that we can be sure that we hear all the voices in the room. And there's parity, there's equity, there's diversity. Right. It's super easy, but it works.

I love it. Three chips, that's another product for you, Jessica. Start making chips that teams can buy and use the chips. I love it. I love it. And multicolored chips at that.

Yes, exactly right.

I know, it's beautiful. It's. You know, I love it because it's so practical. What you're suggesting is so practical because there are certain people who dominate conversations and there are others who don't speak up.

Yes.

What a beautiful, fun way to just even create awareness.

Exactly.

You know, from awareness create comes choice. If you're not even aware.

No, exactly. And it's a great way to even have self awareness. But getting back to what you said around, you know, really practical, I hope, and it's one of my personal values that everything that I talk about is super actionable and super pragmatic. I don't ever. And that's because to me, I feel that's one of a primary obstacle around talking about happiness. Right. It's very much in this like, ether, this atmosphere. How do we even like wrap our brain around it? And my goal and my ambition with everything that I teach and I share and whether it's academic research or my personal experience, it's always around making it as practical as possible, as doable as possible. Because that's where, you know, if it's not doable, then don't tell me about it, you know, like, don't share research with me if I can't figure out a way of how I can do that in my team. So that is a personal value of mine.

Just on the back of a chat we had with Amy Elizabeth Fox, and this is someone that I know, Ashley Schuht, near a dear. You know, one facet about the example you gave I find fascinating is how many chips does the leader get? Because I think sometimes whoever is leading that session has an agenda or has, you know, wants to control it, wants to really own it, potentially because of whatever, you know, maybe just how they're feeling or what they're bringing into that session. I think it's a real open invitation for even the leader to actually give up their chips and go, okay, you know what? I really want to hear what people have to think about. I'm not going to hold the chips. In fact, I might delegate that responsibility to somebody else to really give the team that comfort, to foster that type of culture, that type of conversation. So I think it's something that I do love and I almost would say open invitation to everyone, all listeners. How would you delegate the chips? How would you distribute the chips? How would you see that potentially changing the dynamic of the safety, psychological safety you bring into that, that meeting, into that room?

Yeah. And it's interesting to think about whether the leader gets no chips. Like maybe the leader has no chips and we really just let the conversation see what happens at that point. Now, in certain situations, that's just not practical. And there are certain situations where as a leader, you want to frame the conversation in a certain way. But I do think that it's something interesting to toy with, that maybe the leader says nothing Sometimes. And we see where that lands.

Usually, yeah. And the beauty of it also, or if I could, you know, add on what you're saying and then even modify it a bit and say, you know, you set a rule which is as a leader, you may get a chips, but you don't get to put the chips till there are four chips or three chips.

That's great, right?

So yes, you speak, but don't speak because we are all so familiar with the Sunflower effect, right?

Yes.

Which is the leader speaks and everybody goes. Yes, there we go. That's the answer.

Exactly.

Anybody who's not agreeing with it is not going to say it.

I'm just saying Parker Brothers and Hasbro and Mattel and all those board game companies right now listening to this, I can just imagine they've got, you know, whoever, product development on the phone developed this game quickly before. But I love the rules and like the, you know, something that you shared, you were kindly enough to share these tips about from an individual, from a leadership perspective. You know, as you know, Ashish has authored the nine Hardwired for happiness practices. And we do believe that happiness can be your competitive edge. And just to ask you, of the nine, is there one that resonates or more that you feel is your competitive edge? It's something that you like to bring to the table on a day to day basis.

So they're all fabulous. The one that resonates most with me is this idea of community. Because so much of my work is around relationships and friendships and building community and the value of community. So to me that's the one. And I think that, you know, in the world that we live in, I think that the whole idea of community is fleeting and changing and so, so needed. So that's the one that resonates with me most deeply and truly brings me that feeling of like deep contentment, that feeling of being part of a community on so many levels, right? So it's this idea that you're part of something that's bigger than yourself, right? So that's the first kind of notion of community and then the individual relationships that you have within that community and then it's this idea that you're developing diverse interests and aspects about yourself, right? So maybe you're part of a number of different communities. This is your religious community, this is your tennis community. I'm just kind of, you know, throwing things out there. But that's why the notion of community or, you know, a political community, whatever it is, but that's what really kind of Deeply resonates with me and brings me true, lasting happiness.

Yeah, it's one of my favorites too, by the way. Jessica. Right. It's relational is who we are.

Exactly.

We had a conversation, Ashish, with Patrick from Telemach. And since then, believe it or not, Jessica, Ashish and Patrick mentioned, hey, you know, call your friends more often. Don't rely on, you know, Instagram or Facebook to remind you it's their birthday. I kid you not, the one thing I've taken from that and I do is on someone's birthday, I'm calling them up now. And I think that, you know, again, an invitation, just a simple thing to build community, whether at work or in life at home, is call up one or two people whenever you get a chance. Don't message them for their birthday or to wish them for their anniversary. I did that with a friend of mine who lives in Singapore the other day and he was shocked. He's like, whoa, this is old school. So again, just those simple little gestures that just take a few minutes can be game changing.

It is. I agree with you. That's actually, for me, that kind of reaching out to people on a very personal level is for the people who graduate from the Joy Journal. That's the next level.

Yes.

Love it. So, Jessica, we would love to kind of start to wrap up. And it's something we enjoy doing with our guests. When we wrap up, we'd like to do a little bit of a rapid fire. Fire. So we've taken this kindly from our good friend Renee Brown. I'm sure she won't mind, but the first question we have for you is which book on flourishing do you absolutely love?

Okay, that's a tough one. But I will say, I'm just going to say what I've read most recently that really kind of stuck with me. There's a great book called the Good Enough Job by Simone Stolzoff. I'm pretty sure I butchered his name, so I apologize. But the book is fabulous. And it takes this whole idea that we've been fed, this notion of if you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life. Which is one of the most irritating sentences I have ever heard. Right. So it's this whole idea of maybe we need a good enough job. Now, I don't know if I fully ascribe to that philosophy entirely, but it was a really interesting perspective on work and I really enjoyed it and I highly, highly recommend it.

Awesome.

The Good enough job.

Cool.

Second question, in a time, which is you know, in a world of imperfection, and we're going for always perfect. I love that idea. I'm going to pick that book up. Thank you.

It's interesting. It's really interesting.

And by the way, in the back of Ashish's book, Hardwired for Happiness, he's got a list of books, and I kid you not, back to our earlier topic around learning about the science of happiness. I'm literally going through where I can one by one and trying to pick them off. So again, also, if anyone, any of our listeners need, you know, a list that's also a great source for finding a book to read. Next question. Your favorite teacher or thinker could be spiritual. It could be athletic. It could be philosophical. Who's influenced you the most?

Okay, so who's influenced me the most? I think Adam Grant. Adam Grant has just such a wonderful perspective and aligns with, I mean, astoundingly brilliant. Right? So, of course, everything that he says, but says everything in such a simple, practical way that I always say the most intelligent people, what the people who most impress me are the people who say things in the simplest way possible. And you say to yourself, what on earth did I not think of that? Right? So everything that Adam Grant says, I'm always like, yeah, that's exactly it. So, yeah, I would say Adam Grant.

Yeah. And friends, check out his book, Give and Take. He wrote a new book called Think Again. But the Give and Take book was just truly, truly amazing. I loved it. I think he also wrote Think Fast and Slow. Or was it somebody else who wrote that?

No, I think he wrote that. He also did. You. You said rethink, right? And then he had actually his book with Sheryl Sandberg is really good too, called Plan B. It's excellent.

Yeah, it's option B.

Option B. There you go.

Awesome.

Beautiful.

Okay, now we're going to shift the most recent or your favorite show that.

You'Ve binge watched so many because I spend way too much time doing this, but I will say my most recent one. Okay, so I'm going to give you two.

Cool.

Okay, so there's one that I absolutely love that sort of soothes my soul at the end of a log day, and that is the Great British Baking Show. I adore that show. I can watch it a third thousand times. So that one. And then in terms of a show that I find super engaging. So well acted. Great storyline. Is succession. So good. So good.

Raj brought that one up. Ashish, on the last chat, it was between Ted Lasso and Succession. He's like, which one lifts him up versus which one doesn't? And he was like, succession. So, yeah, love it. Succession. Do you know on the back of your favorite for food, I just finished watching the bear. Highly recommend that.

Oh, yes, Yes. I need to watch that.

One last question. The song you put on when you want to just pick yourself up and dance away.

So there's a gospel song called Happy Day.

Yes.

And I adore that song. So when I want to put myself in a really good mood, I happen to love gospel music. It really kind of hits that, like, a really joyful pitch inside of me. But Happy Day is a great one.

Awesome.

Happy day, happy day. I'm going to add it to my playlist of joyful songs.

That's it.

Asha, you need to share that Spotify playlist. I think that's brilliant because it's. I think anyone who needs songs, books like this is where we need to be sharing.

That's.

That's awesome.

Love it. Yeah. Well, let's make it happen. Jessica, this has been such an amazing conversation.

So much fun.

I've loved, loved. You know, we're in so much of the. Such kindred spirits, and, you know, in a world which is more prosperous than has ever been, you know, as generations, we are more connected, we're living longer. We are frankly, more efficient. We can do so much more, you know, in one tenth of the time. It's crazy that we are at the same time living where we are more stressed, we are more lonely. We are not enjoying the later years, and we are busier than ever. Right? Busier than ever. We have no time. And I love it. It's been such a privilege. Dear friends, if you want to make a shift, the key is happiness. And if you want to bring the magic of Jessica that we are experiencing here, bring her into your organization, into your team, or just reach out to her and leverage her insights and her last 12 years of work in this field of happiness to help you truly also unlock. Make happiness your competitive edge. Live your best life, and let's collectively heal the world. Create a much kinder world.

Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. This was an absolute pleasure. Thank you.

Thank you, Jessica. Thank you, Ashish.

Thank you.

We hope you enjoyed this episode on the Happiness Squad podcast. Make sure to hit subscribe on your chosen platform that you listen to us on. If you enjoyed the tips discussed, looking to combat stress burnout, or seeking deeper fulfillment, or navigating life transitions, then our Rewire program is designed for you. Rewire is your key to unlock your full potential to experience more success. Resilience, satisfaction and creativity make happiness your competitive edge. Check out the show notes and learn more about how you can benefit by rewiring away from fear in between episodes. Follow along on Instagram at my happinesssquad for tons of tips, insights and short videos designed just for you. Until next time.