Why Work Should Be Fun (Sometimes): The Case for Joy & Humanity at Work

Todd Henry [00:00:02]:

There's a moment that I often come back to. Years ago, I walked past a whiteboard in an office where someone had scribbled, we are not machines. Four words hastily scrawled in a dry erase marker, half erased by someone's shoulder. But for some reason, it struck me, because in a world of slack pings, back to back meetings, and inboxes that never quite hit zero, it's easy to forget the simple truth. We're not machines. We're people. And if we're doing creative work, why would we want to be machines anyway? And yet, so much of modern work feels like it's optimized for machines. Right? We chase efficiency, we reward conformity, and we value speed over thought.

Todd Henry [00:00:45]:

We wear busy like a badge of honor. And somewhere along the way, we've traded deep connection and personal meaning for productivity hacks and performance reviews. You gotta hustle, bro. Today on the show, we're gonna push back on that narrative. You're gonna hear from two brilliant thinkers who are leading the charge to make work more, well, human. First, Bree Grof, who is a consultant, author, and expert on organizational transformation, is gonna make the case that work most days should be. Wait for it. Fun.

Todd Henry [00:01:19]:

Not because we're trying to turn the office into Disneyland, but because joy, play, and creativity are the raw materials of meaningful work. When we strip away the bureaucratic clutter, what's left is something profoundly energizing. People using their talents to create value. Imagine that. Then in the second half of the episode, Emily Kasriel, a journalist and author of the new book called Deep Listening, is going to challenge us to rethink what it means to truly hear someone. She'll explain why listening isn't just a soft skill, but a radical act. So whether you're leading a team, navigating a career transition, or just trying to survive your next zoom meeting, this episode is for you. This is Daily Creative.

Todd Henry [00:02:04]:

For 20 years, we've served up weekly ideas for creative leaders who want to be brave, focused, and brilliant every day. My name is Todd Henry. Welcome to the show.

Bree Groff [00:02:17]:

I like the physics definition. Work equals force times distance. It's just some effort that moved something. And so when we think of just that fundamental unit of, if I'm getting to create something, do something, use my skills. Maybe I'm around other people that I like. Hopefully someone else is appreciating it. So often, people believe work is called work for a reason, and it's hard, and that's why you get paid. But if we start with that assumption, we've lost before We've begun because we haven't even explored what could be fun about this.

Todd Henry [00:02:52]:

That's Bri Grof, a senior advisor at SY Partners. Her latest book is called Today Was Fun, in which she explores why the workplace is boring and how we can make it more, well, obviously fun. Now, before you think, oh, sure, it's like Disneyland every day around here. Bree is also a pragmatist and a realist.

Bree Groff [00:03:12]:

Not every day is going to be fun. Sure. And not all parts of work are fun. Like, I really dislike making decks, and yet I've made, like, about 1 billion of them in my consulting career. And so it's a nod to the fact that we don't need to stress if we're not having fun. You haven't picked the wrong career if you're not having fun every day. What I'm advocating for is that we not spend many months or years not having fun before we stop and say, hey, I think my finite days on this planet are deserving of something better.

Todd Henry [00:03:46]:

As I was going through the book, I kept thinking back to this sort of iconic moment in the TV show Mad Men, where I think it's Peggy and Don Draper are in the elevator, and she's complaining about, why don't you do this? Or, why won't you listen to this or whatever. And he said, that's what the money is for. And the idea, to your point of what you're just saying, the idea is the reason we do all this is for the money, and the money makes everything okay. But also, and you argue this in the book, when we don't adopt a mindset that is, hey, this can be fun. We're making things. We're creating value here. It actually has a negative impact also on the work that we do. Right.

Todd Henry [00:04:27]:

If we're not really fully in it, if we're not bringing our combination of passion, skills, experiences to the table, that can have a negative impact on the kind of value that we create, for sure.

Bree Groff [00:04:37]:

And, yeah, it's leaving not only the creativity and the business value on the table, it's leaving your joy on the table, too. So, first and foremost, take the money. Yeah, we have to have a living wage. If you're being paid a boatload of money, amazing. But also, there's no reason why we, in doing that, need to sacrifice the days of our lives for that, because brilliance does not require pain. And I think we've created this false equivalency that if I'm not struggling, that if it's not enormously difficult, I'm not creating something of greatness, but that's just not strictly true. It's sometimes true, of course, but it's not always true. And so if we can think of our fun not only as making our lives better, but also making our work better, because playful work is often better work and making the business better.

Bree Groff [00:05:36]:

It's like when you see, especially like in industries like brand or advertising, consumers are attracted to companies that are magnetic, creative are doing something different. Like we as humans are drawn to people who are vibrantly and fully themselves. That's interesting and it's compelling and it makes us feel like, oh, maybe we could be that way too. And so I think the more that creative professionals can bring that they're doing better work, but which is important, but more I care about, you're having a better life. You're having a better life because you are giving something of yourself, of your ideas, your point of view, how you think the world should be run. And that's one of the coolest parts of being a human. And so that's, I think, why we do brilliant creative work.

Todd Henry [00:06:27]:

You know, as I was chatting with Bri, I realized just how deeply this mindset of grinded out lives in me. It goes back to my youth in sports. I mean, I've always prided myself on someone who can push through, who can hit my marks, who can show up every day. It's how I've published seven books in 14 years. But I realize how easy it is just to put your head down and crank away at your work without really being present and enjoying the process. And I think that's what Bree is saying. It's not about avoiding your responsibility. It's about figuring out how to make it something that you actually enjoy doing.

Todd Henry [00:07:03]:

You know, it's funny because a lot of people think that my book DiEMD is about that. It's about exhausting yourself, about leaving it all on the field. But that's not what I was writing about. What I wrote about in die Empty is that we often leave our best work inside of us. Not because we're lazy, but because we're so heads down, grinding away at the wrong things. We're so busy being busy that we never step back and ask what really matters here. And the wild thing is, once I started loosening my grip a little bit, letting myself approach my work with more play, more curiosity, my work actually got better. My writing got better, and honestly, I enjoyed it more.

Todd Henry [00:07:43]:

So it's not about taking the pressure off for its own sake. It's about creating the conditions where our best ideas can actually emerge. And Bree says that's the whole point. Not just to have fun for the sake of it, but to protect what actually matters.

Bree Groff [00:07:57]:

So there's things like that where you're protecting like the goose that lays the golden eggs, which is your mind share. To create brilliant, compelling, impactful work at the individual level. A lot of times for our own calendars or within our own teams, we can still defend that time. The first thing that we have to do is believe it's worth defending that. Like my brains. If I'm a knowledge worker, thinking is my job. And I think we forget that like email response time is not your metric of success, even though it feels like that's how you are successful. So to get tactical about it.

Bree Groff [00:08:38]:

So, for example, there's one thing I call a do nothing day, which I've done many times with teams. It's extraordinarily difficult to protect a do nothing day, and yet I am adamant that we have one every single project. So what this is, you commit to doing nothing the entire day. And by nothing, I mean producing no emails, no reports, scheduling no meetings, nothing that we think of as work product. Instead, you spend the day in creative exploration. So there's no agenda. I do suggest like some prompt cards and sort of things to get your wheels turning. But I really believe our brains don't work well in 30 minute increments.

Bree Groff [00:09:26]:

It's like Van Gogh was Never like only 30 minutes to knock out a painting before my paint supplier calls. No, like the most creative spaces that we can put our minds in or the best thing that we can do for our brain sometimes is to give our brains the protection of space, time and not needing to produce anything. And then that's when we start to relax into. I'm not trying to snooze the alarm and get the email out and get the slack message out. I'm free. Okay? And then we can unwind that way. And without without exception these days produce really incredible ideas because we've given ourselves the permission. The next step is having the bravery to implement those creative ideas.

Bree Groff [00:10:15]:

But if you don't at least start with respecting how your brain works, you've lost before you've begun.

Todd Henry [00:10:21]:

You mentioned something that was very interesting because I do think that you're right. We don't work well in 30 minute increments. But part of the reason is because we feel this extreme pressure to make that 30 minutes matter because that's the only 30 minutes we have versus we have all the time. I was just before this conversation, I was on a call, a chat with DJ Jazzy Jeff, iconic hip hop figure who was part of DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince with Will Smith. And they had a show called the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. And as part of that show, Quincy Jones, the legendary music producer, came to him and they said, we need a theme song. Jeff and Will said, let's go away to see what we can do. And they went away for 15, and they just did this little demo that was just like, here's something, like what we could do.

Todd Henry [00:11:03]:

Maybe we could do this. And they never heard back. And that song that they did in 15 or 20 minutes, this little demo that Will Smith and Jeff wrote out and recorded became the theme song for the actual show. And now is this, like, iconic song, this theme song for this TV show that's been around for 30 years or whatever. But had they felt. And he was saying, had I felt the pressure that I have to go away and in the next 30 minutes I have to write, like, an iconic TV theme song, there's no way I would have done that, because that's not the way my brain works, but because I didn't feel the pressure to do it. It was actually just this fun process where we were just coming up with ideas and Will Smith was writing lyrics and I was doing the beats, and we were just recording this thing. And so I think what you're getting at in some way by giving space is you're saying we're not only giving ourselves more time to do the things that we are required to do or to come up with the ideas, but also we're taking some of the pressure off to get it right in such a finite amount of time, which is not fun.

Todd Henry [00:12:04]:

It's not fun when you have to crank it out in 20 minutes or 30 minutes. And you feel that pressure for sure.

Bree Groff [00:12:09]:

Because when you feel that pressure, you actually have two talk tracks happening in your brain. There's one that's trying to come up with the good ideas, and the other one that's. Did you do it yet? Did you come up with the idea yet? Is this one's going to be good enough? Oh, you have 15 minutes left to get rid of that second talk track, I think, just makes all the difference. And I often say, if you work for, your brain will work for you. And not everybody's brain works the same too. So it's a matter of know you're trying to stack the odds in your favor of, like, how is my brain going to work best, or how's my team's collective brain going to work best. And so it's things like protecting time, taking away that pressure. Or it could be things like getting a little fresh air or moving our bodies or taking a break.

Bree Groff [00:12:52]:

All of the things that well researched out there about how our brains work best. It's just so ironic. Few of those things are how modern work is actually set up, which is inside at a desk, eight hours a day, back to back something or others. And we're not producing our best work in that way. And in many ways we are performing productivity instead of truly coming up with creative, impactful ideas or working on those ideas and making those things a reality.

Todd Henry [00:13:24]:

I love the idea of performative creativity. Like, it's almost like we're play acting at work as opposed to actually doing the work. And it's so much more fun, so much more satisfying to actually do the work than to play act at the work.

Bree Groff [00:13:35]:

Yeah, and this is what I write about with conformity too. It can sometimes feel, and I understand why, like it feels safer to make our work look like everybody else's work. So you can say this logo looked like everybody else's logo. And like those, nobody yelled at those people, so don't yell at me. And yet it stifles us, that sort of performative. I'm going to try and make it look presentable. Or you've got like terror, like unorganized thinking, but you've nailed the typeface and then we've done it wrong. And we need to protect that foundation of our creativity before we think about dressing it up for its performance at the board meeting.

Todd Henry [00:14:18]:

Bree Groff's book Today Was Fun is available now wherever books are sold. It offers a compelling reminder that work doesn't have to be drudgery, that when we make space for curiosity, play, and yes, even a little mischief, we unlock not only better results, but a more meaningful experience of our lives. Her call to reclaim joy in work is at its core a call to lead differently, to lead with intention, with humanity and with courage. But there's another essential ingredient to human centered work that often gets listening. Not just hearing what someone says, but really tuning in to who they are, to what they need and what's often left unsaid. And that's where we go next. Emily Kasriel is a journalist, a researcher, and the author of a new book called Deep Listening. In our conversation, she unpacks why true listening is a radical act, one that can heal, divides, strengthen teams and transform how we show up, up as leaders and as colleagues, if Bree reminded us that joy is a vital part of doing great work, Emily shows us that empathy and understanding are what makes it possible.

Todd Henry [00:15:26]:

We'll be right back with that conversation. Stick around.

Emily Kasriel [00:15:36]:

So often what we're actually doing is not listening. We're performing listening. But what we're actually doing is preloading our verbal gun with ammunition, ready to fire. We are listening long enough to interrupt somebody, to help them complete their sentences, to tell them what they should be thinking, or to provide a solution. And actually, men are more likely to do this than women or to try and cheer them up. But we're not really using the whole of us to listen to the whole of them with the agenda to understand them better. And that is radical, and that is deep listening.

Todd Henry [00:16:12]:

That's Emily Kasriel, author of the new book Deep Listening. She argues that listening is a radical act. And it's interesting because there are so many common themes between this chat and our previous conversation with Bree Grof. Because so often the reason we don't really listen is that we feel the time pressure to get to the point to be efficient. We see a conversation as a task to complete, not as an act to engage in.

Emily Kasriel [00:16:35]:

I don't have time is the key trap that business leaders in particular come up with. And all of us with so much juggling, so many different agendas. Actually, it's not time that gets in the way, it's the quality of our attention. And sure, it's also time. But by cutting short real listening, what we're doing is we're stopping concerns from being raised, but also brilliant ideas from surfacing. We also leave people feeling dismissed or used. And there's so much research that shows that employees, when they're truly listened to, feel far more motivated, far more respectful and of the organization and want to do better. And not only that, the bottom line also changes.

Emily Kasriel [00:17:17]:

Productivity goes up when people feel truly heard because they feel that their dignity is respected and that is transformative.

Todd Henry [00:17:26]:

I think that's an interesting point. This isn't just to make everyone feel good. This isn't just to ensure that no one's feel are heard in the organization. Because we're busy, we're trying to do things. You argue this is good for the business, this is good for the bottom line. If people experience the being heard, being listened to.

Emily Kasriel [00:17:46]:

Yeah, we all know that you don't leave a job, you leave a manager. And we have all experience at work being not listened to and have those rare moments of being listened to. And the difference it makes to us and the way that we have a different energy in our step. We give more when we feel that somebody has heard us and that we. Our contribution is valuable. That is transformative, Goldust, for any employer.

Todd Henry [00:18:17]:

So you've just mentioned making space. The excuse that we don't have time is something that we need to get past. The second step is to listen to yourself, which I found counterintuitive. It's interesting. What does this step entail?

Emily Kasriel [00:18:30]:

Until we've listened to ourselves first, we're not really in the place to listen to someone else. We need to know and acknowledge, at least to ourself, what our unacknowledged agenda is. Do we really need. We have this desire to prove them wrong. We have a desire to punish them for something. You know, what's going on. Sometimes when we're listening to someone, we're not actually listening to them. We're listening to one of our shadows.

Emily Kasriel [00:18:55]:

It's maybe our bullying older brother. And we project some things that we don't like, even about ourselves, onto the other person. So when we're listening to this individual we find challenging at work, we're not listening to him. We're listening to that bullying older brother. And we feel like we're five again. And when we feel five and we feel bullied, how ready are we to listen to somebody else?

Todd Henry [00:19:20]:

I wonder how many conflicts in the workplace are the result of someone responding not to the manager in front of, but to a manager from their second year in the workplace who was maybe, like you said, like a bully or somebody who never listened and basically just issued edicts and expected everyone to follow their commands without really ever listening. I wonder how often that is the case, that we're not actually responding to what's in front of us. We're responding to some past experience.

Emily Kasriel [00:19:48]:

There's so much research which indicates that, and it's not until we've taken the time. And I have to say, listening to yourself, it's a lifetime journey to understand yourself. You're not just going to get it in a minute. And if you have experienced trauma, you might also need to seek professional help because it can be hard and challenging to be honest with ourself. But when these shadows come up and we realize that, you know, when I know for myself, when I feel 100% in the right and the other person 100% in the wrong and it feels existential, the need to be right and to have that conversation, I'm not ready to listen, something else is going on. I take myself out for a walk. And I even say to that shadow, it's your turn to speak. What's really going on here? Why are you so upset? And then stuff will emerge.

Emily Kasriel [00:20:36]:

Some people like writing or painting or talking to a friend, there's lots of different ways to start grappling with our shadows. And once we are aware, even if that shadow erupts again in the conversation, we can say to it gently and compassionately, hey, I know you're trying to do your best and keep me safe, but I think I can handle that. Can we discuss this later and put that shadow to the side so we can again be open to listen?

Todd Henry [00:21:03]:

So the next step in the book is to be present, which means being aware of distractions, things that might be pulling you away. What are some common distractions that could cause us to withdraw from a conversation? Or what are some things that might be going on inside of us that prevent us from engaging in deep listening?

Emily Kasriel [00:21:21]:

You're so correct. Surprise. Our phones are like the worst distraction. Hey, have you ever been on a Zoom or a teams call where as you're talking to somebody underneath off camera, you're checking your phone for Latest updates or WhatsApp or emails? Hey, now, I have certainly done that. And even if you might not see the phone, you know it, you know that I'm not there. You feel it in every pore. And you left feeling like, not connected. And so therefore, phones off out of sight for the duration, unless you're awaiting the news that your wife has just delivered a new baby or something really critical.

Emily Kasriel [00:21:57]:

If they haven't got that urgency, get it out of sight and use a clock or put an alarm so that you can be present for the limited time you have in that conversation. But it's also those internal distractions, not only the shadows we talked about, but, oh, God, I've got to call the dentist and I've got to buy some pears on the way home to make that dish. We've all got that running commentary, and it's about being present enough, taking the moment for a breath in and a breath out, and really practicing a bit of mindfulness when we're not in that difficult conversation so that we can bring our attention back into being present. And that can be so transformational for the conversation.

Todd Henry [00:22:36]:

I think the point that you make about getting the phones out of sight is really important. We've had a conversation in our family at dinner because we would sit our phones on the table, but just the phone being physically present. There's a lot of research that shows that alone is enough to distract you from the conversation. And really what you're communicating sort of non verbally is you're important to me. But some, as of now, unknown external force out there somewhere at some point might be more important than you. Right. So I need to keep this phone on the table just in case somebody out there is more important than you. So I think that's a really important point.

Todd Henry [00:23:16]:

The idea of put your phone away, keep it out of sight, be fully present with the person.

Emily Kasriel [00:23:21]:

Yeah, that is absolutely so critical. And then step four is about being curious, because when I'm genuinely curious, I then can learn things about you, even if we disagree. And then what I learn starts to allow me to connect with you on a human level. So I don't just see you as a label, as a boss, as somebody who votes for the political party, I think is horrific. I start to see you as a person, as an individual. And that empathy can then lead to respect. And what is critical, it's respect for your humanity. It is not necessarily agreement or respect for your beliefs.

Emily Kasriel [00:24:00]:

And that's something that's so critical because when I've done research, because I've trained thousands of people in hundreds of countries and I find that people often fear that if they listen, it signals agreement. And the research that we did actually with YouGov and NGO more in common in the US showed that young people are much more likely to think that listening signals agreement. And once you can be free of this notion, once you realize that listening is about understanding, not agreement, suddenly you're free to have a conversations with people who previously you felt you had to avoid. Almost like a moral imperative.

Todd Henry [00:24:42]:

Emily Casriel's new book, Deep Listening, is available now wherever books are sold. And if you'd like to hear a full conversation with Emily or Bree Grof, it's available absolutely free@dailycreativeplus.com just sign up and we'll send you a podcast feed with every interview and all the bonus content that we release. Before we go, let me leave you with a simple challenge. Tomorrow, try to bring just 5% more humanity to your work. That might mean protecting an hour of quiet time for real thinking. It might mean turning off your phone and really listening during your next meeting. Or maybe it's walking into your next project asking, what would make this fun? Because if there's one thing we've heard today, it's this. Human work requires human conditions.

Todd Henry [00:25:29]:

And when we create space for listening, joy and intention, better work and better lives follow. Hey, thanks for listening. My name is Todd Henry. If you'd like to learn more about my books and my speaking events, you can do so@toddhenry.com until next time. May you be brave, focused, and brilliant. Sam.