neuroscience — Podcast

Deprogramming the Partisan Brain with Dr. Jay Van Bavel

Why do we side with a political party? How do social identity and partisanship play in today’s politics? Why do we view the other side as the problem? Author and researcher Dr. Jay Van Bavel explores the psychology and neuroscience behind why our brains think the way we do and how we can overcome the toxic polarization in this upcoming election.

Dr. Jay Van Bavel is a co-author of “The Power of Us: Harnessing Our Shared Identities to Improve Performance, Increase Cooperation, and Promote Social Harmony” and a Professor of Psychology and Neural Science at New York University, an affiliate at the Stern School of Business in Management and Organizations, Director of the Social Identity & Morality Lab.

From neurons to social networks, Jay’s research examines how social identities and morality shape the mind, brain, and behavior. His work addresses issues of group dynamics, cooperation, intergroup bias, social media, and public health. He studies these issues using a combination of neuroimaging, social cognition, and computational social science.

Dr. Van Bavel has published over 150 scientific publications and co-authored a mentoring column, called Letters to Young Scientists, for Science Magazine. He has written about his research for The New York Times, BBC, The Atlantic, Scientific American, The Wall Street Journal, Guardian, LA Times, and The Washington Post and his work has appeared in academic papers as well as in the U.S. Supreme Court and Senate.

Thank you to Starts with Us for their collaboration on this series. Starts with Us is an organization committed to overcoming extreme political and cultural division. Check them out at startswith.us.

The Future of Psychedelics with Dr. Matthew Johnson

In this interview, Don MacPherson is joined by Dr. Matthew Johnson, an expert in psychoactive drug effects, addiction, and risk behavior. They discuss clinical research on psychedelics including psilocybin, ayahuasca, DMT, MDMA, LSD, and more. They also dive into the potential therapeutic applications for psychedelics including treating depression, PTSD, and addiction, and improving individual happiness, creativity, and selflessness.

Matthew W. Johnson, Ph.D., Professor at Johns Hopkins, is an expert in psychoactive drug effects, addiction, and risk behavior. He has worked with psychedelics since 2004. He developed and published the first psychedelic treatment of tobacco addiction in 2014. With colleagues, he conducted and published the largest study of psilocybin in cancer distress in 2016. He is Principal Investigator on upcoming psilocybin studies treating opioid addiction and PTSD, and LSD research treating chronic pain.

The Future of Leadership with Dr. Robert Eichinger

The leader of the future ranks high in emotional intelligence, uses technology to enhance leadership effectiveness, moves up the ladder quickly, and practices mindfulness throughout their work. In this interview, podcast host Don MacPherson and Dr. Robert Eichinger look ahead at the future of leadership and identify trends that will disrupt the way we develop, promote, and practice leadership over the next decade. They discuss the importance of emotional intelligence, the role of mindfulness, and how technology will support our leaders as we shift from IQ to an EQ focus.

Dr. Robert Eichinger is an expert in leadership with over five decades of experience. He is co-founder of TeamTelligent and has authored over 50 books, articles, software products, and other intellectual property around the topic of talent management and succession planning.

Daniel Pink Shares the Secrets of Perfect Timing

NYT & WSJ bestselling author Daniel Pink is here to help us understand how our cognitive ability changes throughout the day and how you can learn to plan your day around your brainpower. Knowing when to plan your creative activity, your executive work, and your administrative tasks has a massive influence over the quality of your performance.

In this interview, Daniel discusses his creative process, the importance of coordinating your creative work during the right time of day, strategies for selling your innovative ideas to investors and other decision makers, and a few tips that famous creatives have used to perform their best.

For nearly 20 years, Daniel has written about the intersection of human behavior and work. His books include Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, To Sell Is Human, A Whole New Mind, and his most recent bestseller When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing.

Developing Financial and Emotional Competence with Doug Lennick

Doug Lennick is a legendary leader in the financial services industry who has mentored hundreds of people over his career and coached thousands of people to be more effective leaders and make better financial decisions. In this interview, Doug shares his insights on:

Personal Financial Decision Making: Good debt vs. bad debt, the concentration of private debt, Millennial debt, benchmarks for responsible borrowing, financial education, delaying gratification, financial “slavery,” debt stress and how it impacts performance at work, financial intelligence, preparing for financial uncertainty, behavioral change, Stanford Marshmallow Experiment, impulse control

Effective Leadership: senior leadership trust, compassion, integrity, self-awareness, personal and organizational values, transparency, Baby Boomer retirement, advice for first-time managers, leaders vs. managers, the importance of self-management, alignment of thoughts, actions, emotions to values and goals, moral intelligence vs. moral competence, employee engagement and high performance, advice for first-time CEOs, leadership in a world of artificial intelligence and other major technology transformation, the diminishing importance of cognitive ability in leadership, neuroscience, the adult brain, changing adult behaviors, The Four Rs (Recognize, Reflect, Reframe, Respond), happiness

Organizations, people, and resources mentioned: Arun Abey, How Much Is Enough? Making Financial Decisions That Create Wealth and Well-Being, Ray Dalio, Ken Chenault, American Express, Walter Mischel, 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer, Stephen Covey, Stephen M. R. Covey, The SPEED of Trust, Moral Intelligence, Think2Perform, Spock, The Simple Genius (You)

“Our culture is this…I want anybody to be able to talk to anybody, about any thing, at any time.”

Doug Lennick, CEO of Think2Perform, commenting on one of the ways he built trust, transparency, and empowerment while leading a 17,000 person organization at American Express

Leadership, the Brain, and Managing Lasting Change - An Interview with Dr. Robert Eichinger

Leadership guru Dr. Robert Eichinger shares his wisdom on the topics of:

Neural leadership, change management, the brain at work, neural plasticity, mindfulness, women in leadership, emotional competence, confirmation bias, innovation, leadership and Artificial Intelligence, anger management, narcissism, and derailment research

“You cannot manage change cognitively. It has to be managed from an EQ standpoint. People get promoted based on smarts and fail based on people skills.”

Dr. Robert Eichinger

12 Geniuses Podcast

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