Keith McArthur

Ask a Manager with Alison Green

Alison Green, author of Ask a Manager offers advice on some common workplace challenges. And host Keith McArthur speaks with mindfulness contributor Joelle Anderson about how meditation can help with mental health challenges like depression and anxiety.

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Episode 30 Show Notes

[00:00] Welcome and Intro

[00:59} Keith reflects on death and dying

[3:52] Featured interview with Alison Green

Alison is author of Ask a Manager: How to Navigate Clueless Colleagues, Lunch-stealing Bosses and the Rest of Your Life at Work. Described as the “Dear Abbey of the workplace,” Alison has dishing out workplace advice for more than a decade at AskAManager.org.

In this conversation, Keith and Alison discuss:

  • What do you do if you have an employee casting curses on colleagues? [4:34]
  • How Alison became a workplace advice expert [5:50]
  • The answer to most workplace challenges is ‘speak up and have the awkward conversations.’ [8:07]
  • How Alison’s advice has evolved over the past 11 years [11:46]
  • Alison’s advice on:
    • What if your boss keeps stealing your lunch [15:56]
    • Why employees should act more like independent consultants [17:23]
    • What if your boss is micro-managing you [18:53]
    • What if your co-worker is writing a mean blog about you [21:45]
    • What if a co-worker asks you to keep a secret from your boss [22:55]
    • What if you have an employee who spends too much time on social media? [24:23]
    • What if you have an employee who is always late? [25:45]

[29:24] Alison’s  Instruction Manual

1. What are the habits you maintain every day to stay happy and healthy? [29:40]

  • Spends at least a day every day reading

 2. What personal development book do you recommend? [30:17]

  • Emma by Jane Austin
  • “I’ve read Jane Austin’s Emma more times than I can count and it just makes me happy.”

3. Favorite personal mantra / inspirational quote [30:53] 

  • “I don’t know if it’s a mantra, but I feel really strongly that we should all do what we say we’re going to do when we say we’re going to do it and I find myself telling that to people a lot.”

4. What’s your one guilty pleasure? [31:32]

  • Naps

5. When your time comes, how do you want to be remembered? [31:45]

  • Finding ways to make the world a better one

[32:08] Where to find Alison

[32:45] Mindfulness contributor Joelle Anderson on how meditation helps people suffering from mental health challenges such as depression and anxiety

Joelle Anderson is a therapist specializing in mindfulness meditation and creator and host of the Kernel of Wisdom YouTube channel.

In this conversation, Keith and Joelle discuss:

  • Whether this can be done on own vs with a professional [33:55]
  • How mindfulness helps Joelle’s clients  [36:25]
  • Risks of managing mental health through mindfulness [37:01]
  • Where to find Joelle [37:53 ]

[38:16] Closing words

Feedback & Connect

One comment

  1. Alison Green’s interview here was quite delightful, and I got to learn about some cool stuff. I’ll make sure to share this interview with my friends now. They are big fans of Alison, and this interview ill help them with their work.

    Reply

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