The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk

Annie Duke, former pro poker player and cognitive psychologist who wrote Thinking in Bets, joins to explore decision-making under uncertainty. She discusses admitting uncertainty, distinguishing luck from hidden information, using bets to calibrate beliefs, and techniques for getting unbiased advice. Short, practical takes on framing choices and building systems to learn from noisy feedback.

Daniel Coyle, bestselling author and researcher of talent and group performance. He explores why safety is the foundation of great teams. He describes small rituals and hiring that shape culture. He unpacks vulnerability loops, over-communicating expectations, and how narrative creates purpose. Short, concrete practices for building trust and sustained excellence.

Austin Kleon, New York Times bestselling author and artist known for Steal Like an Artist, talks creativity, daily rituals, and how small habits build lasting work. He describes a factory-like creative process: collect, write a page a day, then shape pieces into bigger projects. He also covers reading as research, reclaiming hobbies to restore creativity, and valuing deep connections over vanity metrics.

Todd Henry, author and founder of Accidental Creative who coaches creative teams, shares how rituals, rituals and disciplined practices fuel sustained excellence. He describes personal routines like morning pages and midday walks. He explains leading by influence, creating stable space for creativity, asking set questions to connect, and helping creators find their own voice.

Dan Pink, bestselling author known for Drive and When, shares his writing routine and research-driven craft. He explores daily peaks, troughs, and recoveries. He dives into the science of breaks, naps and the nappuccino. He explains team synchrony, the power of touch, and why endings shape memory and motivation.

The Learning Leader Show Episode 238: Neil Pasricha - Why Action Creates Motivation: 1,000 Awesome Things Neil Pasricha is the New York Times-bestselling author of The Happiness Equation and The Book of Awesome series, which has been published in ten countries, spent over five years on bestseller lists, and sold over a million copies. Neil is a Harvard MBA, one of the most popular TED speakers of all time, and after ten years heading Leadership Development at Walmart he now serves as Director of The Institute for Global Happiness. He has dedicated the past fifteen years of his life to developing leaders, creating global programs inside the world's largest companies and speaking to hundreds of thousands of people around the globe. "Most think motivation leads to action... No, motivation doesn't cause action... Action creates motivation." Show Notes: Commonalities of leaders who sustain excellence: C -- Clarity - Clear, succinct, memorable O -- Optimism -- "Find the good in everything" P -- Patience -- Delaying decision making until the last possible moment The quality can improve if "we let the tension live" Empower others - "Parkinson's Law" - Work rises to the time needed to complete it. "I don't want to fight the customer." -- Thinking about everything from their perspective. Wal-Mart Being a Harvard Business School graduate "Chase the companies that don't come to Harvard to recruit. You'll learn more." -- Why Neil went to Wal-Mart Neil's 30 second pitch to why someone should hire him for a leadership role when he was very young "I had to be artificially confident" His pitch -- 3 quick questions Do you value internal promotions? What's the #1 program you've seen? Would you be interested in topics of developing leaders at Harvard? Get their email address and follow up None of the companies were hiring when he was leaving school... Neil had to "create a job" within companies to get hired Brene Brown - "If you go through life trying to find confirmation you don't belong, you'll find it." 2008 - The world was falling apart, his marriage ended, his best friend committed suicide.. He started the blog, 1,000 Awesome Things Won a webby award for best blog in the world Wrote The Book Of Awesome He moved to NYC... Didn't know anyone, lived alone He was going through pain while starting the awesome things blog. Focused on three things: Make the blog public - hold him accountable Use a countdown - From 1,000 to 1 -- Helped him know it was going to end at some point Finite - There is light at the end of the tunnel "Most think motivation leads to action. Not true. Action creates motivation." The importance of consistency - Neil's idea was not unique, but doing it everyday made him different from most "Try to be receptive of other people's ideas" -- Helps you "notice things" "Your questions are fantastic. I'm not surprised." Working on deadlines -- Neil wrote for a newspaper for four years. Helped with this skill "I believe in consistency" Actionable advice: You have three, 56 hour buckets of your week. They are: 56 Hours - Sleep 56 Hours - Work/Job 56 Hours - What are you spending this time on? You can do whatever you want... The happiness equation - Work/Life balance fulcrum -- Flywheel Taking his side hustle and making it his full time job -- "I should have done it sooner." "If you go through life trying to find confirmation that you don't belong, you'll find it." -- Brene Brown Social Media: Read: The Happiness Equation - Want Nothing + Do Everything = Have Anything Follow Neil on Twitter: @NeilPasricha Connect with me on LinkedIn Join our Facebook Group: The Learning Leader Community To Follow Me on Twitter: @RyanHawk12

AJ Jacobs, author and immersive nonfiction experimenter, mixes curiosity, humor, and daring self-tests. He discusses acting "as if" and optimistic self-delusion, living life as experiments (like reading the Encyclopedia Britannica and living biblically), radical honesty, gratitude rituals, building a global family tree, and using DNA and perspective to boost tolerance and creativity.

Brian Scudamore, founder and CEO who built 1-800-GOT-JUNK? into a multi-country service empire. He talks about relentless focus, faith in vision, and the discipline required to scale. He shares stories of early hustle, hiring and firing to reset culture, and using mentor boards and routines to drive growth.

Dr. Gay Hendricks, counseling psychologist and bestselling author known for The Big Leap and Conscious Loving, shares his life in transformation work. He explores the upper limit problem and how people self-sabotage at peak success. He outlines four nervous-system responses to fear and describes the four operating zones that reveal your genius. Stories include his Oprah moment, late-life creativity, and finding freedom by doing what he loves.

Jocko Willink, retired Navy SEAL officer and leadership author, shares hard-earned lessons from combat and years teaching discipline. He discusses humility versus ego in teams. He recounts the Ramadi friendly-fire incident and why owning mistakes builds trust. He explains decentralized command, waking early, and how disciplined habits create freedom.