April 14, 2019
SOMETHING NEW
For the last several months, I’ve been anticipating a data migration process at work that has us transitioning from a legacy system to a shiny new database. This has been very exciting, but it is also adding a good deal of work to my plate that typically isn’t there. Last week we hit a milestone that ramped things up even more. And so like a good little industrious American, I’ve added another dimension of work to my life by (subconsciously?) selecting two shows with work as their centering idea to profile this week. Without further ado, let’s get into Better Life Lab and Hello Monday.
A collaboration between New America and Slate, Better Life Lab seeks to study how work impacts life and how to strike a better balance. Each episode follows the story of an individual, and the personal narrative gives way to some discussion with a professional well versed in the area of focus from the first interview. It reminds me a bit of Hidden Brain but with paired back production (minimal voice-overs or transitional connective tissue), making the connection between narrative and research more direct. I like this setup conceptually, but found that it doesn’t yield a lot of ultra compelling tales - maybe partially due to the. While almost all the stories have a relatable element that could serve as a throughline, most of the earlier episodes tend to drag a bit. To be fair, my perspective is that of a listener coming in without a pointed desire to learn specifically about the subject at hand. So perhaps if I was specifically hoping to learn how to take summers off and still get promoted, this complaint would be moot.
Better Life Lab’s topics are intriguing and distinctive, but the episodes blend together a bit. This is at least partially due to the show really driving home the sentiment that “working just the right amount is challenging!” I agree, but I don’t need several hours of listening for that to be my main takeaway. Fortunately season 2 feels a lot more sure of itself. The show has found a way to relax a bit (more fun sound flourishes!) while also retaining the insight that has been there all along. “Beyond Inbox Zero” was a nice breath of communally aggravating air, and “The Calm Company” highlights the little-touted idea that growth at all cost is not a good mantra - for a company or for an individual. Not all topics place the modern white collar worker in the foreground - the realities of retail work and low-wage healthcare workers are profiled in the shows second season.
Speaker of modern white collar work, LinkedIn has a new podcast. Each week Hello Monday dissects the work trajectory of a select guest, some well-known (Seth Myers, Elizabeth Gilbert) and some perhaps less so (Aminatou Sow, Charlie Ayers). The episodes begin with an interview with the guest, and a brief feature on a member of the LinkedIn community serves as a button. Hello Monday’s biographical, tell-me-how-you-got-here style isn’t super inventive. But it does make for a podcast that goes down easy. In some sense it’s a standard mid-range interview show, with host Jessi Hempel guiding the guest through a series of questions meant to invoke a moderately open response. But the variety of guests, who share the broad theme of having had jobs, and the winningly self-effacing host give it a different feel. Also, I definitely appreciate that it is an interview-centric show with a limited run (slated for 13 episodes).
Especially for a corporately-overseen show, Hello Monday deserves kudos for the attempt to enjamb a casual conversation with a segment featuring connection with LinkedIn members. While this sort of native advertising schtick still stands out for the vague plea of shared identity that it is (“our members have interesting stories...just like you…!”), the advertising angle is fairly unobtrusive. I wouldn’t say that every episode is a must-listen regardless of one’s familiarity with or interest in the guest. On the other hand, Hello Monday has proved adept at landing interesting stories with name recognition. My favorite entry so far features Aminatou Sow, an entrepreneur who might also be described as an Influencer. This resonates with the show’s stated goal to cover emerging work that may blossom in the future. Despite my preconceived notion of influencers being the millennial generation’s incarnation of snake oil peddlers, I came out with a less-judgy functional definition (a better equivalency for influencer than huckster would be a self-motivated social media marketing specialist who happens to be very skilled at building a brand).
All this boils down to one thing, the question that all podcast listeners and consumers of media must ask: what do you want from this show/movie/book/album? If you are also someone who has a job and you are mildly curious about the journeys others have taken in their lines of work, Hello Monday is for you. If you are passionate about work and its impact on the lives of you and everyone you know, perhaps the broader ambition of Better Life Lab will sate the desires your actual job cannot. Personally I’m more likely to stick with Better Life Lab - it does have an important formative season under its belt - though Hello Monday does show promise and is in serviceable shape right now. Maybe we’ll check in if Hello Monday gets a second season. But in the meantime, I best ready myself for plugging back into migration mode.
A collaboration between New America and Slate, Better Life Lab seeks to study how work impacts life and how to strike a better balance. Each episode follows the story of an individual, and the personal narrative gives way to some discussion with a professional well versed in the area of focus from the first interview. It reminds me a bit of Hidden Brain but with paired back production (minimal voice-overs or transitional connective tissue), making the connection between narrative and research more direct. I like this setup conceptually, but found that it doesn’t yield a lot of ultra compelling tales - maybe partially due to the. While almost all the stories have a relatable element that could serve as a throughline, most of the earlier episodes tend to drag a bit. To be fair, my perspective is that of a listener coming in without a pointed desire to learn specifically about the subject at hand. So perhaps if I was specifically hoping to learn how to take summers off and still get promoted, this complaint would be moot.
Better Life Lab’s topics are intriguing and distinctive, but the episodes blend together a bit. This is at least partially due to the show really driving home the sentiment that “working just the right amount is challenging!” I agree, but I don’t need several hours of listening for that to be my main takeaway. Fortunately season 2 feels a lot more sure of itself. The show has found a way to relax a bit (more fun sound flourishes!) while also retaining the insight that has been there all along. “Beyond Inbox Zero” was a nice breath of communally aggravating air, and “The Calm Company” highlights the little-touted idea that growth at all cost is not a good mantra - for a company or for an individual. Not all topics place the modern white collar worker in the foreground - the realities of retail work and low-wage healthcare workers are profiled in the shows second season.
Speaker of modern white collar work, LinkedIn has a new podcast. Each week Hello Monday dissects the work trajectory of a select guest, some well-known (Seth Myers, Elizabeth Gilbert) and some perhaps less so (Aminatou Sow, Charlie Ayers). The episodes begin with an interview with the guest, and a brief feature on a member of the LinkedIn community serves as a button. Hello Monday’s biographical, tell-me-how-you-got-here style isn’t super inventive. But it does make for a podcast that goes down easy. In some sense it’s a standard mid-range interview show, with host Jessi Hempel guiding the guest through a series of questions meant to invoke a moderately open response. But the variety of guests, who share the broad theme of having had jobs, and the winningly self-effacing host give it a different feel. Also, I definitely appreciate that it is an interview-centric show with a limited run (slated for 13 episodes).
Especially for a corporately-overseen show, Hello Monday deserves kudos for the attempt to enjamb a casual conversation with a segment featuring connection with LinkedIn members. While this sort of native advertising schtick still stands out for the vague plea of shared identity that it is (“our members have interesting stories...just like you…!”), the advertising angle is fairly unobtrusive. I wouldn’t say that every episode is a must-listen regardless of one’s familiarity with or interest in the guest. On the other hand, Hello Monday has proved adept at landing interesting stories with name recognition. My favorite entry so far features Aminatou Sow, an entrepreneur who might also be described as an Influencer. This resonates with the show’s stated goal to cover emerging work that may blossom in the future. Despite my preconceived notion of influencers being the millennial generation’s incarnation of snake oil peddlers, I came out with a less-judgy functional definition (a better equivalency for influencer than huckster would be a self-motivated social media marketing specialist who happens to be very skilled at building a brand).
All this boils down to one thing, the question that all podcast listeners and consumers of media must ask: what do you want from this show/movie/book/album? If you are also someone who has a job and you are mildly curious about the journeys others have taken in their lines of work, Hello Monday is for you. If you are passionate about work and its impact on the lives of you and everyone you know, perhaps the broader ambition of Better Life Lab will sate the desires your actual job cannot. Personally I’m more likely to stick with Better Life Lab - it does have an important formative season under its belt - though Hello Monday does show promise and is in serviceable shape right now. Maybe we’ll check in if Hello Monday gets a second season. But in the meantime, I best ready myself for plugging back into migration mode.
From: Slate/LinkeIn
Recommended for: At least anyone who has ever had a job, at most anyone who has ever started an organization to fight any sort of inequality in the workplace.
Drop Schedule: Seasonal:Weekly
Average episode length: 30 minutes
Rating: Make It Work
THE LIST
This was so eye-opening to me. If you are a woman, I expect you may already deeply feel the truth in this episode's title. Frankly it was a depressing listen, but a necessary one. Strongly recommended for people of all genders - even if you are someone who readily accepts the injustice in the world, it is still instructive to learn details about things that are passively and perpetually strengthened.
Did you hear the one about the woman who took Equifax to small claims court? It actually happened! The macro takeaways from this may be small and rather obvious, it was simply fascinating to hear the ins and outs of a citizen taking on a corporation. The rest of the season is worth checking out as well, but this episode stands out for highlighting proactive measures in the waves of overwhelming news about broken privacy.
You've heard the familiar refrain, likely from older relatives, in reference to social media: "It's just not the real world." The sentiment dictates that not only is digital interaction inferior, it is some distorted half-life not even worthy of comparison to the physical reality we've come to know over many generations. But when online communication triggers murder in the corporal world, maybe it's time to start acknowledging that the real can exist on and between many planes.
If you could bet on yourself, would you? Like, actually put a promise involving money on the line in relation to the success you think you may have? David Bowie did it, when he promised investors a cut of album sales in exchange for funds to make an album. Why not offer up the option to college students as an alternative to blindly taking out massive loans?
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