What Works
Tara McMullin
Work is central to the human experience. It helps us shape our identities, care for those we love, and contribute to our communities. Work can be a source of power and a catalyst for change. Unfortunately, that's not how most of us experience work—even those who work for themselves. Our labor and creative spirit are used to enrich others and maintain the status quo. It's time for an intervention. What Works is a show about rethinking work, business, and leadership for the 21st-century economy. Host Tara McMullin covers money, management, culture, media, philosophy, and more to figure out what's working (and what's not) today. Tara offers a distinctly interdisciplinary approach to deep-dive analysis of how we work and how work shapes us.
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Top 10 What Works Episodes
Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best What Works episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to What Works for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite What Works episode by adding your comments to the episode page.
EP 478: Data Never Speak For Themselves
What Works
09/26/24 • 23 min
We're constantly bombarded by data. And it's easy to think that with the right clues, we could answer the ultimate questions of life, the universe, and everything.
But data aren't facts. They're not a secret code. Data are media—they mediate our interactions with the world around us. To make them useful and meaningful, we need a critical framework for working with data as media. That's what I've got for you today—a deep dive on how predictability, relevance, and actionability can help us see data for what they are and for what they're not.
Footnotes:
- Anytime I talk about data and how it mediates our lives and work, I'm referencing the work of philosopher C. Thi Nguyen and his concept of value capture. I've written about his theory previously here
- I also make use of Byung-Chul Han's The Crisis of Narration , specifically his critique of a 2008 Wired essay by Chris Anderson about the end of theory
Get written versions of all new episodes at whatworks.fyi—where you can also become a premium subscriber for just $7 per month and help support the work I do at What Works.
- (00:00) - A hypothetical
- (02:32) - Led astry by ubiquitous metrics
- (03:36) - Data aren't reality
- (05:37) - A critical framework for data
- (06:08) - What is predictable?
- (13:36) - What is relevant?
- (18:32) - What is actionable?
- (21:40) - Data literacy
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EP 344: Time To Take A Break?
What Works
07/01/21 • 17 min
Do you ever get the feeling you’re white-knuckling it through business ownership?
Like if you just squeeze the wheel hard enough and focus on what’s in front of you, you can keep your business from ending up in a serious fender bender (or worse)?
I’ve certainly felt that way. All throughout 2020, I felt like my extreme vigilance was the only thing between my business and an 8-car pileup. And we didn’t get hit nearly as hard as many businesses.
It’s a burden, being able to control situations with my hyper-vigilance, but it’s my lot in life. — Tina Fey, Bossypants
That hyper-vigilance can look like needing to have my fingers in every project or having to touch base with every customer. It can look like working 10 hours a day or checking in on the weekends. It can look like not going on vacation for fear of things crumbling without me or always leaving my inbox open throughout the day.
This last year involved every one of those habits at one point or another. Sometimes all at once.
Truthfully, I’m still burnt out from The Year Of White-Knuckling.
And I need a break. That’s why, if you’re reading this at the time it’s published, I’m unplugged and on vacation. Note from writing self to vacation self: seriously, let go—don’t work this week.
Of course, “taking a break” isn’t just about taking a vacation. It might mean making space for a creative project. Or making time to work on your business. Or taking Fridays off. Or putting your podcast on hiatus. There are so many ways to take a break from things that drain us (even if we love them) but hyper-vigilance is not the way you do it.
Last year notwithstanding, I’ve led my business to a pretty peaceful equilibrium.
We have strong systems, predictable cycles of work, and a dreamy community of customers who cheer when we take some time off.
But I also catch a glimpse of my former hyper-vigilant self every time I see Sean worry about our clients on the weekends or try to make vacation plans around reliable access to the internet every morning.
While it would be wonderful to work in a world where taking a break meant just shutting down the computer on a Friday with no preparation and not giving work a second thought for 10 days, taking a break takes some work.
There is work to be done on the business—I’ll get to the specifics in just a moment—and there is also mental work.
Now, if you’re not the anxious, hyper-vigilant business owner that I am, maybe mentally preparing for a break isn’t so hard. I have no idea what that’s like. Feel free to skip ahead, though.
For all the worriers out there, probably the most helpful mental shift I’ve made over the years is learning that:
There is no amount of worry or hyper-vigilance that will stop something bad from happening.
I can’t not take a break because I believe checking email every day averts all potential problems.
Ish happens.
Even the best systems, happiest customers, and most independent team members won’t stop the random problem from breaking through.
But just because I can’t stop a problem from happening doesn’t mean that a problem will happen. I can take a few days or a few weeks off without there being a problem that... ★ Support this podcast ★
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EP 353: Dancing With Systems In Clickup With Lou Blaser & Sean McMullin from YellowHouse.Media
What Works
09/07/21 • 59 min
In This Episode:
* Why Sean McMullin & Lou Blaser, from YellowHouse.Media, switched their project management software from Notion to Clickup (and why it’s not the right move for everyone!)* How they’ve reduced their podcast management procedure from 75 sub-tasks to 11 umbrella tasks* Why streamlining the procedure has allowed them to bring a more customized approach to each podcast they produce* How focusing on the system behind podcast production has helped them create a lot more capacity for new clients
A couple of months back, I read a downright beautiful article about systems.
Yes, you heard that right: a beautiful, thoughtful, and useful article about... systems.
It was written by Donella Meadows, an influential environmental scientist and leading thinker on systems change in the 20th century.
The article outlines 14 principles for *dancing* with systems. But today I want to focus on the first: get the beat.
When we talk about business systems, it’s easy to default to software, automation, or project management.
But a system is much more organic than that.
And if we don’t allow for a system’s inherently organic nature, we miss out on really understanding that system in order to work with it, dance with it.
Meadows explains that a mistake we so often make when we approach systems is that we see understanding the system as a way of predicting and controlling its output.
She writes, “The goal of foreseeing the future exactly and preparing for it perfectly is unrealizable.”
I get that that might be frustrating—especially as we see data and the ability to instantly connect with customers as modes for the ultimate in business predictability.
It can also be a relief.
If the goal of understanding systems isn’t to control them or predict their output but to dance with them and learn from them, we don’t have to be so hard on ourselves!
And that brings me to Meadows first dance step—get the beat. The mistake I see business owners make with systems is that they try to impose systems on their businesses. They create or build systems for different areas of their businesses.
But that negates the systems already at work in a business. And inevitably, trying to create a system instead of investigating a system, leads to frustration.
Meadows writes, “Before you disturb the system in any way, watch how it behaves.”
So let’s say you want to work on your marketing system. If you start with a blank page and start building something from scratch, you’re missing out on all of the data & feedback that already exists in your marketing system as it is now (whether you know it’s a system or not).
If instead, you map out your existing marketing system, no matter how haphazard or messy, you can start to ask some really interesting questions about that system:
* How did we get here?* How else could this work?* What might happen if we don’t make a change?* What are the long-term ripple effects of allowing this system to continue to play out... ★ Support this podcast ★
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11/02/21 • 52 min
In This Episode:
* How Angie Browne‘s career has evolved into embracing her whole identity as a coach & consultant* Why she’s exploring big questions about our identities and how we work* What she did to establish how she wanted to work with clients and companies in this chapter* The story she’s rewriting a personal story she’s been telling for years
We all have an abundance of identities.
I’m a woman. A wife. A mother. I’m a business owner, a writer, a podcaster. I’m a runner, a yoga practitioner, a paddle boarder. I’m an introvert, a book lover, and a new cat parent.
I am many other things, too.
The professional world—as built by white men—has been a place where we leave our other identities at the door. We transform into whatever the job requires of us and try to ignore the rest.
There’s a passage that really encapsulates this in a book I read earlier this year—Having and Being Had by Eula Biss. She writes about a conversation she had with her mom:
“The hardest part of working isn’t the work, my mother tells me, it’s the passing. She means passing as an office worker—dressing the part, performing the rituals of office life, and acting appropriately grateful for a ten-hour shift at a computer.”
When we opt to forge our own path as business owners, it’s easy to imagine that we’ll escape these rituals, avoid assimilating to the expectations of the office. And sure, some of them we do escape from. But there are plenty we end up sticking with—like trying to be grateful for spending 10 hours in front of a computer. And there are others we adopt as part of our new work: the rituals of social media, networking, email responsiveness.
It’s not so much that dressing the part, performing the rituals, or adapting to your work environment is a bad thing.
It’s there also needs to be space for the identities, responsibilities, and personal needs we have outside our job descriptions or client agreements.
Making that space is one way we practice abundance. It might mean rearranging your schedule. Or, it could be a clause you add to your contracts that acknowledges that missing an appointment or rescheduling because of a family need is not the end of the world. It could be a having a colleague you do a mutual mental health check with each week. Or, it could be as simple as acknowledging the transitional space at the beginning of meetings before you get down to business.
This week, my guest is Angela Browne, a coach for luminaries and a diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant for organizations. Part of our conversation is about the way she’s learned to bring her whole self into her work—whether in her former work as a head teacher or in her roles.
But another key part of our conversation revolves around abundant curiosity—the kind that is willing to ask bold questions without needing to have definitive answers.
My hope is that this conversation will inspire you to consider how you can both make space for your many identities in the way you work and make space for abundant curiosity.
Now, let’s find out what works for Angie Browne!
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EP 490: Standardize Me
What Works
03/13/25 • 25 min
Standardization is one of those ideas that, once you see it, you can't unsee it. It's a mental model that can explain, at least in part, many of our social, political, and personal challenges. Whether it's the clothes we wear, the language we use, the dates we go on, or the people we vote for, our choices are often unknowingly constrained by standardization.
In this episode, an update of an essay I originally released for premium subscribers back in November 2023, I explore the role that standardization has played in our economic development, our relationships, and even our identities.
Footnotes:
- Read the essay version of this episode
- "Butt Stuff" on RadioLab
- Doppelganger by Naomi Klein
- "Generation Why?" by Zadie Smith, The New York Review
- "The Bizarre History of Women's Clothing Sizes" by Laura Stampler, Time
- (00:00) - EP 490: Standardize This
- (24:22) - Credits
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05/12/20 • 90 min
In This Episode:
* Why Startup Pregnant founder Sarah K. Peck started organizing mastermind groups & experiences before she was even a business owner* How Sarah facilitates conversation among group members for maximum results* Why mastermind groups are less about getting answers and more about getting in touch with your own inner knowing* The role that mastermind experiences play in her business today and how her business model is structured (including pricing)* Why structure is such an important part of creating highly effective mastermind groups
What would we do without the internet?
I mean, really.
I have access to a global library of information and ideas in my pocket at all times.
If I have a question, I can typically find an answer in less than 60 seconds.
And how about online learning?
If I want to learn a new skill, there’s probably a YouTube video or a CreativeLive class or an ebook that will teach me what I need to know.
It’s probably impossible to quantify the amount of new skills I’ve picked up thanks to the internet.
And how about the people that the internet brings together?
You know I love online communities, social networks, and just finding random connections between humans you would have otherwise never met.
The internet gives me access to people all over the world.
Information, ideas, learning new skills, meeting new people and connecting with old friends... the internet, with all its faults and foibles, can be an incredible place for support.
But at some point, learning new information, acquiring new skills, and even meeting new people starts to come up short.
At some point, as my guest today says, you realize that their aren’t external answers to internal questions.
You realize that beyond access to the world’s information and citizens... you need access to yourself: your own inner knowing.
One way I’ve gotten access to myself—my own inner knowing and decision-making—is through mastermind groups.
Last year, at an in-person gathering of one of the masterminds that we run at What Works, one participant told me that they didn’t really need anyone to tell them what to do with their business. They knew exactly what they should be doing. Instead, they said they needed people to ask why they weren’t doing it.
That’s why they were in the mastermind group.
To me, that’s the perfect illustration of how a mastermind group can support business owners who are committed to—not just learning a new marketing skill or figuring out how to launch a new product—but to becoming a more whole entrepreneur and building a business that works exceptionally well.
I’ve been running mastermind groups of one sort or another for about 5 years and I have a lot to say on the subject. But I didn’t want you to just get my thoughts...
So I invited someone equally as passionate about masterminding as I am, Sarah K. Peck, the founder of Startup Pregnant.
Sarah was on the show before talking about how the Startup Pregnant podcast got started—but the whole business and community of Startup Pregnant has evolved and grown a ton since then.
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07/20/23 • 55 min
So much of our modern discourse around productivity, empowerment, entrepreneurship, and personal growth includes messages about our bodies. These messages might not be explicit, but the messages are there—and our brains pick them up loud and clear.
Similarly, we might not realize that we’re sharing messages that insert themselves into how others perceive their own bodies—but many of us are. It’s impossible to talk about self-discipline, accountability, or efficiency without those concepts leaving their marks on our flesh.
This episode covers a tiny sliver of all the ways that the medium of self-help acts on our bodies. But my hope is that it will encourage you to think critically about the messages you receive about your body and the messages you share that might impact others’ bodies.
You’ll hear from independent beauty culture journalist Jessica DeFino, body confidence influencer Tiffany Ima, and Flaunt Your Fire founder India Jackson.
This episode contains frank talk about bodies, weight, beauty, dieting, and related topics. I know that these subjects can trigger harmful thoughts and behaviors for me if I’m not careful. So please, take care while listening to this episode.
This episode originally aired on October 18, 2022. It's been slightly updated for this rebroadcast.
Footnotes:
- Subscribe to Jessica DeFino’s newsletter about beauty culture and the beauty industry.
- Follow Tiffany Ima on Instagram.
- Listen to the Flaunt Your Fire podcast and learn more about India Jackson.
- Erica Courdae on reconsidering your normal, as well as “Normal is a Life with Michelle Kuei” on the Pause on the Play podcast.
- “Body acceptance stops at the skin. Why?” by Jessica DeFino
- “The Skin as an Antidote to Consumerism” by Jessica DeFino
- “How White Supremacy and Capitalism Influence Beauty Culture” by Jessica DeFino in TeenVogue
- What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey Gordon
- “Postscript on Societies of Control” by Gilles Deleuze
- Self-Help, INC by Micki McGee
- “Rachel Hollis Part 1: Hashtag Relatable” on Maintenance Phase
- “The Trouble with Calories” on Maintenance Phase
- “Bodybuilding vs Powerlifting vs Weightlifting” on Shape
- Confidence Culture by Shani Orgad and Rosalind Gill
- Let’s Get Physical: How Women Discovered Exercise and Reshaped the World by Danielle Friedman
- 3 Books for Remembering “You Have a Body”: On disability, on chronic illness, and on our bodies in society
You can find essay versions of every What Works episode at whatworks.fyi - where you can become a premium subscriber, support my work, and get bonus content for just $7 per month. Upgrade today!
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01/18/24 • 22 min
So, you're stressed. Or work feels intense. Or you're putting more energy than you should into manifesting a day with "no surprises."
But why? Even if you're not working on an especially challenging project or hustling to get in under a deadline, the work we do can be stressful in a sort of ambient and ambiguous way. And we might downplay that stress because, hey, aren't we just lucky to have a cool job like this?
When we think about work, we're often dealing with an outdated metaphor—The Factory. But if you work in a creative, knowledge-based, service, or caring field, that metaphor doesn't have as much to offer as we think it does, especially when it comes to understanding work stress.
Today's episode offers a way to rethink the ways your work can be stressful so you can rethink the resources you need to feel better and do more remarkable work.
Footnotes:
- Rethink Work, an 8-week cohort-based course
- "Sources of intensity in work organizations" by Armand Hatchuel in Creating Sustainable Work Systems (1st ed)
Every episode of What Works is also published in essay form at whatworks.fyi!
- (00:00) - The Factory
- (01:38) - The Factory Metaphor in Job Creation
- (03:39) - Rethink Work Course
- (04:35) - Why the Factory is a Sticky Metaphor
- (07:31) - The Factory Worker, The Bus Driver, and The Creative/Knowledge Worker
- (16:12) - The Problem with the Factory Metaphor
- (19:53) - Course Info & Credits
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08/13/20 • 13 min
In This Episode:
* Why Sean and Tara McMullin chose to “productize” their full-service podcast production offer at YellowHouse.Media... and what productized services actually are* What’s included in the package they offer–and why they don’t often custom or a la carte services* How the productized service model allowed them to quickly create a small group coaching program to increase their capacity and serve more clients
Hey! It’s Tara McMullin and this is a special BONUS episode of What Works—the show that takes you behind the scenes of how small business owners take decisive action on building a stronger business.
This is the second episode of a bonus series on how I’ve approached creating and delivering value through the products and services I’ve offered over the years.
In the first bonus episode, I shared how my most recent offer, a live program called The Commitment Blueprint, started as a personal life change, grew into a free webinar, and then transformed—TWICE—into a paid product.
In this episode, I’m going to give you a closer look at my other company, YellowHouse.Media, and share how and why we’ve taken on the productized service model—including what that means for how we serve our clients, run our operations, and build for the future.
Plus, I’ll share how the same principles that apply to YellowHouse also apply to What Works and how we continue to develop The What Works Network to support small business owners as they build stronger businesses.
Now, in the last regular episode I spoke with India Jackson, the founder of brand visibility agency Flaunt Your Fire. India described what clients come to Flaunt Your Fire looking to achieve and how the agency helps them achieve those results.
She also shared that she tailors each client engagement to the goals of that client using both master services list and a really strong idea of what the agency’s yes, no, and maybe projects are.
This bespoke service model is typically how people approach building a service-based business.
The client tells you want they need, you figure out how to make that happen and put a price on it. Each engagement looks different and might include a different mix of services.
And this model works.
But it’s not the only way to build a service-based business.
A few years ago, I started to notice that the most successful people I was working with in our community and mastermind groups were running a different kind of service-based business.
They were running productized service businesses.
(And in case you’re wondering, yes, most of the time these productized service businesses were out-earning the digital product businesses. So don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t make money in client services.)
I was intrigued by the model and operations behind these successful productized service businesses... but, more than that, I was intrigued by how happy these business owners were!
They were focused. ★ Support this podcast ★
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In This Episode:
* How I decide what roles to hire for (and why understanding our team structure is key)* When it’s time increase capacity by hiring versus fixing messy operations* Why you don’t want to clone yourself to get more done* How product and operations can overlap to creating some really exciting opportunities
When I say I’m an introvert, I mean I’m a hardcore introvert.
People don’t believe me when I say that because I’m loud and enthusiastic—but being loud and enthusiastic is not the same thing as being extroverted.
If you spend more than an hour with me in a social situation, you’ll see the life drain from my eyes as my internal batteries release their last burst of energy.
I wish I was kidding—but I am not.
I also happen to be an introvert surrounded by extroverts.
I’m an internal processor surrounded by external processors. I’m an avoider of small talk surrounded by people who love small talk.
It’s a tricky situation.
Who are these people? They’re my team members—and among them, my husband.
Sean and I often joke about how unfortunate it is that I’ve ended up with so many extroverts in my life. Not because there’s anything wrong with extroverts but because it can be exhausting!
My friend Annie Schuessler asked if I’d be willing to talk about managing a team as an introvert and I jumped at the chance. I’ve learned so much about team-building in general over the last 5 years but I’ve also learned a bunch about how to put guardrails in place around my own energy and bandwidth as I work with my teams.
Since recording this interview, I’ve also started to talk publicly about how the way I work and relate to others is filtered through the lens of autism. So many of the things I’ve always thought of as a result of introversion and social anxiety are present because of my autism.
I am introverted, I do have social anxiety, and I’m autistic.
That’s a pretty thick soup to be wading through as a manager.
The main reason I wanted to share that before you hear this interview is because my experiences as an introverted boss may be quite different from your experiences if you’re also an introverted boss.
The other reason reason I wanted to share that is because, before I had the framework of autism to make sense of my life, I was constantly working against myself in an effort to fix things I perceived as problems & deficiencies.
While I’m still working to become a better manager and leader, I’m also looking much more objectively at how I can build structures that don’t require me to work against my nature quite so often. In so many ways, my autism is a strength for business-building, writing & podcasting, and team-building. But it takes work to embrace those strengths when they’re so different from what other people expect!
Alright, here’s what you’re going to hear in this interview—Annie and I talk about how I find team members, why you need to know what you’re really hiring for before you start looking, how I’m onboarding new hires now, and why you don’t want to clone yourself.
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FAQ
How many episodes does What Works have?
What Works currently has 514 episodes available.
What topics does What Works cover?
The podcast is about Culture, Society & Culture, Personal Growth, Entrepreneurship, Feminism, Capitalism, Podcasts, Small Business, Economics, Philosophy and Business.
What is the most popular episode on What Works?
The episode title 'EP 478: Data Never Speak For Themselves' is the most popular.
What is the average episode length on What Works?
The average episode length on What Works is 37 minutes.
How often are episodes of What Works released?
Episodes of What Works are typically released every 6 days, 23 hours.
When was the first episode of What Works?
The first episode of What Works was released on Oct 28, 2015.
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