INTERVIEW SERIES

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Amy Leneker
Joy Strategist
Author, Cheers to Monday
Global Speaker & Trainer for Fortune 100s

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Transcript

Dough Riddle: (0:02)

Welcome to The Treasure Hunt. Today's conversation is with Amy Leneker, a leadership advisor, keynote speaker, and founder of the Center for Joyful Work, whose mission is to help people and organizations rethink their relationship with stress.

After more than two decades in leadership roles, including time in the C-suite, Amy experienced firsthand the toll that high-performance cultures can take.

Those experiences led her to challenge one of the most deeply ingrained assumptions in modern work: that stress is just the price of success. She's now the author of Cheers to Monday, where she lays out a practical framework for seeing, sorting, and solving stress in a way that actually improves performance rather than undermines it. And we just got word that Amy's book is now number one on USA Today's Business Books list and number 13 on USA Today's overall bestseller list.

So congratulations, Amy. Amy's work sits at the intersection of leadership, neuroscience, and organizational culture. And she's worked with tens of thousands of leaders around the world to build environments where people don't just perform but thrive.

Amy Leneker (01:09)

Thank you.

Doug Riddle (01:22)

More to the reason for today's conversation was a fabulous session Amy facilitated for the Fellows Network of the Carol Emmott Foundation on Brene Brown's Dare to Lead. And so I'm just thrilled, Amy, that we get to have a little conversation. I get to have the conversation. Other people can listen in this morning. And I'm just so pleased to see you. You look quite bright and shiny in your lovely yellow top. I am loving that quite a lot. So, welcome.

Amy Leneker (01:44)

Thank you, I'm so happy to be here.

Doug Riddle (01:52)

Well, let's jump right into it. Role complexity, or wearing multiple hats, can be both a source of stress and pleasure. And I look at your life and the work you do now. So, you know, your book is wonderful, and thank you for making it available to us. But what can you tell us about two of your roles? The very social public speaking and the very solitary writing. How does that work for you?

Amy Leneker (02:18)

For me, it's the perfect balance because it really is my personality. I got to spend time with you and so many great participants at that conference in Chicago. And then at the end of that day, I had to just go back to my hotel and be alone. So it really is how I'm wired that I do enjoy time with people. And then I really do thrive when I've got time on my own to think and reflect. So in some ways, I feel like I have finally figured out the right mix of my professional life, because it's starting to mirror what I've always wanted in my personal life.

Doug Riddle (02:52)

Awesome. So maybe we could dig in a little on what you mean by burnout. In particular, I'm interested in your experiences. You've been very open about your own experiences with burnout. How do you talk, or would you talk to us a little bit about the journey through each of those experiences? You know, most human experiences seem to have stages and elements, and I'm curious, what could you tell us about how that worked for you?

Amy Leneker (03:22)

Sure. So I burnt out in a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad way. And I wish I could say that I had an epiphany or I read a book and decided to do something different, but I didn't. I worked until my body shut down. I got really, really sick. And that was the only reason why I had to stop and reflect on how what I'm doing is not working.

In hindsight, I'm able to look back and see how many stress warnings I missed. My body was telling me it was too much. My friends and family were telling me it was too much. But I was ignoring all of that in this quest to just head down and keep moving forward.

What really surprised me is that when I left that job, I thought that I had inoculated myself against burnout because that's what causes burnout, right? It's the job. So if you take yourself away from the job, you've now made it so that it will never happen again. But a few years later, it happened again. So what I had to confront was that it wasn't just the job; it was that I had taken myself wherever I go. I had to really examine the patterns driving this behavior, because if I didn't, the chances were high that I would just keep repeating it throughout my career.

Doug Riddle (04:50)

I guess I'm curious about the signs and what kind of internal self-talk, this is something I get from you as well, what kind of, what were you telling yourself that allowed you to have amnesia for the signals from your body?

Amy Leneker (05:10)

I call it our stress stories. I think all of us have stress stories that we've either been told directly or indirectly about the role that stress plays in our lives. And for me, I grew up in a house with a lot of love and never enough money.

And so stress, money, and work were all mixed together, and I really didn't know how to separate them. So the story I had told myself all along was that I had it good. Because when I looked at how my parents had spent their working lives, how my cousins, my aunts, my uncles, I had it really, really good. So I remember specifically sitting in my air-conditioned office, thinking, how can I complain? Like, what do I possibly have to complain about? And so I had really negated my own experience. I had minimized and dismissed what was real for me because I was comparing it to generations before me without actually saying that this is real. My experience is real, and there is a point where too much is simply too much.

Doug Riddle (06:18)

And without knowing what their internal process was, or what was going on for them. So important.

Amy Leneker (06:21)

Of course. Yeah, my parents never complained. I even think back now. And when the book came out, of course, they read it. They were one of the first readers of it. And that part stuck out to them too. I cannot think of a single time, Doug, when my parents complained about working hard. I can't think of one day. And if I think of two people in the world who should have complained about working hard, it was the two of them.

So one of the messages that I internalized was that you don't complain. You don't complain about stress. You just do what you've got to do. You keep going. And then that just becomes weeks, months, and years.

Doug Riddle (06:50)

So is that what you've described yourself as, a recovering workaholic. And that's what I call the siren call of getting it all done. How do you relate to that differently now? What do you say when you hear that siren going, because you're busier now? I mean, you're more productive now, can I put it that way? You're engaged in more things, you have more people who count on you, you have more responsibilities, and you wear more hats than you ever did during the times that you were burning out. So what are you doing?

Amy Leneker (07:36)

So I'm just coming off of a book launch that was exhausting, but now it's like, okay, the book launch is over. So it's time to ease up a little bit. So I've gotten into being able to find the rhythm that there's gonna be these cadences that I have some control over and that I have some ability to influence.

And I think the other piece, too, is that there's an awareness of, I think before, I was so afraid that right after I healed from burnout, I was so afraid to ever overwork again. Like, if I overwork just a little, then I'm on this path to destruction. And what I know now is that that's not true.

I think a few things are different. So one is that the season of our life has changed. So at the time of my burnout, our kids were little. And I think being a working mom and trying to balance a career and being the best mom you can be, I had no idea what I was in for. And so I think part of what's changed is that the season of my life has changed. Miles is a college senior, and Clara drives herself to soccer practice. So there's a really different availability that's opened up in my life.

Doug Riddle (08:34)

And I wonder how much I like that I ask you about your internal thinking about that, but I'm also aware that you've created a team, obviously, that supports you. In fact, I think your website, or, you know, your organization is called the Leneker Team, if I remember right.
And so you're already pointing to surrounding yourself and being part of a community. Can you talk a little bit about that? Is that a piece of it as well? The circumstances you've created?

Amy Leneker (08:49)

We are a small but mighty group and they are, they are my, they're a ride or die team for me. And we go all in for each other, so that has made all the difference in the world.

Yeah, 100 % because I think at the time when I burned out, it was a really lonely feeling where I felt like if I wasn't doing something, then it wasn't going to get done. And some of that was a self-fulfilling prophecy because I wasn't delegating. I was really creating it for myself.

Doug Riddle (09:24)

Yeah, no, I buy that. As you know, you came in, facilitated the program, and spoke to us at our 10th anniversary of this foundation, which we started with three people, one of whom was an employee, and the goodwill and relationships. So we completely get that. I think that's fundamental. You've made the point, turning to organizational life, you've made the point that joyful work requires workplaces that support meaning, energy, and sustainable performance. What are some of the ways you've seen organizations create those kinds of structures and practices?

Amy Leneker (10:27)

The good news is that there are organizations that get it. So yes, some don't, but many do. So what we found in our national research study on stress and joy is that the three drivers of joy are when people feel meaning or purpose in what they do. When there's mattering in their relationships, when I know that I matter to you, not just because of what I do, but because of who I am. And then the third one is that there was momentum: you're able to see progress, learn, and grow.

So when organizations can thoughtfully do those three things, they are creating a perfect storm in the best way for joy to occur. Organizations can't force joy. You can't force someone to feel joyful. But what you can do is create the conditions for it. You can remove the barriers that we know are going to prevent it. And now you've set people up to have that feeling of joy at work.

Doug Riddle (11:25)

Can you talk a little bit about specific practices or changes that you've seen in leadership in particular, institutes that seem to contribute to that? Obviously, you don't control any of it, but ones that contribute to the kind of workplace that you're talking about.

Amy Leneker (11:41)

Yeah, so for all three of them, when I think about meaning, I have worked with leaders who have conversations with every single person about the meaning and purpose of work. So connecting their job to the bigger mission of the organization and connecting their job to the overall vision of the organization, but then going a step further and saying, what does meaning look like for you?
Because as the leader, if you report to me and I understand what meaning and purpose looks like for you, the way that I manage you could look very different than if I don't understand that.

For the second one, when it comes to mattering, this is when organizations really understand the value of connection at work. So when people aren't talking about connection as touchy-feely, it's really what you all did in Chicago when you said, "let's come together, let's talk about how we connect at work." That's the second part: valuing relationships.

And I've seen organizations do phenomenal things around momentum. So helping individuals build learning and growth development plans, helping individuals see how what they're doing contributes to the momentum of an organization. So I see many leaders doing all three of those things, which I find incredibly encouraging.

Doug Riddle (12:58)

Wonderful, very helpful. As you've gone through your own stages of life and your professional journey, you mentioned a different stage of life that you're in now, and that may be a benefit. I'm finding there are a lot of benefits to being an old guy. But I'm curious, as you think back on your own emotional needs, have those changed?

Amy Leneker (13:14)

I do think they have. I think for me, as I've gotten older, I have less of a need for external validation. And I think at the height of my burnout, I was also at the height of external validation, where the kudos from my boss meant a lot to me.

My job title started to mean a lot to me. And as I've gotten older and, frankly, as I've gone through some really painful losses, which is usually when you have, at least for me, that's when I really evaluate who I am? Who do I want to be? I've realized that the validation is not from the external, that if I'm always chasing that, I'm never going to be satisfied. And so even with this book, while today is an incredible day to celebrate, it's also this moment to say the book didn't change. The book is what it was. And even if it weren't on any of those lists, it was the best I could do. I poured my heart into it. That's all I had. And so to feel that validation is really something that I've only gotten with time. We have a daughter who's 16, and I talked to her about it. Now I'm like, don't wait until you're 50. Do this earlier than I did. Free yourself from that external validation much sooner than I did.

Doug Riddle (14:23)

So, external validation and getting a sense of yourself—what other kinds of changes have you seen as you've gone through these different stages of life? I mean, you were still a mother. Are you still wearing many of these hats? Obviously, that changes as your children get to be more independent, autonomous, and go off to school, that kind of thing. You've built, even though it's a small but mighty organization, it’s still not just Amy, which at one time was just Amy. So there have been these kinds of things. What are the sources of gratification and meaning and purpose for you? And are those changing as well?

Amy Leneker (15:18)

They are, and I think, and I don't think it would have happened without the first piece. So that part about releasing from external validation is really what allowed me to have the second part of it, which is that I'm no longer afraid to focus.

I think in the beginning, early in my career, and frankly, early in the journey of owning my own company, I wanted to be everything to everybody. I wanted to try to do everything. And it just isn't the way forward. And so to really be able to focus and say, I don't want to do a hundred things. I want to be the very best writer I can be. I want to be the best facilitator I can be. But to really start to hone in has been wildly freeing.

It showed up in this study because that's what I wanted to study. What I want to know, what I want to learn more and more about, is the intersection of stress and joy. And yet when I first started designing the National Research Study, it had about 100 things in it. None of them were about stress and joy. I was trying to do everything all at once. And so freeing myself of that and just really going deep on what's most important to me has really made a difference.

Doug Riddle (16:17)

So what are you curious about next? Where is your curiosity leading you in terms of your own studies, and what topics and things do you want to understand better?

Amy Leneker (16:40)

I want to go all in on joy. So this last book was about the intersection of stress and joy. I think it was exactly the right place to start. I think it's also the healing journey that I had to take to write about my burnout recovery. And now I want to go all in on joy.

So we know now what drives it. We know what prevents it, but I want to figure out what sustains it. I want to figure out how we teach it. How do we measure it? How do we observe it? How do we, how do we make it part of the infrastructure of work? That's what I want to do next.

Doug Riddle (17:10)

So, is this a new study, or what's your process in terms of how you study a topic that's aroused your curiosity?

Amy Leneker (17:19)

We're definitely going to repeat the next study next year. It's an annual study, so we'll do that again. So already thinking now about what those questions are going to be. Wondering what role AI plays. I think there is a connection there between AI and what's happening with people's ability to feel joy. And hopefully there will be a second book. That would be as good as it gets for me to be able to go and write a book about that.

Doug Riddle (17:42)

Okay, that's good. Yeah, I like that. So we haven't figured out the five-book series just yet, then. Not going to torture yourself with that?

Amy Leneker (17:51)

Not yet. My husband just said this morning. He's like, can we celebrate this list today before we talk about book number two? It's like, well, yes and no.

Doug Riddle (18:02)

That's great. Well, obviously, today's a pretty joyful day because you got some cool news. What else is something that surprised you with joy lately?

Amy Leneker (18:15)

I think what's been most surprising to me is that, in the data, 79% of working Americans say, "I need joy in order to do my best work." That number jumps to 89 % for executives.

So now, when I'm testing that anecdotally, the responses have been nothing short of astounding. So just recently, I was talking to a CEO who had reached out to me; their team recommended me for some facilitation. So I'm doing this exploratory interview, and they say, you know, Amy, I gotta tell you, I'm just not that into joy. So I'm wondering. Why are we talking? Like, have you been on my website? Do you know the book I wrote? So I said, I respect that. Thank you for telling me that. And even if that's true for you, our research shows it's not true for 89% of your executive team.

Doug Riddle (19:38)

Wow. Well, Amy Leneker, it was such a joy to actually have a chance to talk with you. And as I think I've mentioned to you previously, the staff of the Carol Emmott Foundation is hard at work figuring out ways we can stay connected and do more with you, since we had such a good time. And I thank you so much for spending time with us here on The Treasure Hunt. You take care.

Amy Leneker (20:03)

Thank you so much.