No Hard Feelings Book Summary

Book Summary

15 min

Audio available

Brief Summary

Learning to manage emotions at work makes the workplace more enriching, productive, and less stressful. The authors give practical ideas on how to avoid feeling overwhelmed and having an emotional breakdown. This book is a quick read on understanding emotional intelligence and achieving a positive work-life balance. Feeling stressed and unmotivated at work? This book will definitely offer you some pointers.

About the Author

Liz Fosslien works as a design and marketing consultant with clients such as Reddit, Zumper, and Ernst & Young. Born in 1985, she attended Pomona College and graduated with a degree in Economic/Math. Liz also doubles as the Content and Editorial head at Humu and as an illustrator for the Wall Street Journal. She previously worked for New Genius and lives in California. Liz has a passion to help remote workers overcome burnout and help create a culture of belonging within organizations.

Mollie West Duffy describes herself as an organizational designer and is the current organizational lead designer at IDEO. Mollie has consulted for organizations that underwent large-scale organizational change. She graduated from Brown University with a degree in Commerce and from Parsons School of Design with an MFA. Mollie is also an entrepreneur and researcher. She writes regularly for Fast Company, the Stanford Social Review and Quartz.

Topics

Career & Success Management & Leadership

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Key Insights

No Hard Feelings: The Secret Power of Embracing Emotions at Work is a useful guide to understand and manage emotions in the workplace. The workplace is an emotional minefield that requires careful navigation. Liz Fosslien and Molly Duffy give practical steps in a hilarious manner on how to avoid emotional burnout at the office and find a healthy work-life balance. The authors show how managing emotions at work is important in staying motivated.

Chapter 1: The Future is Emotional

Humans are emotional creatures by nature. At one time or the other, we all feel overwhelmed, frustrated, and insecure at work. Emotions will always be there- so it’s time you learned to deal with them.

However, most people choose avoidance and suppression in order to appear professional in the workplace. However, this often leads to anxiety and burnout

You have heard that Emotional Intelligence (EQ) is a good predictor of success in the workplace. EQ requires that professionals of the future learn from, and talk about emotions without becoming emotional.

Chapter 2: Health-Be less passionate about your job: Why taking a chill pill makes you healthier

How many times do you check your email at work? For most people, the average time is ten minutes? Being too passionate about work is unhealthy!

Your mood at home shouldn’t be influenced by your mood at the job.

What is the solution to the above problem? There are basically two options-take a holiday or be less passionate about the job (the second option is easier and cheaper!)

Chapter 3: Motivation--Inspire yourself

Most employees are not motivated in the workplace. The level of engagement is often low due to a lack of flexibility and creativity. What does this mean? Going to work for most people is a daily chore.

How do you get motivated and stay motivated? Finding a sense of purpose is your starting point. Reward yourself every time you feel you have accomplished a goal.

Connect with people at the workplace who are inspiring--tap into that uplifting, positive energy and get motivated

Chapter 4: Decision Making--Emotion is part of the equation: Why good decisions rely on examining your emotions

Most people believe that making decisions is a process that is unemotional. Well, that is not true. Emotions are always at work consciously or unconsciously

Since we can’t ignore our emotions, we ought to manage them. This form of emotional decision-making takes practice and involves embracing some emotions and ignoring others.

This means starting by considering what emotions we feel when making decisions. Are the emotions relevant or irrelevant to the decision at hand? For example, firing an employee when you are angry is likely to cloud your judgment.

Chapter 5: Teams-Psychological safety first: Why the how matters more than the who

In a team setting, junior staffers often feel too shy to express their true feelings. They fear making a fool of themselves before senior members. This is referred to as psychological safety--the ease of interacting freely without fear of embarrassment.

Why is psychological safety important? Effective teams that excel in performance are those that operate with high levels of psychological...