Dae Lee Book Club

I had a conversation with one of my clients asking me how to get rid of the negative comments that they have on their corporate pages. And formulas in this book was my answer.

Changing behavior is challenging. But we all know that somehow we need to be able to change something or continuously change so that we become the person we dream of becoming. Come to think of it, even the person that we want to be, changes, but that's another topic altogether. So, how do we change behavior, especially now that we are more stubborn than ever as adults? Let's try to clear things out.

What I have observed these days is that people are not so much fixated on the fact that they have to climb the corporate ladder. Which is a good thing. But it has been replaced by the desire to be seen as someone successful. And social media plays a big role. Constantly comparing ourselves to others. And this desire takes a toll on our physical and mental health. And I find myself in this situation too a lot of times. So how do we combat this climb of the never-ending social ladder?

I get asked this question a lot during my work, how can you unconsciously make better decisions by designing your environment? And this book is the answer. What's different about this decision-making book is that the focus is on the environment design rather than one’s strength, willpower, talent, etc. This leads to choice architecture! Let's discuss that today!

We live in a world of constant distraction, and I think that you and I have experienced this firsthand. And because of this, we have lost our ability to focus deeply which most of the time hinders us from completing a complex task. And it does get frustrating. So here we are going to look at 3 takeaways which include 4 strategies that can cultivate the skill of deep work.

Spontaneity may be a thing these days, but true power comes from habit. I always believed that habits create room for spontaneity. Habits are at the core of everything we do that have an impact on our life, business, and society.

A discussion on The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg

Human behavior is challenging to understand. Human behavior is irrational. But once we can pinpoint a certain behavior or changes in behavior, we can lead and encourage that behavior for intentional change. Whether it's for ourselves or our organization... It’s all about focusing on the three forces that influence it. So, the three forces are...

Anda Goseco and I discuss What Got You Here Won't Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith.

Myke Santos and I discuss Our Iceberg is Melting by John Kotter to see if it is still relevant today.

Success, everybody talks about it and everybody wants to achieve it and only a few are willing to put in the hard work. And recently it's not anymore about hard work. But working smart. But working smart sometimes is not deemed sustainable. So what is it really? The truth is, it's discipline. it makes all the difference. This reminds me of what Les Brown said, and I quote "To be successful, you must be willing to do the things today others won't do in order to have the things tomorrow others won't have."

I get asked this question a lot, what skill do you need to become a great leader?

And when I think about it all boils down to the language that the leader uses. Not the actual language that different countries use like English or Korean, but the method or way of communication. Yeah. You can have the greatest ideas in the world but if you cant translate that into a language that will make people take action. Then I think your leadership wouldn't be as effective as it could be.

But the issue right now is also the fact that the language we use in leadership hasn't really evolved. It's still how leaders should always direct and subordinates should always follow.

So let's dive into how we can develop our leadership in language, better suited to the world today.

We always hear nowadays to be present. Yet when you really think about it more than a third of our lives are spent talking to ourselves, as we reflect, reminisce, or play our scenarios in our heads just like what I did now.

And as far as we know, we are the only species on Earth with the ability for introspection. This allows us to solve problems, make decisions and even plan for the future. But too much introspection can be a bad thing too. Since too much of it becomes chatter - a loop of negative self-talk. So how do we turn the negative being in our heads into our best friend?

I was catching up with one of my friends and the first thing we mentioned was that it's so hard to just talk and catch up on things because of the countless meetings we have. And come to think of it, ever since the pandemic, there are more meetings being held as well as not much time to transition from one meeting to the other. And I think that the reality has become more meetings talking about what can be done but less work actually being done. And if you are like me, most of the time, these countless meetings leave me unengaged and deeply frustrated about the interruption of our work.

This book pulls scientific research and analysis to show how we can transform our meetings into invaluable tools for solving problems and making decisions - what meetings should be in the first place. So let's take a look at the simple tips and techniques that you can implement as soon as you can.

Here we are again talking about passion. We always hear that we have to follow our passion to be happy in our lives.

But books like this go against popular belief and explain things through a different perspective based on reality.

It discusses things like how passion and drug addiction aren't so different from each other and how the general lack of understanding of passion can result in destructive behavior that leaves us burned out or even depressed. I myself have experienced it and maybe even shared it with you a few times. Especially when I wanted to balance my work and life. Interestingly the book also mentions that trying to live a balanced life like the countless self-help books say may be wrong.

Listen in and let's dig deeper!

What does depression really feel like and what are its effects of it on our mind and body? Knowing and understanding this, how can we take the right steps to overcome it? Here is a book that was written by a person who was battling depression, ready to take his own life by jumping off a cliff. He reflects on what stopped him and allowed him to keep going.

How do you manage to achieve performance by creating meaningful connections and reaching a higher level of productivity through a positive proactive mindset? Listen in to find out more!

This is one of the books that got me reading because it was actionable and applicable to whatever I was going through. It's a modern take on stoicism and it’s one of those books that I return to as a quick reminder of what I should be doing. It gives a framework to face the struggles in our own lives with the right perception, actions, and will to see them through.

Attention makes life worth living. So the more focused we are, the more we can give attention to the different areas of our life to make the most out of them. Something to think about. Until I reflected on it, I never really saw it that way.

First of all, I want to say thank you! for listening! It’s our 35th episode! So congrats to our community for getting this far!

This book looks at the set of characteristics and habits that geniuses have. And it's not about waking up early or meditating like what popular literature and social media posts say.

If you are running a company or working for a company and wonder how the future of work should look like this book is for you.
The book questions the current educational systems worldwide in relation to an increasing trend in job automation, growing life expectancy, and a devaluation of educational degrees. It focuses on how the future of work should be and an urgent call to action to adapt to it as soon as we can.

Minimalism was a thing and I am one of those people who embraced it fully and started practicing it. But as time went on, minimalism actually made me more anxious and guilty about things. I may be wrong in the way I practiced minimalism, but I felt bad about wanting or even needing something. And when it came to my output and productivity, practicing minimalism actually took a toll on me. Then I found essentialism - a new approach to productivity and life that allows you to be extremely selective about the essential things in your life and then ruthlessly cut out everything else. And to this day essentialism is what I stand for.

Thank you to Ella Sheen for suggesting and reminding me about this book!

FOMO or the fear of missing out is something that we heard and experienced a lot. Even marketers take advantage of this. But after the pandemic hit. People started talking about JOMO or the joy of missing out especially when it pertained to the virus. In this episode, we explore today’s idea of productivity and common misconceptions about what it means to be productive, as well as how eliminating unnecessary stress by prioritizing effectively can help us live a better life.

I just had a phone conversation with my sister and we talked about how workload these days is way more than ever before. And as thankful we are to have jobs at this time, burnout is real and it affects performance drastically. We theorized that it’s maybe because people are just trying to maximize resources or maybe the world is just getting faster and faster. Regardless of what the reason is, this relatively new book delivers practical advice on how to thrive in the dynamic working environment. We will be discussing well being, work-life balance and prioritizing in this episode.

What happens when you listen to your gut feel? Or what we call intuition. It is said that following our intuition is often much more efficient than conscious deliberating. But if this is the case we should be wary about our intuition leading us to wrong assumptions.

Circumstances keep changing and what we used for our past successes won't always work. So how do we let go of Past Success to Achieve Extraordinary Results?

Change seems to be a recurring topic in the different books that we discuss in this podcast.

So it’s nice to look into how to change. We will be discussing the different stumbling blocks that are in the way, how to get over them, and use some methods to get rid of procrastination, laziness, and much more.

It has been said that stretching has its benefits. It feels good to have a stretch after a hard day's work. But stretching does not need to be limited to the physical world. Our minds can be stretched too. This way we can look for creative solutions, be proactive in developing tasks that really interest us. Of course, it's easy to say this but to put it into action is another thing especially when most of us end up mindlessly staring at our computers without any idea of what to do. So how do we avoid this and become alert and excited people?

It's interesting that as the world around us keeps changing, more skills are required from us. Sure technology made things easier but this also multiplied our work. Not to mention creating the need for more specializations. And because of this, it has become hard to do things on our own. So what should we do? We are told to collaborate but what does it really mean?  

For templates, message me on social media or email! lnk.bio/daelee

This episode is dedicated to Professor Poom Kristhanin and the students of Chulalongkorn University.

Right before recording this session, I just had a lecture or talk, actually, it was more of a conversation with students of Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok Thailand. And we talked about how Purpose and the skills that come along with it are greater than passion and how passion should not be something we should be chasing if we want happiness. And the book that I will be discussing will be exactly about that. This book is one of the reasons why where I am today. It gave me an alternative route to find what I am passionate about.

When I talk to people, a lot tell me that they don't understand why people they know do certain things when the rational, obvious thing to do is right in front of them. And I do agree with them and moments later. I keep remembering that people are not really rational. And it does help understanding how irrational human beings are. Since it might just be the key to us living better lives.

We all know we need to kick bad habits and keep or create good ones. But it is not easy to do. Today we will discuss 4 steps that can help us keep or adopt new ones. So what are the small incremental everyday routines that compound into massive, positive change over time? Listen in to find out.

I've been having conversations with my friends, colleagues, and clients. And the topic other than the pandemic is about work and how there is so much to do - more than ever. And the sentiments are mostly the same, we all thought that working from home or having a hybrid working setup would help us in managing our time better and have more time for ourselves. The reality is most of us feel like it's far from the truth.

In the last episode, we talked about how stress can actually be good for us. And I remembered a book that talks about things that gain from chaos and disorder. So let us dive into how other things that are perceived to be negative, can be beneficial to us, or how we can use the negativity to our advantage.

Stress? This is something that all human beings experience. All the more now with what is happening to the world. I have so many questions about it. Is there an upside to it? Why do we feel stress? What is it really? And how can it make us grow? Can it really? And why stress is good for you. Wait what?

Problems are a part of our life. So why not try to be a problem-solving master?

This book is based on simple advice originally written for Japanese school children. It's a problem-solving method, broken down into four simple easy-to-follow steps.

So at the end of this podcast episode, you should be able to know the first steps toward solving any problem. Know how to use a yes/no tree, and how to achieve massive goals and dreams through the steps.

I really didn't like exercise, but for some reason, recently, from something I had to do, now I find every chance I get to fit in an exercise somewhere in my schedule. This book might shed some light on what I am experiencing.

What is minimalism? Does having less really make us maximize things?

Asians talk about this a lot. And I am a fan of Marie Kondo, But I'd like to see a western perspective on things. And this quick book summary is going to be that.

What is stopping us from doing work? There is an enemy, and that enemy creates resistance that stops us from taking action. And recognizing that enemy is the first step to having power over them. Interestingly, most of the time, the enemy is inside of us.

If there is one thing that I wish I could do daily is to be comfortable with asking questions. And I picked up this book, to improve on that. But after reading this book I realized this book is more on how to persuade people through questions. Although I don't agree with everything in the book, it does have some good points that I can share. I'll also mention what I don't agree with. 

I've been getting a lot of requests on book summaries about working remotely. Thankfully, I just finished a book that was written by the founders of the Remote Leadership Institute. Not many books have been written about this topic since the pandemic is so new and still ongoing. So this might be a really good starting point since there are clear actionable steps regarding remote work.

With what is happening to the world right now and how work and life are integrating. More and more conversations are revolving around work-life balance. I always wondered, what is work-life balance? I question myself when people keep talking about being able to balance it. Is it a myth? I feel like it is. But if it isn't, how do you really balance it? And I picked this book up because I agreed with the title that said The Work-Life Balance is a myth. Let's see what it says.

Lately, I have been very distracted. And after reading some articles online, just like them, I blamed technology and social media for distraction. So to get me back to focus, I picked this book up. Interestingly, I found out that wasting time on my digital devices was a symptom, rather than the cause of the distraction! It even gave me insights that I can use for company culture. If these interest you, keep listening!

The tipping point. It is the magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior starts to spread like wildfire.

It's the time of the year again where I doubt myself and the things that I do. So this is a great personal reminder to not give in to bad thought habits. It's also a push for stronger mental strength and emotional resilience.

If you are wondering how you can functionally structure your work to make the most essential activities a breeze to do, this book is for you.

This book looks at how human-centered companies are changing the future of work and the world.
It can serve as a roadmap for building the workplace of the future based on positive human values.

In this summary, we look at where the ego comes from and how it stops us from achieving success.

Our mindset determines how we deal with issues and how we improve ourselves.
This summary discusses the difference between people with a fixed mindset and the growth mindset. 

If you want to keep posted on my different projects, you can visit lnk.bio/daelee

This book has helped me with coming up with a clear direction for myself and the people I work with. Understanding the infinite mindset helps us push ourselves and others to the path of fulfillment.

If you are dealing with other people often, or want to improve your conversations in personal relationships this book is for you.