Steven Van Cohen | How Workplace Loneliness Impacts Performance

Srini Rao: Steven, welcome to the Unmistakable Creative. Thanks so much for taking the time to join us. It

Steven Van Cohen: is my pleasure to be here. Yeah,

Srini Rao: it is my pleasure to have you here. You have a new book out called Connectable, how leaders can move teams from isolated to all in. And I think it's such a fascinating topic.

We're talking about loneliness in particular, and I'd never seen it written about in the context of the workplace. And given what this book is about, I wanted to start by asking you what social group were you a part of in high school and what impact did that end up having on where you've ended up with your life?

Steven Van Cohen: That's a great question. I was a bit of an anomaly in high school because I was a competitive athlete, I was a soccer player, but I was also a super hippie who had long hair and lots of tie dye and was really into the Grateful Dead and Phish. So I blended between kind of the jock group and the musician, the hippie jam band group, and I split between those two demographics.

Yeah.

Srini Rao: So it's funny when I talk about people who go to fish concert or talk to people who go to fish concerts or Grateful Dead, it seems like there is this very sort of relevant subculture to the whole idea of being connectable. What is it about Fish and the Grateful Dead in particular that have created those sort of cult followings?

Because Seth Godin references the Grateful Dead so frequently in his blog posts. That I feel like there's so much to

Steven Van Cohen: learn from that. I think with music, oftentimes music is an individualistic experience, right? Where like you listen to an artist because there's certain songs that you resonate with. The whole essence of jam band and that culture is it's a collaborative experience, right?

These artists are essentially creating music that bond people together, oftentimes in a live setting. And when you go to Phish or Grateful Dead or any kind of a jam bag concert, like the whole experience of being there with total strangers you've never met before is a part of the magic and the draw that brings people back.

Srini Rao: What about high school sports because I can't tell you the number of people that I have talked to on this show who have mentioned being on a high school sports team as one of the most sort of instrumental influential things that got them to where they were. Tim Ferriss even talks about this. He says his high school wrestling coach was one of those people for him and he said many of the people who are on that wrestling team went on to do incredible things.

What is it about high school sports in particular that creates that and to parents who are listening, what would you want them to know? One of the things that's interesting about high school sports that has a really strong parallel to work is this idea of a shared common goal, a shared mission, a shared vision, right?

Steven Van Cohen: If you're on a soccer team, the vision is very straightforward. Win the game and then get to a point where you're in a tournament to win state or conference or division or whatever. And having very clear mission that everyone can rally behind and support each other on, is what allows for that sense of connectedness to take place in that kind of a setting.

And when you look at work, and work is really the world I spend a lot of my time trying to understand and help people with, When companies have a very clear, strong vision and mission, oftentimes it creates that same feel right within a group of we're in this together. We're all moving in the same direction.

Hopefully we all are supporting one another towards this thing that's bigger than ourselves. And that creates a bond and a sense of belongingness that is really powerful and really important to us as a species. Studying loneliness in the workplace doesn't seem like one of those careers that you basically can go to a high school guidance counselor and say, this is what I'm going to do.

Srini Rao: So talk me through the trajectory that led you here.

Steven Van Cohen: Yeah, it's definitely not something that I had on my wish list when I was graduating from high school or college, but it's something that I'm really glad I fell into. So my business partner, his name is Ryan Jenkins. And Ryan is a thought leader in the future of work.

So he does lots and lots of events with big companies around the world to help them understand the emerging generations. And he wrote a book called The Millennial Manual and he wrote a book called The Gen Z Guide. And when he wrote the book The Gen Z Guide in 2018, he came across a statistic that 79% of Gen Zers feel sometimes they're always alone.

And that caught him off guard and when he shared it with me in 2018, it caught me off guard. And because we do a lot of events with big clients where they're trying to understand how to recruit and engage and develop these young professionals, we started to build content around there's a lonely generation coming into the workplace and what does that mean for work and for productivity and for cohesion and all these different elements.

And we had this whole learning program associated with lessening loneliness because of this generation. And then the pandemic hit and we went to our clients like Home Depot and Bank of America. And we said, do you guys want to talk about loneliness? And every single client said, yes, like this is something we're all experiencing.

Let's talk about it. And then we went to a bunch of big publishers, McGraw Hill being one of them and said we want to write a book about loneliness at work. And they said, yes, this is absolutely what we should be talking about. It's snowballed from there. One statistic that was shared with me from my business partner has turned into a whole thriving business that we're really excited to be leading the charge on.

Yeah. It's

Srini Rao: funny because I'm thinking to myself, I'm like, wow, you're one of the few who seems to have been a huge beneficiary of something like a pandemic. Like you found an opportunity in a crisis that most people probably wouldn't have. But prior to actually starting this company, like what's been the career trajectory that got you here?

My

Steven Van Cohen: biggest passion around the work I do is the work I do around leadership development. So I've been running my consulting company for 15 years, and most of the work I do with clients is to help leaders inside those organizations find more success with their departments or their teams or whatever work that they do.

So I do a lot of workshops, a lot of retreats, a lot of off sites for clients, a lot of coaching and I've been in the leadership development and thought leadership space with regards to leadership development for 15 years now. And the catalyst for that was going back to my time as a soccer player. I'm seven years older than my youngest brother.

And when he was starting to get into park league soccer, none of the parents wanted to coach because it was a pretty big commitment. And at that point I was playing real competitive soccer and my mom said, Hey, do you want to coach David's soccer league? And as like a 14 year old, I took over my seven year old brother's park district soccer league.

And I went to every practice and I coached and I ran them through drills. And on Saturdays I was on the sideline doing all that work and I loved it. Like I fell such in love with that experience. And it's always stuck with me and as I tried to figure out what I wanted to do with my professional career and in college, going back to coaching and motivational speaking and the stuff I do today is always continue to bubble to the surface.

So that's the genesis of how I get into what I currently do today. Yeah. I'm so curious.

Srini Rao: What did you learn about coaching adults from coaching seven year olds because you're talking about two wildly different psychologically, psychological development stages in life?

Steven Van Cohen: Oh, that's an awesome question.

One is patience, right? Like even with adults. We got to channel our patience. We also with adults and with seven year olds, need to understand that learning oftentimes is not at the snap of a finger, right? There are trials and tribulations, and we got to fall down and get back up and brush ourselves off.

And that tends to be consistent regardless of your age. And both seven year olds and 45 year olds need lots of positive recognition. They need lots of admiration and they need a lot of reassurance that what they're doing is correct or what they're doing is incorrect. And that consistent feedback loop for seven year olds and for 45 year olds.

That's really important. So there's quite a bit of overlap and I've never really thought about it from that perspective of coaching a group of seven year olds and coaching the senior leaders that I get to work with. But some of those strategies are pretty applicable. Have you seen

Srini Rao: the movie Kicking and Screaming with Will Ferrell?

Steven Van Cohen: Yes. Is that with Mike Dicca? Yeah. I think so. Yes. I'm a Chicago Bears fan through and through. And to see Mike Dicca in that role and to see Will Ferrell try to compete. Oh, amazing. That was a great movie. Yeah. It was

Srini Rao: just because I was thinking that's what it was like, because the thing about a kid's soccer team, and I just remember this distinctly from watching my sister's soccer team and I was never a very good athlete. So I played maybe one season. And inevitably, like they're going to be kids who are the naturally talented and athletic kids and then they're going to be like my sister or just running up and down the field, which I feel like is half the soccer team on a young kids team.

Like what I wonder is how you address. The sort of positive reinforcement of those kids when, you know, they often are the ones that feel so marginalized in a soccer team. Like I always said like I was the most improved player on my seventh grade basketball team. I was like, that just meant I was the shittiest player on

Steven Van Cohen: the team.

You went from like really bad to like, not so bad. Yeah, exactly. That was the leap. You know what? I think regardless of talent, it's always pretty easy to admire and encourage effort. And as a seven year old who might not have the skills or capabilities, if they're putting in the effort, if they're trying, if they're making little subtle minor improvements based on whatever feedback I was giving at the time, all of that is something that you can reinforce.

So I'm sure as I'm thinking back to my time as a 14 year old coaching a group of seven year olds. I probably spent a lot of time focusing on effort and just trying to make sure they're having a good time because at seven most of those kids weren't going to take it very far after their days in park district soccer.

Yeah it just makes me think about the workplace, right? Where we value performance and results so much. But at the end of the day, if the effort isn't leading to a positive outcome result in a workplace, the consequences are significant. Yeah. Yeah. That's well said. Yeah. So how do you

address that issue then?

Marcus Buckingham is pretty well known for this very simple theory that I believe works really well. It's a sweet spot that leaders can focus on in order to create real engagement and motivation with work. He says, essentially. If you want to inspire someone to do their best work, you need to put them in a position where their interests and their skill sets are in total alignment, right?

So I can be really interested in something, but if I'm shitty at it, I'm not going to be motivated. Or I could be really good at something, but if I don't have interest in it, I'm not going to be motivated. So it's how do I align those two things in a way where I go to work every day and I'm working to my skills and I'm feeling encouraged and inspired with the work because it gives me some internal validation or intrinsic value.

And it's not always possible for everybody in every role, but that's the sweet spot that I help my leader, my leaders that I work with try to pinpoint in each of their team members. Cause when you get that it's pretty amazing what we see from a result standpoint. This ACAS podcast is sponsored by NetSuite, 36, 000, the number of businesses which have upgraded to the number one cloud financial system, NetSuite by Oracle.

1. NetSuite just turned 25. That's 25 years of helping businesses streamline their finances and reduce costs. One. Because your unique business deserves a customized solution. And that's NetSuite. Learn more when you download NetSuite's popular Key Performance Indicators Checklist. Absolutely free at netsuite.

com slash optimize. That's netsuite. com slash optimize.

Srini Rao: Dan Pink and I were talking about this and I was the guy who got fired from every job I ever had. And the thing I realized, I said every one of those basically was, okay, we're putting you on a performance improvement plan. And I thought to myself, I'm like, yeah, this is a good way for you to avoid a lawsuit, but it's not gonna actually improve performance.

Yeah. It literally is just a way to basically protect yourself against legal action. And the thing that shocked me, looking back at it, especially after I've had all these conversations, is to your very point, one of my mentors said, if you mismatch talent and environment, you're going to get shitty performance.

It's yeah, LeBron ran Microsoft and Bill Gates was on the Lakers would lose and Microsoft might not be doing that great. Although LeBron is extremely entrepreneurial, as I'm learning from his biography, but that's an aside. What surprises me is that the question of, okay, is this person even in the right role?

Have we matched their interests with their actual talents? That's a question that never comes up when performance is terrible.

Steven Van Cohen: No. Unfortunately at that point, oftentimes it's too late, right? Like you've lost the person to a point where now we just need to find a replacement. I have a question for you.

So you would put on all of these performance review plans and you got fired from all of your jobs. Was it because you're meant to be doing what you're doing now? Or do you feel like there was missed opportunities at certain employers that if they would have done things differently, you might've had a totally different path to success.

Srini Rao: I can't

,

give you a yes or no answer, yes to a degree I can't I wouldn't say it's an either or answer, it's nuanced, right? I'm a person with ADHD and the worst thing you could do to somebody with ADHD is chain them to a desk. Yeah. And that's what every boss I ever had did. And I didn't get diagnosed until I was, like, it was when I was put on my last performance improvement plan prior to going to business school.

I went to a psychiatrist and told him this is what's been happening, this has been happening since I graduated from college. I'm like, I am not unmotivated and I'm not lazy you don't do what I do now. And I'm like, we've been, I think we're at over a thousand interviews and we publish every Monday and Wednesday for 10 years.

That's not the result of laziness or lack of motivation. To your point, I think it was a couple, so either way, either or I think it was the way the work was structured was really restricting to me.

Steven Van Cohen: Yeah, and you were working in an environment that wasn't conducive to when you get into flow, right?

Yes, we weren't doing things that give you the intrinsic motivation to put in the crazy amount of hours You must put in to run a successful podcast. So yeah I think there's so many little tiny elements that go into Do I show up as the best version of myself and when I don't? Oftentimes it's because I'm just not in the right place See it on the bus, or I shouldn't be on the bus altogether.

Speaking

Srini Rao: of not being on the bus altogether, how do we get to this place where loneliness has become such an epidemic that somebody like Vivek Murthy ends up writing a book about it? And find out that it's the one of the leading causes, if not the leading cause from what I remember, because I read the book.

I just don't remember it in detail of so many of our health ailments today and mental health ailments. How did we get here in the first place? One of the things that's important to understand is this is not a pandemic problem. So pre pandemic loneliness levels were at. An increasing clip that they shouldn't be at.

Steven Van Cohen: So pre pandemic Cigna did some research and they found that 61% of Americans often feel lonely. And that was. greater in 2019 than it was in 2018 and 2017 and years before. So we've seen loneliness increase exponentially over the past decade. The research we did for the book, we interviewed more than 2, 000 people from around the world, and we found that 72% in 2020 and 2021.

We're feeling alone on a monthly basis with 55% saying they felt lonely every single week. And as we've been doing workshops with really big clients, we use a polling software. So oftentimes in webinars we'll have anywhere from 200 to a thousand people. One of the questions that we ask is how often do you feel a sense of loneliness?

Hourly, daily, weekly, rarely, never, and even today in 2023, as the pandemic is shifted to where it's at today, people are still feeling really lonely. 80% oftentimes of the people say that they feel lonely, at least on a monthly basis. And the reason for that is interesting. It's a whole bunch of factors.

One of the biggest factors for why we're at the place that we're at is due to busyness. We just have less margin to invest in our social connections. And that makes sense, especially at work. If I'm constantly jumping from meeting to meeting or project to project, I just don't have as much time to build some of the social connectedness that I need.

There's been a huge shift in what's called dependency. So 20 years ago, if I needed help with something, I oftentimes had to rely on another human, right? Like a neighbor or a friend or a family member, and at work, if I had questions, I had to seek out a colleague or my boss. And today I don't need any other humans, right?

I just need access to my phone and I'll find the YouTube video or a podcast or an article or. Something online that gives me the guidance I need. So that's created huge separations with regards to how we show up for one another, right? Being helpful towards another human being is a very connective experience.

When I can share my guidance or wisdom or perspective and help you do something you can't do. And that's just been stripped away because of access to technology. We've seen obviously huge shifts with. The way in which we interact and communicate via technology and social media. So oftentimes we're communicating, but we're not connecting and we can talk a bit about the difference between those two.

If you want there's also been a shift with regards to like being too professional in the workplace and going to work and not feeling like I can show up as the truest version of myself. And if I have to be somebody that fits in versus somebody who I am. That creates loneliness. So there's all these factors that have just shifted the way in which we live our lives.

And that is why we're now seeing these big increases in levels of loneliness.

Srini Rao: So there's a quote in the book at the very beginning that really struck me. You said, we're subtly turning our backs on humanity every day. We do this when we choose automation like mobile banking, Siri, on demand food delivery, and self checkout kiosks.

And I was thinking about what would life be like without these things? And I was thinking to myself the only positive benefit that I could envision to not having these things is that I might meet a cute girl. But that's because I'm a single guy. But talk to me about that because I'd seen this whole cost of convenience idea show up in other books.

And I realized we don't talk to strangers because of this convenience. I had a friend who told me that one thing that she noticed as a woman when dating apps came out, she said that, and I met her, I think prior to the emergence of Bumble. This was probably when I started business school in 2008. She said in those days, she said, when I went out to a bar.

Guys would actually start conversations with me. And she said, now, when I go to San Francisco as a woman, where there are hardly any other women, nobody talks

Steven Van Cohen: to me. Yeah. So the catch of convenience, as you mentioned, is this really interesting phenomenon that's pretty new and the grand scheme of things, right?

And in the book and just in general, I am not an advocate of. Completely like removing the ease of which we are able to get good services and transportation. And I love having access to my maps so I can figure out where the heck I need to go. I'm not one who wants to print map quest directions out and a stop at gas stations to figure out where I'm at.

But what happens is because we've now gotten into this lifestyle and the set of social norms that are predicated on convenience. We just aren't as comfortable and we're not like working out our stranger muscles. Like we're not talking to strangers cause we just don't have to anymore. And because we don't have to anymore, I think there's a bit of atrophy happening when I'm out in the wild around people that is making it harder and harder to get these quick little micro exchanges between people that are really helpful and important to.

Our species, like there is some really interesting research that shows that two people can have what's called a restorative connection, meaning. Me and you have a moment together, you feel seen, I feel seen, and it boosts our levels of happiness in less than 40 seconds. So it doesn't take a long time for me and you to connect, leave that exchange feeling good and have our connection levels boosted and our connection quota.

Reach the levels we want it to, but that's just not happening as often because of the world in which we're living. So do we need to go back to going to Tower Records in order to buy a piece of music and like interacting with all those people along the way? No. Do we need to be more mindful of the fact that the world in which we live in is restrictive to how we're socially connected with one another and we have to be more vigilant and intentional about connecting with the people around us?

Absolutely. And that's where we need to create some more awareness and some more strategy. Because it's. Absolutely a factor that's driving us apart from one another and creating a sense of loneliness that too many people around the world are experiencing today. I

Srini Rao: want to bring back a clip from a conversation I had with Kel Newport about analog communication.

Take a listen. I think the key observation is that our social brain doesn't know what to make of ASCII characters on a glowing glass screen. It doesn't associate that with social connection. It's a completely different part of your brain that's reading, let's say a comment on a social media post or a text message that's going through the networks of your brain that do reading and abstract comprehension.

And it's almost completely unrelated to this highly evolved social network. That social network in our brain. What that requires is the rich stream you get in analog communication, the pacing of voice, the timbre, is there limbic confidence? If you're in person, little things about your body movements, how you're actually framing yourself vis a vis the other person.

It's incredibly rich, high bandwidth stream that we have this powerful computer behind our ears that does nothing but thrive on that, take that in, process it, figure it out, integrate that into your standing in the world and your community. It's very important. And that huge, important social computer doesn't know anything about computer characters.

And so once you have that recognition, it doesn't mean that like looking at text, what they would call purely linguistic interaction, there's nothing wrong with it, but it's not scratching the itch. It's like looking at pictures of food versus eating food. It's fine to watch the cooking shows, but you're going to get hungry if you actually don't go out there and eat food.

And then once you have that realization Oh, what I need to thrive socially is I need to make non trivial sacrifices with close friends, family, and community that with analog interaction. What do you make of that based on your research?

Steven Van Cohen: I love it. Now there's one big thing that he did not mention that always resonates when I do the workshops I do with the people I work with.

And my world is often world focused on work and creating connection through the lens of work. And when we think about work. Most of the time when we are communicating with others, that's a tactical exchange of information, right? Who needs to do, by what, when, where, and how. And when we are having a lot of our communication that's tactical in nature, the frontal lobe is the part of the brain that registers all that activity.

The feeling of connectedness, like when I feel like, whoa, we just had a moment together. That experience happens in the back part of our brain in a totally separate region. The clip you shared is spot on with how we're just responding to these digital layers of our communication, but just the communication in and of itself, when it's transactional in nature, that doesn't allow people to feel seen.

Feeling seen is when I get the sense that you're really paying attention to me. When you're asking me inquisitive follow up questions that prove to me that you heard what I said, when you're empathizing with me, when you're looking at me in a way to give me that validation that you really care, all of those elements.

Become completely removed when we're like in a metaverse or when we're texting or emailing or chatting via social media. And that is a huge problem for why people don't feel the sense of connectedness that they crave because they're just going about it all wrong. Yeah in relation to that whole idea of this feeling of connectedness, you mentioned three dimensions of loneliness in the book, the intimate.

Srini Rao: the relational and the collective. Can you talk to me about each one of those and how they play a role in workplace loneliness?

Steven Van Cohen: Yeah intimate is the strength of connection is with someone that you have a really close relationship with. So if I'm thinking about work, there's a very famous data set from Gallup.

They came up with what's called the Gallup Q12. It's the keys for employee engagement. And one of the items that they found is having a best friend. At work. And when I can go to work and have a really intimate relationship with someone, they really know me, they really understand me, they really value our connection, then that is going to make me way more motivated to do good work and to be engaged and to perform.

And there's a whole bunch of data that Gallup has found to support that. So that's intimate from a workplace standpoint. The next around relational is, it's all of those other kind of one off relationships. So if I'm working in a team, oftentimes there's anywhere from 10 to 30 people that I'm collaborating with.

And the quality of my connection with each of those people has a factor too, and how I feel lonely or connected and a sense of belonging with regards to my work. Establishing some of the relationship norms and building in some of the rapport and different types of things I can do to strengthen those relationships from the periphery.

is important for my workplace connectedness. And then community is really the greater good of what we're working towards. And if I work in an organization that really we have a cohesive communal goal that everyone is really motivated to work for, and I get some kind of value or impact or makes me feel like what I do matters, then that's also going to make me feel a sense of connectedness.

So connection is typically just not one offs, where I just need one or two people to In order to feel connected at work, there's connection to myself, there's connection to my colleagues, to my boss or supervisor, to the work I do and how that work makes me feel. And I have to look at all of these different connection points through the lens of work in order to determine where are there gaps so I can close those gaps accordingly.

This ACAST podcast is sponsored by NetSuite, 36, 000. The number of businesses which have upgraded to the number one cloud financial system, NetSuite. 25. NetSuite just turned 25. That's 25 years of helping businesses streamline their finances and reduce costs. One. Because your unique business deserves a customized solution.

And that's NetSuite. Learn more when you download NetSuite's popular

,

Key Performance Indicators Checklist. Absolutely free at net suite. com slash optimize. That's net suite. com slash optimize.

Srini Rao: You hear that sound? It's the sound of a sale you're missing out on because you're not selling on Shopify and what does it sound like with Shopify? This is the commerce platform that's revolutionizing millions of businesses worldwide. When I was in college, I had so many ideas, but executing them was a different story, because the resources were limited and the path to bringing those ideas to life was anything but clear.

If only a platform like Shopify had been around then, I could have transformed those ideas into reality with a lot less struggle. It's really remarkable to see how far we've come and how platforms like Shopify are empowering entrepreneurs to turn their visions into tangible businesses. So whether you're hustling from your garage or gearing up for an IPO, Shopify is the only tool you need to start, run, and grow your business without the struggle.

Shopify puts you in control of every sales channel. So whether you're selling satin sheets on Shopify's in person POS system or offering organic olive oil on Shopify's all in one e commerce platform, you're covered. And once you've reached your audience, Shopify has the internet's best converting checkout to help you turn them from browsers to buyers.

Now let's talk about growth. No matter how big you want to grow, Shopify gives you everything you need to take control and take your business to the next level. It's not just about having an online store. It's about having a powerful platform that can scale with your ambitions. And Shopify powers 10% of all e commerce in the U.

S. and as a global force, powering big names like Allbirds, Rothies, and Brooklyn and millions of other entrepreneurs of every size across over 170 countries. Plus Shopify's award winning help is there to support your success every step of the way. Visit This is Possibility powered by Shopify. Sign up for a 1 per month trial at shopify.

com slash unmistakable all lowercase. Go to shopify. com slash unmistakable to take your business to the next level. That's shopify. com slash unmistakable. One of the things you say is that workplace loneliness is defined by the distress caused by the perceived inadequacy of a quality connection to teammates, leaders, and the organization itself.

Remember, loneliness is the absence of connection. Team members who work remotely but feel connected to the work and their team might experience less loneliness than a team member who works alongside colleagues in an office. But lacks a strong connection. So first what are the negative impacts of this on overall performance in the workplace?

Just not just of employees, but for the organization as a whole, like how does it affect an organization's bottom line? And also, let's talk about the idea of remote work, because a lot of people listening to this are either freelancers or entrepreneurs, like I can tell you I have to go out and actively seek social connection.

Because of the fact that everybody I work with my audio engineer is in South Africa, most of my close friends are scattered all over the country so it's something that I realized it's very easy and it became even easier in the pandemic for me to just isolate myself and not talk to people.

Steven Van Cohen: Let's start with the first question. And before I give you some statistics that justify why this is important from a work performance standpoint, I want to give you some context for how loneliness shows up in our brain. Because out of all the research and things that I learned as a part of writing the book, this one really stood out to me.

And they found that when you feel rejected, when you feel like you're not part of the group when you feel excluded, the part of the brain that registers that experience is the same part of the brain that registers physical pain. This means that when you experience that sensation, your body's going through a fight or flight response.

And your fight or flight response is releasing stress hormones. And those stress hormones are creating all kinds of ailments in the body. That's why there's a very famous statistic around chronic loneliness is the equivalent of smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Because your body's in this consistent fight or flight, and these stress hormones are hurting your body with all these really bad illnesses.

So just from that lens of my brain is on fire, I'm feeling stressed, I'm in a fight or flight mode, I think most would agree that if I'm showing up to work, In that state, I'm probably not in peak performance levels. Now, what it does from my engagement and my performance and my retention is pretty catastrophic.

We know that when someone shows up feeling disconnected to their colleagues and to the work and to their leader, they're seven times more likely to be disengaged. And we know that disengaged employees make 60% more mistakes. I'm five times more likely to miss work due to stress or illness. I'm three times more likely to underperform as compared to my better connected colleagues, and I'm twice as often to think about quitting.

So from a pure hard nosed numbers, let's look at the business impact of chronic loneliness. It's significant, and it is one of the main reasons why we're seeing quiet quitting, and it's one of the main reasons why we're seeing people just really unhappy and stressed, and we're seeing increases in mental health.

ailments. And there's all these things that are stemming from the social isolation and disconnectedness that people are living through day in and day out. I think

Srini Rao: you make a very critical distinction between solitude and loneliness because Ryan Holiday wrote the book, Stillness is the Key.

And I think that one of the things that also struck me is how you talked about this sort of constant connectivity, thwarting creativity. And you say that solitude is a state of being alone without the negative emotions of loneliness. It's peaceful aloneness created by a state of voluntary isolation.

Solitude is found by isolating one's mind from the inputs of other minds in order to freely process or ponder. And how do you balance the two? Like, how do we make sure we have time for solitude without it eventually leading to loneliness?

Steven Van Cohen: Yeah. The first thing is we need to be aware of how we're feeling and how much solitude we have or don't have, right?

one of the interesting things and you mentioned this earlier the Requirement for feeling connected is very different for each person All right. I'm an extrovert and due to my unique nature what I have to have From a connection quota standpoint is very different from my business partner, Ryan, who is very introverted and between that spectrum each individual is going to have various needs as relates to how much connection they require in order to feel that sense of connectedness.

So from a solitude versus an isolation standpoint. I might need more or I might need less just depending on where I'm at with regards to things in my life. I have two small children and I travel a lot for work and I'm constantly engaged with clients. So the amount of solitude that I get access to right now for me it's an important component that I have to fight for in order to achieve.

For others, if you're in an abundance of being alone and you're in constant solitude, then it might be the opposite where you have to really force yourself to find more ways to connect. But the reason that solitude is an important insurance against loneliness is because we have a connection with ourselves.

Like we need time to check in and see how we're doing and figure out like, are my needs being met? What's going on in my life that I need to continue to do or to fix? And if I don't have that time for me, then it's really hard for me to show up in the right way for others. And that's why we talk about how solitude is really connective in nature.

Srini Rao: So this is a question of personal and just morbid curiosity. As I mentioned to you, I had your turn off video. And one of the things that you say is that when too much physical distance exists between team members, belonging begins to dissipate. Humans have not evolved to communicate effectively through screens.

I've always made it a point to turn off video when I do interviews and funny enough, Kate Murphy wrote this amazing book called You're Not Listening, where she actually mentioned this it's in Terry Gross actually prefers not to do interviews in person but over the phone and I found consistently that when I cannot see the other person, I'm much more engaged.

Why, what is that about? Part of me knows that it's partially my ADHD but yeah. Yeah I was having this really interesting conversation with Bruce Feiler, and it was fascinating because he said It caused me to ask deeper questions to him. He said, probably because I wasn't seeing

Steven Van Cohen: it.

Yeah I agree and disagree with you at the same time. I agree that turning the camera off in the right circumstances with the right people is really important. What happens is oftentimes when I'm talking to someone over the phone or via video chat with the camera off, That I know I'm able to pay closer attention to the tone.

I'm able to put my own visual in my brain of what I think they're looking like. And all of that gives me context around the messages that I'm hearing and I can shape our conversation in a much more like. sophisticated way, if I'm just tuned into what you're saying in that moment. It's way more distracting if I'm looking at you or if I'm, if you look away, then I look away, right?

There's all these little nonverbal things that can possibly get in the way of hearing and feeling your words. So the research shows that when two people know each other there is a bit more just there's just a better conversation that happens if the cameras are off. Now here's where I disagree.

One of my clients, she came to me and said, it's the first time in my entire life. That I've been told by my manager that I'm not pulling my weight. And specifically, her colleagues told her that she is very difficult to deal with. And she was like, floored. She could not believe that her colleagues felt this way.

And this is feedback she's never gotten before. And we started to understand what she has going on that's different from years past. And she said she's a project engineer, so she goes from project to project. All of her communication with all of these project groups is done over Zoom with videos off and everything is very transactional in nature.

And what she found is that when the camera's off, she's smiling. No one can see her smile, but when she communicates very professionally. And her emotional state is not being reflected in the tone of her voice. There's a mismatch that's going on. And people are hearing her messages in a very cold way.

And Previous to this when she was in person and people can see her smile and they could understand the emotional state she was in, her communication was received in a very different manner. So for her, having some of that face to face opportunity was really important in the context of what she was saying and doing.

So I think with new team members, there needs to be a bit of assimilation and seeing each other and getting a feel for what people do when they talk is important for context we have to be mindful of the audience and the relationships and the work norms and all those things, but there is a place for video alongside.

Having cameras off. Yeah let's get into the less loneliness framework. And I want to look at it from two perspectives. From what I'm gathering just from having talked to you for about a half hour, you largely work with larger organizations. I want to think about this both from the standpoint of in our day to day lives, how we can apply this not just in the professional context, but personally.

Srini Rao: But also for people who are freelancers, people who don't have a place to go to work. Like how does, how do we apply that idea?

Steven Van Cohen: Yeah, that sounds great. Would you like to go through one at a time or do you want me to give

Srini Rao: a high level overview? Yeah you know what, let's start with a high level overview for people just in the interest of time and then we can see how it applies to each of these

Steven Van Cohen: areas.

Sure. So the acronym that we built around their model is called LINK, and the L stands for look at loneliness, I stands for invest in connection, N stands for narrow the focus, and K stands for handle the momentum. And we'll start with L. So L is all about looking for loneliness in self and others. And when we think about this there are very strong signs.

that people can give off to indicate that they might be feeling lonely. And if we are going to lessen loneliness in ourselves or others, being aware of those signs is important because awareness is curative and we can't fix what we don't know or see or understand. So that's the whole first part of the model is pinpointing and spotting the loneliness that might be represented in the people around us.

Investing in connection, that word invest, is a really important word. Because connections don't build themselves, it does require an investment, a commitment. It has to be prioritized. So that whole chapter in the book is really about what does an investment look like? Like, how can I dedicate time to connecting with people in the ways that are restorative?

And we can talk about some of those ways, I'm sure, as we... Get into our conversation. Narrowing the focus is really interesting because we found, at least through work, there are certain work activities that are not what we would typically think of in ways that actually make us feel less lonely. So for example, we found that when someone feels like in their work, They're wandering, they don't have a clear map towards a destination, they're not sure who to turn to, they don't really have resources, they don't know where to go for help, like that sensation is a very lonely feeling that can expand upon loneliness at work.

So being really clear on where I'm going and what I'm doing, that is a narrowing the focus exercise through work that can help me feel more connected. And the last one, kindle the momentum, is really just about... Making sure that as I've started to get this little spark of connection that is turned into a little flame, how do I continue to fuel that flame so that my connection levels continue to change?

To rise versus having that flame go out. So that's a bit of context around the four elements of our link model. Yeah let's talk about the actual practices of applying

,

each one in our day to day lives. Yeah, from, but let's start with the context of a freelancer or somebody like me who works primarily remote.

Srini Rao: And how that would

Steven Van Cohen: so from a look standpoint, even as a freelancer, you're having exposure to people around you, even if they're clients, or if there are other people that you're collaborating with, or if it's roommates, or if it's people that you see out and about. One of the things that's just important to be aware of is that we're tuned into all the little subtleties that the people around us are giving off so we can.

spot if someone might be feeling lonely. For example, my old business partner, his name's Ellis, and Ellis was on an assignment working overseas. He's a consultant. He's a freelancer. He just does a lot of work with different clients for me. And he called me and he said, Hey I said, Hey, Ellis, how are you?

He goes, Hey, Steven. That's all he said. Hey, Steven. And the way he said that, I knew he was off. And instead of diving into. What I needed to talk to him about, I said, Ellis, what's up, man? I said, I can tell something's going on. Talk to me. And he talked to me and he was having a hard time and he was a few weeks away from his family and he was feeling lonely and he was a bit unsure about how the project was going and we spent 25 minutes just talking through that.

Any freelancer that's interacting with people has those little micro opportunities. It's just a matter of, am I paying attention to them? And then am I putting a spotlight on them in a way that allows me to have a connective experience with that person? So I'm going to stop there. Any questions or thoughts around that?

Is that something you agree or disagree with? As it relates to freelancers and the work that they do. So my first sort of immediate thought that I came to was when I have meetings, I want them to be short. I don't like them to be long. I don't like to have like endless conversations with people.

Srini Rao: Granted, I have meetings with friends sometimes, but usually I'm like, all right, let's keep this short and sweet and get to the point. And I'm realizing, huh, I'm like, maybe I'm coming across cold and

Steven Van Cohen: heartless. You're prioritizing different things. Yeah. You're prioritizing getting the work done fast.

You're not prioritizing creating a feeling of connectedness with the people in the meeting. Yeah. And if you're always prioritizing getting things done, then you're going to miss opportunities for that connectedness to take place. So we have to be mindful of that, right? Like how much time and energy and effort am I focused on?

The people side of the business versus the get it done work side of the business. And if you're all in on either, that's not productive, right? We can't be there for every person, every time. Always. We also can't just focus on getting things done or we're going to miss opportunities to build trust and belongingness and understanding and camaraderie and all of those things are important for team dynamics.

So yeah, it's just a matter of what am I paying attention to and how am I showing up in the right ways at the right times?

Srini Rao: Let's talk about the invest piece in that context.

Steven Van Cohen: So if I'm a freelancer, one of the things that I need to do in order to feel more connected is to build what I call a social regimen, right?

Like I have a physical regimen. I take vitamins every day. I work out every week. Like I have very specific routines that I commit to on a regular basis in order to make sure that I feel physically the way that I want. And for social connection, especially for freelancers who are constantly going from project to project and might not have as much time to build some of that chemistry with their clients, the freelancers need to be really intentional about baking in time for connection.

And that might be through work or outside of work. But if I have Tuesday morning coffees, like in every Tuesday, I find someone to have a virtual in person coffee with. Or if it's Thursday afternoon, hour long time where I message someone or reach out to a friend I haven't talked to in a while I need to design my opportunities for connection or else as a freelancer, I'm just going to go, and I'm going to possibly miss.

a lot of my own needs and opportunities for that to take place. So our social muscles need similar workouts in order to stay sharp and strong. And I got to build that into my like weekly game plan or else it's just not going to happen.

Srini Rao: And then the end piece of this, which one was that?

Steven Van Cohen: Narrowing the focus.

Yeah. One of the best ways to feel connected to others. This comes from Dr. Stephen Cole. He is a professor at UCLA. He said, we all have a fundamental human need in order to be desirable, appreciated, and impactful. Cause like a long time ago, if I became a burden on the tribe, I was at risk of getting exiled, which severely plummeted my chances of survival.

And today I still have that same sensation, right? Like I need to feel like I matter and I need to feel like the work I do is important. So if I'm a freelancer and I might not be getting the positive recognition on the work I'm doing from a client, one of the things that I want to do is I want to take time to identify the beneficiaries of my labor.

So after I complete a project or do whatever I'm doing, just taking a few minutes to understand like what impact did this have? What did I do that was helpful to somebody else? What's going to happen now that I've completed this project and what are the gains and benefits associated with my work?

Just that like few minutes of reflecting on the impact you've made for others will make you feel more connected to your work and to yourself and potentially to the team you're collaborating with. So that's a good rule of thumb is identifying the beneficiaries of your labor.

Srini Rao: And then Kindling Momentum.

I knew you'd talk about The Progress Principle, which is one of my favorite books of all time. And that book was a game changer for me when I understood how it really worked.

Steven Van Cohen: Do you want to explain what The Progress Principle is or is that something that you've already talked through?

Srini Rao: So we haven't really talked about it all that much. I'm happy to explain it. As you mentioned in the book, it was based on the work of a Harvard professor named Teresa Amabile. She gave a talk at 99U. And the whole idea was that visible progress was one of the highest forms of engagement and motivation.

I've written about it on the blog, but the thing I realized so often is that people don't feel like they're making progress, particularly when you talk about writers, bloggers, they track their progress with metrics that they can't control. So they try to use lagging indicators as a way of measuring progress and that basically kills their motivation so often.

So the example I always come back to is as a writer, I think the funny thing is I got my book deal and I told people the irony of that was I'd given up on getting a book deal at that point and I focused on one thing and that was writing a thousand words a day and I did that for two and a half years.

And it paid off in spades and the only thing I measured every single day was whether I did the thousand

Steven Van Cohen: words or not. And it kept you motivated because every time you hit another one of those check marks for the day, you're like, man, like I'm making really good progress. Doing everything I said, I'm feeling great.

This is fueling my fire. So I'm glad you shared that the progress principles, a good way to stay motivated especially when you can take time to understand the impact that your work is having, but really the idea of kindling the momentum is just this idea that we have to go back to the beginning of the model.

We have to go back and start to check in and look again. Am I connected to myself? Am I connected to others? And just doing that little bit of an audit helps to Kindle that flame. Looking at, am I continuing to invest in the right ways? Should I keep investing in the way that I am, or do I need to pivot and do something else?

And then for narrowing the focus, same thing, like at work or in my life, are there certain activities that are doing that are able to make me feel connected? Or do I need to rethink some of the work exercises that I'm about? And kindling is just this regurgitation of going back through the cycle.

That's why our model is a circle. We just don't want to look once, invest once, narrow once and be like, Oh, I'm good. I checked my connection box. Like I'm on to the next thing because our connection quotas are like the batteries of our phones, right? Like you don't charge your phone one time and you're connected forever.

You have to continuously charge that in order to production you need from that device. It's no different as humans. So the Kindle is just a reminder to go back and do the three other things repeatedly in order to keep that flame burning bright.

Srini Rao: I want to finish with one area that I think was really interesting considering how much we have talked about the importance of attention flow with people like Stephen Collar here, your Wade Gloria Mark, Revet Kel Newport.

And this really struck me. You had an entire section on the whole idea of interruptibility. And you said that interruptibility doesn't mean throwing focus, productivity, and priorities out the window. It actually means the opposite. Being interruptible is about intentionally placing your focus, productivity, and priority in the right place and on the organization's number one asset, people.

Parting with your most precious resource, your attention, makes others feel seen, appreciated, and included. Productivity is not about squeezing people, but about showing up for them. And it just reminds me of this ongoing argument I've been having with my parents, because they get on my case about my phone settings being on do not disturb.

And I finally had to reset all my iPhone settings last night so that their phone calls come through and even put up, I created custom ringtones specifically for my family, just so their calls would come through. Because I think that as a person with ADHD interruptions really derail me. And at the same time I really, I understand what you're saying.

I, I have close friends like, Hey, I'll call you back in two hours. I'm in my like peak productivity window.

Steven Van Cohen: Yeah. So what you're talking about Tim Ferriss is the one who I learned about the term single tasking, right? And he's all about, we need to batch our productivity timelines and we need to defend that time to do our work because you're right.

If I have to task cop the task cop or I get distracted from other people, it's really hard to get back into a state of flow. And I totally agree with Tim. I think single tasking and batching time each week to do deep meaningful work, very important. Single tasking all the time or like completely turning off do not disturb for giant chunks of most days removes you from the people who need you.

And whatever that cadence is for the amount of time each week for single tasking and the amount of time each week for interruptability, it's going to be obviously on a case by case basis depending on who you are and what you do. But there is something very connective when I reach out to you and you accept my bid for connectedness and validate that I matter.

And when that is removed because I can't access you, then I'm consistently trying to vie for your attention and I'm consistently getting retention rejected, and I'm consistently being told even though it's not formal, that I don't matter, or at least I'm not as important as whatever you're doing in that moment.

So finding that balance between interrupt ability and really concentrated focus is a very important dynamic that most people aren't actively thinking of. But it's very important for connection and for success to take place.

Srini Rao: Wow. This has been absolutely incredible. You packed it with so many thought provoking and valuable insights.

So I want to finish with my final question, which is how we finish all of our interviews. What do you think it is that makes somebody or something unmistakable?

Steven Van Cohen: What do you think it is? The way that you make somebody feel, I like my favorite quote of all time comes from my Angela and she says, people will forget what you say.

People will forget what you do. People will never forget how you made them feel, and that always stuck with me. And every time I get a chance to meet somebody, even if it's waiting in line at the grocery store to check out, I want them to feel seen, and I want them to feel connected. In a way that hopefully gives them a little boost in their day.

So from a remembrance standpoint, you will be remembered based on how you make people feel.

Srini Rao: Amazing. I can't thank you enough for taking the time to join us and share your story, your wisdom, and your insights with our listeners. Where can people find out more about you the book, your work, and everything else that you're up to?

Steven Van Cohen: Yeah, the easiest place is to go to lesslonely. com, and I know that sounds like a dating website. I promise it's not. Lesslonely. com is the hub for all things loneliness and connection. I'm also really easy to find on LinkedIn for Steven Van Cohen. So listeners can reach out to me there. And I look forward to sharing more insights on this very important topic.

And thank you for having me on to put a spotlight on this. It's not being talked enough, and I really appreciate you having me here today.

Srini Rao: Yeah, my pleasure. And for everybody listening, we will wrap the show with that.

Steven Van Cohen: This ACAS podcast is sponsored by NetSuite. 36, 000, the number of businesses which have upgraded to the number one cloud financial system. NetSuite by Oracle. 25. NetSuite just turned 25. That's 25 years of helping businesses streamline their finances and reduce costs. One. Because your unique business deserves a customized solution.

And that's NetSuite. Learn more when you download NetSuite's popular Key Performance Indicators Checklist. Absolutely free. At netsuite. com slash optimize. That's netsuite. com slash optimize.