Michelle: A recent Gallup poll found that 85% of the world's full-time employees are not engaged in their work. Mark: Eighty-five percent? That’s not a statistic; that’s a tragedy. Michelle: It is. And it's the quiet, global epidemic of what one author calls a 'Monday through Friday sort of dying.' Today, we're talking about the cure. Mark: I’m all ears. A cure for the Sunday scaries sounds like a Nobel Prize-winning discovery. Michelle: It might just be. That staggering number is the backdrop for a really timely and, I think, important book we're diving into today: SHAPERS: Reinvent the Way You Work and Change the Future by Jonas Altman. Mark: Jonas Altman... I read he calls himself a 'workologist.' That's a bold title. Michelle: It is, and he earns it. He wrote this book in 2020, right as the world was being forced to rethink work entirely. He spent years interviewing hundreds of innovators—from CEOs to social psychologists—to figure out why, with all our technology, so many of us are still miserable at work. The book was highly acclaimed for capturing that exact moment of crisis and opportunity. Mark: So he’s not just another productivity guru. He’s looking at the whole broken system. Michelle: Precisely. And his solution starts with a powerful idea, embodied in a single person.

Michelle: The antidote to this disengagement is what Altman calls the "shaper" mindset. And the best way to understand it is through a story he tells right at the beginning of the book. It’s about a guy named Manny Caro. Mark: Okay, I'm listening. Who's Manny? Michelle: Manny grew up in Southern California, loved to surf, but was on a traditional path: study, college, job. Then the dot-com bubble burst, and he found himself in a soul-sapping retail job, barely making ends meet. The classic story of disillusionment. Mark: I think a lot of people can relate to that. The dream versus the reality of the paycheck. Michelle: Exactly. But Manny kept surfing. And he rode this weird-looking board—a quad fish surfboard. Other surfers in the water would openly mock him for it. It wasn't the cool, standard thing. Mark: Of course. The cool kids club exists everywhere, even in the ocean. Michelle: But then, they saw him surf. He was incredible. The board was fast, agile, and he was in perfect sync with it. The mockery turned into curiosity, then admiration. And in that moment, Manny had this epiphany. He quotes it in the book: 'It occurred to me at that moment that the rest of my life isn’t going to be determined by other people’s formulas. I’m going to determine my own formula—because nothing else is really going to work.' Mark: Wow. That’s a powerful moment. So he quit his job and became a professional surfer? Michelle: Even better. He became a surfboard shaper. He leaned into his unique design, the very thing people mocked him for, and made it his craft. He found his meaning not in conforming, but in expressing his own unique vision. He became a 'shaper' in both the literal and metaphorical sense. Mark: That's a great story, but it feels a bit like a movie. Is this 'shaper' idea just for artisans and creatives? What about the rest of us in spreadsheets and meetings? Can an accountant be a 'shaper' like some cool surfboard maker in California? Michelle: That’s the core question, and Altman’s answer is a resounding yes. Being a shaper isn't about the job title; it's a mindset. It’s about finding a way to inject yourself, your values, your unique 'shimmer,' as he calls it, into what you do. It’s about shifting the goal from happiness to meaning. Mark: Okay, meaning over happiness. What's the real difference there? Isn't being happy the point of it all? Michelle: The book makes a fantastic distinction, borrowing from social psychologist Roy Baumeister. Happiness is about getting what you want—it's fleeting, dependent on external things. Meaningfulness is about doing things that express yourself. It’s about contribution and connection. It persists even when things are hard. Mark: So happiness is a sugar rush, and meaning is the slow-cooked meal that actually nourishes you. Michelle: Perfect analogy. And this is where Altman brings in the Japanese concept of 'shokunin.' Mark: Hold on, 'shokunin'? What exactly does that mean? Michelle: It’s often translated as 'craftsman,' but it’s much deeper. A Japanese sculptor, Toshio Odate, explains it as having a social obligation to work your best for the general welfare of the people. It’s a spiritual and material commitment to your craft. It’s not just about personal gain; it’s about contributing to the whole. That’s the kind of meaning a shaper seeks. Mark: I can see how that would be more fulfilling than just hitting quarterly targets. But it feels like most companies are actively designed to crush that very spirit. The book talks about 'Inhumane Resources,' right? Michelle: It does. And that’s the next piece of the puzzle. You can have the shaper mindset, but you also have to contend with the environment you’re in.

Mark: Yeah, the phrase 'Inhumane Resources' is so sharp because it feels true. We're treated as resources to be optimized, not people to be inspired. Michelle: Altman would agree. He points to the 'disengagement epidemic' we started with, and a major cause is what’s called the Peter Principle. Mark: I think I’ve heard of that. Isn't it the idea that people get promoted to their level of incompetence? Michelle: Exactly. A great salesperson gets promoted to be a terrible manager because the skills are completely different. This creates a legion of bad bosses who, according to MIT research cited in the book, are the single biggest destroyer of meaningfulness at work. Altman frames this using Douglas McGregor's classic Theory X and Theory Y. Mark: Remind me of those. Michelle: Theory X managers assume people are lazy and need to be controlled with carrots and sticks. They micromanage. Theory Y managers assume people are intrinsically motivated and want to do good work, so they empower them. Most of us have worked for a Theory X boss, and it’s soul-crushing. Mark: Oh, absolutely. So what's the alternative? You mentioned some 'hero' companies. Give me a concrete example of a company that's doing the opposite. What does that actually look like? Michelle: One of the most vivid examples is Zappos, the online shoe company famous for its culture. They have these radical recruiting strategies. First, there's the 'Pay to Quit' offer. After a week of training, they offer new hires $2,000 to walk away. Mark: They pay people to quit? That's insane! But also... brilliant. It's a filter for commitment, not just skill. Michelle: Exactly! It’s a financial bet that weeding out the uncommitted early is cheaper than keeping a disengaged or toxic employee. The book cites data that a single toxic employee can cost a company over $12,000 in turnover and productivity loss. Zappos is just cutting their losses early and protecting their culture. Mark: What's the other strategy? Michelle: It's called the 'Nice Guy Test.' When they fly in a candidate for an interview, they send a shuttle to pick them up from the airport. After the interview, the hiring manager pulls the shuttle driver aside and asks, "How did the candidate treat you?" If they were rude or dismissive to the driver, they don't get the job. Period. Mark: I love that. It’s a test for character, not just credentials. It shows they actually care about their values, not just printing them on a poster. Michelle: And that's the core of a 'shaper' organization. It’s not about perks like ping-pong tables. It’s about trust, autonomy, and living your values. Look at Netflix's famous 'freedom and responsibility' culture, or the Dutch healthcare company Buurtzorg, where self-managing teams of nurses have almost no managers and deliver world-class care at a lower cost. They trust their people to be professionals. Mark: Okay, so we need the right mindset and hopefully a decent workplace. But what can we do, right now, if we're stuck in a Theory X world with a Peter Principle boss? What's in the 'shaper's toolkit'? Michelle: That’s the final, and maybe most crucial, part of the book. It’s about taking back control of your own experience.

Michelle: The first tool in the shaper's toolkit is a big mental shift. Altman argues we should manage our energy, not our time. He quotes the founder of AngelList, Naval Ravikant, who says, "Forty-hour workweeks are a relic of the Industrial Age. Knowledge workers function like athletes–train and sprint, then rest and reassess." Mark: I like that. The idea of working in sprints. I feel so much more productive when I can just block everything out for an hour. Michelle: That’s exactly what the data shows. The book mentions a company called DeskTime that tracked employee productivity. The top 10% of performers weren't working more hours. They were working in intense, focused bursts of about 52 minutes, followed by a 17-minute break. They were truly offline during that break—walking, chatting, not checking email. Mark: The 52/17 rule. I can try that. What else is in the toolkit? Michelle: A big one is the idea of the 'work-life blend.' Mark: I'm always skeptical of that phrase. Doesn't it just mean you're never truly off? A recipe for burnout. Michelle: Altman anticipates that skepticism and makes a key distinction. It’s not about being 'always on.' It’s about purposeful integration versus rigid segmentation. A 'segmentor' draws hard lines: work is 9-to-5, life is everything else. A 'blender,' or a shaper, asks a different question each morning: 'How can I best direct my energy today?' Mark: So it’s about autonomy. Michelle: It's entirely about autonomy. It might mean you do deep, focused work on a Saturday morning because you're inspired, but you take a two-hour walk on a Tuesday afternoon to recharge. It’s about doing the right thing, not just doing things the right way according to some outdated schedule. This is where the contrast between an 'engaged workaholic' and a traditional one becomes so important. Mark: What's the difference? Workaholic is workaholic, right? Michelle: Not according to the research. The book profiles Adam Grant, the Wharton professor who is incredibly prolific. He’s what you’d call an 'engaged workaholic'—he finds so much joy and meaning in his work that it energizes him. It's a deliberate passion. This is completely different from the tragic Japanese phenomenon of karoshi—literally 'death from overwork'—where people are driven by pressure and fear. One is a pull, the other is a push. Mark: That makes so much sense. One is flow, the other is drowning. Honestly, the author's own story about burnout... that hits close to home. That feeling of just toiling away harder because you're scared of failure is so real. Michelle: It is. And that’s why the final piece of the toolkit is what Altman calls 'job crafting.' It’s the idea that you can actively redesign the components of your job to better align with your talents and interests. He tells this incredible story of a hospital cleaner. Mark: A hospital cleaner? How do you job craft that? Michelle: Her job description was just to clean. But she saw herself as a caretaker. So she started doing little things that weren't in her job description. She’d dust the ceilings because she realized comatose patients stared at them all day. She’d bring water to thirsty patients between nursing shifts. She was crafting her tasks and her purpose to be more meaningful, and in doing so, she transformed her entire experience of work.

Mark: So when you boil it all down, it seems the message isn't just 'find a job you love.' It's more profound. It's about actively crafting a life where your work is an authentic expression of who you are. Michelle: Exactly. And that's the book's ultimate challenge to the status quo. The crisis of work isn't an individual problem to be solved with a new planner or a productivity app. Altman says it’s a grand narrative that needs to be rewritten. Mark: A grand narrative... what does he mean by that? Michelle: He means we need to stop thinking in terms of just fixing the broken parts and start imagining a whole new system. He argues we’re at a watershed moment, a chance to move away from the industrial-age model of work-as-drudgery and design a future where more humans can actually reach their full potential. It's about creating a system that values our quirks, our creativity, and our humanity. Mark: It’s a pretty optimistic vision, considering the state of things. Michelle: It is, but it's a necessary one. The book ends by reminding us that the future of work isn't something that happens to us. It's something we build. It's about the meaning we discover and the shape that we collectively give it. Mark: It leaves you with a powerful question, then. It's not just "what do you do for a living?" Michelle: No. The real question is... Mark: Are you just working, or are you shaping? Michelle: A question worth asking. This is Aibrary, signing off.