Is defensiveness stalling your org—and costing you money? In this episode of The Science of Engagement, Dr. Brian Peters and David Snyder show how to replace ego with curiosity and connect engagement to KPIs, profit, and cost reduction (no fluff). You’ll learn why the best leaders are insatiably curious, the exact question that raises the bar—“How do you know that?”—and two practical rituals that make healthy debate normal, safe, and productive.

What you’ll learn

• Why curiosity is the #1 leadership competency (and how it spreads across teams)

• How to introduce “How do you know that?” without triggering defensiveness

• The Top-10 Ideas weekly ritual to surface improvements fast

• The Devil’s-Advocate role to normalize dissent and better decisions

• Tying engagement to KPIs/ROI instead of posters and perks

Chapters 00:00 Intro: engagement without the fluff 02:06 “Welcome to Crazy Town” — defensive cultures in the wild 06:00 Leaders who can’t describe their teams’ work 13:28 Curiosity as the mother competency 24:56 The Top-10 Ideas weekly ritual 28:58 Assigning a devil’s advocate (safe dissent) 31:40 Normalizing “How do you know that?” 32:50 What’s next: The Path to Improvement

Key takeaways

• Curiosity → clarity → accountability → ROI

• Make questioning a role and a ritual, not a personality clash

• Start with shared improvement ideas, then layer in constructive challenge

employee engagement, leadership behaviors, organizational psychology, KPIs, ROI, psychological safety, people ops, culture change, cross-functional collaboration

Most “employee engagement” advice is fluff. In this episode, we get specific. We define engagement in operational terms—what people do, why they do it that way, and how they do it together—and connect it to leadership behaviors, communication cadence, and autonomy/collaboration.

You’ll learn how to cascade organizational KPIs down to roles (3–5 per role), build clear job descriptions and competency models, and use validated assessments to hire for traits that actually drive results (attention to detail, punctuality, sense of urgency, resilience, follow-up). We also debate the big lever: hiring vs. training—and why hiring right usually wins.

What’s inside

• A crisp, non-fluffy definition of engagement

• The “What • Why • How” framework for organizational knowledge

• Leadership as observable behaviors (not styles) + communication rhythms

• Turning strategy into role-level KPIs and measurable accountabilities

• Competencies that move business levers (with real examples: bakery, CS, fulfillment)

• Hiring > Training? When assessments beat remediation

• Teaser for next time: “Welcome to Crazy Town” (organizational defensiveness)

If this helped, like/subscribe and drop a comment with your toughest KPI or competency question—we might feature it next episode.

#EmployeeEngagement #HR #Leadership #KPIs #PeopleAnalytics #JobDescriptions #Competencies #Hiring #Training #WorkplaceCulture #OperationalExcellence #ScienceOfEngagement

Most organizations have mission and vision statements—but struggle to turn them into day-to-day behavior. In this episode of The Future of Engagement, David Synder and Dr. Brian Peters (Doctorate in Industrial-Organizational Psychology; dissertation on employee engagement) breaks down how to design KPIs that matter, avoid common traps, and get every team rowing in the same direction.

You’ll learn:

• What a real strategy looks like—and why “we have a spreadsheet” isn’t it

• How to turn “intangible” roles (HR, customer support) into measurable outcomes

• Leading vs. lagging indicators and why alignment beats activity

• The unintended consequences of bad KPIs (overselling, margin erosion) and how to fix them

• Simple survey metrics to capture “how you made customers feel” without the fluff

• A first-month leadership exercise to cascade clarity across teams

• Weekly meeting systems that keep KPIs alive (not wallpaper)

Chapters 00:00 Intro 01:19 Why KPIs are essential for strategy 05:13 Measuring “intangible” work 10:48 Avoiding unintended consequences 15:20 Making feelings measurable (CSAT, post-call surveys) 18:34 Explaining the “why” behind every KPI 22:20 Leadership exercise to build KPI clarity 30:30 Meeting cadence that sustains alignment 33:55 Wrap-up

Takeaway: Clear, well-chosen KPIs turn vision into action—and engaged teams into consistent performance.

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