Track Changes On Podcast
Track Changes On Podcast explores the future of work, corporate accountability and burnout. Host Caroline Warnes shares reflections as an office escapee who believes workplaces can and should do better. The show questions how companies treat their people and what a healthier relationship with work might look like. It is aimed at anyone rethinking their career, burnout or the role of business in society.
Episodes
Corporate's Fake Emergencies
Episode summary: Why Is Everything At Work So Urgent?Why is everything at work so urgent, even when most of us aren't dealing with life-or-death situations? From last-minute requests to unrealistic expectations at work, corporate life can feel like a constant emergency, even when the work itself isn't particularly time-sensitive.This episode of Track Changes On explores why a constant sense of urg
When Company Logic Defies Common Sense
Episode summary: Why the Worst Business Decisions All Fail This Simple TestWhy do so many companies keep making decisions that seem to defy common sense? Some of the worst business decisions aren’t necessarily made by inexperienced or incompetent people. Often, there’s a perfectly rational explanation for how the company got there.This episode of Track Changes On looks at why business fails and co
Workplace Gaslighting, Bad Management or Something Else?
Episode summary: How to tell if you're a victim of gaslighting at workHave you ever had something happen at work where the gap between what you remember and what your boss says happened is so big that you start questioning yourself? Gaslighting at work can be difficult to recognise, particularly when the same behaviours can also come from bad managers, dysfunctional systems or a corporate culture
The Weird Psychology Behind Corporate Meeting Culture
Episode summary: The weird psychology behind corporate meeting cultureCorporate culture has a strange relationship with meetings. We complain about having too many of them, joke that they could have been an email and block out hours of our working week to attend them. Yet meetings remain deeply embedded in how companies communicate, make decisions and manage work.So why do companies have so many m
The Problem With Work “Families”
Toxic Workplace Culture: Why “We’re Like a Family Here” Is a Red Flag“We’re like a family here.” It’s a phrase that appears in job ads, interviews and conversations about corporate culture, and for some people it’s an immediate red flag.There are plenty of familiar signs of a toxic work environment, from micromanagement and excessive approval processes to workplace rules built around the assumptio
Why Women’s Personalities Become Workplace Feedback
Episode summary: Why are women still told to watch their tone at work?Companies say they want strong female leaders. Yet women are still more likely to receive workplace feedback about their personality, communication style and likeability.The problem is easy to dismiss as a question of behaviour. Sometimes people are rude, aggressive or difficult at work and managers should address it. The more i
The AI Industry Wants You to Be Afraid of Falling Behind
Episode summary: Are we buying AI because we’re afraid not to?AI was initially sold as an extraordinary opportunity. Greater productivity, competitive advantage and new ways of working. Increasingly, however, another message has entered the conversation: adopt AI or risk being left behind.Workers are told their colleagues will have an advantage if they use AI. Companies worry their competitors are
When Looking Busy Becomes the Job
Episode summary: When looking busy becomes the jobDo you ever feel like corporate work is sometimes one big performance? Being visible, staying online, attending meetings and keeping that little Teams dot green can all become evidence that you are working.Some jobs genuinely require presence and activity. But for knowledge workers hired for their expertise, judgement or creative thinking, visible
When Did Companies Stop Valuing Our Time?
Episode summary: When did companies stop valuing our time?Time is the one resource we can't replace. Yet at work, we have become remarkably comfortable with the idea that companies can ask for more of it without paying for it.Unpaid overtime, expanding workloads after workforce cuts and increasingly drawn-out recruitment processes all rely on a similar assumption: when the cost of someone's time s
Are Companies Cutting the Expertise They’ll Need Later?
Episode summary: AI needs specialists. So what happens if we stop creating them?Generative AI is already changing the economics of specialist work. Organisations are looking at where AI can reduce their reliance on writers, designers, developers and other people with deep expertise.In the short term, the productivity argument can make sense. But what happens over the longer term if fewer people ca
What Happens When AI Makes Everyone a Specialist?
Episode summary: AI, specialists and the empathy gapGenerative AI has changed the way we work, but it has not changed work equally.For generalists, AI has opened up new possibilities, making it easier to write, design, analyse and create. For many specialists, the experience has been very different. Their life's work, often developed over decades, has become part of the knowledge that powers these
The Case for Empathy in Corporate Leadership
Episode summary: When did workplace empathy become a deadly sin?Empathy has become an unexpected target in leadership circles. A growing number of books and commentators argue that it makes leaders weak, clouds judgement and prevents organisations from making difficult decisions.But what if that argument is based on a misunderstanding of what empathy actually is?In this episode of Track Changes On
Why Two Different Truths Can Exist at Work
Episode summary: What's happening to trust at work?Employee engagement has been falling since 2022, yet the latest Edelman Trust Barometer suggests most employees still trust their employer.So how can both be true?In this first episode of Track Changes On, Caroline Warnes explores the difference between institutional trust and the psychological contract, and why employees may be spending more ment
