Hello Monday is a weekly show where LinkedIn News Senior Editor-at-Large Jessi Hempel investigates how the nature of work is changing, and how that work is changing us. We’re asking our guests - and ourselves - the big questions: what does work mean to us? Should we love what we do? How do we make sure we still have jobs tomorrow, and that they’re “good” jobs - jobs we feel good about?
Hello Monday brings listeners intimate interviews with guests who have significant ideas to share about how to prepare for the future based on what they’ve figured out trying to navigate their own careers - people like Women’s World Cup champion Abby Wambach, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, former Apple SVP Angela Ahrendts, authors Baratunde Thurston and Glennon Doyle, Late Night host Seth Meyers, and many more. Their stories inspire, while at the same time leaving us with practical advice. During the pandemic, this investigation has grown to include a look at whether or not we need to live in big cities to find opportunity, how to step in and out of the workforce when unprecedented family needs may demand it, and how to network without leaving home.
Our episode on imposter syndrome was the year’s crowd favorite; people of all genders struggle to navigate these feelings, and Lisa Orbé-Austin brought a fresh perspective, was vulnerable in sharing it, and offered practical takeaways.
Hello Monday began as a seasonal show featuring a mix of interviews and reporting by multiple hosts. We have evolved to become a host-driven show in which host Jessi Hempel draws on the relationships she built over two decades of reporting business and technology, folds in the expertise she has developed during this time, and leans into her own curiosities about what the future portends. Our goal is to provide our listeners with a unique conversation every Monday. We aim to keep the show to less than 30 minutes—to coincide with a commute, an exercise routine or the morning kitchen clean-up—and to bring upbeat energy to Monday mornings. To pick up the energy and create a unique experience, we worked with the artist Breakmaster Cylinder to compose original music for the show. We kick off every episode with a two-minute intro to the larger theme we plan to explore, often grounded in Jessi’s personal interests. We frame a question for our listeners so that, as they listen to the interview that follows, they can begin to answer that question for themselves. We use voice-over from our host sparingly to help navigate between ideas, and we wrap up the episode by sharing how people can learn more about a topic. We then invite our listeners to join us for a weekly live conversation about the episode during “Office Hours.” This weekly Wednesday LinkedIn Live session usually draws 75-100 listeners who come to talk about the themes and generally, seek community from other Hello Monday listeners.
Last year, as the COVID pandemic sent many people home and upended whole industries, we introduced a periodic bonus episode feature that serves multiple purposes we find really exciting. These bonus episodes provide our audience with additional touchpoints for the show, enable core team members to investigate ideas that branch off from our core themes, and provide those team members with opportunities for professional development by asking them to step outside the comfort zones of their daily work cadence. Bonus episodes in 2020 touched on responses to the COVID pandemic, the effect of the pandemic on performing artists, mental health in 2020, and even spotlighted listeners doing things of note to the broader community.
Our podcast’s primary objective is to empower a broad set of people to feel they have agency in navigating their careers, and to help them build deeper communities through LinkedIn. Our submission for this entry successfully drove many conversations on LinkedIn. The original post drew 322 comments; It was shared 442 times. Our corresponding live conversation had more than 100 live attendees and continued to draw attention as a video conversation on the platform.
