People and Projects Podcast: Project Management Podcast · Andy Kaufman, PMP, PMI-ACP

PPP 501 | Hope Is Not a Strategy… Or Is It?, with author Jen Fisher

·47 min·2 clips

Real hope requires three things: a goal, multiple pathways to reach it, and your ability to affect change toward it.

1. People and Projects Podcast episode PPP 501 takes up the project-management maxim 'Hope is not a strategy' and tests it against Jen Fisher's new book 'Hope Is the Strategy.' 2. Host Andy talks with Fisher, an author who has studied well-being and leadership and who spent 23 years of her career at Deloitte. 3. Fisher's thesis is that hope is 'not flimsy' or 'whimsical' but a cognitive process that requires action, so it qualifies as a real strategy. 4. Drawing on C.R. Snyder's hope theory, she says real hope needs three things: a goal, multiple pathways to reach it, and a belief in your ability to affect change, with winning the lottery as her example of 'dumb luck.' 5. She argues that much of what workplaces label burnout is hopelessness, and she cites a 2025 Gallup study (she says '67%' but asks not to be quoted precisely) showing most managers were never trained to manage people, so a meditation app cannot fix strained workplace relationships. 6. She recounts languishing, a term from Corey Keyes popularized by Adam Grant, as a 'grayscale' flat line where she kept performing, until a boss in a glass-walled office asked 'When was the last time you felt joy in your work?' and she broke down. 7. Her boundary changes included no email before getting out of bed, calendar entries for meals, exercise, and bedtime, and deleting the email app on vacation after her team pointed out she checked email while telling them not to. 8. She cites Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer's research that time pressure narrows thinking and makes relationships 'transactional,' and Andy recalls a 45% hit to creativity that lingered for days. 9. She says vulnerability, such as telling an executive committee 'I don't actually know the answer,' earned a CEO's comment that it was 'refreshing,' and she lists hope killers like 'It'll never work' with curious alternatives such as 'What excites you about this approach?' 10. Suited to project leaders, managers, and anyone feeling quietly exhausted at work.

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