Planners’ Picks — February 3, 2026
Did you see your shadow or not? Does it change your direction on how to lead yourself and others, or are you being led instead by your values? We talk about staying true to your core values and much more in this installment of PP. Enjoy!
:: Image of the Week
:: CSN’s Book of the Week Recommendation
The Overthinker’s Guide to Making Decisions: How to Make Decisions without Losing Your Mind
From the author of the New York Times bestseller Don’t Believe Everything You Think comes a companion guide that transforms the paralyzing cycle of overthinking into clear, intuitive decision-making.
Your brain is wired to overthink decisions—not because something’s wrong with you, but because you care deeply about making the right choice. If you’ve ever found yourself trapped in endless loops of “what if,” analyzing every option to exhaustion, or seeking everyone’s advice while still feeling lost… this book is your way out.
The Overthinker’s Guide to Making Decisions breaks new ground where “just trust your gut” advice has failed you. Unlike traditional approaches that leave you stranded between endless analysis and vague intuition, this book provides a counterintuitive system that bypasses the overthinking loop entirely.
This isn’t about making perfect choices. It’s about making aligned ones from a place of clarity instead of chaos.
This step-by-step guide will show you exactly how to:
- Identify the surprising neurological root of overthinking and how to stop mental spirals before they hijack your mind
- Apply the step-by-step TRUST framework that walks you through any decision, leaving you with absolute clarity on exactly what to do
- Use the revolutionary SAGE method to break through analysis paralysis in minutes, transforming overwhelm into a single, clear choice
- Instantly distinguish between your intuition and fear when making any decision
- Silence external opinions and reconnect with your inner wisdom so you hear your own voice louder than anyone else’s
- Transform paralyzing fear into psychological freedom, creating space for choices that were previously unimaginable
- End the exhausting replay of past decisions, releasing regret and creating genuine peace with your choices
- Develop unshakable emotional resilience so you can make bold decisions knowing you’ll thrive regardless of the outcome
- Recognize actualized decisions: the transformative choices that create the deepest peace, growth, and alignment in your life
- Uncover the hidden patterns behind your choices with over 70 powerful journaling prompts, reshaping how you decide from a place of alignment, not anxiety
- Implement 20 ‘Mini Trust Experiments’ that build decision confidence in just days, using low-stakes everyday choices to rewire self-doubt patterns
This book isn’t about fixing your mind. It’s about freeing it. You don’t need more advice. You need to trust yourself again. This book won’t tell you what to do. It will help you remember how to listen to the one voice that’s always known.
:: Storytelling
Striving For Excellence
When was the last time you took a moment to truly acknowledge just how far you’ve come and the work you have done to get to this point? No exceptions, no talking down about your accomplishments, just true and genuine acceptance of how amazing you are because of how hard you have worked. Perfection is impossible, but Excellence is achievable. We can always improve, but we must also acknowledge and sit with how well we have done to get to this moment.
In this episode of “Your Stories Don’t Define You, How You Tell Them Will,” Sarah Elkins and Anne Catherine discuss the importance of art and the soul, the necessity of knowing when we are truly excellent, and how to encourage it in others and ourselves.
Highlights
- What superpower are you hiding?
- What is the art you practice that you don’t often think is art?
- Are you coloring in someone else’s lines or your own?
- Letting go of perfection and striving for excellence.
- What was the last thing you were really proud of? No buts.
They’re referring to art during the conversation, but we are all artists in our careers and have special gifts.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/415-striving-for-excellence/id1329558957?i=1000745855870
“You always had the power, my dear; you just had to learn it for yourself.” – The Wizard of Oz
:: LinkedIn Learning
Sharpen Your Decision-Making with Nuanced Thinking Techniques
Learn nuanced thinking techniques to make more thoughtful, balanced, and effective decisions. In this course, critical thinking expert Spencer Greenberg provides you with a powerful decision-making tool kit to help you avoid thinking traps, improve problem-solving, reduce cognitive biases, lock in objectives (to keep projects on track), and make use of your emotions (without being misled by them). Packed with examples and useful takeaways that you can immediately put into practice, this course can help you get better outcomes by making more evidence-based and rational choices on behalf of yourself and your company.
This course includes AI-powered Role Play. Role Play allows you to practice what you’ve learned in interactive simulations of real-world conversations.
:: Mental Health and Self-Care
Ten Happiness Practices for the New Year
Looking to up your emotional health in 2026? Here are simple practices you might consider adopting, from our website Greater Good in Action.
Happiness isn’t always possible, but there are steps we as individuals can take that can improve the likelihood of happiness. Not all of these will work for you, but some might. So, why not give them a try? Here we’ve gathered ten practices from our online library of research-tested happiness practices, Greater Good in Action, that can help you to gain some perspective on the past or look forward to the future.
https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/ten_happiness_practices_for_the_new_year
Mindfulness: 5 Secrets to Making Your Mind Happy
Sometimes it seems like your brain just sits around creating lousy feelings and worries. You want this, you’re frustrated about that, you’re annoyed about some other thing and the list never stops. And it makes it impossible to be happy.
What would be nice is to have a perspective that helps your brain deal with all of these negative emotions. And there may be one — and you’ve probably heard the name a lot lately: Mindfulness. And research shows it works.
See this post for 5 secrets to making your mind happy.
https://bakadesuyo.com/2016/01/mindfulness/
:: Job Searching & Interviewing
How to Find a New Job: An HBR Guide
Are you ready to look for a new job? This comprehensive article covers everything from how to update your resume and write a cover letter to how to ace your interview and follow up. The piece also includes sample language to try and links to resources in the HBR archive.
https://hbr.org/2022/01/how-to-find-a-new-job-an-hbr-guide
:: Work Culture & Team Development
How to Create a Culture Where People Feel Safe to be Authentic
“People feel safe around someone who feels grounded. One of the simplest ways to reset your presence is to regulate your nervous system before you speak or step into a meeting.”
Business leaders must focus on the bottom line of profits and corporate success, but does that have to be at the expense of the authenticity of their employees? I believe it is quite the opposite. I know from my own experience that a culture of authenticity allows the hiring of a team that will bring their all to the workplace. That fosters innovation, creativity and a level of success that few companies dream of. Yet, fostering an environment where individuals feel secure enough to express their true selves remains a challenge. The importance of authenticity cannot be overstated — it is the foundation of trust, innovation, and strong relationships. However, creating such a culture requires intention, understanding, and actionable strategies.
Anne Catherine is a French-Canadian PhD chemist and abstract artist whose work invites people to reclaim their wholeness. Read her interview on creating a culture where people feel safe to be authentic here:
“A leader is anyone, regardless of title or position, who bolds themselves accountable for finding potential in people and ideas, and who has the courage to develop that potential.” – Brené Brown
How to Build Team Spirit
First, let’s be clear about what a team actually is: a group of interdependent people working toward a specific, shared goal. If there’s no clear shared goal, it’s not a team. And, if someone can get the job done solo, then they are not depending on the skills, talents and expertise of others. Thus, a team is defined by interdependent work toward a defined objective. For one team, that objective might be launching a new product or serving a client; for others, it might be producing a film, planning a community event, or competing in a tournament.
In this Guide, I’ll share some tested strategies you can use to build team spirit as you and your teammates work toward your own shared goals. In management science, team spirit is commonly described using concepts such as ‘team cohesion’. Both terms refer to the psychological glue that holds members together – the extent to which they trust and respect one another, feel a sense of belonging, and are motivated to stay engaged. When team spirit is high, it sets the stage for higher team productivity and performance. When it’s low, members feel inhibited and uninvolved. Neither team leaders nor other members should be passive when it comes to teamwork. Team spirit is like physical fitness: you can lose it if you ignore it, but you can also rebuild it with the right regimen.
Key points covered:
- Team spirit is the glue that holds teams together. Like physical fitness, it can be lost when neglected, but it can also be built and rebuilt.
- Craft a team charter. Together, answer three questions: what’s our goal? Who’s doing what? And how will we work together?
- Encourage the free flow of ideas. When brainstorming, adhere to rules, such as expressiveness and non-judgment, to let ideas emerge. To lower barriers to sharing, try written or pair-based brainstorming.
- Set the stage for healthy conflict. Disagreement is important, but focus on ideas, not identities – and follow debates by reaffirming the group’s shared identity.
- Celebrate the wins and mourn the losses together. Recognise the various contributions to your team’s successes, and extract lessons from the setbacks so you can move forward together.
https://psyche.co/guides/how-to-build-team-spirit
What to Do When the Culture at Work Is Shifting—How to Stay True to You
How to Stay True to Your Values, Even When Others Are Not…You’re doing good work, when suddenly the vibe changes. The culture at work is shifting fast. And not in a good way.
It’s subtle at first. That manager who used to speak up in meetings now stays suspiciously quiet. The team that used to push for excellence is now pushing deadlines… out the window. Or decisions are made that feel the opposite of human-centered. You start hearing things like, “Well, that’s just how it works around here now,” or “Pick your battles.”
You’re left wondering: Have we all collectively lowered the bar while I wasn’t looking? And now you’re feeling pressure—spoken or not—to compromise what you believe is right. Just a little. Just this once. Just enough to “fit in.” Let’s talk about what to do when the culture starts slipping, and you don’t want to go down the slide with it.
https://letsgrowleaders.com/2025/11/07/culture-at-work-values-clash/
“You see, if you want to visit a new world, you don’t need a spacecraft. All you need to do is change your mind.” – Matt Haig, The Life Impossible
:: Self-Leadership Development
Why Self-Leadership Starts with Knowing and Living Your Values
What happens when two podcasters decide to slow down, join forces, and have the kind of conversation many leaders are quietly craving right now?
Heather Younger and Robyne Hanley Dafoe collaborate on a shared episode that will be available on both of their podcasts. This is not an interview swap or a highlight reel. It is a real, unscripted conversation between two women who care deeply about leadership, resilience, and what it takes to stay grounded in a world that feels loud, divided, and emotionally exhausted.
They talk openly about why self-leadership feels harder right now, why so many capable people feel stuck waiting for permission, and why caring leadership cannot stop at the edges of our organizations. They explore the connection between values, self-worth, perfectionism, and hope, and explain why hope is often dismissed as unrealistic, even though science suggests it may be one of the most practical tools we have.
This conversation is personal, reflective, and deeply human. It is for leaders, caregivers, parents, and professionals who are trying to do good work without burning out. If you have ever felt pulled between responsibility and self-preservation, or wondered how to stay unshakable without becoming hardened, this episode is for you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaCtgBcsT1A
“Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.” – Albert Einstein
:: Upcoming Events
Celebrate Love Data Week at UW–Madison
Love Data Week, held annually during Valentine’s week, is a celebration of data that invites institutions and individuals to explore how data shapes our world.
- Register for a Love Data Week event. Topics include design and accessibility concepts for data visualization, innovative AI projects, and archiving critical public datasets.
- Learn 3 quick tips to organize and protect your data that take about 3 minutes each.
- Discover more ways to grow your passion for data.
- Check out Bucky’s Data Viz Challenge winners, Barnabas Valko (student) and Andrew Hahn (faculty/staff who will represent UW–Madison at Big Ten Data Viz Championship Showcase
The Office of Data, Academic Planning & Institutional Research (DAPIR) and the UW-Madison Libraries proudly sponsor UW–Madison’s Love Data Week, which includes a partnership with Big Ten Academic Alliance (BTAA).
More on Love Data Week: https://go.wisc.edu/gaa370
OSC Announces In Scope and Ignite Spring Series
The Office of Strategic Consulting is once again offering sessions for leaders and project managers to grow and thrive in their roles.
In Scope is designed for managers of small- to medium-sized projects at UW–Madison. In this series, project management experts address managing projects in the university environment, introduce project management methods and resources, and facilitate conversations around common problems and solutions.
Ignite: Fueling Organizational Excellence features interactive workshops that focus on the tools and resources faculty and staff need to promote and sustain organizational excellence at UW–Madison. In these hour-long sessions, experts share ideas, methods, and approaches to help participants build skills to support continuous improvement and increase organizational effectiveness. Participants leave with stronger cross-campus networks, new strategies on how to improve their work, and the inspiration to implement their ideas.
Find all offerings for these two series below, including a session by CSN Planner Nancy Kujak Ford on building stronger team connections and trust!
https://strategicconsulting.wisc.edu/in-scope-managing-projects-at-uw-madison/
https://strategicconsulting.wisc.edu/ignite-fueling-organizational-excellence/
Leadership Improv with CSN
We’re doing it again! Through a variety of fun, engaging activities, Amanda and Jason from IT Connects will demonstrate how improvisational comedy skills can help supervisors work through difficult situations with staff and peers, as well as practice leadership skills in a light-hearted and low-risk environment.
No comedy or improv skills necessary; we just ask that you bring your willingness to be curious and open to trying new things.
Date: Thursday, March 19, 2026
Time: 2:00-3:15 pm
Location: 1210 W. Dayton St. (DoIT), Room 3139