Caleb and Adriele are joined by special guest, Dr. Robert Sutton, an organizational psychologist and professor of Management Science and Engineering at Stanford. They talk about bureaucracy, the frustrations of middle managers, his new book with Stanford colleague Huggy Rao, *The Friction Project,* which explores how “smart leaders make the right things easier and the wrong things harder.” [21:54] Before that, they sort through big news stories from the week including a report that 2023 was the hottest year on record, the changing language around ESG, and a slew of major layoffs. They also check in on the state of politics prior to the Iowa Caucuses. Then, Caleb talks about some of the predictions from the Executives Club of Chicago’s Annual Economic Forum. All that, plus Ecuador’s new Violet Economy law and Google is using AI to reduce traffic in Seattle. [59:45] Discussed today: Bob Sutton: Work Matters Ecuador’s Violet Economy Law