Numerous people contributed in a variety of ways to the development of this book. I am grateful to all of them for the many ways in which each was helpful and supportive.
Nuria Chinchilla, a professor at IESE in Barcelona, helped inspire my initial interest in social pollution (her apt phrase) and the many effects of work environments on people. Her invitation for me to participate in a (never held) conference led to my doing my first writing on the topic of human sustainability. I value my conversations with her and her gracious hospitality and kindnesses during our visits to the school. Over the years, she has become a good friend and has provided much encouragement for this project.
I would have never had the opportunity to meet and interact with Nuria over the years except that the now-former dean of IESE, Jordi Canals, was kind enough to form an ongoing relationship with me out of an early sabbatical visit. Jordi is an extraordinary individual whom I deeply respect. He has talked with me over the years about sustainability and business leaders’ broader responsibilities, and he led a school where values infused many aspects of its operations.
And I would have never met Jordi or visited IESE in the first place had it not been for my wonderful friend and colleague, Fabrizio Ferraro. Fabrizio started the Getting Things Done short-focused program during just his second year at IESE, 2006. Each May I have had the privilege of working with him and his colleagues on this program. I have developed many friends at IESE from my visits. Fabrizio was a PhD student in the Management Science and Engineering Department at Stanford and collaborated with Bob Sutton and me on a paper. So in a sense, I met Fabrizio through Bob, who therefore also played a role in the evolution of this research project. I so appreciate Bob’s friendship and his being such a great colleague. This story shows how things evolve from small beginnings and meetings in ways that probably no one could have anticipated!
For several years after I became interested in the topic of the effects of the workplace on human health I wanted to obtain an estimate of the aggregate toll of harmful work practices on people and health-care costs. I knew I did not have the modeling and mathematical skills to fully accomplish this. Then, a colleague recommended I talk to Stefanos Zenios in our Operations and Information Technology group at Stanford’s GSB. Stefanos told me he was working with a doctoral student, Joel Goh, who might be interested in helping us. Thus began a collaboration that has resulted in several published papers. To describe working with Joel and Stefanos as a privilege and pleasure would be a shockingly huge understatement. I am as proud of the work we did as of anything I have done in my more than forty-year professional career. Brilliant beyond compare and fantastically lovely human beings, Joel and Stefanos have enriched my life and my thinking in many ways.
A large number of people were willing to share their often painful individual stories about the health effects of their workplace with me. I appreciate their time, their candor, and their willingness to reveal very personal aspects of their lives. For obvious reasons, including the fact that many are under nondisparagement agreements, I do not list their names here. Two people were enormously helpful to me in uncovering and making contact with many of the people I talked to. A huge, enormous, special thanks to Amanda Enayati and Christy Johnson. Their unwavering support, substantive help, and enthusiasm for this project has in many ways made the final product possible.
Many individuals were willing to spend time talking with me about what they were doing in their companies to build healthy workplaces where people could thrive. Thanks for the time and wisdom of Dean Carter, Robert Chapman, Andrew Halpert, Corina Kolbe, Lauren Miller, Ben Stewart, and Heather Wasielewski.
The resources, including time and financial support, provided by my employer, the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University, were instrumental in my being able to do the many interviews and having the time to do the writing of this book. I never take that support for granted, and truly appreciate the unique environment in which I work.
My agents, Christy Fletcher and Don Lamm, helped me place the book and think through the trade-offs involved in such a decision. Don provided good advice and many helpful suggestions on an earlier draft of the manuscript. An inveterate editor and good friend, I so appreciate Don’s wisdom and support of the project.
My editor, Hollis Heimbouch of HarperCollins, is, in a word, perfect. She “got” what this project was about and did not try to turn the book or me into something that we weren’t, even as she provided the editorial support that made the final manuscript more accessible and better in numerous ways. I am blessed to have worked with Hollis on my last two books. She is the best—smart, insightful, and just the perfect balance of supportive and development-oriented.
And always, there is Kathleen. No one, least of all us, could have predicted the consequences of our chance meeting at a party in San Francisco at approximately 10 p.m. on January 19, 1985. In our now thirty-one years of marriage, we have been through a lot together, ranging from the health issues that invariably arise as one ages to traveling to more than forty countries. She is truly my muse. To the best of my knowledge, I have only one life. I am fortunate beyond all belief to be able to spend so much of that one life with the person that friends years ago nicknamed “the Amazing Kathleen.” She was, is, and always will be amazing to me.
Jeffrey Pfeffer, August 2017