Transcript - Overcoming Loneliness at Work With Greg Kettner

Written by : Transcript – Overcoming Loneliness at Work With Greg Kettner • March 11, 2025

Follow along with the transcript below for episode: Overcoming Loneliness at Work With Greg Kettner

[INTRODUCTION]

[0:00:03.7] PF: Thank you for joining us for episode 510 of Live Happy Now. This week, as we continue to look at the importance of connections, we’re going to talk about how we can combat loneliness in the workplace. I’m your host, Paula Felps, and today, I’m joined by Greg Kettner, a speaker and workplace happiness expert who founded the Work Happy Movement. Greg has been studying how loneliness at work affects us, and today, he’s here to share what he’s learned and what we all can do to become more connected and happier in our jobs. Let’s have a listen.

[INTERVIEW]

[0:00:34.4] PF: Greg, welcome back to Live Happy Now.

[0:00:37.3] GK: Thanks, Paula, thanks for having me. I’m a two-timer.

[0:00:41.8] PF: I will not tell a soul.

[0:00:44.5] GK: When it comes to podcasts.

[0:00:46.4] PF: Oh my gosh. Well, you’re doing some very cool work in the space of loneliness at work, and when I saw what you were doing, I was like, “Gosh, will you please come on and talk to us about this?” Because, at Live Happy, we’ve addressed the problem of loneliness quite a bit, and it’s something that’s ongoing. We’re looking at it from so many different angles, but honestly, I really hadn’t thought about it from the lens of work. So, how prevalent is it in the workplace?

[0:01:13.6] GK: It’s more than you think. Studies are at least 60% and above.

[0:01:19.2] PF: Really?

[0:01:20.5] GK: Yeah, that’s across the board, across different types of jobs, working at home, not working at home, but over 60% of the workforces feels lonely at some point during the week, and that’s not a good stat that you want to be on.

[0:01:32.5] PF: No, no. Even if we were on the better side of that, like the 40%, that would still be a really high number.

[0:01:39.3] GK: Yeah. No, exactly, and it’s, you know, I mean, these are studies coming out of Cigna with that study, and one of the alarming things and how I kind of got into talking more about this, I was at the World Happiness Summit last year in London, a phenomenal three-day event and got to hear just some amazing speakers and just learn so, so much. But the biggest one that stood up was a surgeon general, Doctor Ravik.

And studies out now said that extreme loneliness – so, I mean, you and I have days we’re like, “Oh, I’m working by myself again, right? I’m a little bit lonely, maybe I should call a friend.” That’s not extreme loneliness. Extreme loneliness is when you’re shutting yourself in and shutting yourself out of the world, but they’re saying now that the effects of extreme loneliness are as bad on our health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. That’s sad, and it’s horrible, but it can be reversed.

[0:02:27.8] PF: Right, but in the workplace, I really wanted to dive into that. I mean, like, first of all, what made you interested in looking at this topic as a workplace problem? Because I just – I never would have thought of that as being part of the work. Sure, for you and I, remote workers, I get that, but I wouldn’t think that people who go to work would have that same problem.

[0:02:49.0] GK: Yeah, and I don’t have the numbers. I think it’s getting a little bit more loneliness to people like you and I or people who are listening, working from home, but you know, I was in the corporate world for 20, 25 years [inaudible 0:02:59.1], and there were people, I never necessarily felt alone at work, and if I did, I would try and reach out more, you know? Go out for lunch with somebody new, or hang out with a different group of people.

But I became interested in it because I, myself, felt lonely during COVID, and I found myself going, “I’m an outgoing guy, I have a lot of friends, but I just feel lonely.” And I feel like I’m the only one that’s always the one doing the call and then reaching out, and so I started asking people when I would talk to them on Zoom calls or during workshops or you know, not so much during a keynote, like, “Hey, who here is lonely? Let me know.”

[0:03:36.8] PF: I’ll give you a buddy.

[0:03:38.5] GK: I’ll give you flowers, but it’s just so important, and I’ve learned how to overcome it and it’s simple, and it’s easy and going back to the 15 cigarettes a day, it takes four to five, six, it depends on how big your lungs are to smoke a cigarette, but within that same time that it takes to smoke a cigarette, we can be reaching out to a friend. We can be writing a thank you card, a gratitude text, reading exercises, and meditation for five minutes.

So, all these different things that I’ve learned and that I’ve tried did not work for me, so that when I do have those lonely days, I can go, “Okay, all right. My first thing, I’m going to meditate again.” Now, if that doesn’t work, then I breathe again. If that doesn’t work, I reach out to another friend. You know, and I try three or four things, and if that doesn’t work, and it’s nice and sunny, I go golfing, but that’s a luxury working from home, right? And being an entrepreneur.

[0:04:26.1] PF: Right, right, and working for yourself because there’s some people who work from home. We have a neighbor who she was so excited because she got this job or she worked from home with a phone job. She is on the phone, like, she can’t even take another phone call, like a personal phone call, unless it’s in her 15-minute break at a certain time, and we’ve seen her go from being like, really excited and really outgoing, to just felling kind of like, she’s this isolated, tied-to-the-phones employee.

And that’s, you know, that’s a whole different kind of work because she’s talking with people all day, but they’re customers. Like, it’s a customer service kind of thing, and she’s just basically hearing people complain and is trying to make them less mad by the time they get off the phone.

[0:05:11.4] GK: That’s a sad situation to be in. I’m not sure how she can save that because if you’re chained to a desk, so to speak right? I mean, you’re like a rat in a cage because I’ve had those jobs before, and you’re on a queue, and the next one just – you hang up, the next one comes in. It is all about volume. I think, as we get farther down the road and we think more – if we want to be profitable, if we want to be sustainable.

If we want to last a long time, we need to change our approach and start taking care of our people before our profits, and finding ways that yes, we need to get all those upset customers and make them happy, but what is a way that we can do it where the people on our team, who are taking all the blame, have time to be happy, but there needs to be a middle ground, I guess, where, yes, we have to get our work done but how do we keep sane in these times.

[0:06:07.3] PF: So, have you seen any statistics or studies about how loneliness affects our productivity? Because we know, again, back to the smoking thing, there were all kinds of things that came out about how nonproductive smokers were because they’re going outside for cigarette breaks every hour.

[0:06:22.7] GK: Right.

[0:06:23.5] PF: So, what about that? What about loneliness in terms of how does it affect someone’s productivity and morale?

[0:06:30.5] GK: I don’t have specific numbers of that, Paula, as far as productivity and morale, but I do know that people who are happy, and typically, if we’re happy, we’re not lonely, or we are lonely, and we reach out to a friend. I mean, like when you popped up on Zoom today, it was great. We had a laugh, we smiled, we talked about stuff that makes us laugh, and that makes me happy, and when I’m happy, or an employee is happy, they’re 18% more productive.

[0:06:57.2] PF: Wow.

[0:06:58.2] GK: Right? So, not only we have –

[0:06:58.3] PF: Wow, that’s something for leaders to pay attention to.

[0:07:01.2] GK: Yeah. I mean, if you want somebody to work 42 minutes to an hour, who is happy, and then can have time for themselves and go run an errand or go pickup their kids from school, versus someone who doesn’t like their job and just sits there for an hour and doesn’t give them much time.

[0:07:16.9] PF: Yeah.

[0:07:16.7] GK: So, it’s not only the right thing to do, but if we want to be more creative, we want to be more productive if we want to make more money, all these kinds of things, and happy really bleeds into the workspace, and one of the biggest determinants is if you get out of loneliness is if you have just one friend at work, someone that you can confide in, right? Because we will have partners, and at times, there’s things that come up during our day that they just don’t understand.

My wife goes to the bank every day, nine to five. You get a paycheck every two weeks. I’m completely different. Sometimes I’m at my desk at seven, and I go golfing at two, and I’m back at 5:00. It’s so sporadic, and somebody booked me or not. So, having someone that gets you is very key to overcoming loneliness, and it can be a great resource for reaching out, and once you have that connection, whether you share jokes or stories or whatnot, that leads into the happiness.

[0:08:12.5] PF: So, in the workplace, what role should leaders be taking in terms of discovering how big a challenge loneliness is for their workers and then creating solutions for it?

[0:08:25.4] GK: I think leaders are highly important in leading that charge, and you don’t have to be an extrovert to reach out to people. One of the best managers I’ve ever worked for, his name is Jordan Thorsteinson. And it was when I was a sales rep at the Vancouver Connect, and he would kind of – a manager who you didn’t see him in his office a lot. He was out and about on the sales floor.

He was asking questions, “How’s your family, or how’s your pet, or what’s your vacation, what are you doing?” right? So, as a leader, and as leaders, leaders can even be more lonely than regular employees, right?

[0:08:56.8] PF: Oh yeah.

[0:08:58.0] GK: Right?

[0:08:59.0] PF: Yeah, because it is lonely at the top. They’ve already told us that.

[0:09:01.8] GK: Absolutely, and I’ve been a leader, and you have as well too, right? But if I’ve got people, and I’m like, “Oh, why is the boss doing this and that?” And you don’t have each other to rely on, and the boss is like, “Ooh, who do I talk to, right?” And I’ve had people reach out to me, and I’ve helped them as a happiness coach, the leaders, CEOs, right? Going, “I have nobody else to go talk to, I don’t want to take these stuff home, and talk to my wife.”

But when we have that connection, it’s so powerful, and I think leaders, as leaders, we need to create that space, and we need to ask people what they want, and if they are lonely, right?

[0:09:39.1] PF: Yeah, so what would that look like? Yeah, how do you address that with your employees? Because it used to be if you asked any – okay, say, the 1980s, let’s walk into any place and say, “Who is lonely?” Everyone’s going to go, “Uh-huh,” no one’s going to say a thing, like, nobody ever admitted they were lonely. So now, it’s a whole different ballgame, and people are like, “Yeah, I’m lonely,” they will admit it.

So, how do you go about then saying, “Hey, I want my crew to not be lonely, I want my people to enjoy coming to work,” how does a leader address that?

[0:10:11.2] GK: I think one way is being vulnerable and sharing your own story. I was speaking at a conference to a bunch of managers and talking about mental health, knowing we need to take care of ourselves and reach out, and I noticed during my talk at the back of the room, they talk about mental health and suicide, the leader of this group had tears in his eyes, and so, after my talk, I went up to him.

I said, “Hey, I saw you teared up a bit. I just want to make sure you’re okay. Was it something that had triggered you or whatnot?” And he says, “You know what, Greg?” He goes, “I brought you in here so that my management team would be okay talking to their people about mental health and suicide.” He goes, “But what I realized through your talk is that I need to know how to talk about it to my managers.”

[0:10:52.7] PF: Oh, wow. Yeah.

[0:10:54.3] GK: He said, “Because when I was 16, I lost my brother to suicide, and back then, you didn’t talk about it.” Nobody talked about it, nobody knew a lot about suicide, and so he just bottled it up, and he said, “Thank you for the tips and tricks, and I’m definitely going to talk to my team about it.” He goes, “But I don’t know how to do that.” And I said, “Well, it’s pretty simple. Have you ever gone to a therapist before, or coach, or anything?”

He thought for a couple of minutes, and then he said, “Back when I was in University, I was struggling taking tests. I would have anxiety, I would freak out, and so my parents found a therapist for me, and I went, you know, five or six sessions, figured out how to take a test and get rid of the anxiety and all this stuff that I still use today.” And I said, “Why don’t you tell that story?” He goes, “Well, that’s not a part of mental health.”

And I go, “Yeah, it is.” But everybody thinks that mental health is either you’re in a looney bin or you’re suicidal or you’re bipolar, right? And you’re on meds. Nobody realizes that mental health, like you and I know, is about being overwhelmed, or anxiety, or PTSD, or postpartum. It can be so many things, so I think the best thing for leaders to do is to be real and to be open and honest, and you don’t have to tell the most traumatic or worst story that you have.

But, if you could find a story where talking to someone else has helped you, when you get up and be vulnerable in front of your team, then the team member’s going, “Oh, Greg talked about that. If he did that, I can do that too.” So, lead by example, and then be there as well.

[BREAK]

[0:12:27.5] PF: We’ll be right back with more of Live Happy Now. And now, let’s hear more from Greg Kettner.

[INTERVIEW CONTINUED]

[0:12:40.4] PF: What are some of the drivers of loneliness at work?

[0:12:43.6] GK: Social media, there’s a lot –

[0:12:44.7] PF: Really?

[0:12:45.8] GK: Oh yeah, well, it’s social media. How do we become more unsocial? I mean, we spend, and you can look on your phone and don’t if you don’t want to be scared, but when I started diving into this, I was looking at the amount of time that I spent on my social media or on my phone where it’s actually, not necessarily in Facebook or whatnot, but every time I pick up my phone, well, it records that, right? And it was about 12 hours out of the day.

[0:13:09.8] PF: Really?

[0:13:12.8] GK: I was like, “Oh my word.” And the average, the average for kids is eight hours, and the average for adults is around six that we’re on our phones.

[0:13:20.1] PF: But how does that affect us at work? Because, at work or not, well, I mean, if you are, you’re probably going to get in trouble, you’re going to get busted, don’t do it.

[0:13:28.6] GK: Right? But it’s to do the scrolling, whether it’s at work or not, and I think we’ve just gotten to that place like, “Okay, I am going to my job, I’m checking in, checking out because I got a mortgage, and I got bills to pay,” and whatnot, and we’re not being connected with other human beings even though we are at work, and I’ve really placed an emphasis because I work in this room for the last four years.

And so, every day, I’ve got three people that I reach out to of the week. You know, I go for a coffee with Joe on a Tuesday or talk to Tia about my keynote on a Thursday, but there’s people that I can reach out to, and I think we just become so focused on we have more to do with less time, and less energy to get stuff done, and we’re just so – for us, “I got to get my work done, I got to get my work done,” that we forget about ourselves.

And that’s where the loneliness really kicks in because we think, “Oh, well, I must be the only one,” and we don’t have –

[0:14:23.2] PF: So, then do you create like a framework for reaching out, what do you do? Do you say like, to make yourself accountable?

[0:14:29.6] GK: Well, I’ve got post-its on my screen of the five speaker friends that I have to connect with, and it’s funny, Paula, I started doing gratitude texts during COVID, and it’s short and it’s sweet and I just make them very specific. The first one I did was to my brother when I was back in college. I took a year off, and I went [inaudible 0:14:49.1] English is the second language in a tiny island in the South Pacific, and it was very remote.

We didn’t have – well, there was no Internet back then, but we didn’t have TV, we didn’t have radio, we got newspaper once a month. So, we found out that Michael Jordan retired the first time a month later.

[0:15:03.4] PF: Wow.

[0:15:05.0] GK: And so, I sent a note or a letter to my brother, and say, “Hey, I now you’re a big reader, can you please send me some books? I’m really bored and really lonely.” And he did, he sent me a bunch of John Grisham’s and Tom Clancy’s. I just got into reading and devoured it, and I read every day. I absolutely love it, and that helped with my loneliness on this island even though there are 20 other students there.

We’re all missing our family, but I would take time to read, and I would share the stories or whatnot with other people. So, that was 30 years ago, and about three years ago, I just started texting my brother. I said, “Hey, I don’t know if you remember this, but when I was doing that student teaching, you sent me a bunch of books. I fell in love with reading, and I just want to say thank you, and I appreciate you.”

And usually, it takes time two or three days to get a text back from me, but right away he goes, “I totally forgot about that.” He goes, “That is so cool that you like reading because of me.” And so, when I got the text, I felt great. When I got the text back from him, it was even better.

[0:16:02.3] PF: Right.

[0:16:03.0] GK: And so, I sent one of those every day, and it’s amazing how many times people are like, “That’s exactly what I need today. I was lonely or I was bored or I don’t feel any connection with anybody,” and obviously the best connection that we have is face to face, but when we don’t, we need to do other things like texting or calling or writing them a thank you letter to get rid of that loneliness, especially at work.

I mean, even though we’re in an office, it can be very lonely if we don’t reach out and force yourself at times.

[0:16:32.0] PF: Right, and I think that’s like the overriding message on this, whether you work from home or you’re working in an office, yes, you do have to do the outreach, and you have to be that person that’s like, doesn’t just walk in head down, sits at his desk, and does their thing all day, and then leaves.

[0:16:48.2] GK: Yep.

[0:16:49.0] PF: Like, that’s a really solitary, lonely, sad existence.

[0:16:52.7] GK: Yeah, and then I mean, you know, the remote work just kind of exasperates it, right? Because you know, it’s like you have lack of community or you don’t have an office that you go into, maybe it’s closet or you know, you’re pulling out your laptop at the dinner table.

[0:17:05.0] PF: Right.

[0:17:05.7] GK: So, all these kinds of things are there, but it takes work like anything else. I mean, I talk about how to be happier today than you were tomorrow, it takes work. I’m not happy, a deal might go sideways, and you know, sometimes it takes longer to get back to being happy. I remember when my dad passed away last May, I’m like, “Oh, I’ll be fine. Oh my gosh, suck it up, he’s gone, nothing I can do about it.”

But I struggled for three or four weeks, and I was like, “What’s going on?” Like, I wasn’t motivated, and I feel like needing to stop, and so I’m like, “Well, might as well go to my therapist, right?” Here’s a guy who goes to school for this, knows the tips and tricks, and works with hundreds of other people on how to overcome grief. It took work, I think it’s just like easing up, Paula, right? And I liken it to sports.

You know, when I was on a hockey team, I wasn’t the best player. I probably had the most determination and the biggest heart, but I worked at it. I stayed after practice and worked on my skating or worked on my shot. So, all these things that we want to do to improve our life just don’t happen overnight. If it did, we wouldn’t have loneliness.

[0:18:07.8] PF: Yeah. Yeah, that’s true. So, what if you’re at work, you’re fine, you’re happy, you’re having a good time, but you see coworkers who are struggling with or you know intrinsically that someone’s not enjoying their life right now, what are some things that we can do to help others come out of that loneliness, and for them to create habits of happiness?

[0:18:30.2] GK: That’s a great question, and I’ve seen it myself, and I’ve seen it in others. The thing that I’ve learned is just to be a little bit more vigilant on people, right? If you don’t see someone coming in and hanging out with you more often, I remember when I was at the connects, Thursday nights we would go to the pub after work, that was frustrating, right? We were 20-somethings, guys and girls where, after work, we knew that we were going to the brew house and have a couple of pints.

And I remember one Thursday night, my buddy didn’t show up. I was like, “Oh, that’s odd, maybe he had something else,” and then the next week, he didn’t show up, and so I pulled him aside one day. I said, “Hey, you’ve been missing the brew house nights.” He’s like, “Yeah, you know, I’m just – I’m struggling with my mental health, and I’m just lonely, and you guys are good, but I just need some time and space.”

And so, I encouraged him, I talked to him. I’m not a therapist, but I shared with him what I do when I get lonely, and he picked my challenge and he started going to therapy, but if we see a different pattern in our friends or our coworkers, initiate conversation. Be that person going, “Hey, how was your vacation or how were your pets?” Which we did a webinar, and I like to ask different questions to get to know people.

And so, one question was, we’re all going to go by our middle name, right? So, I had them put it in the new screen, type in their middle name, and two people, when they introduced themselves, they didn’t have middle names. I didn’t know people didn’t have middle names.

[0:19:53.7] PF: Oh, wow.

[0:19:55.1] GK: Right? And we probably had 13 people on the webinar, and two of the people didn’t have a middle name, right? So, there was a conversation about middle names, and the people are like – and I had to call people back because people are like, “Oh, well, who are you named after?” All these different kinds of questions, right?

[0:20:08.7] PF: Pretty soon, it’s like off the rails, it’s like, “Hey, back to your thing.” Hey.

[0:20:12.2] GK: But it was great, but we were talking as much that I prepared about loneliness, but I think what it does when you ask the unique question or you specifically pulled someone aside and ask them, it lets them know that you care about them, and it drops that wall, and you can have those conversations. So, I think, you know, one, initiate conversations, participate, and bring them to social activity.

If you are having a barbecue over at Joe’s house after work, and you’ve been invited, go ask Joe, “Hey, can I bring somebody?” Right? And then, bring somebody from work, who you may not have hung out with before, or you might think, “You know what? They probably don’t have anything to do this weekend, let’s invite them.” And then the other thing that I found very helpful, and this is backed up by science, volunteer, right? Whether you’re lonely –

[0:20:57.1] PF: Oh yeah, yeah.

[0:20:58.6] GK: Or someone else is lonely. I started a group here in town called Men In the Middle because after my step-daughter’s she lost her dad to suicide, and I didn’t know what to do. I was 45 years old, and married for a year, and trying to figure out how to be a dad and a husband and hear this thing happen, and when I did the research, I found out that one of the highest rates in suicide is men, 25 to 45.

I’m like, “Well, we need to get a group to have conversations and learn, and so I started this group, but nobody ever wanted to talk about mental health, which is normal. I mean, we’re getting better, but – so, I just started acts of service, and every fourth Sunday, we go the Christian Aid Center and prepare meals for the homeless people in our community, and the friendships they’ve built, the advice I’ve gotten, and the people I’ve helped from just standing shoulder to shoulder, cooking in a soup kitchen.

There’s some retired guys, their kids are older and married and out of the house, and I’m like, “Hey, is Mike ever going to come back on this side of the room?” Like, “Oh, dope, you’ve got a great kid, you have nothing to worry about.” And they laugh at me, right? Because they’ve seen the future, or another guy came up to me, he’s like, “You know what? I’m really struggling. I’m going through a tough time. I think I’m losing my marriage because of my drinking.”

“Well, what do I do?” And I said, “Well,” I said, “The only thing that I’ve known is about the 12-step program,” and I said, “You can talk to George, he’s been sober for 20 years.” So, I connected him with George in the group, and he went to rehab, and he’s doing wonderful. He’s got a new job and been dating another gal and everything, but it’s just looking for something that might be off with somebody, and just being friendly and invite them.

And even just the invite to like, “Hey, I’m going to barbecue, you want to come?” That helps both of you not feel as lonely because –

[0:22:46.0] PF: Right.

[0:22:46.6] GK: The person you ask, like, “Oh, somebody does care enough about me to ask me to go to a barbecue.” One of the cool things I – and I found and I’ve tried to do this more with my friends and my wife, I went to a car print – it’s an organization out of Canada called Genwell and their whole thing is connection, and how we need to be more connected face to face, physically, verbally, you know, get off the phones, all that kind of stuff.

So, I went to the conference, and this one person was speaking. He said, “Right now, we’re going to do an exercise. I want everybody to stand up.” So, I stood up, I stood at the table, I didn’t know anybody, and they say, “We are going to give a stranger a hug.” I’m like, “Oh, that’s not a problem, I’m big in hugs, I’m cool with that.” So, I turned to my left, and there was this gal, she’s probably five years older than me, and hadn’t even really said anything to her.

And she’s like, “I’m Michelle,” and I’m like, “I’m Greg, are you ready to hug?” And so, we leaned in, and I gave her this big bear hug, and after about three seconds, I kind of pulled back, and she’s like, “Greg, get in here, we got 17 more.” And you know what? For the next five or six seconds, it felt really awkward and very weird that I’m hugging a stranger for this long, but I’ll tell you what, Paula, the last five seconds of that hug was magical.

It was almost like my body was flooded, and it just felt like a warm hug and a cloud, and then the person who gave me the lecture was saying that it takes about 20 seconds of human touch for the chemicals in our brain to kick in.

[0:24:11.8] PF: Oh wow, I didn’t know that, that’s interesting.

[0:24:14.1] GK: And you can literally feel it about 15 or 16 seconds. All of a sudden, it just went ooh, and I wasn’t worried that I was hugging a stranger. I wasn’t worried what my wife would think if she saw me hugging an older lady. I wasn’t worried, whatever, that I was going to get Heebie-jeebies or whatever. It was just like, I now have a friend because we held each other for 20 seconds, and again, you don’t want to hug the guy behind you at the grocery store, but your partner, right?

[0:24:41.4] PF: Right.

[0:24:41.7] GK: And go back – and in the morning, I hug her for a good 30 seconds, we just stand there and hugged, and the hugs are way better than when you wake up in the morning, “Hey, good morning, I love you,” right?

[0:24:51.2] PF: That’s fantastic. I had no idea. It’s going to change how I hug because I only hug like, two people in my life, so.

[0:24:59.2] GK: I’ll give you [crosstalk 0:24:59.2]

[0:25:00.9] PF: There we go. Okay, this is some very cool information. I really did want to dig into this topic, and I appreciate you taking the time to sit down and [crosstalk 0:25:10.1] with.

[0:25:10.1] GK: Yeah, absolutely, and if you ever feel lonely like me, and I love it, right? I mean, we met through COVID. We haven’t met in person –

[0:25:17.1] PF: Right.

[0:25:17.9] GK: And then it became a couple of emails back and forth, and then I was on your podcast, you were on mine, and now we share the things that make us laugh and the things that make us frustrated via text or a phone call or whatever, right? But I’ve got a new friend, even though I was lonely, and while I was in Washington, I’ve got a friend in Nashville, and I know if I was going to Nashville I’ll call you up, and we go for lunch, like it’s –

[0:25:40.3] PF: Absolutely, yup, that’s how the world works.

[0:25:42.5] GK: I appreciate it and your friendship.

[0:25:44.6] PF: Greg, thank you so much. I appreciate it. We, I know, we’ll talk again but –

[0:25:49.2] GK: Absolutely, I can’t wait.

[0:25:51.6] PF: All right.

[0:25:51.5] GK: You’re welcome, Paula. Have a great day.

[0:25:54.0] PF: You too.

[END OF INTERVIEW]

[0:25:58.6] PF: That was Greg Kettner, talking about how to overcome loneliness in the workplace. If you’d like to learn more about Greg, follow him on social media, or check out his Work Happy Podcast, just visit us at LiveHappy.com and click on this podcast episode. We hope you’ve enjoyed this episode of Live Happy Now, and if you aren’t already receiving us every week, we invite you to follow us so you never miss an episode.

We’d love to hear from you, so please, drop us a review and let us know what you think of the show. That’s all we have time for today. We’ll meet you back here again next week for an all-new episode, and until then, this is Paula Felps, reminding you to make every day a happy one.

[END]

In this episode, you’ll learn:

Some of the factors driving loneliness at work.
How loneliness affects leaders.
The importance of creating deeper connections in the workplace.

Visit Greg’s website.

Listen to the Work Happy podcast.

Follow along with the transcript.

Follow Greg on Social Media:

Facebook: @gregkettner
Instagram: @gregkettner
YouTube: @gregkettner
LinkedIn: @gregkettner

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