Shows / R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Professor David Maslach talks about graduate school, research, science, Innovation, and entrepreneurship. The R3ciprocity project is my way to give back as much as I possibly can. I seek to provide insights and tools to change how we understand science, and make it more democratic.
Episodes
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Found a 1940s Newspaper and It Scared Me About “Doing Things Right”
I found old newspapers in a recycling bin while moving offices. They were from the 1940s. One article was about Bethlehem Steel. At that moment, it was the…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The 40,000-to-1 Rule of Being Different
If I’m honest, most of my daily interactions are dismissive. Not because people are bad, but because they don’t want to spend the effort to understand what I’m…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
No, You’re Not Lazy. You’re Just Doing Real Learning—and It Hurts
If you’re in school and it feels like everything is falling apart—you’re not alone. Whether you’re in undergrad, doing a PhD, going back as a mature student…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Doing the Right Thing When No One’s Watching Still Matters
There’s something I find deeply fascinating—and honestly, troubling—about how many people are willing to cut corners when they think no one will notice. It…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I’m Just So Glad There Are Wonderful People in This World
I’m just so glad that there are wonderful people in this world. People who are genuine. Sincere. People who care about the person—about the soul inside—rather…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
What If Your PhD Advisor Isn’t Supposed to ‘Extract Value’ from You?
Most people believe a PhD advisor is supposed to “add value.” Or that a student is supposed to “add value.” Like there’s this clean exchange. Like everybody…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Worst PhD Academic Job Market Ever In 2026. Here’s What You Need.
I hear this every single year: “This is a particularly bad year for the PhD job market.” And yes, this year is brutal if you want a tenure track job. But here…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Path to Impact No Longer Runs Solely Through Tenure
There are two paths in research. One where you sit in a room, alone, writing ten pages a day for twenty years—no recognition, no guarantees. You don’t talk to…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Posted 6,200 Videos and Still Feel Uncomfortable Every Time
People keep telling me building my own platform is a mistake. That I look foolish. That I’m stigmatizing myself. That this is “not what serious people do.” And…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Charitable Giving Feels So Hard (Even When You Care Deeply)
I struggle with charitable giving. I always have. And I think it’s because of ambiguity. When you buy a carton of eggs, you get instant feedback. You know what…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Talk About the Parts of Life Most People Edit Out
One of the strangest things about being public is the split reaction I get. Half the people say, “Are you okay being this open?” The other half say, “Oh… I…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Most Frustrating Part of Academia: You Can Do Everything Right and Still Be Discounted
There’s one thing I’ve learned that no one really prepares you for in academia: You can do all the right things. You can follow every step perfectly. And…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
What Growing Up With an Alcoholic Grandfather Taught Me About Failure
I don’t talk about this much, but my grandpa was a severe alcoholic. And I mean severe. He would disappear for days on benders. As a kid, I never saw it…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
How Agreeableness Without Boundaries Leads to Burnout in Academia
Here’s something I’ve learned the hard way: this is how nice people get taken advantage of. I’m a management professor. I study innovation and failure. But…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Real Puzzle No One Talks About in Researc
gotta say the single most important thing that gives me joy today is this puzzle of trying to make my life more fun and more exciting. That’s what the whole…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
“Why do I feel weird, unusual, or out of place?” A Business Professor Reflects
When I was about seven years old, I realized I just think differently than everybody else. I didn’t think like my parents. I didn’t think like my friends. I…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Academia Is Full of Strategic Behavior—But You Can Still Win Without Playing Their Game
I just get so sick of the strategic behavior that happens in science. Everybody’s smart—maybe too smart. They try to outthink the system, outthink each other…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Academia Is Just Another Creator Platform—But With More Suffering (and More Meaning)
You know, one way to view academia in today’s economy is to see it as a platform for creators. A lot of people don’t understand this, but platforms like…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
PhD Depression and Loneliness: The Truth Behind the PhD Experience
Most people will never understand what you do as a PhD researcher. Even inside your own field, you learn very fast that you are walking into the unknown. You…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why “Lessons That Benefit You” Never Feel Entertaining
It’s interesting how humans can sense when something is directed to self-improvement or non-entertainment. We gravitate to entertainment and escapism — comedy…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why You Should End Relationships Fast
I’ve come to a pretty strong belief over the years: if I’m struggling to make progress on something, if I’m not energized at all, if nothing is moving, then…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why AI Will Win: It Doesn’t Need Instant Gratification Like You Do
There’s one thing that’s a real detriment in your career—and almost broadly in your life. Humans are programmed to desire success extraordinarily quickly…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The PhD System Runs on Shame. Here’s How to Break It
If you ever do a PhD, there is one feeling that almost never leaves you. “I am behind.” “I am slow.” “I’m not that good.” And the entire infrastructure seems…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Data Is Exposing Academic Power—And It’s Making Everyone Uncomfortable
I think a lot of the unrest we’ve seen in the last 10 years is because data is exposing more of who we actually are. I read a working paper on conflict of…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Psychology of Busyness (And Why It Breaks So Many of Us)
Some people move through life telling you they are always busy. They never have enough time. Everything is urgent. Everything is falling apart. And then there…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Original Thinkers Rarely ‘Make It’
Why Original Thinkers Rarely ‘Make It’
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Doing a PhD Feels Like Losing Your Mind
Doing a PhD means you are in your head a lot. You live inside your own thoughts, and it becomes very difficult not to go into great depths of negativity. You…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Every Team Breaks the Moment ROI Becomes the Excuse
We don’t talk about this enough: Teams don’t fail because of bad strategy. They fail when someone starts rationalizing their effort. “I’ve already put in too…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Academia Is Panicking About AI—And That’s Why I’m Excited
You know what makes me most excited about artificial intelligence? It’s when I see viral posts on Facebook, LinkedIn, whatever platform—people outing others…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
You Will Never Feel Like You Have Enough Time When You Are Building Something
If you are building some form of software or doing new product development, you will never feel like you have enough time. Lots of people out there have a…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Do Smart, Kind PhDs Struggle in Academia? And, Startups?
I love building something raw — and letting everyone see the mess. That’s the point of the R3ciprocity Project. There’s uncertainty. There’s embarrassment…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Academia Might Be the Hardest Career in the World
People think being a professor is easy. You sit around, read a few books, teach a few classes, and write the occasional paper. But that’s not the reality. Not…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Still Feel Like a Failure—Even After Doing Everything Right
I’ve hit every milestone I was supposed to hit. I got the degrees. I earned tenure. I published the research. I’m raising a family. I even built a platform to…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Mental Health at Work Feels So New (But Isn’t)
I think about mental health a lot—especially mental health at work. Most of us were never taught how to manage the invisible stuff. Not in school. Not in…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Behind Every Startup: Anxiety, Doubt, and Doing It Anyway
Not the pitch decks. Not the TED Talks. Not the LinkedIn wins. But the quiet moments of anxiety. The constant doubt. The deep embarrassment of putting…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
From PhD to Playground: Reimagining Innovation as Fun
simple: 1. Generate knowledge 2. Turn it into real-world solutions 3. Repeat—with joy But instead of pretending that this happens in a perfectly rational…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Feel Like I’m Failing at Everything. But I Keep Showing Up.
Most days, I feel like I’m failing at everything. I’m trying to be a good dad. A good husband. A good son. A good professor. A good person. And most days—I…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
School Never Worked for Me. But I Kept Going Anyway & Became a Professor
I’m going to say something that might sound extreme: If we got rid of higher education as we know it—college, university, all of it—maybe we’d be better off…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Stop Waiting for the Answer. You Must Push Against the World
We’re taught in school to look for a single best answer. One multiple-choice question. One correct option. Select A and move on. But the real world never works…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Didn’t Understand Innovation As A Professor Until I Spent My Own Money and Felt the Shame
It’s not lost on me how wrong management theories often are. I read a lot. And I know this sounds pretentious, but I’m confident enough now to say I’m one of…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Accidentally Built the TikTok of Science
I built the most powerful research tool I have ever used — more impactful than AI. It lets you compare ideas, generate abstracts, and get instant feedback. I…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
What If Academia Is Dying? (Rethinking the Collapse Narrative)
I keep hearing that academia is dying. That we’re in an existential crisis. That peer review is broken. That the system is collapsing. And I get it. I’ve been…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why I Don’t Trust Sensational Headlines (Even When They’re Right)
Sometimes I’ll see a new bill passed or read a shocking headline—and my first reaction is the same as yours: “What the hell is happening to the world?” I’ll…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Most People Should Not Innovate — From an Innovation Professor Who Tried.
There is absolutely far too much hype around innovation. I say that as someone who teaches innovation for a living and then tried to build something myself. I…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Big Misperceptions About What We Actually Do in Science
There is a lot of mystery and ambiguity around the career of a researcher or scientist, and the general public often gets it wrong. Reporters and commenters…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Is Business Strategy Just Luck, Privilege, and Repetition?
Is Business Strategy Just Luck, Privilege, and Repetition? Over time, I have become increasingly cautious about what strategy truly means. I have spent much of…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Real Reason Science Feels Broken (And It’s Not “Bad Apples”)
There is a lot of discussion about the validity of science right now. Researchers talk endlessly about how to make results “more valid,” how to fix problems…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
I Was Told to Fit In—But Being Weird Saved My Career
Everyone says to optimize. To fit in. To specialize. But what if playing it safe is exactly what’s holding you back? In this raw and honest episode, David…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Assistant Professors: Live With As Much Joy As You Possibly Can
Hey assistant professors that are just starting out. I just wanna remind you to live with as much joy as you possibly can. It is very easy to focus on what you…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
What Makes You Strange Might Be What Makes You Brilliant
My dad used to sit in the backyard and just watch his garden. No phone. No emails. Just stillness. It never made sense to me when I was younger—how he could be…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Doing Work You Love Still Makes You Miserable Sometimes.
This is one of those moments I promised I’d be real with you. Nothing polished. Nothing fancy. Just the truth. Right now, I’m grumpy and tired after work—and…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Most University Innovation Fails. That’s Exactly the Point
Most people ask: “Why do universities produce so little innovation per dollar spent?” or “Why don’t university labs focus on real-world innovation?” The…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Hardest Part Isn’t Building the Thing—It’s Getting People to Believe in It
I’ve spent the last 10 years building a platform to make research better. To make it less lonely. To make it more joyful. To make rejection less painful. At…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Research Careers Are So Psychologically Difficult
The research career is hard in a way that’s not often talked about. It’s not just intellectually difficult — it’s personally difficult. It functions a lot like…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
A Researcher’s Doubt: Wrestling with the Strengths and Limits of Peer Review
I’ve become increasingly skeptical of the peer review system—not because the intention behind it is bad, but because of the complicated world in which it’s…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Why Choose Research? Olav Sorenson on Loving the Climb
Why do we choose this strange, difficult career of research—and what makes it worth it? David Maslach sits down with Olav Sorenson, Professor of Strategy at…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The Only Advantage I Had? I Didn’t Give Up
Most people give up. They try a few times. It gets hard. It gets quiet. No one notices. So they stop. And that’s why the game is winnable. That’s why you never…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
Retirement Is a Lie: Why We Don’t Have to Fade Away
I’ve never liked how we talk about retirement. Like life just… ends at 65. You stop being relevant, you stop pushing, and you’re supposed to disappear into…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
The More I Study the World, the Less I Understand It
As a professor and researcher, you’d think I’d be certain about things by now. But the more I study the world, the more I realize how little we actually know…
- R3ciprocity.com - Prof David Maslach: Innovation; Research Life; Striving Towards Happiness
PhD Students: The World Won’t Tell You This, But I Will
You are more capable than you think. Most people won’t tell you that. The world will make you feel small. Rejections pile up. Deadlines feel impossible. And…