Motivate, Not Deflate: Applying Buddhist Wisdom to Elevate Feedback, Performance, and Leadership with Dr Laura Lois Greenwood
About this episode:
What if some of the most effective tools for feedback, performance management, and emotional intelligence had been refined for centuries?
In this practical and thought-provoking conversation, Chris Cooper is joined by Dr Laura Lois Greenwood, a leadership and emotional intelligence specialist who has helped tens of thousands of people transform challenging emotions into clear, compassionate workplace responses.
Drawing on decades of Buddhist practice and real-world organisational leadership, Laura translates ancient mind-training principles into fully secular, workplace-ready tools. Together, they explore why performance management so often fails, why feedback is the pivotal leadership skill, and how leaders can learn to motivate rather than deflate.
The conversation covers emotional intelligence under pressure, common leadership traps, and Laura’s use of frameworks such as “Friends, Enemies, and Strangers” and the Buddhist understanding of anger, grasping, and indifference — all grounded in everyday organisational behaviour.
Listeners will leave with practical insights, a simple feedback structure, and a short mind-training exercise they can apply immediately at work.
More about Dr Laura Lois Greenwood:
Dr Laura Lois Greenwood is a leadership and emotional intelligence specialist who has supported tens of thousands of people in transforming challenging emotions into clear, compassionate responses that strengthen relationships and improve workplace effectiveness. Drawing on decades of Buddhist practice, she translates ancient mind-training methods into practical tools for communication, feedback, and emotionally balanced leadership.
She has designed and delivered more than forty original training programmes across leadership, conflict resolution, mindfulness, cultural diversity, and organisational development. As the founding Director of the Workforce Training Centre at the University of Hawaii Maui College, Dr Greenwood led workforce initiatives for 22 years and certified hundreds of facilitators through Train-the-Trainer programmes. Her clients include leading hospitality, healthcare, and public-sector organisations in Hawaii and internationally.
Dr Greenwood holds a BA with Phi Beta Kappa distinction, an MA in East Asian Studies, and a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. A committed student of Buddhism since 1968, she has studied extensively in Asia and Nepal and helped found Vajrapani Retreat Centre in California. Her work integrates Eastern contemplative wisdom with Western leadership practice to foster resilience, emotional intelligence, and lasting organisational change.