902: How to Ensure Great Career Fit with André Martin

Pete Mockaitis
André, welcome to How to be Awesome at Your Job.

André Martin
Hey, thanks, Pete. Glad to be here. Thanks for having me.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, thank you. I’m fired up to get into some wisdom from your book Wrong Fit, Right Fit: Why How We Work Matters More Than Ever. But, first, I think we need to hear a little bit about your mushroom farm. What’s the story here? You do that on top of everything else?

André Martin
I do it on top of everything else, although I’m not in the day-to-day operations of it. So, the farm was a passion project by some buddies of mine that grew up in southern Missouri, and the concept behind the farm is we actually grow mushrooms in empty grain silos to the tune of about 20,000 pounds a week.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow! How many grain silos does it take for that volume of mushrooms?

André Martin
That’s one grain silo.

Pete Mockaitis
One grain silo?

André Martin
Yup.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow! One of my first jobs, actually, was I audited, like, local municipalities and farms. I was a little auditor intern for an accounting company. And I had the privilege of getting to climb up grain silos to drop a measuring tape to assess the inventory value of the grain in the silos on the balance sheets of these farms. So, I’m quite familiar with grain silos. And I’m thinking that sounds somewhat lucrative based on the price point of mushrooms and the cost point of a grain silo. Am I overlooking something, André?

André Martin
I think you’re overlooking the length of time it takes to get it right consistently when it’s the first time it’s been done. So, the team has been at this for about four and a half years, and we’re still trying to make it consistent enough that we can guarantee that we can continue to make that kind of production month over month over month. So, we’re getting close. Hopefully, someday it’s lucrative and, even more importantly, I hope it helps us get rid of food deserts around the world someday. That’s the goal.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, that’s so clever. And so then, do I have multiple, like, layer cake inside that grain silo? Like, how many stories, I guess, of mushrooms am I looking at?

André Martin
Think of it more like a helix.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay.

André Martin
It’s gravity-based. And so, what we’re really trying to do is remove a lot of barriers to mushroom farming, one of which is the cost to do indoor farming is significant but the cool thing about mushrooms is they thrive in dark and humid environments. So, these grain silos provide a really great sort of architecture to do some cool work off of. And, again, the team has been at it for a while and we’re learning every day.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, now I’m curious to hear, what is, in your opinion, the most delicious species of mushroom and recipe for that mushroom to be in?

André Martin
Oh, that’s a great question. So, I grew up in southern Missouri, and I remember one of my best friend’s mom, Ruth Lorman, made beef stroganoff, and that was your basic button mushroom done up with a lot of cream, a lot of goodness, and a lot of heart. So, that’s my best memory of a mushroom dish. What about yourself, Pete?

Pete Mockaitis
That is good. I’m thinking about my buddy, Father Jim Herbert, and we went to get some morel mushrooms, and they were just very simple. We just grilled them up and had them as like a side dish in the middle of the rest of the meal, and there’s life for you.

André Martin
Oh, that’s great. I love them. They’re super good and great for you, so we hope they’re around and an even bigger food in the future.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, I’m glad we covered that, André. We got it now.

André Martin
Yes, sir.

Pete Mockaitis
We set the record straight on mushrooms and grain silos. Now, let’s hear about Wrong Fit, Right Fit. Any particularly surprising or counterintuitive discoveries you guys made when researching and putting this together?

André Martin
Quite a few. I think I’d start with the first one, is that, hey, when we looked at the issues around employee engagement today, we know that Gallup tells us there’s an estimated $7.9 trillion of lost productivity due to disengagement. A lot of the time, we like to think that it’s good or bad culture. It’s a toxic environment or it’s an engaging environment.

And the truth is it’s a lot more nuanced than that. So, when we talked to the hundred or so interviewees that we interviewed for the book, one of the things that came out really quickly is this idea that every company starts off wanting to create a great experience for their employees. They want to be a great place to work. It’d be counterintuitive to create anything other than that.

And so, if you start with that truth, the thing that we found that’s most surprising is that, for about 60% of people in the company, they’re pretty happy. Maybe not totally engaged but they’re content. And then for the other 40% who have the same skill set, the same background, the same affinities, they struggle, it’s like they’re slogging through mud.

And so, really one surprising idea is that there’s probably not a single best practice because every company has a different way of getting work done day to day.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, then when it comes to fit, there’s multiple styles, approaches that can work. How do we think about fit in terms of which one is good for me or not so good for me?

André Martin
Yeah, Pete, it comes down to a couple of things. The obvious things that align us to an organization are things like purpose, values and mission, the team I’m working on, the manager, the job that I have. But one of the things that came up in the book, too, was there’s this whole piece of information below the surface, which is how the company works day to day. How do we solve problems? How do we make decisions? How do we manage conflict? How do we develop people and give feedback? How do we gather and convene? What’s our relationship with time? How does information flow?

And those were the things that when we talked to talent, they were saying when the company works like you like to work in those areas, it’s easy. It’s like writing with your dominant hand every day. When it doesn’t, it can feel hard, it can be stressful, your quality goes down, you lose confidence and competence, and you end up in a place that’s really hard to go to work every day. It’s sort of the origin of the Sunday Scaries in many ways.

Pete Mockaitis
So, could you share with us an inspiring story of someone who went from feeling like their job was the wrong fit to the right fit? And what did they do? And what did they discover?

André Martin
Well, I’ll start with a story that’ll answer that question sort of in the other direction, so someone who was looking from a wrong fit experience back at what actually was right fit for them. And this was a creative marketer, and one of the places that this person started their career had very standard and consistent ways of working, so those things we mentioned: how they collaborate, how they socialize ideas, how they solve problems.

And early in their career, this person felt like that was constraining. And one of the insights from this story that was really interesting is, looking back now, what they said is, “Because I didn’t have to worry about how to present an idea, back then and that right fit experience, it was actually a pure execution or experience of my craft. That is, I was being able to do what I do best every day because all my creative energy was flowing to the thing that I do really well, as opposed to how work gets done.”

And that was sort of the big insight from the story, is this idea that your creative energy is always flowing. But for many people in wrong fit experiences, it’s flowing to how work gets done as opposed to what they’re really gifted at in this world.

Pete Mockaitis
So, can you give us some examples of some of this “how work gets done” stuff?

André Martin
Yes. So, think about it this way. There are some organizations that socialize ideas via beautiful decks. You create PowerPoint slides with wonderful images and pithy poetry. And then there’s other companies that do that via two-page memos. Amazon is one of the most popular examples of that. And then there’s others that expect really deep research papers, which is something we saw a lot at Google when you’re working in technology and machine-learning. And so, if the way that ideas get socialized don’t match the ways that you prefer to do work, it just feels harder than it should.

Pete Mockaitis
Understood. Okay. Well, so then, I’m curious, how do we go about clearly identifying what an organization does on these dimensions? And what is our preference to really determine: do we have a wrong fit or a right fit and making some adjustments where we can?

André Martin
Yeah, Pete, this is one of the most interesting parts of the book. And, again, through the interviews, one thing that became really clear is that work decisions are one of the most high-value decisions we make in our lifetime. Think about it this way. We spend about 13.5 years of our adult lives at work. That’s every second, every minute, every year. It’s a huge chunk of our lives. It’s actually second only to sleeping if you think about the distribution of our time as adults. And yet we tend to make those decisions about where we work on very little information.

The interview processes, if you think about it, they’re more like first dates than they are really getting under the hood to understand what the reality is going to feel like. And if you’ve ever had a first date, I know I had many before I met my wife, although you feel that excitement on the first date, by the second, third, fourth, or fifth date, things change as you get to know the person.

And what we’re finding in companies today is that’s happening more and more regularly to talent. They get recruited with this idea of what the company is going to feel like, what the job is going to be like, and then when we get into the company on the first day, it feels radically different. And it’s in that sort of discrepancy that we’re seeing a lot of engagements start to suffer.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. So, what is your recommendation for a prudent, practical research approach by which we can learn the stuff before it’s too late, and we go, “Uh-oh, wrong choice”?

André Martin
I think there’s a few things I’d say, and as a psychologist, I’ll start with some of the cognitive things. First, you have to understand that there’s a few things that are at play as you’re making a big decision. And that could be the cereal you’re going to buy in the grocery store, to the house you’re going to buy, to the job you’re going to take.

First and foremost is we tend to be very influenced by successful brands and successful companies. And there’s a phenomenon in social science called BIRGing. It’s called basking in reflected glory. It’s this idea that we are going to buy into things that have had past success. And so, one of the first things I’d say to talent is just watch that. The biggest coolest brands might not be the best place for you to work.

The second thing that happens is, once you open up a job description, and you get in a recruiting process, you have to realize you’re in a marketing effort. Think about it. Every talent that is showing up for an interview, we show up on our best behavior. We’re first-date ready. We have scripted answers. We’re dressed in our best outfits. We’ve thought about what we’re going to say and how we want to present ourselves. And the same is true for the company.

And so, instead of getting a realistic idea of who each other is going to be like on a random Tuesday morning, we actually are seeing us at our best, which we know isn’t necessarily who we are day-to-day. And the third thing, from just a cognitive standpoint, is this idea of confirmation bias. Because talent is so motivated to find a job, to get the job, to work at a great brand, we tend to pay attention to only a small sliver of the available information given to us, and most of that’s subjective and from the internal source of the company, career sites, recruiters, the interviewees.

And so, the first thing I tell talent is, “Make sure you’re using a broad set of information. Pay attention to what happens in the interview. Pay attention to what’s on the website, but go and find videos. Talk to people who have recently left the company. Look at annual reports. Find all the public information on the company to sort of round out what you’re seeing.” And my rule of thumb is if it doesn’t show up in three sources, really ask yourself if it’s likely going to be true day-to-day.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, so could you perhaps walk us through a research process by which someone is assessing what’s up with their prospective employer, and they have a few specific questions they want answered, and how they might get after them via these different sources of information?

André Martin
That’s great, Pete. The first thing I would tell any talent at the start of a process is the first thing you should do is not open a job description and apply for a job. The first thing you should do is take some time to really understand who you are, how you work, what you’re solving for right now, the kind of life you’re trying to build, what kind of leader or manager you work really well for.

And in the book, we have this set of excursions that really helps talent to do that. When we were talking in the interviews, one of the things that talent told me when we asked them, “When did you know it wasn’t a right fit?” And they said, “If I’m being totally honest, I knew it in the interview but I chose not to pay attention to those things.” And so, the first step is make sure you know who you are, how you work, and what you’re solving for.

The second step is to really do a lot of external research on the company. So, before the interview happens, don’t just depend on what the company sends you. Look at all those assets we talked about: annual reports, and videos of leaders, and past folks that have worked there, and really get a good sense on, “What does this company look like day-to-day?”

And then when you’re in the interviews, there’s a few key questions that will help you sort of discern a little bit more about what it’s going to be like to work there, and it’s hard because these are first dates. So, a few of the questions I really like, the first one is, “What’s the profile of the person that’s really successful here?” That gives you a sense on… and ask the follow-up question, “How do they show up for work? What does it look like when they’re in a team meeting?” And really get at, “What’s the success profile? Who’s really successful?” And ask yourself if that’s you.

The second thing I like to have people do is have someone walk you through a-day-in-the-life. So, in an interview, have them pull up their calendar and walk you through what’s on their calendar for the day. This gives you a sense on what’s important, what they’ll be working on, how they think about time, what’s their meeting cadence, all those kinds of things.

And then I also love to ask the question, “What’s the reputation of the team? And what’s the reputation of the leader?” because, again, that tells you where the team is going to be and what you can expect of some of the work that you’re going to have to do upon arriving there. And we have, again, about 10 or so questions in the book that help talent get a little bit deeper into how the company works.

Pete Mockaitis
And is the timing for these questions, is it your recommendation that it’s sort of right there in the interview, “Do you have any questions for me, André?” Like, right there?

André Martin
You know what, it’s really funny, Pete, I love the way that you bring that up because we often feel, in an interview process, like we’re being interviewed. And the truth is that you have to be at your best as an investigative journalist inside an interview process. And so, in those last five minutes, which we all get to, “Hey, André, do you have any questions for me?” often we don’t take advantage of those.

We ask a layup question, something that makes us look good or sound good. And this is your moment to really dig in and get to know the company at a deep level. So, I always would say have two or three really strong questions, and use that time. And then if you don’t get them answered, ask for more time because, again, this is one of the highest-value decisions you’re going to make in your life, and you don’t want to just be dependent on the small bit of narrowed information that you get from the company through the process.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. And I’m curious, do you recommend, from a timing perspective, we’ve got the “Do you have any questions for me?” right there, first interview or second interview or third interview, and then there’s a whole another zone of time in which, ideally, you have the offer, and you’ve not yet said yes to the offer.

And it’s funny because, as I’m imagining this, I sort of think about, like, “Ooh, that’s the time when I can really just get after it in terms of my investigations and talking to people and all of that.” And so, how do you think about the timing and the sequencing? Does one line of investigation work better at one time versus another? Or, can we just do all the investigating all the time and it’s all good?

André Martin
Well, here’s what I would say, is those early questions you ask in an interview, you absolutely want to be able to convey that you’re both highly interested in the role, and also that you’re a very curious person. And so, I think it’s okay to ask some very pointed, very high-impact and meaningful questions during the interview. It can actually make you look like a better candidate.

The other thing I would say to you, and you mentioned it, Pete, there’s that moment after you get the offer and before you take it, and then there’s also a moment after you take the offer and before you start, where often we just sit and breathe, we just sort of go, “God, I got the job. I’m so happy and my job is over.” I would tell any candidate that that’s the time when you really start increasing your efforts, both so you can be really ready to onboard and get to high productivity quickly.

But the second reason is because this is your time to really find out more and more about the truth of the company. And a couple places I like to look is I almost always reach out to my LinkedIn network, and look for people that I know that have recently worked at that company but might’ve just left because they’re going to be willing to sort of tell you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about the experience and being there.

And because they’re in your network, or second in your network, they’ll usually pick up the phone, and most people want to talk about their past experiences. So, that’s a really good place to do some digging if you don’t feel comfortable about doing it in the interview process itself.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And these high-impact questions, we talked about a couple, like a-day-in-the-life, let’s see the calendar. Can you just give us bullet after bullet after bullet of some of your favorite high-impact questions you like to ask?

André Martin
Yeah. So, I talk about the person, what’s the profile of success, that’s a big one. A-day-in-the-life I do love. The reputation question is really important. And often, if you’re doing interviews with people outside of your function or your team, they’ll tell you sort of what the reputation is. I like to also get after, “What are going to be the two or three most important pieces of work I’ll do in the first 12 months?”

Because here’s the deal, Pete, as we know that job descriptions, they are a litany of bullet points about all the possible things you could do in a job really for the rest of your life. And that’s very different than what you’re going to be asked to do in the first 90 to 120 days of being there. Often, what we find is if this is the job description, this big long list of all the things you could do, often the job that you get is going to be a very narrow set of those things plus a lot of additional duties that never showed up in the job description.

So, I like to ask that question for two reasons. One, it’s important to really get out, “What is this role in reality day-to-day?” The second reason is that you want to make sure that the near-term deliverables fit areas where you’re best in class because the easiest way to be a success in a company early on is to be given deliverables that are in your wheelhouse or they’re something you’re really good at.

And when I’m looking at a job, if I look at the near-term deliverables, and I say, “Yeah, I can do those things,” but I’m not best in class at it, I might sort of think twice about taking that job because you’re transitioning into a new company, you’re building a brand-new reputation, a brand-new network, and people are going to start looking at you to say, “What kind of talent do we have?”

And if you’re doing work that you’re not great at, it can sort of cause you to create maybe a less impactful reputation than you could’ve otherwise.

Pete Mockaitis
Understood. Okay. Well, let’s fast-forward in time, and so we’re in a job right now. As we think about fit, are there any telltale signs that it’s just like, “Yes, this fit is fantastic” versus “Oh, no, this fit isn’t quite right” that maybe is escaping our immediate conscious awareness at the moment?

André Martin
There’s a few. And so, one of the parts of the book that resonates, at least for me, personally, is the metaphor of what it feels like to be in a wrong fit experience. One of my favorite quotes from the book is someone mentioned they’re in the wrong fit when it felt like everyone else had a secret decoder ring for success except for them.

They were seeing people in the company that looked like them, acted like them, had the same experiences as them, had the same job, and they were excelling, when this person go, “Something just doesn’t feel right.” And so, one of the ways I think about it is if you’ve ever tried to write with your non-dominant hand, that’s what it feels like to be in a wrong fit situation.

It’s harder than it should be. You’re frustrated. You’re stressed. Your quality of work isn’t where it used to be. You start questioning whether or not you’re good enough. And I think your first instincts in that is if work feels hard, you might want to think about whether or not, long term, this is going to be a fit for you.

Some of the telltale signs are things like, “I tend to work harder. I’m putting in more and more hours because I’m trying to be impressive.” That can be a sign many of the interviews talked about, “When I didn’t have a right fit, when it was a wrong fit, I tried harder. I spent more time.” And that’s because you’re trying to make up for fit in effort, and it just doesn’t work out that well.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Understood. Well, André, tell me, is there anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

André Martin
The only other thing I would say is one of the aspects of fit that I find really important is this idea that sometimes we mistake the excitement for something new with the comfort that comes from a committed relationship. And so, again, the analogy that’s really great is if you compare a first date to being married or being in a long-term relationship, a first date is all dopamine. It’s excitement. It gets your blood flowing. It’s the unknown. All those things produce dopamine which is this really powerful neurotransmitter that causes us to react in a certain way.

There’s a very different neurotransmitter that’s activated in long-term committed relationships, and that’s oxytocin. And what oxytocin feels like is it feels like more like a deep hug, like this really warm pleasant feeling. And what I worry about is, since we’re in this world where everybody’s infinitely browsing, we’re all looking for greener grass, we can sometimes mistake comfort for boredom, for lack of momentum, and we will jump ship from right fit experiences in search of dopamine or excitement when we really had maybe a place we were thriving at and we just mistook the feeling we had for something other than what it was.

Pete Mockaitis
Ooh, André, that’s powerful stuff. It’s funny, as we speak, just yesterday, I started listening to Anna Lembke’s Dopamine Nation, which I’m digging. I recommend it. And you’re right, that idea, especially if we’ve become so acclimated to stimulation nonstop in every format from social media to games or alcohol, you name it, that you think, “My job is boring. I got to go find something more exciting.” And yet if our job is boring, as opposed to horrific, like, that might be a good thing.

André Martin
Pete, it’s a great thing. If you think about where creativity comes from, where inspiration comes from, having a firm grounding, a sense of comfort to explore, that’s the basis of what Amy Edmondson talks about in terms of psychological safety. That is the feeling of comfort that we often are like, “I’m bored. I got to go do something else.”

And I looked at some of the stats data that are out there, 29% of employees leave their company after their first promotion. That’s stats from ADP. And 70% of Gen Z cited that they were potentially thinking about leaving their current job inside of 2023. And so, you just get this feeling that everybody has sort of mistaken this idea of comfort for boredom, and we’re jumping way too fast.

And transitions take effort, right, Pete? Like, the thing that we know psychologically is every time you move companies, every time you hop jobs, you are having to rebuild your understanding of how a company works, you’re having to rebuild the understanding of the products and services that are offered to customers, you’re having to rebuild your social network, you’re having to rebuild your reputation.

And, therefore, if you think about, in every transition you go through, your creative energy in that first year, it goes to rebuilding those things, not to your craft so you’re probably getting better at transitions but you’re not actually getting better at the thing that you’re trying to do as your craft, day to day in the world.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s good. Well, André, this is probably a whole other conversation but how do we get better at being okay with being bored in our careers or, I guess, anything?

André Martin
One of my strategies, Pete, is I do a lot of self-reflection about what I’m solving for. And so, I go back, not to make this about the book, but those excursions in the book are personally made, because the one thing we don’t do enough in this high-information, high-excitement, high-dopamine world is we don’t stop, take a deep breath, take three steps back, and open our eyes really wide, and ask the question, like, “What am I solving for? What am I trying to build in terms of my life? What do I want out of my job? What kind of career am I building?”

There’s three different types of careers, for instance. Like, you can build a career around craft, company, or cause, but you can’t do all three of those things. What kind of person do I want to work for? What do I want my life to be 10 years from now? And what’s really interesting is, if you do that work, you can sort of start to see the signal in the noise, and you will, I guarantee it, look at your current experience very different, and you will look at every experience that comes after very different as well.

But we have to do that work a lot more often than we used to because there’s just an onslaught of greener grass coming at us every day.

Pete Mockaitis
Can you expand upon this notion of craft, company, and cause? You say we can’t have all three.

André Martin
Well, that’s the unicorn. I’m not saying you can’t but it’s really difficult. What I try to tell people is each of those careers has a very different trajectory and a very different choice you make around the types of jobs you take. So, I’ll give you, for instance, let’s say you’re of company. I don’t know what your favorite consumer brand is but let’s say you’re working for this company that you just believe in your heart and soul in what it stands for, and the products it brings to bear.

You want to be at this company for the next 25 years because you love it so much. I would tell you that your career then needs to have as many different jobs and as many different functions as possible because the strength of being part of a company as a career is that you know the system and the people in the system better than anybody else.

Right now, very different than craft. If you think about craft, craft is about this question of saying, “I want a career that ensures that I will be the best in class in a very narrow and specific area.” To be the best in craft in any specific area, let’s say my area. I was a chief talent and learning officer, and started my career in leadership development.

To be one of the best in leadership development, it’s really hard to do that and stay at a single company, because if I stayed at a single company, I see one approach to those things. If I’m at multiple companies over a career, I see five, six, or seven different ways of doing it, and, therefore, I have a lot more tools to use as I develop those assets. So, if you’re doing a career around craft, it’s really important that you think about having as many different systems as you can, within reason, to see how to do this in many different industries, in types of companies, and even sizes of companies.

And then cause, cause is the ultimate. Cause is all about, “I have this really big injustice, opportunity, or thing I’m trying to solve for in the world.” And when you have a career around cause, you really want to be at the middle of whatever is happening in that space. So, again, if you’re wanting to solve for the environment, get to a place where the environment is at risk. You want to save the oceans on the coast of California, you want to save the rainforest, but you need to be in the middle of where the action, where the thought leaders are, where all the discussions are happening. And that’ll take you wherever that movement is sort of in the world.

And so, my younger brother spent a lot of time in the Peace Corps, and he was of cause, and he went to Kazakhstan for a longer part of a year and a half because he wanted to help drive education in developing countries, and so he was definitely of cause. But I would say this, it’s not impossible to have all three, but you create very different experiences and design very different careers based on what you’re really making primary.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s a very helpful framework there. And it’s nice how it seems like, “Oh, those are the opposite in some instances,” in terms of, like, craft and company, and I know folks who have gone both ways. I’m thinking about web design or systems architecture, it’s like, yeah, they probably know that better than, I don’t know, 99.99% of humans on the planet because they’d gone deep into it. And then once they’ve exhausted the learning that organization can give to them, it’s like, “If craft is your thing, then it’s time to move on.”

And, likewise, I’ve got buddies at Nike, that was their dream, and they’re still there from college to now because they think it’s just the coolest thing ever, in terms of, like, the shoes and the sports and the athletes. It’s so cool, and, likewise, he has been in a lot of different roles, and that makes you all the more valuable and hard to fire in terms of, “This guy is the glue who knows about the manufacturing, and about marketing, and about the new product design, and then the athlete partnerships.”

It’s, like, you think twice before, your next cost-cutting endeavor, you slash that guy because you’re going to miss a lot of the good connectivity that makes a behemoth of an organization function smoothly.

André Martin
Pete, I couldn’t say it better myself. And what I love about your description and your story there is, often people who are of company, they’re not maximizing their ability to be invaluable because they’re not thinking about their job progression as, “Wow, I need to broaden my network. I need to broaden my experience. I need to know every corner of this company.” And that’s the way you protect yourself and allow yourself to be invaluable over time if you truly are in love with the place, like Nike, which many are.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, you’re in Oregon. So, you’ve seen that before, I bet.

André Martin
That’s right, I have.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, now could you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

André Martin
One of my favorite quotes is “Joy cometh in the morning.”

Pete Mockaitis
That is hopeful on those days.

André Martin
I’m a hopeful person, Pete, 100%.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

André Martin
It’s a new one. So, there’s a recent study by MIT, it just came out with a company called Culture 500, and they did this really cool study on culture. And what they did is they took the espoused values of all these companies that are high on culture, and they grabbed those from annual reports, and videos, and communication with the company, and then they weighted them.

And then what they did is they took those espoused values, what companies said they were about, and they compared those with the felt experience of employees on the employee review sites. And the net of the study was there’s zero correlation between the two, that what companies are espousing they stand for isn’t necessarily what’s showing up in what the felt experiences for the employees that are part of their company.

Now, that study is fraught with a little bit of a hardship because we know that the employee review sites aren’t necessarily all the employees but it gives you a good indication that, “Hey, often what we’re talking about that’s important isn’t necessarily what’s showing up in the day-to-day lives of our employees as they work for us.”

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I hope there’s at least a few companies that have a good match up, but, across the board, they weren’t seeing it.

André Martin
They weren’t seeing it. And I find that really fascinating.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, okay. And a favorite book?

André Martin
Dedicated by Pete Davis. He has written a book on how to get through this crisis of commitment that we’re living in the world. And I really like his perspective that it’s not a loss cause. We can still be committed to things. We just have to stop infinitely browsing as much as we currently are.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

André Martin
Favorite tool, I have been recently using Arist.co. It’s a text-based learning platform that allows the small micro doses of learning to hit you every morning via your phone, and then you can have the option to go deep or wait until the next day’s lesson. And it just allows learning to be spread over a long time, and it’s with me every day in the flow of work.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite habit, something you do to be awesome at your job?

André Martin
Favorite habit, this is more of something I did to be awesome as a husband and a father. We practice no-text Sundays. So, from the moment all of us got out of bed until 3:00 o’clock, we would turn off our phones and our technology, and make sure that we were eye-to-eye, knee-to-knee, elbow-to-elbow out in the world. And that was a pretty fun way to put technology aside just for a little while, and have some fun as a family.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a particular nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; they quote it back to you often?

André Martin
Yeah, this nugget that resonates for me is that “Opportunity is infinite, and human energy is not.” So, really try to spend every day at your highest and best use because we just don’t have enough time.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

André Martin
I’d point them to www.WrongFitRightFit.com and also to a newsletter that I run called Monday Matters. It’s meant to be practical tips to make your week better, and that’s at MondayMatters.substack.com.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

André Martin
I do. I think my final challenge is back to what we talked about, because it’s one that is core to why I wrote the book, which is just be careful not to mistake comfort for boredom. The grass is inherently often not greener, and comfort is something that allows us to be at our best, and so cherish it if you have it. If you don’t, I believe it’s out there, and you can find it if you keep looking.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. André, this has been a treat. I wish you much luck and many good fits.

André Martin
Hey, thank you much, Pete. Thanks for having me.