Podcast - How to be Awesome at Your Job

Dec 02

724: How to Master Your Executive Presence with Muriel Wilkins

By Ida del Mundo | Podcasts | No Comments

Muriel Wilkins says: "Executive presence is really about how others experience you."

Muriel Wilkins dispels myths surrounding executive presence and shows you how you can develop your own, no matter what your role is.

You’ll Learn:

What executive presence really means
The two muscles you need to train for executive presence
The key factors that affect your confidence

About Muriel

Muriel Maignan Wilkins, Managing Partner and Co-founder of Paravis Partners is a C-suite advisor and executive coach with a strong track record of helping already high performing senior leaders take their effectiveness to the next level. Muriel is the host of the Harvard Business Review podcast, “Coaching Real Leaders” and is the co-author, with Amy Su, of “Own the Room: Discover Your Signature Voice to Master Your Leadership Presence”.

Resources Mentioned

Book: “The Power of Positive Thinking” by Norman Vincent Peale
Book: “The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself” by Michael Singer

Thank you, sponsors!

FSAstore.com. Use your flex spending account funds with the greatest of ease!
StoryBlocks. Enhance your video storytelling quickly, beautifully, and affordably at Storyblocks.com/awesome.

Muriel Wilkins Interview Transcript

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

Muriel Wilkins
Thank you. I’m glad to be here.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to dig in and chat about executive presence. And maybe you could start us off by saying what the heck does that even mean?

Muriel Wilkins
That’s what actually set me on a track to figure out what it means because a lot of people don’t know what it means. It’s a term that’s used so broadly and loosely, and it’s a term where many of my clients, my coaching clients were getting feedback on their executive presence. And, quite frankly, when I would ask, “Well, what does it mean?” They’re like, “I have no idea.”

So, from my perspective, and based on the work that I’ve done with folks and my research on it, executive presence is really about how others experience you. And, more specifically, when I think about it from a leadership presence, is when others are in your presence, do they feel like they’re in the presence of a leader? And that has nothing to do with where you sit hierarchically in the organization. It all has to do with what you exude.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, certainly. And so, I can see how that really is frustrating for the individual, it’s like, “I don’t know.”

Muriel Wilkins
That’s right.

Pete Mockaitis
“It’s like based on someone else’s perception of me.”

Muriel Wilkins
Exactly. And even worse, it’s like, “Well, I don’t know, but Joe has it.” And I’m like, “Yeah, but you’re not Joe.”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, okay. So, that sets the vibe. It’s like, “If someone has executive presence, and I’m in the presence of someone with executive presence, I feel like, wow, I’m with a leader.” Okay. Well, then I’m curious, you tell me, is it like you either got it or you don’t? And what if you don’t, what do you do?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah, that in itself is sort of demoralizing as a follow-up to getting feedback on executive presence. It’s like, “You need to work on this.” But, you know, can you really work on it because you’re either born with it or you’re not? And if there’s one thing that I’ve tried to do around this topic of executive presence is really debunk the myth that it’s just something that you naturally have. It’s something that you could definitely build and develop over time. The key is developing a presence that is also authentic to you because it’s not mimicking everyone else. It’s about having an impact in a way that’s relevant to others while still maintaining a sense of who you are and what you bring to the table in your own authenticity so that you’re not a chameleon.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, got you. So, that sounds super. Let’s maybe dig into maybe the particular components and approaches to make that transition happen well. But maybe could you start by sharing an inspiring story of someone who got the word, “Hey, you need better executive presence,” and then what they did and the results that happened from that turnaround?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah. Well, I’ll share my own story because I was the receiver of that feedback way back when, and the feedback that I got was that I needed to tone it down.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, boy.

Muriel Wilkins
And it was like, “Okay, what does that mean? My volume sounds just fine.” But what they were talking about was, again, my presence was not one that was with those particular stakeholders, one that really exuded the position that I had as an executive and as a leader at that time. And so, that is something that I think many people have experienced, whether it’s, “You need to tone it down,” or whether, “You need to be more confident.”

You often hear it in terms of adjectives, “Be more this,” “Be more inspiring,” “Be more assertive.” And the fact of the matter is that, just as I described with your presence, it’s the feeling that you give somebody. An adjective is not a verb so it doesn’t really give the concrete steps of what you’re able to do. I often say, if somebody has received feedback of “Be more confident,” it’s not like you wake up one day and say, “Well, today I decide not to be confident.” Like, everybody wants to show up as confident.

So, when we think about executive presence and what are the steps to really get there, the first place is to recognize, “What is the impact that you want to make? What is the impression or the feeling that you want to leave people with?” And when you think about what the impression is, or the impact, that a leader or an executive or somebody that you want to “follow” has on you, it’s usually two things, the combination of two things: they are credible and they’re relatable.

And so, the intersection of those two things is actually what makes up or what makes you feel like somebody has executive presence because they have that impact on you. And so, the first place to start is understanding that those are the two levers that you have, and then determining, of those two levers, “Which one am I exuding and which one am I not? Or am I exuding both? Or am I not exuding any of them?” So, it starts with some self-awareness around what the impact is that you’re actually having. Because if you can figure that out, that it’s either the credibility or the relatability, then you can figure out “Well, what do I do about each of those muscles?”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, I love that a lot. And in terms of that first step, I think it’s easy to skip over, like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, give me some tactics, Muriel.” But, no, no, it is so foundational because I guess I think I’ve made my own mistakes with this in terms of any types of presenting of yourself, like I think I’ve had headshots done, and I’ve made the mistake before. I picked a headshot, it’s like, “Ooh, I look really hot in that one. I think that’s the best photo to go with it.” It’s like, “You might look like the most aesthetically pleasing, in your opinion, Pete, but actually that’s not what we’re trying to accomplish here in terms of the target demographic and audience and impression that we’re sending.” Like, these aren’t modeling headshots. These are for a speaking agency to get me booked to do keynotes.

And, likewise, that comes up in LinkedIn in terms of it’s like, “In your profile and your picture, how do you want to present those elements and the headlines and the experiences because there’s a variety of flavors you could take?” Like, if you’re trying to represent yourself as a model or a standup comedian, that’s going to have a different vibe than if you’re trying to do this executive presence thing. And you’re seeing, when it comes to executive presence in professional workplace environments, generally what we’re after is conveying credible and relatable. So, it’s awesome.

Muriel Wilkins
That’s right. And it also goes beyond the professional workplace. If you think about your friends, or the people you associate with, or your family, or your partner, yeah, I don’t know about you, but I want my partner to be credible and relatable.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, sure, yeah.

Muriel Wilkins
So, it really also just becomes around what do we tend to look for as humans in others that gives us a sense that we can be confident in them, and that we have some type of connection to them? And so, those are why they end up being the two muscles.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, so then in practice, what are some key do’s and don’ts to convey all the more credibility and relatability?

Muriel Wilkins
So, the way that I tend to think about it is almost like conditioning an athlete. When you think about an athlete who conditions themselves in their preferred sport or their sport of choice, they’re a master at that sport. They have to be conditioned at three levels. They have to be conditioned from a mental standpoint, they have to be conditioned from a skills standpoint, the skill of that particular sport, and they have to be conditioned physically for the sport that they’re playing or competing in.

Likewise, when you’re trying to really master and train these muscles of credibility and relatability, again, mastering your leadership presence, you also have to condition yourself at those three levels. And so, what are those? So, the first place is your mental conditioning. Well, what’s our mental conditioning when we think about our presence? It’s the beliefs that you have. It’s the thoughts and the assumptions that you have about yourself, about the other, about the situation.

And understanding what those are, and with no judgment of “Is it a right thought or a wrong thought?” this is not like “The Power of Positive Thinking.” It’s more around, “Is that belief actually serving you in showing up as credible and relatable?” So, if I don’t have conviction around my message – and conviction is just a belief, I believe in my message, I believe in what I’m saying, or I have knowledge about what I’m saying – then how in the heck am I going to show up as credible in what I have to say?

So, the first level is mental conditioning, and I’ll tell you, Pete, that’s the hardest one for people to get their head wrapped around because a lot of times it is about them dismantling the beliefs that they’ve had for an eternity. So, that’s the first one. The second level of conditioning is skill conditioning. And in our game of executive presence, that’s your communication skills. And so, what are the communication skills that allow you to show up, again, credible and relatable? It’s quite simple.

From a credibility standpoint, the communication skill is your ability to speak in a clear and concise way. Rambling does not define credibility. And on the relatability side, the key communication skill is the skill of being able to listen so that you can understand where the other is coming from. Understanding creates connection. And in between those two, we have the skill of how you frame your message and also how you handle questions both in terms of how you ask them and how you answer them. So, with my clients, we work on those four buckets. I try to simplify. You don’t have to know all. You don’t know how to use every golf club in the bag. You just need to learn how to use a few of them.

And then the last piece is your physical conditioning. And physical conditioning is your nonverbals, your body language, your appearance, even your visibility and what message that sends across. And, again, I’m not one to say, “Here are the five great body language postures that you need to hold for you to show up as a leader.” What it really comes down to is, “Is there alignment between the way you are holding yourself nonverbally, or what you’re communicating nonverbally? Is there alignment between that and what you say and your assumptions?”

And so, we’re looking for alignment along all three of those conditioning levels, and that they’re not working against each other, and that they’re also not working against your desired outcome of being credible and relatable.

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. Well, Muriel, this is so powerful in terms of, okay, we’ve got the set of things to be working on. And the athlete analogy is swell. So, let’s talk about the mental and the skill and the physical components of conditioning. I’m thinking when you said with beliefs, thoughts, and assumptions, not about good or bad, right or wrong, but rather is it serving you? Is it helpful? Is it working out for you?

And you mentioned sort of the beliefs in the message, like you fundamentally buy what you’re selling. And I think this is probably universally true, it’s like I just cannot sell something I don’t believe in. I’ve turned down a lot of prospective sponsors. I turned down a lot of them.

Muriel Wilkins
I hear you.

Pete Mockaitis
And so, there’s that. And then I’m thinking there’s also some beliefs, thoughts, assumptions about sort of you, yourself, what other people think of you, like, “Oh, everyone is looking at me. Oh, they think I’m stupid or they don’t think I’m senior enough to be in this room. They think I’m a loser. They think I’m stuttering. They think I’m saying like or so and you know too much.” So, it seems like there’s a whole host of potential beliefs, thoughts, assumptions that can be not serving you. Tell me, are there some go-to beliefs that you find helpful, reassuring, confidence-boosting? And how do we condition ourselves to land there instead of the unhelpful places?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah, absolutely. So, a big one in terms of when you’re trying to boost your confidence, as you said, is around the belief that you don’t have to always have the answer, and that you are in the room to share the value, and you have to understand what it is the value that you bring to that table, and that the value isn’t always – and most times it’s not – about having the answer and knowing everything and being an expert on everything.

And so, when people tend to show up as lacking confidence, they place an expectation on themselves on what it means for them to show up successfully in that meeting or at that table. And what I have them do is recalibrate, “Well, is that even realistic? What is the value that you bring? Why are you in that meeting?” And when they’re able to define it and then actually stay in their lane in terms of what they’re able to do, they can have confidence in it because they know exactly what they’re there to do. So, that’s one example.

On the flipside, if somebody is working on the relatability aspect, the belief that often gets in the way is, “I already know the answer,” which then shuts them down from listening. And so, the belief that would serve them better in terms of showing up in a more connected way and a more relatable way is to come in with the thought of “I have a perspective around what needs to be done and I’m open to hearing others’ perspectives.” So, it’s a slight reframe. It’s a slight reframe.

And it doesn’t mean that, if you’ll notice, it doesn’t mean that you’re disregarding that you have the answer. Like, I’m not going to lie. Yeah, you probably do but let’s expand that a little bit. Let’s open the possibilities a little bit. When people stay too attached to their belief, it creates constriction, it creates closedness both in terms of what you have to offer, what gets in the way of confidence, as well as what you are open to from others, which then creates a disconnection.

So, all I try to do is get them to see that there are different ways that they can think about, again, themselves, the situation, or the other, that might then open them up to different ways of communicating or physically showing up.

Pete Mockaitis
Right. And so then, once you know and have heard the belief once, you’re like, “Okay, yes, Muriel. That sounds like good, fine, and solid lead. That is true.”

Muriel Wilkins
“I wish it was that easy.”

Pete Mockaitis
“I would like to land upon and return to again and again.” But how do you condition, train, reinforce, lock in those neural pathways so that that’s where we go?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah. Look, this is like, if we boil it down, this is what most people have, again, a very difficult time with. It takes practice. This is what we’re talking about here is mental discipline. And so, I try to get folks to just really focus on one at a time. Let’s hone in on one and they just practice it, they practice it, they practice it. And I try to get them to practice it in real situations, so not just thinking about it conceptually, because everybody can do something conceptually. I can speak conceptually about how I can do the Iron Man but it’s very different to actually go do the Iron Man.

And so, I get them to practice it, practice it, practice it, until it becomes more natural. And when they start seeing that their actions, because, again, it’s not just the mental, it’s also the skills and communication and the physical, when the skill conditioning and the physical conditioning reinforces those beliefs, then it helps, so it kind of creates a cycle. It’s holistic rather than just “Oh, I only need to do one thing and not the other.”

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. And so then, when you say practice it, as I was thinking about the athlete analogy again, I can imagine practicing free throws, or throwing the football, or conditioning strength, bench press, squat, deadlift in the weight room, what does practicing a belief look, sound, feel like in practice? What am I doing when I’m practicing a belief?

Muriel Wilkins
So, at a very practical level, let’s say I’m coming on to this show with you, and I can pause for 30 seconds beforehand and say, and really pause and ask myself, “What am I thinking about what I’m about to go into? What do I think about me? Like, let me really try to understand what my beliefs are going in, about myself? Do I believe I’m going to mess up? Do I believe I’m not prepared? Do I believe I don’t know what this is about? What do I believe about the show? What do I believe about Pete? What do I believe about what’s going on around me?”

And if I conclude that those things are not going to help me show up on this show in a way that is credible and relatable, then I say, “Okay, like what thoughts do I need to focus on right now? Let me put…It’s not that those things might not be true, but let me put them on the backburner for a little bit. I can come back.” So, the way that I’ll do it, I’ll just say this to my clients, is just say, “Hey, you know what, negative belief or belief that doesn’t serve you, I’ll check back in with you in 30 minutes and we’ll deal with you, but you just stay over there right now and let me focus on the ones that help, okay?”

So, it truly is around being able to pause, having awareness around what you’re thinking, and then being able to redefine the thought. It’s a three-step process. It is not easy, Pete. Like, this is, again, the stuff around mental discipline, and it’s hard because it’s inside of us. It doesn’t operate outside of us. But it’s what creates, from my standpoint, it’s what makes the most sustainable impact.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely. Thank you. Well, I appreciate you zooming in there, and that is handy in terms of making sure that you do have time for that silence as opposed to, “Oh, go, go, go, finish up, finish up the last words and the last deck, page, slide, and the last seconds, and then grab the laptop and head on into the room or the Zoom call,” or whatever.

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah. And, you know, the funny thing, Pete, is like most people will say, “Well, I don’t have time for that.” Like, it doesn’t take a ton of time. Like, we just did it in 30 seconds, in a minute. It does not take a ton of time. So, I’ll tell my clients, like, “Well, as you’re brushing your teeth in the morning, kind of go through the meetings that you have that day?” Well, people aren’t commuting these days, but as they commute, as you’re walking the dog, the day before, go through your Outlook calendar, whatever calendar you use, what are the meetings, and just do a quick mental check around what you’re thinking going in versus it’s the warmup. I consider it the warmup.

You don’t wait till you’re on the field to look around and say, “Oh, who am I dealing with? Who am I playing against? What position do I play?” No, you do that. But that whole warmup happens way before you’re on the field.

Pete Mockaitis
Well said. Well said. All right, so that’s the mental game, a core piece of it. And how about we talk about communication skills? We could spend hours talking about these core skills. I’m curious, do you have any particular tips, tricks, tools, tactics, or do’s and don’ts that make all the difference when it comes to listening or speaking clearly and concisely?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah. So, with listening, speaking clearly and concisely, framing, questioning, here’s the thing. These are not about just, “Hey, I just need to know these skills,” because, quite frankly, most people are already using them. The question is, “Are you using them in a strategic way? Are you clear around what it is, again, the impact you’re trying to make?” And given the impact you’re trying to make, then being able to dial back and say, “If that’s the impact that I’m trying to make, then what communication skill would increase the probability that I’m making that impact?”

And so, when you start thinking about it that way, so then you have a choice around what you’re doing rather than just being on default. You say, “All right, if I’m trying to create a connection with the other person, or with this group of people, or I want to come off as engaging, then it would behoove me to listen more.” Why? Because when somebody feels heard and understood, for whatever reason, it creates connection. When we feel understood by the other, it deepens the connection.

And I’m not talking about like we have to get into a deep intimate relationship with everybody. It’s just a feeling of like, “Yeah, you get me.” But when you have somebody, you’ve probably experienced it, when you’re faced with somebody, and you’re like, “Oh, my God, they don’t get me at all,” there is no relatability, there’s no connection.

So, listening is the key skill, I’m sure there are others, but the core skill. And it’s not…there are different levels of listening. You don’t have to go to the deepest level every single time. Again, it depends on what you’re trying to do. But I will say, if your goal is to influence or inspire somebody, the more you’re trying to inspire others, the deeper the level of listening you have to go into, to really understand what is going on with them.

On the flipside, which is the skill of what we call structured efficacy, the skill of being able to speak clear and concisely, what I tell folks is always start with the headline first, and then drill down to the data. Most people who cannot speak confidently will tend to share all of the data and then they give you the conclusion or the answer 20 minutes later. And I try to get them to flip that, “Give me the answer, give me the headline, and then give me the three supporting facts or datapoints or rationale that support your thesis, let’s say, or your headline.”

Because it’s kind of silly to say, “I have three points,” but then you go on to number 20. So, that in and of itself helps one be concise. So, those are some tips around those two. And to be honest, the most critical one is the communication skill or framing, because framing is all about how you set context, and context helps determine whether you can get other individuals to interpret the message that you are giving in a way that’s similar to how you want them to interpret it.

Left without context, people are going to interpret the message based on their own beliefs, assumptions, biases, and thoughts.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, if it’s the most critical, we must talk more about this framing. So, how does one frame well? And can you give us some examples?

Muriel Wilkins
Sure. So, one that people face many, many times is you walk into a meeting and there’s an agenda but there’s not a clear sense of what outcomes you’re looking to drive through in that meeting. So, you have good conversations, you leave the meeting, and it was like, “Hmm, what did we actually accomplish?” And so, a great example of framing is what we call outcomes-driven framing, being able to start your message or your conversation with, “Here are the outcomes that I want to drive to. I’m going into a meeting, all right. So, what we’re trying to drive to by the end of this meeting is making a decision on X.”

Now why is that helpful? Because everybody in that meeting at that point, or increases the chances that everybody in the meeting at that point will interpret or take in the discussion with a sense that there’s a decision that needs to be made rather than they’re taking it in as an FYI, they’re taking it in as a point of contention, they’re taking it in as whatever, the list goes on.

So, framing from an outcomes standpoint really helps. What’s another example of framing? Another example of framing is what we call strategic framing. This is when you give strategic context, or bigger-picture context, or the 30,000-foot altitude context. Where is this particularly helpful? It’s helpful when you are communicating up, communicating to people who are more senior than you. So, you frame your message in a way that’s relevant to them and what their strategic agenda is rather than how it’s relevant to you at the 10,000-foot altitude.

Pete Mockaitis
And can you give us an example of that in practice in terms of, “Okay, there’s a thing I want to make happen, and I got to give some strategic framing so higher up folk engage and want to back it”?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah, let’s say that you work in the HR function and you’re proposing an initiative around leadership development. So, framing it from your context might sound something like, “Leadership development is really helpful in terms of cultivating people and creating engagement in the workforce,” and then give whatever the initiative is.

Framing it from a strategic level is saying, “I know one of our key strategic pillars this year is talent excellence and retention of our employees. We’ve talked about how, by the end of next year, we want to achieve a workforce of X numbers,” whatever it is. It’s tied to the strategic pillars of the organization or the main business priorities of the organization, and so you start there. And then say, “So, therefore, this leadership development program or initiative is in support of that.” So, you tie it directly to whatever the organizational objectives are.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s super. And I’m thinking that some organizations have maybe – if I may be so bold – too many organizational objectives that the higher up you’re communicating with may well have forgotten that that was one of the strategic initiatives, they’re like, “Oh, that is one of them, isn’t it? And you got something for me to make that happen. Oh, and I don’t know of anything else that’s making that happen. So, yeah, let’s go ahead and do what you’re saying, Muriel.”

Muriel Wilkins
That brings such a funny story, Pete, because I ran into that once, and I framed it strategically around what the top brass of the organization had said was important for them, and they’re kind of like, “Huh? No.” And I said, “Well, look at the homepage of your website. Like, it says it right there.” So, they all pulled it up on their phone, and they’re like, “Oh, wow. Like, yeah, we actually said this was one of our strategic priorities.” So, to your point, sometimes they forget what the priorities are.

Pete Mockaitis
And then that just makes you wonder how much of the priority is it truly, and how much of it was sort of a word salad committee production versus a, “Wow, we’ve really thoughtfully clarified and drilled down into that which is the huge most impactful leverage.” Well, that’s a whole another conversation, strategic critical thinking priority matters.

Let’s hear about the physical view of things – the nonverbals, the body language, the appearance. So, we want to have alignment so it’s not sort of contradictory throughout. And I guess everyone have their own tics that they have, and maybe I’ve heard videos is a great way to assess them. I’m curious, are there any particular things you’ve seen again and again and again in terms of, “Hey, start doing this. Stop doing that,” that makes all the difference and it’s so easy to fix?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah. Well, first of all, I think, again, it depends what it is the impact that you’re trying to make. One of the things I tell my clients is, “Look, if the feedback you’re getting is that you show up as abrasive, and when you asked, ‘Well, why do I show up as abrasive?’ people are like, ‘Well, you tend to yell a lot and you always have a scowl on your face.’’ If I say that to a client, the client says, “Well, I want to show up as abrasive,” well, then we’re done, we’re good, because their nonverbals are giving them the outcomes they want.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, mission accomplished.

Muriel Wilkins
Right, mission accomplished.

Pete Mockaitis
Apparently.

Muriel Wilkins
But usually that’s not what people want. Again, they want to show up as credible or engaging and relatable. And so, from a nonverbal standpoint, the place to first start is, “What is under my control?” which I am. I’m 5’3”. I cannot change that. I might add a little bit of height by wearing heels but out of my control that I’m 5’3”. So, if I want to give the impression that I’m confident and height is not on my side, because for whatever reason, height might make me seem a little more dominant or whatnot, so what else is at my disposal?

Well, how I sit at the table, when I physically sit at the table. Do I shrink to the back of my seat? Do I slouch back, therefore, retreating me even more? Or, do I actually lean forward on the table, pull up my chair to the table? I’ve been known to, if I walk into a meeting and the is too low and makes me seem even lower than my 5’3” size, then I raise it to maximum height. So, these are things that are under your control and, quite frankly, it’s not just about the impression you make on the other. It’s also how it makes me feel. I don’t want to feel small at that table.

The other part is your voice. And so, your voice says a lot about you. Number one, you want to be heard in that meeting. Well, we better be able to hear you from a projection standpoint. I have twins, by the way. They’re 14 years old and so I’m constantly in this, “I can’t hear you. You’re mumbling.” Mumbling will never get your message across. And so, even from that basic level with your voice, “Do you have some poise around your voice?” Well, what does that sound like? It usually sounds with people who are comfortable, taking pauses as they speak. They speak much more in a deliberate way rather than just speeding through it and never slowing down. That’s in your control.

So, with all of these things, whether it’s your eye contact, your gestures, your voice, your posture, it’s not about, again, a right or wrong, which I think is the way that it’s been positioned a lot of times. It’s more around, “Is the way you’re carrying these things, are they going to have the impact that you want to have in this environment, in this context?”

Because take something like eye contact. In the Western culture, eye contact exudes confidence for whatever reason, but in other cultures, it does not. So, it also has to be culturally and contextually relevant. So, executive presence in and of itself is very situational. It’s very dynamic. It’s not this, “Do it this way and that’s it.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, so let’s say adopting the context specifically of we’re in a professional United States business environment, looking to be credible and relatable and persuasive in what we have to say so that it’s taken seriously and action is taken and things move forward, I’m curious, are there any particular appearance things you might quickly suggest that we adjust?

Muriel Wilkins
Yeah. So, here’s my rule of thumb when it comes to appearance, let it not be distracting and detracting from every other thing that you’re doing. That’s it. I have many people who ask me things like, “Should I cut my hair? Should I cut my beard? Should I not wear braids? Should I straighten my hair and not have my hair curly? Should I dress a different way? Should I wear suits? Should I wear pants? Should I…?” and the list goes on and on and on.

And I say, “Okay, in the environment that you’re in, would your appearance distract in any way?” So, I share the story around with me, I have clients all along the spectrum. I have some organizations that I work with who are extremely conservative, very traditional. And then I have clients where I have some nonprofits that I work with that are, in the inner city, small. If I were to go to my small nonprofits dressed the same way that I go to my traditional conservative clients, it’s not that the way I’m dressing is bad. It just would make me stand out in a way that then maybe makes me feel confident but doesn’t necessarily create or engender any form of connection with the clients that I’m serving.

So, it truly is about to what extent is the physical energy that you exude distracting or detracting from what you’re trying to do versus supporting you? So, that’s the same we do with beliefs.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. And I’m curious, and this might be maybe more of an advanced move, are there times in which we do want to look a little different and distinctive from the audience in the room for a particular objective? What are your thoughts there?

Muriel Wilkins
Yes. So, let me back up a little bit from that question, because the goal is not, “Hey, I need to fit in.” You still want to have, like I talked, I’m not the most traditional conservative person, but I got to have these clients, so what I’m not going to do is wear my most outlandish outfit, but I will wear a suit but I might have some jewelry that’s still a signature me, so I don’t feel like I’m completely “selling out.”

Pete Mockaitis
Sure.

Muriel Wilkins
But are there times when you may want to stand out a little bit? Yeah, but know why you’re doing it. Know why you’re doing it. So, I’ll give you an example, not just about appearance actually, but more going back to kind of nonverbals. So, if you’re giving a presentation, you may have a choice between standing behind the podium or not using the podium at all.

Well, when somebody asks me, “Should I use the podium? Should I not?” I say, “Well, what impact do you want to make? What impressions do you want to make? If you want to come off as very professorial and expert-like, by all means, stand behind the podium. If you want to show up as like the expert, stand behind the podium. If you want to lean into engaging with the audience, trying to be relatable to the audience, don’t stand behind the podium.”

So, it always comes back to, “What do you want?” And that’s where a lot of people don’t have clarity is even around what is it that they want, how they want to come off.

Pete Mockaitis
Perfect. Thank you. Well, Muriel, tell me, anything else you want to make sure we’d mention before we hit the favorite things?

Muriel Wilkins
Well, this stuff, as I said before, takes a lot of practice, and you never really fully stop because your context changes, you change, your assumptions change, your skills, hopefully, improve over time, how you physically show up changes, so you constantly have to think about, “In this moment, at this time, what is the impact I want to make? And then how do I get there?”

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

Muriel Wilkins
The one that’s really been resonating with me over the past couple of months, the past year, quite frankly, has been, and I know it comes from Buddha’s teachings but I can’t quote who said it, is, “Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.”

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. And how about a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Muriel Wilkins
My favorite one is around growth mindset and the reframing, because I think growth mindset has a lot of reframing, and Angela Duckworth’s work around that, reframing around how we approach learning. And how we approach, quite frankly, how we define success, that it’s more about the effort rather than the outcome.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. And a favorite book?

Muriel Wilkins
Favorite book. My favorite book of the moment is The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer.

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

Muriel Wilkins
My Outlook calendar.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, sure. And a favorite habit?

Muriel Wilkins
Favorite habit. I wish it was a more infused habit, but my favorite habit is meditating.

Pete Mockaitis
And is there a particular nugget you share that you’re known for and people quote back to you often?

Muriel Wilkins
I say there’s a favorite question that I ask my clients over and over again.

Pete Mockaitis
Let’s hear it.

Muriel Wilkins
And it is, “What do you want?”

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

Muriel Wilkins
So, they can go check out my podcast at Harvard Business Review called “Coaching Real Leaders,” or go to CoachingRealLeaders.com. They can find more information about me and all of the ways that I work with folks at MurielWilkins.com or ParavisPartners.com.

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

Muriel Wilkins
Figure out what you want and the impression you want to make and the outcomes that you want to drive to, and then work backwards from there.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Muriel, thank you. This has been fun. I wish you lots of success and luck in the adventures to come.

Muriel Wilkins
Thank you. This was great.

Nov 29

723: The Crucial Perspectives of Effective Leaders with Daniel Harkavy

By Ida del Mundo | Podcasts | No Comments

Daniel Harkavy walks through his proven framework for elevating your leadership.

You’ll Learn:

The seven perspectives of effective leaders
The critical first step to elevating your leadership
Three questions to help you build your compelling vision

About Daniel

Over the past twenty-five years, Daniel Harkavy has coached thousands of business leaders to peak levels of performance, efficacy, and fulfillment. In 1996, he harnessed his passion for coaching teams and leaders to found Building Champions where he serves as CEO and Executive Coach. Today the company has over 30 employees, with a team of 20 executive and leadership coaches who provide guidance to thousands of clients and organizations. His previous best-selling books include Living Forward, a simple framework for prioritizing your self-leadership, and Becoming a Coaching Leader, a step-by-step guide to moving from manager to coaching leader.

Daniel’s book: The 7 Perspectives of Effective Leaders: A Proven Framework for Improving Decisions and Increasing Your Influence
Daniel’s book: Living Forward: A Proven Plan to Stop Drifting and Get the Life You Want with Michael Hyatt
Daniel’s organization: SetPath.org
Daniel’s website: BuildingChampions.com

Resources Mentioned

Book: 1776 by David McCullough
Book: Six Thinking Hats by Edward de Bono
Book: The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain by Annie Murphy Paul
Book: Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know by Adam Grant
Book: Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
Book: The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk

Thank you, sponsors!

Blinkist. Read or listen to summarized wisdom from thousands of nonfiction books! Free trial available at blinkist.com/awesome
University of California Irvine. Chart your course to career success at ce.uci.edu/learnnow

Daniel Harkavy Interview Transcript

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

Daniel Harkavy
Thank you very much for having me. Looking forward to our conversation, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Me, too. Me, too. And I want to kick us off by getting right for the good stuff, Daniel. Don’t want to risk it. Can you tell us one of the most surprising and fascinating discoveries you’ve made about leadership, having spent over 25 years coaching business leaders?

Daniel Harkavy
That’s a good question. All right.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, you got front-row seat coaching these folks.

Daniel Harkavy
Crazy seat. Yeah, crazy seat.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, we’re going to hear some of these insights from your book, The 7 Perspectives of Effective Leaders. But, yeah, I imagine some of the couple aha moments in which you’ve discovered some patterns, like, “Wow, these high performers across the board, they all got this sort of thing going on.”

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, and I would, you know, Pete, it’s a great question. I want to start off by saying that they’re really comfortable in their own skin, and they’re humans. I remember in my younger years, Pete, I was so intimidated as a result of the privilege I had. I earn some sort of privilege. It was this unmerited favor, where if you looked at my CV or my resume, if you looked at accomplishments in previous years, I would’ve questioned whether or not I would’ve allowed me into the room to sit as an executive coach to this leader.

And I find myself in that situation still. I’m 57. I find myself in that situation constantly. But I remember coming to a place, and it was mid-40s, where I just said, “You know what, I have a unique gift, and the leaders that I get to work with, they’re really comfortable with who they are and who they’re not, and they don’t need to fake it, they don’t need to act like the smartest person in the room,” which is going to lead me to another big aha, and I want to just add value to your listeners.

The best leaders, I said this on a podcast just a while ago, the best leaders don’t feel the need to have all the right answers. The best leaders feel the need to ask all of the right questions. You can tell a man is wise not by the answers that he gives but by the questions he asks. They’re intentionally curious. There’s just this insatiable appetite to learn and to understand so that they can make better decisions. And, in so doing, they gain influence. And that’s the premise of my last book, so it was a big one for me.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s good. And I appreciate that they know who they are and they know who they’re not. And I’m finding more and more of that lately, just in terms of, “You know what, real estate investing, probably not for me.”

Daniel Harkavy
Good to figure that out.

Pete Mockaitis
It seems really cool, and my hat’s off to people, but it’s sort of like there’s only a very tiny sliver of what happens in real estate investing that I’m really good at and love, and there’s a whole lot of stuff that I’m not so great at. So, there’s that. But teaching, oh, yeah, game on. Let’s do more of that.

Daniel Harkavy
Oh, that’s great. What you do is, when you figure out which few lanes you’ve just got a lot of passion for, and you seem to win, and they create momentum for you in other areas of your life, they’re life-giving, stay in those lanes. And then if there are some adjacencies or different lanes that are just interesting to you, don’t hold back from trying. You have to try that real estate investing. If there’s something in you that says, “You know, I’m curious. I’m going to try it,” try it and don’t let failure do anything other than teach you.

If you come to a place where it’s like, “All right, I learned. I learned I don’t like that. I learned that that energy is not worth the result so I’m going to place the energy elsewhere,” – great. Keep taking risks but really know where you can make that difference. For you teaching, you get to invest your time into making a difference and elevating thinking and belief and performance of all those that sit and who have curiosity and the desire to learn. It’s great.

Pete Mockaitis
Beautiful. Thank you. All right. So, you mentioned in your book The 7 Perspectives of Effective Leaders: A Proven Framework for Improving Decisions and Increasing Your Influence you kind of mentioned the big idea. Could you expand upon it? What’s your core message or thesis here?

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, a leader’s effectiveness is determined by just, only, just two things – your decision-making and your influence. And I have been having conversations with leaders of organizations here in the US, as well as leaders around the globe, and said, “Just challenge me. Like, tell me I’m wrong.” And I’ve had one in particular said, “No, Daniel, you have to have integrity. It’s not just decision-making and influence.”

And I said, “No, no, no, having integrity is what’s required in order for you to be a good leader. But if you want to then move from being a good leader to an effective leader, an effective leader makes fantastic decisions and they have maximum influence because leadership is all about mobilizing a group of people, leading them from a place today to a better place tomorrow. So, you have to make great decisions in order to create strategies and to align yourself with the right people, and then to empower those people, equip those people, and allow those people to do what they need to be doing, which is where influence comes into play.”

So, I take leadership, which is a huge topic, and I just say, “Hey, here’s kind of the connect-the-dots and let’s make it easy – decision-making and influence.” So, how do you elevate your decision-making and your influence? That’s where the seven perspectives come in.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yes, I was, indeed, just about to ask that. And so, you made a distinction there. I guess integrity, a good leader, as in one who is ethical and moral, versus an effective leader, one who gets the job done to bring in folks to improved destination. Is that kind of the contrast you’re making there?

Daniel Harkavy
Well, you can’t be an effective leader without being a good leader. So, it’s almost like the next rung on the ladder, so, yeah, you could be a good leader. You could be a good leader, meaning you’re a good person, and you do good, and maybe people like you and you’re respected. But to be truly effective, you may be investing a lot of energy and time in areas of the business that are not…they’re not leading to the results that you want. So, how do you continue to finetune your thinking, belief, and behavior so that you get the best results and you’re effective?

So, in 2014, I was so curious about leadership efficacy that I started doing a lot of intentional observation because, at that time, I was approaching two decades doing what I was doing, and that was following a decade in business prior to in leadership, and I just wanted to try to make it simple. So, the seven perspectives used to be five, and I started using them in organizations. And I started to bring executive teams around together for two-day retreats to focus on five, which then grew to seven, and they became communication and execution models in businesses.

So, the seven perspectives are current reality, long-term vision, strategic bets, the perspective of the team, the perspective of the customer, the perspective of your role, and the perspective of the outsider. If you have intentional curiosity and then you exercise discipline and place time and energy into those seven, really, six of the seven, the sixth perspective, your role, elevates as does your efficacy. So, that’s it at a very high level, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, when it comes to the perspectives, I guess the word perspective means just that, “I’m sort of stepping into the shoes, or trying on the glasses of a different party or view of things.” And that makes sense that when you think about things from each of those seven different perspectives, you see different things, like, “Hey, my current reality is this, and maybe there are some things I don’t like so much. And then my long-term vision is that, which is different from my current reality. And what my customer thinks is probably, ‘I don’t care at all about all those operational things you’ve got going on behind the scenes. Just give me my burrito on time, or whatever, your business is.’”

So, I like that just in terms of thinking about, “Hey, let’s hop into a different perspective and see what bubbles up.” So, once I know the perspectives, what do I do with them to get better at decision-making and influencing?

Daniel Harkavy
Well, knowing the perspectives does you jack. Doing the seven perspectives is where you see the meter move.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, how do I do a perspective?

Daniel Harkavy
You allocate time.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay.

Daniel Harkavy
You allocate time. There are probably some principles, Pete, that have to be unpacked. One principle is that “Better humans make for better leaders.” So, a leader’s job is to surround himself with really good humans who are both wicked smart and have high potential. When you, as a leader, do that, well, then you actually know that the people around you are the best ones to make the majority of the decisions.

So, what you’re doing is, a great leader is really curious. In current reality, perspective one, you’re spending time understanding the mechanics of the business. There’s this old saying that’s probably before your time, but you may have heard it. You’ve heard of the ivory tower leader?

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah.

Daniel Harkavy
Where’s that come from? What’s an ivory tower leader, Pete?

Pete Mockaitis
Well, the idea is it’s someone who is aloft, removed from the day-to-day kind of operational realities of how things really are, and instead up in a fancy ivory tower, just sort of thinking or pontificating and sharing theoretically how things ought to be. That’s kind of the picture that comes to mind.

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, and you’re spot on, my man. So, think about working in an organization where you have an ivory tower leader. Is that leader making decisions that are leading to great results? And do those that are several rungs below in the organization, is that leader winning influence?

Pete Mockaitis
No. You know, as I chuckled, I was thinking, it’s like, “No, but I hope they’re writing good pieces for the Harvard Business Review that are giving us credibility and leads.”

Daniel Harkavy
Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis
Like, that’s about all I could hope for from the ivory tower leader. Just a thought leadership in PR.

Daniel Harkavy
And you know what, you get great case studies. You do. So, that’s why I say current reality is your starting point because you get it. If you don’t have both feet firmly planted in current reality, if you don’t understand the operational realities, the levers to pull, the inputs to look at, if you don’t understand the mechanics of the business, well, then you impede your ability to make great decisions because you don’t understand what it’s like to do the business today. And then, as a result of that, you lose influence.

So, perspective one is foundation; both feet firmly planted. If you don’t have that, okay, starting point on your way is GPS, or your Google Maps is screwed up. So, good luck getting to a better tomorrow. You’re lost already.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, we got to get a really clear picture on what is current reality. And I think I recall from – is it the book 1776 – that was like a theme that I came to over and over again, “George Washington’s greatest trait was that he saw reality as it was as opposed to how he would like it to be.” Really hammered that thesis home.

And so, how do we get there? We talk to people. Any sort of key questions or activities that help us get a really clear true picture of the actual current reality?

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, we understand the historical, we know which reports to look at, we know which dashboard, we know the content of the dashboard, we understand what the plans are for the year ahead, that’s all part of current reality. And then we invest time in some of the other perspectives which help to inform current reality. So, let’s camp on that current reality. And I will tell you, the best leaders spend time where they’re looking at the health of the business. They do a report review. They do a dashboard review.

Depending on the health of the business, that can be hour-by-hour if in crisis, and I’ve been there before. Or, if the business is running really, really well, it’s weekly or monthly, depending upon where you are in the business. But you understand you never get away from the workings of the business. The best CEOs, Pete, I don’t care if they’re like 70,000 employees, they’re still spending time on the frontlines, they’re in the factory, they’re in the restaurant, they’re in the hospital room floor, they’re in where the product or service is being experienced.

And it’s so important, Pete, that perspective is actually the perspective when you’re on the floor, and you’re in the restaurant, when you’re in the factory. There are a few things you’re looking for and you’re gaining perspective from the team and from the customer. And I used to have all of that combined into one perspective, and I was like, “No, it’s so important that you need to parse it out.” So, it went from five perspectives to seven. And one of the reasons it went from five to seven was because I added the perspective of the customer. All of that informs current reality.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, so then in terms of the seven perspectives, so knowing them and saying that you want to get a clear view of each of them is swell. I love it in terms of hanging out where the product or service is experienced is great for getting a view of what’s the true current reality, spending some time, getting up in there and not hanging out far away in an ivory tower, are great.

I’m curious if there are any particular all-time fave approaches that tend to yield boatloads of insight and surprise for folks, like, “I think walking around and talking to people is wise and should be done, and is often not.” So, it’s valuable just to remind people to go ahead and do that. What are some things that really open eyes? Is it a survey or is it a demo? Is it being an undercover boss, like the reality TV show? What are some of the, I guess, research approaches that really illuminate these perspectives super well?

Daniel Harkavy
So, there’s not a one instrument or process response for all of the different perspectives. They all require different energy, different discipline, different time. So, you say survey or an undercover boss. If you want the perspective of the team, the best leaders place such a high value in meeting with the team. You don’t need to overcomplicate it.

One of the guys in the book is Frank Blake. And Frank Blake is the non-executive chairman of Delta Airlines. He was the CEO of Home Depot for eight years and he’s part of our roundtable. We do a CEO roundtable in probably, let’s just call it July of last year. Yeah, probably either July or September. Frank serves as non-exec chair for Delta, plus he serves for several other, on other boards.

And what he was realizing, as he was talking to executive teams, was the leaders, when the pandemic first started, were doing a great job with a megaphone, “This is what’s happening. This is where we’re headed. This is the vision that we’re reporting out.” But with everyone going home, what was being missed was the one-on-one conversations that would take place over a lunch break, or, “Hey, let’s go for a walk,” or, “We have scheduled one-on-ones in the office.” That was being missed.

So, Frank was with this other group of CEOs, or a group of our clients and peers, and he said, “You guys, I’m having people over to my house, executive team members for Delta and other organizations that I serve on. I’m having them over on my porch for tea. If you want the perspective of the team, you have people over, sit outside in today’s times, and you have tea. This stuff may seem simple but I’m talking to you about Fortune One companies, and where are the pain points.”

Relationship is what suffered. And looking somebody in the eyes, and going, “Hey, how are you doing? What’s going on? What do you need to win? What are you seeing that I need to see?” There’s no instrument that will help you to see what’s not being said or to hear what’s not being said in the conversation. So, this one-on-one piece is the most effective.

Now, you use surveys to help guide your questions. Surveys are fantastic, but you don’t stop. That’s for the perspective of the team. And then you look at the perspective of the customer. I think of Martin Daum, who’s the chairman of Daimler, and Martin, again in the book, a client for seven, eight years, Martin and his organization, or Tim Tassopoulos and his organization over at Chick-fil-A, two radically different businesses.

Mercedes Benz, Daimler, trucks and buses, the largest organization in that space in the world, market share is more than 40%, Chick-fil-A, they outperform their restaurant-type peers in ridiculous ways, their leaders spend time in the restaurants or in the trucks with the drivers, talking to the customer, or in the restaurant with the people eating the food, talking to the customer.

So, you can look at surveys and you can glean insights but the best leaders are sitting down with the customers, saying, “What’s it like to do business with us? What do you like? What don’t you like? What would you like us to add? What would you like us to take away? What works well? What doesn’t? What would cause you to leave us and go to a competitor?” They just ask really great questions, but they invest the time.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. That’s good. Well, I’m curious then, as I think about the seven perspectives, strategic bets seem to stand out in terms of it’s like current reality, the customer, the role, the outsider, the team, I hear like, “Oh, yeah, those are perspectives.” How do I take the perspective of the strategic bet?

Daniel Harkavy
All right. So, the perspective of the strategic bet is perspective three, and it comes after perspective two, which is vision. See, perspective one, current reality, allows you to manage the business but that doesn’t guarantee leadership efficacy. You’re managing well if you understand current reality. Vision has to be clear and compelling. You and your team need to see a better tomorrow if you’re going to engage the heads and the hearts of your people, so you have to see a better tomorrow.

And if you have that perspective two, long-term vision, then you create a gap from where we are today in 2021 to where we’d like to be in 2025 or 2030. That gap is where you build strategy. Seventy-five percent of organizations fail in execution of strategy because they don’t have the right starting point, current reality, they lack the resources, whether that be people, time, money, expertise, or they lack that strong anchor of long-term vision so that when the going gets tough, they don’t stick with it.

If you’ve got current reality and you have long-term vision, then there’s a higher probability of you picking the right strategic bets that will move you from current reality to that long-term vision. So, strategic bets are strategies that are grounded in current reality and anchored in long-term vision. Good, you’ve got your two waypoints on your GPS. Then those strategic bets, you can’t have too many of them or the risk of failure is great, the strategic bets are the result of the team giving input, understanding what the customer needs, those other perspectives, and you stack the odds in your favor so the bets pay off.

You make sure you’ve got the resources. You make sure you’ve got the leader. You make sure you’ve got the team. You make sure you have the right people and the rhythms. You set the gates so you know whether you’re on track to hit the destination or off track, then you pivot and you adjust. They’re not guarantees; they’re dynamic. Then you know when to kill them. Some bets just need to, you know, know when to hold them, know when to fold them. Sometimes you just let them go. But if you win on two or three over a long period of time, they can change the game for your business, but they’re not guarantees, so.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, then I’m curious, could you maybe give us a story in which we tie it all together in terms of there’s a leader who apparently didn’t have the fullest picture on one or more of the perspectives, and he or she did some things to get that perspective, and what unfolded?

Daniel Harkavy
So, I can think of a gentleman by the name of Hartmut Schick.

Hartmut Schick works for Daimler Trucks Asia, he’s the CEO. And one of my fellow CEO mentors on my Building Champions team, Tom Brewer and I did a two-day retreat with them, and we’ve been doing executive team work with the organization in their different op-coms, their different leadership teams around the world for seven years. But he was newer to doing it with his team. He served at the board level, which I’d work with for a while, but we did it with his team in Tokyo.

What we did was we structured two days to look at the overall business from six perspectives. We wanted to, well, excuse me, from the first five perspectives – current reality all the way through the customer. Then we had a session around how that impacts your role. Tom and I were the outsiders that spoke into questions and challenged. At the end of two days, they said it was the most effective meeting they’ve had. And then what he did was he communicated throughout the entire organization, thousands of people, as to what the leadership team, their op-com, had been through and how they saw the business.

So, he architected all of his communication from that point forward, all of their meetings from that point forward, around the different perspectives. It takes the complicated and it makes it simple. Because if you talk about a matrix organization that’s global, that gets parts from Detroit, that has manufacturing in South Africa, that is relying on chips coming from India, that has the frames built in Germany, that is delivering a product that is going to be driven in the streets of Sephora, with a customer base that can be everywhere, it’s so complicated.

What you do is you take that complicated and you put it into thinking buckets or perspectives, and it helps everybody to think better, which is a leader’s greatest responsibility. So, Hartmut is just one where I was so pleased because it was pretty neat to see years ago them adopt the model, the framework, then send the notes out to the entire organization around it, and now leading the organization as they do all of their exec retreats where they focus on each of the primary five, with the help of the seventh, then it impacts their role so they know how to function quarter by quarter.

Pete Mockaitis
And so, I’m intrigued, so most effective meeting ever, that’s awesome. Good job. And having the seven perspectives enables some more simplicity and clarity as opposed to, “Ahh, I’m just kind of confused and overwhelmed by all this stuff.” Could you maybe dig in a little bit in terms of, and we can protect their confidentiality and use other examples if you want to, but I would love it if you could give us a demonstration before our eyes, to see, “Oh, yeah, sure enough. I was kind of stuck and fuzzy in a realm of complexity before I kind of segmented into some perspectives, and now I see how, yeah, that’s a lot easier”?

Daniel Harkavy
Every organization, when you look at how their executive team, and then the teams that move through the organization as you move down, if you look at their meeting notes and agendas, the agendas for their meetings, and then you look at the output of their meetings, you’ll see for most a lot of frustration. And the reason for the frustration is because there’s too much on the agenda for the time, or the agenda items aren’t the right agenda items, or there’s not the right information or clarity around, “What we’re supposed to be doing in those meetings.”

So, what will happen often is people, they don’t think in parallel. There’s a book that I would recommend to you, Pete, if you haven’t read it, and to your listeners if they’re interested in how to help people think better. And it is the Six Thinking Hats by Edward de Bono.

Pete Mockaitis
Ah, yes.

Daniel Harkavy
Parallel thinking. Awesome, right? You say, “Ah, yes,” because you know him or know of his work, right? Awesome. Well, his whole deal is, get people to think in parallel. So, how the seven perspectives help is you label what we’re going to talk about, “For the first 45 minutes, what we’re going to do is we’re going to do an update on the current reality of the business. What are the key metrics that we need to be looking at so that everybody in the organization gets up to speed? The accountants don’t see the same things that the salespeople see, the marketers don’t see the same things that supply chain sees, the CTOs don’t see the same things that the customer-experience people see.”

So, when you’re going to bring people together, you need to elevate awareness so they’re all seeing it and thinking it because they’re responsible for the global success, the organizational success, not just their department. You with me?

Pete Mockaitis
Mm-hmm.

Daniel Harkavy
Current reality gets us on that level of playing field so everyone understands. Even though I’m the CFO, I need to understand what’s happening on the customer front. Even though I’m marketing, I need to understand what’s happening on the technology front. Even though I’m technology, I need to understand what’s happening on the customer experience front.

So, we spend time getting everybody to current reality, starting point on the GPS, “Everybody have all the white hat, all the information you need to have? Good. That will inform the next conversation.” We talk vision, “All right. This is where we’re still headed. Are we messaging it correctly? Does everybody on the team understand how their job is contributing to the bigger picture?”

Oftentimes, people get stuck in their four-by-four cubicle or, in today’s times, they get stuck in their home office and Zoom and they’ve forgotten that the function they’re doing day in and day out, Monday through Friday, is equating to a greater impact. They just see it as role-specific.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool. So, Daniel, that’s how we get the picture of current reality. So, then tell us, how do we go about getting a great understanding of the perspective on long-term vision?

Daniel Harkavy
And as I’ve mentioned, you think about the first three perspectives as components to a GPS. So, if you’ve got your starting point, that’s current reality, without that destination of having a clear compelling vision, then it’s really difficult for leaders to lead themselves and their teams and their organizations well.

And most great leaders have the gift of making the invisible visible. They can see who they want the organization to become and how they want the organization to basically serve or function in the future. They don’t see it with absolute 20/20 clarity, but they see enough to where it’s like, “All right, that’s exciting, so it’s compelling. I’ll take risks. We, as an organization, will take risks.” It’s compelling and then it’s clear. It’s got to be clear so that you can build that third component, those strategic bets, to move you from where you are to where you want to go.

So, Pete, we’ve got a model for how we help organizations and leaders build vision, and if you want me to unpack that, I’m more than happy to.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yeah, what are the components there?

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah. So, years ago, we said that all teammates, they’re spending the majority of their waking hours at this thing called work, and they’ve got questions, either consciously or subconsciously. And the questions are around these three Bs. We call it 3B vision. What do we belong to? Who we’re going to become? And what are we going to build?

And if your vision can answer those questions, belonging in today’s time is being really valuable. And then, “Who are we going to become?” like, if I hitched to your wagon, tell me how I grow, we grow, because most people don’t go to work and just want to be average. They want to win and they want to create something special, so, “Who are we going to become?” And then, very specifically, “What are we going to build? If this thing all works right, and if we sacrifice for another 10 years, 5 years, 20 years, whatever it may be, what is it that we will have built that will be significant and will make a meaningful difference in the community or the world?”

And if you can answer those three questions from a vision perspective, between you, the leader, and your leadership team, and you really start to build a compelling picture, like I said, you paint something that you can begin repeating over and over again, well, then you start to engage not only the heads but the hearts of your people.

When people actually come together in really healthy ways, and they will be more selfless to pursue a greater purpose, a greater mission, because they want to see that happen, instead of just coming to work today, and going, “Yup, just doing my job. Got to count 17 widgets. Counted 17 widgets. Built 17 widgets. Oh, well, ho-hum. Clock out.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, so then when we think about a long-term vision, could you share with us a really excellent articulation of that in terms of the belonging, the becoming, and the building versus a not-so excellent articulation of that?

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah. So, here’s the thing, if I were to show you the Building Champions vision, it’s about eight pages long because the belong piece is answered by your convictions and the behaviors that go along with those convictions. Those behaviors are what begin to establish guardrails and build culture in an organization.

And then the second piece of belong is purpose. So, what’s your organization’s purpose? So, in the last several weeks, I’ve been with two organizations where one of them, being a global organization, we just got back from Germany a couple weeks ago, and they were putting together convictions, the things they’ll fight for, and then the correlating behaviors. And that exercise takes a day, but when you’re done with it, you come away with like five or six convictions. And an organization like them, some 20 plus behaviors that they want to hold one another accountable to so that they know how leaders and teammates should behave in order for that culture to be healthy and dynamic.

So, for me to share a healthy, or for me to share a good example of that, that’s me reading me through five or six convictions and a purpose, and then 20 some behaviors. And then you move to “Who are we going to become?” and that’s paragraph by paragraph, “Who are we going to become in the community? Who are we going to become from a technological perspective? Who are we going to become as a team? Who are we going to become in the vertical? Really, what are we going to be known for?” And that can just be paragraph by paragraph.

The more clear you are in painting that picture, then it’s easier to begin executing on tactics and strategies to go there. And then, on the final, “What are we going to build?” that can be just some Herculean compelling and vision. If you studied Collins and Porras years back, they called that the big hairy audacious goal. For Nike, it was, “Crush Adidas.” It’s something that’s so big that everyone is going to work for it. It’s going to probably be a career’s worth of energy. So, that’s me telling you, “Do you want me to spend 15 minutes and read you through a vision?”

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I think that just understanding that that’s what it looks like, and if you could maybe share with us some links, we’ll include in the show notes, that’d be cool. But maybe, for now, could you give us an example or two of a conviction and some associated behaviors that flow from them?

Daniel Harkavy
Oh, you bet. You bet.

Daniel Harkavy
So, here’s some real good work that was done by one of our clients. They did some work with our team to go through these convictions to behaviors exercise. And this organization is in the financial services industry, and their convictions are integrity, creativity, family, and fun. So, let’s take creativity and we’ll use that one to riff on. They have creativity, “We embrace and drive positive change and innovation.”

This is in an industry where technology is really transforming and disrupting how people have done work and how the consumer interacts with the financial services firm. Now, the behaviors that they’ve identified are, “We empower our associates to find creative ways to fix problems quickly in order to meet the needs of our clients, both internal and external. We intentionally create space to brainstorm solutions without judgment, and believe that great ideas come from anywhere in the organization.”

The next is, “We never stop asking ourselves how we can improve.” And the final behavior for creativity is, “We regularly share ideas and successful processes between departments to spark creative ideas across the company.” So, Pete, you think about an organization where your highest-paid leaders come together and, usually when it’s strategy, they’ll spend anywhere from a half day to two days together, anywhere from once a month to every quarter, those are in your higher-performing organizations, and what they will do is they will pre-game.

So, just like an athlete who’s getting ready to go out and compete when it’s game time, they go through that mental exercise. We’ve got a competitive rower who’s one of our clients. She tells us how she would walk around the boat and the exercises, she would do the breathing, etc. We train corporate athletes to do the same.

So, when you’ve got a team that’s coming together for a half day, full day, two days, every month, or every quarter, we have them pre-game by reading these documents, these guiding tools that they’ve used, so that their heads and their hearts are ready to engage in productive conversations instead of coming in, reactive answering the email, and then moving to the crisis du jour. They stay at that higher level, and reviewing these helps them.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s clever in terms of because you know, as they do that, they’re like, “I’ve read this before,” and maybe if it’s quarterly or monthly, perhaps many, many times, and yet it’s like, “Ah, and here that elevates me to a different vantage point. This is what we’re up to, what we’re doing here,” as opposed to the immediate cross off a task for the day.

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, it’s fascinating if you do any research on kind of brain science or neuroscience with regards to how people transform and elevate behavior. What the brain needs to do is it needs to focus on what matters most. And if it attends to, or focuses on what matters most, then it’s better equipped to prevent the noise and the distraction, but you need a system for working memory. And we humans, the best system we have for working memory is to repeat looking at or listening to something.

So, the more we read this, the more it becomes us, we attend to, and then manifest these behaviors because we’re reminding ourselves, “This is what we did together. This is who we said we would be. This is what we said was most important, and how I said I would show up as a highest-level servant or leader in the organization. And I have to hold myself accountable to this, and then healthy teams hold one another accountable, not just to the results but to these behaviors.” That’s where you see real lift with teams.

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

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, I would just say with regards to vision, it’s not a one and done, Pete. Great leaders are reminding their teammates of a vision and how everybody’s job connects to the purpose or the vision, and they’re doing it over and over again. My organization, Building Champions, is now 25 years old, and every single Monday, with the exception of holidays, at 7:30 a.m., Pacific Time, the entire team comes together on the screen, and we were doing this long before COVID and all that.

We’ve been coming together on the screen because we’ve got teammates spread throughout the country, but every Monday, 7:30 a.m. Pacific, for half an hour, the team comes together, we talk about business at hand, and then we always do a remind on the vision, which is some aspect of it. You have to be the chief reminding officer, as my buddy Pat Lencioni says. So, it’s something you live, it’s something you repeat, it’s something you’re always doing.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely. Well, now, could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Daniel Harkavy
You know, I love one that has really impacted me, and it’s just as a result of the privilege of getting to walk side by side with so many humans in my business. And it’s an old Hebrew proverb, scripture, and it says, “So, teach us to number our days so that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” Pete, the reason I love that is because our heads are so easily deceived. We believe we can always get to what matters most tomorrow, “Oh, if I could just get through this one project, or through this busy season, then I can give my best to my best, then I’ll attend to my health, then I’ll start to focus more on that partner, spouse, friend, or whatever it may be.”

And that passage, “Teach me to number my days,” because every one of us have a finite number, “so that I may gain a heart of wisdom,” that conviction, so that I focus more on the here and now, and I’m more present, makes me a better human. And I’m now 57, but that thing really became meaningful to me when I was in my young 30s and I lost a couple friends who were young, and I realized, “Shoot, there’s no guarantee of 82 years on this planet.” So, it’s a guider for me, bud. Thanks for asking.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, certainly. And how about a favorite study or experiment or a piece of research?

Daniel Harkavy
Lately, if I were just to show you the books that are here that I’ve been diving into, new and old, it’s more of a theme. So, The Extended Mind by Annie Murphy Paul, or the new Think Again by Adam Grant, or the old, Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. And now I just jumped into this one The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma.

I’m fascinated by transformation and how our brains work. So, that’s been the area of extreme interest for me lately.

Pete Mockaitis
And how about a favorite tool?

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, this will sound so self-promoting and quite possibly arrogant. But I will tell you that I wrote a book with a co-author and longtime client and friend, Michael Hyatt. I wrote a book in 2016 called Living Forward. And it’s all about a life-planning format, a life-planning framework, that helps you to figure out who you want to be in all areas of your life. And it has a profound impact on leaders, and the majority of our executive client leaders are all in their 50s.

And so many, over the last 25 years, have said, “Okay, huge gamechanger. I wish somebody would’ve walked me through that in my 20s.” So, it’s such an effective tool that we’ve just launched a not-for-profit to help America’s young adults, it’s called Set Path. SetPath.org, where we’re giving life-planning and mentorship, gratis, to young adults to help them to fight the drift, and to bring more intentionality and focus to their lives. That tool or framework is one of the most powerful that I’ve watched people experience.

Pete Mockaitis
Cool. And how about a favorite habit?

Daniel Harkavy
Dating my wife. I got a lot of habits but married for 33 years. We’ve been in each other’s lives for 46 and I got all sorts of crazy addictions, as you can see behind me. But dating my wife is the profitable one.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a key nugget you share that you’re really known for, and people quote you often?

Daniel Harkavy
I think a lot of it has to do with a few beliefs that I have, “Better humans make for better leaders.” I think I’m known for really instilling that. I think I’m known for being one that listens and does everything I can to instill meaning into conversations so that you felt heard. Then I believe self-leadership always precedes team effectiveness. And team effectiveness always precedes organizational impact.

So, just with the theme of your podcast and what you’re hoping to help people with, I would say I have a deep belief around that “Better humans make for better leaders,” and how you lead yourself is always something you’re working on because it impacts how you lead your team, and how you lead your team ultimately impacts how you impact the overall organization. So, if you can figure out how to make progress in each of those three domains – self, team, and org – what you can be doing to advance and make a greater difference on all three of those, you’ll do well. And that is a core belief of mine.

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

Daniel Harkavy
BuildingChampions.com, SetPath.org, and Daniel Harkavy on all of the social channels. As of late, I’m not as active but I do have a team that’s always pumping out content that our collective group puts out there, everything in the way of podcasts, to blog posts, to thoughts. And you can find this wherever you’re doing your social stalking and engagement.

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

Daniel Harkavy
Yeah, I do.

Daniel Harkavy
For many of you in their young 30s, you’ve recently purchased a home, many of you have made a life commitment decision with a partner or spouse, some of you now are starting to have little ones crawling up your legs and all around you and they’re fun and they’re crazy, and you’re trying to build your careers.

The book, Living Forward, I’m going to continue to sell for as long as I can because it’s all around building a life plan. But you can get the life-planning tool for free at Building Champions, costs you nothing. And I would tell you, if you want to figure out how to be awesome at work, you figure out how you can be awesome in life because work is only one aspect of who you are.

And the better you’re doing and the more value you’re adding in all areas of your life, you’ll actually be better at work. Absolutely true. So, you want to accumulate net worth in all aspects of your life, not just your career and your finances. You want to attend to all the areas of your life that bring you happiness and joy. And if you do that intentionally over the long haul, well, then you’re just going to be a heck of a better teammate and a better leader.

Living Forward, you can check that out. There’s a Living Forward book, website, you can see it on the Building Champions website. It’s wherever you buy books, but you can get the tool for free.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Daniel, thank you. This has been a treat. I wish you tons of luck and success in your effective leading.

Daniel Harkavy
Pete, thanks for allowing me to join you and your tribe. I love your questions. I love your depth. It’s been a pleasure getting to know you and I wish you great success and happy holidays as well.

Nov 22

722: How to Hire and Get Hired Masterfully with Lou Adler

By Marco Bartolome | Podcasts | No Comments

Lou Adler says: "Don't make excuses. Get it done."

Seasoned recruiter Lou Adler shares insights from his decades of professional experience to help you hire and/or get hired.

You’ll Learn:

What’s wrong with most job descriptions
The real 30% increase you should be seeking
Why you shouldn’t apply for a job directly

About Lou

Lou is the CEO and founder of The Adler Group – a consulting and training firm helping companies implement “Win-Win Hiring” programs using his Performance-based Hiring℠ system for finding and hiring exceptional talent. More than 40 thousand recruiters and hiring managers have attended his ground-breaking workshops over the past 20 years.

Lou is the author of the Amazon top-10 best-seller, Hire With Your Head and The Essential Guide for Hiring & Getting Hired. Lou has been featured on Fox News and his articles and posts can be found on Inc. Magazine, BusinessInsider, Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal.

Prior to his executive search experience. Lou held senior operations and financial management positions at the Allen Group and at Rockwell International’s automotive and consumer electronics groups. He holds an MBA from UCLA and a BS Engineering from Clarkson University.

Book: Hire With Your Head: Using Performance-Based Hiring to Build Outstanding Diverse Teams
LinkedIn Article: 15 Hack-a-Job Ideas for Getting a (Better) Job
Website: WinWinHiring.com

Resources Mentioned

Book: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change by Stephen Covey

Thank you, sponsors!

Storyworth. Give a super meaningful holiday gifts this year at StoryWorth.com/awesome.
Setapp. Try out up to 200 of the best software tools in one streamlined place at setapp.com.

Lou Adler Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Lou, thanks for joining us here on the How to be Awesome at Your Job podcast.

Lou Adler
Hey, happy to be here, Pete, and thank you for inviting me.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m so excited to get your wisdom on both sides of the hiring table, the hiring and the getting hired. And I have a feeling that in your work over the years, you’ve probably encountered some interesting stories. Anything particularly memorable or fun or touching or hilarious that leaps to mind as you reflect on your career here?

Lou Adler
Well, I don’t know if it would be fun or hilarious, but important is probably a dozen, but since you’ve only asked me that question 15 seconds ago, I have to scramble pretty quickly. But I do remember one and it was 30 years ago or maybe even longer. I was talking to a candidate, and I was a recruiter at the time, my background has been diverse, but certainly when I was a recruiter in the early days, I thought I was going to place this one candidate who’s a remarkable person as a plant manager.

And at the time I was a contingency recruiter, and I would get full fee, and the compensation today would’ve been 100,000. So, if you multiply 30% by that, that was the fee I would’ve gotten, so not insignificant fee. So I just listened to him, and say, “John, I was devastated literally.” You lose that money, I didn’t have it, but I lost it anyway because I already, in my mind, spent it.

I said, “Why are you taking the other offer?” and he listed his whole list of five or six, seven reasons why. And then, this is the important part, as I listened to it and I regained my composure, I said, “John, you’ve just made a long-term career decision using short-term information.” He said, “What are you talking about?” I said, “John, everything you just said, the compensation, the title, the location, has to do with what you get on the start date. Not one thing did you say is what you’re going to be doing and becoming as a result of taking that job. We’re talking about a 15-minute drive each way, so we’re talking about a half hour.”

“You’re talking about a slightly better title, you’re talking about slightly more money but the big thing you’re missing is you’re working in a company that’s going downhill, that’s in an old state electronics versus new state-of-the-art making displays. So, what you do in the next two to three years will affect the rest of your life. And if you take that offer, admittedly it’s a little bit more money, slightly better title, VP manufacturing instead of plant manager, but you’re putting yourself on a career deathtrap.” I might not have used those specific terms.

Then I said, “John, did you already accept the offer?” And he said, “No, but I want to call you first because I told you I was going to do it and I feel badly that I’m not going to take the offer.” I said, “Well, why don’t you think about it before you call the other company up?” And I thought, at that time, that I might’ve convinced him to at least think about it, but I didn’t think I was going to get the offer so I was pretty devastated.

He calls me up the next morning, he says, “Lou, I’m going to take your offer.”

Pete Mockaitis
There you go.

Lou Adler
He said, “Everything you said is 100% true. Working in old line manufacturing means two to three years from now, I’ll never get any better than this.” He took the offer, and nine months later he called, and said, “Lou, I’ve just been promoted to VP operations for six plants both in the United States, and we’re now building in China,” which was when the big Chinese movement took place, “and everything was absolutely the right decision.” And I still remember those words today, this is nine months later when I said, “You’re making a long-term decision using short-term.”

And, to me, that’s an important lesson that I tell all candidates, it’s in all the books I write, is too many candidates hire for what they get on the start date, or accept jobs what they’re getting on the start date, not the work they’re going to be doing and what they could become if they’re successful. So, to me, that’s the epitome of everything I train, I advocate, and I listen for, and I actually ask candidates, “Why did you take job A and go to job B? Why did you go from job B to job C?” And they always say, “Well, they promised me this, they promised me that.”

I said, “No, they don’t promise you. You have to do the due diligence yourself to get that information. And if you don’t get it, you’re making a long-term decision using superficial information.”

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, I love it and that’s very easy to overlook in terms of you see what’s right in front of you, and it feels pretty close, pretty visceral, pretty emotional, it’s like, “This is my livelihood, this is my experience of work, this is what’s going to happen when I get in the car on Monday morning. This is what I’m going to see on my business card. This is what I’m going to see in the cheques or direct deposits that appear in my bank.” So, yes, that makes a lot of sense that we can naturally fall into some short-term right-in-front-of-you myopic thinking and we need someone like Lou to point us into the long term. Very cool.

Lou Adler
As part of my most recent book, which is called Hire With Your Head, the theme of the book is called win-win hiring. And it’s the idea that hiring managers, recruiters, and candidates alike should think about success measured on the first-year anniversary date not the start date. Hiring success means, hey, the candidate on the anniversary date says, “Well, I’m glad I took this job and I’m still glad I have it.” And the hiring managers says, “I’m glad I hired that person.”

Achieving that win-win hiring outcome is hard to do but critical to do regardless of whether you’re a recruiter, a hiring manager, or the candidate accepting that offer or not. And very few people do it. But that’s the essence of what I’ve been advocating and what I’ve been teaching, that’s called win-win hiring, achieving those kinds of outcomes.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, that’s a great perspective, win-win hiring, one year. So, tell us, Lou, what are some of the core principles that make that the case, that one year later, folks say, “Yeah, I really am glad I hired that person and/or…”

Lou Adler
Now, I’ll give you another story. Now, my history is I didn’t start thinking I’m a recruiter but I became a recruiter before just about 99% of the people listening to your podcast were born. It was 1978.

And I remember my first search assignment was, again, a lot of the work I had done was in manufacturing. It was for a company in the automotive industry and I knew the president, and I knew that when I became a recruiter, this was going to be my first assignment, so I met him the second or third day as a recruiter. And Mike was the president of this company in southern California, and he said, “I’m looking for someone with ten years experience, has a degree in engineering, probably would be great if that person had an MBA, and results-oriented and good communicator,” and all the stuff that you always see on job descriptions.

And I looked at that job description, and I said, “Mike, this is not a job description. This is a person description. A job doesn’t have skills, experience, and competencies. A person has that. Let’s talk about the job before we’re about the person doing the job.” And I said, “Let’s put the job description or the person description in a parking lot. What do you want this person to do? What would this person need to do to be successful in the first year?” And he said, “Turn around the plant.” I said, “Fine. Let’s walk through the plant and figure out what that person needs to do.”

We spent an hour walking through the plant – labor performance issues, scrap issues, processing issues, layout issues, inventory, management. It was a crummy plant. I said, “We’ll find somebody who can turn this plant around.” I have never used a job description that defines skills, experience, and competencies. It always defines the work as a series of performance objectives – build a team to put together an international reporting process within six months; make quota; design a new circuit that can accomplish A, B, and C and would fit in this kind of parameters and meets these kinds of criteria. It’s always outcomes with the idea being if a person can accomplish that work, he or she is perfectly qualified.

What changes it is the mix of skills and experiences, and I tell my client, “They obviously have to do the work. That’s not compromising but give us some relief on the skills and experiences. Having the skills and experiences means the person can do the work or motivate to do it, but if you can find someone who’s competent and motivated to do that work, you’ve got the right person. You just opened a talent pool to everybody who can do the work. Black, white, old or young, green or yellow, physically-challenged or not, it doesn’t matter.” And I’ve talked to numbers of labor attorneys but the number one labor attorney in the world contends that’s the most accurate way to hire. That’s objective criteria.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, and I was thinking that if in the unfortunate world that it doesn’t work out a year later, that feels pretty bulletproof in a courtroom – I’m no lawyer – but in terms of, “Hey, this is what they were hired to do. It didn’t happen so we’re looking for someone else who can do it,” as opposed to, “If they were people…”

Lou Adler
Conversely, if you find that’s what you’re looking for, you just dig deep, and to, “Hey, Pete, we need someone who can turn around the plant. Tell me about the biggest turnaround operation you’ve ever been involved with,” and spend 20 minutes digging in and understanding that. Or, “Hey, we’re going to build a team of accountants to put an international reporting system,” “Hey, we’re going to develop a new interface that accomplishes A, B, C using this skill. Walk me through anything you’ve done that’s related to that.”

So, your question was, “How do you create a win-win opportunity?” Well, first, you got to define the work that person has to do over the course of the year that would result, at least from the hiring manager’s perspective, a win-win hire. Then you got to find candidates who are motivated and competent to do that work and find it the best career move up competing alternatives.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, I love it. Lou, you just break it down, the step-by-step. So, let’s hear about that next step in terms of how does one go about finding those folks once we’ve clearly defined what a win-win situation looks like?

Lou Adler
Well, that’s a great question. You must read the book. No, seriously, the next step in, first, define the job, a series of key performance objectives. Then find candidates, or I call them semifinalists. You don’t need a lot of people to hire a great person. You just need the right people. So, our high-touch process is spend more time with fewer people as long as they’re prequalified.

And I was with a hiring manager last week, and he was looking for a software developer to do some backend stuff. It was pretty complicated. And I just said, “What do you want this person to do, Harry? What do you want accomplished?” And he told me, “Well, a couple of tasks that were big.” So, I said to him, “If I can find someone who’s done comparable work, it won’t compromise on that ability to be performance qualified,” that’s one step, “and the candidate has been recognized for doing that work and in that top half or top quartile or top third of a peer group, or top 10%, would you at least talk to the person on the phone?” He said, “Absolutely.”

So, part of sourcing is you look for, “Who would a hiring manager want to talk with if they could do that work and they were recognized for being exceptional at it?” I said, “Even if the person had a different mix of skills and experience.” Hiring manager said, “I don’t care. If they could only do the work and motivated to do it, I’d want to see him.” Then I said, “But, now, we’ve got the other side, is we’re going to look for a discriminating candidate who would see that job as a career move.”

So, then we look for, as we find candidates, we look for candidates who see that job as a move, maybe going from a big company to a small company, working at better projects, someone whose growth has slowed down, go to a place where the growth is accelerating. So, there’s a lot of things you can do and there’s a lot of technology to get you to find candidates but you have to be kind of clever at it, but we look for performance qualifying, meaning they can do the work, some super skills; achiever terms, meaning they’re in the top half, top third, top quartile in a peer group; and, from the candidate-facing-decision, hey, the job is a clear career move.

Then you engage in a conversation, “Hey, Pete, would you be open to talk about a situation superior to what you’re doing today?” I tell recruiters, “Don’t sell the job. Sell the conversation. But if you’re dealing with the right person, they’ll engage in the conversation. You take the time pressure off and you discuss this is a career move so the candidates get the…” And I tell candidates, “We’re going to have a conversation to see if we can achieve a win-win hiring outcome. It’s going to take a little more time but let’s just engage in a conversation.” And most candidates are, “Of course. It makes logical sense.”

But you have to know the job to have credibility with the candidate. So, that’s where, taking the intake meeting, and I say, “Here’s the job, Pete. We’re looking for someone who can do A, B, and C and here’s the situation. Here’s the resource.” You really know what you’re talking about. So, recruiters who don’t know the job and just source active candidates who they find either through a job posting or an email, it’s just pure transactional and pure blind luck if they hire a good person. And in pure blind luck, if the person is going to be there a year from now.

Pete Mockaitis
So, I get what you’re saying with regard to, “Hey, find those semifinalists. It is going to take a little bit of more work up front, but the good news is we don’t need to look at hundreds of resumes. We can look at a handful.” Are we thinking five, ten? Is that what we’re talking about here roughly?

Lou Adler
Absolutely. Maybe 12 to 15 but you got to be persistent to talk to everybody because most candidates don’t think you’re different so you got to kind of prove that through the process of pestering, engaging.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. That feels a lot better as a candidate in terms of, “Oh, cool. So, at worse, I’ve got 14 contenders clamoring for this opportunity as opposed to hundreds. Okay. Well, yeah, Lou, that’s worth 10 minutes for me to just see what you’re thinking but maybe a lot more.”

Lou Adler
Sure, maybe just 10 minutes.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, okay. And so then, can we hear about how do you, on the recruiting side, go about finding these people and confirming that they’ve got the performance qualification, that they can do it, and that they’re in the top half, third, or fourth?

Lou Adler
Well, first off, there’s a lot of ways to do it. A lot of my books and interviewing, we train hiring managers on the whole process – defining the work, finding candidates, interviewing candidates, and closing the deal, and even the onboarding process. But from an interviewing standpoint, so if I was going to call you up, and say, “Hey, Pete, let’s just have a conversation.”

And I said, “Pete, part of this assessment is to make sure this job represents a career move. And to be a career move, it has to give you at least a 30% increase.” “Thirty percent, did you say?” “Well, yeah, but it’s not money. Thirty percent is a combination of job stretch, meaning a bigger job; faster growth, a job with more impact; and more satisfying work. And that’s a complicated decision to make but that’s what I want to go through. So, let me just review your background in general, see if there’s a fit, and if so, we can get serious.”

So, during that process, I dig deep into the candidate’s accomplishments to see if they’re comparable and see if the 30% opportunity exists, and I say, “Pete, this looks like it could be there with bigger team, faster growth. This is the kind of work you like to do. Let me get the hiring manager engaged in this process and we’ll move forward.” But I also say this from a closing standpoint, I say, “Pete, if you’re really the candidate, and you’re going to get an offer two or three weeks from now, it’s high probability you’ll get one, 20%-30% possible, I’m going to ask you a question.”

“I’m going to say forget the money. Forget all the day-one stuff. Do you really want this job? And if you do, tell me why. And if you can’t describe that 30% in your own words, because that’s the information you have to get over the interviewing process, I’m going to suggest you don’t take the offer even if it pays the most because that will not drive your satisfaction growth and lead to a win-win hiring outcome.” So, it’s incumbent upon you, the candidate, to get that information, and is incumbent upon the hiring manager and the hiring company, to give you that information. And if there’s a clash there, fine. Don’t move forward. That kind of has the whole pieces tied together.

Pete Mockaitis
As we have this conversation, Lou, it’s just I keep myself in the candidate shoes, and thinking, “Yes, I like that. Okay, that’s distinctive.” And 30%, that just feels right in the gut in terms of, “Hey, if it’s an 8% bump, is it really worth all the time and effort and hassle and change and disruption to your life and routines to go chasing after it? I don’t know. But 30% is like, well, yeah, that is…”

Lou Adler
But, again, it’s not in monetary. Money won’t be on top of that. But the idea is that if you really get 30% of the compensation will increase at the same rate year after year. So, if you look at, “Hey, what’s your compensation a year or two from now?” it’s going to blow if you really get the non-monetary increase. Your compensation will be there a year or two from now just like this fellow John. He called me up and said his compensation was far greater, title was far greater because we put him on a better career path.

Pete Mockaitis
And then how do you go about confirming whether, in fact, a candidate is in that top half, third, or fourth?

Lou Adler
Well, there’s a lot of ways to do it, basically. And I’m doing a training session so I had to do some recording, doing some recording on some online training on a Friday, no, excuse me, Thursday. So, I said one thing that I look for is a dozen techniques. One of them is, “What kind of recognition did you get for that project?” Well, one thing from a technical standpoint, which is pretty interesting, I call it the Sherlock Holmes deductive technique, is good candidates are always assigned stretch projects early in their career, “Hey, Pete, when you took on that job, what kind of projects did you get assigned?”

Now, if you were assigned, after three months, menial work or average work, consistent with your peer group, then you’re probably an okay person. But if you’re probably starting to get stretch assignments, assigned to more important teams, those teams started recognizing you and asked you to be on other teams, there’s a lot of evidence that you can use to determine if someone is a high achiever. The point is too many interviewers, or hiring managers in particular, judge a person and that person’s raw technical insight, and using a lot of subjective material, “A smart person should do this.” But that’s not…

I’m not technically competent in any of the jobs but I’m a great technical interviewer because I look at what other people thought of that candidate. If you’re a good person, if you’re a sales rep, you get assigned tougher clients. If you’re an accountant at a big accounting firm, the partners in your job don’t give you menial accounts. They give you important accounts and they expose you to important people. If you’re a marketing person, you get assigned bigger projects.

And as a result of being successful, you get assigned even bigger projects, more important product lines that are involved in the company. So, you look for those kinds of things that, “What would likely happen if this person was really good doing that work in that company?” And you start picking up the evidence. They got a president’s award, they got a nice letter, they got a bonus, they got a promotion more rapidly.

So, it’s those kinds of obvious things when you think about it, say, “Of course, that’s what would happen.” You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to do that. You just got to think logically of, Pete, you make a personal judgment. Other people have made a judgment about that person, and that person has made a judgment about him or herself. So, look for that kind of evidence that would be indicative of what a high achiever does.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Lou, I’m just going to put you on the spot and make it a little challenging. I think that it’s funny that what you say that sounds like, “But, of course, we should all do that,” and yet we don’t. And what’s common sense is often not common practice. I’m curious about if you’re hiring someone from an organization whose kind of processes and meritocracy is just kind of broken, and these deductive clues we’d like to lean on as Sherlock Holmes are not giving us the indicators we’d like, what are some other sources you’d use?

Lou Adler
Well, it depends. Maybe the candidate is not any good.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s one possibility. I guess I was just looking for what are some extra indicators or clever approaches that we can get that validation, that check mark.

Lou Adler
Yeah, I don’t know that there’s a clever approach. I think I’m pretty deductive. And I don’t want to say deductive in any kind of intellectual sense. I just look for evidence. If I don’t find the evidence, I pass. I can’t afford the risk.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Fair enough.

Lou Adler
When I ask a person, “Why do you change jobs?” and if they always change jobs for short-term reasons, that, to me, is the indicator the person is not really focused on career-oriented, a career-oriented focused person. So, there are things you can look at that would get you some insight and validate that the person is really an okay person but not a high achiever. High achievers want to progress. They self-develop. They work hard and they do get assigned projects. And even if once or twice, it was a screwup, so be it. That’s fine. So, there is evidence that you can look for.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Sure thing. Well, so let’s say we got our semifinalists, and then here we are in the interview phase, can you help us think through on both sides, what are some do’s and don’ts?

Lou Adler
Well, the thing to me, over the years I developed what I call the hiring formula for success. And the hiring formula for success says, so it’s how you actually evaluate candidates. It’s ability to do the work in relationship to fit, drives motivation, and because motivation is so important, it’s squared. So, the do’s and don’t are, “Hey, if you want to achieve a win-win hiring outcome and hire someone in the top half, they better be motivated to do the work you want in the context of your job, the fit factors.”

Of that formula, ability to do the work, which is a combination of hard skills and soft skills, but most people only measure the technical skills, they ignore the soft skills – organization, planning, team collaboration, understanding. They just focus on the hard skills. But if you get at the hard and soft skills, the next one is the fit factors. Fit with the job. Does the candidate really want to do that work? Fit with the hiring manager style. In my mind, I was pretty independent and I had a hiring manager, the group president whom I worked for, was a micromanager, I said, “Fire me if I don’t do the work. Just leave me alone.”

There are other people who want a manager and subordinate who align better on what they need. So, one fit factor is the managerial fit. Another fit factor is the culture of the company. Another one is the pace of the organization. Another one is the sophistication of the organization. But those context issues are critical. There are a lot of confident people but if they don’t fit the fit factors and they’re not motivated to do the work, they’ll underperform.

So, that’s getting pretty complicated but the way we do that, we break the interview down in different pieces, we dig into the candidate’s accomplishments, and then we group around a formula around that hiring formula to make sure that we have all the components measured accurately. So, that’s the secret sauce of how you find candidates who are going to excel in that circumstance. Ignoring the fit factors, it’s, again, problematic if you want to achieve a win-win hiring outcome.

Pete Mockaitis
And you said motivation was squared?

Lou Adler
Yeah, ability to do the work in relation to fit times motivation squared. If you just kind of go through the basics of it, you’ll get some done. But if you’re motivated to do the work, you’ll get a lot more done.

Pete Mockaitis
And in the course of the interview, how do we assess whether one is, in fact, motivated, or, on the flipside, as a candidate, to reveal that you are motivated?

Lou Adler
Motivation to do the work, not get to work, and that’s a critical step here in this process.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, how do I assess whether, one, a candidate has motivation, or convey that I am a motivated as a candidate? You know, it’s funny, I remember I had a friend who was really into a consulting opportunity, and then he got some feedback from his interviewer, he’s like, “You know, you just didn’t really seem into it.” He’s like, “I’m very into it. This is my number one company that I really want to work for.” But, somehow, it didn’t get conveyed. So, how do we convey it? And how do we check for it?

Lou Adler
Well, see, that’s the issue. The fact that someone is quiet and low key has nothing to do with motivation to do the work. Unfortunately, candidates, or hiring managers and interviewers judge you by how motivated you are there during the interview and how extroverted you are. Totally inappropriate. The way I do it is I dig deep in the candidate’s accomplishments and ask many questions, “Hey, what did you do in this accomplishment? Where did you take the initiative? Where did you go the extra mile?”

And I ask that constantly as part of different accomplishments so I start seeing a pattern on the types of work that naturally motivates the person to excel. That’s how I get at it. And I see the pattern of, “Hey, this person always goes out of his or her way to build the team, always takes these architectural design issues, always does this without prompting.” Very few people do everything without prompting all the time. But I start seeing this pattern of activity.

Now, how does a candidate do that? And I don’t want candidates, and I tell candidates, me as a recruiter, unfortunately, my technique is not universal, I tell candidates, “I don’t care if you’re a good interview. I care if you’re a good performer. I’ll try to clean you up to make you the best interview possible. But I’m going to represent you if I think you’re good.” Then we have a course, and you can look on WinWinHiring.com. It’s how to prep for an interview where I tell candidates how to do the best job they can of presenting themselves for a specific job.

And the way to do that is if you feel you’re being superficially assessed, I say to candidates, time out very quickly, and say, “Would you mind telling me some of the major accomplishments related to this job because I’d like to give you examples of work that I’ve done that are most comparable?”

Pete Mockaitis
“Let me do your job for you, interviewer.” That’s funny and I’m laughing because it’s kind of sad but sometimes necessary. Like, as candidates, it’s like, “Let me do your job for you, interviewer. I think what you want to know is the following.”

Lou Adler
Yeah, but most of the time it is. But at least the fact that you just asked that question, indicates that you’re proactive, even if you ask in a low-key way, “Oh, that’s a pretty good question. What are the resources for that job? What’s the timeframe for that job?” And you start asking these questions that say, “Wow, this person…” Even the quality of your questions and proactively asking them, brand you as, “Hey, this person is pretty aggressive.” Your answers the other part, “No, I did some work that’s comparable. And what did you say the biggest problem was in that? You said that design issue to build the tool to do A, B, and C? Let me give you some examples of work that I’ve done related to that.”

So, the idea is, find out what the work is and proactively ask about it. Even if you ask in a low-key manner, it’ll, “Wow, this person is really competent. He really knows what he or she is talking about.” So, I think those are the issues. If you just wait, assume that you’re going to be assessed accurately, the chance of that is five-to-one against you’ll be judged on personality traits and your depth of hard skills.

Pete Mockaitis
And I like that question for getting after motivation. It’s like, “Where have you gone the extra mile here? Where have you gone the extra mile there?” because you’ll surface, I imagine, some patterns. And, hopefully, the answer is not, “Oh, uh, no, I don’t know.” And that can really get you thinking. As I reflect, as I’ve asked myself that question in different endeavors, it’s like, “Where have I gone the extra mile?” it really does reveal, “Oh, yeah, that’s where I was motivated.” And where have I not gone the extra mile is like, “Oh, that’s where I didn’t care and I did the minimum I had to do to comply with the law,” or whatever needs compliance rather than my proactive vigor.

Lou Adler
Right.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, tell us, Lou, any other top tips you would suggest? I think let’s give the candidates a little bit more love in terms of if we want to stand out to become found, to dazzle our prospective employers, what are your top tips on that side?

Lou Adler
Well, first off, my big tip is do not, do not, do not apply for a job directly. Chances are 3% you’ll get interviewed; 1% you’ll get hired, so it’s just a waste of time. On the other hand, if you see a job that you like, I would find out, “Hey, is there any way I can get a referral into that specific job?” That would be great. And it could be a second- or third-degree connection, but you try to see if you can do it, “Okay, what’s this company doing? Do I know anybody? Do I know anybody in my school?” You start looking on LinkedIn.

And the beauty of LinkedIn, it’s a network of 700 million people, not a database of 700 million people. And I don’t think recruiters or candidates take advantage of that. So, now, let’s assume that’s probably going to happen that you’ll know somebody for that job 10%-20%. It’s not going to be high, but you never know. If you get a professional background with an accounting firm, or bigger company, you might be able to get some connection.

On the other hand, 50%-70% of the time, you’ll be able to find out who the vice president is for that department, or director for that department, even if it’s not over that specific job. And I remember talking to this fellow, this has to be five or six years ago now, or maybe ten years, but he was Italian, he had his MBA from some school in Milan, he wanted to work for a telecommunications company in Europe, and he named the top three or four, “I want to work a job here. How would I get it?”

And I said, “Well, it’s easy enough to find a VP of marketing in any of those jobs. Why don’t you do a little MBA-like case study, putting each of their telecommunication systems, if that’s the area you want, and some kind of little competitive matrix, company A, company B, company C, company D, and some of the key features by product line?” So, this person wants to be a product marketing person.

I said, “Then just do a little summary with one or two pages, and then send that off to the VP, and say, ‘I’d like to work in product marketing, and this is what I’ve done. And I’ve found some key weaknesses in some of your products. I’d like to have a chance to chat with you about them.’” He said, “That’s a good idea.” And he called me up once or twice over the next two weeks, and said, “I’m just starting to send out emails, and I think I’ve got one interview already.” I hadn’t heard from him again for like six months, said, “Lou, I got that job with that one company.”

So, there are ways you can find the names of people, do a mini-consulting project, and just arrange to have a conversation, and say, “Hey, I’d like to do this.” And on LinkedIn. There’s an article I call 15 Ways to Hack a Job. So, if you look up Lou Adler, Hack a Job on LinkedIn, you’ll see an article, and it talks about using the backdoor to get the interview, to get to the top of the resume heap. And if you want to apply, unless you’re a world-class person with exactly the skills, it’s a low probability event. I would rather spend more time with fewer postings rather than applying to hundreds of postings.

Same thing with candidates. Don’t spend a lot of times with hundreds of candidates. Get to the right candidates and spend more time with them per candidate. Spend time on jobs you want. And if you put some effort into it, you will get a conversation.

Pete Mockaitis
Do you think that most people spend too much time fine tuning their resumes and LinkedIn profiles, and they can spend that time better elsewhere? Or, what’s your take there?

Lou Adler
That’s a good question. I would say the thing is, and I do look at resumes, so I guess here would be the advice. And this was like 30 years ago, I had a training for candidates. I don’t know how I did it, I figured I just wanted to train candidates on how to get a job, so this was pre-internet, pre-job boards too, so it had to be 1990-ish.

And I said, “Take your resume,” I had everyone bring a resume, and I said, “Give it somebody whom you don’t know.” And I said, “Turn it over and give it somebody whom you don’t know.” Then I said, “I’m going to give everybody 30 seconds to look at that resume.” Maybe it was 15 or 20 seconds. I said, “When I turn the clock on, I want to say turn the resume over and just circle the things that stand out,” maybe it was 10 or 15 seconds. “And then turn it back over and give it back to the person you got it from.”

So, I then said, look at the candidates, and said, “Now, look at what’s circled. Is that enough to get someone to read your resume because you only got five or 10 seconds or 15 seconds where somebody sees your resume and decides to read it?” So, now, I take that same advice, and a lot of people had their name in big bold letters, their address in big bold letters, the title of summary in big bold letters. I said, “Is that going to get someone to read your resume?”

So, now, you take that same advice, so, “Hey, you’ve got 10 or 15 seconds,” recruiters only get 10 or 15 seconds per name, maybe five or six, they got a whole list. Some machine is going to score it in priority order, but assume you get to the top of the list. Well, what’s going to stand out? It’s that first line, which is usually that description. So, if that description turns out, so that’s what I do. I don’t even look at the person’s name.

I just look at the title they give themselves, “Expert in a job of developing something or other.” If it’s kind of cool and interesting, “Oh, that’s kind of interesting, pretty clever.” I highlight something. “Coaching thousands of people on how to do A, B, and C.” “Oh, that’s pretty cool. I got to look at that.” So, I would say that’s probably the most important thing is the first line below your name on LinkedIn. I don’t exactly know how it turns out to look at but I just don’t remember how it does.

But I guess I don’t know if anybody can just look at LinkedIn and look what it looks like, but, to me, that would be the thing. And then I highlight one or two major accomplishments and probably the academics or the track record that somehow show the promotions very quickly, say, “Hey, this is an achiever.” So, some of those achiever terms quickly and some of the projects the person has worked on.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, how about a favorite quote?

Lou Adler
Stephen Covey who wrote The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, is my favorite author of all time. He came up, and this was 30 years ago, seven habits that a team, like exceptional people, all have. One of them was “Begin with the end in mind,” “Think win-win.” And “Seek first to understand before you’re understood.” So, I’d say those three are critical, “Think win-win,” “Seek first to understand to be understood,” and then “Begin with the end in mind.”

But if you think about the comment I made, Pete, about, “How do you control the interview if you’re a candidate?” it’s to start asking questions, “Begin with the end in mind,” “Hey, Pete, what do you want done in this job? What will success look like? And I’d like to give you some examples of work that I’ve done.” That is proactive enough to force the interviewer to tell you, and they’ll be impressed by the fact you asked that kind of question. You have to give a decent answer, too, but, nonetheless, you’re in the game if you ask the question.

So, you’re beginning with the end. Why answer questions that aren’t relevant? Why not answer questions that are related to the real job. So, force the person to do it. But I use those quotes a lot and refer to Stephen Covey a lot, so maybe that is my favorite quote.

Pete Mockaitis
And how about a study or experiment or bit of research?

Lou Adler
I went to a number of companies that process resumes, they’re called applicant-tracking systems, and I validated the number. And one company had all their users there, and they said, “Over the last five years, since we’ve been in business, we’ve processed 75 million resumes. And of that, 750,000 people got jobs.” And everybody clapped.

And I said to myself, “That’s 1%.” So, they’re spending 99% of all the people applied did not get a job. I then ultimately asked, and that’s what I got. The likelihood of applying is random chance. And then I validated that with two other applicant-tracking system companies. They weren’t as big as that one. But in 30 or 40 resumes, it was about 1% of people who applied get a job. Three to four percent get interviewed.

Then you say, “Where do these other 96% of the jobs get filled?” And most of it is referrals, or internal promotions, or through a trusted recruiter, or from a second-degree connection. So, then that’s a lot of that stuff evolves on, you just look at the statistics, it says, “Hey, the way to get a job is to do your own due diligence. Don’t assume that a posting on Indeed or a posting on ZipRecruiter is going to get it, get you that great opportunity, and applying to hundreds and hundreds of jobs a week. That’s not work. That’s a waste of time.”

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite book?

Lou Adler
Oh, that would be Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

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

Lou Adler
For me, a tool is LinkedIn. When I was a recruiter, I could find anybody on LinkedIn in 24 hours. It was easy. No, it’s another tool that I would actually say. I don’t know if you know this. It’s called a phone. You have to talk to people. And I think too many people try to make it impersonal, whether you’re on the company side or the candidate side.

Hiring is a serious personal business. It’s an important decision. And if you try to make it a technical role, you’re going to be unsuccessful. You try and make it a personal relationship; you’ll be very successful. That’s why I say spend, combine high tech with high touch. Don’t just rely exclusively on high tech to make important hiring decisions.

Pete Mockaitis
And is there a particular nugget that you share that people quote back to you often, or that you’re known for?

Lou Adler
Define the job. Or, “It’s what people do with what they have, not what they have that makes them successful.” It’s what people with what they have, not what they have that makes them successful. So, during the course of the interview, I understand, “What do you have in terms of skills and experiences and opportunities, and what have you accomplished with those?” And I’m looking for people who have accomplished more with less.

Pete Mockaitis
All right.

Lou Adler
And that really reveals a lot about that person’s capability.

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

Lou Adler
I would go to WinWinHiring.com. WinWinHiring.com is a training course, an online training course. But I’d also go to Amazon and search “Hire With Your Head.” The book just came out, fourth edition from Wiley. Whether you’re a candidate or a hiring manager or a recruiter, you’ll find it invaluable in terms of planning your life and your career.

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

Lou Adler
Well, to be awesome, yeah, I say don’t make excuses. Get it done. It doesn’t matter if you’re committed to do it. Don’t blame others. Just do it. And I see that all the time. And one thing I hate is people who make excuses. I like people who get the job done. And getting it done on time, even if it’s not perfect, is more important than saying or making excuses on why you didn’t make it perfect. Get it done in some level so people can use it. Meet your deadlines. Don’t make excuses. Get it done. That would be my motto for being awesome at your job.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Lou, this has been a treat. I wish you lots of luck and fun in all the ways you’re getting it done.

Lou Adler
Great. Thank you, Pete. Nice chatting with you.

Nov 18

721: How to Balance Caregiving with Your Career with Liz O’Donnell

By Ida del Mundo | Podcasts | No Comments

Liz O'Donnell says: "Sometimes the most important work we do is not in the cube or an office; it is at home."

Liz O’Donnell shares her tips on how to deal with the stresses of taking care of your aging parents while managing your career.

You’ll Learn:

The mindset that eases the burden of caregiving
The most important thing you can do when things get overwhelming
The motto to remember when times get tough

About Liz

Liz O’Donnell is the founder of Working Daughter, a community for women balancing eldercare, career, and more. An award-winning writer, her book, Working Daughter: A Guide to Caring for Your Aging Parents While Earning A Living, was named one of the Best Books of 2019 by Library Journal.

Liz is a recognized expert on working while caregiving and has written on the topic for many outlets including The Atlantic, Harvard Business Review, Fast Company, Forbes, TIME, WBUR and PBS’ Next Avenue, and has been featured in Health and Ozy Media. She also works with companies to create programs in support of working caregivers.

Resources Mentioned

Book: Lonesome Dove: A Novel by Larry McMurtry

Thank you, Sponsors!

StoryBlocks. Enhance your video storytelling quickly, beautifully, and affordably at Storyblocks.com/awesome.

Liz O'Donnell Interview Transcript

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

Liz O’Donnell
Thank you.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m excited to dig into your wisdom. It is a tricky topic that a few listeners have requested and you are one of the top experts in the field, so maybe you can orient us a bit. What’s the backstory behind the book Working Daughter?

Liz O’Donnell
The backstory is that both of my parents were diagnosed with terminal illnesses on the exact same day. So, I went from one hospital where the team told me my father had Alzheimer’s and could never go home. And before I even left the parking lot after that meeting, I got a call from another hospital where my mother had been brought a couple of days before, it was stomach pains, and they told me she had ovarian cancer and probably three months to live, and could I come right away and we could tell her together the news.

And I was working full time at a marketing agency, I had two kids in elementary school, I had my first book that had just come out, and I already thought I was as busy as could be, and I felt completely alone and completely unprepared, and working through elder care was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. So, I vowed no one else should feel this way.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow, that’s powerful. And thank you for sharing your story and your journey with us here, and the book to enrich folks. Boy, what a day. So, tell us maybe a little bit of the story in terms of a little bit of the ups and downs and key best practices and discoveries you made that somehow make it possible to make things kind of still somehow work?

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah. Well, I’ll start backwards, I’ll start at the end. And the end was realizing that sometimes the most important work we do is not in the cube or an office; it is at home. And so, we have to forgive ourselves when we’re not on our career paths because I was the breadwinner in my family. My husband and I had an agreement that he would be home with the kids and I would go to work. And I laugh now thinking, “What was I thinking?” But at one point, I was all in on my career so I couldn’t not show up for work. And I worked for a small company, and I was really lucky that I had paid time off and I had flexibility because so many caregivers don’t.

And so, I had all of these things going for me as far as trying to make this work but, again, probably the hardest thing I ever had to do. I lost a lot of influence at work. I lost key clients. I still had a seat at the table but I could tell that my voice didn’t carry as much weight. And so, like I said, if I start at the end, I just had to really forgive myself and realize that, one, you should never feel guilty for showing up for your family, and, two, you should never feel guilty for having to go to work and earn a living. And in between, do the best you can.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, we definitely want to hear a little bit about sort of the how one forgives one’s self because that’s so much easier said than done. But, first, can we hear a little bit about sort of, in practice, in terms of like at the ground level, how is it that you lost influence at work and key clients? Like, how did that translation unfold?

Liz O’Donnell
The next six months of my life after those two diagnoses, I can only describe them as completely wild. I had an Excel spreadsheet, I had at the time 196 items on it. I would wake up every morning and highlight the ones that had to happen that day. So, it’s things like I had to find a memory care facility for my dad. My mom was an hour away but, now that she had a terminal diagnosis, I wanted to move her closer to me but I wasn’t moving her in with me, “So, was I moving them to the same facility?” They had different care needs. I was digesting these two diagnoses and what they meant and trying to learn about them.

I end up moving my parents four times. So, if you can imagine four phone calls to the phone company for a hookup and four calls for a change, so that alone, I think, could kill a person, waiting on line on hold for the phone company, and medications, and hiring nurses, and looking for wills, and I had no sense of their financial package, so literally digging through Rubbermaid bins where my parents, who were Depression-era, which meant they kept everything. So, digging through trying to figure out what their financial picture was, what they could afford, if they had burial plots, like all of that stuff had to happen every day.

And so, I don’t know how else to describe it but I was kind of a mess. And in the middle of all of this, or on top of all of this, I still had to show up at this very demanding job. And so, as I said, I was really lucky in that I had flexibility. So, I went to my boss and asked if I could extend my flex time and my paid time off, basically, so that I didn’t take any one chunk of time off but every week I would set a new schedule, and that was such a God-send.

But that’s one thing, I know I’m kind of jumping ahead, but one thing that when people think about elder care in the workplace, they think, “Well, it’s like child care.” But assuming you have a healthy child, child care is much more predictable. You know when your kid will start preschool, and when they’ll start kindergarten, and when they’ll start first grade, and when their vacations will be, and when their well-checks at the doctor will be, and you can put all that on a calendar.

With elder care, I didn’t know, “Was my mother going to live three months? Was my dad going to live ten years? When were these moments that I needed to drop everything and show up? When were they going to happen?” And so, I was flaky.

Pete Mockaitis
Got you. So, flaky as in you ended up making additional errors and not following through on some commitments at work due the sheer overwhelm and stress of all this stuff happening unpredictably day after day.

Liz O’Donnell
Absolutely. The hardest thing I think was caring about work. As I said, at one point when my husband and I were planning a family, I was like, “I love my job. I’m not giving it up.” And now, here I am, and I’m literally dealing with life and death, end-of-life decisions, and the fact knowing that my parents…we all know our parents are going to die someday, we’re all going to die someday, but now it’s imminent and it’s being discussed.

And to show up at work and care about you’re on conference calls and people are like circling back, and parallel pathing, and strategic paradigm shifts, and it’s like, “People are dying. I don’t care about any of this.”

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Wow. Well, Liz, you’ve really painted quite a picture in terms of so that’s what life…that’s what the experience of life was like in the midst of that. And so then, you learned a few things in terms of some principles and some practices and some tools in order to cope with that, whether our listeners are specifically dealing with exactly this, parent elder care, or other realms of illness or wild stress and unpredictability in the personal life.

Share with us, what are some of the key principles and practices? You mentioned forgiveness, and so just to make sure we don’t lose it because it sounds huge, tell us, how does one go about forgiving one’s self? Because I think it might be easier to know intellectually, “Hey, this is a difficult time right now, there’s some special unique demands that need my attention, they’re very important, and so I’m going to need to tend to those.” And, yet, we could still feel some guilt about the tradeoffs that we have no choice to make. So, how do you wrestle with that?

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah. To be perfectly transparent, I don’t think I came to this conclusion, forgave myself, until later when I was writing about the experience. And, for me, it’s through writing I realized what I was thinking. So, if people are wrestling with it right now and not figuring out how to do it, I would say you’re right on path. You’re totally normal. Don’t beat yourself up.

You asked me, well, your question has a lot of parts to it, so I’ll start with the practical stuff that I learned at work. And what I learned at work is that I needed to be prepared every day for an emergency. So, years prior, I went out on maternity leave twice. And leading up to maternity leave, which, again, is predictable. You get a date. It might not be the exact date but you kind of know when you’re going out on leave. And so, I started to keep a running list of projects and what the status was, and I made it really easy for whoever was going to fill in for me to be able to fill in for me.

When I got these two diagnoses and when this crisis first sort of erupted in my family, my house, if you will, at work, was not in order. I hadn’t filed an expense report in months. I was storing stuff on my hard drive, not on the Google Drive or the server. I wasn’t really good about cc’ing co-workers. So, one of the things I learned through the whole experience – my dad lived for, I don’t know, maybe another five years, so I was a caregiver for quite a while – was to always keep your house in order, and, like I said, keep stuff on the hard drive, I mean, on the Google Docs and Google Drive, and cc everybody in the company, and make it really easy for your co-workers to help you out.

And then just know. I was a Gen X worker with a lot of younger millennial co-workers, so they had not been through this experience yet. They also hadn’t seen all the equity I had built into my career, the years of sweat equity, to sort of earn that flexibility. They just knew that this older woman was a flake. She was leaving a lot, just taking lots of personal calls. I just had to trust in the process that we don’t always get to see what comes around but know that someday they would experience it too, and that there’s just sort of this cosmic payback in the workplace. And maybe my reputation was taking a hit with them and they didn’t understand what I was going through, but there had been people ahead of me that I had filled in for, and there are going to be people later that you need to be filled in.

So, a lot of it was mindset. So, there were those practical things I did at work to hopefully make it easier for people to cover for me, but a lot of it was just mindset, constantly telling myself, “This is okay. This is normal, and you really can’t worry about your reputation at work right now. It’s is not the most important thing.” And death has a way of kind of giving you perspective.

Pete Mockaitis
Right. And that’s beautiful as we’re talking about forgiveness. So, it’s not only forgiving yourself, but then forgiving others and the co-workers. Like, if you see them, I don’t know, gossiping or chattering about you, or maybe just a look on their face, or whatever, that a subtle or not too subtle contempt or frustration, that that is a beautiful perspective in terms of not so much like, “I hate them, they suck,” but rather, “Hey, you might not realize it yet, but there will come a day when you, too, need and will appreciate this flexibility, and right now happens to be my time. And so, that’s where we are.”

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah. And that’s easier said than done, and part of that is because we all have so many jobs now. It’s not like we’re all working at the same company for 20 or 30 years and we sort of evolved together. So, I had to know that I might never see my co-workers go through this. They did not see my early stages of my career in sort of a, “So, what now?” kind of perspective. And I don’t mean to minimize this process because I think, for many of us who are career-oriented, being mediocre at work is really hard. It’s a big adjustment.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. You know what, that reminds me of, this is under the most random of connections, but I think it was Ronda Rousey, the ultimate fighter, who was defeated and she gave an interview. She’s very vulnerable in which she just started crying, and she’s like, “If I’m not this, what am I or who am I?” in terms of her identity was so wrapped up in like winning and victory and being a champion. And that can happen amongst folks who like being awesome at their jobs when there’s a period of time in which the environment is not so conducive to awesomeness at the moment.

And so, you shared a couple mindset bits. Did you have any other kind of phrases, or mantras, or mottos, or kind of go-to things you reminded yourself of in those moments?

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah so, prior to the crisis, the two diagnoses, my parents were needing more and more care, and I was finding it quite disruptive to my life and my career. I was working. I was traveling. On the weekends, I want to be with my kids. I was spending at least one day a weekend helping my parents with shopping and bills and mowing the lawn and all of that stuff, and I was really resentful of it.

And I remember after this crisis and coming home that night after being at the two hospitals, and it was really late by the time I got home, everyone was in bed, and I just sort of sat on the sofa in the dark, and I remember thinking to myself, “You know what, the only way through this is through this,” which is a bad paraphrase of the Robert Frost quote. I didn’t know that at the time but I just remember thinking, like, “You can’t get around this so you might as well just get in it and just figure it out.” So, the only way through is through kind of kept me going.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes. And that sounds simple but I think the alternative thoughts to that are numerous and tempting, like, “There must be some kind of a trick, or approach, or a strategy, or a tactic, or a resource, or a something that’s going to make this all better.” And we’re chatting about some things that kind of help a bit but, ultimately, the fundamental difficult circumstances are there and are not just going away.

Liz O’Donnell
Right. And I had been thinking about elder care, as I mentioned, for a couple of years prior to the crisis because my parents were needing more, I was giving it to them, I was feeling squeezed already as a busy working mother. So, I had been waking up at 2:00 in the morning, thinking, “I know they need more care but I don’t know exactly what, I don’t know exactly how I’d fit it in.” I’d been Googling and finding these websites that were all, I call them halo and angel websites back then. And this was like 2013, 2014, and it was just like, “What a blessing to be a caregiver and just sit down and chat with your family, and divide the work, and everybody will be okay.” Useless. Completely useless.

So, I’d been searching for the tools and the resources up until this point and I hadn’t been able to find them, and so that’s why I thought to myself. And so, I was just…I wasn’t getting anywhere. And so, this concept of the only way through is through was really, for me, about how you’re going to use your energy. You only have so much energy. Energy is probably boundless and all of that good stuff, but at the time I was feeling depleted.

And so, was I going to use up my energy resisting, like, “I don’t want to do this. Why is this happening?” or was I just going to use my energy to get it done?

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. And, let’s hear, inside your mind, what is resisting sound like, so we can readily recognize it in our own minds and curtail it sooner rather than later?

Liz O’Donnell
It sounded like, “This isn’t fair.” It sounded like, for me, the typical family caregiver of elder care is, I mean, I fit the profile. I was a woman in her late 40s, early 50s, with a parent over the age of 65, and a child under the age of 18, she’s working outside the home, and she’s busy. So, I fit the poster child for this, but the difference is it’s usually the oldest daughter, and I’m the youngest of three, so there’s a lot of, “Why me? And what about my siblings? And why don’t they step up?” And I bet if any of your listeners are going through that, because siblings come up all the time, it’s like one of the top two questions I get, “So, where are my siblings? This isn’t fair.”

And the other thing that I was feeling, and I hear from caregivers all the time, was, “This is putting my life on hold.” And so, again, I learned after the fact, after I wrote about this and processed this, that it didn’t actually put my life on hold. It’s just the turn that my life took. And I think if people can learn to live through these life crises as opposed to wait until, that’s another huge step.

And I think, whether it’s elder care or anything else, we tend to, “When I get the next promotion,” “When I find the right partner,” “When I drop 20 pounds,” this whole concept of waiting until, if we can figure out how to wake up every day, and be like, “Okay, this is my life. How am I going to make it work? It might be ugly today but…” then I think that’s just freeing.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. Well, so in your book, your chapter titles are imperative verbs, which is a style we like to use in our gold nuggets actually, so it resonates. So, it sounds like you’ve done some talking about how you accept and how you absolved. And you teased a little bit about prioritizing with 196 items in Excel, and you have limited energy. How do you prioritize well in the midst of these difficulties?

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah, the 196 items, those were the tactics. And, for me and what I talk about in the book, the prioritizing is when something, some kind of wrench comes into your life, or your career plans, or whatever it might be, like elder care did for me, and when you realize that the path you thought you were taking and the ladder you thought you were climbing isn’t quite what can happen right now, figuring out what’s most important and what you can shed.

So, back to that concept that I hear from other working daughters all the time, which is, “Caregiving has interrupted my life, or stopped my life, or put my life on hold,” I understand that concept, I felt that concept, but not necessarily true. Your life just needs to shift right now. So, what are the top three things in your life that are non-negotiable.

And so, for me, it was staying employed, because I was the breadwinner. I couldn’t lose my job. And it was showing up at some level as a parent. And I don’t remember what the third thing was at this time, but what are those three things? And so, everything else was a no. I said yes to those three things every day. I was going to be there for my parents. I was going to not lose my job. And I was going to be an okay parent myself. And everything else fell off for a while.

I was very involved in local politics. I was an appointed official. I resigned from that position and I had been promoting my first book, and I decided I was going to give that a B or a C effort. I had these three things that were most important in my life, and that’s what I was going to do. So, prioritizing for me was more bigger bucket items, and realizing that there were other things, so many other things in my life. I knew I wanted my first book to do well enough that I could write a second book. And I knew that I wanted to be an okay enough mother so that my kids wouldn’t be talking about me in therapy in a few years.

So, what were the things? And I knew that I had to stay employed but I wasn’t going to keep fast-tracking at that point. So, what were the things that I wanted to have in place when caregiving was over? And what was the minimum I had to do to make sure that I could step back into those roles?

Pete Mockaitis
And that’s a question that many of us haven’t asked much and don’t like asking, “What’s the minimum I can do?”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, Liz, so you’ve got some other great verbs here: deflect, choose, manage, disrupt, renew, plan, reflect. I’m intrigued about the renew, in particular. So, could we hear about some of the best practices there and another one or two things that you think made all the difference?

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah, so renew is in that chapter, I talk about, I think, it’s seven most annoying words that a caregiver hears, which is, “You should take care of yourself.” And, in my case, when I finally told my boss what was going on in my life, that’s what she said. And, luckily, I had worked for her off and on almost all of my career so I was able to take her head off and keep my job and the responses.

We know we’re supposed to take care of ourselves. What we can’t figure out is how and when with the 196 items, waking up every day, going through all of this stuff. And so, she said to me, she goes, “Well, why don’t you start with hydrating?” And it was so simple. I had been waking up every morning, starting the coffee, caffeinating all day long, drinking Diet Coke all day just trying to stay awake and go, go, go. And then at night, I would be so caffeinated that I would have a glass of wine to try to unwind, so I was definitely dehydrated through this whole experience.

And it was such a simple thing to do. Who can’t fill a CamelBak or a plastic water bottle and walk around all day? And so, I said, “Okay.” And because I had promised my boss, I committed to it, and I started just adding more water to the day. And then eventually I started keeping a pair of sneakers, or trainers, or tennies, depending on what part of the country you’re from, in the trunk of my car, and going for walks when my parents were sleeping, if I was bedside or waiting. There’s a lot of waiting in elder care. There’s hospital time. There were doctors who were late. So, I just started throwing on a pair of sneakers and walking around whenever I could. And little by little, I was adding these small things. So, in my book, I write about, I think, 50 things you can do for self-care.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, 5-0. Nice.

Liz O’Donnell
Well, they’re really small and simple, and some of them are physical and some of them are mindset. This is kind of embarrassing, but what the heck. I had certain songs that I would play at certain times in the day to just sort of shift my mind and put me in a good mood. Like, there was a song I always turned on as I was driving up to…my mom eventually moved into a hospice home, and I never knew on any given day what I was walking into, and I worked from the hospice home a lot of times. I worked remotely so I wanted to be as upbeat and positive.

So, I’d clicked on my iTunes. If it’s singing in the shower, if it’s sometimes helping other people out, it didn’t have to be hit the gym every day because that wasn’t realistic. But what are the little things we can do to feel better every day? And it really makes a difference.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, that’s powerful. You know, it’s so funny, hydration, that’s a great place to start because it’s easy to neglect, and that makes a big impact. So, suddenly, I’m looking at a pair of eye drops on my desk, which is true. Sometimes I like tough through a day with dry eyes for no reason, all day. It’s like I just don’t have to live like that, or dry lips with ChapStick.

Liz O’Donnell
Right. Exactly. Yeah, I just kept going to the soda machine for Diet Coke. I didn’t have to live like that.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good.

Liz O’Donnell
You’re actually less tired when you drink water.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, water, songs, walking, sing in the shower, helping others. Any other thing that leaps to mind of the 50 that’s huge for renewal?

Liz O’Donnell
I think anything that helps you escape, that helps you sort of shift out of the stress that you’re in. So, reading, comedy, podcasts, all of those things might not sound like the traditional self-care that we talk about, but anything that can give your mind, which is on overdrive, a break is really helpful. So, are crafts as a parent. I didn’t practice this but my research shows that doing any kinds of crafts, knitting or…because they take your brain away from the stress that you’re thinking about.

Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. Okay. Well, so outside of renewing, any other top tips or best practices you want to make sure to share with listeners who are dealing with elder care and career at the same time, or other, just personal challenges with work at the same time?

Liz O’Donnell
I want to go back to that planning what happens after because I think it can be really uncomfortable. Because when you’re thinking about what happens after, you’re actually thinking about, “What happens when my parent dies?” And we have a term in the Working Daughter community that we call grelief, and it’s a combination of grief and relief, and that’s often how we feel when our parents die. And it can feel really uncomfortable to admit that there’s an element of relief there.

But the person you love is no longer suffering, you’re no longer struggling, and so I think it’s really important that we’re honest about this. And so, thinking about, “Okay, someday this is going to be over. What are my goals and how do I keep moving towards them?”

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. Well, Liz, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we hear about some of your favorite things?

Liz O’Donnell
You know, the other thing I want to mention, and thank you for asking that, is just to talk about this at work. As recently as 2013, 2014, when I was first going through it, nobody was really talking about this. And more and more, we’re seeing articles about elder care, there’s a lot of conversation about workers who are parents, but there haven’t been that many about workers with parents.

And it’s not just elder care; it’s spousal care, it’s sibling care. COVID has made us all caregivers at some level, so I think being comfortable, and trailblazing a little at work, and talking about caregiving, and when your companies might be talking about parents, reminding them it’s not just parents. Because the more we talk about it, the more normal it’s going to become. And it is, there’s like 54 million of people out there who are going through some kind of caregiving and working. So, why isn’t it more discussed?

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. Well, now, could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Liz O’Donnell
My favorite quote now is “Action is the antidote to despair,” which is attributed to Joan Baez, the folk singer. And, for me, it’s the things that have you stressed out, if you just take one small step, you’re going to feel that much better. And, specifically the elder care, part of the reason we are so unprepared when it comes to elder care is nobody wants to talk about these things. We all know we should be talking about our wills. We all know we should be talking about burial plots. And often, like, “Eww, who wants to talk about that?” But if you just take one little action and move in that direction, ooh, your stress just goes away.

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

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah, I found these two professors when I was writing the book. One is at Johns Hopkins and one is at University of South Florida, and they have been studying the impact of caregiving on people. And they have found all the things that I just told you that it is stressful, it impacts your health, your relationships, etc. However, they also found something they call the caregiver’s gain.

And when they looked at non-caregivers compared to caregivers, they found that caregivers have better physical strength, cognitive ability, self-esteem, and actually longevity. So, I think the more we can talk about the caregiver’s gain, the more people will realize that caregiving, while it often feels like something that takes from you, it actually gives you something tremendous as well.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s beautiful. You know what came to mind is, “So, those deadbeat siblings can suck on that.” That’s not the kindest.

Liz O’Donnell
That’s exactly the kind of conversation you’d hear if you joined the Working Daughter Facebook group.

Pete Mockaitis
So, I’m not too out of line. Okay. All right.

Liz O’Donnell
No. And that’s part of the reason I wrote the book, and I started the community, was back to that, like, it was all angel wings and halos, and people would always like they kind of tilt their head, and their voice gets sappy, and they’re like, “You’re a caregiver. It’s a blessing.” But I wanted a place where people could say things just like that. And that’s what I love about that research and what these two professors have done, is that their research doesn’t say that caregiving is all wonderful and it’s going to be better for you. They say both things can be true at once. And I think I just answered one of your upcoming questions, but I’ll wait till you get there.

Pete Mockaitis
A favorite book?

Liz O’Donnell
Oh, no, not that one. My favorite book is Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. Just can’t say enough good things about it.

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

Liz O’Donnell
I think it’s Spotify. I have a playlist for like every scenario. Like, if I wake up and I’m feeling stressed, I have a playlist for that. And if I’m giving a big presentation, and I’m having impostor syndrome, I have a playlist for that. And I have a Working Daughter playlist that reminds working daughters that they’re doing amazing work. So, I think Spotify is actually one of my best career tools.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite habit?

Liz O’Donnell
A favorite habit? I think it’s water.

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

Liz O’Donnell
And that’s what I was just alluding to a second ago. In the Working Daughter community, we say all the time that two things can be true at once. And it’s we can say, “This completely sucks,” and also know at the same time that we’re glad that we have the opportunity to do it. We can feel grief and relief at the same time. Not something that people always embrace but we can hold two opposing truths.

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

Liz O’Donnell
WorkingDaughter.com, that points you to the private Facebook group and the book and all kinds of stuff.

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

Liz O’Donnell
Yeah. It would be to think about how we can be more compassionate at work because it was First Lady Rosalynn Carter who said, “There are four types of people in the world. Those who have been caregivers, those who are caregivers, those who will be caregivers, and those who need caregivers.” So, this is a workplace issue, and it requires that we’re compassionate with each other as we go through it.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Liz, thank you. This has been powerful and helpful, I hope, to so many. I wish you the best in all of your adventures.

Liz O’Donnell
I appreciate you talking about it. Thank you.

Nov 15

720: Navigating the Great Resignation with Dr. David Rock

By Ida del Mundo | Podcasts | No Comments

Dr. David Rock shares strategies to help both employees and employers come out of the Great Resignation feeling more satisfied.

You’ll Learn:

Why so many professionals are now quitting
The small shifts that drastically improve satisfaction and productivity
The telltale signs it’s time to quit your job

About David

Dr. David Rock coined the term neuroleadership, and is the Co-founder and CEO of the NeuroLeadership Institute (NLI). The Institute is a 23-year-old cognitive science consultancy that has advised over 50% of the Fortune 100. With operations in 24 countries, the institute brings neuroscientists and leadership experts together to make organizations better for humans through science.

Dr. Rock has authored four successful books including Your Brain at Work, a business best-seller, and has written for and been quoted in hundreds of articles about leadership, organizational effectiveness, and the brain which can be found in Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Business Insider, CNBC, Forbes, Fortune, Inc., USA Today, BBC, The Boston Globe and more.

Dr Rock is originally Australian, though based in the US since 2010. He holds a professional doctorate in the Neuroscience of Leadership from Middlesex University in the UK.

David’s book: Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long
David’s website: DavidRock.net
David’s organization: NeuroLeadership.com

Resources Mentioned

Study: “Cubicle, Sweet Cubicle: The Best Ways to Make Office Spaces Not So Bad” by S. Alexander Haslam and Craig Knight
Book: The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work by Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer
Book: Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert
Book: A User’s Guide to the Brain: Perception, Attention and the Four Theaters of the Brain by John Ratey

Thank you, Sponsors!

Blinkist. Read or listen to summarized wisdom from thousands of nonfiction books! Free trial available at blinkist.com/awesome
University of California Irvine. Chart your course to career success at ce.uci.edu/learnnow

Dr. David Rock Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
David, thanks for joining us here on How to be Awesome at Your Job.

David Rock
It’s a pleasure. Good to be with you.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Well, I’m excited to be with you and I’m hoping you can give us some insight beyond the headlines. We’re hearing this term Great Resignation a lot. First, can you define it for us? And tell us, is this a really a big deal or is this overhyped?

David Rock
It’s a bit of both. Statistically, when you really look at the data, and I’m a scientist, I like data, it’s definitely bigger than other times but it’s also part of an ongoing trend where we’ve seen increasing numbers of people changing jobs every year. So, it’s definitely a bump but it’s really hard to say whether it’s a function of sort of no one quit last year, because we were so uncertain, and then kind of, suddenly, there was this big bump now making up for that. Statistically, it looks a little bit more than just that big bump but it feels bigger. And certainly, it is bigger, and you may notice it around you in certain industries, but it’s not kind of enormous thing necessarily from a statistic point of view.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And so then, but is there something noteworthy and bigger there that’s worth exploring and digging into?

David Rock
Yeah, absolutely. There’s a really very specific experience that millions, if not billions, of people have had. It’s very unusual. The Great Depression, a hundred years ago, is probably the only thing in all and parallel that really left a mark on people. People who grew up through the Great Depression had certain habits, the horrors of their life till the end of their life. And I think, in a similar way, the folks who’ve lived through this pandemic are going to be affected by it for a long, long time.

And there’s a number of things that happened. Huge parts of the economy are built on devices to distract us from ourselves, whether it’s movies, books, television, apps, everything else. And for a lot of people, Netflix kind of ran out, and there was nothing left to distract them.

Pete Mockaitis
They finished it.

David Rock
They finished it, right? And so, they’re left having all this time with themselves, and sometimes what they saw they didn’t really like. So, there’s a percentage of the population who’s interested in self-reflection and kind of thinking about life, but there’s a lot of people who go through life, probably a majority, without much time really thinking about themselves. We don’t have 90% of people in therapy.

And so, a lot of people were kind of forced to take a good honest look at their life because there wasn’t much else to focus on, and they saw that they didn’t really love their job, that maybe they didn’t love their partner, maybe didn’t love where they lived, and those three things changed a lot when the pandemic finished. And the job is the easier one to change than a house or a partner. You’re probably more likely to trade up in the job, but the other two, it depends. So, a lot of people kind of coming out of this say, “I want to make big changes.”

And, also, there’s this really big lack of control that we all have experienced and are still experiencing. There’s a really big lack of control, so think of autonomy. And so, by kind of changing jobs, in particular, you’re reasserting your feeling of control in your life, in a way that’s probably the least disruptive as well. So, I think that’s another reason. In summary, people kind of had time to think and got to see a lot of their life wasn’t great. And then they found a way to regain control, which is the easiest way is changing jobs.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, autonomy, status, control, things that folks want or maybe not getting as much as they’d like in their jobs, and so a switch is one way to accomplish that. Do you have any interesting research insights on can we get more of that while staying where we are?

David Rock
Yeah, absolutely. So, autonomy is this really interesting construct in the brain. It’s a feeling of being in control or having choices. The two are quite similar. When you press a button to cross the street, you expect it to change in a certain amount of time. If nothing happens after a few minutes, you get frustrated. You thought you had control over crossing the road and you discover it’s broken and now you feel better. You’ve regained control and you cross another way. But our feeling of kind of being in control is something that goes up and down through the day but, generally, within a certain limit. And the pandemic really drops that sense. We felt completely out of control. We just didn’t know what to do in a huge way. And it’s such an interesting phenomenon – control.

In animal studies, it’s the difference between life and death. So, in animal studies, essentially, you can give animals a certain stress, and some will have this perception of being in control of it and some will feel out of control, and it literally is the difference between life and death. There are studies with humans, in retirement homes, in aged homes, where they give a control group no change, and another group, they give them three choices. This was done in about the ‘70s. But they give them three choices of like a plant, or an art, or where to put the bed. It actually halved the death rate for people who were given control.

And then a third study that always blows my head off, people given the control over how they laid out their cubicle. So, same job, same company, same cubicle, still had the same computer, but they were allowed to bring in like personal things in their cubicle versus not. And the people allowed to bring in personal things, who felt in control of their cubicle, are 25% more productive. It’s like a day a week more productive. It’s crazy.

So, autonomy has this outsized effect on many, many functions in the brain. And, essentially, it puts us in more of an approach state or towards state when we have a sense of control. And when we reduce that sense of control, it activates more of a threat state or avoidance state. And, generally, we’re far more creative in an approach state. We literally have greater cognitive resources for holding big ideas in mind. We collaborate better. Just about everything is better in more of an approach state, what happens when we feel like we’re in control.

A little bit of an avoidance or threat state is okay for focusing for short bursts but you won’t be very creative but you’ll be able to execute well. So, there’s a whole lot of science to this but, essentially, the pandemic kind of reduced our feeling of control but a lot of clever people worked out hacks to that, and said, “Actually, you know what, I can control my diet now better than any other time in my life,” and decided to really monitor their diet and track it, do experiments, and people said, “You know what, I can control my sleep properly for the first time ever. I can even control the people I meet.” And the introvert, germophobes, had a field day. But we could suddenly control a lot more things because we were in a home environment.

And so, while you can sort of focus on being out of control, there were other ways that you could focus on. Actually, your control had increased in a local way. And we even had more control over when we worked versus when we had breaks and all of this stuff. And that was one of the silver linings of the pandemic is that we had this increased sense of control about kind of workflow because our manager wasn’t standing over us. So, it gives you a clue to sort of what we can do. But the science of this is really fascinating.

Pete Mockaitis
Indeed. And what a powerful impact there by having even minor amounts of control. You’re allowed to decorate your cubicle as you see fit. And so, boy, that just gets me thinking, there’s probably so much autonomy that, we guess, we just sort of leave on the table, if you will. It’s like we don’t even consider that we have that control in order to exercise it and enjoy the benefits of controlling our work, break time, or our food choices, or our sleep. Any other categories you think are just sort of like overlooked, like, “Hey, this is in your control. Seize it and reap the benefits”?

David Rock
Yeah, absolutely. If you’re at home a lot of the time, you’re in control of who you socialize with. And now you don’t have to socialize with people who are in a 20-mile radius. You can socialize with people anywhere in the world. And I’ve been part of a poker school, or poker club, for over a decade, and most of my buddies I played with are in Australia where I’m originally from, and I kind of miss them.

And what I found is that there was a great app where we could literally play poker online and see each other and hear each other perfectly. It was just like being there. And we started playing monthly and enjoyed it so much, we started playing weekly. And now I’m getting together with some of my favorite humans literally every week for a couple of hours and just hanging out. It’s a wonderful thing.

So, you gain this control over who you interact with, and whether it’s family or friends or people you really want to learn from, that’s another upside to this time. And I think the people’s willingness to sort of try things on platforms is always going to be with us. We’ve all learned that there are things we can do on platforms, like Zoom, that we never imagined were possible, and actually they can work. And so, I think that’s going to stay with us for some time.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely. Okay. Well, so then what are some other ways you recommend folks can upgrade their satisfaction with where they are? They can look for opportunities to exercise their autonomy. What else?

David Rock
Another thing that you want to play with is your sense of certainty.

So, we have this drive for our feeling of control that’s always relative, so you have a little more, a little less than where you were. But we also have this drive for a sense of certainty, and they’re similar but quite different things. And a sense of certainty is literally, “How much do you feel you’re able to predict what’s about to happen?”

Let me give you an example. Normal times, you’re at work, you’re at the office, and you live a little far away, and your partner borrows your car. And during the day, they say, “Hey, I think I’m going to be back in time but I’m not sure, and if not, you’ll need to get public transport.” You know that’s like an extra hour and a hassle. The whole afternoon, your brain is going to go back and forward, back and forward between, “Do I have to leave at 5:00? Do I need to leave at 4:00? Am I going to have to deal with that?”

While that ambiguity is there, a big piece of your brain is trying to solve for two different realities, and it’s trying to do all the sort of what-if questions about if you have to take the subway and the bus, or if you’re going to have the car, and it’s debilitating. You’re actually using some of your limited working memory. So, that’s a small bit of uncertainty where you just got, “Do I take transport or am I having a car?”

And so, your brain is constantly mapping out into the future trying to kind of plan ahead unconsciously. When the world is really certain, as it sort of was before the pandemic, things were kind of in a flow and you knew how you’re getting home, and what you’re doing next week, and where you’re going for vacation, and when you would next see your parents, and all of these kinds of things. Then certainty plummeted during the pandemic. And one of the interesting phenomena was our temporal focus, or how far out we could think, really shrank.

Normally, we think like, it’s not uncommon to think a year out and plan a vacation in a year, or some education in a year, or two years, you’re working towards, or be saving for something a few years out. We went from a year to not a quarter or even a month, and not even a week. Many of us, during the pandemic, could barely think a few days ahead. We were very much in the now. And it was because of the amount of uncertainty, there were so many variables that were uncertain that it just hurt to think even a week out at some points. There was just so much that was changing all the time.

And so, we became much more focused kind of in the moment. And part of it is that uncertainty, like a lack of control, increases the threat response in the brain, which literally reduces resources for prefrontal or working memory. And so, you had this issue where lack of control actually made it harder to just hold things in your mind, and so you just focus on the now. Then there was this whole kind of complexity of just trying to calculate further out and how exhausting that was, and we just kind of gave up.

And so, that issue happened. And interestingly, again, this is one of those situations where you can kind of hack your perception of control just like you can autonomy. And the interesting thing about the brain is things that are local are valued more highly than things that are farther away. So, feeling certain about your office where you spend a lot of time will actually give you a whole lot of benefits because it’s right in front of you all the time.

And so, you can hack your brain’s need for certainty by…and a lot of people did this, like organizing your office like crazy, organizing your bookshelf, organizing your filing, re-setting up your systems, getting your computer better than ever, getting the stand you’ve always wanted, and the camera and eyesight. Just getting super organized, so literally you didn’t have to use working memory for lots of little things anymore.

Steve Jobs was famous for this, always wearing the same things where he didn’t have to make decisions in the morning, and could focus on other things. It’s a bit like that. You just create this huge amount of certainty, and your brain has to make fewer decisions, and it’s less taxed overall. So, there’s a local effect with things that are physically close to you and also things that are close in time, and that’s one of the ways of hacking this.

So, you end up organizing your calendar, your schedule. You end up just kind of getting really disciplined and structured, and that hacks your sense of certainty even if the outside world is completely crazy. And so, there’s always kind of hacks like this, particularly around autonomy and certainty you can do even when the world is really crazy, to locally feel a lot better and be able to think well.

Pete Mockaitis
That really resonates and what’s coming to mind for me is I’ve got a buddy, Ronnie, and he said to me, boy, decades ago, he said, “Laundry is power.” I said, “What are you even saying?” And then, sure enough, this was before I was doing my laundry regularly, we’re like teenagers. And then when I got in the groove and I understood, it’s like, “Ah, yes, when you have a drawer of perfectly folded and organized and clean and ready-to-go laundry, that is power.” Because whatever tiny bit of your RAM was spent wondering, “Do I have clean underwear or shirt or dress, socks?” whatever item you might need or want. It’s like the answer is, “Yes. Why, I’m certain my clothing is handled.”

Likewise, I’ve got a bunch of high-protein snacks on my shelf, and that feels great in terms of like, “I don’t need to worry. If a schedule gets all choppy or weird, I’m not going to go hungry. there’s reassurance there that feels good.” So, organizing in terms of, “I know I’ve got my pens or my stand or whatever, my apps,” lay it on us, what are some other ways we can remove uncertainty from our lives and reap those psychological benefits?

David Rock
I have to tell you a funny relevant story before we go into some other ones. I just had a birthday recently, and my partner said, “What do you really want?” And I said, “I want to never think about socks again.” Like, I work out every single day. I’m just spending like five minutes pointlessly searching for socks and pairing them and stuff. I said, “I want you to really care about the perfect socks, and go test them, find out and see if you can work out. I like XYZ, and then that’s the thing I most want for my birthday.”

And they did it, they went out and she like worked out the exact one and threw out all my other socks, and gave me just dozens and dozens and dozens of the exact same socks, so I just never have to think about matching socks ever again. And it’s kind of something I’ve always wanted. I always felt too indulgent. But it’s like that stuff adds up because it’s attention you can’t put elsewhere in all those little places.

Pete Mockaitis
David, I love that so much. And the problem with socks is that they have all these different styles. Like, if you get pack of five, it might be five different designs, like, “That doesn’t help me because if I lose one, then the pair ends, whereas I’ve got redundancies, they could replace each other.” And so, it’s harder to match and pair. So, I’ve actually had the same fantasy but I, too, have not taken the time to realize it.

Pete Mockaitis
Awesome. All right. So, socks, that’s one thing you cannot think about ever again.

David Rock
Well, it’s a good metaphor. And then if you take that and say, “Look, what else do you regularly, like at least once a week, find you waste attention on?” Because attention is actually a limited resource. If you’re having to pair socks, that’s attention you can’t put onto something else. So, what else do you regularly, like at least weekly, maybe daily, put attention on so that you really don’t need to, you really shouldn’t have to? And how can you replace those things so that you really don’t have to actually give that any focus anymore?

You’ll start to see a lot of things where you could create a lot more certainty in these areas, whether it’s bulk buying food so that you know you’ve always got three months’ worth of things that you never have to worry, or shop four times a year, or it could be around planning your exercise routine a month out at a time, or planning your diet a whole way out. So, there’s different ways to think about it. It’s kind of whatever you’re interested in but, essentially, the fewer decisions you have to make that are kind of pointless, the better off you’ll be. That’s the tip overall.

Pete Mockaitis
Right. And so, it’s not so much, “Oh, I’m at the gym. What am I going to do here now?” but rather, “I’ve taken some time, I’ve done some research in advance based on my goals and the equipment that’s available and the time I have, this is what I’m doing.” And so, you’ve made one decision to rule dozens or hundreds of subsequent things.

David Rock
Right. One of the things I did is I realized I was terrible at going to the gym, and it just was the time sucked till I get there and deal with things, and get back, and I didn’t like the environment at the gym, and I needed to work out fairly regularly. I felt there were benefits. The research was really saying there were benefits.

And as I looked into the research, it became clear that actually a small amount of exercise, if you do it every day, is fantastic. And by small amount, I mean like five minutes, even five to ten minutes. And I realized I’m overcomplicating this thing. What if I could do something that I could do absolutely anywhere, it doesn’t matter what hotel I’m in, what part of the world I’m in, what mental state I’m in, I can just, anywhere, do some exercises and do them absolutely daily?

When I simplified it down to that, I had all this certainty, and now I could just weave in exercise into part of my day. And so, pushups and sit-ups go a long way plus some stretching. If you could do that regularly, daily, you’ve got an amazing set of health benefits and strength and confidence. And add some cardio from most days from a walking meeting so that you’re getting that cardio in as well while you’re in a meeting, and you’ve got a fantastic exercise routine without ever going to the gym. So, again, you’re kind of creating, I guess, it’s not just certainty. Also, you’re just creating more ease with your attention and with having to achieve your goals.

Pete Mockaitis
Right. Like, “Oh, when and where and how am I going to get this workout in?” It’s like, “Oh, that’s just five minutes. It can be anywhere. And for the time being, I’ve chosen to schedule it at this time recurring, and now there it is.” Cool. All right. Well, so then let’s talk about if we do want to make a change in the job, how do we know it’s time and how do you go about thinking through and deciding that?

David Rock
Companies are really good at trying to keep people, and I think that it’s really good, and I speak as an employer as well, I guess, in this, but it’s really good to explore the options because sometimes we just think that the job we’re in is the only opportunity, but a lot of companies are good at being flexible, and you might find there’s a completely different career path in the same company.

I remember we did a lot of work with Intel for quite some years, the chip maker, and I remember a dinner a few years ago with maybe a dozen of the Intel executives, and they were introducing themselves, and I said, “How long have you been here? And what do you do?” to a person. Everyone had been there 20 plus years. And they weren’t necessarily that senior, they were mid-career, I was like, “How does the company keep you so long?”

And everyone just laughed and said, “Well, every two or three years, I get a knock on my door, and someone offers me a ridiculously big job that I could never imagine I would ever be chosen for and throws me in the deep end in this incredibly challenging opportunity that I get to really sink my teeth into. And they just keep doing that every few years. I’ve never gone more than five years without that happening.” And everyone to a person agreed.

So, Intel, in the background, who worked that out, and kept really, really good people by stretching them a lot. And so, a lot of clever organizations want to give you different kinds of roles, and I think the first step is to explore, “Is it the company or is it the role?” If you’re an extrovert and you’re stuck in accounting filling in forms, you may find that joining the sales team might make you intrinsically happier. That’s an obvious one.

So, I think the first thing is, “Is it the company, or is it the role, or is it the team?” Maybe you’re in a team where the chemistry isn’t right. And I’ve got a team of 200 plus people, and magic happens sometimes when you move someone to a different team. Someone can be an underperformer and not happy. You put them in a whole different team, they do incredible work. So, there’s a definite chemistry thing. So, I think it depends. Is it the company? Is it the team? Is it the work? It’s good to think about those things and explore ideas.

If it’s all three, you might want to consider your options. And sometimes people just want to really shake things up. They want to really, really shake up their kind of whole world and kind of challenge themselves to learn new things, especially if they’re maybe mid-career, they’ve done a few years kind of in their first five to ten years of working. They’ve kind of really learned a lot of skills in one environment, they’re like, “I want to challenge myself and learn something completely different.”

I was talking to a colleague who’s been in pharma for a long, long time, and she’s like, “You know what, I want to go and be in media now. Pharma has been great but I want an entirely different ecosystem. I want to learn entirely different things about the world, and that’s something I’m passionate about.” So, that’s a person that probably will leave because it’s the entire industry they want to shift, so getting a new job in there won’t be helpful.

So, I think you got to think about also the industry, the company, the team, and the job itself. What really is it? And if it is time to leave, it’s always really great, and I guess I say this as an employer, but it’s always really great to let people know really early and minimize the surprise elements so your colleagues, not just your managers, but your colleagues also have time to set things up so they’re not drowning.

I know in many organizations right at the moment, everyone is struggling for talent. I don’t know how the math of that works but I think just a lot of people are not working. And it’s not just restaurants and bars. Like, everyone, everywhere is really short staffed somehow. Just about every industry I talk to, people are saying, “We just don’t have enough people for the work.” So, I’m a fan of giving folks lots of warnings so you’re not throwing anyone in the deep end.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. So, we’ve talked about some tiny interventions in terms of just like your own mindset and what’s in your sphere of control, what you can do there. We talked about some big changes in terms of, “I’m out of here.” And so, maybe about some in-between size changes, do you have any pro tips on how we go about communicating with managers, leaders, others in terms of, “Hey, you know what, this job isn’t working for me,” or, “Hey, I really appreciate if we can make this shift or accommodation”? Any magical scripts or words or phrases or approaches that really work well here?

David Rock
Yeah, there’s no magic in that stuff. It creates a lot of anxiety for people, so I think being clear is really helpful, being really clear about whether you’ve made a decision or not, whether you’re talking to other organizations already or not, where you are in your process. If you’re really early in your thinking, let people know you’re early in your thinking and you’re not planning to do anything for a few months. If you’ve kind of already decided to leave and you’ve already done interviews, you got to be kind of upfront about that.

So, I think there’s a lack of transparency in both directions, employer and employee in these things, and I think everyone wins when there’s more transparency around this stuff. So, I think just be really clear about where you are in your process and it’s just really nice to give people a little bit of a time to find that replacement as well, especially in this environment.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Flipping the perspective a little bit, when you are the employer and you are looking to retain the talent, you mentioned some of the best practices of Intel, what are some of the other things that you find are really great things to do to help get people to stick around?

David Rock
One of the biggest motivators is feeling you’re making progress. There’s a whole book on that called The Progress Principle by Teresa Amabile. But it’s this feeling like you’re actually able to really do your best work, not just make progress but you’re able to really be proud of the work that you do, and know it really is your best work. There’s sort of nothing worse than getting home and saying, “I tried my best but, really, there are all these roadblocks in the way, and I did half the job I could’ve done,” or, “If only my colleagues had my back,” or, “If only I had this technology,” or, “I just didn’t get to look as good or hit it out of the park.” It’s frustrating.

So, I think helping people do their best work is really important. And the challenge with that is it’s very individual so managers will have to learn to ask questions about it. So, some really interesting data out recently, like there’s a whole conundrum about, “Where do you let people work now that the offices are opening up a bit?” But it turns out, there’s no one answer to that. About a third of people are saying there are productive places at home full time. It’s not just that they want to goof off. It’s actually where they work hardest to get the most done.

Now, some of them might also appreciate having more time with their kids and less pointless time driving and all sorts of things. But, literally, a third of people say they’re more productive working at home than anything else. About a third of people say they’re actually more productive working in the office, and that’s where they get the most done. Now, they might be extroverts, or they might not have conditions at home that are good, or they just might not have the discipline that they just end up distracted too much at home. So, you’ve got really different polarities there.

And so, as a manager, you want to help people work out where they do their best work but even when they do their best work. Some people, like their routine is such whether they have kids maybe, but they just do amazing work if they can start at 5:00 a.m., work through 8:00, take four hours off, and then do three hours in the afternoon. And they’ll do stellar work if they do that, and be healthy, and a good parent, and all these other things.

Other people, they’ll do stellar work if they start at lunchtime and go straight through till 8:00 p.m., That’s just how they work. They’re night owls. So, there’s the where you work, there’s the when you work, there’s, our research show, that who you work with and what you work on is even more important, even more motivating. Like, you can give people, this is back to autonomy, give people a little more control than they thought they might have over what they work on and who they work with, you actually get an even greater sense of engagement.

So, we’re coming back to autonomy a lot, but giving people more control over where they work, and when they work, and what they work on, and who they work with, these things are very intrinsically motivating. And, at the same time, how can you, as a manager, kind of remove roadblocks and give people the tools they need to really feel like they can do their best work? Those are a couple of the really big things we think.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. Well, tell me, David, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

David Rock
I think this is an incredible time to make big changes in how we work individually and for organizations. I think it’s a really interesting time because all our systems kind of that were very frozen forever are being kind of unfrozen, everything is sort of bit in flux. And as we start to open offices again and go back, before we fall on bad habits again, I think it’s a great time for companies and individuals to think about the habits they want to have, think about the kind of culture they want to have, think about the kind of team they want to be part of, all of this.

So, I think it’s a great time to be really intentional as we kind of transition into 2022. Let’s be really intentional about the kind of life we want to live as individuals, or the kind of culture we want to have as a company. And, for me, it’s really important to say this. Follow the science because the science is often different to our gut instinct. Follow the science and then experiment, and then follow the data. Follow the science, experiment, and follow the data, are three really important things as we move forward. Don’t just follow gut instinct.

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

David Rock
Theodore Zeldin, a philosopher at Oxford, one of my favorite authors, he often said, “When will we make the same breakthroughs in the way we relate to each other as we’ve made in technology?” So, that’s something that inspires me really often.

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

David Rock
I really like the study by Dan Gilbert. Dan is a professor at Harvard. He wrote the book Stumbling on Happiness, which is about the way we mis-predict what will make us happy in the future. We think that a big car, an hour in the suburbs will make us happy than a small apartment in the city. And it turns out, the ten hours a week of driving makes us miserable much more so than the space makes us happy.

So, anyway, he wrote this great book Stumbling on Happiness and he did this study a few years back, looking at kind of, “What are the different activities that make people happy?” And what he discovered was really surprising, was that about half the time people are literally not there mentally. The lights are on but no one’s home. They’re like in a meeting but they’re mentally in lunch tomorrow. Or, they’re supposedly working on a document but their mind is off on something else altogether.

So, about half, it’s about 48% of our waking hours, we are literally not present in what we’re doing. It’s such a fascinating finding and tells you why we need to kind of be reminded to have more of a growth mindset and kind of experiment a lot more because we’re just not present a lot of the time.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite book?

David Rock
A book that kind of changed my life a lot and sort of set me down the neuroscience path a lot was John Ratey’s book. It’s an old book now but it’s called A User’s Guide to the Brain. And I read that and read that and read that, and thumbed through that, for years and years and years. And it gave me like the first kind of really good dose of language about what was happening inside my head. And at some point, I said, “You know what, I really wish there was a version of this for doing work.” And there wasn’t, and I kind of ended up writing that book. That’s my book Your Brain at Work.

And, as self-serving as this is, I just re-read it and re-edited it, and ten years later, after I kind of originally read it, I actually got a lot out of it. So, that’s my second most favorite book, it’s my own book. It really helped me understand my brain, writing it. And even ten years later, even if it’s very late, I had to do it to kind of improve it. So, anything that sort of gives you language for what’s going on moment to moment in your brain, gives you an ability to be more mindful in a way because you’re paying attention to internal experiences and states so you’re literally more full of your mind. Your attention is on your mental process.

And these kinds of things end up having a similar effect as actual mindfulness training in that it reduces stress and gives you greater cognitive control and all these other things. So, I’m a big fan of learning about your brain as a way of being more adaptive in life and more effective in your career or as a manager.

Pete Mockaitis
And a favorite tool?

David Rock
I think my favorite tool is the hot tub, the jacuzzi. It’s a communication tool, and I’ve probably had one consistently for the last 20 years in everywhere that I’ve lived. I’ve made sure of it. And what I find is you get this unusual window of time where you’re super comfortable, super relaxed, where you can really have long deeper conversations, usually with my partner or with a close friend. It’s this kind of non-obvious conversation tool for having really good quality downtime. And I find, when I don’t have a hot tub around, we just don’t spend that kind of time really going deeper on things, whereas with the hot tub, you do. So, there you go, an unexpected tool.

Pete Mockaitis
And is there a key nugget you share that people seem to quote back to you often?

David Rock
“We tend to think about what’s easiest to think about rather than what’s right to think about.” Something I said in Your Brain at Work, and a lot of people quote that. We tend to think about whatever is easy to think about rather than what we actually should be focused on. And so, a lot of the intangible things don’t get enough attention over things that are just more tangible by kind of accident.

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

David Rock
A couple of places of work that I do with organizations, NeuroLeadership.com. Personally, DavidRock.net. My book, my most recent book is Your Brain at Work. You just look that up. You’ll find it everywhere. And easy to find me through DavidRock.net if you’re interested in all the different things I’m involved with.

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

David Rock
I think this is a great time to think about the next decade or so for yourself. The decisions you make right now about your career will last you five to ten years. So, I think this is a good time to think deeply about what inspires you, what motivates you, what you want to really spend your time and your attention on. A bit like the socks. Do you want to spend your attention on something that annoys you or do you want to spend your attention on something that really inspires you? So, I think it’s a great time to be thoughtful about how you want to spend the next decade or so.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. David, this has been a treat. Thank you and I wish you much luck and fun in your adventures.

David Rock
Thank you so much. Appreciate the opportunity.

This Podcast Will Help You Flourish At Work

Each week, I grill thought-leaders and results-getters to discover specific, actionable insights that boost work performance.

724: How to Master Your Executive Presence with Muriel Wilkins

Muriel Wilkins Interview Transcript

723: The Crucial Perspectives of Effective Leaders with Daniel Harkavy

Daniel Harkavy Interview Transcript

722: How to Hire and Get Hired Masterfully with Lou Adler

Lou Adler Interview Transcript

721: How to Balance Caregiving with Your Career with Liz O’Donnell

Liz O'Donnell Interview Transcript

720: Navigating the Great Resignation with Dr. David Rock

Dr. David Rock Interview Transcript

Subscribe To The Podcast