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KF #38. Optimizes Work Processes Archives - Page 9 of 12 - How to be Awesome at Your Job

Jul 16
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321: Making Meetings Meaningful with Mamie Kanfer Stewart

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Mamie Stewart says: "It's really everybody's responsibility to have an effective meeting."

Mamie Stewart shares her expertise in planning (and declining!) meetings, substitutes to the traditional meetings, and making meetings more beneficial and productive for everyone.

You’ll Learn:

  1. How to decline a meeting so well, that they may just thank you for doing so
  2. Ideal alternatives to meetings
  3. Best practices for achieving your expected outcome in meetings

About Mamie

Mamie Kanfer Stewart is the author of Momentum: Creating Effective, Engaging, and Enjoyable Meetings. Her company, Meeteor, helps teams and organizations build healthy meeting culture. As a coach, speaker, writer, and trainer, Mamie has helped thousands of people improve their meetings and how they collaborate. Mamie has been featured in Forbes, Inc, and Fast Company. She is a regular contributor on The Price of Business and is the host of The Modern Manager podcast.

Items Mentioned in this Show:

Mamie Stewart Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Mamie, thanks so much for joining us here on the How To Be Awesome At Your Job podcast.

Mamie Stewart
Thank you so much for having me, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I want to hear first and foremost about, you do piano sing-alongs on a regular basis. What is the story here?

Mamie Stewart
Yeah, I love piano sing-alongs. I grew up playing piano, and I kind of played on and off, but in total probably about 13 years of lessons. But I never quite got into classical music, and even jazz wasn’t quite the thing for me, although I studied both for many years. And then about 10 years ago we were on a family business trip and we were in a bar, and one of our customers was playing the piano and everyone was singing along. And I was just watching the scene – I was in my mid 20s at the time – and I was like, “I want to be that person at the piano. I want to create this environment for other people. That looks like so much fun.”
So, I went home from that trip and I started playing again, and I play using guitar chords. So I use lyrics with guitar chords and I can figure out the melody in my right hand – I took enough lessons that the piano’s a really intuitive instrument for me. And now I basically only play pop songs and the whole family gets together. And we do it for parties, we’ll do it just hanging around the house with my kids and my cousins and my nieces and nephews. And we just went on another family business trip a couple of weeks ago and we did it on the business trip. And it was really fun watching my dad, because he was so proud of me. And it was really fun to be there with all of our customers again and I was actually that person at the piano, making the music happen.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, that’s great. It just sounds so wholesome, in terms of family fun, as opposed to everyone’s on their iPad, zoning out in their own little worlds.

Mamie Stewart
Yeah, it’s really incredible when people come together like that. And I used to hate the piano because it felt like such as solo instrument to me. It’s always tucked in the corner and you can’t take it with you and sit around a bonfire. And so for a long time I didn’t like it as the instrument that I was good at. And I really wanted to learn guitar, which I since have, but actually play a lot more piano than guitar, because the power of the piano to bring people together to sing like that is just amazing. And it’s so fun when everybody’s crowded around and leaning over my shoulder and screaming out what songs they want next. It’s a lot of fun, and fun for all ages.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, it sounds like an effective meeting, if I may. How’s that for a segway?

Mamie Stewart
Nice.

Pete Mockaitis
So you’ve got a company Meeteor – clever name, like meteor with two Es before the first E. So, what’s it all about?

Mamie Stewart
So, Meeteor is all about meetings, obviously. And we used to be a technology company, and now we are more of a training and coaching and consulting company. So, we focus primarily on helping organizations and teams build effective meeting practices. And we do that by offering trainings and courses and workshops, and through coaching. So we work with a lot of teams to help them think about their collaboration practices from a broader perspective, of which meetings is one of them. But then really thinking about, what are the kinds of meetings that you’re having and how do you implement those effective meeting practices?

Pete Mockaitis
Excellent, thank you. Okay, so I want to touch on that point right there. You said you were a technology company and so you were doing software. Now you’re not. So maybe we could just quickly hit that point. What’s your take on the pros, cons, limitations of, and what’s available when it comes to meeting apps?

Mamie Stewart
So, I love technology. I’m not a technologist, I don’t know how to code. I tried it once and it was not for me. But I really believe in the power of technology to help us do our best work. And when it comes to meetings, when you have to plan an agenda, and you need to take notes, and you want that information to be available in lots of different places to all the different stakeholders that need to be informed of meetings’ outcomes, technology is wonderful. So, it can simplify and streamline your process, do wonderful things.
And there are quite a few good meeting apps that exist right now. So, a couple of them, if people are interested – BeNote is a great one, Instant Agenda, Lucid Meetings, Wisembly Jam. There’s a whole bunch out there and they’re all different. They all have a unique kind of perspective. Some of them feel a bit more corporate, some of them feel a little bit more cool and hip, some of them have more structure where they help you build an agenda using the different buckets that you need to think through, some of them are more free-flow. So they’re kind of all over the place, but it’s really about what you need to integrate with your own technology and what you need as a meeting planner or participant to get the most out of your meetings.

Pete Mockaitis
Right. I was just imagining – and this maybe exists, so you tell me – that it would be interesting in a meeting… Because I’ve been there – it’s just like, “This particular content is not at all relevant to me in any way, shape or form.” And so in a way it’s as though this segment of the meeting I could just not be at. And so I thought it would be interesting if there was maybe a live slider on an app that you could just move from 0% to 100%, like, “This is relevant and I’m into this” versus, “Not at all.” And so I guess you’d need to maybe have that in a dedicated device or something, not full of other distractions, which would cause its own set of problems. But tell me, Mamie, does that exist?

Mamie Stewart
Not that I know of, although I’m wondering if the reason it doesn’t exist is because everybody would always be on, “This isn’t relevant for me.”

Pete Mockaitis
Well, but I think that’s valuable information, especially if you’re taking seriously the cost of your meetings and saying, “Oh, okay. Duly noted. Let’s have fewer people in these meetings.” So yeah, I guess they don’t want to hear the hard truth: “I’m a boring presenter and / or I have convened a meeting that is wasting everybody’s time.”

Mamie Stewart
Yeah, and unfortunately that’s often how we see it – it’s never my meeting that’s the terrible one; it’s the meeting I have to go to that’s so bad. Yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
There we go. Look in the mirror.

Mamie Stewart
Exactly. It’s the reason we work with teams, because it’s really everybody’s responsibility to have an effective meeting. So if you go to a meeting that you shouldn’t be at, that’s on you too. It’s not just, “Oh well, I was invited to a meeting. I have to show up.” And if you’re planning a meeting, you’ve got to be on it too. You’ve got to be thinking a lot about who are the right people. And there are many practices. I know this isn’t rocket science, but there are clear steps you can walk through to figure out, is a meeting the right next step, and who should be there?

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, now your book Momentum covers a number of these principles. Maybe first and foremost we’ll set a little bit of the “Why” or the stage, in terms of, to what extent are poor meetings just terribly destructive and sabotaging companies’ and organizations’ efficiencies? My hunch is, the answer’s “A lot”, but if you could maybe contextualize that and see, is it just a little bit a lot, or a lot a lot a lot?

Mamie Stewart
Well, the problems with meetings are quite vast and really varied. So, they are costing people their energy, right? Everybody has been to a meeting and you walk out of it and you’re feeling so drained and frustrated. It was a waste of time. You have so many other things to do, now you’re going to have to work late. That is a real cost on people, and it’s a cost for the company.
And we can’t always quantify that but I’d say it’s a cost in lost productivity, and it’s definitely a cost in engagement, which companies are thinking a lot about: “How do we increase employee engagement?” And the number of engagement right now is very low. It’s something in the 20% or 30% of employees who report being engaged at work. And when you’re going to 5, 10, 20, 30 meetings a week, that has a big impact on how you feel about the company and the work that you’re doing. So that’s one form.
Another form is around the finances. So if you’re thinking about it from the value that you’re paying your people to be there – if you have a 5-person meeting and each person is being paid $50 an hour – that’s a $250 meeting. And most of us don’t think about meetings that way, but every hour you spend, it’s not just one hour. It’s actually five man hours if there are five people. And that can trickle down to the bottom line and it can be quantified in finance. And there are some online tools – if you just search “cost of meetings”, you’ll find different calculators to help you figure out how much are meetings actually costing you financially.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes. And I guess owning my own business I think about every hour of myself in this way. And so, if I’m in a terrible meeting, I try to be a nice guy, but I feel it – it’s like, “You are stealing money from me right now.” [laugh] In terms of, there are so many value-creating things I could be doing in these minutes, other than this. And so, I don’t know, I’ve yet to just exit, abort mission, like ejector seat, “I’m out of here.” But maybe that’s the right answer. So tell us a little bit of that, when it comes to, you say there are a number of tools when it comes to determining who should be at the meeting and should you be at the meeting. To begin with maybe, is the meeting even the appropriate choice for what we’re trying to accomplish here?

Mamie Stewart
Alright, so we’ll start at the beginning. So, if you’re planning a meeting, the first thing you want to do is figure out the desired outcome for that meeting. And we call it “desired outcome” because it really is the outcome or the result that the meeting is going to achieve, not the activity the meeting is going to be doing. So we often think about meetings by asking ourselves the question, “Why are we having this meeting?” And it’s kind of natural to answer, “To discuss, to brainstorm, to consider, to problem-solve.”
And those are all wonderful things to do in the meeting, but they’re not outcomes. So at the end of the meeting, if you ask yourself, “Did we achieve our brainstorm? Did we achieve some problem-solving? – yeah, you could say that we had a great discussion and yeah, we dug in and we thought about solutions and we problem-solved, but that doesn’t tell you if it was a productive meeting. It doesn’t actually tell you what the meeting achieved, and whether or not that helped move work forward. So, we focus on a desired outcome and we ask the question, “At the end of this meeting, what will you have achieved? What will be there?”
It’ll be something like a list of potential ideas for further investigation, or a decision that’s made and agreed upon, or a plan for the next three months with clear metrics for success, or alignment on this complicated information that we need to have a shared agreement on how to move forward. It can be written in millions of different ways, depending on what the meeting needs to accomplish, but you’re focusing on that outcome.

Pete Mockaitis
I think my least favorite outcome that I’ve heard for a meeting is, “To just kind of see where we’re at.” And I suppose maybe there’s a kernel of something that’s workable into a valid outcome there, in terms of, like you said – we truly do need to have an understanding of who is doing what and where it stands, in order to come up with, I guess, the true outcome would be, the plan going forward, or an elimination of redundant efforts, would be the success for that meeting.

Mamie Stewart
Yes, and that does happen on occasion. We say meetings that are about sharing information usually aren’t meant to be meetings. So there are lots of different ways and alternatives to meetings, so we can talk about those for a minute. You can send an email if it’s just, “Here’s some information you all need to know. Here’s an email that explains it.”
If you need people’s input on something but you don’t actually need them to interact together, you can write up a memo or have a shared document of some sort, put it online and ask for people to give input. And they can leave comments and edits and ask questions, but they can do it on their own time and you don’t have to bring them together in a room to do that.
You can also use chatting tools or other different forums, and even an alternative to a group meeting is lots of small one-on-one meetings. So, instead of me bringing five people together and taking an hour for the six of us to meet, I could go around and have a one-on-one with each of those people and spend 10 minutes with five people. I’m still spending 50 minutes of my time, but they’re only dedicating 10 minutes to me.
So I’ve saved them 50 minutes, because I went one-on-one, because I didn’t really need them all to be in the room together. I just needed to get their input on something. And it was maybe too complicated to send in a document, or maybe it’s too important and I really want to make sure that they understand what it is I’m sending and I want to talk to them face-to-face. So there are lots of ways to communicate besides meetings.

Pete Mockaitis
So I love that – those many alternatives to meetings. Another one I’m thinking about is just a survey, in terms of, “I need your input.” Maybe you’re commenting on the document or maybe you’re just filling out a survey with SurveyMonkey or Google Forms or Typeform, which I think is so cool. These are handy ways to collect that.
But what really blew my mind there is that one-on-one approach. Not only mathematically is that saving huge cost, in terms of everyone together versus one at a time, but it’s also in many circumstances likely to improve the input that you’re collecting, because people are not sort of censoring themselves like, “Uh-oh, I don’t want to offend these other four people in the room by stepping on their toes or making them think that I thought that their work was lame or that I’m questioning their judgement or their smarts”, or whatever. So you could not only save time, but even get superior input and build better relationships all in one fell swoop by having multiple one-on-one meetings versus the longer group meeting. That’s huge.

Mamie Stewart
Absolutely. Many times it’s even easier to schedule, because finding an hour for everyone to overlap can be really hard, but finding 10 minutes with each person, especially if you’re using a tool like Mixmax or Calendly or a couple of other scheduling tools, where you just send them your link and they grab 10 or 15 minutes on your calendar – it is so much easier to get those 10 or 15 minutes with people individually than trying to find an hour where you all overlap.

Pete Mockaitis
I love it. So then, we talked about when a meeting is appropriate and the alternatives to the meeting to achieve those aims. I’d love to get your take, if we’re on the receiving end of a meeting request and you’re having a heck of a time seeing how that is helpful for you to be there, or even it’s maybe slightly helpful but kind of way down low on your priority list, compared to the other, much more compelling things for adding value for the organization or achieving the key goals, etcetera. How do you do that dance in which you are declining a meeting, particularly if it comes from someone with higher power or authority or title in the organization? It seems like it may not be the right answer to say, “Nah, I’m out.” [laugh]

Mamie Stewart
I wish we could do that, but no, most of us can’t do that. There are there a bunch of different ways you can approach it. So first is, if you don’t know what the meeting is about and what the meeting is meant to achieve or why you were asked to be there, you should absolutely ask.
And it is totally okay to say, “I would really like to make sure that I’m prepared for this meeting. I’m not 100% sure what I can do to be ready, or what value, or why you’ve asked me to attend, or what perspective you want me to bring. I really want to be ready for this meeting. Can you tell me what the meeting is going to achieve, so that I can make sure I have all the information ahead of time or anything else I need to be prepared for?” So basically making yourself look like a wonderful employees who’s saying, “I want to make sure that this is a good use of your time as the meeting leader. What can I do to prepare? Can you give me more information about this meeting?” So that’s one approach.
On the same token you can also offer, “This is my understanding of what this meeting is about. Am I understanding this correctly?” So, “It’s my understanding that this meeting is going to be planning for the next quarter and making some decisions about budget allocation. Is that correct? And if yes, is there anything I need to be doing to prepare for that?” So if you want to offer something up, you can say, “Here’s an idea of what this meeting might be about. Is that correct?” So that’s one way.
If you’re not comfortable going directly to the meeting leader for any reason, especially if it’s not your boss – if it’s maybe from a different department or another colleague and you just don’t feel like they’re going to be receptive to that – if you can go to your manager… And again, even if it is the manager’s meeting, you can still go to them with this perspective, which is, “I was invited to this meeting and I have these other priorities that I know are really important to the team or the organization. Can you help me prioritize here? I’m not sure what is most important. Do you really need me to be in this meeting or do you think that this meeting is important, or can you talk to the meeting leader because I’m really trying to balance all these things and I don’t want to drop any balls?”
So again, now you’re asking for help from your manager, but you’re saying, “I want to do this all. It’s not that I’m trying to get out of work; it’s that I want to keep the quality of work high. I want to make sure that my priorities are aligned with the team of the organization’s priorities as well.”

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, that’s great. You say, “Hey, what’s the goal? How can we be prepared? What can I do to be in great shape for this?”

Mamie Stewart
I have yet to have anyone come back and tell me that it didn’t work. I think most of the experiences I’ve had is hearing from people saying, “Once I came and I asked and I said, ‘What is this meeting all about?’, most managers who are calling meetings, or most meeting leaders actually know what they want to accomplish.
It’s already in their head; it’s why they called the meeting. It’s just that they didn’t communicate it. So it’s not that they are being thoughtless and like, “Oh, let’s just have a meeting for the sake of it.” They have something in their head they want to do. They just haven’t explained it or put it in writing or told anybody else. So, they’re most likely going to come back and say, “This meeting we’re going to talk about this customer and our strategy for how to handle them.” And then you can have another conversation.
If you realize if you’re thinking, “I don’t know that I need to be in this conversation”, that’s a different conversation, because you can say, “Now I know what this meeting is about and I’m not 100% sure that you need me for this meeting. I have a lot on my plate. Is there something I can provide ahead of time, any information I can share ahead of time about this client?”, or whatever the meeting’s about. And you can also let them know, “If I don’t attend, I am aligned with whatever outcomes you guys decide on and I accept any tasks that you allocate to me.” Now you have to be willing to go with that if you’re going to say it, but you’re basically trying to get out of the meeting by saying, “I’m willing to go with the group and I’m willing to take on responsibility for whatever decisions are made.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, that’s a nice one. I like it. Okay, so then I’m wondering about large meetings, in terms of the whole department or the whole company or the whole team, in terms of, I think some folks have some bad habits when it comes to enjoying having everybody around when it may not particularly be value-added. Sometimes I think there’s some sort of emotional, familial dimensions to the game. What are your thoughts on those?

Mamie Stewart
There’s definitely a thing about inviting lots of people to meetings as a way to build relationships, and I’ve seen this multiple times. A lot of teams use their standing weekly meeting or their all-department or all-hands meetings as ways to build relationships and connection with each other and with the company, rather than for whatever said purpose they’re actually trying to achieve. They’ll say, “This is our weekly meeting. We’re going to go over what everybody’s up to” or, “We’re going to report out the numbers.” But really they’re only doing that because they’re subconsciously trying to create a sense of connection between people or between the organization.
And there are wonderful ways to make connection that don’t involve bringing a bunch of people together to sit through really boring report outs. So, I’ve talked to a number of different team who’ve tackled this in different ways. Some of them have started after-work get-togethers, some of them will go on a one-day team building retreat and just have fun, some will do lunch and learns.
I love this one story about a company – they started a book club that was an opt-in. So you didn’t have to read the book, but if you wanted to, you could. But anybody would show up for one lunch every month, and whoever had read however much, and then they just talked about it. And it was a chance for them to talk about something that wasn’t work-related, and get to know people in a different way. And they chose all kinds of books – fiction books, business books, books on the future of work – all kinds of cool stuff. And sometimes only one person had read it and sometimes they all did. But it didn’t matter because it wasn’t about the book; it was just about getting together and enjoying lunch and being humans.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s great. It’s to provide superior alternatives that meet that objective all the better, in a more fun, energizing sort of a way. I dig it. Okay, so enough about getting out of meetings. Let’s say when a meeting is occurring – what are the key steps after you’ve identified the outcome you’re after, to really have some best practices and productive meetings flowing?

Mamie Stewart
Alright, so you’ve identified the desired outcome, and now you want to think about the structure of the meeting and who needs to be there. So, for the structure of the meeting, there are a lot of different flows. What activities are you going to do? How much time do you need to allocate? Are you going to break people into small groups or is it always going to be one big discussion? Are you going to have any pre-material for people to consume so that when they come in they’re ready to jump into the content and you don’t have to spend the first 20 minutes getting them up to speed?
So there’s a whole bunch of things you can do around structuring an agenda that will help you make sure that the meeting achieves the desired outcome. But again, if you don’t know the outcome, you can’t really design an agenda to achieve it. So you’ve got to start with that outcome.
And then in terms of the people, it’s the same thing. If you know what you’re trying to achieve, you can think through, who needs to be in this meeting to get to that outcome? And I’ve heard from multiple people that they’ll have a wonderful conversation and they’ll get to the end of the meeting, and then they realize that the key decision-maker isn’t there. And so then they have to have another meeting with the key decision-maker, in which the key decision-maker asks all the same questions and wants to go through all the same options that the group already discussed. So they basically have to have a repeat of that meeting.
And it’s really unfortunate, because if the meeting leader had been really thoughtful about who needs to be in this meeting to get to that outcome… If you know that the outcome is a decision and not a recommendation, then you want to make sure that you’ve invited the right people. And sometimes you do invite them and they decline – then you need to reschedule. If that key decision-maker says, “I can’t make it to this meeting”, because usually they’re upper management and their schedules change and they get busy – don’t have the meeting without them. It’s okay to have a meeting without some people, and there are other people who are critical who need to be there.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes. I’m thinking back to someone I know who mentioned in his career he had a rule for his meetings attendance, which was that he always insisted that there be a clear outcome and a decision-maker present, and he would walk out of meetings if those two criteria were not met, which is bold. But point well taken, that if that’s your objective, it is impossible to achieve some objectives without certain people there. So yeah, don’t go there if you don’t have the key people in the room.

Mamie Stewart
Yeah. And I’ve actually seen people walk out of meetings before because they’ve realized it’s not a good use of their time. And In some cultures that really will not fly, and in other cultures it’s totally acceptable. Even if it’s never been done before, you have to know the vibe of your people, you have to know the culture of your company and the style of your team. But I’ve seen people say, “This discussion’s really interesting, but I’m realizing it’s not actually very relevant to my work. So if this is the only topic we’re going to cover for the remainder of the meeting, I’d actually just like to get back to my other work, because I don’t really think you need me.”
And teams will be like, “Okay, that sounds fine.” And sometimes they’ll say, “Actually no, there’s another topic. Maybe we should flip the order and talk about that one now, because you need to be here.” And I’ve actually done that in meetings where I’ve looked at the agenda and I’ve said, “The thing they really need me for isn’t till the end of the meeting. So is it okay if I show up halfway through instead of starting at the beginning and sitting through the first half of the agenda that they don’t need me for?”

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good, absolutely. Well, I’d love to get your take then, when you’re in the heat of the meeting, what are some pro tips for keeping that conversation moving toward the outcome that you’re trying to hit?

Mamie Stewart
This has got to be one of the hardest things, is being in a meeting and watching it go off tracks and feeling like there’s nothing I can do about it. We actually just wrote an article about this on our media blog, so you can check it out there. But there are a couple of approaches, and I want to reiterate – this isn’t easy stuff. I was actually just in a meeting with about 20 people; I was not leading it.
And I was watching this debate unfold and it was really souring the energy of the room and it was painful to watch. And I was sending vibes to this one person being like, “Please stop talking. Please stop hammering on this. We really need to move on.” And afterwards I was like, “Oh my gosh, I was totally that person who saw this meeting crashing and I didn’t do anything.” And this is my business; I should be the first one to jump in.
So I want to reiterate – this is not easy stuff, but there are things you can do. So, some of the things that we recommend – and coaches have to coach themselves too – so some of the things I recommend are, one, asking a question. So questions open up thinking in a way that statements don’t. So if you’re interrupting and saying, “It seems like this conversation has gone off track” – you’re kind of asserting a judgment in a way that other people might respond with like, “Stop interrupting us; we’re having a conversation here.”
But if instead you ask a question, like, “I’m listening to what you’re all saying and I’m trying to connect how this train of thought is going to help us achieve our outcome. So I’m not suggesting we stop; I’m just trying to understand the connection.” Now you’re actually asking people to respond and say, “Oh, how is this helping us achieve our outcome? Oh, maybe it’s not. Maybe we could table this for later.” So you can use questions to guide a conversation.
Another approach is to just suggest that it gets taken off the table right away. So this is what I wish I would have done. I wish I would have said in that meeting, “This is a really important conversation that we’re having right now. I don’t think it’s the most important conversation for this whole group to be having. I’m wondering if we could have a subgroup tackle this topic after the meeting ends, or maybe next week when we can find time to get together. But I feel like we have a bunch of people in this room that this conversation isn’t relevant for.”
And that’s also what happens, is when conversations go off track, it’s maybe a few people who are interested in the topic and you start getting into the weeds, but it’s actually not relevant for the whole group, or it’s not going to help you get to that outcome. And that conversation doesn’t need to stop; it just doesn’t need to happen right then. It needs to be taken offline for a different meeting or a different conversation.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely, thank you. Well, now, any thoughts when it comes to doing the capturing of the notes and the actions and the follow-up activities?

Mamie Stewart
Oh yes. So nobody loves taking notes. At least I haven’t met anybody who says they love taking notes. It’s not a fun job, it often can feel very administrative, but taking good notes in a meeting is a really wonderful skill. And you can develop this skill by practicing. But it’s hard to get engage and take notes and maybe help facilitate and keep things on track, so it can be a lot one person to do. So, if you’re not in that boat of, “I want to learn to take good notes and it’s going to be a thing that I do all the time, is take meeting notes”, another approach that we recommend for teams is to take notes as a team.
So during the course of the meeting, everybody is responsible for writing down key information. If you hear a decision that’s made, write it down. If you hear a next step that’s called out, write it down. If you hear a big idea or important information or something that’s relevant for you, write it down. And at the end of the meeting, you reserve the last five minutes to do a wrap-up. And one person pulls up some sort of digital document – could be an email, could be a meeting tool that you’re using, could be a Google Doc. It doesn’t really matter; we just suggest that it be digital so it can be shared easily. And you type up the notes together.
So you do a little round robin and you say, “Okay, who captured a decision?” Or ask the group, “What decisions did we make today?” And people will call it out, and one person types it up. And you build the notes together so that at the end of that five minutes, at the end of the meeting, you have now notes that everybody’s agreed upon, because they all sat there and built them together.
And it’s instantly shareable, so even people who weren’t in the meeting can be informed of the meeting’s outcomes. So if you were that person who opted out of the meeting because you didn’t feel like it was important for you to be there, but you actually do need to know what came out of the meeting – if there was a decision made that affects your work – it can be instantly shared.

Pete Mockaitis
I dig it, thank you. Well, tell me, Mamie – any other key things you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Mamie Stewart
Just that meetings can be really fun. Meetings have such a bad rap and it’s not their fault. Meetings are really a wonderful way to come together and be with your peers and your people and build culture and move work forward. And it does take some effort, it does take some thinking, but that’s why I wrote the book and that’s why my business exists, because we can help people do it. It’s not rocket science. It takes a little bit of knowledge, a little bit of skill, and mostly a lot of effort, a willingness to say, “I’m going to do something about this. I’m not going to let meetings get in my way anymore. I’m not going to let them be this big distraction. They’re not a necessary evil of business”, and putting forth the effort to say, “I’m going to change this.”

Pete Mockaitis
Excellent, thank you. Alright, now could you share with us a favorite quote, something that you find inspiring?

Mamie Stewart
Yeah, so I have a piece of artwork that hangs in my office by a fantastic artist, Shannon Finnegan. And it’s double-sided. And one side says, “Change is impossible”, and the other side says, “Change is inevitable.” And I love it. As soon as I saw it in the gallery I was like, “I have to have that”, because I find that that is kind of the constant state of being of feeling like, “Oh my gosh, changing people’s behavior, trying to impact how people work, all of those things – it just feels impossible sometimes.”
Our habits and our behaviors are so ingrained to who we are and how we think that it’s impossible to change. And yet, we’re always changing. We’re never really static people; we’re constantly learning and growing and evolving. And so this dynamic tension that exists within change is just something I love and think about a lot.

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

Mamie Stewart
So I’ve been thinking a lot about this when you sent that question, and I kind of came to two conclusions because I listen to a lot of audio books and I read a lot. And I love the Center for Creative Leadership – they do a lot of different research, but I just love their work. And it’s not a particular study, but the research that’s been done on the impact of sleep on productivity and how important it is to get healthy sleep, and the diminishing returns that come from working long hours.
As an entrepreneur I started in the mindset of, “You have to work crazy hours and do everything you can to make this business succeed, and you need to drive your employees to get the most out of them.” And that just wasn’t me, and it didn’t really work for me. And when I started reading some of the research about the importance of sleep and work / life balance and all these things, like, “Yeah, that makes a lot more sense. I don’t want to work 15 hours a day. I have two little kids and a husband who I love and I want to be with. And I’m not going to do that.” And if I’m not doing it, I’m definitely not making my employees do it.

Pete Mockaitis
Alright. And how about a favorite book?

Mamie Stewart
For managers I love the book Radical Candor. I’m sure you’ve heard this one before.

Pete Mockaitis
We had Kim on the show.

Mamie Stewart
Yeah, and she’s wonderful. It’s just a great book. I really love it. And for non-work-related stuff, I love the book Zero: The History of a Dangerous Idea. It’s about the concept “zero” and the history of this idea within mathematics and in life, that there could be nothingness. And there was a time where in math there wasn’t a concept of zero because you couldn’t have zero. Zero was not a tangible thing that you could have. You could have one, but you couldn’t have zero. And once zero became part of the world, it opened up math in a phenomenal way. It allowed for negative numbers and imaginary numbers and all kinds of cool stuff that we didn’t always have before that.

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you. And how about a favorite tool?

Mamie Stewart
Well, I already said that I love technology, and I love apps. So a couple of my favorites are Mixmax – I use it for my email and I use it for scheduling, and just it’s a great tool. And I have an app on my phone called Forest, which allows me to grow a tree to keep me from using my phone. Now at work I almost never use it because I don’t get distracted by my phone at work, but when I’m at home with my kids, it’s this horrible thing that I do because it’s like, “I’m so bored playing dolls, I think I’m just going to get my phone up.”
So, my kids now know and they will tell me, “Mommy, let’s play. Can you grow a tree?” And I’ll open up my phone and I will set a timer for the tree to grow in 30 minutes. And basically every time I open up my phone, it asks me if I want to kill my tree, and I say, “No, I don’t want to kill my tree. I want to play with my kids.” And so I will put my phone back down. So, it’s a great tool to keep you from being distracted by your phone.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh wow. And how about a favorite habit?

Mamie Stewart
I love habits. So, one of my favorites is to make a checklist of what you want to get done every day. So, sitting down every morning, and whether you have a to-do list that you’re pulling from or it’s just all kept in your brain – however you keep yourself organized – being really intentional, just like with a meeting, know what is it that you want to achieve in that day, and make a little checklist for yourself. It helps you stay focused, and that sense of satisfaction when you check everything off feels really good. And if you didn’t get to everything, you could even do a little mini reflection. So, I’ll often look and say, “Where did I get distracted?” or, “How did I either underestimate or overestimate how much time something was going to take?”

Pete Mockaitis
And tell me, is there a particular number of things you have on this to-do list? Some people say, “The five most important things, the three most important things, the two most important things”, or “No more than two hours’ worth.” How do you gauge that?

Mamie Stewart
I’m not a fan of arbitrary rules. The same thing happens with meetings – people say, “I like the ‘two pizza rule’. You should never have more than X number of people” or, “Meetings should never be more than 20 minutes”, or whatever. I don’t know, I don’t subscribe to those things. I feel like arbitrary rules maybe are general rules of thumb that can help, but they don’t actually get to the underlying problem.
And so, if you’re being really intentional, it’s not about how many things are on your to-do list; it’s about what you have the capacity to do that day. So when I look at my calendar and I see I only have an hour of time today where I’m not in scheduled meetings – what am I going to do in that one hour? What’s the biggest priority?
And it might only be one thing – it might be writing the outline for my next episode of The Modern Manager, or it might be working on the proposal for the client that I’m courting. If I have six hours available in a day, it’s a totally different list. So it really just depends, and each activity takes a different amount of time. So you have to be thoughtful. I don’t think it’s helpful to just say, “I’m going to pick three things to do”, because that might not be enough and it might be too many.

Pete Mockaitis
Got it. And Mamie, tell me – is there a particular thing that when you’re sharing your wisdom, really seems to connect and resonate and get folks nodding and re-tweeting and quoting yourself back to you?

Mamie Stewart
Well, we talked about it a lot today, which was the desired outcome. That is definitely the number one thing that I talk about, it’s the number one thing I suggest people do. So, if you’re only going to do one thing after listening to this podcast, look at your calendar and for any meetings that you’re planning, write a desired outcome, or for any meetings that you’re attending, ask yourself, “What do I think the desired outcome is of this meeting?” And if you’re not clear, go ask someone about it.

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

Mamie Stewart
So you can find all my information on my website, which is MamieKS.com. So you can get my email there, you can find information on my book, you can find my Facebook and Twitter accounts, all that good stuff.

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

Mamie Stewart
Yeah. So, definitely do that desired outcome thing I just talked about. And secondly – it’s kind of broad, but take ownership of your meetings. Whether you’re planning them or attending them, you have the responsibility and you have the capability to make them productive. So, stop looking at meetings as this necessary evil, as this horrible thing that’s going to waste your time, and start looking at them as an opportunity to get work done.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, I love it. Mamie, thank you so much for taking this time and sharing the goods. I wish you and Momentum and Meeteor all the success in the world!

Mamie Stewart
Thank you so much. It’s been a pleasure.

Apr 04
0

282: How to Manage Your Attention and Your Priorities with Neen James

By | Podcasts | No Comments

 

Neen James says: "We can't manage time, but we can manage our attention."

Neen James shares best practices for directing our attention toward meaningful priorities.

You’ll Learn:

  1. The fifteen minutes per day that can change everything
  2. Strategies for selecting the worthiest goals
  3. How we often fail to pay good attention to people

About Neen

Neen James is the author of Folding Time™ and Attention Pays™. Named one of Top 30 Leadership Speakers by Global Guru several years in a row because of her work with companies including Viacom, Comcast, and Abbot Pharmaceuticals.

Boundless energy, quick-witted with powerful strategies for paying attention to what matters, Neen shares how to get more done and create more significant moments at work, and home.

Items Mentioned in this Show:

Neen James Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Neen, thanks for joining us here on the How To Be Awesome At Your Job podcast.

Neen James
G’day. What a privilege to be on your show. I love this podcast.
Pete Mockaitis
Well, thank you. I’m so flattered to be chatting but we met in person a couple years ago in Orlando, and my how the time flies.
Neen James
My goodness. That was several years ago. Your memory is incredible.
Pete Mockaitis
Well, you were very memorable.
Neen James
[Laugh] You’re sweet. That’ll definitely get you points, just for the record.
Pete Mockaitis
Sure. We could flatter each other but I want to get going a little bit. I learned about you that you love fast cars. What’s the story here?
Neen James
Oh my gosh. I love speed and I love the glamour of things like F-1. Formula 1 cars that are insane, right? I love the speed, I love the precision. I love the excitement and I love driving fast cars too. So, I love watching them and I also love driving them.
Pete Mockaitis
So now, do you drive these fast cars? Where do you drive them where you can drive them fast enough, or do you just make do with the speed limit suggestions?
Neen James
Yeah, I’m so fortunate to not get too many speeding tickets. My husband and I live in a beautiful part of Pennsylvania called Bucks County and they have some stunning roads. It’s not even about necessarily the speed in the back roads, Pete. It’s about how beautiful the journey is, but I do love being in a gorgeous fast car too.
Pete Mockaitis
Interesting. Have you seen the Netflix series “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee” with Jerry Seinfeld?
Neen James
Yes. [laugh]
Pete Mockaitis
I just wondered, who is this for? Who likes all of those things? I like comedians, I like cars and I like coffee. Here’s the show for me.
Neen James
For you and me, that show is perfect.
Pete Mockaitis
I guess they did their research. Netflix, they’re good with their data. Hopefully we’re going to get the direct to consumer insights shortly on the program. We’ll see. We’ve been back and forth, but very cool. Speaking of the use of attention, how’s that for a segue from Netflix. You’ve got this book coming out called Attention Pays. Very clever. Rather than Pay Attention, Attention Pays. Tell us, what’s the main idea and what’s it all about? Why is it important?
Neen James
The reason it’s so important Pete, let’s start with that. It’s because we’re living in this time where we are more distracted than we’ve ever been before. Technology has changed the pace at which we work and we feel what I call in the book, the “over trilogy” – which is overwhelmed, overstressed and overtired, and so many of our listeners can relate to at least one or all of those things. What I’ve realized is we can’t manage time, but we can manage our attention. So what I created through the research and interviews and all my speeches and all the great time I get to spend with my clients and in my executive mentoring, I realized that we pay attention three ways.
Personally, it’s about who we pay attention to and that’s being thoughtful. Professionally, it’s about what we pay attention to and that’s being productive. And globally, it’s about how we pay attention in the world and that’s about being responsible; personally, professionally and globally. The book shares hundreds of strategies that every person in their professional career … and it doesn’t matter if they are working inside a big organization like so many of your listeners, or whether they work for themselves. This will apply.
Pete Mockaitis
Okay, well. Boy, are you a keynoter perchance laying it out in three key elements?
Neen James
You better believe it.
Pete Mockaitis
All right. I’m intrigued to dig into each of those but first, I’d love it if maybe you could orient us a bit in terms of … you mentioned that technology, it’s happening and things are changing. It’s fast paced and all this information and all that, sure. I guess I’m curious to hear just what kind of a difference does it make if you are a master of your attention versus you’re, I guess at the mercy of whoever wants your attention.
Neen James
Let me give you an example of one of my clients. I have the privilege of working with Comcast. I was with the leadership team and what we decided to do was we decided to set them a challenge. Could they invest fifteen minutes in a strategic appointment with themselves every day to master their own attention, identify their top three not negotiable activities? Before their head hits the pillow tonight, what’s their three? The reason we did this with this leadership team is they were responsible for a very large budget with a very large team. We realized that their attention was being pulled in hundreds of directions. I’m sure your listeners can relate to that. What was fascinating about this particular case study that we did was every single leader told me, as a result of investing their attention for fifteen minutes a day, their team development went up, their sales went up and they became the top performing team in the region. This is amazing to me … in their company, my apologies.
What’s amazing to me is that that fifteen minutes which we all could invest, right … Fifteen minutes is fifteen minutes we can find in our calendar, they learned to master a strategic appointment with themselves. I love that idea of just that one fifteen minute appointment every day, and that way too you know what your most important things are that you do today. It drives your productivity and it holds you personally accountable for the results.
Pete Mockaitis
Well Neen, I can’t let that go. Fifteen minutes a day made a transformational difference for these folks, so you must unpack it for us. What’s happening during these fifteen minutes? What’s the prescription?
Neen James
Let me tell you how I do mine, Pete, and this might help the listeners as well. For me what I do is, I make my coffee and I sit down with my … it’s a pretty fancy system. I use a Post-It note admittedly, and what do on that Post-It note is I write at the top “today, I will” and then I determine what are three things that I absolutely must achieve today.
Now these three things will move me closer to my goals. For example, if you work for a company, chances are you have objectives you’re being measured on, on a quarterly or annual basis. It’s a really great idea to identify activities so they’ll bring you closer to those particular goals. If you are a leader who is managing a team of people, no doubt your team has responsibilities that you as their leader need to guide them on. So what are three things you could do today that would move those projects or objectives or results forward?
What this does, Pete, is it becomes a decision filtering system, meaning every time you want to get distracted, every time someone walks into your office, every time you’re tempted to go on social media, you look at your three things. I deliberately write them on a Post-It note and I’ll tell you why. I can carry that silly little Post-It note with me all day and it’s a visual reminder of where my attention needs to be invested, as opposed to some of us … I’ve tried electronic to-do lists, I’ve tried apps, I’ve tried written to-do lists. It’s the one thing that I seem to be able to stick to, but here’s the other thing Pete.
Pete Mockaitis
Stick to! Zing.
Neen James
{Laugh]. I love being able to cross things off. I wonder if you’ve got people on the podcast who will admit that they write things on a to-do list just so they can cross them off, right?
Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. It’s the example I use in my … workshops for judging preference, yes.
Neen James           
It’s true though because we want to know something we did today mattered. If you simplify your day by what we call prioritizing your priorities into those top three not negotiables, you’ll have a much stronger chance of achieving them. Do you remember when Pete Shankman was on the show and he talked about eliminating all the choices? He has such a fantastic way of seeing the world and managing with such a fast brain that he has, but I believe too that we have to be able to get super clear on what’s important today. Otherwise, everyone will very happily take all the time and attention you want to give them but that doesn’t get you closer to your goals.
Pete Mockaitis
Understood. So Neen, I think my challenge with this is … hey, I’m looking at one right now. I’ve got a sheet and I have listed a dozen things and I feel pretty good. They’re all done. Now I’m just chatting with cool people like you for the rest of the day. I’d love to get your take on prioritization is hard, you know? Running three things is a lot harder than running thirteen things. What are some of your pro tips for … first of all, you tell me how strict is it that three is the number. Do not drift into more, or is it a little flexible? How are you thinking about it?
Neen James
For me, I feel like three is a great number that I can remember. Three is a number that I can share with someone else. Three is manageable in my day. Now I could write 23 things on the list Pete, but the challenge with that is then I become overwhelmed and we can become paralyzed with too many choices. Three things means I’ve diligently done the work in my fifteen minute appointment to identify my top three. These are the three things that are going to strategically move me closer. Sometimes, it means we may have to put something like a doctor’s appointment on that list. We might have been putting off a check-up for months and months, but we have to do it. It’s important to our health because if we don’t have good health, then obviously we’re not going to perform at work.
It might be that you’ve got to do a performance review for one of your team members. We’ve been putting it off, putting it off, putting it off. But what happens is every time we put something off, every time we ask our brain to remember something else, it’s like opening a new tab on the computer. Every time you ask your brain to do something, it opens a new tab. The brain craves completion, Pete. Every time we complete something, our brain gives us this little shot of dopamine, like a little high five from our brain, like “Yay Pete, good job.” We need more of that. We need more of that momentum of completion. Choosing three things is manageable.
Pete Mockaitis      
Momentum of completion is an excellent turn of phrase. I’m digging that. I like what you said about the doctor’s appointment. Sometimes I think when I’m setting my three things, it’s almost like the doctor’s appointment is already scheduled. I sort of know that I’m going to exit and go to there, so it almost feels like it doesn’t count in the sense that it is almost like a foregone conclusion that that is just going to occur. I almost feel like it’s cheating, or I haven’t earned that dopamine hit of completion goodness by doing such a thing. I’d love for you to set me straight in terms of what seems appropriate and sensible to put on there, because I think some things you just know you’re going to do. It’s like “I’m going to brush my teeth” or even if you have other great habits like “I know I’m just going to walk on the treadmill. I’m just going to pray. I’m just going to make a healthy lunch.” That’s awesome. Does that count? Do I get credit for that if it’s already a habit, like it’s going to happen whether I write it or not?
Neen James
I think it’s only going to get credit if it enhances a habit you have. If you’re going to walk on the treadmill and you’ve been used to walking and you like walking but you want to challenge yourself to a run, maybe what you think about is “Can I turn this walk on the treadmill into running for half a mile and see how I feel?” It’s also about being able to enhance our performance, Pete. It’s about helping every day for us to be stronger, better, to be able to have life with more excellence, with more fun, to be more thoughtful.
For example, that doctor’s example might be a routine thing you do, but what the doctor might say to you is “I need you to eat more green vegetables or I need you to get your cholesterol in check or I need you to manage your stress.” Then what you want to think about is, the thing that would go on the Post-It note maybe the next day would be “Okay, what are some stress management strategies I need to investigate? Could I invest fifteen minutes of my attention finding a new app or trying a new yoga pose or investing more time praying or in quiet time?” While I’m talking about some personal strategies, the same applies for professional strategies, but here’s the thing. Attention is personal, professional and global. The same person who goes home needs to turn up at work; we need to be the best version of ourselves. We need to be able to pay attention not only to other people, but we have to be able to pay attention to ourself.
Pete Mockaitis
I like those distinctions there in terms of what is moving you toward a meaningful goal, and then two, it’s an enhancement. It’s making you stronger as opposed to, I guess maintaining sort of status quo, habitual, how it is, the current level. It’s like you’re moving into upgrade territory. I think that’s helpful in terms of saying what counts, but I’ll maybe even back it up a little bit for you to arrive at three things that matter, you need to get some clarity on the goals, the macro objectives and priorities that are worth pursuing. What’s your take on doing that well?
Neen James
Think about it. If you’re a listener and you want to get promoted, there might be activities that are going to get you more in line with the opportunity to be promoted. For example, you may need to identify your successor. Who is the person you’re going to train and upscale, so that you could get promoted into a new role? You might have to become your own publicist and start to be able to communicate the evidence of why you’d be a great person to be promoted. Maybe you’ve got to start to enhance your skills by doing additional internal learning programs or external study.
The beauty of knowing if your goal is to get promoted at work because you’re awesome at your job, what you want to think about is what do I need to do to get promoted? What are the things that I have to improve, enhance or educate? What you can then do is put those types of things on your list. I have this saying that I want to be “Ah-mazing,” because I want to wake up every day and go “Oh, that’s amazing.” I want to be in awe and wonder on a daily basis, whether it’s serving a client, whether it’s travelling somewhere new or whether it’s looking after one of my team. Every day, I want us to think about how can we invest our attention at being even more “ah-mazing,” and in your case, awesome. How can we be more awesome at our jobs? We have to look for these things that we want to focus our attention on, because time’s going to happen whether you like it or not Pete.
You and I get the same 1,440 minutes in a day. You can’t manage time but you can manage your attention.
Pete Mockaitis
Okay, I’m right with you there. Final point on the three and I’ll move on. We talk about time and the minutes we have available. I want to get your take on when you establish the three, you want the momentum of completion – great turn of phrase. I’m wondering, you don’t want to be too easy in terms of “Hey, these are three important things but I’m going to knock them out in twenty minutes, bam!” You don’t want them too hard because then you don’t get that momentum of completion. It’s just not getting done, so how do you think about calibrating that well?
Neen James
I think it depends on your day. Sometimes, just the fact that we get to work out and eat a healthy meal and actually get to bed before midnight, that’s a big day for some of us. Sometimes, just getting that report to our boss or being able to answer all those e-mails or to get to every meeting on time, sometimes that feels like an achievement. While it’s hard to prescribe for people what is going to be easy or what is going to be hard, what I want you to think about is the question to yourself is “Will this make me more awesome at my job?” If it’s going to make you more awesome at your job, then I think that’s something that’s worth investing in. Will it make you more awesome as a team member? Will it make you more awesome as a partner with people you share your life with? Will it make you more awesome in your community for the people that you stand in service of, whether it’s your church, your temple, your parent teacher community, your alumni? I think with these three things, you know in your gut whether you are pushing yourself or not. Some days feel like survival and some days feel like success. You get to choose.
Pete Mockaitis
Okay, thank you. When it comes to these disruptions, distractions that would take our attention away from where we want to put it, maybe you could orient us a little bit in terms of what are some of the best approaches to keep your defenses appropriately operational, so that you are not getting overwhelmed by distraction.
Neen James
I think we have to identify what the distractions are first, Pete. Some people, we feel like our devices are a distraction and for many of us, they are. It’s the notifications, it’s the phone ring or it could be just the fact that we get a little bored and so we by default go check our Facebook status instead of paying attention in a meeting. For some, distractions include our devices. For others, distractions could be that you constantly have people interrupt you in your cube or your office, where people are constantly walking in saying “Do you have a second? Do you have a minute?” There’s never a second and there’s never a minute.
Other distractions can be ourself. We can be sometimes the worst at managing our own attention, because we open up a website and then that takes us to another website which takes us to another website, and then twenty minutes have gone by and we’ve achieved nothing.
So, distractions can come in the form of technology. They can come in the form of our own head traffic, some of our fears, concerns and stressors. The first thing we need to do is identify what those distractions are and then look to how to eliminate them. What I tend to use is some of my favorite tools. For example, one of my favorite apps is called Freedom. Freedom is an app that I can install on all of my Mac and my iPhone, which is a website blocking app, which means if I’m trying to get very dedicated focused amount of activity done or I’m writing a proposal or I’m preparing a keynote speech, it literally blocks me out of websites. It’s really powerful because you can set it up for short or long periods of time. I love using tools like that that will help me stay very focused.
I also have an actual cover on my phone. What I realized was, sometimes just seeing that something’s happening on my phone was enough of a distraction so I got an actual cover which covers the screen. There are little ways that you can become much more diligent in the way you manage your distractions – turning off every notification, closing windows you’re not really using, being able to cover devices, maybe leaving things like your cell phone outside the meeting room so you can pay attention in the meeting. Maybe when you’re driving, leave it in your bag or in the glove compartment so that you’re not actually tempted to check it.
We have to think about the fact that if for example we have an office, could you occasionally shut the door and then tell the team “When my door is shut, I’m trying to work on a project.” If you don’t have the luxury of an office in your particular workplace, could you use headphones in your cubicle and just say to your team “Hey if I have my headphones on, I’m just trying to get something completed.” We’ve got to start to create strategies for this continual state of distraction we live in.
Pete Mockaitis
Yes, I like that. Any pro tips for communicating that to a boss or others who think that they have the right to take your attention whenever they please?
Neen James
I think it’s a conversation. You’ve got to be a grown-up and you’ve got to say to your boss or your team member or your colleague that you really enjoy spending time with, “In order for me to be really productive, there’s occasionally times where I need to be hyper focused. My way of being hyper focused is by putting my headphones on, or booking a conference room on another floor, or coming in maybe twenty minutes later so I can sit at the local Starbucks and get my day really prioritized. But having agreements with your team and then being able to honor that, it’s kind of like a “Do Not Disturb” sign. I have done this with manufacturing clients, with pharmaceutical clients, with media clients, where they have created internal team versions of Do Not Disturb. So one of my media clients in New York, they have these little signs on the back of their chair and it’s like red and green.
If it’s red and you walk up to their chair, that’s their internal version of Do Not Disturb. One of my pharmaceutical clients has these little soft cush balls that they sit on their monitor. If you walk up to their monitor, you can see this tiny soft cush ball which is their internal Do not Distrub sign, and the team have become so good at not interrupting each other. We have to think through what’s going to work for you, what’s going to work for your team.
Pete Mockaitis
I like that so much. It reminds me of this Brazilian steakhouse with the red and the green.
Neen James
Oh yeah, exactly! Same thing.
Pete Mockaitis
Bring me delicious meat versus “No thank you, I’m satisfied for now.”
Neen James
[Laugh] I love it.
Pete Mockaitis
Very cool. It’s really fun how that does become sort of normative and folks can all respect it. I suppose they will know if they need to … if there’s a true emergency that requires an overriding of the indicator. One of my favorite things, you talk about headphones … this might be overboard but I like my Bose noise cancelling headphones and then I have earplugs on inside them.
Neen James
Oh really? That’s amazing, so no one can penetrate the sound barrier.
Pete Mockaitis
It really is. Sometimes I’ll be startled like “Ah, there you are. I had no idea.” That does happen sometimes and then it’s sort of fun. If you remove an earplug, it’s kind of like “Whoa, this guy.” For better or for worse, I don’t know what exactly the message that sends out, whether this guy’s a freak, he’s a real weirdo and/or “Whoa, that dude was focused. Maybe I should carefully think if it’s essential that I interrupt this flow state.”
Neen James
I think that we need to understand what works for us doesn’t always work for everyone else, and we need to communicate more actively about where we need to be able to focus our attention and how others can help us as well. It does require great grown-up conversations, but it will totally increase your productivity.
Pete Mockaitis
Very nice. In terms of our overall capacity to pay attention, I hear all these stats like “our attention span has shrunk from twelve seconds to eight seconds.” I still don’t quite know how that’s being measured. I want to dig into that study one of these days, but tell us what are some approaches to improve our very mental ability to pay attention?
Neen James
Let’s just start with the fact that no one actually had evidence that our attention span is shrinking. No one had evidence that when you have the attention span of a goldfish … I mean who wants to be compared to a goldfish? It’s crazy town. Every piece of research we tried to find where people were actually measuring true adult attention spans wasn’t happening. I think what happens is Pete, our attention is split.
We have to be aware that we are splitting our attention, and what that means is we have to then think about for us to really pay attention in a more profitable way, in a more productive way, in a more thoughtful way, we have to think about who’s in front of us right now and how much of our attention do they need or deserve at that point in time. What really needs our attention and what do we need to do to be able to progress that particular task, activity or conversation? And then how are we going to show people we’re paying attention? That could be the simplicity of looking someone in the eye when they’re talking. It could be the simplicity of taking notes so that you don’t forget what is being said. It might be the opportunity to ask a question to see if you really understand what the person is sharing with you. We’ve got to be able to be more diligent.
My little five year old friend gave me the best lesson in this. If anyone has a five year old listening to this, you know what it’s like to try and debate with a five year old. My friend Donovan and I were in a very heated debate and then at one point, he grabbed up to me. He was so annoyed. He and I were kind of discussing something. He thought I wasn’t paying attention to him. He jumped up to meet me. He grabbed my tiny face in his tiny little hands, he turned it towards him and he said “Me, listen with your eyes.” He was five years old. That wisdom from a child has totally changed the way that I pay attention, where we have to show people we’re listening with our eyes.
Pete Mockaitis
Certainly. I’d love for you to expand upon that. I guess that means that you’re looking at them and not sort of trailing off, and what else in extremely specific tactical terms?
Neen James
One of the things we found was there were a couple of studies that were done where people were experimenting with a device on the table, and whether people trusted you if you had your device on the table, whether they felt like they were being valued. It was interesting in all these different research studies that we were looking at, that people often trust you less, that they feel less important with you if they can see your device. What they’re thinking is, there’s someone else who needs your attention or you’re going to default to your device instead of paying attention in that conversation.
So we need to think about all of the things that potentially pull on our attention too, whether it is maybe people working in an open plan office, so there’s constant noise and smells and sounds and laughter and music and conversations all around us. Maybe it is when we’re meeting with someone, what’s happening in the conference room as far as if we’re letting someone dial in. Do they really get our attention? Do we include them? Do we involve them? Listening with our eyes is not just the physical act of looking someone in the eye, but in a virtual world we also have to think about when we reply to an email Pete, do we really answer the question or the concern that was addressed? Do we truly listen to the webinar?
Do we listen in on the teleconference and provide an answer at the appropriate time? When you think about how much we don’t pay attention, it’s fascinating. I think we live in a time where we are paying attention, but just not paying attention to the right people, the right things, the right way.
Pete Mockaitis
Interesting. I think that really gets you thinking in terms of just being intentional then with regard to … I think about these teleconferences where folks are not paying attention and you’re advocating to pay full attention. That makes me think, maybe these teleconferences I shouldn’t be in the first place.
Neen James
Yes, sometimes it means declining a meeting. Sometimes that’s the best use of your attention. In the book, we talk about intentional attention. It’s the choices we make and the actions we take. I use the word leader, whether you are yourself personally leading a team of people or whether you are a leader. As leaders, we have a responsibility to be intentional with our attention because it’s intention that makes attention valuable.
Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Neen, tell me anything else you really want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some your favorite things.
Neen James
We think we’re paying attention but we’re not, and I just want to challenge our listeners going back to those three things – can we pay attention to the right people, the right things, the right way? Use that as a filter when you catch yourself not paying attention with intention.
Pete Mockaitis
Okay, thank you. Now can you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?
Neen James
I love when Oliver Wendell Holmes “A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimensions.” I love that.
Pete Mockaitis
And tell me, have you found particular ideas stretched your mind a whole lot that you’d care to share here now?
Neen James
I think it probably goes to my favorite book, which is called The Thought Leaders Practice written by Matt Church who was an early mentor and now a business partner. In Thought Leaders Practice, he talks about how we can really demonstrate our ideas with visual tools and how we can position our expertise, whether we are internal corporate person or an external entrepreneur. I think for me, it’s this ability to show people what message you’re trying to share with them. I love contextual modeling and that’s something that I’ve become fascinated with.
Pete Mockaitis      
Thank you. How about a favorite study or experiment or a bit of research?
Neen James
There are so many that I was looking at for my Attention Pays book. I found it really hard to narrow it down. What I think is really important if we want to be more awesome in the way we pay attention is that we become our own study and start to study ourselves on how we’re showing up, how we’re paying attention and then seeing how we can change that.
I don’t have one particular one but I am quite fascinated with how each of us pays attention to ourselves, so maybe we become our own study.
Pete Mockaitis      
How about a favorite book?
Neen James
The Thought Leaders Practice by Matt Church. I’d probably go back to that one. That is definitely one of my favorites and it’s one that I go back to time and time and time again. The other one that I love is at the completely different end of the scale, The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown.
Pete Mockaitis      
Yes, thank you. How about a favorite tool?
Neen James
I go back to two apps. One would be Freedom app I mentioned earlier in the interview, and the other one would be Text Expander. It is my all time favorite and I use it every day multiple times a day.
Pete Mockaitis      
Completely agree, and they were also our first sponsor so thank you Text Expander.
Neen James
Great job, they’re amazing.
Pete Mockaitis
Agreed. How about a favorite habit, a personal practice of yours that helps you be awesome?
Neen James
I write Thank You notes every day. I find one reason to write one Thank you note, whether it’s while I’m traveling to housekeeping, whether it’s a client that I’ve had the privilege of serving, whether it’s a barista who’s made me an amazing coffee or whether it’s someone that I really care about in my personal life. I make sure that I write one Thank You note every day.
Pete Mockaitis
Cool. How long are these thank you notes? How long does it take? Do you have a system?
Neen James
I do carry stamp stationery with me everywhere so I always have them in my bag. I always have them at my desk and I have them in my car, so the system is keep stamp stationary with you all the time.
Pete Mockaitis
This can only happen in the morning or the afternoon or evening?
Neen James
I have a deal with myself. I don’t go to bed until one’s written. Sometimes it’s a little bit messy late at night, but generally speaking they happen throughout the day.
Pete Mockaitis
All right. Is there a particular nugget, a piece that you share that tends to really resonate and connect with folks and gets quoted back to you, a Neen original piece of brilliance?
Neen James
Listen with your eyes.
Pete Mockaitis
Okay, and Neen is there a particular place where you’d like folks to learn more. If they want to get in touch, where would you point them?
Neen James
There’s only one Neen James online. If you go to NeenJames.com, you’ll find everything you need and you can follow me on social media at Neen James.
Pete Mockaitis
Do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks seeking to be awesome at their job?
Neen James
I want you to invest fifteen minutes in an appointment with yourself and I want you to try this every work day. Identify your top three not negotiable activities before your head hits the pillow that night. Try it for me for one week. I guarantee your productivity will increase.
Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Neen, thank you so much for sharing this. It was fun to reconnect after some years and you’re continuing to rock and roll and make a huge difference. This was a lot of fun, thank you.
Neen James
It was a privilege. Thank you for everything you do in the world. This podcast makes such a difference to people to allow them to be awesome at their job and pay attention to what matters.

Jan 29
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255: Minimizing Avoidable Failures with Russell Klusas

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Russ Klusas says: "Look for people who've been there and done that, and do that well."

Tradecraft founder Russ Klusas discusses optimal decision-making amid life goals, recognizing avoidable failures, and learning from the successes and failures of Silicon Valley.

You’ll Learn:

  1. How to understand and use bounded rationality
  2. How to identify avoidable failures
  3. The good and the bad from Silicon Valley

About Russ 

Russell Klusas is the Founder of Tradecraft, a full time, in-person immersive training program for people who want to work in startups. He was also previously the CEO of Big Lobby, and the Entrepreneur-in-Residence of Founder Institute. He attended the University of Illinois.

Items Mentioned in this Show:

Russ Klusas Interview Transcript

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

Russell Klusas
Oh, Pete, glad to join you.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, this is going to be a whole lot of fun, I think, because we’ve had a lot of great conversations that probably should’ve been recorded over the years, and this time we’re doing one. And you’re in the minority, maybe only half a dozen guests are people I’ve known for years and prior to the episode. So, I want to put you on the spot and ask you to share with the world a favorite Russ & Pete memory.

Russell Klusas
Oh, what’s weird is that my strongest associative memory of you isn’t an actual event; it’s a hand gesture.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, boy. Okay.

Russell Klusas
And it’s yours, and it’s like this very particular like half Bill Clinton pointing fast, just really excited, like jazz hands thing that you do when something is really being optimized. Like every time I say your name or think of your name I always just imagine you like pointing out as you’ve made some really cool point and your hand kind of wiggles on its way down. It gets me excited.

Let’s see. If I had to actually talk about a favorite event, though, like looking back when that’s actually like relatively significant, if I go back and think about it, is when you and I we were in college, we spent one, I think, kind of like winter break working on some silly little idea called Connect Text.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah.

Russell Klusas
Which we had decided that if we could text message blast everyone on campus on where they should go and where would be cool, and what bar was full, and what place was offering a new deal and whatnot that that would be great. And beyond being an idea that was a little bit ahead of its time, and it’s now then executed through things like Twitter and Instagram and Groupon and all these other things alike, if I look back on the group of people that worked on it there was me, and there was you, and there was Bo, and there was this guy named Sergei, and like pretty much everyone who worked on that has now gone on to do some pretty interesting and significant things in the tech world.

Like Sergei runs a vast majority of the product at Zillow; Bo started a company called FutureAdvisor that sold for a ton of money to, I think, BlackStone; I think Luke was kind of weighing in on some of that stuff who did MyMiniLife and Farmville; and you’re doing this stuff with this podcast and the coaching, and hearing about your more and more; then I’m kind of like pulling up the rear here by keeping myself busy here in the Valley.

Oddly, there’s pretty much nobody from that group who hasn’t gone on and done something relatively significant. I think that’s pretty cool.

Pete Mockaitis
That is cool. University of Illinois in action, that’s good. And as I’m thinking about the gesture, you say, my buddy Dave articulates it by saying, “Okay, I have some things up here, and I’m going to bring them over here.”

Russell Klusas
Yes. Yes. That is the thing. And, like, I can’t hear not only your name but I can’t hear any variation of the word optimal without thinking of that gesture first. I think if an associative memory is a high-valence events that tends to recall a very particular set of feelings for you then that word instantly recalls my memory and vision of you, and, I don’t know, I always found that interesting.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m flattered. Thank you. I’m encouraged to hear that. And I just think of, when I think of you, I think of not that this is to be like a 40-minute lovefest, but I just think of how you are just sort of seem to very quickly seem to get to know lots of impressive people really fast. And so, just like the folks that you get to have meetings with and are in the room with you it’s just sorts of astounding to me at times. So, impressive sort of the gift and the skillset you have associated with networking and relationship building is pretty awesome and hopefully we’ll learn a couple of those tidbits here today.

Russell Klusas
Well, it sounds good to me.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, just to orient folks a little bit, could you maybe tell us the shorter two- three-minute version of your career story from where you started to what you’re up to right now?

Russell Klusas
Yeah, I would say like probably the most interesting part about my story is how early it started. I think I started my first real legit business, one that I probably should’ve filed taxes for and produced real revenue on when I was eight, that was a little snow shoveling business that I had started that ended up being kind of fun activity that I still talk about to this day with my parents and whatnot every time I see them.

But, basically, from the time that I was eight on, I have always kind of seen starting businesses as a really good excuse to go out and learn new things and to gotten to solve various problems I’ve seen in the world. So, that has saw like all these really eclectic path where, in high school, I ran a company that did PR for local small businesses, and I got to do really creative and fun things where I would be on a retainer for a local antique shop.

And in order to drive business for them I would end up throwing some party for high schoolers outside in their parking lot. And everyone would ask me, “Why are you doing that?” I’d say, “Well, because I’m going to make sure that the party runs over,” and all of these people need to be picked up by their parents. So, their parents wind up spending 20 minutes inside browsing while they’re waiting for their child to be done at this event.

So, in college, after I had sold the little PR company, I committed to the idea that I was going to have a normal college life. That lasted six days until my then girlfriend, and now wife, moved into her school, and I decided that the loft, the thing that actually raise the bed in her dorm room so that she can put her desk underneath it, just wasn’t up to my standards, and it was too expensive and not fit for the room and all this other stuff. So, then I started a furniture company that ended up blowing up on me one summer. I went away on vacation for a few minutes and came back and all of a sudden there was $100,000 in orders that I had to figure out how to solve. That was my first exposure to kind of explosive growth.

And really, since then, I’ve spent a vast majority of my career kind of floating back and forth between a kind of like a finance-heavy version of business where I invested in a lot of real estate and did some mergers and acquisitions on buying some small companies, and then kind of staying true to my roots which was more of a technology base and doing web design and marketing and software development for a variety of clients.

Until eventually I found myself out here in Silicon Valley where I now run a place called Tradecraft. And what we do at Tradecraft is we kind of help people figure out what’s next. One of the things that Silicon Valley is really good at is helping young founders and startups kind of succeed at the kind of company level. But there’s not a lot of focus on individual people and making sure that they don’t fail for avoidable reasons. Not the risk stuff, not the taking a chance but just like kind of the simple day-to-day things that make sure that they’re kind of achieving their highest and best use in the world.

So, we take people who are transitioning into technology. We take people who are trying to shift from another career or they’re trying to step up a level and kind of get a job that they, otherwise, wouldn’t qualified for and we kind of provide some mentorship and guidance and education, whatever it takes to kind of help them succeed.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s right. That’s right. And so, perfect, thank you for laying that out. That’s very helpful. So, now, I want to dig in a little bit. When it comes to working with folks on the full career perspective and helping them succeed, and cutting the avoidable failure, we’ve talked a number of times about sort of thinking tools and common mistakes that folks make when they’re putting the game plan together for their career.

And I love it, like you told me a great example of how someone said, “I want to work in Airbnb,” and then you say, “Well, why do you want to work for Airbnb?” And you sort of discovered that that’s not really the optimal path – there we go, optimal.

Russell Klusas
And the hand gesture starts.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes, there it is – for them. So, can you share with me a little bit sort of how do you think about and guide folks as they’re sort of thinking through their next career move?

Russell Klusas
Yeah, when you actually kind of break it down and step back and look at the reasons that people both succeed and fail in their careers and, really, more holistically in their life in general, it can usually be traced back to this thing called bounded rationality. And not to get too geeky but a little Econ 101, like economics says that humans are these perfectly rational creatures and that we are constantly understanding what all of our options are and all our alternatives on how we can spend our time, and we have clear goals in mind, we understand our alternatives, we’ve collected all the information we can, we’re constantly selecting our own highest and best use in the market.

But, practically speaking, rationally, emotionally speaking, that’s not actually true. This guy named Herbert Simon, in the ‘50s, realized that humans are not optimizing creatures. We are boundedly rational which, to put it simply, means that when we’re making these big important life decisions we often find ourselves in situations where we don’t have enough information. We don’t actually have the key information that we need to make that decision.

If we did have that information, we don’t have what he called intelligence, but what I call insight, into why that information matters and how it will kind of play out in our lives. So, even if I gave you access to everything that you could possibly need when it comes to the actual raw data, because you haven’t developed an expertise around these subjects and around this thing that you’re about to do, you don’t understand how it all fits together, the greater system of it.

And, unfortunately, the last bit of it is that we are often in situations where we don’t have enough time to offset the first two, we don’t have enough time to go get that information or to really understand what that means. So, when you understand that bounded rationality is the reason why we tend to kind of miss stuff, then it makes it a lot easier to understand what it is that you have to provide somebody with in order to help them overcome that, right?

So, in some cases it’s just understanding what a career path looks like. And, for you, when you’re trying to break into a new industry, whether it’s tech or finance or anything else, it’s this unknown unknown, as Rumsfeld so famously told us. And it’s not even reasonable if you think about it to expect you to understand not only all of the options that you have but all the paths you can take, but what kind of opportunities and landmines you need to look out for along the way. You’ve never been there. You’ve never done that. It’s not that you are going to Google and being too lazy to do your research. It’s just you’re going to Google and you’re not even sure what to type in. You don’t know what the right questions are.

Pete Mockaitis
Yes, you don’t know what you don’t know.

Russell Klusas
Yeah, it’s like if you were to take someone who is going into college in the next few months, or he’s going to start college the next fall, like having been through college, having been there and done that, you would have all these great advice to provide somebody with. But going in that first time like you wouldn’t even know what the questions are.

You haven’t been faced with the problems yet, so a lot of times you end up making, what hurt in retrospect, pretty obvious mistakes, things that aren’t really all that unique, mistakes that people have been making for millennia in some cases, and you end up having to reinvent the wheel and kind of recreate all of these possible ways out for things that could be avoided if you just had access to the right people with the right information at the right time.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Go ahead.

Russell Klusas
So, when it comes to getting people over that, a lot of it is just a matter of recognizing where people are, in fact, boundedly rational and trying to act as that mentor, as that friend who can kind of help them through those times.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, so then, in practice, if someone is looking to make a career shift, or enter into any new sort of great unknown unknown, what would you recommend folks do in terms of gathering a bit of that context expertise sort of base-level backgrounder to reduce the odds they’re going to do something really dumb?

Russell Klusas
Well, historically speaking, when you look back all the way as far as you can go up till now, there’s only really been one form of solution that has worked consistently, and that’s something equating to mentorship or apprenticeship, right? Even if you go back to medieval days right up to now, like usually the best way that you can overcome the challenges you’re about to face in college is to have an older brother or to have a friend who’s already been there and done that and can guide you along the way and kind of help tell you, not what to do but like help you understand what decisions you have to make and what your options are.

So, what I would say is seek out mentorship, and sometimes that’s literally going and seeking somebody out and trying to find a way to be valuable to them so that they will be willing to spend a few minutes with you, hopefully share some of that wisdom. But in the cases where that’s not available, like seek out mentorship online in the form of all of the knowledge that exist there, the books, the podcasts, these types of things. Go find people who have been there and done that, and kind of look at what they did and work your way backwards.

A lot of times when people come to us at Tradecraft and they’re trying to figure out what their first job should be outside of Tradecraft, they go to Tradecraft, they get some kind of immersive learning experience, and they go get that first job, we often don’t tell them to start with figuring out what that next job is. We tell them to go try figure out what they want their job to be five years from now. We call it our TN plus two, or plus three. Not one-time period out but a few times periods out.

We say, “Go find that. Then go find a few people who have that job then look for a pattern between the people who that job that you want to have someday and what they did prior in their experience.” If they were visual designers straight out of college, go be a visual designer. If they were just hustlers at brand new companies, like go be a hustler. Look for people who’ve been there and done that, and do that well.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s great. And I think at the same time, while you’re having those conversations with them, make sure that’s what you actually want to do, like burst any bubbles that you might have in terms of poor assumptions and getting a realistic job interview.

Russell Klusas
Oh, yeah. I mean, far and away, the biggest ramification of bounded rationality is people avoiding it altogether. They avoid the big decisions. For some reason, the last 10 or 15 years it’s been like something approaching cool to like not have goals and to not spell them out because you’re supposed to just get on the rocket ship, as they say, or go where the world takes you, just pursue things. And that’s just ridiculous. When you talk to successful people one of the things they almost always have in common is they always have goals. They always have something that’s far and off out that’ll be kind of the north star of them in their day-to-day activities.

And when people think that if you pick a goal today then that means that has to remain your goal your entire career, and that’s not true. There’s nothing wrong with changing your goal as you get new information. But to not have a goal means that you can’t really evaluate whether or not you’re doing well. And for some people they find salvation in that, right? “If I don’t have a set of goals to compare myself to, to compare my performance to, then I’m definitely not doing bad because I just never ask that question.” Right?

But they almost always end up regretting it. They almost always end up looking back on it and having woken up one day, and going like, “Holy crap, I’m in my early or mid-30s and I don’t really like where I am. I’m not doing anything I care about. I’m not setup to have that senior-level position in the firm, or to have the influence or the impact that I want to have,” and it’s because they weren’t being mindful of their most valuable asset early in their career, which is time. On and on, the only thing that matters in the early stages of your career is time.

Pete Mockaitis
Now, when you say the only thing that matters is time. Do you mean in terms of how you’re spending it? And is that a wise use of the time?

Russell Klusas
Yes. Without a doubt, if I had to tell somebody like, “The asset in your life that you need to optimize for, especially early in your career, it is time.” Right? The thing that I would tell you to go seeking out in your early days is knowledge, right? In your early 20s when you have a low standard of living, a low burn rate and few responsibilities, that is the best time to make sacrifices and to dedicate yourself to learning and becoming an expert in your craft, going for mastery, if you will.

But the thing you need to be most careful of is time because that’s where this avoidable failure stuff really starts to kick in, not just in the small failures; the day-to-day stuff. But it’s a common thing you see out here in the Valley, it’s like people who go to law school, and they go to a great law school, they go to Harvard Law School and then they graduate and become a first-year associate in a top-tier firm in Manhattan, and then six months later they end up on my doorstep, and you go, “Whoa, wait a minute. What happened?”

There’s nothing wrong with deciding you want a different path in your life, but my question to them is always like, “Is there something that fundamentally changed about the field of law while you were in law school? Is there something about being a first-year associate that is different?” And they always go, “No, that’s how it’s fairly it’s always been.” And I said, “Well, if you had known that, if you had been forced to intern or something like that at a law firm for over three months, for the summer before you went to law school, would you have gone?” And they always go, “Oh, absolutely not.”

And it’s not that going to law school is bad. You and I, both, we have a bunch of friends who are lawyers and they love it and they really enjoy it. But, like, real avoidable failure isn’t often the stuff that you notice; it’s the stuff that you don’t even think that is failure. It’s going to law school and dedicating three years of your life there only to figure out that that’s not what you want to do, that’s not the vocation, the life’s work you want to have, and having lost that time, because time is valuable.

Pete Mockaitis
So, we talked about these avoidable failures, of these whoopsie-daisy kind of moments, like, “Oh, man, I wish I hadn’t done that.” Let’s talk about some of your pro tips to get a little bit of a preview or a test in advance. You talked about getting a peek from mentors and apprenticeship master type folks, you talked about doing an internship, and you talked about availing yourself to the books and podcasts that they give you a glance inside? What are some of your other favorite tactics for getting a feel for things in advance of doing the thing?

Russell Klusas
Well, I’ll tell you one that is one of my favorites but is almost the antithesis of the ethos here in the Valley, at least when you first start to see it, and that is I tend to focus more on avoiding failure than I do on having some world-changing success. And it’s not because I’m not an optimist, and it’s not because I’m not ambitious. I like to think that I, and the people that I work with, are both of those things.

Like anyone who tells you that they can give you the five steps to success, how to turn yourself into the next Mark Zuckerberg, anyone who’s promising you that you’re going to be the next X Factor, they’re lying because either they don’t know how complicated this stuff is, and you shouldn’t be listening to them, or they do know and they’re just trying to sell you something.

Like it is impossible to predict with any level of certainly what is going to make somebody fantastically successful. There’s just too many variables that have to line up, too many things you don’t have control over. And because of that, like I tend to focus more on, “Let’s just make sure that I don’t screw up all the time. I don’t waste my time and energy and money on things that can be avoided.”

Because I think it was like Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett’s investing partner who said, “If I can avoid death long enough,” and it’s like Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett, these days are kind of the most famous examples of people where they’re like they don’t really try and knock it out of the park that often. What they try and do is make sure that they’re not doing anything that’s going to cost them in a really, really big way.

So, I would say like, very practically speaking here, mental models and cognitive biases, there are lists of them, there are blogposts, a hundred different ways to find these things, but cognitive biases are those things that your emotional brain, mostly, uses to help you make quick decisions. But a lot of times your cognitive biases will betray you, right? You’ll have the recency effect, you’ll have the anchoring effect, there’s always kind of different things.

And the more you learn about them, it’s kind of like learning about your own weaknesses. And the more you learn about them, it makes sure they’re like every time I’m making a big decision I always run through the list of cognitive biases and kind of ask myself, “Am I susceptible to this one right now? Have I considered this from the other angle?”

Same thing with mental models which are usually just kind of a way of offsetting these cognitive biases and knowledge blockers. Like, play devil’s advocate for yourself. Always look at it the other way when you can. And like they said, one really great example, as I said, “If you want to figure out how to really, really help something, a classic mental model is to, instead, think about what would really, really hurt something,” right?

Pete Mockaitis
Right.

Russell Klusas
If you say, “I want to have the biggest impact in India that I can have over the next 10 years to raise the poverty level. I want to bring people out of poverty.” Like, the best way to find out what you can do to help is to start with going like, “What’s the worst thing that could possibly happen?” And that’s when you start at identifying things like infrastructure, right? Where it’s like, “The internet would be great, but we need clean water first. We can’t worry about whether or not they’ve got one laptop per child until they have a way of charging that laptop.” And those things are often forgotten.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Thank you. So, I’d love to hear, when it comes to the mental models and the cognitive biases, you said there’s these books and there’s blogposts. Do you have a couple of favorites or go-tos that have helped you expand your thinking and arrive at your checklist?

Russell Klusas
Sure. What I would say is on the book front, there’s a book called Seeking Wisdom from Darwin to Munger by a guy named Peter Bevelin who’s a professor and who was an early investor in Berkshire and he’s just kind of written down a lot of the things that they learned over time, and it’s a great book. It’s one of my favorites.

I technically work in complex systems. I’m a system thinker as from a field’s perspective, and people always talk to me about like The Fifth Element and it’s kind of more pop culture type books, but I would take the Seeking Wisdom on any day of the week.

Pete Mockaitis
We had Matt Bodnar also mentioned that back in Episode 127, so two votes of confidence.

Russell Klusas
Yeah, for some reason I just find that like any time I bring up that book, and somebody has read it, I am almost instantly like kind of on the same wavelength as that person. It just works out great. The other one I would probably surface is the cognitive bias codex which you can find on Medium. It started off as like somebody just running through ever cognitive bias they can and trying to explain it, and then it turned into pretty elegant little poster. It’s gotten more and more kind of popular over the days, but like that’s a good place to start from a cognitive bias standpoint.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, beautiful. Thank you. Okay. Well, so then, I’d also like to get your take then in terms of that’s a great career tip in looking at the T plus two, T plus three, getting a real clear sense for, “What are we talking about here? In what ways might this totally go south or be disappointing?” Now, I’d love to get your take on, I’ve mentioned at the beginning, you’ve got quite a knack for networking, meeting people, building relationships. How do you do it? It seems like, I don’t want to mean this in a pejorative sense, but you mentioned a lot of names that’s very impressive. And like, “Dang, son, how did you end up in a room with Tony Robbins or whomever?” Like, what’s your philosophy and your best practices in this game?

Russell Klusas
Yeah, I would say that it’s actually kind of ironic that you would say that because nowadays, out here in Silicon Valley, as opposed to U of I, I think I’m actually one of the less impressive networker there is. There are some people here who are just truly amazing at it and they are actual extroverts as opposed to myself who’s an introvert kind of masquerading as an extrovert when I need to.

There are some people out there that I think are amazing at it that I would encourage them to continue to get. But I do think I have a couple, which is, the first one, like if you’re not an extrovert, if you’re not someone who naturally feels really comfortable like going out and striking up conversations with new people that you don’t know, get to know some people who are, befriend some people who are because I would tell you that a vast majority of what you’re saying are like impressive names that I’ve gotten to be in the room with, they’re not people that I reached out to cold.

They’re not people that I begged and borrowed and stole to kind of get in the room with them. They’re people where my friends knew them and decided that I should end up in a room with them at some point. It’s through a lot of introductions, so it’s just like understand in your industry who the kind of super connectors are, and try to defend those people, and tell them that.

If there’s one of the things that kind of openly tell people is like, “If there’s ever any one you think I should meet, up the ladder from me, down the ladder from me, regardless, like if there’s someone that you think I should meet, like just make an introduction, let me know. I will take the time.” Because I don’t do a lot of cold outreach, but I get a lot of great introductions. I meet some great people that way.

Pete Mockaitis
I see. And how does one go about identifying super connectors?

Russell Klusas
I think it’s kind of like with any, like for me, for example, my partner is just world class at this particular thing. He has traveled the world in his entire life from being a professional musician who’s on the road to living in a number of different countries with his wife who’s a diplomat. He’s a guy who’s had to kind of like drop into new communities and find his home over and over and over again, and he’s just really great at it.

And really early on in working with him and getting to know him, both as a friend and as kind of a business partner, I recognized that that was a weakness of mine in some cases and that he would be really great at helping me fill that. So, like you would generally know who they are once you meet them because they’re going to be the ones who immediately want to introduce you to somebody else, or the ones where you’re being introduced to them. It’s definitely one of these you-know-it-when-you-see-it kind of things.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Got you.

Russell Klusas
The other thing that I would say is probably as important if not more important than anything is always focus on creating more value than you capture. Like especially when you’re trying to kind of go upstream. The most important thing you can do if you really want to get in the room with somebody who’s important is be able to bring some value to their life.

It’s easy to think that just because they’re that really big and important, and you’re just getting started, that there’s nothing that you can do that’d be valuable to them, but that’s just not true. It’s just not. You have a certain hunger and a certain perspective on things that they just don’t have anymore. It’s just like always be thinking, “How can I find some way to provide value to these people?” And then offer that value up and just consistently commit yourself to creating more value than you try to capture. And, eventually, it will take hold and it will start to work.

And if you’re a kind of a good person, you’re willing to give back, you’ll continue to do that no matter what height you reach in your career, that’s how you just end up with a lot of really good friends, or a lot of people that you can kind of be on call when the time is needed.

Pete Mockaitis
I dig it, yes. Generosity is a theme that’s come up numerous times and I’m totally, totally on board there. I’d also want to get your take when it comes to in your realm of Silicon Valley, startups, fast pace, everything changing so fast, what are your pro tips when it comes to learning quickly and adapting smartly as stuff evolve and changes?

Russell Klusas
One thing I’d say is having that goal in mind. The most important step in learning quickly is make sure you’re learning the right stuff. There are a lot of things that you can spend a lot of time learning that are kind of irrelevant to you. A good example of that is like I will often be asked by small business owners that I still run into whether or not they should learn to use WordPress or some other kind of site creator.

And I often tell them, like, “You should just pay somebody to do that.” And the reason isn’t that they can’t figure it out, or that it wouldn’t be interesting to them, it’s that the tools that are used to put websites together radically change every four or five years. And if you make a decent website as a small business, you shouldn’t be creating an entirely new website more than every four or five years.

Which means you’re spending all of this time upfront to learn something that by the time you need it again it won’t be relevant anymore. People forget that knowledge, like all other assets, has a decay rate. So, just make sure you’re learning the stuff that’s going to be valuable to you. The other benefit of kind of keeping that end goal in mind is it kind of forces you to remember that chances are, with the way the world is going, your job role will not exist in 30 years whether it’s artificial intelligence, globalization, automation, like there’s all these different things that come into play.

But the truth is your role isn’t going to exist, but if your job role isn’t going to exist, your job goal probably will.

Pete Mockaitis
Tweet that, it rhymes.

Russell Klusas
One of the things you notice about your job goal is that you start thinking about the people that you’re serving. If you’re a designer, people aren’t going to be using Sketch five years from now or ten years from now most likely. It’s just not a probable thing. But are they going to be trying to design great user experiences that help get people the exact information they wanted, the exact time they want it with the lowest friction as possible? Of course, they are.

Like, in psychology, learn these things that are kind of has a certain level of permanence. And the thing about having this kind of longer-term goal in mind is it helps focus you to make sure that you’re spending your time on the things that are really valuable so you don’t get surprised and kind of caught off guard.

Pete Mockaitis
All right.

Russell Klusas
One of the things that I worry about when I talk to a lot of young people today, especially people who are doing very, very well, is this kind of like – I don’t mean to harsh – but there’s like a certain level of hubris that our generation has around our own skillsets, right? Like the compare and contrast is like a web developer, a full stack developer here in Silicon Valley, versus like a coal miner, right?

And they look at these coal miners, and they go, “Oh, man, like that skillset, it’s completely useless. Their job, that’s not needed anymore. How could those people let the world kind of pass them by like that?” And I look at them and go, like, “Man, you know that’s going to happen to us, too, right? We’re not only going to disrupt all these other people. Eventually we’re going to disrupt ourselves. We’re one good algorithm away from not meeting a friend in engineering anymore.”

It’s like you have to assume that the time of you being able to join one company for your entire career, or stay in one role for your entire career, and just move up to levels of seniority, almost those have gone. You need to be constantly looking forward and seeing what you can do to make sure that you are always on kind of the cutting edge of what it is that it takes to fulfill the goals of your organization.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Cool. And as we kind of move into the final phases, I want to get sort of your reflection. So, you’ve seen a lot of people and inserting them into a lot of roles at the cool companies, and the up and comers across Silicon Valley. And because it shows up in the news a lot that I think some people have like startup envy, like, “Oh, man, that’d be so cool. That’s be so sick to even work…” you know, fill in the blank, Airbnb, Facebook, Google, whatever.

So, I’d love to get your take on what are some things that the professional world at large can learn and model from Silicon Valley? And what are some things that Silicon Valley really needs to tone down and learn from the rest of the professional world?

Russell Klusas
Oh, yes, I’m very passionate about this topic.

Pete Mockaitis
All right.

Russell Klusas
What I’d say is I almost separate kind of old-school Silicon Valley to the one that you see today, and I’m sure that everybody says this about their particular time. But the inspiration that I think we can take from the old-school Silicon Valley is to think big. Be ambitious. Recognize that Moore’s Law and these things that we get to do with our time, they can fundamentally change the world. I mean, people forget there were no iPhones 11 years ago.

Pete Mockaitis
Right.

Russell Klusas
It’s only like 10 and a half years ago there was no iPhone at all. And from the first year of the iPhone there were no apps, there were no external apps, there’s no app market. Like imagine living your life without a smartphone, like the iPhone today, it’s crazy to think that. Like, in our parents’ lifetime the microwave was created.

These are transformative changes, and we have some huge problems that are facing the world right now, and to be even bigger ones that are likely to come with the kind of rapidly-changing market conditions we’re going to see with all this artificial intelligence stuff. Think big. Solve things that matter, right? Do work worth doing.

From today’s Silicon Valley, probably even more than the early days, the thing that we do really, really well here is we try to keep the cost of failure low. We look at things over longer-time horizons and more holistically than a lot of the rest of the world. Being from Chicago, not to mention friends that I have that are from East Asia and other kind of community-oriented societies, like failure hurt.

I failed a couple times when I was in Illinois. You feel like a failure and you feel like you’ve done something wrong. Whereas one of the things that Silicon Valley is really good at is recognizing that the 25-year old entrepreneur who raised half a million bucks from friends and family or angel investors or something like that, and spent a year and a half busting his butt trying to make something work, and fails miserably, like he may be a failed entrepreneur but he’s going to be the most qualified young employee you could possibly hire because they know what it’s like.

They say the best way to get promoted is to get your boss promoted. Like somebody who has tried and failed but had really worked for it, there’s very little that will prepare you to succeed in the world like being thrown in the deep end, and that’s something that the Valley is good at. We value it. The people whose startups failed here, they get recruiting calls all day long from the moment they accept it’s time to move on.

Now, on the flipside of that, I think we’re starting to see some of the pretty significant negative ramifications of what technology can do. And, on the one hand, there’s like the really surface level stuff. There’s things like, well, social media addiction, and the impact that that has on teenagers, and the impact that that has on relationships, the impact it has on the way we see the world.

Like, I am not someone who believes that teenagers posting things on Instagram, and then valuing themselves based on how many likes they get. I don’t believe that that’s going to be a good thing. And like so many other people are kind of starting to say, I think that social media addiction is going to become the sugar of this decade, and I think that Silicon Valley is definitely at fault for a lot of these things.

We do a lot of things that are right, and oftentimes just not out of any malicious intent but just out of ambitious excitement and kind of a little bit of naiveté, like we do what we can to make things grow as fast as we can, and increase engagement as much as we can, but those things, cognitive biases, that I just got done telling everyone, they should pay attention to so they don’t make mistakes.

Those things, cognitive biases, are used against people to get them to use products more and more and more and more. And I think Silicon Valley, nowadays, needs to start remembering that not everything is fail fast. There are some things that we should be thinking through the second and third order effects to make sure that we’re okay with where it is, right?

Like, Twitter is great. Without Twitter we probably don’t have Arab Spring. But without Twitter we also don’t have Donald Trump and fake news, right? Without Facebook and Instagram and some of these other things, we don’t have everyone being able to find – like if you go on the internet today you can find your tribe. You can find a group of people who are like you, and that’s amazing for that kid who felt like he was totally alone in his small town in the Midwest.

But we also have troll groups and there are things that make it worse. We need to start thinking through the ramifications of our actions, and sometimes we need to slow down a bit. And we need to make sure that we consider the real-world ramifications that some of this disruption will have because I don’t think that we’re always going to be happy with the results, and although I hope that everything that has already kind of been put out there already, I hope we’re going to figure out ways to kind of offset that and deal with it.

I spend a lot of time talking to people about automation and artificial intelligence, universal-based income, and, “What are we going to do when the world changes as things get even faster and faster here?” We got to be really careful about it from a systems perspective, like the number one job in 47 States is truck driver.

Most people are populated as truck drivers in 47 of our States, and Elon Musk could singlehandedly put all of those people out of business. And our economies are not setup to have 4% or 5% or 6% of the economy go unemployed all at once. And that’s what happens, because when semi-trucks become automated it’s not only all the truck drivers, it’s a lot of those mechanics, it’s all those little gas stations along the way, it’s all the little hotels and restaurants that are put all up and down I-80 running across the country. They’re going to have some big ramifications of these things and it’s kind of like our responsibility. If we’re going to break in, we’ve got to worry about how to fix it, too.

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

Russell Klusas
No, I would say listen to things like this, listen to podcasts and whatnot, but this should be the way that you get psyched up in the day. This is the way that you get motivated and you get excited and you get inspired. But, at some point, also turn these things off and just get to work. Just go do something. Go write something, go read something, go learn something that’s going to kind of move you forward at the end of every day.

Pete Mockaitis
Awesome. Okay. Well, now, could you share with us a favorite quote, something that inspires you?

Russell Klusas
Oh, you gave me this one ahead of time that I was kind of torn on it. So, I have two, I’m going to share them both with you. The first one is kind of speaking directly to what we were just talking about, which is, “It’s not a super power if it can’t be used for evil.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay.

Russell Klusas
And I think that people really underappreciate that. Like those things that can result in fantastic growth and wonderful success, there’s often a flipside to that, that do some real harm, and you’ve got to be appreciative of that and understand it so that you can be looking for it. It’s the defense against the dark arts, if you will.

And the other one is that people often don’t realize this, but like I used to play hockey, and I watched a lot of people who are figure skaters, kind of at practice. And one thing that I always notice was that professional figure skaters, the people who are really experts, they fall down a lot more than the amateurs do, and it’s because amateurs tend to practice what they’re good at because they’re looking for the reinforcement of, “Hey, I’m good at this. I know how to do this.” Whereas, professionals are always pushing. They’re always stretching themselves to try to accomplish something more, and they know that falling down is kind of part of the process.

Pete Mockaitis
I like how that is sort of clear contrast and visual. Nice. Thank you. How about a favorite study or bit of research?

Russell Klusas
I was originally going to say the Seeking Wisdom book is a good book to read. In the absence of that, if there was one like scientist that I would say that almost everyone should study, his name would be Claude Shannon, and he was the guy who created information theory, and was actually responsible for a huge percentage of the things that we do day in and day out right now when it comes to computer science and the early days of AI and whatnot.

But Claude Shannon was the guy who like technically he was working on encryptions for military stuff. But this guy, if you understand his work you’ll find yourself with a greater understanding of how people work and it’ll give you a high level of empathy because you’re going to start understanding that the world that you’re living in, the reality that you believe to be true is not reality for everyone else.

Everyone has their own interpretation of reality, and the sooner that you realize that, and the sooner you start focusing on, “What’s that other person’s reality? And how can I make sure that I understand and empathizing with that?” the farther you’ll go in life.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And any other key books you’d recommend?

Russell Klusas
Because I know a lot of the people here are talking about getting a job, look into something called The Minto Pyramid Principle.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yes. Barbara Minto.

Russell Klusas
Great writing is important in your career, and being able to present your ideas is important in your career, and Barbara Minto is uniquely qualified to kind of help people organize those things.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And how about a favorite tool?

Russell Klusas
Like, honestly, my favorite tool is our Dry-Erase Markers, specifically Ultra Fine Tip Dry-Erase Markers because I have really small handwriting and I have a whole bunch of whiteboards in my office. That’s like my mid version of it, if you have an office with whiteboards. If you don’t have an office with whiteboards, get 11X17 paper because you can express a lot more ideas on a little bit bigger sheet and it gives a little bit extra consequence. And then when you have some money to burn, go buy yourself something called a Microsoft Studio because it’s amazing.

Pete Mockaitis
What is a Microsoft Studio?

Russell Klusas
You will notice that the moment you type it in Google because it’s it had this beautiful launch with this wonderful advertisement. It’s a 27-inch screen that you can push down to kind of like have a flat kind of drafting type surface and it has the pen tool on it. And as someone who spent my entire life trying to take the notes that I take on paper when I’m reading and writing and all the stuff, and put them onto a screen, the Studio is just amazing.

Now, if it’s just as a replacement for pen and paper, it’s just a ridiculous waste of money. It’s something that’s like $3500 or something like that, but it’s fantastic. It’s so good that I can’t convince myself to buy another one, so I literally will carry this desktop. I will put it into the original box and carry it back and forth to my house on the weekends to make sure that I can still get at it if I have a good idea. It’s great.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, I love it. And how about a favorite habit?

Russell Klusas
Like, figure out how to find your own flow. I’m sure that flow has been talked about a number of times on this podcast. But you got to find your own routine and kind of the one that works for you. But you should know what it takes to get yourself into a mindset that allows for kind of maximal output.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, yeah. And what is it for you?

Russell Klusas
I have a very unique working schedule. Literally, the way that I space out and the way that I space out my week, like I have a true commitment to it where I do the exact same thing every week and it’s absolutely crazy. And I wouldn’t recommend it to anybody else, that it works for me. And it’s important to kind of keeping me centered.

Pete Mockaitis
And I’d love to know, how do you enforce the rest of the world when they want a piece of you at certain times such that you stick with the schedule?

Russell Klusas
Ironically, that’s why my schedule exists. So, I am a person who is consistently in the maker category where I’m doing research and trying to create cool new things on my own. I’m in the manager category because I have a couple of businesses that I’m responsible for running and staff and clients and all those things.

I also have family, and I’ve got to find a way to serve those three people. Forgot about social and all that other stuff. Nobody has any of that if you have these three, but it’s hard to kind of make sure that I can fulfill my obligations to these groups of people that I really genuinely want to spend time with, but also find time to get in the zone myself and get stuff done.

So, I, for example, I work a lot of nights, so I will sometimes start my day at noon or at 1:00 o’clock and I’ll spend four or five hours with my staff, and then I’ll kind of work all night so that I can get stuff done, and so that I can be available to my kids when they wake up and when they go to bed. But that’s just kind of what works for me, and it’s really about prioritizing my time and making sure that I want to set myself up to have as much success as I can, and to kind of minimize the switching costs, the cognitive load of going from one thing to another.

Pete Mockaitis
Right. I see. And so, what are the sleep hours then?

Russell Klusas
I mean, these are ones that I literally would not recommend to anybody at all because I’ve been doing this – and you know this, as one of my older friends – I’ve been doing this for a very, very long time, maintaining these crazy schedules, but I generally come into work on Monday around 10:00 or 11:00, and then I stay at work until Tuesday night around 5:00 or 6:00, and I work that whole time.

Then I go home and see my kids Tuesday night, I wake up with my kids on Wednesday morning, and spend a few hours with them there. And then I do it again, I go in Wednesday afternoon, I work all night, I go home Thursday, and then I do it again on Friday.

Pete Mockaitis
No kidding.

Russell Klusas
So, like for the last year or so, I’ve only slept four nights a week but it’s definitely not something I would recommend to the masses because it takes a while to get used to, and it’s also not something that I would do if it weren’t for the nature of my work right now. Like,       there are reasons why I don’t want to go to sleep with half of an idea, but I would expect that to change.

But it’s more about the fact that I found myself for too long feeling like I was always having to shortchange somebody, and I didn’t want to not be there for my kids ever, and not ever be home during the week, and I didn’t want to have to blow off my staff, and not be able to take new meetings. I also didn’t want to miss on the time that I felt was important for me continuing to make progress on my life’s work, and so this is the schedule that I found worked for me and it turns out that I don’t really value sleep probably that I should have, certainly not more than I value the other things.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow. That is fascinating. Thank you. I knew your hours were interesting but I didn’t know that they were so systematically repeated and in this fashion and it’s great.

Russell Klusas
Yeah, I’ve never been a big like World Wrestling Federation fan but I have become enamored with The Rock over the last kind of two or three years here, because oftentimes I am up at 3:00 o’clock in the morning or 4:00 o’clock in the morning, and for me that’s like mid-day a lot of times. I’m really just starting to get going.

I’ll take a break just to kind of give myself a little reset on something I’m working on, and I kept going online. And when I’ve opened Instagram, or something like that, I would see The Rock, and The Rock would also be up at 3:00 o’clock in the morning. He would be saying and doing the exact same thing I was saying and doing to myself. He’d be literally in the gym, in the Iron Paradise, he calls it, because he wants to make sure that he is the hardest worker in the room.

And I always thought to myself, like, “Man, this is the People’s sexiest man in the world, and the highest-earning actor, and all these things, and yet he always grounds himself by saying he does not sacrifice his time in the gym,” whether it’s a 12-hour day or a 30-hour day, that guy is in the gym because it’s not work for him. That’s how he keeps himself centered.

And I really, really, really respect his work ethic and I think he and I share the same mentality, that we’re either going to win or lose, but if we lose we’re going to be 100% sure that we did everything we could possibly do to succeed. Like I don’t like quitting, so that’s the only thing. I take a lot of risks in my life, and I’d failed plenty of times, but I don’t quit, and I like that mentality and then that keeps me focused.

Pete Mockaitis
Awesome. And is there a particular nugget that you share when you’re working with folks that really seems to connect and resonate with them, they’re taking notes and nodding their heads, like saying, “Yes, Russ. Yes”?

Russell Klusas
Honestly, I don’t know because that implies that I’m saying something that’s making them extra successful when in reality that’s not my job. Like, my job isn’t to make them fantastically successful. My job is just to kind of watch their back and make sure that they don’t fail. I’m Jiminy Cricket in a lot of their lives. So, a lot of times I’m having kind of like radically honest conversations with them about things that matter, but mostly I just want to make sure that they know that we’re there for them when we can be.

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

Russell Klusas
I’d probably point them to Tradecraft if we’re plugging something, go to Tradecraft.com. Otherwise, I would say go find yourself Claude Shannon because he will change your life.

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

Russell Klusas
Know what your TM plus two is. Make sure that the next job that you’re getting, like recognize that. Like I used to be a speechwriter, and I learned from some really great people on that, and they often told me, “You know what the point about first sentence is? To get someone to listen to the second sentence.” Like, it’s really stressful when you’re just trying to get odd jobs, especially early in your career when you’re in survival mode.

The money is kind of running out of your bank account, you’re getting pressure from your parents or see your friends get jobs. It’s really easy to kind of lose sight of the big picture. And just recognize that every job you get, every opportunity you take, it’s always about kind of going towards that greater goal – your vocation, your life’s work. Be thinking five years out because, I promise you, it’s easier. A lot of the details fade away. It’s not as scary when you’re thinking five years out. It just either feels right or it doesn’t.

Pete Mockaitis
Awesome. Well, Russ, thanks so much for taking this time. This has been a ton of fun. We finally recorded a conversation of ours. Hopefully, it’s helpful to the world. And keep on rocking.

Russell Klusas
Thank you very much, Pete.

Jan 08
0

246: Doing the Most with Your To-Do List with Suzanna Kaye

By | Podcasts | 2 Comments

 

 

Suzanna Kaye says: "Productivity... really has only a little bit to do with the tools, 80% of it is the psychology that goes into it."

Professional organizer Suzanna Kaye shares her tips on optimal to-do lists for optimal productivity.

You’ll Learn:

  1. How to cope when your tasks are too overwhelming
  2. A common mistake when working the to-do lists and apps
  3. Guidelines for identifying your priorities

About Suzanna 

Suzanna Kaye is a speaker with a passion! She can be found training and speaking to audiences both locally and internationally about how to structure their lives in new ways to be more productive and organized. Suzanna is the founder of Spark! Organizing, LLC as well as a former CFO for a national corporation. She brings a creative, encouraging, and judgement-free approach to productivity and organization. Her favorite topics include Productivity, Organization and Time Management. As a LinkedIn Learning author, she really does make productivity look effortless.

Items Mentioned in this Show:

Suzanna Kaye Interview Transcript

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

Suzanna Kaye
Hi. Thank you so much for having me.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’d love to get your take, you’ve done a number of jobs over the course of your life. But you said that one was noteworthy, and that was as a Disney Ferry Boat driver. Can you give us the backstory there?

Suzanna Kaye
Yeah, I was lucky enough to be living in Orlando, Florida when I was younger, and one of my first few jobs that were beyond babysitting was driving the Ferry Boat at Walt Disney World, at The Magic Kingdom, which was a fantastic job and the best customer service training I could’ve ever asked for.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m intrigued. So, now Ferry Boat driving, that sounds like it could also get pretty intense at times with regard to the people and the potential for being packed in there. Any noteworthy stories?

Suzanna Kaye
I actually had to dock the Ferry Boat during a hurricane once. It was the last run of the day and they were shutting down the Ferry Boats because, you might not know this, but there’s only four feet of those Ferry Boats that are under the water and the rest is all above the water so it’s basically a giant sail. So, as the winds were whipping in it was very difficult to get that docked to this little slip, and they were just pulling the plug on it and it was the last boat to make a run, and it took me, I think, 12 or 13 tries to get it into that slip finally. But I cheered when I finally got it in. It was nerve wracking.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, I bet. Everyone’s watching.

Suzanna Kaye
It was great. I felt very successful.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, that is cool. Well, so now you are the founder of Spark! Organizing. I try to put the exclamation point in my voice there. And so, you have some experience as a professional organizer and a CEO and I guess organizer of other organizers. So, maybe, could you kick us off by sharing, do you have any really cool stories with regard to how you saw just like an amazing transformation occur in the realm of organization and what difference that made for someone?

Suzanna Kaye
Yeah. Well, there’s so many. I’ve been doing this for over a decade and it’s just been amazing seeing some of the changes that go on with people just simply having your space under control or your schedule. I can think of one in particular that just amazed me because the great news just kept coming. Her name was Mary and we got her home under control after she’d suffered a big loss and was trying to get back on her feet.

So, giving her home back in control was step one. But once her home was in control, the confidence and the feeling of just having her life back in control then helped her increased her salary and her position at her job, it helped her lose weight and she actually ended up in a new relationship all simply from getting her space under control and feeling more confident from it. It was amazing and I still get updates from her, that’s just amazing things happening. It’s wonderful.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, that is absolutely so cool. And so, we’re talking about to-do list here today, and I think that a lot of times the to-do list problems we bump into have some sort of deeper issue with regard to kind of unresolved priorities, or values, or decisions, or some psychological stuff that’s going on under the hood, under the surface there. Could you speak to maybe a pattern or two or three you’ve noticed when it comes to working with the people behind the to-do list?

Suzanna Kaye
Oh, yeah, that’s the great thing about – the fascinating thing to me about productivity is that it really has only a little bit to do with the tools, 80% of it is the psychology that goes into it which I love. So, one of the things that I find most common is this feeling of overwhelm that people have whether it’s from the task seeming too daunting, or something that’s tapping into one of their fears, or simply the quantity of them, and if they’re unorganized it can be very overwhelming, and that’ll just shut you down immediately. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, the first thing that you do is just absolute shutdown and don’t make appropriate decisions or stick your head in the sand and make no decisions at all.

So, that’s one that I see very often. And then the other one is not knowing your priorities. And like priorities is the true priorities, not what’s on fire at the moment but what will move you forward towards your goal and fit into your value set more than anything else on the list. And when you got a very long list, or you’re being pulled in multiple directions, it’s really common to lose sight of what that is and then you feel unproductive because you get a lot done but nothing important.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Noted. And so, then, when it comes to that overwhelm piece, I guess, do you have sort of an SOS or an emergency stuff drop-and-roll protocol for, “Uh-oh. Uh-oh”? When you’re in the overwhelm place rather, as you said, making dumb choices or no choices, what do you do to sort of quickly snap out of it so that you minimize the amount of time that you’re in that suboptimal zone which can have some cascading negative consequences?

Suzanna Kaye
Right. Well, there’s a couple of strategies depending on where the overwhelm is rooted. One of the common strategies – I don’t know if your listeners have heard of Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy. It’s a fantastic book. But the concept there is to do whatever the scariest, ugliest, nastiest task is on your list first thing in the day.

A lot of times our overwhelm is because there’s something on that list that is just growing bigger and uglier that we’re avoiding. So, eating the frog first thing in the morning, doing that nastiest thing first is going to set you up for that day to be amazing after that because there’s nothing else that will be as bad and your brain is not making this one task worst and worst and putting it off and feeling guilty that you’re not doing it. So, that’s one of the best ways to get over that overwhelm if it’s a seriously nasty task or a daunting task that you’re not looking forward to.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Excellent. Any other kind of quick tips come to mind?

Suzanna Kaye
Some other quick tips: knowing your priorities, like I mentioned. One of my favorite things to do is called the top three. And when you got that hundred-task long task list, knowing which three items out of all of them are the most important and fit into your goals and your values, that means that you can mentally let go of the rest.

So, you no longer need to be overwhelmed by that other 97 items because you know none of those are as important as the three that you have highlighted that you’re working on now, and that can just give you that sense of relief. But when you don’t know, when they all seem equally important, that’s a great way to get you to shutdown right away. So, that’s another one of my top go-to ones.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Noted. Well, so then, I’m curious then. I want to dig into some particulars which is just to make sure I don’t overlook any of the best stuff. You’ve got a whole LinkedIn Learning course about to-do list which I think is pretty cool to go into some depth on this topic. And so, I’m curious, when it comes to all the work you’ve done with all your folks, what do you see as being some of the most high-leverage suggestions that you offer in terms of folks making the most of their to-do list?

Suzanna Kaye
The one that I have come across with almost every single coaching client that I worked on for productivity is over-organizing it, over-thinking it, working with tools that aren’t appropriate. So, for example, I had a coaching client that was international and he would frequently change his task management programs because he was trying to find the perfect one, that Holy Grail of task management that’s going to solve all the problems, and it’s not out there.

There’s no one that’s perfect for any one person. They have all have some issues. You just have to find the ones that work with your personality type and then – and this is the part that nobody seems to grasp easily – to stick with it and keep working on it through the growing pains of it and the learning process of it. And once you’ve committed to it, really commit to it long term so you can then analyze it and see what parts of it could be better.

But at the beginning it’s way too early to be changing to another platform again. You’re not gathering all the information you need about your personality and what’s working and what’s not working, so don’t grab that overly-complicated list thinking that it’s going to be that wonderful problem solver unless you’re willing to stick it out and see which parts that are truly useful. So, don’t keep popping around, don’t choose the over-complicated options, go for just what you need and stick to it.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. That’s good. Thank you. So, now let’s talk a bit more about the priorities matter in terms of a lot of folks, they start from a place where their priorities are unclear. You had a tip earlier just there about the zeroing in on the top three as antidote for overwhelm. And so, then, what are kind of the key questions or rules of thumb you use to quickly surface, “What’s the true priority here?”

Suzanna Kaye
I think setting your goals is the important first step when you talk about priorities. You don’t know what your overall goals are. You don’t know how these different tasks fit into them. So, when I’m assessing priorities I sit down with what my goals are and specifically what my highest goal is at that point in time, because you know we always have more than one. We got a bunch of things that we want to do.

So, knowing which top goal you’re working on, that will then help you see which of those tasks will help you reach that goal fastest. So, out of your tasks list, figure out which one is going to move you closer to that finish line the fastest while still fitting in with your values of who you are. A lot of times we leave values out of our goals, and that’s a surefire way to come to a crashing halt because our insights resist reaching a goal that does not align with our values.

So, if it’s not inspiring to you it’s probably not a good goal. And the same thing with the task, if it’s not inspiring to you, you don’t feel like it’s part of that passion, it’s probably not supposed to be on your tasks list.

Pete Mockaitis
And what’s intriguing when it comes to priorities is I think that some of the goals could nest into much bigger sort of macro goals, like areas of life. So, I think like many, many, many things on my to-do list could sort of fit into the realm of run a great business or grow wealth. And so, I think sort of within that area I can get a means of prioritizing metrics such as estimated wealth creation per hour invested is a metric I use as I’m kind of thinking through different potential initiatives.

But there are other important goals like be a great husband, make my wife feel loved and cherished and great, which are a little trickier in terms of finding a clear unit for prioritizing that. And then there’s the bigger question in terms of the prioritizing across sort of disparate life areas and sort of what takes the cake. And so, then, this is almost like an existential or sort of deep human purpose type question. But how do you help clients navigate those trickier questions of priority setting?

Suzanna Kaye
That’s a very big question and there’s so much that I would love to just dump on you with this answer, but I’m going to just pick a couple of areas and focus on those. First off, I do believe that you do need a broad set of goals. There’s not just one area of your life that you’re trying to achieve great things in, such being a great husband need to go along with building wealth.

I think making your goals SMART goals is very important in order to make sure that you’re working towards the goal in the way you want to achieve it. And for those who aren’t familiar, a SMART goal, there’s very different words for the acronym depending on where you learned it. But, basically it is specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and time-bound.

So, you need to be able to set a value to know when you have achieved this. So, for me, being a good wife might mean my husband absolutely loves when I cook dinner. It makes him feel very loved. So, being a good wife, my goal might include cooking dinner two nights a week for the month. And then at the end of the month, I can then look back and say, “Okay. Well, I had time-bound, it’s within a month. I had a quantifiable number, it’s measurable, two times a week. It is attainable and realistic. It’s very specific. Did I achieve this?”

So, knowing those SMART goals makes it a little bit easier to see exactly what you’re working towards instead of just being a good wife which can be a little overwhelming and daunting as well because you don’t know how to do that unless you set a measurable number to it.

Pete Mockaitis
And could you help me? I’ve wondered about this. I’ve seen a variety of this SMART goal acronyms and done a few speeches on it myself. So, can you distinguish for me between attainable and realistic? Those kind of sound like the same thing.

Suzanna Kaye
They do sound a lot like the same thing, and depending on, like I said, where you learned them from. Back in my days in business school those were the words that they used. But in the way that I use it, attainable would be if it’s something that can be achieved within the reasonable amount of time that you’ve set.

So, if I were to say, “I’m going to cook dinner eight nights a week,” that is not attainable. Realistic in this sense kind of crosses over that. For me, realistic fits into how my life is structured. If I were to say seven days a week, for me that’s not realistic. Yes, it’s attainable but it is not realistic in my scheduling and my lifestyle. That’s the framework I use. Like I said though, depending on where you’ve studied, they have different acronyms but it also falls into that same framework.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Understood. Thank you. So, then, for priorities, so we talked about some of the big questions. Anything else you want to say about zeroing in on and establishing priorities?

Suzanna Kaye
Yes, another part that I love to use with people as far as priorities, because we’re all in different points emotionally in our lives, at different points in our lives, if you search it online you can probably even find a sample of it, and I can always send you a link. But if you create a pie chart that shows the different areas of your life such as spirituality, relationship, financial, health, all of those major areas, and then rate how you feel about your life right now in each of those areas and just color it in up to the point where you feel like you are succeeding in that area, then that’s going to be a great visual about what areas you need to focus on as far as your priorities and goals go.

So, if it’s being a good wife, if my relationship is a 10 out of 10 right then, or an 8 out of 10, that’s great. But that means that those goals might not be as high on my list as maybe my health which might be a 5 out of 10. So, that’s going to help me figure out which of those goals in my life as a whole should be more top focus so I can keep that a balanced circle rather than some being in the one or two areas and not even noticing it until it’s too late.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Cool. Thank you. Now, I also enjoyed hearing your “if only one thing” approach. Could you unpack that a little bit?

Suzanna Kaye
This one goes along very well with my type of personality. And I am definitely one of those people where I naturally rebel against other people telling me what I should do, as well as myself telling me what I should do. So, some days I simply need to feel successful, and I have on my desk a picture frame with a framed piece of paper that says, “If I can only accomplish one thing today, it will be…”

And within that there’s a box, and I take a Dry-Erase marker and I write, “The main goal, for me, if I complete this one thing, I can feel that the day was a success.” Most of the time this is my frog. It might be just something that really has a tight deadline that needs to be done, and I know that once this is off my plate I will feel better.

But this is my one thing, in that way no matter what breaks out during my day, what fires happen, what goes wrong, if that was completed at the end of the day I can still give myself a pat on the back because that one thing was achieved, and that was my goal. I had one. So, on those really rough days it’s the only thing that keeps me away from the Ben & Jerry’s.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Excellent. Thank you. Well, so then, I’m thinking about all these things and so if we’re going to get into some systems type approaches. And I like how you mentioned the personality and the differences and the preferences, and how that all kind of plays in together. So, whenever I’m talking to productivity folks, I like to get them to weigh in on what are your thoughts when it comes to David Allen and Getting Things Done or GTD?

Suzanna Kaye
I think it’s a great system. I think that there are so many great systems out there actually. And, like I mentioned before, it has a lot to do with your personality type. Currently, I have my absolute favorite book, I keep buying copies of this book and giving it to people because I think everybody should read it. It’s called The Four Tendencies. I don’t know. Are you familiar with The Four Tendencies at all by Gretchen Rubin?

Pete Mockaitis
Just from what I’ve read in the summary because I haven’t read the whole thing myself.

Suzanna Kaye
Yes. Well, it is a must-read because it really digs into not only what your own personality type is as far as accountability, but also those around you. So, I understand the people who work for me better, I understand my husband better because of this book, but I primarily understand myself better. All of a sudden it clicked that I am not the type of person who works well with a very structured list. It’s just everything that I naturally fight against.

So, there are four tendencies, in general, when it comes to how we meet expectations. There is the upholder who can meet both inner and external expectations without much problem, that’s the one I wish I was but I’m very far from it. There’s the obliger who does really well with meeting outer expectations which are if somebody else needs it, they’re really good at making sure to get that done, but they’re not as good as getting it done for themselves if it’s just an internal desire.

Then there’s the opposite, there’s the questioner. They’re really good once they feel that it’s logical. They’re good at having those internal expectations met, or if it’s an external expectation, when somebody asks for something, if it falls into their own logic, they’re really good at meeting those. And then there’s the rebel, and that is where I fall.

We need to see it as part of our identity. We have to really have it resonate with who we are a lot of times in order to get things done. So, simply having somebody else ask for it, or deciding that we should do it is not enough for us. So, knowing these tendencies about yourself tells you a lot more about the systems that will work for you.

So, some of these very structured systems are fantastic for somebody who might be an upholder or a questioner, and who’s really good at those internal expectations and doing what they’ve decided they want to do. Now, somebody like an obliger or a rebel might have a little bit more difficulty with the structure because there’s no external accountability for the obliger so it might be a little bit too much and it might be a little too overwhelming, they’re just too detailed.

And then, for a rebel, the details, when you get down to that level, can be kind of suffocating. It’s way too much detail, puts a whole lot of pressure on it. You’ve spent so much time planning just to let yourself down. So, that being said, somebody like a rebel does really well with a looser system, so something like beginning things done or some of the more robust task management systems, something like OmniFocus or Todoist or WunderList that have all these great bells and whistles. Those don’t work quite as well for a rebel because there’s just too much detail.

But if we can work with our moods and our emotions and our energies within a simpler list, so I use Clear myself, or there’s also Google Keep is a really good one, and they’re just very basic list, and you can have a list of lists within them but without all of the flagging and tagging and all of those things, those work really well for rebels because they’re very simple and you can go with your mood and go with your energy when you feel the pull to do these things.

Now, upholders, they do really, really well with things like the Getting Things Done system or OmniFocus or Todoist, those are great for them because they love the details and, like I said, I wish I was more of a detail person but us rebels have some good things too.

And then there’s also the Bullet Journal which is a fantastic system for people who don’t necessarily want to be tied to the technology, so not everything is necessarily good online for everyone. So, if you like something more paper-based, a Bullet Journal, it does not have to be drawn on all pretty and you don’t have to spend hours setting it up, but that can be a really good system for people too.

So, know your personality type and test some out and see if it works for you really well then just adjust the few things that need to be changed. But if it’s just a struggle then it’s probably the wrong system for you and you should go to something either more simple or more structured or offline.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, now I’m intrigued there when it comes to if it’s a struggle for you then maybe you need to change your system. But thinking about your previous advice when it comes to, “Don’t kind of always be flip-flopping and jumping to the next thing,” I guess I’m wondering if there might be some, I don’t know, fundamental kind of mindset or discipline or habit things that need to kind of be in place to make any system work, and without them all systems will fail. Can you comment on a couple of those sort of universal human fundamentals that may be at play here?

Suzanna Kaye
Most definitely. And, yes, you should not just jump crazily from one to another. I think, if everything, if you’re going to try it, try it solidly for at least 30 days. And by solidly I mean if you fall off the wagon, get back up, and then go for 30 days from there. Don’t miss a week and then hop back on for another week and say that it’s not working.

So, that’s one of the basics with humans, 30 days, 28 days, there’s varying numbers but they’re all around the same area to build a new habit. If you do something consistently for approximately 30 days, that’s when the habits start to get built, and that’s when the struggle becomes less because, now, it’s just something you do instead of something you have to try to remember. So, with any of these systems, building that 30 days habit is important because if you’ve done that, after 30 days and it’s still a struggle that’s when it’s obviously the system and not just the underlying habits.

Pete Mockaitis
Understood. Okay. And a Bullet Journal, can you elaborate, what is that, how do we get our hands on one?

Suzanna Kaye
Sure. A Bullet Journal, you have your hands on it right now. It’s simply a book and a pencil or a pen. And a bullet journal begins with an index usually, or you could put it at the end. I put mine at the beginning. But the first part is an index, and it indexes all of the different topics you’ve covered within the journal. And then within the journal you can have multiple things you track. The main thing is going to be your daily activities.

So, for today, I would have my 10 or so tasks, and then I would index the page that those tasks are on, of I took meeting notes with those tasks, the meeting information, those that that page is on in that index. So, my index can now tell me where my notes are or what page that it’s on that I did certain tasks and certain activities for tracking purposes and to look things back up which is one of the things that paper system you lose, you don’t just do a search.

So, it’s kind of a couple pages of your search function is what that is at the beginning, referring to the page numbers of these different topics, these different key words. And then within it’s your task list and they have a series of symbols that tell you at the end of the day whether you completed the task or, “Did you migrate it to the next day?” or, “Did you delegate it to somebody else?”

There are just different ways that you can use these symbols in order to show what happened with that task, and keep it on your radar so it does not just die on that day and you aren’t writing all of these tasks over and over and over. They’re specifically moving to the next day or to a specific calendar date or being delegated or completed.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. That’s cool. And when it comes to the icon demarcations, how do we know those or do we just make them up ourselves, or is there sort of a master reference list?

Suzanna Kaye
There is a master reference list if you just Google online bullet journals. But I’ve got my own because my brain likes to identify things differently so, to me, having an X next to something does not mean the same necessarily as to you. So, when I complete a task, I like the X versus a checkmark or versus crossing it out. So, I say make up whatever works for you, just be consistent with it. I like to put a dot next to anything that’s delegated because, to me, it’s kind of like a period, so, done.

Pete Mockaitis
You know, it’s so funny, as you talk about this, it really is coming to life. When I am writing things down as sort of like a temporary or sort of like a daily type view because I do love OmniFocus myself. I guess I’m upholding. It’s tremendous. But when I am doing a paper thing maybe to try to kind of focus my day, it’s like, “All right. This is what’s up for today,” as opposed to OmniFocus having the omnibus compendium of all commitments and actionable ideas ever conceived in my brain. It’s kind of the storehouse of that.

And so, if I’m doing it for the day I’d really like to cross out the item, or sort strike through, that’s what we call it, strike through with a green marker. I don’t know. It just feels like that’s so done, like green or cache. I don’t know. So, that’s there. And when I delegate I like to have it be a triangle with the point – I guess it’s not equilateral – but it sort of points it to the right, kind of like, “Hey, this goes to somebody else, not me.”

Suzanna Kaye
Exactly, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
So, yeah, I hear what you’re saying, like make the icons your own, but the Googling might spark some inspirations.

Suzanna Kaye
Yeah. Now, I will warn you, when you Google it you will see a number of these bullet journals where people have taken a lot of time to draw out either make it beautiful or draw different charts and structures, and you can do that if that’s what you want to do. And for some people it’s a really good meditation at the beginning or the end of the day, and it really helps them connect with their day and have that peaceful time as they lay out this journal of their day.

So, some people really thrive with that, but you don’t have to do all of that. So, a lot of people will see online these pictures of these bullet journals that look so complex. Just remember that they don’t have to be. You can even create one one time and print it out each time you need it and put it in a three-ring binder if that helps. If you’re like me, and when I get to your day, instead of drawing out your day for an hour, then it can be done with a bullet journal. Do not let it scare you off.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. And I also want to get your view on when it comes to tasks and calendars, I hear a couple of schools of thought. And one is that, “Well, the calendar is for the hard landscape of that which is scheduled,” which is sort of, “I have an appointment with Suzanna at 4:30 p.m. Central Time, and that’s there.”

And so, then when it come to putting tasks on the calendar, do you have some perspective? Like some would say, “They don’t belong there,” and others would say, “Oh, no, no. You should absolutely schedule the things because what we don’t schedule just sort of maybe never happens.” So, how do you navigate the pros, cons, distinctions, guidelines when it comes to putting tasks on a calendar?

Suzanna Kaye
That’s a good question, and you’re going to hate it because I’m going to come back to my answer of it depends on your personality type. But I think it’s a good practice to do every once in a while whether it’s putting it on the calendar or tracking your time, no matter what your personality type is, in order to make sure you’re being realistic about how long your tasks truly take.

So, spending a week putting them on all on your calendar is actually a really good practice to do every once in a while to make sure that you are still being realistic about how long each of these items take, because most of the time we grossly underestimate how long a task takes.

Now, if you’re the personality type that loves to schedule them on the calendar, then that is perfect. I think the calendar is a great place for it and, especially with these digital calendars these days, you can have multiple calendars that you can show and hide so I don’t see why you would not have a task list as one of them if that’s something that you do well with.

I, personally, have been known to schedule batching on my calendar. Now, what batching is is it’s taking similar tasks and doing them all at the same block of time. So, for example, when I schedule a batch day, I might have one hour of answer emails, I might have one hour of making phone calls, and these calls could be for different subjects and different projects, but it’s me being on the phone for one hour.

Or me being on the computer, or me being in the filing cabinets doing actual paperwork items, similar items in one time-block, and does that really well on a calendar if you don’t want to write each individual task on the calendar, that’s fine. Batch them and then your brain does not have to lose that productivity time switching between tasks types because it takes a little bit for our brain to go from a phone call to an email to a computer file. It just takes a moment.

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

Suzanna Kaye
I can’t think of anything else. I think it’s most important just know your goals and the values that are attached to them. And when you’re thinking about your goals and the priorities for the day, also one of the questions I like to ask myself is, “Is this going to matter in five years?” So, sometimes when it seems like you’ve got these different tasks that are equally important, some of them in five years it will have made an effect, and some of them it won’t, so that’s a good question sometimes to bring a little bit more clarity as to what’s the bigger priority.

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

Suzanna Kaye
Ah, I’ve got two, of course, because I’m a quote person. I am very focused on helping others achieve more in their lives, so one of my favorite quotes that’s out there right now is, “Empowered women empower women.” And I have that on a T-shirt, I’ve got that on my wall. And then my other favorite quote that I’ve had since I was younger is by Edith Wharton, it’s, “Be the light or the mirror that reflects it.” And, to me, that simply means I don’t need to be the one that shines all the time if I’m helping other people shine in the world, and that just means a lot to me.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Great. Thank you. And how about a favorite book?

Suzanna Kaye
Oh, I mentioned The Four Tendencies. Everybody needs to read that one by Gretchen Rubin. I think it’s fantastic. And I heard about Gretchen Rubin actually through Oprah. If you don’t mind me telling, another podcast, or the three podcasts that are on my favorites podcast list: it is yours, it is Oprah’s Super Soul Sunday, and Mary Forleo’s, and I think that those three are the top hitters, and that’s where you find out about all these big mind leaders that are in the world today, it’s those three.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, shucks. I’m flattered. You probably say it to every podcast who interviews you, “Oh, it’s you and Oprah. It’s you and Oprah.”

Suzanna Kaye
But it’s true, it’s those three. I love to find the thought leaders of the day and the people who can bring me and people to a successful way, I just think are wonderful. So, those are some of the other two of it. If they’re listening to the podcast here, they already know about you, then those are the two others that need to be on their list.

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

Suzanna Kaye
Oh, I am frequently amazed actually by research on the storage industry and the amount of clutter in our lives, of course, being an organizer. But there’s just so many billions of dollars spent each year on storage and it is one of the fastest growing industries in America today. And it’s very unique to America to be such a huge industry. It just blows my mind and I’m fascinated.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, I don’t think I knew that. So, you’re talking about like self-storage lockers type stuff.

Suzanna Kaye
Yes. All of these places that we put our things temporarily and then forget about them but keep paying the bill for those places, yes.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, so, okay, if you could indulge us, any intriguing numbers? So, there’s many billions spent on it, it’s high growth, I’m wondering what’s the average length of time that someone maintains a storage locker because in some ways I think that makes sense. It’s like, you know, “Hey, I’ve got an internship for three months in this other city, and I’m not going to take everything there and back.” So, I think there’s certain contexts where that makes total sense. But you’re saying that it’s quite common that folks just shove it there for years and years and forget about it but keep paying.

Suzanna Kaye
They do. And I don’t have a statistic on how many years, but one of my favorite statistics is that the U.S. has upwards of 52,000 storage facilities which is more than five times the number of Starbucks which is amazing because you see a Starbucks everywhere you go, and there are more storage facilities than that.

Pete Mockaitis
Wow. That is intriguing in so many ways. I’m doing up business ideas as we speak, I don’t know, “Bring it back. Bring it back.” And how about a favorite tool, something that helps you be awesome at your job?

Suzanna Kaye
I think my favorite tool is actually my Label Maker. I love my Label Maker because if you can see things nicely labeled your brain can read it and register it better even if you’ve got great handwriting. It registers it better if it’s printed so it just puts your brain at ease and makes it easier.

Pete Mockaitis
And the high contrast, I find, because. Now, you’re using the DYMO I saw on some of your photos?

Suzanna Kaye
I have two because, as an organizer, if one breaks you need a backup.

Pete Mockaitis
All right.

Suzanna Kaye
I don’t think everybody needs two. My favorite is the Brother though.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, okay.

Suzanna Kaye
The P-Touch by Brother.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Say it again, what is it by Brother?

Suzanna Kaye
It’s called P-Touch. The letter P and the word Touch.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Very good. Any thoughts to the pros and cons? That’s right, we go detail here, let’s hear it.

Suzanna Kaye
Yeah, the DYMO is simply the cost and wastes of label tape because they leave so much blank tape on the end of each label. It’s simply more cost-efficient to use the Brother’s P-Touch version than the DYMO. I’ve learned that.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. So, it sounds like you’re saying that the P-Touch is overall fundamentally superior.

Suzanna Kaye
I believe so.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, I saw a picture of you with the DYMO Label Maker, and I thought, “Oh, I’ve got the same Label Maker. That’s so cool.” And now you come in here and say, “Actually that one sucks.”

Suzanna Kaye
“Actually, my other one is better.” Yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, good. Well, I’m glad I asked.

Suzanna Kaye
DYMO looks better for the pictures, it’s cheaper to use.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, and it’s a sleek-looking unit, I’ll hand you that. So, at the very least, not to trash DYMO. I will say DYMO has served me well. It’s very quick. It’s very portable. I can even operate it one-handed, I’ve large hands, and it looks good in a photo. So, we’ll give them that.

Suzanna Kaye
It does, yes. It’s a very handsome and it does work well.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Cool. All right. And then when it comes to habits, in terms of things you do to be awesome at your job, what are they?

Suzanna Kaye
Gratitude. I think gratitude is the habit that I can tell when I start to slack because things just don’t run quite as smoothly or as well, and I miss opportunities because my brain and my eyes are just not opened to them. But by focusing on the things I am grateful for and the why, why I’m grateful for them. It makes me aware of so many other opportunities out there when I come across them instead of being closed off to them. So, it’s been the best habit for my personal life as well my business life.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a particular nugget that you share in your speaking or trainings that seems to really connect and resonate, and getting folks nodding their heads and saying yes and taking notes?

Suzanna Kaye
I think the main thing that I share that resonates with people is it’s okay, everybody has their thing that they’re not at the level they want to be at, and just keep going, you’re not alone. So, if your home is not where you want it to be, if you’re not as productive as you think that you should be, or as successful as you feel like you should be, it’s okay as long as you’re still taking that next step every day. Keep going because we all fail, we just don’t do it publicly. So, we’re all in the same boat. I’m pretty sure even Oprah has rough days that she just does not post on Facebook but we can relate to her.

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

Suzanna Kaye
I would tell them to find me on my Facebook page. Just search for Spark! Organizing on Facebook, and that’s where I’m always having conversations.

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

Suzanna Kaye
I think probably my call to action would be to figure out what your breakthrough goal is and keep that in mind. And by breakthrough goal I mean that one thing that if you could achieve it, it would change your life. And just know that and keep that in front of you each day.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Beautiful. Well, Suzanna, thank you so much for taking this time and sharing. It’s been a lot of fun. I wish you much luck with your organizing and speaking and training and all you’re up to.

Suzanna Kaye
Well, thank you so much. I truly enjoyed it.

Dec 08
0

239: Building Yours Systems for Success with Sam Carpenter

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Sam Carpenter says: "Your life is a collection of separate systems."

Sam Carpenter explores how you can effectively work with the collection of systems that make up your work and life.

You’ll Learn:

  1. The benefit of seeing your complex life as a simpler collection of systems
  2. How to analyze and fix the kinks in your system
  3. Top systems that are most often dysfunctional

About Sam 

Sam has a background in engineering, journalism, publishing, forestry, construction management, and telecommunications. An author and entrepreneur, he is president and CEO of Centratel, the premier telephone answering service in the United States. Other businesses he founded and operates are Work the System Consultants and PathwayOne, an online marketing firm based in Italy.

Items Mentioned in this Show:

Sam Carpenter Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Sam, thanks so much for joining us here on the How To Be Awesome At Your Job podcast.

Sam Carpenter
Thank you, Pete.  Glad to be here.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, it was really fun chatting with you, that in between the time you said, “Yes, I’ll do this interview”, and this interview happening, you announced a run for governor.  How’s all that going?

Sam Carpenter
Right, in the state of Oregon.  Very well.  We’re ahead in the polls, I’ve got 50,000 followers on Facebook, and I only announced three weeks ago.  So, it’s fun.  And I ran for US Senate two years ago, and that was not fun. [laugh] It’s good to be in the lead and it’s good to have a lot of people behind you, so it’s been very fun actually so far.

Pete Mockaitis
Cool.  I’m glad you’re not just sort of losing your sanity along the way.

Sam Carpenter
I didn’t say that.

Pete Mockaitis
Fun and insane – I guess not mutually exclusive.

Sam Carpenter
I may be insane, but I’m not losing my insanity in any sense, no.

Pete Mockaitis
So, we chat with folks with all sorts of ideas along the political spectrum, but the idea I’m most interested in learning from you is as an area of your deep expertise, when it comes to systems – you’ve got the books Work the System and The Systems Mindset.  So, could you share with us what are the big ideas behind these books and why they’re helpful?

Sam Carpenter
Well, the two books – they are interesting – one was written in 2008 and the other one was published in 2016, and they both have the same thread.  And the central thread is this: It’s that our lives – and I’ll get a little sort of metaphysical here, but not really – our lives are collections of systems and processes.  And in our houses – and you and I were just talking about our houses for instance – I can turn around here from my computer and I could go to the sink and turn the water on and the water will come out, because the system of delivering that water is a good system and the water pressure is right and the little town here in our second home here in rural Kentucky, the water system works well.  And I could go flip the light switch on over there – that’s a separate system.

Those systems have nothing to do with each other, anymore than your heart has anything to do with your kidney.  I know they’re connected and I know they work together, but really, they’re separate.  And it’s the same for your radio in your car and your brakes in your car.  And every tree that’s outside my window right now is separate from the trees next to it.  Your life is a collection of separate systems, and if that’s the truth, the hand of God reaching down is not going to get you where you want to go, some new law isn’t going to do it.  What’s going to do it is seeing your life as a collection of systems.  And moment to moment, since 1999, when I walk through a room I see a collection of systems, or when I’m driving in the car – every car is a separate system, every driver and every car is a separate system.

And then you can fix things.  If your life isn’t going very well, then take it apart and find the most dysfunctional systems and work on those first.  But another loan from the bank isn’t going to help, and another wife is probably not going to help.  So you take things apart.  And so, Work the System: The Simple Mechanics of Making More and Working Less, which was published in 2008 and is in its third edition and we’re just doing another printing now – I think it’s our 12th printing – it talks about business and gives you documentation and processes, and how to document your processes, how to define them, how to pick them out, how to correct them and how to make sure they stay good.  And then The Systems Mindset: Managing the Machinery of Your Life – it’s the same thing, but it’s designed for people who don’t own businesses.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool.  Thank you.  And maybe could you help define a little bit for us – when you say a “system”, do you have a precise definition on the components, or what makes a system a system?

Sam Carpenter
It’s an entity that stands on its own with a purpose.  For instance, a car is a separate primary system, okay?  And its purpose is to get whoever’s in it from point A to point B.  And a house is a system – an enclosed system – which is a collection of subsystems designed to house you.  In a business a separate system would be your phone system.  Another system would be how you answer the phone at the front desk.

At Centratel – and I’m sure we’ll talk about Centratel – how you answer that phone at the front desk is very well defined.  There happen to be seven steps: You pick up the phone, you put a smile on your face because if you put a smile on your face, there is a smile in your voice, and you answer in a very certain way.  And anybody who answers the phone, answers it exactly that way.  And the way we got that system to be perfect was we took all the people together who answered the phones, including me – the owner of the company – and defined what a perfect answering system would be.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, now I’m intrigued.  If we could maybe make this come to life all the more.  So, could you walk us through what is a perfect phone answering system, that could come in handy for anybody who picks up their phone.

Sam Carpenter
Well, I gave you the first two steps, and then you define how you want to… I can’t remember how they’re doing it at Centratel now; it seems to me it’s changed a little bit, but it’s something like this: “Centratel, this is Mary.  May I help you?”  Very generic, but if John’s answering, it’s the same thing, except he uses his name.  And then the next couple of points in that process: Try to help the caller get to the destination they want to get to, whoever it is – our CEO, our tech guy, whatever it is.  And then another system will take over once it’s delivered.

Everything is documented too; everything is exactly documented – how our operators answer the phone, how we handle a complaint, how we do a sales pitch, our marketing.  There are many, many, many processes.  Now people don’t walk around reading those processes; they are documented.  But the fact that they’re documented and on our hard drive means that they’re paid attention to.

And here’s the other thing, Pete, which is pretty cool.  If your life is a collection of systems, and therefore your business is a collection of systems, wouldn’t it make sense to work on those systems 24/7 and have other people do the actual work?  So, my management staff of seven at Centratel – we have about 40 people there, we do 400,000 a month at the call center, the little answering service.  All of those managers do nothing but work on systems, and if I catch them doing the work, I give them a lot of grief.

For instance, I found my CEO Andi was answering the phone because we had a real rush.  We take messages and deliver them – that’s what our answering service does.  So she has a console on her desk, and it got really busy in there and she jumped on to help the 15 or 20 TSRs that were out there to handle the traffic.  And I said to her, “Don’t ever do that again.”  We were laughing, don’t get me wrong.  And she says, “I know, I know.”  I said, “It’s so heroic, and I guess there’s some value in showing everybody out there that you care, but don’t do it anymore.  I pay you way too much money to do this other stuff, and the TSRs understand that.”  Our telephone service representatives – regular people that answer the phones.  “They understand that you have things you have to do in here.”  For instance, we’re putting $100,000 new heating system in our building – that’s got to be her top priority and she can’t get distracted.

But my point is this: It’s that everybody who’s in management works on processes and systems.  And so she’s working on this process and working on this system.  And we have three words that we use, Pete: automate, delegate, delete.  That’s what a manager should be doing all the time.  Automating it so you don’t have to do it over and over.  Anything you do over and over again, you shouldn’t be doing probably.  A real chief, a real manager, is always on a new project doing creative things.  Automate, delegate to somebody else – an assistant, for instance, or off site.

Automate, delegate, delete.  So many things we do we shouldn’t be doing at all; there’s no pay off.  And you go back to the 80/20 rule, which is absolutely the truth of the matter: If you can get rid of all the superfluous stuff that has no ROI – return on investment – you’re going to have more time to expand on the things that are profitable.  I do consulting, because Work the System is a book on how to do all this stuff, and you wouldn’t believe the businesses we run into, you wouldn’t believe the government of Oregon.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay.  So, I’d love it if you could maybe walk us through some examples of let’s say… The audience here are professionals, they want to be awesome at their jobs.  Can you give us some examples of some systems that probably could benefit from some attention, or maybe some transformative innovations or interventions that you’ve brought about for some folks, that can spark actionable ideas here?

Sam Carpenter
Yeah.  The innovation that most companies should have, and most don’t, is what we call – and it’s a document – it’s called the Strategic Objective.  And you can get my book at WorkTheSystem.com and download it for free.  The whole book, audio, or any number of text iterations.  And we fixed over 500 businesses in the last seven years – Josh Fonger, my main guy and I.  They don’t have documentation.  And so, the main system you need is a system of what is it you do and where do you want to go.  And it’s got to be more than a mission statement.  A mission statement is a total distraction.  “Oh, we want to be the best and we want everybody to love us and we want our employees to be happy and all our customers to be happy”, and blah, blah, blah, blah.  It means nothing.

What you need is to take it apart in more detail.  Instead of a little paragraph it really needs to be on one sheet of paper, maybe 300 words, and you list what you do, where you want to go, kind of how you’re going to do it, the things you’re not going to do, sometimes the tools you’re going to use.  And you have to get everybody going in the right direction.  And if everybody is going in a different direction, they all have their own little individual ideas of where you’re going, it’s going to be a dysfunctional mess, and 9 out of 10 businesses are dysfunctional messes, small ones.  The big ones didn’t get big by being dysfunctional messes.

Now, I have a system of documentation I use – there’s other systems – the point is, everybody has to get on the same road, whatever process they use.  And then another document is the Operating Principles.  So we have 30; we call them 30 principles.  These documents are in the back of the book, in the appendix.  And the principles are like, “There will be no clutter in the office”, figuratively or literally.  I’ve got the book here – I could read through them, but you get the idea.  There’s 30 principles and we use these principles for gray area decision-making, when you’re not really sure really what to do.  “What would you do here?”

Well, another one is the simplest solution.  Occam’s Law – the simplest solution is invariably the correct solution.  And I had somebody define it – a new employee, a manager that I think I’m going to hire for the campaign – she said, “The simplest system is the most elegant system.”  And that’s a beautiful thing.  So, that’s just one of the principles.  And we have 30 principles there, and the person could go to the book and plagiarize both the meaning and the tone of both of those two documents I’ve mentioned.

And then the last series of documents – there are three – are the Working Procedures.  And that is where we document how you answer the phone, how you handle a complaint.  We’ve got hundreds and hundreds of them in the office.  But if you don’t get everybody going down the same road and doing things the same way, you’re going to have a mess.  And the other thing is you don’t have a system for them to say, “Hey, this is changed over here.  Process A over here is no longer any good, because one, two and three happened over here.  We’ve got to change the process.”  And then you’ve got to let everybody know the process has changed.

So you can see how I, as a leader, work on processes and systems and protocols, and these are the things that get everybody going in the same direction, and you become efficient, because the thing that kills businesses is inefficiency.  Fire killing – that’s what it is.  Fire killing destroys businesses, fire killing destroys administrations and government, fire killing destroys marriages, it destroys everything.  You want to get from A to B in the most efficient way possible, and you can’t be waylaid by problems that come up because you didn’t have a process to prevent the problem from happening in the first place.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay.  So I want to get super, super tactical here, if I could.  So Sam, do you have a system for doing your laundry or having others do your laundry, and what is it?

Sam Carpenter
No, this is very interesting.  The new book, The Systems Mindset, is for anybody who doesn’t have a business.  And in there I say you don’t need to document this stuff in your personal life.  You need to document how the car wreck goes on the car – you need to write down somewhere that the front connectors are 18.5 inches back from this corner of the windshield.  And maybe how you change the filters in your HVAC system, maybe, if somebody else is going to do it.  But there isn’t much documentation in your personal life; it’s a matter of thinking.

So The Systems Mindset subtitle is Managing the Machinery of Your Life.  But in a business, because you’ve got a lot of people doing this stuff, John needs to know how Mary does it, and Mary has to do it the same way Frank does it.  You’ve got to get everybody doing things the same way, and then those are the people who create the processes.  It’s not top-down like military; I don’t write up all the procedures.  I wrote up the first procedures for the first few months – that was in 1999.  I haven’t written a procedure in a couple of years.  And the one I wrote was for me in the office.

But they write the procedures.  What a great way to do things is to have the people who do the work do the procedures, because they know how it works – they know how to talk to the customer, they know how to do this, how to do that.  Now, my CEO and I keep everybody going down the same road.  “No, we don’t want to have this new service; it just isn’t in keeping with where we want to go.”  And you can go back to the strategic objective and figure that out and make an argument for it.  But for instance, if we had extra space in our office, we could have a tanning salon for example.  I mean, it would make sense; there’s people there 24/7.  It could be Bend, Oregon 24/7 Sam’s Tanning Salon, and it would probably make money.  But we’re not going to do that because it’s got nothing to do with our main concern, which is telecommunications and so forth.  So, it keeps you going.

And so when you ask me for, “Give me a process, give me a system” – those three documents are critical.  And then you can go down to how you handle a complaint, how you can… So, what happens is, and I’ll get to your main question, which I think I understand, is when Josh goes out in the field, what he does is go in… And either one of us can walk in any business and tell you in 20 minutes what the problem is.  And sometimes your brother-in-law does need to be fired, okay?  Sorry about that, explain it to your wife, but he’s a problem.  We get into that too, but once we get into the business, we see how it’s run and what are the mechanical – and “mechanical” is such a great word – what are the mechanical irregularities and dysfunctions?  And you fix the biggest problem first.

And maybe the biggest problem is your brother-in-law needs to go – okay, I get that.  But within the business there are processes that need to be documented.  For instance, if there’s something that’s handled by six different people – say it’s a 20-person business – six different people and they all handle it a different way – that’s ridiculous, because some are going to do it real well and some are going to do it in a horrible way.  Why don’t we all do it the real, real fine way?  Put all six people down at the table, “Okay, what’s the first thing you do?”  And then it’s, “Number one – do this, number two – do this, number three – do this, number four – do this.”  And then when that process is done and everybody agrees it works, you put it into place and you move on to the next biggest problem.

You really do start with the biggest problem, I don’t care what it is.  I can almost guarantee you the second problem won’t have anything to do with the first problem.  It will be something completely different, I don’t care what kind of business you’ve got.  And you work through based on what are the biggest problems first, and all of a sudden you get through five of those big problems and things start to smooth out; there’s not so much fire killing.  You might’ve fixed 60% of all your problems by fixing those five things.

And it could be anything; in a machine shop, it would be how the guys are doing a certain piece on the machine, and everybody is doing it in their own way.  It might be a drill press, it might be a lathe, it might be anything.  But you’ve got to get the guys together and sit them down and say, “What’s the best way to do it?”  And Frank over here is doing it this way and he says, “Oh John, I didn’t know we could do it that way.  Yeah, man, it’s really great.”  And then John is going to learn something from Frank too.  It’s really the most simple thing and it’s all based – at the beginning of our chat here, Pete – it’s all based on the mechanical fact that our lives are collections of systems and processes.

That little beagle that’s sitting on the couch in the sunroom there – he’s a separate system too.  And I just got this Garmin tracker for him because he’s a hound, and when we go out in the woods, he’s gone, man.  If he gets a scent of anything, he’s gone.  And so this fabulous tracker – and it took me about a half hour to figure it out on how to work – I can take him out and it’s got a little antenna that comes up, and the documentation is the little book I got with it.  But he can run anywhere and I know exactly where he is.  He got out 600 yards from me the other day and I just went back and got him.  And it’s even got a little what they call a “stimulator” on it – it’s actually like a chock that you can adjust.  And I adjust it so he knows it’s happening, not so it hurts him.  But if he gets out too far, I can just hit a button and he knows to come back to me.  That is a separate system too.  It’s a separate system from the beagle; the beagle has nothing to do with it; they just work together very well.

And that’s how a business should be – if you could take your business apart and stop believing you just need to hire a better manager or if you could just get that other loan – no, no.  Instead you go exactly the opposite and you take it apart piece by piece, but you’ve got to get this thing in your head, about the separate systems.  So Work the System and The Systems Mindset.  The Systems Mindset book is a smaller book.  It’s in two parts.  The Work the System is in three parts; the middle part is about documentation.

But essentially the first part of each book is getting the systems mindset, and that means you can walk down the street and you see separate systems; you don’t see this massive confusion.  I like to say “a mass confusion of sights, sounds and events”.  The barking dog over there has nothing to do with your belly ache, has nothing to do with the dog on the end of your leash.  And the trees when you’re walking by have nothing to do with each other; they’re all separate.  When you can drive down the road or walk down the street or sit in your house and really see that – that’s called the systems mindset.  And it usually comes in an instant, it comes in a flash.

It did for me, it happened one night.  I won’t go into how that happened, but I woke up the next morning and I saw the world differently.  And that was in 1999 and my whole life got cleaned up at that point.  I was a mess.  I was a mess in the business, I was a mess in my personal life. Everything cleaned up beautifully, because I started facing reality.

Do you know what it means to be red pilled, Pete?

Pete Mockaitis
Is that from The Matrix?

Sam Carpenter
Yeah, man.  It was the greatest science fiction movie ever made, in my mind.  So, listen to this: “Morpheus…”  And this is 1999.  “I’m trying to free your mind, but I can only show you the door.  You’re the one who has to walk through it.”  And so in the campuses there’s this thing called redpilling, and that is all of a sudden seeing reality for what it really is.

But back to The Systems Mindset – redpilling in my mind is seeing your life as a collection of separate systems.  Very few people will get it right away.  Some people who are listening to this get it right as they’re listening to it, but most don’t; it takes a couple of weeks.  Download the book, look at it – your life will change forever.  You’ll get what you want out of life.  I got everything I wanted out of life.

I’m going to run for governor for just the hell of it.  I mean, that’s not really true – I’m going to run for the hell of it because I’ve got the time, and I want to make some big changes in our state.  The forests are burning down, the government’s out of control. I mean, why not go for something big?  I see it in that sense: Why not do something big, because the rest of my life has come together so well?  I have the time and the money to do it.  I have more money than I need, I’ve got more time than I need.  This is something I can do.  And I’m in my late 60s, and this is the time of my life when I want to help.

I have a non-profit overseas and people say, “How come?”  And I say, Why not?”  There’s a bunch of teachers over there; you know what they make in these back-country Pakistan towns?  $15 a month, Pete.  And the kid’s tuition is $1 a month, and that’s high.  And so, I can go over there and get so much bang for my buck with my non-profit to help those kids. So if you could see your life in this way, everything comes together, everything starts to make sense and you start getting what you want out of life, because the reality is, your life is a collection of systems.  And if you treat it that way and go for the most dysfunctional systems first, or the biggest system that you think you can get a grip on, all of a sudden things will go your way.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, can you give us some examples then, in terms of for individuals for systems they have that are frequently dysfunctional, or how do we zero in on, “Of all the systems in my life, this one is probably the most dysfunctional and should get my attention first?

Sam Carpenter
Are you talking about in a business environment?

Pete Mockaitis
No, I’m just talking an individual professional.

Sam Carpenter
An individual professional.  Okay, number one – communications.  And so, that’s what we were talking about before we started talking here.  So, we have these tools; one’s called EVM, and we’ve been using it for many, many years.  It’s relatively new, and if you have an iPhone or Android, doesn’t matter, but there is a way to attach a voice message as an attachment on to an email.  It’s powerful stuff.  It’s how I run my companies.

So, I’ve got 40 people at Centratel.  I could get on the phone after we finish here and I could say, “Hey everybody, just want to let you know I’m coming back tomorrow.  I am, by the way, flying back from Kentucky.  And we had a great report, great numbers, our bottom line was terrific.  I just want to thank all of you.”  And I say that, I attach it to a group email and everybody gets it.  Josh – Josh is my field guy and we’re partners.  He’s in Phoenix, but he’s on the road all the time.  I don’t even know where he is most of the time.  So, “Hey Josh, I was thinking about this or that, and what do you think about this?  Get back to me.”  Well, he might not hear it for a few hours ’cause he’s working with a client, but he will get back to me in the same way.  We very rarely are on the phone at the same time, and it’s the same with my CEO, and it’s the same with my campaign people – very, very seldom.

So to the professional who’s got people that he or she works for, I would say, do that, because our tendency, Pete – maybe your tendency, and it used to be my tendency – is to sit down and write a long email.  I’m sorry, it takes 20 minutes; and with an EVM I can do the same in two minutes.  And you get your tonal inflection in there, the whole thing.  The only thing we document are processes, and anything that is very sensitive or complex information, we sit down and do an email.  So, if your professional is super efficient, they will be better at what they do.  And there’s other tools out there, other communication tools too.

One of the big things I changed recently, because this tool has been bugging me… And what happened was, I had my PC computer, we were down in Savannah, Georgia, and I lost it.  I lost it in the hotel.  It turned out somebody had found it and picked it up and it got put in the wrong place.  I ultimately found it three days later, but it ruined the vacation, because I knew half of it was on the Cloud and half of it wasn’t.  And Diana and I said… I know that I can get another PC and download most of it, but there’s so much that I’m going to miss and I’m going to be struggling to put the pieces together for a year, and it’s going to be like my house burned down.

So we had been talking and she’s kind of had the same problem, where booting her computers all day long.  It’s a Microsoft problem – sorry about that, Bill Gates.  But I got my computer back, everything was fine, but you know what we did?  We said, “To hell with it.  We’re switching to Apple’s computers.”  And we switched to the Mac Pro, and I’ll tell you what – replacing that system with this system was one of the best movies I made in the last 10 years.

Pete Mockaitis
And so now it automatically backs up then to the Cloud?

Sam Carpenter
Everything’s on the Cloud, everything makes sense, everything’s intuitive.  You know what?  What do you use, Pete?

Pete Mockaitis
I also have a MacbookPro.

Sam Carpenter
Yeah.  So, everything’s intuitive, it never breaks, you could go a month without having to reboot it.  You know what I’m talking about.  I don’t know if you’ve ever dealt with a PC, but you want to kill yourself.  I’m sorry, you want to put a bullet in your head half the time.  And 30 years I was a PC user, because of the systems we used professionally in the call center.  I don’t need to do that anymore because I don’t do much in a call center.  I don’t do more than an hour of work a week at the call center.  So, the process, “How’s your computer doing?” or, “How’s your…”  We went from Androids to all iPhones, because they’re just more reliable, and everybody doesn’t have something different.  And I don’t care how many extra apps you can get on an Android; the basics never fail on the iPhone.

Pete Mockaitis
Can you tell me, this electronic voicemail – I assume that’s what EVM stands for – it sounds pretty handy.  How do I start doing that in my life?

Sam Carpenter
Well, there’s a native on the iPhone that works.  I like Say It & Mail It.

Pete Mockaitis
Is that a website I can go to?

Sam Carpenter
I think you can find it on Google.  I like that, I use them both.  Say It & Mail It – you’re pretty much limited to five or six minutes, and you can’t stop it and then start it again.  So if it’s something quick, you know what you’re saying, if I’m leaving a message for Diana or something – it’s real fast and I use that, and you can get it on an Android too.

Pete Mockaitis
So I can do this natively in email on my iPhone.  How does that work?

Sam Carpenter
Yeah, it’s there.

Pete Mockaitis
The menus, the settings for mail.  Okay, got it, cool.  So communications is one system – make sure that your technology isn’t causing you all kinds of headaches and frustrations and crashes and restarts and delays; your email isn’t dominating your life, in terms of lots of long messages that take a lot of time.  What are some other systems you think professionals can get some big gains?

Sam Carpenter
Yeah, here’s another more of a mental thing, and I know you’re into the mental part in the consulting you do.  Don’t ever have more than 30 emails in your inbox, okay?  Ever.  And you know what I do with my email?  I don’t have a task list – there is another simplification.  My task list is in my email.  When I open my computer and look at my inbox, all my tasks are there.  Oh, I have some on my calendar, like this one, so I don’t forget meeting with you today.  But I have all my tasks and all of my correspondence is in one place.  Obviously it’s on my iPhone too.  Think about those processes and systems.  So take apart your day.  What are the things that are frustrating you?  Figure out a way to make it really good, automate it, delegate it or delete it, and work on the processes of your life.  You know what I mean?

Your car.  Okay, so I have this argument with people all the time, and half your listeners won’t like what I’m going to say.  I don’t believe in buying a used car, because when you buy a used car, it’s used for a reason, usually, unless some young kid went off into the military and didn’t expect to, and this kid is perfect.  Some used cars out there are perfect, but why would you want to give up the best years of a car’s life – the good smell, you know it’s not going to break, you know you’ve got a great warranty.  I always buy a new car.  People say, “Well, as soon as you drive off the lot…”  Yeah, that’s true – as soon as you drive off the lot it loses value, but with a used car, the best years of its life are gone.  So you buy a used car with 40,000 miles – I’m sorry, it’s going to be the muffler, it’s going to be the belts, it’s going to break.  I guarantee you almost all the time there’s some big problem that made that car be a used car.  So, one of the systems I have in my life, one of these mental systems, is I buy close to the best and I always buy new.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool.

Sam Carpenter
These are head processes, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis
Alright.  Well, is there anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about a few of your favorite things?

Sam Carpenter
Well, another thing we did, and people can’t run right out and do this, but we built this house we’re in.  We moved in the last day of July, and this house is exactly the way we wanted, right to the size of the TV to where the hearth is to how the lights work.  Try to design where you live. But take the time to work on the place where you study, the place where you live, the place where you sleep.  Take the time to do it.  Clean the garage, get everything in order.

There’s that, and then you go back to the business.  You’ve got to document your primary systems if more than one person is doing the processes.  That’s number one, and it could be anything.  I don’t know what people do out there – they sell cars, they sell insurance, they’re working for a big corporation, they’re an engineer with a high tech company – you’ve got to document the main things that the people around you are supposed to do.

And it makes a lot of sense in some cases to document the processes you do, because when you get them down on paper, you can say to yourself sometimes, “Why am I doing this like that?”  And then you get them down on paper and you say, “Why am I doing this at all?”  And you get super efficient. And everything I’m doing with the campaign right now has to do with building the machinery of the campaign.  And when I get elected, I will go into Salem, Oregon and I will do the same thing there and work on the processes and the systems.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool.  Thank you.  Well, now could you share with us a favorite book?

Sam Carpenter
How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World – Harry Browne.  This was written a long time ago, back in the ’70s.  He did a second version in the ’90s.  He ran for president on a Libertarian ticket.  And he’s deceased now.  And it says, “Freedom is living your life the way you want to live it.  This book shows you how you can have that freedom now, without having to change the world or the people around you.”  It’s a brilliant book.  I don’t have any problems at all with it, and I’ve read it a number of times.  This hard copy here cost me $140 on Amazon, used.  It’s out of print.  And I give it to my very best friends and closest people and I say, “This is mandatory reading if you breathe.”  [laugh] It’s my favorite book.

Pete Mockaitis
Thank you.  And tell me – how about a favorite habit, a personal practice of yours that’s effective?

Sam Carpenter
My clean-up habit.  So I take 30 minutes every day at some point during the day and I just clean stuff up – I pick up the table, I do something in the garage, the car may need it.  I spend 30 minutes a day, at least, cleaning up after myself.  Not that I’m a slob, but if nothing needs to be cleaned up, I do some organizational thing to jump ahead.  That is a really good personal habit to have.  And I exercise every day, of course.  Maybe not every day, but five days out of the week.  It’s so important to get some aerobic exercise and some resistance training if you can, to keep that brain system working right and keep this incredibly complex miracle that is our individual bodies working properly.  And I am convinced that aerobic, heavy breathing, pushing your heart, cures a lot of evils and cures a lot of problems that you’re never going to have.  It prevents them happening.

Here’s another saying, and this is mine: “You can’t measure the bad things that don’t happen.”  You can’t measure them.  And that’s a very important thing, and I think keeping the clutter picked up and getting out in the woods and climbing or skiing or doing whatever it is anybody wants to do, cycling – very important in keeping your brain together, but you can’t measure it really.  You can’t measure the good that it does you, and you can’t measure the bad things that it prevents.

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

Sam Carpenter
WorkTheSystem.com is a good place, and there is a link there to TheSystemsMindset.com, and you can go there.  And people can Google my name and there’s all kinds of stuff out there.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool.  And do you have a final challenge or call to action you’d issue to folks seeking to be awesome at their jobs?

Sam Carpenter
Yes, I do.  Right now, right this moment, even if they’re not at their jobs, even if they’re driving in the car or listening to this on their smart phone walking down the street – just look around, wherever you are, even in your living room or your desk at work – but look around and see the separate systems around you.  As I described right at the beginning here, Pete, I don’t care what environment you’re in – you can see 100 separate systems around you if you look for them.  And do that little routine over and over, and all of a sudden it’ll dawn on you, “Oh my God, that’s the way the world’s put together.”

My big TV down here has nothing to do with what goes on in the laundry room over here, with the washer.  They just have nothing to do with each other; they’re separate from each other.  Yes, they all work together – I get that.  But here’s the thing – let me leave you with this – if you walk down the street and you get hit by a car and your leg is shattered, you know what?  They’re not going to take you to a dermatologist.  You’re going to go to an orthopedic surgeon who specializes in that.  And so, keep that in mind – the people who do well in life learn to compartmentalize the world around them, so they can find the dysfunction, see the dysfunction and get it fixed.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, beautiful.  Well Sam, thanks so much for taking this time here off the campaign trail and such, and I wish you much luck in the systems of life and the impacts you’re looking to make!

Sam Carpenter
Well, thank you, Pete, I enjoyed this.  Will catch you later.