100 Years of Solitude on The Tim Ferriss Show

“if you were going to have the other to the lighthouse I would say 100 Years of Solitude Gabriel Garcia Marquez”

Coach George Raveling and Claire Hughes Johnson — The Tim Ferriss Show · The Tim Ferriss Show

Listen at 111:11

“so I gave him Gabrielle Garcia Marquez's 100 Years of Solitude for him to know okay if you've never written a book”

Dr. Jane Goodall and Cal Fussman — The Tim Ferriss Show · The Tim Ferriss Show

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“if you were going to have a billboard yeah I think the fight for me in my billboard would be is it make the implicit explicit or is it undermine the super structure from within I'm not sure but one of those one of those is my billboard we're going to have to so first one but the first one yeah I get I think I get the first one making the implicit explicit is so valuable to If by the way so many a lot of people are like I love that your book is like so humanistic about people and how to care for I was like folks my book is about getting results like I do appreciate other humans and I love working with them even though people like sometimes Patrick calls and I would be like oh my gosh this is like the hardest problem and we'd go oh if there were no humans involved it would be so much easier right but point is I love humans and The Human Condition but I really I'm talking about how do you get results and how do you get results you get super clear and transparent anything implicit you make it explicit and you're like clear like this is a process we're going to go through it to get to this outcome and what is the outcome we want make it explicit I mean Tim you I think are the master of this what are we measuring why are we measuring it how will we know if we won and I would add to that and what process will we go through together to get there so that no one is guessing or reading the tea leaves or wondering why another team is doing the same project put it all on the table so that we can get to the end faster and frankly more inclusively and why do I care about inclusion yes inclusion is a good thing for people to feel better and included but actually because if you've hired a bunch of smart people and yet they don't feel included they will not share their opinion and the reason you hired them is because they're smart people who bring diverse opinions and if they won't say them then you're not really benefiting from all that work hiring them I'm like because you want a better outcome right like I'm like this is all about results but I think people it's a little windy to get there m sometimes until you make it explicit I wanted to piggyback off of your Irish pattern in life and recommend a short film that I think won an Oscar I might be making that up but it won some the slew of fancy Awards and I watched it last night called an Irish goodbye it's about 22 23 minutes long you can find it on Vimeo I think you might be able to watch it on YouTube as well it is hilarious and profound and outstanding I think based on the little that I feel like I've sort of felt out with our fiction Love Fest I think I think you would really enjoy this it is it is one of the better short films I've ever seen it's really good it's really really good so an Irish goodbye I've got what is it little big and Irish goodbye start with an Irish goodbye because then you'll be like wow Tim really recommends good stuff and then if you hate little big at least I'll have some Redemption preemptively all right yeah so it's that's like the Amo B before you try to chew on the the fever dream and I I Al say also I'd love a good Irish goodbye I used to be find it a little offensive but now I now I'm like gosh there's some real Beauty and just disappearing oh I do that all the time I do it all the time so email policies I had a request from Kevin Kelly recently who's been on the podcast and is a close friend and and he's asked if I could help him with anything we're having a conversation he said well I do have one request and it's not for him it's because he gets asked about it so much he doesn't have any issues with the email but he's like I want you to ask every one of your guests about email policies SL rules systems anything that they have ended up using that they have found helpful and I will say in advance my my assumption is that almost well it's not my assumption I've also run into this even though this podcast has some of the top performing people in the world of every discipline imaginable they all claim to kind of suck at email they're behind and it's hard so I I understand that being that as it may see it's a beautiful expression that as it may be that as it may you are still going to have to answer this yeah are there any sort of email policies systems rules implicit things that you make explicit that you found helpful I actually worked on Gmail right after it launched at Google and like you should think I would be like a power email organizer and I'm okay but I'm not great but one thing that that just stuck out of my mind as you brought this up is I I had a good friend who was executive at Genentech and she rose up with Genentech as it got big and she got more and more responsibility and she told me about this leadership training they put them in Tim that St like honestly whenever I look at my inbox I think of this training where they gave them some 30 minutes some window they gave them an inbox and they were like you need to process all this and like kind of do the right things right okay and so in this inbox of like hundred emails whatever they have 30 minutes you have to find there's like a massive legal issue there's an HR violation but it's like not in the headline of the subject of the email sounds like an anxiety dream like a bunch of bombs in these messages and you have to like open them skim them decide you have to come back to it right like and I kind of was like feeling like Japanese game show I'm like would this be a show that people might want to watch and I think there is a sector of people who might find that like really interesting to watch so sometimes I look at my inbox and I'm like oh my gosh I have 30 minutes and I need to find all of the like legal time bombs but one of the things that I think I'm very good at on email is there is a set of people in my both professional and personal life where no matter like they get open immediately right like and I'll open it and if it's by the way read FYI I'll read it later but like I really want to make sure I mean it's easy some of these people it's like easy it's like your kids right by the way my kids are so they're teenagers they never email me so that's like easy but you know certainly if you're the COO of a company even if you're not the COO anymore if the founders of stripe emailed me directly I'm going to open the email you know like pretty freaking quickly just to make sure so it's sort of like your boss but I do think that some people have a methodology which is like either lifo or fifo right last in yeah and I think that that's tempting my husband does this a little bit it bothers me I'm like but you have cues which is who is it from yeah and is a group or is it direct to you and use those cues to prioritize and so if you only have 30 minutes you know where to start so that's one of the things and it is a combination of the people and what's being sent to you directly yeah so I think that's a number one rule I have that I'm pretty actually good at so there's certain people who feel I'm very responsive on email because I I am very responsive to them yeah I'm not maybe responsive to everyone as consistently the other is I have this is not this is like more of a cheat but you're an investor I think right so I I've invested in some companies and a lot of them send these investor newsletters or investor updates Updates this is like one of my and of course because I do have some Gmail skills I label them I know there's a folder full of them and I have every intention Tim that on Friday for like two hours think I see where this is going I'm going to read those investor updates okay you know what that is not correct I sometimes like when I'm on an airplane and I'm trapped I like open and start reading them but like I am not reading them in a timely fashion I'm just going to and I'm sorry all the founders I've invested in I'm sorry I'm not reading your investor updates in a timely fashion but what I've learned to do and this goes back to making the implicit explicit and also to another rule I have which is Strive to set expectations with people so now when I invest in a company I say to them I say look you may email me I'll give you my email I said I'll give you my cell phone I'm quite good on text but please don't abuse it right and if you want to WhatsApp me and not Tech whatever either of those is going to work and then I say to them I want you to know I really appreciate getting the investor updates I will not read them in a timely fashion I may not read them at all if you need something from me directly like you need help me interview this person or I have a c you should get in touch with me directly not at the end of an investor email that says please help us hire some more data science right and that makes me feel so like cognitive load wise I'm like stress relieving I have been feeling so much guilt about not reading their D and by the way they spend so much time on them and it's terrible sometimes but I I no longer feel guilt I've told them you must contact me directly set expectations but this is actually a management lesson which is why not this goes back to the user manual or they working with CLA guide like why not tell people I have this habit of ignoring this kind of thing and if you need my attention you have my permission please use it please text me even I mean for these Founders they have my phone number I'm like if you need me you can call me right but it's sort of a human lesson we learn over and over again which is we're like dying inside that we're disappointing someone and I'm like no just renegotiate the terms of what expectations they should have of you how else does this renegotiating show up this has become it's embarrassing to say but I'd say maybe in the last two years has become such a a revelation for me in a sense because I always thought about negotiating as the thing you did in the beginning and I got I think pretty good at that I'm sure you did at times though I would have who knows like maybe I had two glasses of wine or I had too little sleep or whatever and I would agree to these things and then later I'd look at my calendar and my blood pressure would go up you know 30 points because I felt trapped by these commitments that I made when I was compromised or rushed or lazy fill in the blank MH and this renegotiating has become an invisible option made visible for me in the last two years could you talk a little bit more about how you have used that in your life personal or professional how that shows up like examples would be really helpful here so people can really get a grasp on it yeah I mean I can really I'm having like almost a physical reaction to relating to you about this calendar it's like it's like your past self I used to say oh my gosh I just mailed myself a letter bomb like you're like later I'm going to you know so one is of course we all strive to improve which is yeah do not make a decision in the moment about a timer or a commitment of resources or time without trying to project your future self you know like but of course we all do because you're right we're rushed we're trying to be responsive we're trying to move through our inbox by the way because we've only got 30 minutes or you might fail the corporate training test or the Japanese TV show don't want to come in last yes so one thing is trying to be better about projecting and I also had a friend who's like a very kind of spiritually in touch person and she said when you're something is requested of you she said you need to sometimes listen for the quiet no you say that one more time she said when something's requested of you a person I mean she's like sort of like sometimes reaction is wow yes right you've had this someone I mean hey Tim Ferris asked me to be on his podcast I was like yes emphatically that is something I want to do right that is easy my past and future selves are very happy to be here but often we get a request you have this experience and you're looking at it and she says listen for the quiet no because we often feel like we have to say yes and so and her trick trick is and I know this wasn't the question you asked me which I will answer but her trick is these are really closely related I'm so interested in this I think they are you do not respond immediately because we often feel I mean if you're someone who's Prides yourself on being decisive and responsive and empathetic as I do I feel like well they asked me to be on this panel at this important conference or whatever and I'm like I've learned that my response in fact should be when do you need to know whether or not I can do be on this panel or I'll even say I need two weeks to get back to you about whether I can be on this panel because if I don't give myself some space I will do yes instead of the quiet no because I didn't give myself time to really think about is this my priority should I spend my time oh my gosh I have to fly to the city and do you know like you have to really think so when you are renegotiating so I'm proud of you that you found this as a skill and by the way I same problem like I had a delayed travel earlier this week and I was looking at my next day and I was thinking well I am going to get home but I'm going to get home at like now 2: in the morning and then I looked at and I was like I should not even be doing that stuff I was like why did I even agree to go into Boston and have lunch with this person and then talk to this other person when I'll be and so I was like I am going to renegotiate those commitments I don't even have to say that I was delayed I you know like it was a good so it's a good skill but what I look for is a pattern a pattern of why am I renegotiating this stuff it means I'm not making the right decision in the first place so I listen for the quiet no but if I find myself renegotiating it is often about yeah commitments I've made commitments especially of time is the main thing I mean that is my mom my mom was very talented apparently mathematician in college and my mom went to Harvard well Radcliffe then but you know I think it was pretty rare for a woman to be like a star in the math department super rare and she decided to go get her PhD in history and to major in history and I said why did you switch like why did you make this the switch and she said I realized that there is a tradeoff that most people find themselves making between money and time and she said I knew that if I prioritized math it would likely lead to a more lucrative career by the way my mom was like out there she was going to work and she did and she was going to have kids and work but she was like it would lead to a more lucrative career but I would not have time so I decided to become she became an academic she got her PhD she became a professor and why because professors have more control over their time and they have the Summers off and they have time to think and write and that's what she knew she wanted which by the way is pretty aware for like a 19 or 20y old to realize you're going to trade money in time and I I think it's Peter teal or is it who says like people don't value their time highly enough right like they just like don't get like every hour is costing you something and I've taken me so long to come to this point where I'm like oh my gosh I just threw away and said sure I'll meet with you to give you advice about that thing and I'm like oh so I've become less responsive on email because I am trying to stop stop myself from I don't know mortgaging my time so I I mean you you may or may not have had the same experience but I renegotiate all right here's an example you were looking for concrete I have a woman who I highly value personally in my life she's a founder and she asked me to be on her board and I had made a rule I make rule by the way to to stop myself from saying yes to stuff I make rules so I I I made a rule I was like no no more boards I also had a rule have a rule about travel right now I'm like my daughter's going to college soon No More Travel unless it meets these criteria because I want to be home of course she doesn't want to hang out with me but I want to hang out with what are the criteria to set of curiosity could be just a few examples really important to stripe I still actually work part-time for stripe and they are you know they get bids on my time and if stripe said the most important thing you can do for stripe is go to this happened to me recently go to Helsinki to slush to this conference I was like fine I will do it I will go to Helsinki for stripe right because I and by the way I had a great time and I met a great number of Founders and it was actually a blast but so is it important to stripe is it a personal connection that is Meaningful to me that is asking you know of My Time treasure talents I will at least but my criteria is not to say yes to default but it is to number one I'm I've gotten I'm like number one is there a way I could do it that is less friction as in am I flying to California anyway therefore I can do that commitment if I bundle it so can I control when it is and if I can control when it is and it's a personal connection that's meaningful to me I will make it happen but it will not happen quickly but if it's not something I can control where and when it is then I have a subset of criteria of like like can I do but I often will say like could this thing maybe it's a conference can I do this next year and get back to you later so I can actually think for a minute about my a lot of it is buying time but anyway I have these rules about things because it stops me so I said to her I said I have made a commitment to myself that I will not join another board and then I said and she because she's a talented founder she's persistent and she said why don't you just come and be an observer why don't you just come to I know I know come to the board meeting and then she told me why she really needed help in this particular moment and there was a situation where having someone who was sort of a friendly who was neutral in the room was going to be valuable so I said okay I will come but I will not like I really want to set your expectations right back I was like I am not this is not going to reel me in I'm not going to join the board and I did go and she actually convinced someone else and the two of us went and we actually I think helped her through a particular Moment by being sort of bored participants but then she said I'd like you to come to every you know of course every board me and I said I don't think I can commit to that but I can try when it's virtual and if it's in person I'm pretty sure I won't but like you can invite me and I went to a couple I did pretty well and then I started to look at my calendar and I was like I can't do this I can't even take three four hours like I can't and so I needed to renegotiate there's a quote that I have in my book that people find I think the most compelling line in the book and I keep having to remind them it is not my line and yeah I know this problem I'm like no no no don't attribute it to me that was Mark Twain or whatever exactly exactly so the line is from Ron hitz or Marty Linsky these are the Adaptive leadership guys who do the balcony and the dance floor analogy and it is leadership is disappointing people at a rate that they can absorb yeah I had that line underlined it's very catchy it's very comp because it really makes you think and it's kind of dark too you're like wow leader what does that mean in like concrete terms and then I'm not going to let go of the the renegotiating cuz I'm going to come back to that I want to ask you about phrasing and wording that you use but let's talk let's let's talk about leadership and disappo people well I think one of the ways that leaders disappoint people is their time right they can't give like you can't you don't have unlimited time you're the CEO of a company right there's no way you're going to be at all the things or do all the things but the key is how do you create enough leadership buyin that people understand and they kind of and also you get a little bit of forgiveness when you're the CEO I think but leadership is disappointing people at a rate they can absorb to me is about management is very knowable it's like how do I get from point A to point B what people do I need how many what's the scope how we going to measure it here's the project plan here's the Milestones here's the talents I need and now I'm going to deploy and delegate and I think leadership is very unknowable because it is essentially having a vision and an idea a goal that you haven't even fully understood yourself right often yeah you know it's it's like we're going to climb this mountain that no one has ever climbed before by the way and you have to be really convincing to build followership like you're painting a picture of the top of that mountain man and it is awesome and the climb is going to be like really challenging but really rewarding we're all going to you know and you you are going to get on that Journey with those people and you are going to be wrong about a lot of what you just said right like no actually it wasn't as easy up the South face as we thought it was yes we did actually need special equipment no we didn't like I mean come on you don't even know how you going to get up there I mean the analogy that's more concrete that I use is I came into stripe and look it's a product that has people's money right and you need need to have good support experiences when something is wrong with any kind of payment like I'm expecting money I'm trying to take money I'm moving money there's a high expectation and Patrick is like we need to build 247 Global support right we had really good Ambitions and by the way I want to be clear one of the things that stripe has as a value is to be users first it is always our most important operating principle it is actually deeply the culture of the company so much so Tim that when the support team would get behind the entire company would stop and answer support emails MH and so this was becoming an existential problem because we had to do engineering work and other work to build the company but we were like ending up on Fridays before the weekend right because you want to get back to people quickly answering support tickets by the way you hit product Market fit you get traction this is a super normal problem M but it is not great because the product like is people's money it's a quality problem but it's a problem nonetheless and so Patrick is like look we need to have this 24/7 and I had to get up as a leader and say I will build this and I had built similar things for Google so I wasn't like completely describing a mountain I'd never seen but I certainly didn't join Google when it was only like 160 people with 21 support people and I was like we are now going to do a set of things to Sol this and it took me a few years and it's not perfect and involved hiring very talented people I don't get credit for what we built but I still look back on that and I say I can't believe I declared that I would get it done and I didn't have a plan because I'm more of a manager I'm more of like I need to have a clear plan on how I'm going to get this done and instead I was like yep we're going to have it Public Announcement and I mean Patrick kind of pushed me there but I was like this is uncomfortable and I'll I tell you I did disappoint did I deliver it by the end of that year oh no Tim I did not deliver it by the end of that first year like let's not kid ourselves like I disappointed but I did figure out a way to do it and I think people followed me they kept following me they kept believing we were going to do it which is some combination of me being authentic I think me being honest about where we were me being having a plan eventually me demonstrating that it mattered whatever so I think that's what it means is like you will not live up to everything you said all the expectations of you with your time with your ideas we're all humans mhm we're not perfect and we're not you know fortune tellers I don't know I'm not a fortune teller not fortune tellers so this ties into the the renegotiating actually pretty well because there are many different species of renegotiating one was you gave an example very early on in the conversation when Lucy was getting thrown under the bus the dog ate my homework yeah situation and then we segwayed from that to the player versus victim and the player would say you know what you're right I committed to get this to you by 5:00 p.m. I didn't and because this emergency popped up and I da da da I didn't let you know I should have let you know how about 5:00 p.m. tomorrow or whatever the example was renegotiation renegotiation so in this particular example when it becomes clear to you that by whatever deadline had been agreed you were not going to be able to deliver what you were going to hope to deliver what does that conversation look like I mean it's not exactly semiotics but I know you like language and I know you consume a lot of language yeah so what is the language that you use to have that conversation whether it's verbal or in email you made the connection and then you didn't finish making a connection but it is so easy to sound like a victim right when you are facing this kind of a situation and if you're someone who prides themselves on being a player on taking ownership and you've made this commitment and you're like oh my gosh there is no way I'm either coming to that meeting or delivering 247 Global support in six months you know and so what does it look like the first thing I did that was probably the smartest thing I did when I joined stripe was I listened and I did my first 90 days and I talked to everybody and I heard sort of here's priorities here's what people need here's what might need my attention and then I sat down with Patrick and I said I'm hearing these four things that one of them was the support thing by the way that really need my attention and I am going to rank them and then I want you to see my ranking and I want to agree on my level of priority of I said is I can't make meaningful progress on four things at once I can maybe keep and I actually predicted in that moment I said I don't because we had to build sales we had to build recruiting we had some internal like operational stuff that needed to be fixed and then we had this support sort of smoldering fire and I said I think I actually need to build sales and recruiting ahead of fixing support but I predict support is going to implode within the next six months and at that point you were coo is that right I was coo yeah I was actually hired as chief of business operations and then I be we just swapped titles with someone else but it's a long story but yes I was basically coo and he was like and remember we're users first we got to like this was a painful because we were also not getting back to sales leads though Tim I was like you know I just want to I'm also here to build some Revenue like I'm here to build go to market and I'm here to deliver some revenue for this company and I'm like we have this other thing where we're not we're not getting back to our prospects right and so it was a very Sophie's Choice kind of moment honestly oh and then we couldn't hire people to build the company so we couldn't get back to sales seads or get like you know this is normal by the way this happens especially for for people like me coming into that kind of opportunity but what I loved about that conversation was Patrick was one first of all supportive he was like great this is good for us to talk out now and then he had to admit he's like I can't believe I'm doing this but I agree you're not going to fix support in the first six months like really we made an agreement and then by the way Tim four months in complete explosion and I was thinking in my head thank goodness this goes back to expectation setting I'm like thank goodness I said out loud that I thought I was going to explode and then I mean by the way still terrible I was still sad I was like oh my gosh I had to go then put it at the top of the priority list basically but I had at least four months to build some other things point is when you're renegotiating so one is try to set the priorities align on them and set expectations ahead of time even if you haven't done that you're going to reach a moment where you're like there's no way we're getting to the top of this mountain and so what you try to do is not come up and make a bunch of excuses so what I I think I did in those moments and we were you know we had written public goals in the company we had plans we had and I just want to be clear none of the plans this is where when you're working with Founders maybe this is a side what do you call them side quests this is a little bit of a side quest love side quest when you're working with Founders people describe this reality Distortion experience which often is more that they have a version of reality and they're like no no no we can ship the iPhone in five minutes or whatever you know and like everyone's like yes Steve yes we can right there's another version of reality Distortion I find which is you can fix that thing in five minutes right like you I mean it's now a joke between Patrick and I because he'll be like yeah we could just code that up and I say in five minutes you know it's not five minutes but so we had a consistent conflict where I would would say to him no that mountain is not going to be climbed by the end of this year like I never actually said I was going to build that thing by the end of the year and he refused to hear it he was like no it really needs to be the goal like this actually needs to be the goal and is it may Claire yeah be that as it may Claire I'm making it your goal and I was like okay under duress I am going to like take this goal and try to put some language in it that gives I mean I'm going to get a red right whatever on here I mean that doesn't feel good this is the other thing it's it's beneficial to walk into a situation like that after some amount of Career Success so so that you have some amount of self-actualization so I was like luckily my whole identity is not tied up in this goal because I would have been destroyed I would have really lost confidence by the way a lot of leaders you hire into a startup environment end up losing confidence just because you're getting pummeled like totally pummeled and like you need to sort of be like no no no I'm not I have identity outside of the success of this moment but I was like all right I'm going to publicly get up in front of the company and have failed on this goal but we disagree like we agreed to disagree that this is possible what's also funny though is I was like I think he really believed it was possible and he's very smart then I'm going home I'm like driving home at night I'm like has he ever built anything like this no like why am I even listening but they they reality distort you into thinking yes it's completely possible like I don't know how I got fooled but what I did sort of commit to myself is like I have to make meaningful progress so what are some of the milestones we can point to so what you do is you go in and you say well I was not convinced this was the right goal but I agreed to it here are the Milestones that I'm glad we hit so you kind of don't forget to point out you made progress I think sometimes people get defense they're like I don't want to be defensive but you have to be like look it's not like nothing happened and then you try to be data driven and what I think because this is where the context matters Stripes Founders and Stripes culture is very learning oriented very more so than almost maybe any startup I've come across yes at an early stage too so think about the cultural context you're in what did we learn what did we not know and what did we learn trying to get there on this goal what did I learn by the way some of them are mistakes I made so try to be humble stripe is also very humble culture say here's some things I thought I knew by the way I thought I did know I was like we were going to Outsource certain things that I thought was going to be easier than it was and that is true and here's what I learned here's what I thought here's what the truth was here's what I learned here's now what we're going to do differently and by the way everyone's nodding in the room because they're like cool cool we had a plan we tried it I mean they're Engineers they know it like did not work the way we thought it was going to work we're going to try this other thing so so you basically do a retro postmortem whatever you want to call it sort of publicly in front of everyone in the language they like speaking M right so the language strip like speaking is learning I made mistakes what am I doing differently what do I see next how are we going to get there now you know what I mean like it's I'm confident but humbled by this experience and I've learned a lot and here is some data that shows we have made some progress because that also people want to make sure like we actually know what we're doing so that's what you do and I think for you know it depends on your context and S of what language do you speak that is a big example right this is this is a big example we're talking about and that is I think a very effective way to as a player offer a Mula in a way yeah yeah at that point then and this may be if this is going to require a dissertation then tell me and I can rejig but how did you decide to scope the thing and then make a counter offer effectively right or was that even your decision to make I don't know in terms of like okay we've learned these things these were some assumptions and then leading into the kind of now what I won't do the dissertation version Tim but I will tell you one bind I found myself in consistently that I'm sure you have also is it's a talent bind which is yeah I can only do so many things at once individually me alone yep and I did feel like a victim I'm going to be honest cuz I had been trying to hire someone I had hired someone they hadn't worked out partly my fault partly not my fault and I'm in a meeting this happen so many times like we could picture any but I'm talking to Patrick and I'm like look we know so and so it didn't work out here's what happened with that we now have face a choice which is you have Claire as a resource me alone am I going to go lead support directly like am I going to go start building this thing with all my most of my time and what is the opportunity cost of that what is the tradeoff of me not leading sales by the way at that moment which I was also leading this is where I fell into a trap cuz I had like a few too many needing to clone myself problems and this happens when you're growing quickly but it's still I got into an egregious case of needing cloning eg it was egregious it was egregious there was one point where I mean I think it's important that people especially because they seem to think I have some like storied career I'm like there was a moment where I had taken a former colleague from Google who I was admittedly I'll be honest was trying to recruit to stripe out for a coffee you're just going to be a board Observer just come once yeah right exactly and he says to me he used to actually work for me and he knew how much I pride myself on good management practices and he asked me how many direct reports do you have and I told him and he almost like I had to peel him off the ground he's like I can't believe you let that happen to you he was like what happened to the Claire Johnson that I know I'm like I know I'm so sorry like I had had so many direct reports it was how many direct reports it was a crime at Peak I want to say the peak to you was 23 but it might have been 27 and I just like lost control of I I really don't Tim I didn't want to go here a l didn't want to go here it's so many 101s and of course I do actually make one ones happen so point is I got schooled by my former direct report for violating my own rules in the need for cloning but the point is negotiation turns from we're negotiating you getting this massive goal done to what's the cost of me getting that goal done for the other priorities and then you're making a joint decision by the way the outcome of that negotiation could have been let's not build out sales any fur let's not keep internationalizing let's not open new markets let's wait on those other things because we decided you should just go and be the directly the head of support honestly like that was not where the conversation went it was like okay what creative ideas do we have to somehow do both because we're reality distorting that's fine but you know the actually you got to push yourself and so I think in that exact moment if I'm remembering the scenario we talked about some talented people I had hired some people into the org who we were like could we lean on them could we put some newer leaders managers into the deep end and get them to take on more of this plan and in the end that was part of the solution which is let's take some risks with some people we have give them more than they probably are ready for and see if they can swim which I'm not always a fan of because I have seen people not make it out of the pool by the way a lot of young companies find themselves in that situation and if you have great hiring which we did I'm proud to say that you know actually that's where opportunities and Magic can happen for people like I'm going to get to build out the global support orc you know but anyway so we ended up sort of compromising but we weren't going to trade off my other responsibilities and that became a more important discussion about how do I deploy like Patrick anyone who's the CEO has got to be thinking well who are my most important resources and how am I deploying them against the most important priorities so take the negotiation up to that level would be my advice that's a great macro renegotiation example and uh we're not going to stay on this forever but I want to spend a little little little more time on it when you're renegotiating the next day right so we're moving down to the micro here yeah what language do you use like you have a meeting booked you got a lunch booked in Boston you got this you got that and the other thing when you reach out to these folks what do you say I think you want to again be a player not a victim and you got to take responsibility MH so I think there is a version of saying I mean I don't love if it's the next day that's rough but I think you and I both know sometimes people canel yeah it could be the next week too right it's just broadly speaking I do actually tend to look at my calendar at least a week ahead and sort of start renegotiating because I don't like to be the one who's like the morning of or the day before but I think you sort of own it whether this is an email it's probably an email might be a text and you say first of all I am very sorry I know we had time tomorrow on the calendar I am staring at a list of priorities and I've realized I don't I cannot make you know like you're saying something that doesn't hopefully make them feel diminished and say like I mean I often will tell them there's this thing like I am on this board in the middle of a transaction and I have to be on a phone call for four hours tomorrow and unfortunately I think I need some time to prep like I need some time to prep and I booked our lunch and it's not realistic that I'm not going to be able to be present at that lunch right like it's not great you know like I try to give like I'm probably over context people but I think it makes you more human it's like look I did this thing I'm sorry what if you don't have like a house fire to point to what if you just look at it and you're like you're like you're not important yeah I mean like but you you get it like you're like why did I agree to why did I mail myself the letter bomb yeah the Ghost of Christmas Past is coming to scratch my door and I'm realizing I don't want to moderate this panel and Tuscaloosa no offense to tuscala but you get the idea because I've got all this other stuff going on and I just don't want to spend the energy yeah yeah what are you do in a case like that again I try not to be the day before but sure no let's let's say you look at and you're like okay this thing is in two weeks I'm not doing this thing yeah so my instinct is always to offer context and be a little bit vulnerable which maybe is not expected I think you also know there's a like I think women will get judged more for certain things and in particular like not being conscientious is the thing that gets a little more beaten into you is my feeling as a woman and so you have to also watch out for creating some reputational issue that I think maybe not everyone has to watch out for so maybe some of my instinct to offer more information is to like try to avoid that hit but I've been saying to people recently that I have reworked my personal priorities and the demands of my time are higher than I've actually seen in my professional life which is true and I have realized that I cannot do a good job of some of the commitments I've made MH and unfortunately I can't like travel and be on this panel and be pres and like be effective for you and this is where I feel sometimes I'm a little weak I'll try to offer I'll be like there's so I mean I try to think do I know anyone locally who could do this I'll be like I think I have an idea if you want an idea on someone who could Sub in like I'll try to find some solution for them if I'm really leaving them in a Lurch right because I don't love that but I kind of am just honest about like I can't do this well and I think you want someone at their best it's not going to be my best that's really good language I'm not going to drag us back into the swamp of of selling literature but like it's good language that's that's good word smithing right and I think you're showing self-aware like look I looked at priorities I realized and also you're showing context which is this is true statement I'm like I have more demands on my time than I've ever had in my life and I'm learning to cope with it and I'm learning that I can't perform at the level I'd like to perform and I don't want you to suffer for that you want to show respect for people they want a good panel they want your best you know you're saying like like please just you have to trust me I'm not going to be great mhm and they'll be disappointed one thing that I do think I think Cheryl's an example of this they're people I've come to respect there the people who protect their time like demons right the other people I've come to respect are the people who are like very comfortable just saying no like you know what no I'm sorry I can't do that my hope for myself my future self is like I am not in the situation where I'm doing that renegotiation right again it goes back to being honest taking time before you make the commitment just saying no but it's also with Investments like a lot of Founders will be like or even nonprofits they come and they're like I want to tell you about our organization and you're like oh that organization sounds amazing and then you're like but then do you want to waste an hour of your time in their time learning about it when you realize I don't have time to commit a lot to this organization yeah what they would rather have is one no it's not on my list of causes that I support or by the way two I will give you x amount of money you never have to meet with with me I don't actually have time but sounds good here's some money goodbye like and they'll say well can you make that commitment for multiple years in a row sure like but like maybe maybe not like you say well let's learn you know like but I think getting faster at like there's a pattern here which is you want my money and my time am I willing to give any money or time yes no if I'm willing to get a little bit just tell them and get out yeah totally don't have a dog and pony show about it or Investments like I I just don't really invest in a lot of be see I'll just write back and say this is not for me I don't really do B to see good luck yeah and they're like thank you because they didn't waste their time sending you a deck sending you you know yeah they're not chasing the Glen Gary leads forever and so you think you're being an empath by saying oh let me hear your story this is my this is my trap my personal trap is I think I'm being an empath giving them 30 minutes let me hear your story and in fact the empathic thing to do is to say I'm going to do a probability assessment the chance that I'm going to invest slake a donation are sub 5% no no for you no for me and you don't have to think about it ever again you don't have to email me tomorrow and ask me again right like they're going to keep coming back yeah absolutely I love that so glad I asked and a great answer also very useful useful useful answer what are some other rules we are going to back the car into the garage of selfawareness it's okay because a lot of this pulls at the Hem of self-awareness from a bunch of different directions but you mentioned that there are certain rules you have because your kid is going off to college and therefore X Y and Z what are some of the other rules that you have for yourself around what you will or will not do well I have a rule this is more of just a self-awareness I do get intuitive and I do jump to sort of judgments conclusions Solutions quickly so I have a rule that like especially if I'm in a position of leadership and I'm in a meeting and there's other people like instead of stating my opinion I have to ask a question because if you're the senior person and you state your opinion like the whole thing is over like you're not really right yes Steve we can ship it in five minutes exactly here's an iPhone so that that's a rule could you give an example of what that would because you could also ask a question in a way that makes it clear it's your strong opinion right so what might that look like they're kind of looking to you like they say you know I think we need to X and you're like looking at you and you say I have a thought I do I I'll share it but actually I'm interested in in what you all think we should do MH got it like I want to learn from your thought before I share mine you know and that's by the way the benefit of seniority is you can be like no I'm not going to like I appreciate and refuse to answer question I'm not going to perform right now I will perform later like because I actually want you to participate mhm I'm often now in a position of sort of coaching leaders and because I'm more of an operator not a professional coach I have the same problem I'll be like oh my God this is obvious like here's what you're going to do and then I think no no no no no no so I'll say to them all right give me the bones of the situation and then I'll start to tell them what I think and I'm like no and I'll say you know what I'm a and I totally commentate I'm like a sports color commentator I'm like I was about to jump in and tell you exactly what I would do if I were you and they're at the edge of their seat because that's what they came for like that's what they want and I said we're not going to learn from that what I want you to do is tell me your instinct what is it you think you're doing next and I don't even say give me the whole answer I'm like what what would you do next because it's often a situation there's an executive they think is underperforming there's a team off the rails whatever I'm like what what are you going to do next then I get them talking and then I sort of get out from them and I'll tell you Tim most of this I mean there's the reason these people are leaders most of the time they're like 80% of the way they're they're just not confident in their Instinct and so my job is not to tell them what to do or how to do it it is to build their confidence in their Instinct and then yeah we can brainstorm the last 20% I mean it's just like good this is a total digression but good pedagogy right like how do people learn people do not learn by being told answers no we all know this but yet we get some amount of experience in our life and we think I'm going to go tell some people some answers no what you're going to do if you're a good leader good teacher is you're going to lead them through learning with you and they are going to get to the answer and you are going to celebrate them doing that but I cannot tell you how many times I myself have to create a rule to shut my own mouth because I love helping people luckily I don't think it's the know-it-all version of this I think it's the I can help you oh my God I see how to help you and I just want to tell them the answer and I got to zip it zip it so one rule is like yeah I make a travel rule another rule I make is as I already told you which is don't say yes immediately MH it has to be very rare for me to say yes immediately and as a pleaser that's very hard to be like no I'm sorry I have to get back to you next week how often do you say I have to get back to you next week versus I'm not sure can you get back to me next week versus in other words like where does the ball fall in whose Court by the way good feedback for me Tim and I take it thank you no I think that is actually a really good tactic that I don't do enough of is to say I think this is unlikely that I'm going to be able to do this I'm willing to consider it but what I'd like you to do is go look at your other options s and if you're you know not finding something feel free to get back to me by the end of the month and I will consider it but it's you know like basically telegraphing like I kind of want to try to help you but I can't like I really you got to go to your plan B I'm not going to be your keynote speaker and that's a great feedback I mean if you find yourself doing that you should be asking yourself why is it just not a no it's a no yeah it's a no for me you know but maybe it's a way to trial yourself into realizing oh this is a those are the training wheels yeah but I like your idea which is like put the ball in their court maybe again it's back to some donation request or something like you know why don't you get in touch this is not for me now feel free to get in touch in the future MH a lot of those people might just not ever and I mean sorry for them because they're not persistent but but is that like is that being a player is that being a player enough I don't know yeah hitting the snooze button can lead to like a delayed 24 car pile up later in my experience good analogy I was chatting with a friend of mine about this because I'm fascinated by rules for folks who handle a lot of inbound of any type and his rule for the charitable stuff specifically like ah here's M go fundme or this or this he's like well look he's done very very well professionally and he's like okay look if it's a friend and it's basically any cause that's not going to entail reputational risk if it's like ah my Budd he's doing a climbing Kil andero for prostate cancer and he's as a GoFundMe they'll basically give 5K to anything sight on scene because the universe of possible acquaintances or friends who's going to come to them with that is is pretty limited right so but but the rule is like 5K that's it that's our Rule and then for anything large it's just like we focus on this and this and this and outside of that we are not involved that's it yeah no I think that is so powerful that would be another rule is like for something that's a major commitment of my time or my resources someone said to me it's Time treasure talent but there's another one that's like testimony o okay all right which I love so time Treasures like Capital treasure talent and testimony and testimony is interesting right because you could Tim care about something that you can't give time to and you could say if you need a quote from me I mean again now we're like in this weird rarified air where someone might want to quote from not probably not me but I think that that's another thing you could do but but the thing that for any of those categories you need some criteria yeah which is like you know some people it's about climate if it's not related to climate and working on the climate crisis it's a no and I think those people actually make more friends than I probably make CU I'm like I'm not sure that sounds so important just to ask a clarifying question on one time I get that seems pretty straightforward hours minutes treasure it's like Financial Resources things of that type testimony okay like endorsing something or some version of that by the way version of that might be like can I introduce you to someone and Endor you you know like yeah totally what is talent I mean I understand the word but I think of talent as you if they're utilizing your talent wouldn't that kind of fall into the time bucket or is it a separate thing I had a similar question because this was a friend of mine who was like facilitating this workshop with people trying to think about what their criteria were for like what what am I going to spend my time on I think that the version of it is you say to someone I agree with you like I can't really deploy my particular Talent without putting some time in but the example was say you are like very good at some specific thing and the thing takes takes you you know less than 30 minutes they're like all right I don't want you to join my board but can you read this press release and tell me is it good or not I can't give you my time I can't join a board I can't commit to a regular meeting it's almost what I say to some of the founders I work with I'm like don't expect me to read the newsletter and try to volunteer for all the things you need but if you think my particular Talent is going to be useful and here's what it often looks like Tim is they send me profiles of people they're thinking of hiring and I give them a five minute CLA assessment and so that is my time but I don't get on the phone I'm just like here's the questions usually how it comes back because I'm all about questions is here's the three to five questions I'd have about this background if I'm you and I'm hiring for this role I'd like why did they move around five times why did they stop doing that job why did you know like I would just give them interview questions and then I would back away so you're right it takes me a minute but you probably have a version of that like I've heard people text you with very specific like which supplement should I take or which you know should I intermit and fast yeah I get that kind of stuff you could probably text back this one no this one you know like that's probably still time and you probably should count how much time it is but it's a way to stay connected it's compressed because of the expertise SL exposure right you already know the answer you're already you have the talent you don't have to go do extra work and you can answer quickly quick add-on because I realize you you've done so much hiring and developed so much talent I'm so curious how you spot bad apples or elicit negative feedback or infer negative feedback when in the US it is so incredibly difficult to get honest negative feedback from anyone because they're so concerned about liability you're talking about like references hiring yes references exactly the non-dissertation answer is this is like people have trouble giving hard Fe people have trouble asking this question which is I think it a question you just ask which is like is this someone in the top 20% of people you've ever worked with and then they say yes you say top 10 and then if they say yes oh so is it top five and then they're like because what happens is when people are ask for a specific quantifiable ranking of something they don't like lying and so what I think happens is we don't we're not comfortable asking for ranking questions sometimes about humans and I don't love them actually in most contexts but in this case I'm like I'm going to pin you down on how good this person really is and how they handle and you could go just to top five I think that's the short answer I think the other answer is you say to someone you put them again in the role of you say look I'm going to be their manager you are their manager what's the thing I could do that's most important to help them that's a good question and people will say some very revealing things because all of a sudden they're back being the manager of the person and they're like well I'll tell them to really be more truthful when things are off the rails you're like what yeah and then you'll sort of get going you like tell me a situation where you had to use that advice like what you know anyway so those are two one very specific ex pin them down and one a little more tricky so good oh Deft very very elegant all right as promised the garage of self wear that is the the very strained analogy that I used and tell me if this ties in I'm curious what good answers to this question might be but I do want to talk about self-awareness so we can go into it however you would like CU it's sort of the foundational layer for everything that is built upon it or it seems that way to me yeah that's my hypothesis so yeah so actually I was going to ask you about the question when have you see me do my best and worst work but we can come back to that we can come back to that I'm going to bookmark that maybe we'll get to it maybe we won't but how should people think about self-awareness and I'm just going to share something that I found in the course of doing homework and you can certainly fact check this but I I thought it was quite thought-provoking this is from CNBC and I think it was an interview with you so this is you know if you're not self-aware how would you know right that's a hell of a question it's kind of like you the tree falling in the forest no one to hear it kind of question yeah here are some telltale signs you consistently get feedback that you disagree with this doesn't mean the feedback is correct but it does mean how others perceive you differs from how you perceive yourself interesting I added the interesting uh you often feel frustrated and annoyed because you don't agree with your team's direction or decisions you feel drained at the end of a workday and can't pinpoint why you can't describe what kinds of work you do and don't enjoy doing so that's setting the table or maybe just peing people's curiosity yeah how would you suggest people think about self-awareness why is this important in the worlds in which you operate I spent a lot of time thinking about how do you get results through people through teams like I'm not actually the one building the product so I got to do it through kind of Brute Force human brain power and human time and I think that most people who think that way start with the individuals you're managing or the team or the organization and my argument is where you started this this section of the garage is it's the foundation is self-awareness it actually has to start with you you're not going to get great results from the people around you until you understand yourself MH and I mean I think it there's some obvious reasons why which is like look I alone can't move the mountain I need you and I need to complement myself how am I going to complement myself with other capabilities and skills if I don't understand what I'm bringing to the table by the way a lot of people think they're the director in every scene no you're not you're often an extra and just knowing that will make you more effective uh so that's a side piece of advice for you but a lot of self-awareness building to me a lot of these workstyle assessments you can take are just trying to help you figure out your defaults like right's my default setting so a lot of them are asking you you know are you more introverted or extroverted right talking about I guess for maybe lack of a better descriptor almost like personality typing tests like my Briggs dis anyag I mean there's a million there's Discovery insights I've taken there's the Hogan assessment like whatever there's that's like 170 questions like there's a all these different there's the Big Five personality test there's a lot of them strength finder it goes on and on strengths finder good one there's so many but to me they all boil down to on one axis let's call it the horizontal axis you've got are you more introverted or extroverted and the litmus test is sort of introverts think to talk and extroverts talk to think right so where do you fall in that Continuum and then the other thing is the vertical axis which is are you more task oriented or people oriented which by the way doesn't mean you can't get a task done and my litness test for this is like if someone comes to you with like a massive problem in some organization is the first thing you think of the first task that has to get done or oh my God the people and it's just what do you lead with for me I'll be like oh my gosh someone's getting fired which is sort of a task and a person answer anyway but but I would say sorry I'm being very negative today it sort of boils down then and then you think okay what quadrant am I in am I a more extroverted task oriented type person or extroverted people by the way a lot of extroverted people oriented people are excellent at sales makes sense right they're their default is I love getting stuff done talking to you like let's yay be a s and then you've got your introverted task oriented people where do a lot of those people work Tim do you think introverted task oriented people engineering program engineering Finance give me a spreadsheet and I will rule the world I do not need to talk to you to finish this model right in fact you often do and I know that and so that's the other thing is you have to be really careful not to stereotype with any of this and not to generalize but I think it helps any human Frameworks are useful for a reason which is I am comfortable sort of saying okay where can I place myself in these quadrants and then what does that mean my default setting is and by the way the people around me have different default settings this is such a dumb tactical lesson but I'm one of those people where if I trust who I'm meeting with I don't need the agenda ahead of time I'll be like let's meet and then at the very beginning of the meeting bang out the agenda make sure we know we're going to get done you know like I I I still like to run it well but I'm kind of loose with the prep I have people who have worked for me who are like frozen if they're like I don't have time to think ahead of this meeting what we're going to talk about and I'm thinking there's something wrong with them I'm like well come on we trust each other we work together we're just going to spitball about this they're like no I don't want to meet with you like I had to learn that there are people humans in the world who if they don't have time to think before a meeting will not be effective in the meeting and will be uncomfortable because it's so because my water is really different than that really different right but you if you're trying to create an environment that's conducive to different Styles different defaults you got to be aware of your own and then realize and I have to operate aware of others because I want that meeting to be really effective and I've got to email you know Richard the day before and tell him we're going to spitball ideas for this new marketing campaign right does that make yeah yeah it totally that's what it all boils down to it's default settings it's really cultivating awareness but starting at home start at home and then start to map other people guinea pig is always in the cage right next to you in that case right it's just easier to some case a little easier to study coming back to the personality test for a second were these I'm not sure if that's the right way to categoris them Myers Briggs disc anagram Etc workstyle assessments work style work style assessments if you could only choose one or two that have been most helpful to you personally what would you choose there's one that's called I think if you just Google it's insights discovery which is sort of to me more effective than Myers brig Myers Briggs has a lot of interpretive work you have to do on your results like understand what sensing is understand what the decision-making process of a sensing judger or whatever like insights Maps you more and they have some shading and colors but it's sort of like more straightforward that is one I'm a fan of the other is more of a simple one but Patrick cson obviously who I've worked with I think I brought him around he felt like these things are like horoscopes he's like they're just going to a report it's going to sound like a plausible prediction of you and I said I get it I get the skepticism and I really do by the way for anyone and actually I think there's value in getting a horoscope which is like well how does it actually make me feel like do I agree with it or not what am I really like it actually is part of a process in my opinion yeah is a prompt like a roar shock prompt yes it's a prompt and how you react to it is interesting right like you're like I really yes I am finding love this year you know you know or am I not but point is he then did some research and there is one the Big Five personality test is very simple it's available for free online as far as I can tell or I've seen and it's like you know just these five factors neuroticism agreeableness conscientiousness there's one that's sort of entrepreneurial comfort with ambiguity like whatever and you can tell a lot from well one the research supports that they're pretty indicative of certain sort of like human behaviors and I think this should make like you and I have had a lot of conversations in this discussion about things like saying yes too easily but if you're like very high agreeableness and very high conscientiousness guess what you're going to end up committing to too much stuff yeah for sure and so when I'm saying oh I'm jealous of those people who protect their time you know what they're pretty comfortable being disagreeable they're pretty comfortable being like no or frankly canceling at the last minute saying sorry I don't have time today for you MH and if they're not very conscientious they're like I don't even feel bad you know but by the way no judgment a lot of Founders are really good about being like look I'm doing the most important thing that I got to be doing today and and I'm the operator I'm like oh but we made a bunch of commitments and we made a plan and we got to stick to the plan right and that meeting of those Styles is very powerful that's why you know you want a diverse team but anyway I would say those two yeah Patrick is endlessly fascinating he's been on the show yes probably a couple years ago boy oh boy does that man read I know he is a voracious consumer of knowledge he is he puts he puts the rest of us to shame you know what though Tim I bet he's never seen John Wick so we have that we have that going for us one zero Ferris cin put wick on the scoreboard yeah we were actually in a meeting and he said something about Greg papovich and two of us looked at each other we're like do you really know who Greg papovich is and it was it was like amazing because Patrick also is not super up on sports popular culture you know we all have our strengths papovich also incredible somebody I would love to have on the show at some point oh yeah well that's why he knew yeah so going to the kind of black belts of no people who I'm wondering if there are people who stand out outside of the cison and people who are sort of Paragons of no people who are really good at saying no or defending their time where you're like wow that person's really good at like keeping their eye on the one Puck that matters yeah anybody come to mind well I mentioned you I think Cheryl's very good at getting back being very accessible and fast and sort of decisive like no efficient she's very efficient she's she's someone and and sometimes that efficiency is a no right yeah who else have I worked with that are I mean my version of it is someone who I think is least doing it carefully with others feelings like I don't love the person who has an assistant for example who cancels everything right there's a mod no there's a model here Tim you've seen it yeah where they agree to everything and then they have a cleanup crew yeah it's lame they have a cleanup crew Like the Wolf from Pulp Fiction they send it out to like do the Dirty Work yeah and I think what's happening is I'm doing left-and column filtering names of people right now in my mind where I'm like nope can't mention them because I think they actually have a cleanup crew they use the cleanup crew they use the cleanup crew like there aren't that many who seem I mean I think you have some good I think it's in 4-Hour Work Week you have some good models of pushing people on not just being busy but being productive yeah and I think the people actually that I there's some engineering leaders I worked with at Google who I thought was very bold but of course makes sense they would look at what were we planning in a meeting and they'd be like I don't need to be here or this meeting doesn't seem important you know and to me those are Paragons of no though because it was very open very direct very honest it was like I see what you're trying to do with this one hour and I am not giving you my hour yeah and and I think that why can't more people just call it you know yeah uncomfortable there's a finance guy that I'm on a board with and he'll be like what are we trying to accomplish in this and how long do we need and like he'll set his I'm here for that objective and I'm only here for this long and and I admire it because he's like don't be chatting away about other stuff I want to be productive not busy don't want to hear about your fishing trip right now Ralph exactly so speaking just because you mentioned uh the board why no more boards just the thinking behind it there are different motivations for being on boards I don't know if you are serve on boards no i' I basically from the beginning having run into a lot of people I don't even even I have a number of friends who have policies that they won't join any more boards and I took that as an indicator and so I've only done advising I've never been on boards yeah so I would say there's a sector of the world that feels it is a service and I do think it's a valuable service by the way I serve on some boards with some people who are like Jedi Master board members and I'm like wow you are serving like these companies because you are like awesome at governance and you know proxy statements politics and you like get it you know but I think there's a service motivation there's a motivation that has to do with maybe a personal CEO really trusts you you want to help them like that's mostly what happens with me I'm like I want to be there for that person but it is a big commitment and if you're someone who's realized that time is your most precious resource which is my mom realized somehow when she was 19 but I did not you know boards can Stomp all over your calendar they can just say you know what all day Friday we got you know someone just made an acquisition offer and you're like goodbye you realize like you think you're controlling your time because they don't meet that often but no no no no so really what I've decided is I need to go on a board diet and then rebuild I'm not going to say no ever to like I'm never doing it again but I've realized the bar has to be like extremely high I mean I'm on the board one of my favorite boards and I would do it forever if they I don't know if I'm adding that much value but is the Atlantic mhm which is private so it's easier but the quality of the people involved it's a very different part of my I mean we're doing the business brain stuff but there's also like you get to meet these amazing writers and you get to be part of like exchange of ideas about the future of democracy yes you know that's enriching me right that's the other thing is making sure there's an exchange in the board of you're learning you're getting enriched they're benefiting and I don't think it's easy to always get that balance right and so you just have to be careful I think you just have to be and I I I think I just didn't realize the level of commitment not just time but sort of to do it well I mean it's goes back to renegotiating so what I'm doing is I'm saying no more boards until I've renegotiated some of my current commitments and then we'll see that's also a very powerful language right there right like categorically I have a policy of saying no to X until I've a b and c that's right done deal and by the way people can't argue with that because they're like that does sound like a very San thing to do yeah but I have a lot of appreciation more than I I did before of folks who do this in service yeah governance matters right it matters for institutions not just companies right if done well and it should be done well but but gosh it's a big commitment be careful with those big commitments folks they sneak up on you yeah anything that has multiple years attached to it yeah oh boy it's kind of like the scope creep time evaporating version of the best business model of all time which is being a venture capitalist where you have these like stacked funds that's great if you're taking your 2 and 20 but if it's a commitment of your time over multiple years and then they start to stack and oh my God then you're like 27 snow layers deep in the Avalanche of time requests that's right that's right and you got like a 10-year Horizon minimum that seems exciting at the beginning and then then you stack another 10 and another 10 and you're like wait a minute all of a sudden I'm like 65 years old and anyway yes some funds have closed and hopefully you've done well but you made commitments before those things happen to another set of them yeah so it's like a rolling Avalanche it is not the Avalanche is not ending do not say yes right away folks yeah especially to multi-year commitments that's probably the headline that and the toy is broken I'm telling you that's that's your next book The I really think I could do well so I have to ask this because it's of acute interest for me personally also because it might help me individually but also with employees of mine managing High performers how do you get extraordinary output from extraordinary people without burning them out or letting them burn themselves out so if I was like what are the pantheon of management lessons so one of them is you got to manage different people differently another Pantheon lesson is spend disproportionate amount of time with your high performers because instead what we all do is get all of our time sucked by the folks who are struggling and then we don't invest in the high performers and then they're either burning themselves out or finding a new opportunity because they're not realizing they're high performers and benefiting or they know they are and they're not getting investment and they're like I'm going to go get investment somewhere else so number one is how do you manage them is you make sure that they are a priority of yours even though they are perfectly good on their own which is the sort of dilemma right like how do I help them I came up with in my book I steal I mean I don't steal I credit I Source a lot of Frameworks the book scaling people tactics for management and Company building oh yes thank you just to throw it in there so there are a lot of QR codes you can scan and look at the sites where I reference a lot of materials and books conscious business Fred cof in there one framework I think I mean as far as I can tell I made up myself was a top talent framework which is again I try to like simplify things but I think High performers fall into two categories and I call them pushers and pullers and so The Pusher is the one who's like give me more give me more they're often wanting to get more comp too but they're like I want recognition I want responsibility I want scope I want to move the needle I'm high impact they're very impatient with themselves with other people they can be a little high friction for the team because they're like going for it grabbing it grabbing it but you know it's fun because you load them up and they're just like carrying the whole thing up you know like up the hill without you but they can be tough my main coaching often ends up with them is saying until I believe that the people working with you love working with you I don't think you're succeeding they're like what what because they're all keeping score but they're keeping score in the sort of maybe early in his life Tim Ferris version I don't know oh no that's a fair assessment I mean I think I am a pusher as an entrepreneur for sure and that I've learned how that can be a liability right it can be a huge superpower and it can be a huge liability right and your job is to sort of like I say you know giving direct feedback is holding up a mirror and just being like here's the beauty of you and here's the liability part and if you can't show me that you can work on the liability part I can't keep loading you up because in the case of The Pusher yeah they might burn themselves out but they actually like burn out the people around them so that's The Pusher the puller it's funny this happened to me in a couple of conversations I've had I'm usually being interviewed by someone who's like The Pusher I'm the puller but anyway I'm the puller is someone who no complaints you load them up and they're like yep yep I got it but they're not asking for it they're not grabbing it they're not pushing but they're highly competent they're very organized they're they're very consistent reliable and you just and they have good judgment and you're like okay I know that person won't screw that up I know that person will get the people to the party and the you know whatever it is and you just start loading them and they don't renegotiate they don't know how to say no and then they explode like they basically implode or explode that's what I've run into with past employees yep yep and there's some like I went through a period of my own development where I was like I think of it as my martyr period where where I literally I don't know who I thought I was martyring myself for like everyone else I like I would be doing all this stuff for my colleagues for my team and I was like no one appreciates like I don't know and I eventually had a really good open conversation with a guy not my boss who worked with me and he's like did I ask you to take that on like you to start running that project or you run our planning process or like did you I mean did someone ask you and I'm like well no no one was doing it so I'm doing it he was like hm and do you he's like and why do you feel like you have to do that you are I was martyring myself for nothing like I think Martyrs at least are celebrating like a god I was like sacrificing myself on the altar of someone didn't do the work so I'll do it it was very bad very bad but but and I was resenting the hell out of my colleagues like I mean this happens in relationships I mean it's like the who's going to take out the garbage thing but I just I designated myself the garbage collector for like a whole set of things partly because I thought it was that was part of my job but still it was not good not good anyway the polar will implode slash explode and you might not be able to save them if it gets too far so your job with them is like look let's work on delegations skills let's work on saying no let's work on Boundary like look at me let's work on rules boundaries how do you not be the person carrying everything doing three jobs right yeah and I think that once you know those two archetypes you can sort of look for the signs of them and then you can think well what's their classic Development Area and then your job is to be all over them on that Development Area because they will collapse if you don't yeah get them to see that part of their job job is to like The Pusher especially part of your job is to stop creating friction for everyone mhm yeah like for me I really started to take exercise seriously when I decided it's part of my job to be like a better leader I need to get a certain amount of exercise and now I will make time for it and I think a lot of these types are like I'm not I'm going to do everything to win these pushers and you're like you know what part of winning is it's like avoiding a peric victory like avoiding one where everyone wins but dies on the field right like that and and they're like oh well then how do I do that because it doesn't come naturally to them they're like how do I and then they'll say I don't want to work with low performers and this is the problem right they're they're so good that I mean now we're going deeper on this they're so good that you can't quite say back to them no those people are the same as you so instead you're like yeah okay we all have different strengths and weaknesses what I feel like you're doing is not even appreciating what anyone else is bringing to the table why do you think that is and it's like well they don't stay up all night like I do getting the thing done you're like no they don't and I actually don't think sometimes you should stay up all night getting the thing done but what do they do well and then you get them turn to think about assets you're like how can you use that asset to get the things done and they're like hm but they really don't think that way because it's all on their own shoulders takes practice like so many things Claire this has been a fantastic conversation thank you so much I've had so much fun I've taken copious notes I'm going to be following up on a million side quests as we call them but important side quests I've taken notes of phrasing that you've used all sorts of things so I am looking forward to actually digging into my homework I will not stay up all night for the record I'm trying to also Health First sort of foundational along with the awareness yes having the vehicle to do the things you want to do your book which I highly recommend to folks it's incredibly tactical scaling people tactics for management and Company building tons of templates tons of Frameworks lots of specifics that you can apply immediately people can find you correct me if I'm getting this wrong but on Twitter at cuses Johnson we'll link to LinkedIn as well are there any other websites or anything else that you'd like to point people to the strip prep website you can find scaling people and you can find actually I did interviews with a bunch of leaders that there's digital only content which we can give you all the link to that but beautiful but no thank you Tim this has been wide ranging as promised and stimulating and I've got some recommendations I'm walking away with so thank you oh thank you so much Claire and for everybody listening we will link to everything in the show notes this will be encyclopedic and you can find that at tim. blog podcast and you just search for Claire and this will pop right up and you'll find everything that we discussed and until next time be a little bit Kinder than is necessary not only to others but also to yourself and as always thanks for tuning in”

How to Take Radical Ownership of Your Life and Career — Claire Hughes Johnson · The Tim Ferriss Show

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“i kind of had that as it was soul and hope in the time of trump and the u.n climate change papers and so i felt that we were very very much had trends gone from the dusk of climate disaster to the night of a lot of craziness and brutality and hopelessness but that the dawn always arrives and so i wanted to be as fearless as i could be writing about all three of those stages but just helping people remember the dawn always comes you know and that and oh i heard something tim i thought was beautiful which was that twilight refers to dusk and on twilight is the when the light is fading and becoming night and twilight is when the night is fading and becoming dawn and so i wanted to write these stories that were as real as possible but that that were as hopeful and real as i possibly could”

How to Tame Your Inner Critic | Anne Lamott · The Tim Ferriss Show

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“thousand years of solitude or 100 years of solitude”

Anne Lamott - Spiritual Fitness, Creative Process, and Redecorating the Abyss | The Tim Ferriss Show · The Tim Ferriss Show

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“so I gave him Gabrielle Garcia marquez's 100 Years of self Sol itude for him to know okay if you've never written a book and you're going to tell somebody you want to you want to write a great book all right read this”

Cal Fussman Interview (Full Episode) | The Tim Ferriss Show (Podcast) · The Tim Ferriss Show

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