334: Yancey Strickler - Using The Power Of Metaphors (This Could Be Our Future)

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Learning to own yourself. And eventually, eventually I came to
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realize that I just needed to make friends with my fear.
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I needed to befriend the pressure. I shouldn't run from those.
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I needed to embrace those because those were also good
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things for me. Like I can see how fear produces excitement,
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how pressure, how like my, my best moments, my favorite
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moments as CEO were crisis moments. You know, that, that
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pressure brings out such clarity and like I am exceptional
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in those moments. The mundane is like harder, can be harder.
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Because then you don't know what to do. When there's
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a crisis, you know that something needs to be solved.
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And it's about digging deep enough to get to the
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real problem.
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We are opening up applications for our next Learning Leader Circle.
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We only do this once a year. And think back
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to the great conversation I had with the legendary Jim Collins,
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episode 216. He said, Ryan, before you get too caught
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up in the why and the what, you need to
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first be very intentional about your who.
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Who will be your friends? Who will be your mentor?
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Who will you help? Who will you choose.
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To surround yourself with? That will be the single greatest
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determining factor in your long-term success. And I would ask
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you the same question. Who are you surrounding yourself with?
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Do you want to be surrounded by growth-oriented leaders that
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are willing to push you? We've added specific curriculum and
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elements so that by the end of the year, you'll
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have tangible outcomes to measure your growth and be a
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more effective leader, both personally and professionally. These groups are
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intentionally curated and kept small. Time and again, the thing
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that people say they love about these groups is the
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relationships they're able to build with one another in a
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short period of time. If you'd like to apply, go
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to learningleaderscircle.com. That's learningleaderscircle.com to apply. Welcome to the Learning
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Leader Show presented by Brixie and Meyer.
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I am Ryan Hawk.
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Thank you so much for being here. Text LEARNERS to 44222.
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In order to join tens of thousands of learning leaders
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from all over the world, receive Mindful Monday updates, what
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I'm reading, writing, watching, thinking about. Also give you the
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opportunity to be part of my book launch team, Text
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Learners to 44222. Now on tonight's featured leader, the great
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and thoughtful Yancey Strickler. He's a writer and entrepreneur, co-founder
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and former CEO of Kickstarter. He's been recognized as a
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young global leader by the World Economic Forum and one
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of Fast Company's most creative people. Also author of a
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great new book titled This Could Be Our Future, A
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Manifesto for a More Generous World.
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A few of the topics we discussed. What is Bentoism?
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And Yancey shares why this framework will help you. And
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then as the CEO, he shared the unique way he
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chose to hire leaders and the qualities he looked for
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and how you could develop them. And then how was
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he able to use storytelling and metaphors as a sandwich,
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as Yancey calls it, to inspire people?
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And more importantly, how can you inspire? do this as well.
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Ladies and gentlemen, this one is so useful with Yancey Strickler.
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All right, Yancey Strickler, man, so good to have you
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here on the Learning Leader Show.
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Welcome.
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Yeah, thanks, Ryan.
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I mentioned to you before we started recording, I was
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really looking forward to this one as I dug into
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your book.
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I'm a big fan of Kickstarter.
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I've certainly backed my fair share of projects and And
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so there's a lot to get to, but to get
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us going, you know I'm fascinated by leaders who sustain excellence.
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And I'm curious to think about the ones in your life,
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because you've lived an incredible life so far at still
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a relatively young age, and you surround yourself with others
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who have done a fantastic job of sustaining excellence. And
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from your perspective, what have you found that those leaders
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all seem to have in common?
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It's a great question. And one, as you ask it,
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I should have spent years always studying this, trying to
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figure this out. But the word that comes to mind
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is selflessness. And I first think of a couple people
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in my life. I think of Greg Popovich, the coach
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of the Spurs. I'm a huge NBA fan. And Pop is,
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you know, there's a selflessness there. There's a famous line
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that to play for the Spurs, you have to get
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over yourself first before he'll consider you. But yeah, I mean,
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I think the right kind of leaders are able to,
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like they have the strength to hold on tight to
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a vision or a goal or they have a strong
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sense of what's important. And then they just have incredible
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flexibility everywhere else. You know, you have a sense of
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like what other people need and you're willing to move
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to meet that. You know how to anticipate that. You
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know how to ask questions. It just requires spending more
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time living in the minds of other people than I
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think yourself while still like, you know, having, having that
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strong kind of self coherence, um, that lets you know what,
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what the right direction is. But, you know, the leaders
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that have been the worst leaders I've experienced in my
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life are people that are just, the job is a
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reflection of them. Everything is about them, you know, that it,
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it doesn't take long for you as an employee or,
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appear just to learn that, like how irrelevant you kind
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of are to that person. So that sense of, you know,
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cause it's interesting cause as a leader, you need to
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have that strength. You need to be able to command respect.
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You need to, you need to be someone that people
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look to, but at the same time you have to
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use that power to mirror back what's around you. And
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I think that's what succeeds. Yeah.
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That's an interesting balance. And I think I'm curious about
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how to develop that. Is that innate? I wonder about
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your evolution. You're a CEO of a wildly successful company, Kickstarter,
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and there's a lot to your story. But as I
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think about that, for the person that's listening that is
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currently leading a team, let's say they're a mid-level manager
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within a big company and they think, wait a second,
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Yancey brings up a good point. I don't know if
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I've been showing enough compassion for the people on my
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team or understanding how to meet them.
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I think it's understanding more than compassion because it's not
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just about giving love. It's just about what's going on
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with them. It's a weird way to go about this,
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but part of the brilliance of Amazon and the reason
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why it's run a lot of retail out of business,
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other than being a monopoly, but another reason for that
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is that Amazon makes decisions thinking about this customer maximization idea.
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So they're thinking Amazon's thought process is what is in
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our self-interest is what's in the self-interest of a customer.
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So by us maximizing for someone else's desires, that actually
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will produce the best outcome for us. And I think
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as a manager, it's similar. Now, that can lead you
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to like a death by a thousand cuts of just
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like listening to a Whatever mundane things aren't that important.
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But on a daily basis, if you know where your
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team is, if you know how to check the temperature,
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and if you have that curiosity, it's a huge advantage.
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So I think that some people naturally are more curious
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about others. Some people are more pro-social, more inclined to
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think that way. Interestingly, I think those are people that
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maybe have a harder time getting into management because they're
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maybe not advocating for themselves as strongly.
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As they could. As maybe perhaps ambitious enough?
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Yeah, well, yeah. But these are people that probably have
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such a high level of self-awareness to know their faults
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that they question, oh, should I really be the leader?
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Whereas the person next to them who's too dumb or
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not self-aware enough to look at their own faults is like, well,
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of course I should do it.
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How do we fix that? How do we put that
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into practice?
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Let's say somebody is listening as an SVP at a
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big company and they make hiring decisions for leadership roles.
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I grew up in the profession of selling and what
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got me in the room to interview for management roles,
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as you could probably guess, is they took the stack
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rankings and they said, all right, we're going to interview
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the five people at the top for this management job.
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Now I like to think that I could fulfill and
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did a good job as a leader, even though I
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made a million mistakes along the way, but that's not
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necessarily the best way to choose managers is just to
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look at the top of the top performers and say, well,
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because they were good here, they will be good at
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this completely different skillset of a job.
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So how do you, how do you manage that?
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Well, if you are, if you're already in that management position,
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and you're looking to have more of this, I think
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it's a daily habit. I think it's, you know, it's
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putting on your calendar an hour a day. That's, you know,
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could be one-on-one conversations with your team. It could be,
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you're going to go deep into whatever customer surveys came
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back to let you know about who you're serving. But
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I think it's setting aside an hour a day where
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you're just imagining like, this is, you know, I want
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to be a sponge and I want to soak up
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what everyone below and around me is thinking about. And
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just like that's a key part of my job. You know,
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I think those sorts of daily habits, just if it's
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on your calendar, but something you have to do, you'll
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do it. For someone that like, if you're trying to
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find who on your team has that skill set, like
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rather than going to the person who talks the most
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in the meetings and saying that should be our leader,
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but instead asking another way, that's a great question. I
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would imagine the team might know. The team itself might know.
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They might... you ask them who should be the leader,
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they still might not call out that right person, but
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they also probably know if you ask them, hey, when
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you're having an issue and you don't want to go
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to a manager, who do you go to? And if
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more than 40% of people say the same person, it's
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like maybe that should be your leader. But those people
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are great because just the ego– you know, the ego
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can serve the mission, can serve the team, but at
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the same time, their energy is going into just like,
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just being an amplifier for other people.
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Yeah.
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And I think for that person who wants to get
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to that role, being known as the person that people
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go to for help and being willing to offer that
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help to serve others is a great way to what
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I would say get earned respect and earned leadership, not
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leadership by position. We all know positional leaders, right? The
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people who were placed in big time roles yet, they
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hadn't necessarily earned respect and didn't take the time to
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do it.
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And so this is a way you could do it
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from within.
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Yeah, totally. I mean, I think promoting from within just
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provides huge dividends, but it requires you having a healthy
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organization to start with. You could also just end up
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further replicating whatever your foibles already are. But it's, you know, I've,
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I've had, you know, I've, I've hired and developed so
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many leaders over my career and have made a lot
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of bad hiring decisions, which is like extraordinarily painful for everybody,
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for everybody, you know, cause it's like, if you hire
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a bad fit, it's, it's not that that person is
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like the worst person. It's just like, we didn't, there's
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something wrong with how we each conceptualize what, what this
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outcome was going to be. And ultimately if I'm the
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one making that decision, Like that's, that's on me, you know?
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So I've had to learn from those things, but yeah, it's, uh,
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you know, especially as a CEO, like I had years
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where I feel like, you know, 30 to 40% of
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my job was just recruiting executives and just having a
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lot of, a lot of dinners, a lot of dinners,
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just trying to sniffing for the right kind of person.
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So how many, uh, so what, how many employees did
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you have, uh, ultimately within your organization as a CEO
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of Kickstarter?
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Yeah.
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So I was CEO from 2014 to 2017, late 2017.
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And when I left, it was like 155 people. When
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I started as CEO, I think it was 70. Wow.
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And so it was I mean, it was crazy. It
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was like my first day as I mean, I've been
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there from the beginning, run the company with your co-founder, co-founders.
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Yeah.
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And but then my first day as CEO was our
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first day in like our first. fancy new office and
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which was like so much bigger than the size of
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the team we had. And it was just a real,
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a real moment of like, you swallow hard and just
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realize how much things are about to change. And so,
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you know, I was, I was leading through the quote unquote,
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like professionalization of the organization where you go from a
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family where everything just works because that's how it works.
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And you just all know each other to operations become
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more complicated that increasingly breaks down. And then you have
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to implement systems and structure and you have to make
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some sense of things, which is like for me, for
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me as someone who did a dream of being an entrepreneur,
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when I discovered I was good at working in companies
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as I had in earlier jobs, like I felt weird
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about it because I wanted to be a creative person.
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Like I didn't want to be like, a good guy
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in a meeting. I wanted, you know, I wanted to
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be more rock and roll than that.
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Your background's in music, right?
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My background's in music. So yeah, so I felt like
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a little bit of a sellout being good and, you know, whatever,
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inside a room with a whiteboard.
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It's silly.
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It's silly now.
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I can see it.
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At the time, it was hard to deal with. But,
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you know, but it was also, you could very easily
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look around the organization and see where very good people
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were struggling to know what was expected of them, where
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too many decisions were having to go up go up
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the chain and like reach me. And like every time
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a decision reaches a CEO, you know, you could argue
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that's a little bit of a failure of the organization
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to like, people should know how to, we should inform
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people how to make these kinds of decisions. So it's
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that process of growing and then discovering what systems no
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longer work and then trying to build new ones, but
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try not to build systems that are too oppressive where
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it sucks to work there. And you know, it's, it's,
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it's a gnarly, a gnarly part of the process that
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there were moments of it that I thought we were like,
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I was doing great. There were moments of it where
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I'm like, oh my God, what's going on?
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How did you feel?
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So we'll take us back. You move into the new
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fancy office. It's too big for you, but you're planning
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to grow into it, obviously. And I'm always curious because
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there are people who are either going for a have
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just been promoted and now they have much more responsibility
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than they used to. And these people are listening right
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now in their car, they're working out and they're saying,
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I'm scared, but I don't want to admit it. I
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don't want to tell anybody. How did Yancey feel when
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he became the CEO? I know you co-founded, so it's
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a little bit different because you were there from the
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very beginning, but still there's a different responsibility from when
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you now go from.
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A founder to.
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So what was the feeling going on? And I guess
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I'm slightly hoping you're going to help make these people
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feel a little bit better.
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Yeah. I mean, it took kind of years to really
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wrap my arms around it.
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Really? I mean, well, in a way that like, how
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were you scared?
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Well, it's just more like, just, just, I felt like
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I had to, and I, I'd always felt this kind
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of weight as a, as a founder, like the weight
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of the responsibility of everything. But the weight that I
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felt as CEO was, was bigger than I expected. Like
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I thought I was ready for that. And I think
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I was in a lot of ways, but also like the,
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the on me-ness of it.
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The what? I'm sorry.
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The on, the on me-ness. I'm making up a phrase,
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but just like how on.
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Me it was. Like it's on your shoulders.
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Yeah.
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Gotcha.
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Gotcha.
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Just like that. The feeling of that exceeded what I anticipated.
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And yeah, I first tried to hide that feeling. And
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I like talked to my co-founders about it. You know,
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I was like real with them. But in general, I
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just tried to hide it. Yeah. And I write about
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this in the book. But eventually, you know, I came
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to accept these parts of me that had that were
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like still learning and tried to see that as a
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positive thing. And, you know, just try it. Just learn
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to own it and just understand that, you know, I'm. whatever,
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at the time I'm 36 years old, I'm like a
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music critic who has in this thing, like, what, what
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am I expecting? Like, do I really want to go
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back and redo my life? So I feel differently now,
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or do I accept that like part of what makes
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me unusual for a job like this is also a
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strength and I should, you know, so there's just a
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lot of like learning to own yourself. And eventually, eventually
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I came to realize that I just needed to make
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friends with my fear. I needed to befriend the pressure.
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I shouldn't run from those. I needed to embrace those
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because those were also good things for me. Like I
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can see how fear produces excitement, how pressure, how like
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my best moments, my favorite moments as CEO were crisis moments.
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You know, that pressure brings out such clarity and like
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I am exceptional in those moments. The mundane is like harder,
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can be harder. Because then you don't know what to do.
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When there's a crisis, you know that something needs to
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be solved and it's about digging deep enough to get
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to the real problem. And I'm really good at digging
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in problems. I'm really good at like really trying to
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think through of what's at the core of this.
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Where does that come from? How do we talk to
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the core? Where have you developed that? Is that innate
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or have you developed that somehow?
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I think it's innate. It's just I read all the time.
355
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I'm just super curious. Like whenever I meet anyone, like
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the first half hour of a conversation is me asking
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them questions just because I learn that way.
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What do you like to read?
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I mean, I read widely. I love sci-fi. I read
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lots of nonfiction. I'm currently reading the new Jonathan Safran
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00:18:02.740 --> 00:18:06.079
Foer book about the climate. I don't know. I'm always
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reading two or three different things, but my whole life
363
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I just read nonstop.
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00:18:11.259 --> 00:18:14.710
I've learned so much, Yancey, from doing this show that
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you know what is an absolute superpower are leaders who
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are willing and able to Aggressively pursue what they're curious
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about and then digest it, distill it, be thoughtful about it,
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and then share what they think after having this large
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intake engine as a consumer of information. about what they're
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curious about. And this can then make you better in
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any area. You may be reading about the climate, but
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then you also are reading about three other books that
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were mentioned by that author that you saw on a
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podcast or something like that. And now all of a sudden,
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because of this one area that you were curious about,
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you've become more knowledgeable in four different areas, which helps
377
00:19:00.210 --> 00:19:03.769
you as a husband, a dad, a CEO.
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You know what I mean?
379
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Well, yeah. I mean, I've come, my wife pointed this
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out to me, but like the, what makes the my,
381
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the book that's coming out work and what's made like
382
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the things I've written or my most successful moments work
383
00:19:16.420 --> 00:19:18.900
as my wife puts it as like, I make these
384
00:19:19.000 --> 00:19:24.309
sandwich ideas where I squish together unrelated concepts and through
385
00:19:24.349 --> 00:19:28.009
that reveal a greater truth and, and taking, and that's
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00:19:28.049 --> 00:19:31.029
often done by taking something that's very pop and attaching
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00:19:31.049 --> 00:19:34.190
to something that's very not pop. And through that reveal,
388
00:19:34.230 --> 00:19:37.609
you know, revealing something. And, and it's that, Like that's
389
00:19:37.630 --> 00:19:40.839
what my brain is so good at is finding these sandwiches.
390
00:19:41.700 --> 00:19:44.900
Weirdest phrase, weirdest metaphor for this. But yeah, but just,
391
00:19:45.789 --> 00:19:49.529
always just making these connections, just making these connections. Like
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00:19:50.650 --> 00:19:54.049
I read once somewhere that companies that have stakeholder boards
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00:19:54.109 --> 00:19:58.640
rather than shareholder minder boards are on average worth 80%
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as much as their traditionally for-profit counterparts. So like a
395
00:20:01.920 --> 00:20:05.980
German automaker that has a board of governors that includes
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00:20:06.019 --> 00:20:09.970
employees and environmental activists or whatever. Generally, those companies are
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00:20:10.039 --> 00:20:15.000
worth 80% of what their more traditional, financially maximizing competitors
398
00:20:15.019 --> 00:20:16.759
are worth. I just read that one time. And then
399
00:20:17.579 --> 00:20:23.019
learn about this Japanese eating philosophy called hadahachibu, which says
400
00:20:23.059 --> 00:20:25.940
that the goal of any meal is to be 80% full.
401
00:20:26.259 --> 00:20:29.039
That way you're still hungry for tomorrow. And this is
402
00:20:29.079 --> 00:20:33.500
the concept behind Japanese cuisine, is that we shouldn't over-full ourselves.
403
00:20:33.519 --> 00:20:35.759
That way there's always still room to grow. And like,
404
00:20:36.220 --> 00:20:37.990
I don't know, I just... the span of a month,
405
00:20:38.049 --> 00:20:41.609
I read about this 80% valuation thing for stakeholder companies,
406
00:20:41.670 --> 00:20:45.519
read about this Japanese philosophy. And it's like, all right, well,
407
00:20:45.539 --> 00:20:49.440
what's this, what's this 20% that we're bleeding right now? Like,
408
00:20:49.480 --> 00:20:51.559
is that the problem? Is it that extra 20% we're
409
00:20:51.579 --> 00:20:54.940
trying to get? But anyway, I just, I just love, yeah, my,
410
00:20:55.119 --> 00:20:58.400
my brain is just, is just really good at storing
411
00:20:58.440 --> 00:21:01.230
and making connections. And that, you know, that helps so
412
00:21:01.269 --> 00:21:04.099
much as a CEO to like being able to be
413
00:21:04.119 --> 00:21:06.359
able to speak in metaphors to the team, you know,
414
00:21:06.420 --> 00:21:09.000
talk about the hard thing that's going on, but talk
415
00:21:09.039 --> 00:21:12.539
about it in a slightly indirect way that brings more
416
00:21:12.660 --> 00:21:15.220
oxygen to the situation that would be harder to otherwise.
417
00:21:16.079 --> 00:21:18.380
Can this be developed or, or I guess a better
418
00:21:18.400 --> 00:21:21.980
question is how can this be? Cause you, it sounds
419
00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:24.819
like you certainly have some innate talent and skill, but
420
00:21:24.880 --> 00:21:29.180
I also believe everybody has the capacity to lead in
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00:21:29.259 --> 00:21:31.440
some way, shape or form. And everybody has the capacity
422
00:21:31.480 --> 00:21:34.490
to learn if they're willing to, What is it just
423
00:21:34.589 --> 00:21:37.490
the simple act of reading what you're curious about or,
424
00:21:37.650 --> 00:21:41.029
or how can other people listening be better at speaking
425
00:21:41.089 --> 00:21:44.799
in metaphors, understanding the sandwich idea. So you can pull
426
00:21:44.839 --> 00:21:47.339
from way over here and way over here and mash
427
00:21:47.359 --> 00:21:49.799
them together. And then they're at their Monday morning team
428
00:21:49.859 --> 00:21:53.960
meeting and they're working to inspire and exceed goals and
429
00:21:54.019 --> 00:21:58.380
build a culture. How can, what's a tactical thing someone
430
00:21:58.400 --> 00:21:59.809
could do to get better at this right now?
431
00:22:00.630 --> 00:22:02.589
That's a great question. I think it's, I mean, one
432
00:22:02.609 --> 00:22:04.890
thing I do is anytime I read anything interesting, I
433
00:22:04.950 --> 00:22:06.950
write it down. I mean, I'm good at remembering, but
434
00:22:06.990 --> 00:22:10.259
I tend to write, you know, I'll highlight in Kindle,
435
00:22:10.299 --> 00:22:13.400
which is much less effective, but I'll just take notes
436
00:22:13.460 --> 00:22:16.740
of things that just are interesting, you know, whatever the
437
00:22:16.819 --> 00:22:20.539
gestation period of a lizard, you know, they're just things
438
00:22:20.559 --> 00:22:22.990
that whatever reason they stick out and that act of
439
00:22:23.049 --> 00:22:26.210
writing it down, you know, has a real impact. You know,
440
00:22:26.529 --> 00:22:29.150
I would say a lot of people could be a
441
00:22:29.170 --> 00:22:33.220
lot more creative in And using metaphors, I mean, they're
442
00:22:33.299 --> 00:22:36.220
so powerful. They're so powerful in like helping us make
443
00:22:36.259 --> 00:22:39.180
sense of things. Probably if you look at like every
444
00:22:39.220 --> 00:22:42.069
tweet that has more than 5,000 retweets, it's probably some
445
00:22:42.109 --> 00:22:46.450
sort of sandwich metaphor of like pop internet meme plus
446
00:22:46.549 --> 00:22:52.869
current event or whatever. And that through those, through those, combinations,
447
00:22:52.930 --> 00:22:55.650
it's like, we see, we see some truth. Oh, Trump
448
00:22:55.710 --> 00:22:58.500
really is like X or Pelosi really, you know, whatever.
449
00:22:58.539 --> 00:23:01.640
It just, it tells us, it tells us something. And
450
00:23:01.660 --> 00:23:05.539
I think we all have access to those things, you know,
451
00:23:05.559 --> 00:23:07.259
I mean, doing it as good as those people do.
452
00:23:07.299 --> 00:23:09.099
I mean, I look at with jealousy at people on
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00:23:09.119 --> 00:23:10.920
Twitter who do that too. Like I'm not at that,
454
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I'm not at that level. If you give me, you know,
455
00:23:13.420 --> 00:23:16.069
a conversation, I can do it. But in 10 words, that's,
456
00:23:16.230 --> 00:23:17.109
that can be difficult.
457
00:23:17.309 --> 00:23:19.009
Well, but you look at your book and like, you
458
00:23:19.049 --> 00:23:24.390
can tell a story that about Adele going on tour
459
00:23:24.470 --> 00:23:27.950
and then how that applies to one of the ideas
460
00:23:27.970 --> 00:23:30.859
that you come up with, right? As someone who's obviously,
461
00:23:30.880 --> 00:23:32.200
and we'll get to that one in a second, but
462
00:23:32.220 --> 00:23:36.339
I was just pointing out that if you just share
463
00:23:36.400 --> 00:23:38.539
the science, and I try to do this with speaking
464
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and writing.
465
00:23:39.119 --> 00:23:40.289
I just finished my first book.
466
00:23:40.349 --> 00:23:44.049
I'm speaking a lot about Congrats. Thank you. And thank you.
467
00:23:44.329 --> 00:23:46.109
You obviously know the process of how hard it is.
468
00:23:46.130 --> 00:23:50.140
But I think the part that people remember if you
469
00:23:50.160 --> 00:23:53.660
meet up with somebody after a keynote is I'm a
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story science application speaker and a story science application writer.
471
00:23:58.960 --> 00:24:00.779
So I want to hear the story.
472
00:24:00.799 --> 00:24:00.880
Yeah.
473
00:24:01.940 --> 00:24:05.269
Then the science so that the story was not just entertainment,
474
00:24:05.309 --> 00:24:07.809
but there's a reason that story was told. And then me,
475
00:24:08.009 --> 00:24:10.680
I'm sitting in your audience and how do I apply
476
00:24:10.720 --> 00:24:12.980
that to my life? Why do I care? Why does
477
00:24:13.000 --> 00:24:15.220
this matter? And so that's like, even some of my
478
00:24:15.259 --> 00:24:17.519
line of questioning can be along that, like Yancey, let's
479
00:24:17.660 --> 00:24:20.279
get tactical. How can a person develop that skill?
480
00:24:21.019 --> 00:24:21.980
Totally.
481
00:24:22.220 --> 00:24:23.019
One other thing.
482
00:24:22.960 --> 00:24:24.839
I just wanted to say, just like, I think maybe
483
00:24:24.859 --> 00:24:27.029
where I learned this as we have this conversation, maybe
484
00:24:27.049 --> 00:24:29.930
where we learned this is that I grew up evangelical
485
00:24:29.950 --> 00:24:35.569
Christian in Southwest Virginia and every, every pastor I ever had,
486
00:24:35.930 --> 00:24:38.509
you know, the Sunday sermon always goes this way. You
487
00:24:38.569 --> 00:24:44.349
start with the, light, popcorny hook to make everyone sit
488
00:24:44.390 --> 00:24:46.690
up straight in their seat. You transition that into scripture
489
00:24:46.730 --> 00:24:49.109
and you transition that into like what you're left with.
490
00:24:49.170 --> 00:24:53.130
But I, you know, that taught me a lot about, yeah, how,
491
00:24:53.289 --> 00:24:55.029
how to speak to people, how, how, how to get
492
00:24:55.049 --> 00:24:55.809
people to hear you.
493
00:24:56.089 --> 00:24:57.069
Yeah, no, that's a good point.
494
00:24:57.089 --> 00:24:58.849
Uh, I want to get back to one thing because
495
00:24:58.869 --> 00:25:00.630
I think let's get practical for a second. Then I'm
496
00:25:00.650 --> 00:25:02.380
going to dive into some notes I took on your book,
497
00:25:02.710 --> 00:25:04.359
which we've touched on some of them so far, but
498
00:25:04.720 --> 00:25:07.210
one of them was, so you, you, You mentioned you
499
00:25:07.230 --> 00:25:12.859
went from 70 to 155 people as your time at
500
00:25:12.880 --> 00:25:15.359
CEO at Kickstarter. So over the course of that time,
501
00:25:15.380 --> 00:25:18.039
you're obviously hiring people. And some of those roles you're
502
00:25:18.059 --> 00:25:19.880
hiring are leadership positions.
503
00:25:20.220 --> 00:25:20.369
Yeah.
504
00:25:21.049 --> 00:25:24.589
And I'm fascinated by a, from a thoughtful, curious person
505
00:25:24.670 --> 00:25:28.009
like you, what are some of the qualities you would
506
00:25:28.150 --> 00:25:31.950
look for when hiring for a leadership role? Obviously not
507
00:25:32.009 --> 00:25:35.180
necessarily position specific, because if there's an engineer, yes, they
508
00:25:35.220 --> 00:25:37.220
gotta be able to do those, those, they gotta have
509
00:25:37.259 --> 00:25:39.220
some of those skills in order to do the job.
510
00:25:39.519 --> 00:25:43.619
But I'm thinking just more at a quality slash characteristic
511
00:25:43.680 --> 00:25:46.880
level of the people, their makeup as a person. What
512
00:25:46.920 --> 00:25:48.259
are some things you really valued?
513
00:25:50.200 --> 00:25:52.519
You know, as I think back on like the most
514
00:25:52.539 --> 00:25:56.599
successful of those relationships, I mean, it's funny. The things
515
00:25:56.619 --> 00:25:59.240
where it didn't work, there was always some, there was
516
00:25:59.279 --> 00:26:01.119
some sense I had that that was the case that
517
00:26:01.160 --> 00:26:01.980
I tried to ignore.
518
00:26:02.960 --> 00:26:04.069
Even in the hiring process?
519
00:26:04.920 --> 00:26:07.329
Maybe a little bit. Maybe a little bit of just like,
520
00:26:08.009 --> 00:26:09.809
but you sort of talk yourself into, well, maybe that,
521
00:26:09.950 --> 00:26:11.730
you know, but that doesn't really matter. No one else
522
00:26:11.769 --> 00:26:14.029
brought that up. No one else, you know, and because
523
00:26:14.049 --> 00:26:16.230
you want, because you want it to work out. Like,
524
00:26:16.970 --> 00:26:19.769
the longer the process goes, the more likely you are
525
00:26:20.049 --> 00:26:22.430
to talk yourself into things. So I think I might've
526
00:26:22.470 --> 00:26:26.759
known the outcome in every case, but definitely because of
527
00:26:26.799 --> 00:26:29.859
who I am, I only wanted to work with other
528
00:26:29.900 --> 00:26:33.759
leaders who also had that kind of selflessness, that servant mindset,
529
00:26:34.079 --> 00:26:38.460
you know, people that would talk about the accomplishments of
530
00:26:38.500 --> 00:26:42.190
their teams was great. People who would talk about personal accomplishments,
531
00:26:42.789 --> 00:26:47.160
you know, I just like, didn't really believe, um, you know,
532
00:26:47.460 --> 00:26:50.859
Kickstarter is so mission driven and, and also we've always
533
00:26:50.900 --> 00:26:53.759
made this vow to never sell the pub, never sell
534
00:26:53.779 --> 00:26:56.220
the company or go public. So like whatever stock options
535
00:26:56.259 --> 00:26:58.720
an executive is getting, I would have to explain to them.
536
00:26:58.759 --> 00:27:00.980
It's more like a, you know, it's, it's more like
537
00:27:01.000 --> 00:27:03.089
you're getting royalties for a hit song you wrote in
538
00:27:03.119 --> 00:27:06.210
the 1970s than it is. You're getting like a lottery ticket.
539
00:27:06.569 --> 00:27:09.450
And so that was actually super helpful for just screening
540
00:27:09.529 --> 00:27:12.490
out a lot of people who, They're like, Hey, you know, well,
541
00:27:12.509 --> 00:27:14.650
I've got four more years where I need to earn.
542
00:27:14.690 --> 00:27:16.039
And so I, you know, this isn't right for me.
543
00:27:16.049 --> 00:27:17.890
And I'm like, great. That's why we have this conversation,
544
00:27:18.109 --> 00:27:19.650
you know, cause I don't want you coming in here
545
00:27:19.690 --> 00:27:26.200
and having those different expectations. But the leaders that I promoted,
546
00:27:26.220 --> 00:27:28.720
the leaders that just stood up, you know, stood out
547
00:27:28.779 --> 00:27:32.119
so well, people that I always felt a real comfort
548
00:27:32.160 --> 00:27:33.869
being honest with. And I always had a sense they
549
00:27:33.880 --> 00:27:36.430
were being honest with me. They didn't seem afraid to
550
00:27:36.470 --> 00:27:41.440
give me bad news. Um, I think you can tell when,
551
00:27:42.720 --> 00:27:44.559
maybe it's harder to tell, but when a team believes
552
00:27:44.619 --> 00:27:47.839
in a leader and when they don't. The team knows,
553
00:27:47.960 --> 00:27:51.109
even as you as the boss don't know, the team
554
00:27:51.119 --> 00:27:55.230
knows the truth of whether it's working or not. There's
555
00:27:55.250 --> 00:27:59.829
all sorts of, how do you get that information is interesting.
556
00:27:59.869 --> 00:28:04.509
There's a lot of ups and downs to that process,
557
00:28:04.529 --> 00:28:07.099
but it did get to a point of having the
558
00:28:07.200 --> 00:28:10.509
right nine people around the table together and having that
559
00:28:10.569 --> 00:28:15.970
chemistry of like people respecting each other, people working together.
560
00:28:16.190 --> 00:28:18.789
Like I had confidence that I could lay a problem
561
00:28:18.849 --> 00:28:20.509
out on the table and that someone would grab it
562
00:28:21.130 --> 00:28:23.250
and would like know the steps to take. And it,
563
00:28:23.849 --> 00:28:27.119
you know, it's, it's, it's amazing. It's amazing when you're there,
564
00:28:27.150 --> 00:28:28.650
you know, you do feel like Voltron.
565
00:28:28.799 --> 00:28:30.819
You know, pretty cool when that, when it starts, when
566
00:28:30.859 --> 00:28:31.720
it starts clicking.
567
00:28:32.380 --> 00:28:34.119
But also you have this mindset of like, okay, now
568
00:28:34.140 --> 00:28:36.519
that we're here, like we're good. It's set in reality.
569
00:28:36.579 --> 00:28:39.509
It's like, You get those periods for like three weeks
570
00:28:39.589 --> 00:28:42.490
and then more static starts and you have to fight
571
00:28:42.529 --> 00:28:47.619
your way back. And I mean, that's leadership is a
572
00:28:47.680 --> 00:28:50.779
constant fight to stay at equilibrium. And you keep waiting
573
00:28:50.819 --> 00:28:53.400
for when's the moment where everything starts running itself. And
574
00:28:53.440 --> 00:28:57.019
guess what? It never happens. You know, there always has
575
00:28:57.059 --> 00:29:00.849
to be some hand on the till or you do
576
00:29:00.880 --> 00:29:03.690
such a great job at empowering people and your organization
577
00:29:03.730 --> 00:29:05.849
is so wide open that people are empowered to act
578
00:29:06.029 --> 00:29:09.319
on the things that they're doing that, you know, um,
579
00:29:09.420 --> 00:29:11.869
but I, I don't, I think that's possible early. I
580
00:29:11.890 --> 00:29:13.309
think that's harder as you go along.
581
00:29:14.589 --> 00:29:17.170
So at the end of 2017, you decided to leave. What,
582
00:29:17.250 --> 00:29:18.789
what was it that made you want to leave?
583
00:29:20.390 --> 00:29:25.630
Um, I mean, all, you know, there was much greater
584
00:29:25.670 --> 00:29:27.779
complication than I'm saying in a lot of this stuff.
585
00:29:27.950 --> 00:29:28.210
Yeah.
586
00:29:29.099 --> 00:29:32.309
So, you know, I was, uh, I got very tired
587
00:29:32.309 --> 00:29:35.940
by the end of this. I mean, this was like
588
00:29:35.940 --> 00:29:39.339
12 years. Um, and, You know, and and honestly, like
589
00:29:39.380 --> 00:29:42.859
having to replace people, all that, like really took so
590
00:29:42.900 --> 00:29:46.319
much energy out of me. And so I ended up having, like,
591
00:29:46.380 --> 00:29:48.759
I had a, I had a rough 360 review at
592
00:29:48.799 --> 00:29:51.480
the end of twenties, at the end of 2016, I
593
00:29:51.779 --> 00:29:55.880
think it was like, I'd, had to let go to people. And,
594
00:29:55.900 --> 00:29:57.599
you know, just like it was, it was like my
595
00:29:57.660 --> 00:30:00.299
first rocky period and it showed up in my 360
596
00:30:00.299 --> 00:30:01.839
and I, I put in front of my board and
597
00:30:01.859 --> 00:30:04.680
I said, Hey, like, here's what it says. Like, I
598
00:30:04.720 --> 00:30:08.369
think these criticisms are legit. You know, this is something like, yeah.
599
00:30:08.420 --> 00:30:10.769
I think defensive you got, you were like, I think.
600
00:30:10.670 --> 00:30:13.430
It's easy for by myself.
601
00:30:14.710 --> 00:30:18.170
I remember getting those and all. And my immediate initial
602
00:30:18.210 --> 00:30:21.759
thought was, You know, I hate admitting this, honestly, but
603
00:30:21.799 --> 00:30:22.960
I'd say they're wrong.
604
00:30:23.259 --> 00:30:25.519
What are they talking about? Or they don't understand, you know?
605
00:30:25.819 --> 00:30:26.279
And then you have to.
606
00:30:26.279 --> 00:30:27.740
You're mad about some of those things still.
607
00:30:27.839 --> 00:30:28.140
Yeah.
608
00:30:28.319 --> 00:30:30.480
But, you know, but I have to reflect that if, like,
609
00:30:31.940 --> 00:30:33.319
people feel unsteady.
610
00:30:33.599 --> 00:30:33.839
Right.
611
00:30:33.940 --> 00:30:36.799
Like that, you know, what did that... Of course, I
612
00:30:36.839 --> 00:30:40.380
have all my explanations of why. I have every justification.
613
00:30:40.440 --> 00:30:43.359
But still, the end result is people feel unsteady. Like,
614
00:30:43.519 --> 00:30:46.930
how can I deny that? So I had... three days of, yeah,
615
00:30:46.970 --> 00:30:50.450
they're all idiots and whatever. And then, but then I,
616
00:30:50.599 --> 00:30:54.160
you know, I, I forced myself to put on my
617
00:30:54.220 --> 00:30:59.000
co-founder hat and to say, you know, what, what does
618
00:30:59.039 --> 00:31:03.069
the organization need? Maybe I'm not what the organization needs. Maybe,
619
00:31:03.269 --> 00:31:06.750
maybe the organization needs something different. And so I put
620
00:31:06.769 --> 00:31:09.009
that out to the board, you know, I had that
621
00:31:09.049 --> 00:31:11.609
conversation and I said, I, I think it's me. I
622
00:31:11.630 --> 00:31:13.890
hope it's me. You know, all these, I'm excited for
623
00:31:13.910 --> 00:31:16.019
it to be me. Um, but I also think these
624
00:31:16.059 --> 00:31:17.920
are things like we really have to look at where,
625
00:31:18.440 --> 00:31:21.609
you know, 10, almost 10 years into this business and
626
00:31:21.650 --> 00:31:25.130
through that process, like it was revealed, you know, I
627
00:31:25.170 --> 00:31:27.650
think the, the truth of the situation was revealed and,
628
00:31:27.869 --> 00:31:31.869
and I, you know, uh, it was, it was really,
629
00:31:31.930 --> 00:31:34.470
really hard. It was really, really hard because that had been,
630
00:31:34.490 --> 00:31:38.849
you know, my identity for like a decade. Um, but
631
00:31:38.890 --> 00:31:41.430
it's funny, like, you know, once, once I, once I
632
00:31:41.529 --> 00:31:43.339
reached that decision with the board and we, you know,
633
00:31:43.359 --> 00:31:45.460
we talked about it. you know, I just made the
634
00:31:45.529 --> 00:31:48.509
choice to step away entirely from the company and to
635
00:31:48.549 --> 00:31:54.210
just like think about what was next. And, uh, and,
636
00:31:54.529 --> 00:31:57.289
and just discovered like a wealth of energy. I had
637
00:31:57.390 --> 00:32:01.410
no idea I had. And like the, the exhaustion of
638
00:32:01.519 --> 00:32:06.220
the job, uh, had, I hadn't felt it. I did feel,
639
00:32:06.279 --> 00:32:07.880
I mean, there were days there were, I remember, I
640
00:32:07.880 --> 00:32:10.440
remember one day I was like, had to go to
641
00:32:10.480 --> 00:32:12.680
work and I was standing there in the house and
642
00:32:12.720 --> 00:32:14.930
had my hand on the doorknob and I, And I
643
00:32:15.009 --> 00:32:16.730
couldn't turn the door to leave the house. And I
644
00:32:16.730 --> 00:32:19.240
just started crying. I started crying there. My wife like
645
00:32:19.319 --> 00:32:22.220
walked up. She's like, what's, what's, what's happening? What's going on?
646
00:32:22.480 --> 00:32:23.819
You know, like, did I get a phone call?
647
00:32:23.839 --> 00:32:24.240
Like what?
648
00:32:24.359 --> 00:32:27.900
And I, I was just like, I just, I just
649
00:32:27.980 --> 00:32:31.289
don't know how to be a CEO today. Like, I don't,
650
00:32:32.289 --> 00:32:34.650
I don't know, like in this 20 minutes of riding
651
00:32:34.690 --> 00:32:35.950
the train to work right now, like, I don't know
652
00:32:35.990 --> 00:32:39.529
how to put on the mask. Like, I feel, I
653
00:32:39.569 --> 00:32:43.970
feel really tired. And I never had a moment like
654
00:32:44.009 --> 00:32:48.069
that before. And, um, and that was the pressure of
655
00:32:48.170 --> 00:32:50.559
like these conversations about what should the future of the
656
00:32:50.599 --> 00:32:53.559
company be me, you know, just all these things. And, um,
657
00:32:54.579 --> 00:32:57.579
so it was very, you know, it's very challenging, but
658
00:32:58.099 --> 00:33:01.210
I think we all were growing up about it and
659
00:33:01.369 --> 00:33:03.990
trying to keep in mind of like, what's most important
660
00:33:04.069 --> 00:33:06.809
beyond us as individuals. And I think did a good
661
00:33:06.829 --> 00:33:07.349
job at that.
662
00:33:08.000 --> 00:33:12.319
Well, I have to think as a co-founder, though, it's
663
00:33:12.359 --> 00:33:14.740
not like you were hired as the CEO of a
664
00:33:14.759 --> 00:33:18.660
company that you just came into from the outside.
665
00:33:18.680 --> 00:33:19.309
Yeah.
666
00:33:19.400 --> 00:33:23.569
It had to just add to that those emotions, I
667
00:33:23.589 --> 00:33:27.329
would imagine, given that this was your baby. You started
668
00:33:27.390 --> 00:33:32.009
the company and now you are potentially going to give
669
00:33:32.029 --> 00:33:34.890
your baby to somebody else. I can't imagine.
670
00:33:35.549 --> 00:33:36.650
But there's a, you know.
671
00:33:37.940 --> 00:33:38.259
Yes.
672
00:33:38.380 --> 00:33:41.700
There's like a responsibility that I still feel. I still feel. And,
673
00:33:41.900 --> 00:33:43.920
you know, the company's had its ups and downs since
674
00:33:43.940 --> 00:33:46.160
I've left and I've had, you know, zero involvement. And
675
00:33:46.220 --> 00:33:49.630
it's like I viscerally feel everything that's going on.
676
00:33:49.789 --> 00:33:51.410
You know, you still feel it. You still.
677
00:33:51.789 --> 00:33:52.789
Yeah. Yeah.
678
00:33:52.930 --> 00:33:54.670
Did you ever have a do you ever have a moment?
679
00:33:55.279 --> 00:33:58.240
Sometimes in the quarterbacking world, I got beat out for
680
00:33:58.259 --> 00:34:01.869
a job my sophomore season to Ben Roethlisberger, the quarterback
681
00:34:01.880 --> 00:34:02.400
for the Steelers.
682
00:34:02.440 --> 00:34:03.410
We were in college together.
683
00:34:04.250 --> 00:34:06.490
And I can act like I rooted for him to
684
00:34:06.529 --> 00:34:09.630
play well, but I didn't. Obviously, I wanted him to
685
00:34:09.650 --> 00:34:12.050
play bad because I wanted to play. And I feel
686
00:34:12.130 --> 00:34:14.710
bad admitting that, but I also know I'm a human.
687
00:34:14.989 --> 00:34:17.130
And I wanted to play and I'm competitive.
688
00:34:17.150 --> 00:34:19.949
Do you have any moments, even though it's your baby,
689
00:34:19.969 --> 00:34:22.289
and I don't understand the financials, so maybe you need
690
00:34:22.309 --> 00:34:24.860
the company to do well and you'll be even more rich.
691
00:34:25.300 --> 00:34:27.480
But do you have moments where you're like, you know what?
692
00:34:28.280 --> 00:34:31.760
If they do bad without me, I don't know. Or
693
00:34:31.800 --> 00:34:34.150
if they struggle, it shows that they needed me. Do
694
00:34:34.170 --> 00:34:35.289
you ever have those feelings?
695
00:34:36.449 --> 00:34:38.250
I mean, I don't think in any real way. The
696
00:34:38.269 --> 00:34:40.309
whole time I was leading the company as a co-founder,
697
00:34:40.329 --> 00:34:43.929
many hats as CEO, I always felt very good about
698
00:34:54.110 --> 00:34:56.849
my ability to lead. It just felt, felt natural. And
699
00:34:57.449 --> 00:34:58.889
I sense from the people that I worked with that,
700
00:34:59.090 --> 00:35:01.530
you know, whatever, I have my foibles and, you know,
701
00:35:01.639 --> 00:35:05.099
I get excited about shiny objects just like anybody. Um,
702
00:35:05.340 --> 00:35:08.179
but you know, in general, I think, I think good
703
00:35:08.199 --> 00:35:11.800
at that. And, you know, that process of getting that
704
00:35:11.800 --> 00:35:14.900
360 and then the untangling and going through all that,
705
00:35:15.039 --> 00:35:19.320
like made me really question a lot of that and
706
00:35:19.519 --> 00:35:24.750
like put my own legacy in some doubt for me. Um,
707
00:35:24.829 --> 00:35:28.469
that I think I probably had a year of after leaving,
708
00:35:28.510 --> 00:35:31.280
like really not knowing what to make of that, but
709
00:35:31.400 --> 00:35:36.239
over time have come to like, accept my value, you know,
710
00:35:36.480 --> 00:35:38.619
which like, but it's, it's hard. It's hard. Right. Like,
711
00:35:38.659 --> 00:35:40.480
I'm sure you had your moments of like, well, am I,
712
00:35:40.570 --> 00:35:42.510
what kind of quarterback am I, you know, whatever. And
713
00:35:42.550 --> 00:35:46.230
it's like, well, you know, You can be, but maybe
714
00:35:46.269 --> 00:35:48.150
it's not the right system for you. Maybe it's not
715
00:35:48.190 --> 00:35:50.869
the right whatever. Just time doesn't work out the right way.
716
00:35:51.050 --> 00:35:53.190
Well, yeah.
717
00:35:53.409 --> 00:35:56.360
Looking at the person sitting directly next to you in
718
00:35:56.400 --> 00:35:59.679
the meeting room and watching the tape together and realizing
719
00:35:59.719 --> 00:36:02.960
he's better than you is not the easiest thing to feel,
720
00:36:02.980 --> 00:36:06.769
especially as a 19-year-old, to say the tape doesn't lie.
721
00:36:07.639 --> 00:36:11.119
And I, uh, he's outplaying me and yeah, that is a, a,
722
00:36:11.670 --> 00:36:16.489
a crushing feeling. However, still very valuable to go through
723
00:36:16.570 --> 00:36:20.230
because it forces you to be resilient or you could quit.
724
00:36:20.949 --> 00:36:24.869
And I think that's usually, you know, not the right way.
725
00:36:24.929 --> 00:36:27.070
I mean, it's, it's a, it's a, it's a weird gift.
726
00:36:27.110 --> 00:36:29.469
It's not a gift I want my child to receive.
727
00:36:29.849 --> 00:36:32.989
I want my child to learn every lesson through unmitigated success,
728
00:36:33.150 --> 00:36:37.110
but these are good ways to learn things. And, even,
729
00:36:37.119 --> 00:36:40.030
you know, even this book process, I'm like, you know,
730
00:36:40.150 --> 00:36:43.309
pitching to all these places I'd love to write for whatever.
731
00:36:43.349 --> 00:36:45.010
And you get turned, you get turned down a lot.
732
00:36:45.289 --> 00:36:49.469
And your proposal you did, or I'm curious, like, I.
733
00:36:49.449 --> 00:36:51.710
Mean, oh, I'm in for the book proposal. No, the
734
00:36:51.730 --> 00:36:54.110
proposal worked out. It worked out the way it was
735
00:36:54.130 --> 00:36:56.449
supposed to, you know, um, which I'd be happy to
736
00:36:56.489 --> 00:36:58.409
talk about, but I even mean like now trying to
737
00:36:58.469 --> 00:37:01.050
place op-eds or whatever, you know, I'd love to be
738
00:37:01.070 --> 00:37:02.659
in the wall street journal, you know, and then they
739
00:37:02.699 --> 00:37:07.449
say no. And then, The book's coming out anyway. They're
740
00:37:07.469 --> 00:37:09.730
still the next thing. And so it just forces you
741
00:37:09.789 --> 00:37:14.139
to accept rejection and just roll and just roll. And
742
00:37:14.619 --> 00:37:18.360
I'm finding that the first three times that happened, I like,
743
00:37:19.219 --> 00:37:20.920
I mean, it's still every time it happens, I feel
744
00:37:21.039 --> 00:37:23.139
annoyed and upset, but I'm also like, wow, this is
745
00:37:23.199 --> 00:37:26.829
super valuable because I'm like, I'm failing all over the
746
00:37:26.869 --> 00:37:29.630
place and things are still working. You know, it's still
747
00:37:29.670 --> 00:37:31.909
moving forward. Like the book's still coming out, whatever. And
748
00:37:32.650 --> 00:37:34.510
where there's the part of me that just wants to like,
749
00:37:35.369 --> 00:37:36.630
There are days where I'm like, I just want to
750
00:37:36.670 --> 00:37:38.789
get under the cover. I want to pull the book,
751
00:37:38.869 --> 00:37:41.219
you know, whatever, just burn it all. Just whatever I will,
752
00:37:41.380 --> 00:37:43.980
you know, no one should see anything. You know, you
753
00:37:44.019 --> 00:37:48.380
go through these swings and yeah, but it's, it's so
754
00:37:48.440 --> 00:37:51.800
valuable to experience failure and then discover that it's not
755
00:37:51.820 --> 00:37:52.900
that big a deal. Yeah.
756
00:37:53.260 --> 00:37:56.179
You're, so this could be our future, a manifesto. It's
757
00:37:56.199 --> 00:38:00.860
a big word for a more generous world. What was
758
00:38:00.900 --> 00:38:04.239
the impetus behind you saying, I'm going to do this.
759
00:38:05.090 --> 00:38:10.769
The hard work of having 70 to 80,000 edited words
760
00:38:10.989 --> 00:38:13.150
put in a book for all people to judge.
761
00:38:14.050 --> 00:38:16.260
What went behind you wanting to do this?
762
00:38:17.840 --> 00:38:22.679
It presented itself to me in multiple ways. The whole
763
00:38:22.719 --> 00:38:25.880
thing started, I used to live in New York, in
764
00:38:25.900 --> 00:38:28.489
the Lower East Side. And in my neighborhood, around the
765
00:38:28.530 --> 00:38:30.889
corner from my house, there had been a dive bar,
766
00:38:30.909 --> 00:38:32.829
a punk bar. It had been there forever, called Mars Bar.
767
00:38:33.550 --> 00:38:36.969
And in 2014, it got torn down in a TD
768
00:38:37.010 --> 00:38:40.650
Bank in that same corner. And the crazy thing about
769
00:38:40.690 --> 00:38:42.920
this was at the time, there were three other TD
770
00:38:42.960 --> 00:38:45.539
Banks within a 15-minute walk of that same corner. So
771
00:38:45.699 --> 00:38:51.860
this is the fourth TD Bank in a 15-minute walking
772
00:38:51.889 --> 00:38:55.650
distance radius. So I started researching this. I was super curious.
773
00:38:55.809 --> 00:38:57.530
I'm someone who likes to dig, so I started digging.
774
00:38:58.199 --> 00:39:00.809
and found that there were almost 1,000 bank branches in
775
00:39:00.849 --> 00:39:03.809
Manhattan alone that was like up 400 over the past
776
00:39:03.809 --> 00:39:06.369
10 years. Like there were more than ever. And I
777
00:39:06.429 --> 00:39:09.650
realized that every one of these bank branches before had
778
00:39:09.710 --> 00:39:12.840
been something like Mars Bar, probably not a punk dive bar,
779
00:39:12.900 --> 00:39:16.960
but a New York locally run business that was now
780
00:39:17.019 --> 00:39:19.340
like a Bank of America or Chase or whatever. And
781
00:39:20.420 --> 00:39:23.639
that just seemed insane to me because it was clearly
782
00:39:23.659 --> 00:39:27.889
making the neighborhood worse, but also clearly everyone's developing fancy things.
783
00:39:27.929 --> 00:39:30.630
Everyone's making money, even though the neighborhood's getting worse. So
784
00:39:30.789 --> 00:39:33.949
how does this work? So I ended up having a
785
00:39:34.030 --> 00:39:35.829
talk that I was supposed to give at an event
786
00:39:35.849 --> 00:39:39.030
called Web Summit in Ireland, and I was the CEO
787
00:39:39.050 --> 00:39:42.659
of Kickstarter. And I just kept thinking about this idea,
788
00:39:43.000 --> 00:39:44.659
and I decided I wanted to give a talk about it.
789
00:39:44.820 --> 00:39:46.800
I wanted to talk about watching this change in my
790
00:39:46.820 --> 00:39:49.300
neighborhood and what I believed was the reason behind it.
791
00:39:49.780 --> 00:39:53.369
which I said was a belief in financial maximization, which
792
00:39:53.469 --> 00:39:56.809
is that the belief that the rational choice in any
793
00:39:56.849 --> 00:40:00.889
decision is whichever option makes the most money. And that
794
00:40:01.030 --> 00:40:04.909
this was this hidden default setting that was running the
795
00:40:04.949 --> 00:40:07.710
world and running our decisions. And so I gave a
796
00:40:07.750 --> 00:40:10.710
talk just like talking about this and connecting that with
797
00:40:10.750 --> 00:40:13.150
like why every movie is a sequel and why Taylor
798
00:40:13.190 --> 00:40:16.969
Swift is on the cover of every Magazine and Y
799
00:40:17.030 --> 00:40:19.150
Country Radio had the same number one song for a
800
00:40:19.170 --> 00:40:25.559
year straight. I put a transcript of it online later
801
00:40:25.579 --> 00:40:29.159
and it went nerd viral. It was number one on
802
00:40:29.199 --> 00:40:32.380
Hacker News for a couple days and people really connected
803
00:40:32.400 --> 00:40:38.570
to it. I responded to that by just saying, wow,
804
00:40:38.750 --> 00:40:42.070
I found a sandwich to talk about this. This is
805
00:40:42.110 --> 00:40:45.139
a sandwich that people are able to see something that's
806
00:40:45.300 --> 00:40:48.360
otherwise harder to see. And so from that point on,
807
00:40:48.400 --> 00:40:50.860
whenever I gave a public talk about Kickstarter, it was
808
00:40:50.900 --> 00:40:53.679
always around this idea. And then when I stepped down,
809
00:40:53.699 --> 00:40:56.500
I went through that whole process. I wasn't sure what
810
00:40:56.519 --> 00:40:59.840
I was going to do, but I, you know, I
811
00:40:59.880 --> 00:41:01.880
thought I was just like in a hide under my
812
00:41:01.900 --> 00:41:03.719
covers for a month. But like my first day, I
813
00:41:03.760 --> 00:41:06.400
had so much energy and was ready to like, you know,
814
00:41:06.460 --> 00:41:09.429
just rip the roof off the world. And I had
815
00:41:09.469 --> 00:41:12.530
this thought that as CEO, as a leader of the company,
816
00:41:12.570 --> 00:41:16.409
I did so much strategic planning, thinking about how do
817
00:41:16.429 --> 00:41:19.659
we frame goals, values, all these different frameworks for thinking
818
00:41:19.679 --> 00:41:22.619
about what to do. And I just thought, I need
819
00:41:22.699 --> 00:41:26.599
to treat myself like I'm a company. And I need
820
00:41:26.639 --> 00:41:30.489
to run quarterly and annual planning on myself. And so
821
00:41:30.530 --> 00:41:34.070
I spent a week going through these various thought processes
822
00:41:34.090 --> 00:41:37.199
that I'd gotten from like, This book, The Advantage, is
823
00:41:37.300 --> 00:41:38.639
one of them by the same guy that wrote.
824
00:41:38.699 --> 00:41:39.219
Len Shoney?
825
00:41:39.800 --> 00:41:40.079
Yes.
826
00:41:40.280 --> 00:41:42.360
Yeah, man. He's been on here a few times. He's awesome.
827
00:41:42.380 --> 00:41:43.420
Yeah. Advantage is amazing.
828
00:41:43.440 --> 00:41:44.119
Yeah.
829
00:41:44.179 --> 00:41:46.820
So like a lot of those kinds of frameworks. And
830
00:41:46.840 --> 00:41:48.469
I just had a notebook that I filled with all
831
00:41:48.510 --> 00:41:50.630
these ways of thinking. At the end of that, I'd
832
00:41:50.670 --> 00:41:53.269
come up with five possible paths for like what I
833
00:41:53.309 --> 00:41:56.309
would do next. And so I decided that the next
834
00:41:56.389 --> 00:42:00.519
week I would spend each day of the week fully
835
00:42:00.679 --> 00:42:03.280
living inside that idea. So one of the ideas was
836
00:42:03.300 --> 00:42:05.039
that I would be like I'd try to write a
837
00:42:05.079 --> 00:42:07.159
column for a newspaper or something like that. So like
838
00:42:07.300 --> 00:42:08.949
I had a day I woke up that Monday and
839
00:42:08.969 --> 00:42:11.949
I'm like, all right, I'm a newspaper columnist. That's my
840
00:42:11.989 --> 00:42:14.010
job today. I'm going to try to experience that job.
841
00:42:14.050 --> 00:42:15.829
So like I'm going to try to write something. I'm
842
00:42:15.849 --> 00:42:18.730
going to imagine I'm pitching more ideas. I'm going to
843
00:42:19.210 --> 00:42:21.590
try to imagine if I'm three years from now, how
844
00:42:21.610 --> 00:42:24.010
am I doing this? You know, whatever. And just getting
845
00:42:24.050 --> 00:42:27.239
that like body sense of is this right or not?
846
00:42:28.099 --> 00:42:31.260
And one of those five choices was to turn that
847
00:42:31.300 --> 00:42:33.920
talk into a book. And so I had a day
848
00:42:34.039 --> 00:42:35.440
just like, I'm going to try to do an outline
849
00:42:35.460 --> 00:42:37.989
of this. I'm going to see. And of the five
850
00:42:38.010 --> 00:42:41.650
things I tried, it was the one that flowed the most.
851
00:42:41.849 --> 00:42:43.739
It was the one that I just could feel it.
852
00:42:43.849 --> 00:42:47.590
I could feel it. And I had a very clear
853
00:42:47.679 --> 00:42:51.300
sense of the emotion that I would want someone to
854
00:42:51.380 --> 00:42:54.789
feel reading this. it would be a feeling, a feeling
855
00:42:54.909 --> 00:42:57.869
of greater awareness, a feeling that they're, they're seeing something
856
00:42:58.010 --> 00:43:01.050
they're not supposed to see. And a sense that in
857
00:43:01.090 --> 00:43:03.579
the same way that Kickstarter made me feel like I
858
00:43:03.599 --> 00:43:06.719
was like floating two feet above the ground, just cause
859
00:43:06.739 --> 00:43:09.079
I had a different sense of how the world works. Like,
860
00:43:09.119 --> 00:43:11.500
how does that, how can I allow everyone to have
861
00:43:11.539 --> 00:43:16.719
that same emotional experience? And, um, Yeah. So I just started,
862
00:43:16.760 --> 00:43:18.239
you know, it just sort of presented itself to me
863
00:43:18.300 --> 00:43:21.400
as the thing. And the final step that was so
864
00:43:21.460 --> 00:43:23.360
important was that I, you know, I went around starting
865
00:43:23.380 --> 00:43:24.960
to meet literary agents, you know, I want to write
866
00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:27.559
a book. And of course, most people I meet, like
867
00:43:27.679 --> 00:43:31.239
I'm the ex-CEO of Kickstarter, they imagine I have way
868
00:43:31.280 --> 00:43:33.420
more power and sway than I actually have in the world.
869
00:43:33.440 --> 00:43:36.820
So they're like, you know, write whatever, kickstart your business, like,
870
00:43:36.840 --> 00:43:38.800
let's do it. It's going to be a bestseller. Let's
871
00:43:38.820 --> 00:43:41.260
do it. And instead I was like, actually, I want
872
00:43:41.280 --> 00:43:43.860
to write something that I'm scared to say this word,
873
00:43:43.909 --> 00:43:47.269
but I think it's a manifesto. And it's about these ideas.
874
00:43:48.570 --> 00:43:51.690
And there was one agent in particular who I could
875
00:43:51.710 --> 00:43:54.929
tell was really smart. And he was really skeptical of me.
876
00:43:55.329 --> 00:43:56.349
And I really loved that.
877
00:43:56.590 --> 00:43:57.309
Who was it?
878
00:43:57.670 --> 00:44:00.250
His name is Daniel Greenberg. And I just thought, I
879
00:44:00.710 --> 00:44:03.719
want to win you over. And if I can convince
880
00:44:03.780 --> 00:44:06.340
you that my pitch is good enough for you to
881
00:44:06.380 --> 00:44:08.900
send to publishers, then I'll really know it's good enough.
882
00:44:08.980 --> 00:44:11.789
Because any of these other jokers... who knows what they're
883
00:44:11.809 --> 00:44:14.800
going to tell me is good. And so I used
884
00:44:14.860 --> 00:44:18.800
him as my first kind of shadow, you know, to,
885
00:44:19.099 --> 00:44:21.199
to bounce this off of. And it was so helpful.
886
00:44:21.400 --> 00:44:23.039
It was so helpful. And then the publisher I went
887
00:44:23.099 --> 00:44:25.389
with my, my first proposal, this book was like different
888
00:44:25.409 --> 00:44:27.449
than it is now. It was a little more art bookie,
889
00:44:27.949 --> 00:44:31.710
a little more complicated. And these, these publishers, Viking books
890
00:44:31.769 --> 00:44:33.750
told me that they, their message was that they would
891
00:44:33.789 --> 00:44:36.349
be happy to meet with me However, only if I
892
00:44:36.369 --> 00:44:39.380
was willing to take out all of the imagery and
893
00:44:39.409 --> 00:44:42.539
all the complicated things I was doing, which I thought
894
00:44:42.559 --> 00:44:44.619
was the coolest stuff in the book. But I went
895
00:44:44.659 --> 00:44:48.739
and met with these two women, and they immediately explained
896
00:44:48.760 --> 00:44:52.239
to me, listen, you're doing this stuff as a crutch.
897
00:44:52.320 --> 00:44:55.659
You're trying to hide behind these other things. You don't
898
00:44:55.679 --> 00:44:58.159
need to hide. And your book is good enough to
899
00:44:58.179 --> 00:44:59.719
do it on its own, and we can help you
900
00:44:59.739 --> 00:45:03.739
do that. And again, it was like this amazing critical
901
00:45:03.780 --> 00:45:07.070
feedback thing. given in a way that was so loving
902
00:45:07.110 --> 00:45:10.789
and so helpful and so empowering. And so I feel
903
00:45:10.809 --> 00:45:13.050
like I was very fortunate from the beginning to be
904
00:45:13.130 --> 00:45:16.070
working with people that did, I think, have my best
905
00:45:16.130 --> 00:45:18.730
interest at heart but weren't going to act blindly based
906
00:45:18.829 --> 00:45:21.590
on that. And then the writing process, because I know
907
00:45:21.750 --> 00:45:24.579
I'm challenging the dominant ethos of our time, I also
908
00:45:24.619 --> 00:45:30.880
had close readers of the book were partners at investment banks. uh,
909
00:45:30.949 --> 00:45:34.000
very prominent conservative economists. Like I wanted to go to
910
00:45:34.019 --> 00:45:36.420
the people that I thought would be most critical and
911
00:45:36.440 --> 00:45:38.059
just say, Hey, I don't, I don't want to be
912
00:45:38.079 --> 00:45:40.079
an idiot. Like, help me not be an idiot. But
913
00:45:40.119 --> 00:45:42.679
also like, I think what I'm saying is real. Um,
914
00:45:42.699 --> 00:45:46.769
so I really sought out like what I, I don't know.
915
00:45:46.789 --> 00:45:49.090
I sought out that negative feedback because I could just
916
00:45:49.150 --> 00:45:52.170
sense that without that, who knows where I'm going to talk,
917
00:45:52.210 --> 00:45:56.050
what corner I'm going to back myself into. So that
918
00:45:56.250 --> 00:45:56.909
was so important.
919
00:45:57.269 --> 00:45:59.070
One of the topics you bring up in the book,
920
00:45:59.110 --> 00:46:02.039
I'm getting it in my notes now. So I've only
921
00:46:02.079 --> 00:46:03.820
read this and I haven't heard it. So sometimes I
922
00:46:03.860 --> 00:46:05.219
botch it when I do these types of things.
923
00:46:05.420 --> 00:46:06.059
Bentoism?
924
00:46:06.619 --> 00:46:06.800
Yeah.
925
00:46:07.260 --> 00:46:07.840
Did I say it right?
926
00:46:08.280 --> 00:46:08.739
Yeah.
927
00:46:08.780 --> 00:46:11.800
So explain what that means and why it's important to you.
928
00:46:13.289 --> 00:46:15.989
So the book, I argue that our belief in the
929
00:46:16.250 --> 00:46:20.269
universal rationality of financial value is based on a limited
930
00:46:20.329 --> 00:46:24.489
definition of our self-interest. That ever since game theory, which
931
00:46:24.550 --> 00:46:27.389
is like the study of strategic conflicts, we've been operating
932
00:46:27.429 --> 00:46:30.849
on this mindset that the rational choice is always to self-maximize.
933
00:46:31.150 --> 00:46:33.949
Whatever you want, you do that to the maximum possible
934
00:46:34.409 --> 00:46:37.360
without going to jail. And basically that is our definition
935
00:46:37.380 --> 00:46:41.530
of rational behavior. And that that mindset is like illustrated
936
00:46:41.570 --> 00:46:44.389
today through a hockey stick graph is what I imagine.
937
00:46:44.510 --> 00:46:47.679
You know, the graph of whatever that, whatever it is,
938
00:46:47.739 --> 00:46:51.219
your popularity, your power, your sales, your, your wealth is
939
00:46:51.559 --> 00:46:53.760
growing so fast. It goes, the line goes up into
940
00:46:53.780 --> 00:46:56.800
the right. And so I just had this thought that
941
00:46:56.840 --> 00:46:59.909
that hockey stick graph is actually just a small slice
942
00:46:59.929 --> 00:47:01.670
of the picture. Because if you take a step back,
943
00:47:02.670 --> 00:47:05.190
the X axis of the hockey stick graph of time
944
00:47:05.670 --> 00:47:08.130
goes from now all the way into the future. And
945
00:47:08.150 --> 00:47:10.949
the Y axis of that hockey stick graph goes from
946
00:47:10.989 --> 00:47:15.130
just the self-interest of me to us. As our self-interest grows,
947
00:47:15.329 --> 00:47:18.429
so does our responsibility. The difference between being a solo
948
00:47:18.530 --> 00:47:23.699
entrepreneur and having 150 employees is enormous. Like what counts
949
00:47:23.760 --> 00:47:29.500
as your self-interest changes? And so bentoism is this, it
950
00:47:29.559 --> 00:47:32.219
looks like a bento box, it's four quadrants, but it
951
00:47:32.340 --> 00:47:36.329
argues that Our rational self-interest is not just now me,
952
00:47:36.550 --> 00:47:39.030
which is the bottom left corner of this bento or
953
00:47:39.050 --> 00:47:43.809
the hockey stick graphs. The hockey stick graph lives. Our
954
00:47:43.869 --> 00:47:46.630
rational self-interest is also our future me. It's the bottom
955
00:47:46.670 --> 00:47:48.389
right box of the bento. And that's the space of
956
00:47:48.429 --> 00:47:52.159
like the 70-year-old wrinkled gray version of ourself that made
957
00:47:52.179 --> 00:47:54.039
all the right choices and that we live up to
958
00:47:54.099 --> 00:47:57.199
our values and we are the person we say we are.
959
00:47:57.400 --> 00:47:58.860
And we do that on a daily basis.
960
00:47:58.920 --> 00:47:59.699
It's that voice.
961
00:48:00.579 --> 00:48:02.869
There's also in the top left bento, there's now us.
962
00:48:03.480 --> 00:48:06.300
Dickey is those people that we rely on and who
963
00:48:06.500 --> 00:48:10.340
rely on us, our families, our employees, our friends. Our
964
00:48:10.380 --> 00:48:13.159
decisions affect them. They are also in our rational self-interest.
965
00:48:13.219 --> 00:48:15.940
And finally, the top right corner of the bento is
966
00:48:15.960 --> 00:48:18.619
called future us, and that's the next generation, our children.
967
00:48:19.219 --> 00:48:24.719
And so this two-by-two graph, which is produced with one
968
00:48:24.820 --> 00:48:29.039
axis representing self-interest, the other axis representing time, I call
969
00:48:29.059 --> 00:48:31.380
bentoism because it looks like a bento box. And the
970
00:48:31.400 --> 00:48:34.260
beauty of a bento is that a bento is, it
971
00:48:35.480 --> 00:48:38.230
comes from a Japanese word meaning convenience. And a bento
972
00:48:38.250 --> 00:48:40.610
box always has a variety of dishes, never too much
973
00:48:40.630 --> 00:48:43.230
of any one thing. And it honors that same philosophy
974
00:48:43.269 --> 00:48:46.210
I said before of hadahachibu, which says the goal of
975
00:48:46.250 --> 00:48:48.630
a meal is to be 80% full, so you're still
976
00:48:48.650 --> 00:48:53.929
hungry for tomorrow. So a bento box is a default
977
00:48:54.280 --> 00:48:58.480
for a convenient and healthy meal. Bentoism, the idea of
978
00:48:58.539 --> 00:49:02.019
looking at our choices this way, is meant to be
979
00:49:02.239 --> 00:49:05.219
a healthy and convenient default for us to make choices
980
00:49:05.239 --> 00:49:08.300
that are in our true self-interest. Because right now, we
981
00:49:08.400 --> 00:49:11.989
act according to a very, very, very narrow idea of
982
00:49:12.050 --> 00:49:15.469
what is in our self-interest, of just now me. But
983
00:49:15.489 --> 00:49:19.630
these other spaces exist. They're real. They're rational. They're in
984
00:49:19.650 --> 00:49:24.360
our self and our inability to understand spaces beyond now
985
00:49:24.389 --> 00:49:26.590
me is part of where we're screwed right now. Like
986
00:49:26.659 --> 00:49:29.739
we can't solve the climate crisis because there's no solution
987
00:49:29.780 --> 00:49:33.460
that will improve our now me being, but that's just
988
00:49:33.480 --> 00:49:36.179
because we're borrowing from tomorrow to pay for today right now.
989
00:49:36.199 --> 00:49:39.519
So we just have a very limited notion of where
990
00:49:39.639 --> 00:49:44.280
our problems and solutions are. And so bentoism is an
991
00:49:44.320 --> 00:49:47.039
expansion of that and an argument for a new way
992
00:49:47.079 --> 00:49:47.980
to see our lives.
993
00:49:48.659 --> 00:49:54.760
I brought up Adele earlier, and I think she is
994
00:49:54.780 --> 00:49:57.500
an example we can talk about and then relate how
995
00:49:57.539 --> 00:50:00.239
this could be practical for me as in the listener.
996
00:50:00.639 --> 00:50:03.750
But what did Adele do when it came to tickets
997
00:50:04.389 --> 00:50:07.969
and scalping and the secondary market, what did she do
998
00:50:08.110 --> 00:50:09.829
to make it better for her fans?
999
00:50:10.449 --> 00:50:15.750
Yeah, so for most artists, big-time artists, their concerts get scalped.
1000
00:50:16.070 --> 00:50:19.340
Artists cannot participate in the proceeds of that scalping. Live
1001
00:50:19.639 --> 00:50:24.440
Nation Ticketmaster lets them do that. But Adele, rather than
1002
00:50:24.480 --> 00:50:27.320
do that, rather than choose to just accept the fact
1003
00:50:27.360 --> 00:50:30.260
that she's performing shows for either wealthy fans or people
1004
00:50:30.300 --> 00:50:32.159
who are spending more money than they probably should to
1005
00:50:32.199 --> 00:50:35.369
see her play, She found a startup in the UK
1006
00:50:35.429 --> 00:50:38.269
that had built an algorithm that would measure how loyal
1007
00:50:38.329 --> 00:50:40.690
someone was as a fan to her as an artist.
1008
00:50:41.630 --> 00:50:44.769
So they could go to any market and using social data,
1009
00:50:45.730 --> 00:50:50.690
they would identify whatever the top 30 percentile of Adele
1010
00:50:50.730 --> 00:50:54.429
super fans in each market. They use this algorithm to
1011
00:50:54.750 --> 00:50:59.199
like numerically, mathematically determine these things. And then allow those
1012
00:50:59.260 --> 00:51:02.130
people the opportunity to buy tickets, not restricting how the
1013
00:51:02.190 --> 00:51:05.130
tickets could be resold in any kind of way, just
1014
00:51:05.170 --> 00:51:06.869
trying to make it so the tickets got into the
1015
00:51:06.909 --> 00:51:09.869
right hands. And for shows that operated this way, it
1016
00:51:09.909 --> 00:51:12.750
was only 2% of those tickets ended up being scalped.
1017
00:51:13.090 --> 00:51:15.940
So 98% of people just held on to them and
1018
00:51:15.960 --> 00:51:18.480
just went to the show. And so here, my argument
1019
00:51:18.539 --> 00:51:22.460
is that Adele is in her rational self-interest. She is
1020
00:51:22.519 --> 00:51:25.719
maximizing for fairness and for the community of people at
1021
00:51:25.739 --> 00:51:29.690
her show that, this technological tool of this algorithm allowed
1022
00:51:29.730 --> 00:51:32.789
her to do that. And for her, this heightened sense
1023
00:51:32.869 --> 00:51:35.969
of her self-interest to think not just of herself as
1024
00:51:36.010 --> 00:51:38.719
a performer, but to imagine the audience member as well,
1025
00:51:39.219 --> 00:51:41.860
like allowed her to make a better choice, a more
1026
00:51:41.920 --> 00:51:44.940
creative choice. And we might look at that as a
1027
00:51:45.780 --> 00:51:49.119
emotional decision by Adele, you know, what a good, what
1028
00:51:49.139 --> 00:51:51.659
a good soul she has, which she certainly seems to,
1029
00:51:52.300 --> 00:51:55.429
but like, it's a rational choice too. It's something that is,
1030
00:51:56.050 --> 00:51:59.360
is replicable that anyone could do. It doesn't, you know, when,
1031
00:51:59.440 --> 00:52:01.500
when we're relying on people to have a good heart
1032
00:52:01.579 --> 00:52:04.039
to make these, these better choices, I think we're going
1033
00:52:04.059 --> 00:52:07.800
to struggle. But when, when these decisions that are for
1034
00:52:07.820 --> 00:52:11.179
the better self interest of more people can be portrayed
1035
00:52:11.199 --> 00:52:13.389
in such a way that we can see them rationally,
1036
00:52:13.409 --> 00:52:15.309
where we can all operate from the same logic and
1037
00:52:15.349 --> 00:52:17.789
same way of thinking, then, then that becomes something that
1038
00:52:17.829 --> 00:52:21.340
like really can, can be a mass movement. Um, so I,
1039
00:52:21.489 --> 00:52:24.679
I thought, I thought that was super interesting by her.
1040
00:52:25.280 --> 00:52:27.059
And I think that's a lot of what the future
1041
00:52:27.119 --> 00:52:29.619
is going to be. It is going to be around
1042
00:52:30.320 --> 00:52:33.679
defining and measuring new kinds of values, things like loyalty.
1043
00:52:33.900 --> 00:52:36.219
I think we're going to need a global universal metric
1044
00:52:36.260 --> 00:52:38.840
for carbon and the environment where we're all trying to
1045
00:52:39.460 --> 00:52:43.829
collectively make decisions based on the same criteria. Because we're
1046
00:52:44.349 --> 00:52:46.269
dealing with a lot of global challenges and we're all
1047
00:52:46.309 --> 00:52:50.559
trying to do them in highly localized ways that may
1048
00:52:50.599 --> 00:52:51.719
not really work.
1049
00:52:52.619 --> 00:52:55.699
So somebody hears that story about Adele and I want
1050
00:52:55.719 --> 00:52:58.400
to try to be the contrarian because to be the
1051
00:52:58.460 --> 00:53:02.889
voice of the skeptical listener, Yancey, and they're saying, well, yeah,
1052
00:53:02.989 --> 00:53:06.710
but she's already a multimillionaire. She loses a few million bucks.
1053
00:53:06.769 --> 00:53:10.550
It's no big deal. Easy for her to do. Well,
1054
00:53:10.909 --> 00:53:13.730
what about me, the person who has the mortgage and
1055
00:53:13.809 --> 00:53:17.619
cars and kids and not living paycheck to paycheck, but
1056
00:53:17.639 --> 00:53:19.940
we're not well off.
1057
00:53:20.000 --> 00:53:21.360
We're, we're, we're fine.
1058
00:53:22.369 --> 00:53:25.949
How does, how does the Adele story and Bentoism go
1059
00:53:26.050 --> 00:53:26.889
from this?
1060
00:53:27.510 --> 00:53:27.969
Okay.
1061
00:53:28.429 --> 00:53:31.130
That's actually for other people. That's not for me. How
1062
00:53:31.170 --> 00:53:33.610
does that relate to the, the normal person?
1063
00:53:34.300 --> 00:53:38.340
Well, I have been teaching workshops. Um, I did one
1064
00:53:38.360 --> 00:53:40.940
in my house yesterday. It's the fourth one I've done.
1065
00:53:41.420 --> 00:53:45.440
I'm teaching workshops for strangers on the internet, Um, this
1066
00:53:45.480 --> 00:53:48.260
goes out of my email newsletter where I say, uh,
1067
00:53:48.469 --> 00:53:51.030
there's going to be experimental event. This is where my
1068
00:53:51.070 --> 00:53:53.909
event ends up. It's at my house yesterday. 15 strangers
1069
00:53:53.969 --> 00:53:56.969
came to my house and, uh, it's around my living
1070
00:53:57.010 --> 00:54:01.239
room and I taught them bentoism and, and I, I,
1071
00:54:01.610 --> 00:54:04.400
I lead us through a process where we build our
1072
00:54:04.440 --> 00:54:08.170
bentos together, where everyone answers. I first do it with a,
1073
00:54:08.340 --> 00:54:10.599
someone in the class will, will volunteer and we'll do
1074
00:54:10.619 --> 00:54:12.599
it on a whiteboard in front of everyone, filling out
1075
00:54:12.639 --> 00:54:15.480
their values in each of the four bentos. I begin
1076
00:54:15.559 --> 00:54:18.099
the whole session by asking people to write down four
1077
00:54:18.260 --> 00:54:20.760
should I questions from their life. Should I do this?
1078
00:54:20.800 --> 00:54:23.739
Should I do that? And after they've built their bento values,
1079
00:54:23.780 --> 00:54:28.210
which lead us through, then people pair up. I pair
1080
00:54:28.269 --> 00:54:29.969
up everyone. They go to different parts of the house.
1081
00:54:30.130 --> 00:54:33.389
And then they take turns asking their bentos questions and
1082
00:54:33.429 --> 00:54:37.289
talking them through with another person. So this is like
1083
00:54:37.349 --> 00:54:40.199
the third or fourth time I've done this. Um, so
1084
00:54:40.239 --> 00:54:44.300
now it's like maybe 50 people that have bentos, but, um,
1085
00:54:44.380 --> 00:54:46.239
I'm going to be doing this a lot more. I
1086
00:54:46.360 --> 00:54:49.969
genuinely like my bento. It's, it's my home screen on
1087
00:54:49.989 --> 00:54:52.570
my phone. It's, I'm looking at, I'm turning my head
1088
00:54:52.610 --> 00:54:53.989
right now on my desk, looking at it, hanging on
1089
00:54:54.010 --> 00:54:56.389
my wall, but it's literally how I make choices. I,
1090
00:54:56.869 --> 00:54:59.760
I look at my bento and the values that are
1091
00:54:59.860 --> 00:55:01.500
in each one. I'll, I'll read you what they are.
1092
00:55:01.559 --> 00:55:04.059
My now me, what I have written there. What am
1093
00:55:04.099 --> 00:55:07.139
I about? I'm about showing people the matrix. That's what
1094
00:55:07.199 --> 00:55:10.760
drives me. That's where I'm best at. My now me
1095
00:55:10.800 --> 00:55:13.969
is clicking is when I'm doing that. My future me,
1096
00:55:14.030 --> 00:55:16.909
the old version that's wise, that always wants me to
1097
00:55:16.929 --> 00:55:19.030
do the right thing, it's telling me two things. It's
1098
00:55:19.070 --> 00:55:23.829
telling me create harmony, bring people together, find the sandwich
1099
00:55:23.909 --> 00:55:26.829
that delivers happiness to people. And the other one is
1100
00:55:26.889 --> 00:55:30.789
don't sell out. Strong in my values has always been
1101
00:55:30.809 --> 00:55:34.070
this belief of not selling out. my now us, um,
1102
00:55:34.150 --> 00:55:36.329
what is the value I create or, or, or put
1103
00:55:36.369 --> 00:55:38.449
with the people I'm with? I'm about, I realize I'm
1104
00:55:38.469 --> 00:55:42.309
about deep time. I'm a terrible texting friend. I'm super
1105
00:55:42.349 --> 00:55:44.460
sporadic on email, but like, I will give you six
1106
00:55:44.500 --> 00:55:47.420
hours of undivided time and like, and it'll be amazing.
1107
00:55:47.659 --> 00:55:49.119
Like that's the kind of friend I am. I came
1108
00:55:49.139 --> 00:55:52.559
to realize that and my future us, my values about
1109
00:55:52.639 --> 00:55:55.539
building a better matrix. It's not getting rid of the matrix.
1110
00:55:55.619 --> 00:55:57.949
It's can we iterate on this? And so when I
1111
00:55:57.989 --> 00:56:00.909
make choices, I'm, I'm looking at these things and thinking
1112
00:56:00.949 --> 00:56:04.750
about them. And, There's one area where it really changed
1113
00:56:04.789 --> 00:56:07.030
how I thought, which is part of how I make
1114
00:56:07.070 --> 00:56:10.989
a living is by giving paid speeches. And I will
1115
00:56:11.030 --> 00:56:14.639
get asked to speak for companies that, sometimes the companies
1116
00:56:14.659 --> 00:56:17.820
that I have a problem with. And in the past,
1117
00:56:18.320 --> 00:56:20.019
I've always just said no to these things because I
1118
00:56:20.059 --> 00:56:22.539
have this like don't sell out vibe in me. And
1119
00:56:22.599 --> 00:56:24.579
I just like, and when I get asked to speak
1120
00:56:24.599 --> 00:56:27.619
for these companies, I get super angsty and I'm not
1121
00:56:27.699 --> 00:56:29.320
fun to deal with. And I just get in a
1122
00:56:29.340 --> 00:56:31.719
pissy mood about it. And then I just say no.
1123
00:56:32.380 --> 00:56:34.699
And then I got an invitation for a company like
1124
00:56:34.739 --> 00:56:37.820
that shortly after I'd made the bento. And when I
1125
00:56:37.840 --> 00:56:39.940
made the bento, I resolved I will make all choices
1126
00:56:40.179 --> 00:56:42.840
according to this now. So I asked my bento, should
1127
00:56:42.860 --> 00:56:45.320
I do this? So to ask your bento a question,
1128
00:56:45.360 --> 00:56:47.340
you ask each of the four boxes what they say.
1129
00:56:47.400 --> 00:56:49.659
So I asked my now me, which is about showing
1130
00:56:49.699 --> 00:56:51.900
people the matrix. Should I go give a talk for
1131
00:56:51.920 --> 00:56:54.429
this company? Now me's like, yeah, you show people the matrix.
1132
00:56:54.469 --> 00:56:56.789
That's what you're doing. You should do it. My now
1133
00:56:56.869 --> 00:57:00.150
us voice about deep time, not really relevant, but I
1134
00:57:00.190 --> 00:57:02.980
find it relevant to think that my bento doesn't say
1135
00:57:03.019 --> 00:57:05.380
i should just spend time with the choir like the
1136
00:57:05.420 --> 00:57:08.099
idea that i should only share my message with my
1137
00:57:08.159 --> 00:57:10.489
tight us like doesn't seem right so i think my
1138
00:57:10.530 --> 00:57:13.309
now says i should do this talk building a better
1139
00:57:13.349 --> 00:57:16.530
matrix my futurist goal like it's companies like this that
1140
00:57:16.570 --> 00:57:18.329
are going to need to change it's not like a
1141
00:57:18.349 --> 00:57:20.550
bunch of little companies it's the big ones evolving yes
1142
00:57:20.590 --> 00:57:22.550
i should do this but then i looked at my
1143
00:57:22.610 --> 00:57:25.510
future me and that don't sell out and that still
1144
00:57:25.550 --> 00:57:28.530
said no and i looked at this and i came
1145
00:57:28.550 --> 00:57:31.449
to think about this in a totally new way. I thought,
1146
00:57:31.489 --> 00:57:34.349
you know what? This like future me don't sell out
1147
00:57:34.389 --> 00:57:38.550
voice is like a bouncer standing outside, like protecting me.
1148
00:57:39.230 --> 00:57:41.219
And I have the right to go and tap that
1149
00:57:41.280 --> 00:57:42.900
bouncer on the shoulder at any time and say, Hey,
1150
00:57:42.940 --> 00:57:45.260
let this one in. But like, keep out. Yeah. Keep
1151
00:57:45.300 --> 00:57:48.179
an eye out for this shit. And, and that, and
1152
00:57:48.219 --> 00:57:53.019
that I was, I could both be empowered to have
1153
00:57:53.079 --> 00:57:56.610
that value. and to overrule that value while still being
1154
00:57:56.650 --> 00:58:00.190
in line with myself, while still being self-coherent, without compromising.
1155
00:58:00.309 --> 00:58:02.889
And I also can choose to still say, no, don't
1156
00:58:02.929 --> 00:58:05.869
sell out, is what's important, even if the other bentos
1157
00:58:05.889 --> 00:58:08.929
may disagree. But I feel like I have an actual
1158
00:58:08.989 --> 00:58:11.860
understanding of what's going on in my head when I'm
1159
00:58:12.380 --> 00:58:16.260
getting so frustrated about, why can't I, why does this
1160
00:58:16.280 --> 00:58:18.679
get me so angry when Exxon asks me to give
1161
00:58:18.699 --> 00:58:21.579
a talk or something? And yeah, so I found that
1162
00:58:21.599 --> 00:58:25.500
to be like really eye-opening because I felt like I
1163
00:58:25.519 --> 00:58:27.320
had a greater understanding of what was going on within me.
1164
00:58:27.400 --> 00:58:30.619
And I was, I felt way more in control of
1165
00:58:30.679 --> 00:58:33.590
my decision because I was just, I could really see it.
1166
00:58:34.360 --> 00:58:36.280
And so it's been like that. So I literally have
1167
00:58:36.389 --> 00:58:39.409
lived now. I, the bento, I first designed the bento,
1168
00:58:39.469 --> 00:58:43.969
it was last August. So I've been living, you know,
1169
00:58:44.090 --> 00:58:47.349
following my bento now for over a year and making
1170
00:58:47.429 --> 00:58:49.909
every major decision by, and my wife too, we look
1171
00:58:49.929 --> 00:58:51.730
at ours, we talk about it together and trying to
1172
00:58:51.750 --> 00:58:54.409
make choices that are in line with this. And, It's
1173
00:58:54.469 --> 00:58:56.710
not easy. I mean, there are things I'm doing now
1174
00:58:56.750 --> 00:58:58.530
that are in conflict because my bento says, no, you
1175
00:58:58.550 --> 00:59:02.199
should go do this. And I'm like, I'm a little scared. Like,
1176
00:59:02.199 --> 00:59:03.619
I'm not ready yet.
1177
00:59:03.619 --> 00:59:04.500
Like what?
1178
00:59:04.500 --> 00:59:07.449
Well, I mean, just like, I don't I don't know.
1179
00:59:07.489 --> 00:59:10.760
Just like, uh, patching things up with an old friend or,
1180
00:59:11.059 --> 00:59:14.300
you know, having a hard conversation with somebody. You're like, yeah,
1181
00:59:14.360 --> 00:59:16.920
I know that's what I should do, but like, yeah,
1182
00:59:17.260 --> 00:59:20.440
don't want to. Yeah. Um, but I don't know. It's,
1183
00:59:20.619 --> 00:59:25.530
it's genuinely been enlightening. And so the, the workshops I've
1184
00:59:25.550 --> 00:59:27.949
given with people, um, you know, I gave one in
1185
00:59:27.989 --> 00:59:31.139
July and I'm, I'm still emailing the people who went
1186
00:59:31.179 --> 00:59:32.949
who are talking to me about it and who are
1187
00:59:32.969 --> 00:59:36.929
explaining what they're doing, just like, hey, here's what's happening,
1188
00:59:37.150 --> 00:59:39.710
and it's gonna happen with the same 15 people from yesterday.
1189
00:59:39.730 --> 00:59:42.869
I'm gonna do another one next week. I'm trying to really,
1190
00:59:42.889 --> 00:59:47.050
I don't wanna just have the idea and just say, hey,
1191
00:59:47.059 --> 00:59:51.260
make the most of this. And the more I share
1192
00:59:51.300 --> 00:59:55.719
with people, and almost to my kind of terror, I'm
1193
00:59:55.800 --> 00:59:59.389
seeing that it's bringing them real value. And the terror
1194
00:59:59.429 --> 01:00:01.400
I feel is like, oh man, I really have like,
1195
01:00:01.420 --> 01:00:03.880
I can't ask this. I need to do this.
1196
01:00:05.300 --> 01:00:09.159
No, that's good stuff. I love to hear it. I
1197
01:00:09.179 --> 01:00:10.880
might have to, are they always in LA?
1198
01:00:11.739 --> 01:00:12.760
No, I'm going to do, I'm going to start doing
1199
01:00:12.780 --> 01:00:15.019
them on zoom. I haven't tried that yet, but I'm
1200
01:00:15.039 --> 01:00:15.360
going to try.
1201
01:00:15.380 --> 01:00:17.119
All right. I'm going to join one of those. So
1202
01:00:17.139 --> 01:00:19.940
we'll have to talk about that afterwards. One last question, Yancey.
1203
01:00:20.000 --> 01:00:28.119
So you're sitting face to face with a young, ambitious, smart,
1204
01:00:29.059 --> 01:00:32.409
person who wants to make a positive contribution in the world.
1205
01:00:32.989 --> 01:00:36.190
And they say, Yancy, you wrote a book that's a
1206
01:00:36.389 --> 01:00:38.730
manifesto for a more generous world.
1207
01:00:39.369 --> 01:00:40.289
What are some.
1208
01:00:42.469 --> 01:00:45.699
Pieces of life advice you could give me to help
1209
01:00:45.739 --> 01:00:48.679
me with that goal to make a positive contribution to
1210
01:00:48.739 --> 01:00:53.699
be happy, content, and and do good. Uh, what, what's,
1211
01:00:53.800 --> 01:00:56.300
what are, what are a few nuggets that you could
1212
01:00:56.340 --> 01:00:59.400
share based on your experience to help me?
1213
01:01:00.760 --> 01:01:03.590
Well, I think a lot, a lot of what I, there's,
1214
01:01:03.619 --> 01:01:06.070
there's a couple areas that are like personal in the book.
1215
01:01:06.130 --> 01:01:08.489
And one of them is about my struggle with feeling
1216
01:01:08.530 --> 01:01:12.190
like a failure, according to the dominant concepts of success
1217
01:01:12.230 --> 01:01:13.110
that I was surrounded by.
1218
01:01:13.690 --> 01:01:13.849
Right.
1219
01:01:13.869 --> 01:01:16.110
So I'm like looking at, I'm a CEO of a
1220
01:01:16.150 --> 01:01:21.909
famous company, seeing magazine covers about like go crush your enemies, CEOs,
1221
01:01:21.949 --> 01:01:24.489
whatever this, all this kind of like language and it like,
1222
01:01:25.300 --> 01:01:27.619
and it's making me feel bad about myself. Cause I
1223
01:01:27.659 --> 01:01:30.139
think like, I'm not like, I'm not that guy. And
1224
01:01:30.219 --> 01:01:32.460
do I like every magazine I see is telling me
1225
01:01:32.480 --> 01:01:35.280
I have to be that person. Like, do I, can
1226
01:01:35.380 --> 01:01:40.010
I do that? Like, and in that, that made me
1227
01:01:40.030 --> 01:01:43.110
feel broken and, and you know, never to the extent
1228
01:01:43.150 --> 01:01:45.750
that I truly tried to change who I was. Um,
1229
01:01:45.849 --> 01:01:47.289
cause I just, I think I knew that I didn't
1230
01:01:47.329 --> 01:01:52.590
have that capacity. So, I would say that it's hard
1231
01:01:52.610 --> 01:01:55.469
to be aware of the water you swim in. There's
1232
01:01:55.510 --> 01:01:58.880
the David Foster Wallace story about a little fish and
1233
01:01:58.909 --> 01:02:01.199
a big fish are swimming in the ocean. The big
1234
01:02:01.239 --> 01:02:03.579
fish says to the little fish, how's the water today?
1235
01:02:03.780 --> 01:02:07.539
And the little fish says, what's water? It's hard to
1236
01:02:07.599 --> 01:02:11.159
recognize the water that we swim in, but that is
1237
01:02:11.239 --> 01:02:14.829
such a superpower, to have that heightened awareness of why
1238
01:02:14.909 --> 01:02:19.070
the things are happening around you. Most people are moving
1239
01:02:19.110 --> 01:02:21.059
around without a lot of awareness of that, so just
1240
01:02:21.139 --> 01:02:26.059
having that awareness gives you such a leg up. I
1241
01:02:28.119 --> 01:02:31.340
don't know exactly how to teach that except reading, being curious,
1242
01:02:31.579 --> 01:02:35.949
not just doing what people tell you to. I don't
1243
01:02:36.010 --> 01:02:38.949
know exactly how to have that mindset, but I feel
1244
01:02:38.989 --> 01:02:43.510
like that's really important. I'm spending a lot of time
1245
01:02:43.550 --> 01:02:46.690
now talking to people under the age of 25, even
1246
01:02:46.730 --> 01:02:49.900
under the age of 20, Because the book is trying
1247
01:02:49.920 --> 01:02:52.019
to speak to those generations to say, hey, you're going
1248
01:02:52.039 --> 01:02:55.530
to be in power 30 years from now. My generation,
1249
01:02:55.550 --> 01:02:57.889
I'm 40 years old. My generation, we made the mistake
1250
01:02:57.929 --> 01:03:00.170
of thinking that we could just go with the flow
1251
01:03:00.210 --> 01:03:02.760
and everything would just keep working. That institutions could keep
1252
01:03:02.820 --> 01:03:05.400
running themselves. That nobody had to do a job they
1253
01:03:05.420 --> 01:03:07.639
didn't like. We could all just try to be on
1254
01:03:07.719 --> 01:03:11.300
MTV reality shows and the world would be cool. And
1255
01:03:11.530 --> 01:03:13.750
it hasn't worked out that way. And so my plea
1256
01:03:13.789 --> 01:03:15.550
to the younger generation is to have a plan, to
1257
01:03:15.610 --> 01:03:18.710
have an idea of where to go, to not just
1258
01:03:18.869 --> 01:03:22.269
to say it's like today, only 8% better, but it's
1259
01:03:22.329 --> 01:03:25.409
like actually engage with some of these questions more deeply.
1260
01:03:26.389 --> 01:03:29.489
So when I'm meeting amazing young people, which I do
1261
01:03:29.510 --> 01:03:33.550
all the time, my pitch to them is like the
1262
01:03:33.610 --> 01:03:37.440
great new frontier is the definition of new values. It's
1263
01:03:37.679 --> 01:03:42.340
it's it's discovering loyalty. It's discovering how to measure carbon
1264
01:03:42.380 --> 01:03:45.559
in a way that's like truly effective and helpful for everyone.
1265
01:03:45.760 --> 01:03:50.090
It's in, you know, approximating the the social cohesion of
1266
01:03:50.130 --> 01:03:52.530
a neighborhood and discovering how to do these things. But like,
1267
01:03:53.670 --> 01:03:56.090
you know, I believe that human beings always do the
1268
01:03:56.150 --> 01:03:59.090
best with what we know. Like, I'm very I'm a
1269
01:03:59.150 --> 01:04:01.550
very positive person about humanity. I think we do the
1270
01:04:01.590 --> 01:04:04.590
best with what we know. So like what new knowledge
1271
01:04:04.610 --> 01:04:06.570
could we possess that would allow us to do even better?
1272
01:04:06.769 --> 01:04:10.909
And to me, it's understanding new values beyond just financial value,
1273
01:04:11.269 --> 01:04:17.159
moving those things from a irrational, emotional, feelings-based space to
1274
01:04:17.300 --> 01:04:20.539
one that still honors those things, but is also like
1275
01:04:20.579 --> 01:04:22.579
is put in a language where we can all act
1276
01:04:22.699 --> 01:04:26.780
on it, where like Jamie Dimon can be, you know, whatever,
1277
01:04:26.820 --> 01:04:29.780
whatever he is like as a person and still make
1278
01:04:29.820 --> 01:04:32.199
the kinds of choices that would produce this greater benefit.
1279
01:04:32.340 --> 01:04:35.989
And like, An analog I use is the NBA and
1280
01:04:36.030 --> 01:04:39.909
what happened when analytics discovered how valuable the three-point shot was.
1281
01:04:40.289 --> 01:04:42.250
Everyone started playing differently because it was just a better
1282
01:04:42.289 --> 01:04:48.030
way to play. It first was about ideology and computers
1283
01:04:48.050 --> 01:04:50.929
telling us what to do and whatever, the Charles Barkley-isms,
1284
01:04:51.030 --> 01:04:54.820
but over time, it's just like, well, shit, people win
1285
01:04:54.840 --> 01:04:56.530
more when they play this way, so we should all
1286
01:04:56.570 --> 01:05:00.440
play this way. I think that if you can produce results,
1287
01:05:00.480 --> 01:05:03.230
if you can create value, that will that will be
1288
01:05:03.309 --> 01:05:06.329
borne out over time. And that's how we should decide
1289
01:05:06.369 --> 01:05:07.849
to make these choices. So I would say to the
1290
01:05:07.869 --> 01:05:11.610
young people, like, to me, that's the greatest opportunity. Like
1291
01:05:11.650 --> 01:05:14.429
to me, that is like, that is step change for
1292
01:05:14.469 --> 01:05:17.079
our planet. If we were to begin to uncover some
1293
01:05:17.119 --> 01:05:20.420
of those things. And, um, and so I think that's,
1294
01:05:21.679 --> 01:05:24.559
you know, maybe that's what I will be dedicated to, uh,
1295
01:05:25.440 --> 01:05:29.070
for the foreseeable future. We'll, we'll see. But, That's the
1296
01:05:29.110 --> 01:05:32.530
big bet. That's like the optimistic bet on human beings. Like,
1297
01:05:32.610 --> 01:05:35.280
look at the wealth we've created focusing on money. Amazing.
1298
01:05:35.420 --> 01:05:38.380
Truly amazing. Now imagine, let's apply that to some of
1299
01:05:38.420 --> 01:05:39.940
the other things that we need to do.
1300
01:05:43.559 --> 01:05:44.219
Thank you, Yancey.
1301
01:05:44.260 --> 01:05:46.960
Where would you send my listeners to learn more about
1302
01:05:46.980 --> 01:05:47.539
you online?
1303
01:05:48.579 --> 01:05:51.630
I'm online at ystrickler.com, Y-S-T-R-I-C-K-L-E-R.com.
1304
01:05:54.110 --> 01:05:54.449
Perfect.
1305
01:05:54.809 --> 01:05:56.840
And, uh, the book is called, this could be our future,
1306
01:05:57.030 --> 01:06:00.659
a manifesto for a more generous world.
1307
01:06:00.679 --> 01:06:02.420
Check it out. It's really good stuff. Fancy.
1308
01:06:02.639 --> 01:06:06.119
Um, I, uh, told you I looked, was really looking
1309
01:06:06.139 --> 01:06:08.300
forward to this one and, uh, you certainly didn't disappoint,
1310
01:06:08.380 --> 01:06:08.809
crushed it.
1311
01:06:08.860 --> 01:06:10.039
And I really appreciate it.
1312
01:06:10.039 --> 01:06:13.139
And I absolutely want to continue our dialogue, um, as
1313
01:06:13.179 --> 01:06:14.909
we both progress and I'll certainly be a part of
1314
01:06:14.949 --> 01:06:16.449
one of those, uh, bento sessions.
1315
01:06:16.489 --> 01:06:16.769
Yeah.
1316
01:06:17.030 --> 01:06:19.280
Yeah. You know, I, I really appreciate it. And I,
1317
01:06:20.099 --> 01:06:22.159
the mid-level leaders that I worked with over the years,
1318
01:06:22.179 --> 01:06:24.460
I mean, just my, my favorite people. Like I just,
1319
01:06:24.539 --> 01:06:28.300
you know, I, um, every, everyone who chooses to step
1320
01:06:28.340 --> 01:06:31.039
into leadership roles, I just, I commend, I have so
1321
01:06:31.059 --> 01:06:33.800
much love for, it's not easy. Um, but we, the
1322
01:06:33.840 --> 01:06:38.400
world needs great leaders and selfless ones. So if, when
1323
01:06:38.420 --> 01:06:40.409
you hear me say that, you feel like that little
1324
01:06:40.989 --> 01:06:43.070
inkling in your belly or your heart that like, maybe
1325
01:06:43.110 --> 01:06:46.590
I'm talking about you like step up, listen to that voice.
1326
01:06:46.610 --> 01:06:50.219
You know, the world, the world needs you. And don't
1327
01:06:50.260 --> 01:06:50.820
be afraid of that.
1328
01:06:51.760 --> 01:06:55.059
Thank you so much, man. As mentioned, let's keep this
1329
01:06:55.079 --> 01:06:56.579
thing rolling. Look forward to the next one already.
1330
01:06:57.239 --> 01:06:57.440
Cool.
1331
01:06:57.460 --> 01:06:57.840
Thanks, Ryan.
1332
01:07:00.099 --> 01:07:00.320
Wow.
1333
01:07:00.460 --> 01:07:06.550
Conversations like that with someone as intelligent as Yancey really
1334
01:07:06.969 --> 01:07:12.690
stretch me as an interviewer and a conversationalist. And I
1335
01:07:12.769 --> 01:07:16.809
think what that illustrates is it's very healthy to regularly
1336
01:07:16.889 --> 01:07:19.989
put yourself in in positions to speak with people who
1337
01:07:20.050 --> 01:07:23.750
are smarter than you because over time, you will learn
1338
01:07:23.929 --> 01:07:26.469
at a faster rate than if you are just speaking
1339
01:07:26.510 --> 01:07:28.510
with people at your level.
1340
01:07:28.550 --> 01:07:30.260
It forces you to stretch.
1341
01:07:31.030 --> 01:07:34.099
A few of the areas that Yancey talked about that
1342
01:07:34.179 --> 01:07:38.139
really stuck out to me, using metaphors as a sandwich
1343
01:07:38.739 --> 01:07:42.860
with different ideas and stories and put them together, I
1344
01:07:43.300 --> 01:07:47.309
found this is a commonality among really impressive, inspiring people
1345
01:07:48.099 --> 01:07:53.119
intelligent leaders that that was helpful. And then the challenge
1346
01:07:53.159 --> 01:07:59.420
of receiving tough feedback, that 360 review from people that
1347
01:07:59.760 --> 01:08:03.210
were all around him within Kickstarter to have to learn
1348
01:08:03.250 --> 01:08:06.909
that there were areas where he wasn't particularly getting it
1349
01:08:06.949 --> 01:08:10.769
done was a massive challenge. And you heard the emotion
1350
01:08:10.789 --> 01:08:13.760
in his voice, especially talking about that moment where he
1351
01:08:13.800 --> 01:08:16.979
had his hand on the door and he couldn't leave
1352
01:08:17.060 --> 01:08:20.390
his house. And he broke down crying to his wife saying,
1353
01:08:20.489 --> 01:08:23.729
I'm not able to be a CEO today. That was
1354
01:08:23.750 --> 01:08:27.279
a really compelling part of the talk. Then bentoism, right?
1355
01:08:27.420 --> 01:08:31.779
Now me, future me. Now us, future us. Doing that exercise.
1356
01:08:31.819 --> 01:08:34.039
I'm going to have a follow-up call with him to
1357
01:08:34.079 --> 01:08:36.979
go deeper in that. And I'd be happy to share
1358
01:08:37.000 --> 01:08:39.579
that with you if you are interested to learn more.
1359
01:08:39.600 --> 01:08:42.989
You can email me, ryan at learningleader.com. I hope you
1360
01:08:43.029 --> 01:08:45.140
enjoyed this one as much as I did. If so,
1361
01:08:45.220 --> 01:08:47.119
I would love it if you would tell a friend
1362
01:08:47.199 --> 01:08:49.659
or two, perhaps one that has never listened to The
1363
01:08:49.699 --> 01:08:52.079
Learning Leader Show. The best form of marketing is word
1364
01:08:52.239 --> 01:08:56.710
of mouth, one person at a time. I thank you
1365
01:08:56.810 --> 01:08:59.189
so much for continuing to do this and giving me
1366
01:08:59.229 --> 01:09:01.819
the opportunity to do what I love on a daily
1367
01:09:02.079 --> 01:09:05.880
basis for that. I will forever be grateful.
1368
01:09:06.039 --> 01:09:07.720
All right. Talk with you next week. Can't wait.
1369
01:09:09.500 --> 01:09:13.159
We are opening up applications for our next Learning Leader Circle.
1370
01:09:13.640 --> 01:09:16.939
We only do this once per year. And think back
1371
01:09:17.020 --> 01:09:20.970
to the great conversation I had with the legendary Jim Collins,
1372
01:09:21.020 --> 01:09:22.279
episode 216.
1373
01:09:22.279 --> 01:09:24.130
He said, Ryan, before you get too caught up.
1374
01:09:24.130 --> 01:09:26.630
In the why and the what, you need to first
1375
01:09:26.930 --> 01:09:31.449
be very intentional about your who. Who will be your friends?
1376
01:09:31.789 --> 01:09:34.489
Who will be your mentor? Who will you help? Who
1377
01:09:34.510 --> 01:09:38.430
will you choose to surround yourself with? That will be
1378
01:09:38.470 --> 01:09:43.260
the single greatest determining factor in your long-term success. And
1379
01:09:43.300 --> 01:09:46.819
I would ask you the same question. Who are you
1380
01:09:46.939 --> 01:09:50.510
surrounding yourself with? Do you want to be surrounded by
1381
01:09:50.649 --> 01:09:54.630
growth-oriented leaders that are willing to push you? We've added
1382
01:09:54.689 --> 01:09:57.670
specific curriculum and elements so that by the end of
1383
01:09:57.710 --> 01:10:01.310
the year, you'll have tangible outcomes to measure your growth
1384
01:10:01.369 --> 01:10:05.560
and be a more effective leader, both personally and professionally.
1385
01:10:05.619 --> 01:10:10.350
These groups are intentionally curated and kept small. Time and again,
1386
01:10:10.390 --> 01:10:12.710
the thing that people say they love about these groups
1387
01:10:12.829 --> 01:10:15.810
is the relationships they're able to build with one another
1388
01:10:15.890 --> 01:10:19.210
in a short period of time. If you'd like to apply,
1389
01:10:19.710 --> 01:10:25.659
go to learningleaderscircle.com. That's learningleaderscircle.com to apply.