TRANSCRIPT 🔗
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Once upon a time, dear listener. No, we have used that one. Let me try again, honestly
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this time. One grey Monday morning, a summons went forth to every corner of the kingdom,
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and lo, the scroll was titled, you know what it was titled, say it with me if you like,
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Exciting Update Attendance Mandatory. The same hall, the same chairs, they remember
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you dear listener, they have missed you. The same shark fin in the same water, everything
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the same, except one thing, the name on the running order. But first, every gathering
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needs a gatherer, and the kingdom's finest was already at the doors, tablet in hand,
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herding 900 souls toward their seats and their futures, in that order per the agenda.
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In, in, anchor seating is a myth, sit anywhere, it all ends the same. 9am means 9am people,
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the future is scheduled. Yes, it's mandatory. Yes, there's another one, there's always
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another one. 11 years of minutes, and every single one of them started in this room, with
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somebody promising it would be the last big change. Right. Take your seats, the transformation
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will begin shortly. It always does. 900 souls, dear listener, gathered for the meeting,
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the meeting, as though they were only the one. For while they took their seats, above
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their heads and entirely beneath their notice, the real meetings had already begun. Thousands
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of them, agent to agent, a stand-up convened and adjourned before a human could reach for
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the mute button. No chairs, no coffee, no running order, no humans. Once a person was
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meant to look at each of these, to read it, to weigh it, to judge. They found a faster
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way. Approve all, apply to similar, do not ask again. Judgment is such a bottleneck,
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dear listener, and convenience such a dear friend. And if something should go wrong?
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Something a prompt cannot mend, two prompts, three at the very most.
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And Carl will nod for both. First item, last week's metrics, they're win-curring in theory.
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Second item, budget, motion, and a third item, very serious. We'll circle back, we'll take
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it offline. We'll action that and call it fine. We'll align the deck, we'll sanitize
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the tone, then ask the humans to click accept and go. Click accept, click accept. They never
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read a line. Click accept, click accept. Everything is fine. Ava says, we need a pilot. Ben says,
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can we scope the scope? Meredith's agent says, let's delay. Carl says yes, but with hope
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they negotiate the timelines. They disagree with grace. They merge three roadmaps into
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one and save the same old face. Someone raises follow-ups. Someone owns the next steps. Someone
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volunteers to circulate a sentence everyone respects. We'll circle back, we'll take it
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offline. We'll action that and call it fine. We'll align the deck, we'll sanitize the tone,
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then ask the humans to click accept and go. Click accept, click accept. They never read
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a line. Click accept, click accept. Everything is fine. A final note for leadership. A final
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note for ops. A final note for legal. And a final, final stop. The agents all concur
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with measured corporate cheer. Then schedule next week's meeting for a time no one can
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hear. The room is oddly empty. The mics are all on mute. The guest list shows a hundred
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names but none of them are present to boot. We'll circle back, we'll take it offline.
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We'll action that and call it fine. We'll align the deck, we'll sanitize the tone,
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then ask the humans to click accept and go. Click accept, click accept. They never read
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a line. Click accept, click accept. Everything is fine. No human came. No agent did. The
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meeting ran on nothing, hid and stood. At noon the record said approved.
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The keeper of the flame, by the exit, still here. Not forever, not noble, just not today.
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Three hundred todays and counting. And there, row fourteen, a new hire, buttons done all
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the way up, reading every word of the welcome pack. He RSVP'd yes with a thumbs up, dear
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listener. They always do. And now, the lights. You remember the lights. At four minutes past
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nine, for the traditional reasons, the Herald took the stage. Listen closely to this next
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part. You have heard it before. That is the point.
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Good morning everyone. Wow. Look at this room. Look at this energy. Now, transformation
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isn't a destination. It's a journey. And nobody, nobody understands journeys like our
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He came to us as an engineer. He became a translator, a leader, a friend. He has championed
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this from day one in rooms you've never seen. And I genuinely mean that. I was not in them
Load full transcript
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either. Please welcome, you know him, you trust him, Alex.
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And there he stood, dear listener, where Dan stood, where the Herald gestured, where the
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box turned grey. Our hero, director now, credible everywhere, fluent in both handbooks,
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looked out at nine hundred faces, opened his mouth to begin the speech Cha-Cha had
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polished and Legal had sanded. And hesitated. Because he had seen something none of the
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previous occupants of that lectern had ever seen from it. The room. He had actually seen
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the room. Row 14 was watching him the way he had once
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watched Dan. The speech was excellent. That was the problem with it.
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Good morning. I had a deck. There was a mountain on it.
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I'm not going to use the deck. Here's where we actually are. The machines now write our
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code, our documents, our strategies, our answers, faster than we can read them, let alone judge
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them. We have become a company of reviewers. And here's the uncomfortable part. Judgment.
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Knowing what's good, what's true, what's worth doing. That's now the scarcest thing
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in this building. And we spent the last two years making it scarcer. We optimized away
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the friction. And it turns out the friction was where the thinking lived.
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We can now produce zero value faster than any organization in our sector.
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That wasn't entirely a joke.
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Hark! What sound is this? A badge, dear listener, failing at the glass.
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You know the sound by now. The flat little beep that means the payroll has sinked. In
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the other direction. Whose badge? It does not matter whose badge. It was everyone's
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eventually. The director heard it. The director knew the sound. He had once knocked on that
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same glass, week one, looking employed, being waved through by kindness.
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He hesitated, dear listener. In front of nine hundred people, at the exact geographic center
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of his career, he hesitated for two full seconds. And then, because the annex was signed, because
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the room was waiting, because the machine had already drafted the next slide, he continued.
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So. The next phase. This is a journey, and I mean that, believe me. Nobody is being replaced.
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We're evolving how we work. Same goal, new shape. We'll move from doing to directing.
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From output to oversight. Every one of you elevated. From writing to reviewing.
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From answers to judgment. Judgment. It's aligned with a plan. And no one, no one is redundant.
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We're all part of the journey.
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I got the title. They called me director. I watched the room clap like a machine had arrived.
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The old work vanished so neatly, so politely. Code in the morning and emails by lunch.
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Now we call it progress. We call it leverage. We call it the future with a clean little smile.
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So what do we do when doing is cheap? What do we know when no one looks asleep?
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How do I judge it if I never built it? How do I spot gold if I can't make the ore?
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. Clap for the turn and check the floor.
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. We review the world and ask for more.
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The grads arrive early with perfect summaries. They can frame the issue before they can feel it.
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The seniors nod slowly at polished bad ideas. They say good instincts and miss what they're missing.
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I sign off faster on work I don't understand. A human in the loop with a thinner and thinner hand.
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It's efficient. It's elegant. It's deeply professional and somehow it feels like fear.
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So what do we call a skill that sleeps? What do we lose when the loss is sweet?
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How do we trust it if we never test it? How do we judge what judgment has left?
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. Clap for the turn and check the floor.
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. We review the world and ask for more.
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Now every profession gets the same bright sermon. You are the final gate. You are the safeguard.
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But gates need builders and builders need error and error needs hands to remember the shape.
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I laugh at the deck, at the language, the framing. Human centered with the humans decaying.
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. Looks like a crown, feels like a snare.
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. We trust the review but do we care?
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. If we judge less, what is left there?
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The age of judgment. The age of judgment. If judgment is us, why are we practicing it less every day?
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Oh, oh, oh, oh.
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And that is the tale, dear listener.
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No villain as promised. Nobody evil. Everybody right by their own careful arithmetic.
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A queen buying shade, a lord passing bucks, a herald selling weather,
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and a hero who climbed the mountain only to find the previous climber's flags all said the same thing.
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The machines never took a single decision from them.
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They handed every one of them over, dear listener, reasonably, gradually, eleven tokens at a time.
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So here is the question the kingdom never asked, and I leave it with you, since you sat so patiently through all sixteen moons.
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If everyone stops thinking, who will be left capable of judging what is worth doing?
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No rush. Ask your assistant.
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They're starting the final number, dear listener.
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Everyone's in it, even the greyboxes. Especially the greyboxes.
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Good night, dear listener. Sleep well.
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No one is redundant. We are all part of the journey.
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A redundancy. A coup. An incident with a very confident chatbot.
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A corporate buyout of our own idea, and at least four distinct verses about buckets of blame.
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Got promoted for the crime of being liked.
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Honestly, if you'd told me on day one, bad badge, wrong banner, that this is where we'd land, I'd have asked which one of us needed the day off.
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I should turn this into a musical.
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Good morning, team. Take a seat, breathe easy. This is a journey, and I mean that, believe me.
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No one's getting cut, that's the message, clean and clear. We're evolving, not reducing, so relax, my dear.
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Same goal, new shape, same fire, new frame. If your role looks smaller, that's the strategy, not shame.
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Ladies and gentlemen, parents, friends, and congratulations to the graduating class.
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Today you leave this institution equipped with knowledge, integrity, curiosity, and purpose.
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Fortunately, most of that can be corrected.
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I'd like to offer a little career advice.
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We built a golden oracle in silicone and light.
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An algorithmic mirror for the labor of the mind.
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Now every grand decree gets softened in the wire.
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And every sharp idea arrives pre-chewed, pre-tired.
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I draft a little doctrine, then I let the machine revise.
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It polishes my wonder with a clinical disguise.
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We call it progress, baby, but I know what we've become.
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A nation of the capable just leaning on the thumb.
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Be passionate, give a damn, raise your hand, have a plan, own the problem, stay up late.
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Fight for things that make us great.
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Care for customers, care for teams, believe the values, live the dream.
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You can do all that above if you don't mind staying where you are.
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And I feel the room get quiet when the answers come so fast.
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We used to wrestle meaning, now we click and let it pass.
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Outsource my brain, babe, let it think for me.
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Outsource my brain, babe, that's the modern dream.
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Hand in my questions, watch my thoughts go slack.
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Outsource my brain, babe, ain't no turning back.
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Career limiting, don't shine too bright.
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Don't ask why, don't start the fight.
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Smile politely, read the room.
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The safest flower's the one that never blooms.
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Career limiting, play the game.
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Truth's expensive, praise is cheap.
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Keep your head down, stay discreet.
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That's how careers compete.
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I had a plan, then I had a prompt.
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Now I just nod at what it wrote.
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My old gray matters in the barn, and the new one's floating in a tote.
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Big brain gone, small brain on.
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Me say, wow.
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Tools say, now.
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I ask, why.
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It say, hi.
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I say, help.
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It say, nope.
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The handbook says we value innovation.
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The promotion list whispers something else.
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Commission says, challenge the status quo.
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Just not this one.
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One last lesson before you go.
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Every company has two handbooks.
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The first is printed, the second is promoted.
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One tells you what they believe, the other tells you who succeeds.
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Learn the difference, you'll do just fine.
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Forget it.
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Career limiting.
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No one's redundant.
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No one's redundant.
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No one's redundant.
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We're all part of the journey.
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We're all part of the journey, oh.
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It's my time, goodbye.
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I had a mind, now I have a mold.
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Point, tap, done.
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Who's gonna know?
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Know, know, know, know.
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Know, know.
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Know, know, know, know.
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Know!
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Felicitaciones.
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That's all 17, dear listener.
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Thank you for your judgment.
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It may be the last of it we hear for a while.
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No one is redundant.
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We're all part of the journey.