Full Transcript for Walking away from a dream job? Dom Price reveals what really happens in the space after “I quit.”

line that didn't actually seem in my control. 00:05:57 Speaker 2: Right. 00:05:57 Speaker 1: So a lot of the time the loaths, you're like, oh, I'll tweaker and I'll I'm like, I was in a global role from Australia that requires international travel. That wasn't anyone's fault. There's no one to blame for that. That's the role I was in. So if I don't want to do international travel, I can't blame the company or anything else. That's on me to decide how do I go about navigating that. And then the laugh that was reducing, rightly, work was becoming a little bit more serious and a little bit more involved, not in a bad way, but I was like, okay, and one of the things that I was longing for was again is Ai has taken off in the last year year and a half. The bits of the job I was enjoying, the most was I had a huge indulgence and advantage where about a third of my role would be spent with it lasting customers, helping them navigate change, and I'd be dropping in parachute in help them a little bit, and then I'd have to parachute out. And I sat there and I did the excise, and I was like, I really enjoy doing that, but I'd love to go a few degrees deeper. 00:06:53 Speaker 2: You describe your decision making process, and it sounds so obvious and clear, but I know, you know, for myself when I've been in that position and for friends of mine that have gone through that, it's often really foggy until you get that clarity. It reminds me of that book. It's a relationship book, and it's something like too bad to stay, Too Good to Leave or something. It's something like that completely butchered the title, And I think that that feels like a lot of people's experience when they're deciding whether or not to leave a job, particularly if they don't have something clear that they're leaving it full, like another offer, they've been headhunted or whatever. Like, was there a moment where the clarity really came to you? Because I would imagine that there were probably a lot of foggy days in the lead up to that decision. 00:07:39 Speaker 1: Being brusally honest with you a montha i'd say not yet. It was a twelve year, wonderful relationship where I grew so much. I learned a huge amount. I've got some amazing colleagues, some amazing things. I don't think there's clarity in that kind of decision. 00:07:55 Speaker 3: I just don't. 00:07:55 Speaker 1: Maybe other people get that and I can't. I think it's more on balance and instincts and going okay. I think overall I have a sense that I might like there's lots of like nuance. Wasn't that that I might be better off doing other work elsewhere that is more aligned to my passions and my purpose and that might smell, look and feel quite similar to what I used to do, or it might be quite different. The only realization I had was that I wasn't going to work that out whilst I was in the job. So my first step was, how can I do more reflection now to ensure that I take the good lessons from my time those twelve years and keep them.

What are the things that I should leave behind? Because there were nuanced to that environment, other way, unique other a point in time or whatever, I want to leave them behind, and what are the new things that I want to do and what does that new mix look like and how can I start playing with that? And that's been an opportunity for reflection but also exploration of what might be not in terms of like looking for a job and job descriptions, but like, what are the opportunities out there in this world of AI transformation and disruption and technology general change and huge disruption in markets and politics and everything else. Like companies are kind of struggling right now. What have I got in my artillery that can help them be one degree better? And where might I do that? And so it's a mix of reflect but project it into the future and just doing that, trying to do that almost every single day. 00:09:19 Speaker 2: I would imagine that one of the hardest things about leaving at Lassian. And I mean, you know, when I think about people that are well known for being associated with a well known brand like you, you would be one of the top ones. Don When I think of you, I think of it Lassian, and I imagine for you that's very internalized. What did that process or what has that process looked like for the last few months of teasing that apart and working out who is dom If he's not dumb price work futurist at Lassian. 00:09:49 Speaker 1: I'd say this, but it's many dark moments as that have light, right, because when you lose that kind of identity, you're like, oh, I have nothing without that, I don't exist like is is It was a cloud that's now gone and it's just sky. 00:10:02 Speaker 3: Right. 00:10:03 Speaker 1: There's quite weird moments when, even though it's a singular word or a singular thing, it feels like everything right. It feels like the rapper around your whole identity and that rapp has gone now, so you feel completely exposed. 00:10:14 Speaker 3: Right, So there's elements of that. 00:10:16 Speaker 1: You then come on a different oscillation where you're like, well, now I'm not working for an organization. 00:10:20 Speaker 3: What opportunities does that give me? Right? 00:10:22 Speaker 1: That is there more freedom and with freedom comes opportunities in space and you get all excited again. And then you get excited and then you're like, ah, a lot of space, a lot of blank space, a lot of white space. 00:10:34 Speaker 3: What is it I'm meant to do with is? 00:10:35 Speaker 1: Because for the previous twelve years there was some level of structure around, so something there's no structures. It's not just the title that you miss, it's the structure of the role, the people. It's wakened in the morning and being inundated with Slack messages and the adrenaline kick that gives you feeling important. And then you wake up one day and you're like, Slack's empty now me, and you know that slack being empty is not a bad thing, apart from when it really hurts your ego and you're like, no one wanted me overnight. Apparently all I did was sleep and nothing happened that needed me. So like emotionally and ego wise and connection and purpose, all those things have gone through a real mix in a healthy way. Like I think I've been very uncomfortable the last probably eight twelve weeks in various moments, but dealing with that discomfort, I think it's been really healthy to go, Okay, let's just sit with that for a bit, just marinaid. Let's not reconcile or defend or do anything. Just sit with it for a bit and understand what that means and therefore, what can I do now or in the future to be different to that like, do I want to be associated with a brand again? 00:11:41 Speaker 3: Do I need that? 00:11:42 Speaker 1: Or can I put my big boy pants on and do some of this by myself? And how much of it was me versus like and it's not about attribution, it's just like, have I got the confidence that where with all the competence the ability to go and do this myself? Or do I need that packing or is that backing just really good arm around the shoulder and moral support that said go for it, mate, We've got you. When you're twelve years in the same institution, you get very comfortable and when you take away those foundations, it's like a shot of discomfort. 00:12:12 Speaker 3: That I'd not had for a long time. 00:12:14 Speaker 1: Right, I just bottled it up and probably needed Maybe I needed that job to be like WHOA. 00:12:19 Speaker 3: Okay, Like I need to do something different now. 00:12:22 Speaker 2: I'd love to know you, like, what are some rituals or strategies or even conversations that you've had, like within your friendship circles that have helped you get better at sitting in that place of discomfort and kind of move through that. 00:12:37 Speaker 1: What is to not overly focus? So I'd say in the first few weeks post leaving. It was almost like a daily conversation or like every other day, and that became too much. You know, what if why? And you're like, oh no, that got that sends me down the wrong angle versus going okay, there's an amount of time I want to carve out for a reflection, There's an amount of time I want to carve out for future discussion, and then there's a whole the time that I want to dedicate to building a new identity, which right now involves my three year old twin boys starting preschool two days a week. That was a massive transition for them. They'd been wholly looked after by my wife up until then. 00:13:13 Speaker 3: I can just be a. 00:13:14 Speaker 1: Good dad and a good husband for a while. That's not a bad identity. But I won't do that if I wake up every morning going hmm, what to ruminate about it? So actually having focus right, and I said my wife, I need focus, I need things to do. And what it meant was because I was doing things and moving things forward. When i'd stopped doing those, that's the time to go, hey, Amantha, you're a good mate. Here's where I'm at.

I'm reflecting on this. I've got this crazy idea, spitball it with me. So essentially, I would say for the last twelve weeks, I've been building quite an abstract jigsaw of reflection of the past and feedback from people and how I feel in the moment and my new roles as a dad and as a parent and as a husband and all this other stuff, and then what these future bits of the puzzle and what might that look like, and how okay am I with that? Not having defined edges because there's not a finished puzzle to look at that tells me that I'm finished, So I'm actually creating the puzzle at the same time, and I think I've I've had to learn to get more comfortable with that and use my friend, my really trusted friends, colleagues, whatever you want to call them, to go hey honest. With an example, I met a mate for a coffee the day. I'm talking through some stuff and he just said, He's like, look me in the eye, and he's like, dom, why are you looking for the job? Why not just look for a job? I was like, what, And he's like, he sounds like you're trying to perfect the puzzle you're looking through. The perfect job doesn't exist. Just find a job and go and play with it. I was like, yeah, but it takes a really good friend just to cut through the noise in your head and go why are you doing that? 00:14:49 Speaker 3: And you're like, I actually don't know why I'm doing that and all, but like what's my alternative? 00:14:55 Speaker 1: And they give you the alternative and you're like, yeah, I'll give that a try. Like I'm in a mode of I'll give it a and if it works great, it doesn't, it's okay. I'm not taking the company on anything. I'm not taking the mortgage and putting all on stocks and shas like I feel like I'm playing around the ages and that exploration with good friends and good people. 00:15:14 Speaker 2: I can so relate to that. It takes me back eighteen years ago when I was working at Leo Bennett as a senior brand strategist there a consumer psychologist, and I knew I wanted to leave the advertising industry. As much as I'd loved my time at Leo Burnett and love my job, but I felt like I'd hit an expiry date. And I remember several of those conversations with my friends where I was applying for jobs and I couldn't find anything that I really wanted. There was one job, but they didn't want me, and then I end the whole other story. And then I remember one friend just said, well, why don't you just do like try something on your own, just and create your own company that you want to work for. And I just thought that was such a crazy idea. But I don't think I would have even entertained that as a thought. I think I was twenty eight or twenty nine at the time. Had someone not planted that, had I not got that external stimulus, if. 00:16:09 Speaker 1: You just think about the psychology of but it kind of makes sense, like I've built a structure around me that has enabled me to thrive for twelve years at Lassian. When I stopped working at Lassian, that structure was

kind of still there. It felt like it was. So you think you're operating within that structure, and then day by day you're like, no, I've made up that structure. It's actually no longer there. So it's an active choice I'm making do I want to keep parts of that structure or not. And the structure that you gave up was I need to be employed by someone else, right, that was part of your structure and then you're like, someone's giving me a nudge and it turns out I could employ myself. Like I hadn't thought of that and I was never going to, but why not? 00:16:46 Speaker 2: Solid it gives right, do you have or have you developed a decision making criteria? Sounds too formal, but some I guess decision making heuristic or ways that are going to guide your next decision because it sounds like you're you're looking for your next workplace or at least people to partner and collaborate with. How have you gone about working out what do you really want now? 00:17:12 Speaker 1: So the first part was was I looking for a job or a place or people? I was like, oh I go now, selfish, greedy, me goes all of them. And we're like whenever I'm coaching someone, I'm like, when I we're with a great leader and a great culture or great growth or money like what they're like, I want the financial security and. 00:17:31 Speaker 3: The upside with a great leader and huge growth. 00:17:32 Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, I don't know myself where they so like anyway, So that was the first decision. 00:17:38 Speaker 3: What is it? 00:17:39 Speaker 1: Is it a brand? Is it a size? Is it an industry? Is it the people. One of the big decisions that I had to make early on, and I'm still kind of making, is domestic versus international. 00:17:50 Speaker 3: The ego side. 00:17:51 Speaker 1: Of me and the adrenaline and the excitement and the curious side of me goes international. 00:17:56 Speaker 3: I want to be in a global role. 00:17:57 Speaker 1: The reality of me goes I really like living in Sydney, and Sydney is really bloody far away from everywhere. So I said to my wife, I said, I really like my kitchen, and she's like, what's that got to do with it? And I said, I really like my kitchen, and I don't think I need a nicer kitchen. So I think, like, income wise, we need enough to pay the mortgage and feed run and pay the bills and whenever else, but I don't need a nicer kitchen. 00:18:20 Speaker 2: And I should add that you are an excellent cook, because I've seen many of your meals on instat I. 00:18:25 Speaker 3: Work within my limited skills. 00:18:27 Speaker 1: But it is this moment of going if I don't need a nicer kitchen, then what dream am I chasing? So the first decision was it's probably more likely domestic and less likely international, but it's probably more likely smaller than it is larger, it's probably more likely growing than it is static or struggle. And so I've done them more and over, and then quite early on I'm like, I need. 00:18:48 Speaker 3: To be around people some

amount of the time. You know. 00:18:51 Speaker 1: One of the wonderful policies and structures that at last in around team anywhere, right, the ability to work from anywhere has had huge benefits for me as a. 00:18:59 Speaker 3: New dad, right, and a husband and whatever else. 00:19:02 Speaker 1: But also I'm a grade day extra for so me sat in this office on a daily basis having zoom meetings or watching these that's not a healthy version of me. I need to be around people. So I was like, okay, So it's been again a game with just going what's it more and less of? And then I think the best part of the decision making criteria that I feel very slightly indulgent for and very fortunate to have is. 00:19:26 Speaker 3: The ability to play. 00:19:28 Speaker 1: So essentially, I sat down, I looked at my network of people that I know, and I'm like, Okay, instead of applying for a job or guessing what a company might be like, how can I use my brand and my connections to open doors where I get to go and play with those companies? And essentially try before you buy. So there's a whole of organizations that I get to try before I buy. And so each of these leaders that I'm working with, I'm like, tell me how your business model works, who's your competition? Who were you competitions that aren't anymore? Who might be next? 00:19:56 Speaker 3: Well? 00:19:56 Speaker 1: How my technology not even AI? How my technology changing business model? Or how you engage with your customers? Are you like your staff? And I'm just curious about the companies that are, like, here's the challenges that we've got, Like, let's play. So that playfulness actually means I don't have to make any decisions, or it means I get slightly better insight before I make a decision. So I'm using that to my advantage. 00:20:18 Speaker 2: Coming up next, Dom and I talk about change. Dom shares with me how he sees leaders coping, or rather struggling, with the tidal wave of change hitting organizations right now, and he talks about the three patterns he's seeing in boardrooms, why so many leaders are clinging to old experience, and how some even trying to just wait out AI. We also dig into what real productivity looks like, why human systems are breaking, and the surprising traps teams are falling into when AI actually does free up their time. If you're looking for more to improve the way you work can live. I write a short weekly newsletter that contains tactics I've discovered that have helped me personally. You can sign up for that at Amantha dot com. That's Amantha dot com. Dom you are and have been like in the boardrooms of so many different organizations, helping so many different leaders. Like previously through the lens of it lassion, but now as DOM price like something I am finding a lot of. In fact, I can't think of a conversation where this hasn't come up with Inventium's clients in terms of just how much change is going on, particularly with what AI is doing to workplaces and doing to

culture, and how do we navigate that better? And I would love to know where do you see leadership teams really getting it wrong when they're trying to drive change and transformation. 00:21:56 Speaker 1: I want to start by saying I have huge sympathy and empathy for leaders right now. I think they're going through a lot right just the inherent uncertainty around politics and tariffs and wars and supply chains and technology and people and generations in the workforce and the amount of legislation being thrown at them. You can ask for people to come back into work, No, you can't. They're have a right to disconnect, and they can't disconnect. There's just a lot for them to deal with, right, So I don't deal with many leaders that have bad intent, But I'm working with a lot of ladies were just struggling and a couple of mistakes that they make, right. So one is I think a lot of leaders that have got tenure were sold a story that if through tenure you'd get to a position and then you could rely on your experience to maintain power in that position. And then me, you and every other thought leader on LinkedIn's come along and gone sorry, mate, not true. So actually you need to reinvent yourself and like, no, that wasn't on the memo. The memo was I've done thirty five years, I've got the parking space, I've got the desk, I've got the EA now so I'm it, And you're like, no, actually, highly irrelevant. None of those skills are useful anymore. It's completely reinvent how you lead, Like help me out here and. 00:23:01 Speaker 3: I think some of them. 00:23:03 Speaker 1: There's a co hole that I've been working with that actually genuinely believe they can outlast AI. Right, I've heard it out of someone's mouth. They were like, what I reckon, I've got four maybe five years left. If I just bunker down, don't annoy anyone, doem my thing. I might get moved around a few times. I'm not going to get fired, so I'm not going to piss anyone off. You're going to hang around. I'm not going to offend or celebrate anything. I'm just going to hang around, take my money and go. 00:23:29 Speaker 3: I'm done. 00:23:29 Speaker 2: Right, where do I hire one of those people? Oh my god? 00:23:33 Speaker 1: Actually I did a workshop and there is twelve people in the workshop. Four of them admitted that that was then that was their persona. They're like, I'm just waiting this out. I'm not investing in change. 00:23:42 Speaker 3: I'm done. 00:23:42 Speaker 2: And look, I do totally get that from a human point of view, and to. 00:23:45 Speaker 3: Be fair, I applauded them for their honesty. 00:23:47 Speaker 1: I'm like, at least, at least you're not in denial, like I don't like what you're doing, but you're owning it totally. There's then another co hole that have gone. We've done three transformations in the last fifteen years. We did an agile transformation, culture transfer, and ad digital transformation. They say, we don't feel transformed. We spend sixty million we did through transformations. So is it Have I been trained that the way to do this is to hire a set of consultants, give them twenty million dollars and get them to paint a picture of my AI future. And I'm like, please don't, please don't outsource this, Please don't make this a report, don't make this an initiative or a program. Like it's more systemic than that. And so they're struggling because they're like, who do I give them money to you to come and do this for me? And then the third cowhor have just not understood the size of the price. There's an example from financial services. There's a guy I've been working with that is completely overhauled his entire business in how they operate through the lens of AI. It's like, I'm going to reinvent the business through a lens of AI. So they've got bricks and mortar, they've got a normal kind of Internet, right, you interact, I respond kind of business and they've gone AI agentic workforce where it's basically working for you in the background and doing all things, so you don't apply for a mortgage more. It just comes and tells you that it can get a better mortgage for you, applies to you, send you to the document. 00:25:04 Speaker 3: Like. So he's got and done that. 00:25:06 Speaker 1: And I went with him to a few of the other financial institutions to show them and they were like, Oh, our plan for AI is to we're going to roll it out in our call center to reduce call times. Right, So it's not And I've got again nothing against those people. They've not understood this power that's their fingertips. So they're looking at all their existing problems saying, how can I make these problems slightly less bad using expensive technology versus going hang on separate. I've got problems, let's part those. What might my world look like for my customers, stakeholders, me in this world of technology? How did I paint a picture of what that looks like? And how did I start building that today? So I don't know if that's lack of ambition or just lack of foresight, but I think there's those three cohorts in place and they all just come down to a point of anchor. Whichever one of those you're struggling with, you go, here's my anchor. I'm going to dock. I'm going to sit here and I'm going to wait this out, either through denial, through I'm going to outsource it to someone else, or it's just a call center thing. It'll be fine, we'll get some efficiencies and we'll move on. And you're like, it's not a call center thing. It's a fundamental change in how we work. 00:26:11 Speaker 2: How about the human side of actually helping the humans change and adjust their mindset. I know we come across all sorts at Inventium, and I think like, unlike other digital transformations, there's just there's so much more fea here. And you know it's legitimate as well. 00:26:32 Speaker 1: We've already been sensing this for a while, which is the nature of the change of AI is basically taking what used to be computer programming or intelligent

technology work that was limited to people with software engineering degrees and saying, actually, now it's just humanly accessible by all knowledge workers. You're like, oh, that's a fundamental difference in accessibility. You're and here's the power of it. You don't need an operator. You don't need a person to roll it out or manage it or trade like. It's just there, has ubiquitous and as you use it, it gets more intelligent and you get more intality. 00:27:04 Speaker 3: Like, okay, this has changed all the rules of the game. 00:27:07 Speaker 1: So essentially what I think has been happening for most of the last year and a half boards, certainly in the enterprises boards, senior leaders have gone to their IT person and gone, it's. 00:27:16 Speaker 3: Another IT thing. 00:27:17 Speaker 1: How much do you need for this AI And they're like forty mil And they go and buy a few tools and. 00:27:22 Speaker 3: They roll them out and they're like, there you go. We've rolled them out. 00:27:26 Speaker 1: But no one, no one has upgraded the human system of how the organization actually works. And so they've given my mother in law a Ferrari. Right, It's like it's not a good combination. She wants to toodle down the road, she wants to look around, she doesn't want to go fast. 00:27:42 Speaker 3: But you've given all. 00:27:42 Speaker 1: These people who are just in this mire of work something super powerful but not enabled or activated them. The challenge I gave a CEO the other week was I think you've invested heavily in technology systems integration. You've got the best of breed of all the things. I don't think you've invested out heavily in your human system integration. 00:28:02 Speaker 3: So the two are at odds. 00:28:04 Speaker 1: And so once we've got on a whiteboard in person, right high fidelity on a whiteboard, we basically landed on a few things that made up their human operating system that needed an upgrade. And some of them were close, they needed a nudge or a tweak. Others He was like, that's probably five or ten years old. That's the way we've used to do it, So let's not upgrade that. Let's swap that out and find the new version. So I'm working with them as an advisory capacity to go, how do you build the best version of your organization. Don't go look at Spotify, don't go and look at Google or Meta, don't go and copy anyone else. Be the best version of yourself in your industry for your people and your customers, and you'll be fine. You'll be relevant for it for a long time. 00:28:43 Speaker 2: What are some of the other big problems that you are seeing out there, like with the human side of these tech transformations. 00:28:50 Speaker 1: To the two really like quite funny. Human traits that I'm seeing kind of on repeat. And that's why I like them. Right, It's just it just shows the fragility of us as humans. Right, there's an orgization I was working with early this year. They did that very clever ab test with their AI. Half their team's

got AI, the other half didn't because they wanted to see the comparison. I love it, and the CEO is great. It's like, I want to know the real impact. If I roll it out to everyone, I'll never know the real impact. I'm like, now, ab test, go for it. So ran them side by side for a period of time. The vendor came back with a report that the team that was using AI was thirty five percent more productive. 00:29:22 Speaker 3: Right, So he. 00:29:23 Speaker 1: Rings me on a Friday afternoon. He's like, this is amazing, Right, it's performance review season. I'm going straight to the CEO. I'm going to go straight to the board. Thirty five percent productivity. I'm going to get my budget approved. 00:29:33 Speaker 3: Roll this out. 00:29:34 Speaker 1: And I'm like, before you do, can you tell me or go and check just double click where did that end up? Because I don't care what you saved, I care what you did with it. And he's like, good question. I'll come back to it on the Sunday. Comman's like, not going to the CEO, not going to the board. So the team that had had the thirty five percent productivity improvement had a fifty percent increase in meetings, and when he asked them, he just want to speak to a few people. He's like, no, one's in trouble. What happened? And they're like, well, we save the time. We didn't know the next best thing to do. If you save me, if you go down, here's this magic tool says you ten hours a week. I'm like, cool, what do I do those ten hours? I've never had those ten hours before. You've never gifted me that much time. So so we do the first thing in front of us. We're like, we'll meet, we'll have an intellectual joust, we'll make no decisions, we'll have a great debate, will take no minutes. So we do a lower cost think right, And so all the stats. 00:30:28 Speaker 3: Every time I'm on any. 00:30:29 Speaker 1: Portal LinkedIn wherever else and I see someone claim AI delivers x percent productivity, I genuinely do not care. 00:30:36 Speaker 3: I'm like, how did you reinvest that? This one goes? 00:30:39 Speaker 1: I can use AI to save time, so we all learn it with a better mental health state. Brilliant, Like I'd get behind that, but just saving time, I don't know what that even meants. 00:30:50 Speaker 2: It can be dangerous in terms of how some companies measure productivity. Like I look at something like how easy it is to generate let's say, a ten page strategy report, which if they're using AI and they're using it poorly, it's going to be AI slop or work slop or you know whatever we're calling it. And then that's going to land in someone's inbox and they're either going to read through the whole thing and waste hours of their afternoon, or they're going to feed it into AI and get AI to summarize it, and it is probably going to come back with different dot points to the ones that the original person inputed. And while that might seem productive because oh my gosh, they've produced a strategy report in ten minutes, they've actually wasted a whole lot of other people's time. So I think it's really complex how to measure productivity. Tell me, like, how do you think about, like what does a good productivity boost actually look? 00:31:40 Speaker 3: Like? 00:31:41 Speaker 1: I violently agree with you, Like this whole like the temptation of theits, and there's a whole of theats have been creative. I do the bullet points AI long pro Some write a bullet post like it's a whole merry dance, and You're like, the real question is what message was I trying to convey to you? 00:31:55 Speaker 3: Did you receive it? And did you understand it? It's a very different measure of success. 00:32:00 Speaker 1: Then I broadcast out to one thousand people, You're like, goot a nine hundred and ninety out of them open the email. 00:32:05 Speaker 3: Okay, did anything understand it? I don't care? 00:32:07 Speaker 1: Right So, I think there's there's a metal level point you made at the start that question, which I think is crucial for us to anchor on right now, what are we measuring. There's someone who I'm mentoring right now and they confessed to me that in their performance review that said that one of their metrics was invoice payments and there's a ninety six percent success rate on invoices paid. And their boss was like, oh my god, that's amazing. It's so much better than this had to be before. And I did it. 00:32:31 Speaker 3: But like, here's a gold star on a trophy and to pay right. Awesome. 00:32:34 Speaker 1: What they did was they included not dollar invoices because this company has a free service. So what they did was everyone who has a free service gets an invoice that is automatically paid free. Ninety six percent rocked it out of the park, right, So let's just admit we're all clever enough to fudge the numbers if we want to. So I think we need a moment to step back and go what do we really care about? And I don't think it's ever one thing. I would say the leaders I'm working with right now have gone very nineteen eighties on me and have gone balanced scorecard. And I've seen it a lot in the last few months, and I'm like, it's having a resurgence. 00:33:09 Speaker 3: Right. The spy skills are about together. 00:33:11 Speaker 1: We've got the balanced scorecard because it's not just safety, it's on time. And it's not just on time, it's profitable. And it's not just profitable. I need a good customer experience. And you're like, oh, you're now asking me as a leader to look at four different things in trade off and you're like, yeah, I think that's what leadership always was. So that we've had this weird fetish for the last few years since the pandemic of just focusing on productivity, not many people having the honest conversation about the consequences of that and the trade offs. So with this pursuit of productivity, let's say one of the trade offs is we've killed mental health. People are working longer to get the same work done, and the more stressed is that what we wanted

If we get a two percent productivity improvement and GDP's got up, But like a record number of people right now are going to their GP because they're struggling with mental health and burnout, that's not the equation we want. So I think it's this step back and go what do we care about? And I think we care about the wellness of our people. 00:34:04 Speaker 3: We have to right. 00:34:05 Speaker 1: For most of the businesses I work with, their biggest asset is still their people. Like invest in them like you would plant a machinery, Take fifteen percent of your budget and renew them and do preventative maintenance and. 00:34:16 Speaker 3: Look after them so that they can be the best vision of themselves. 00:34:19 Speaker 1: Don't wait for them to get burnout and go, oh, we've got an EAP or a phone number you can call orders an app right, that's not wellness. I think wellness is in there. I think relevance. And there's a business I've been working with recently and I don't quite know how they're measuring it, and there's a bit of Unicorn magic in it. But as a leadership team, they ask themselves the question are we still relevant? 00:34:40 Speaker 3: And relevant is. 00:34:41 Speaker 1: To our customers because they're evolving, to our stakeholders, to our suppliers in our ecosystem, and to our teams, to our people. So like brand attraction, do people want to work with us? Like if we are seen as dull and not innovative, then we want to attract the best people that will affect our products, that will affect our market. So they've kind of understood the system again and gone, we need to be relevant. To be relevant, we need high learning velocity. So how do we build constant learning and learning loops into everything that we do? And I'm like, sure, I don't know if it will work or not, but it's a good experiment to go. That feels better than saying we were thirty percent more productive and you're like, but we did the wrong We were doing something that wasn't valuable. We did it fast, but it was crap. So I think my guess is we're all going to end up with some form of balanced scorecard where we go Actually, if we're honest, I want ABC and D. And what I need to do as a leader is to understand if I turn the dial upon A if I'm running a project and I'm like, this has got to be safe, but it's late and over budget, is that I win? 00:35:42 Speaker 3: And where would I dial it on safe to go? 00:35:44 Speaker 1: It's safe enough and I can still deliver it on time and with great experience, Like I think we need to understand those. 00:35:49 Speaker 3: Dials and how they interact. 00:35:50 Speaker 1: That is modern leadership that I think we've avoided by this theater of productivity, which I don't actually think pays a dividend. 00:35:58 Speaker 2: Couldn't agree more now. I don't often end with like one of those annoying pippy podcast host questions of like if leaders could do just one thing, But I am actually interested in what you would say, Like, you know, you've worked with so many different leaders and have done you know over the last decade, if you could give leaders listening just one piece of advice, something to do differently, what would that be done? 00:36:23 Speaker 3: Right now? 00:36:23 Speaker 1: The biggest success I'm seeing in leaders is the ones that are literally not mesophorically rolling their sleeves up, getting with their team, not doing it to them or for them doing it with them, and saying, let's give this a red hot go and by the way, I don't know. And when I see that, I'm like, we're good, We're fine, because you actually don't know. So there's a person in another room going, I know, and you're like, don't you don't know. 00:36:49 Speaker 3: None of us know. 00:36:49 Speaker 1: Stop pretending you know. You're a clown, you're a full The ones that go, you know what, I don't know, but. 00:36:54 Speaker 3: I have a plan. 00:36:54 Speaker 1: I've got a framework or a model, and I think I believe that we, the collective team here can work through this together. So let's explore, let's experiment, let's do that, and then if you want to go like a grade. The ones that are doing that that, I'm like, Wow, you're naming it and then telling the story. 00:37:10 Speaker 3: And I'm seeing a. 00:37:12 Speaker 1: New superpower in modern leaders around storytelling. The ones that can stand up and authentically say here's what I do with my team, here's why I did it, Here's what happened, here's what we're doing next, here's what worked, here's what didn't, and here's anything any of our assets you can borrow to do this yourself. And when they do that genuine storytelling, I'm like, I do not care. 00:37:30 Speaker 3: What comes your way. 00:37:31 Speaker 1: You are fine because you've just got this mindset, this resilience. Instead of fighting it with firmness, you're responding to it with softness and going, that's okay. We can work through this with small people. I've got the right team, I've got the right sool, let's work through this. And it's weird that that not weird? What kind of is weird that the humility, that down to earthness now seems like a superpower. And actually, when I see the chest beating, I've got this sca out of my way. 00:37:57 Speaker 3: Just let me do it. I'm like, you don't, because you will shit. 00:38:00 Speaker 1: Something that is in that person's mind and it unfortunately, it might work on a one off. It might work, and if it does, you're going to give them everything, and the next time it won't work if they will have just been lucky versus the collective team right and the humble leader that is happy to do it, but sleeve rolled up, I'm still your leader. 00:38:17 Speaker 3: But I'm doing this with you, not to you. 00:38:18 Speaker 2: I love that, Dom, and I've loved our chat. I love our chats on Mike and off Mike. Thank you so much for coming back and being just the most wonderful regular guests on How I Will. 00:38:30 Speaker 1: I set myself a goal of appearing every season. It just means I need to produce a new content so I can be relevant to you. 00:38:35 Speaker 2: Ever see totally Thank you, Tom Thank you. Losing an identity can feel like losing the ground under your feet, but as Dom reminds us, sometimes the most powerful moment is simply admitting I don't know yet and letting that be okay. Next time you feel that pool towards change, try giving yourself some white space, sit with the disc comfort before you feel it, and let it tell you what needs to shift. If you want more on navigating big transitions and change, go back to my episode with Tomorrow Mind author Gabriella Callaman, where we talk about how to build psychological flexibility to be more fit for any change that life throws your way. If you like today's show, make sure you hit follow on your podcast app to be alerted when new episodes drop. How I Work was recorded on the traditional land of the Warrangery people, part of the Cooler Nation